{"id":183,"date":"2026-01-11T11:11:31","date_gmt":"2026-01-11T16:11:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/?p=183"},"modified":"2026-01-11T11:13:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T16:13:19","slug":"oh-no-i-started-reading-chris-crawfords-the-art-of-computer-game-design","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/oh-no-i-started-reading-chris-crawfords-the-art-of-computer-game-design\/","title":{"rendered":"Oh no, I started Reading Chris Crawford&#8217;s The Art of Computer Game Design"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"\">I found a PDF of an HTML version online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"\">Two quotes ripped out of their context in Chris Crawford&#8217;s preface to The Art of Computer Game Design:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"\">The computer game is an art form because it presents its audience with fantasy experiences that stimulate emotion.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"\">This more sizable investment of participation yields a commensurately greater return of emotional satisfaction. Indeed, the role of participation is so important that many people derive greater satisfaction from participating in an amateur artistic effort than from observing a professional effort. Hence, games, being intrinsically participatory, present the artist with a fantastic opportunity for reaching people.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li class=\"\">So art creates-evokes-invokes-generates-provokes (not sure which word(s) are most appropriate) an affect<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"\">Return-on-investment language\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li class=\"\">Making a rhetorical case for video-games-as-art in 1982<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"\">Flattening of satisfaction\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li class=\"\">What if the &#8220;satisfaction&#8221; of &#8220;participating&#8221; were categorized as <em>different<\/em> from &#8220;satisfaction&#8221; of &#8220;observing&#8221;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"\">Is &#8220;participation&#8221; in a game different from &#8220;participation&#8221; in an &#8220;amateur artistic effort&#8221;?\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li class=\"\">What even IS &#8220;participating in an amateur artistic effort&#8221;\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li class=\"\">To de-vague &#8220;Artist&#8221; a bit, does a musician feel listening to music is a lesser experience than making it?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li class=\"\">Is this a false binary, following on the &#8220;return-on-investment&#8221; framing by looking at a finite amount of resource to be put Into the Art-Self<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"\">What are the stakes, I guess is a big question to keep in mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"\">Anyway I decided to stop taking notes at this point because my skin felt thin and itchy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I found a PDF of an HTML version online. Two quotes ripped out of their context in Chris Crawford&#8217;s preface to The Art of Computer Game Design: The computer game is an art form because it presents its audience with fantasy experiences that stimulate emotion. This more sizable investment of participation yields a commensurately greater [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[22,18],"tags":[47,48],"class_list":["post-183","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-words","tag-chris-crawford","tag-the-art-of-computer-game-design"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=183"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":185,"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183\/revisions\/185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=183"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btphotographer.com\/postdraft\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=183"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}