EMP Seattle – The Art of Video Games

Great quote on the wall of the EMP

If only every city across the country would have this exhibit. I wish more people would get the impression that what was once written off as a child’s hobby, is now an art. The Experience Music Project (EMP) museum in Seattle is currently hosting the exhibit: The Art of Video Games.  Their website will tell you, The Art of Video Games is a groundbreaking new exhibition exploring the 40-year evolution of video games focusing on the most influential artists and designers of game graphics, storytelling, and player interactivity. What it doesn’t tell you is that you feel awesome walking out of a room that tells you that your life long hobby is also AMAZING art.

I did zero research on the exhibit before walking in to the room and was greeted with booths around the room going counter clockwise showcasing the hardware, screen shots of games, title information, and hand sets to listen to a screen that had game play with voice over describing the game. This lead to us feeling SUPER old at times, “Wow, is that a Commodore 64?”, or laughing about some pretty strange games that the exhibit decided should be pointed out as a stellar example of that type of game. I guess Attack of the Mutant Camels in 1983 was not a game to be missed?

Each station would show games that were unique or notable to that system – Think Pacman, Super Mario Brothers, Metroid, Sonic the Hedgehog, Halo, etc. It was fascinating to be able to walk around a room to incrementally see the changes that went from Atari, to the Wii! While it was easy for me to gloss over some systems (I never owned a Genesis) I stopped and read every line on the both’s of others (I still have a little SNES controller shaped hole in my heart). In one corner of the room as well were glass cases showing original concept art for games like Starcraft II, World of Warcraft, Halo and more.

You could spend lots of time if you wanted to camp out in front of the TV they had set up that played interviews with famous devs discussing the topics of Beginnings, Inspiration, Narrative, Experience and The Future; and jebus was I glued to the TV watching Warren Spector talk about Experience with Deus Ex, or Jenova Chen on the experience of Flower. Passionate developers talking about games as an art form outside of an event like PAX brings a new perspective and.. pride for this interact art medium.

My favorite part of the exhibit though were the hands on stations where you could play on a large screen different games. Adults were lining up with their kids so that “they” could play Super Mario Brothers (and by “they”, I mean, the kids could take a crack at it, and when their turn was up the adults would grin when they saddled up for their turn), or when kids would watch for 10 seconds and march up to Pacman and start gobbling up those white pellets.

This is a fun exhibit; if you find yourself in Seattle with some time – checking out the EMP and The Art of Video Games is a fun way to kill an hour. Then go home, grab an emulator, and see if you can figure out what the heck was up with the Attack of the Mutant Camels, because I still can’t figure it out.

EMP info:

325 5th Avenue N, Seattle, WA 98109

www.EMPmuseum.org

facebook.com/EMPmuseum