This upcoming March the New York Museum of Modern Art will be installing a permanent video game exhibition. So, there you have it — video games are art. I expect to hear no more about it. No no, I don’t care what Roger Ebert says — art! Debate over!
Anyways, hit the jump for the 14 games MoMA has chosen to exhibit…
– Pac-Man (1980)
– Tetris (1984)
– Another World (1991)
– Myst (1993)
– SimCity 2000 (1994)
– vib-ribbon (1999)
– The Sims (2000)
– Katamari Damacy (2004)
– EVE Online (2003)
– Dwarf Fortress (2006)
– Portal (2007)
– flOw (2006)
– Passage (2008)
– Canabalt (2009)
Not a bad line-up. A good mix of high concept indie stuff, early formative games you can’t ignore (even if art was probably the last thing on their creators’ minds) and more substantial games more remarkable more for their interesting mechanics than their slick art styles.
Eventually the plan is to expand the collection to over 40 games. These are some of the titles the museum has earmarked…
– Spacewar! (1962)
– Pong (1972)
– Space Invaders (1978),
– Asteroids (1979)
– Zork (1979)
– Tempest (1981)
– Donkey Kong (1981)
– Yars’ Revenge (1982)
– M.U.L.E. (1983)
– Core War (1984)
– Marble Madness (1984)
– Super Mario Bros. (1985)
– The Legend of Zelda (1986)
– NetHack (1987)
– Street Fighter II (1991)
– Chrono Trigger (1995)
– Super Mario 64 (1996)
– Grim Fandango (1998)
– Animal Crossing (2001)
– Minecraft (2011)
Hey MoMA — I know a pretty good flea market where you could probably get all those games for under $150 total. Hit me up on Paypal and I’ll get this exhibition finished for you (and slip Super Metroid in while I’m at it).
via PC Gamer & Inside/Out