Journey Creator's Next Project Aims to Gain Wider Cultural Respect for Video Games

ign.com:

When Jenova Chen released Journey ten years ago, he wanted to prove to the world that video games were art. Now, everyone pretty much agrees they are.

So why, he asks, are they still not getting the wider cultural respect they deserve?

"You go to a party, and someone says, 'What do you do?' If you say, 'I write scripts for movies'...They treat you as if you are an author of a book or a poet…You're a servant for the public. But if I tell them I work in games, in 2005, they said, 'You know the Columbine shooting? The congressmen said you guys are making kids violent.' And in 2014 to today, people are like, 'I heard you guys make a lot of money, right?'...That's basically what people ask. The only other time people would ask these questions is if you run a casino.

"These days we are working on something different because, now [we've proven they're] art, how come people still don't respect games? I got these games like Flower and Journey in the MOMA and Smithsonian and in all these contemporary galleries. I thought this is going to elevate the public respect for games, because how is it possible that game is a lesser art form than any others?...If proving games can be art can't elevate the respect, or how the public view games, what else can I do to change that?"

One reason Chen cites for the continued struggle of gaming for cultural respect is the mobile market, and by association, the rise of free-to-play games and what he sees as predatory monetization tactics. Though he himself has released multiple games on mobile and recognizes there are artistic mobile games out there, he says that the preponderance of those specific business models has dramatically increased the number of people playing games regularly, but also harmed