What a climbing game and Columbo revealed to me about the purpose of “art”

I just finished the rock climbing game Carin which I had been looking forward to since I played the demo 18 months ago. The gameplay was 10/10 but the story caused me to enjoy the game less so I must rant about it.

Sure they sprinkled in some wokeness but what I really didn’t like was the pretentious and emotionally manipulative ending. Basically the reason the player character was climbing the mountain was to escape from her emotional trauma and find herself. It also heavily implies that she dies at the end and becomes one with the universe.

All this is making me think I hate art. Today when something is made as art as opposed to being made as something with function the art is just self indulgent, pretentious and pointless. Often art full of nihilism or its deconstructionist.

Art used to fulfill the function of either reflecting beauty or saying something insightful about the human condition. Modern artists hate beauty and have worldviews so broken the points they make are either nonsensical at best or wrong at worst.

The game ends with the main character conquering the thing she’s worked her whole life to achieve and then asks the player what is the thing you want to conquer. This could be an inspiring message if the game didn’t undercut the message by playing sad music, having an emotionally sad tone and not only failing to show the climb back down the mountain but that it will be impossible to make it back down alive. This confuses the message. The game try’s to pose questions like “why are we here?” And “what is our purpose?” But without a Biblical foundation the questions and proposed solutions land hollow.

Contrast this to Columbo from 50 years ago. It could also be considered art but it’s a reverse horror show where you follow the killer as he waits to be found out by the monster hunting him which is Detective Columbo. The murdered is always someone of high social standing. The kind of person that can use their power to avoid the negative consequences of their sin. You spend the first third of each episode seeing the careful planning of the killer to ensure he covers his tracks and no one will ever discover his sin.

Then enters Detective Columbo exactly one third of the way through the episode.  Most of the time he knows who did it very quickly but has to figure out how to prove it. He teams up with the killer to investigate the crime asking question after question until finally the killer confesses.

Here’s why this is good art. Detective Columbo is not an investigator in the tradition sense. He doesn’t accuse every suspect until he finds the right one like a normal detective show. He, like The Shadow, are an allegory for a guilty conscience. Both Columbo and your conscience know of the things you’ve done when no one else could possibly know. They both pester you with “sorry to bother you but ….” And  “one more thing”.

We all have experienced a guilty conscience and the fear of being found out is something we all can resonate with. That’s why Columbo is so good. And each episode ends with the conscious (Columbo) causing the killer to confess. This is strait out of the Bible “Be sure your sin will find you out.” Numbers 32:23b The show by accident is illustrating a fact about humanity that is stated in the Bible. That’s art. This postmodern nonsense that comes out today just isn’t it. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.