As for quantitatively measuring the power of an experience, I fail to see why it is necessary to do so.

The argument — that games need to produce powerful experiences in order to be considered by society at large as an art form — does not necessarily imply that there needs to be a quantitative measure of power in order to pass an arbitrary threshold. With beauty, we judge something to be beautiful not by some quantitative measure of beauty, but by a personal qualitative evaluation. What constitutes power? What defines powerful enough? These are all qualitative questions that need to be answered at the level of the individual. My answers will likely be different than many other’s answers.

But what I’m trying to do is to distinguish between the consideration of a medium as an art form at the societal level, as opposed to the consideration of a specific piece within that medium as a work of art at the individual level. My argument is that the former follows from the latter.

At this time, I would say that there are a few games out there that some people would consider to be works of art — whatever they base that on. Perhaps they felt that these games moved them powerfully enough to believe so. But I believe that no game has been able to accomplish this on a large enough scale such that society as a whole would now consider games to be an art form. It is my belief that some game eventually needs to do this to achieve that ultimate goal, otherwise games will continue to be considered more of a pastime than true art.

Perhaps that does imply that there is a quantitative threshold defining the number of people that need to be powerfully affected by a game which, when surpassed, will result in widespread acceptance of the medium as an art form. If so, it is certainly an undefinable number, likely relate to a vast number of influences. But the end result nevertheless is that, at some point, it happens.

If movies are art then why isn’t the Alone in the Dark movie considered as a piece of art?

This is the general point of my discussion: What defines an art form vs. what defines a work of art. Pieces made within a particular medium can be works of art or they can be vapid and trite — it’s up to the individual to decide. An art form is the medium itself; movies are an art form, but that doesn’t mean that all movies are works of art. But I would argue that there had to be at least one movie generally perceived by enough people to be a powerful work of art before movies (as a general medium) were considered an art form.

(no, really, I’d love to go on discussing this, as I 100% disagree with you but you do make sense, though you’ll have to wait a bit… can’t find the time today, but as I actually am an urban theorist, I ask you to at least trust me on them city definitions. Anyway. Be back very soon)

“both definitions you chose to copy and paste are both wrong and incomplete”
Provide an instance of them being wrong. For people who need more than a baseless opinion to be convinced.
As for them being incomplete, I’m not writing an essay. Search and you will find definitions that fit any instance of the word.

“I don’t need to have anything explained, thank you.”
Apparently, you do!

define: democracy ->
the political orientation of those who favor government by the people or by their elected representatives

Both definitions are clear. If there’s something you don’t understand, ask for an explanation.

“Point is not everything can be defined in absolute terms”
Physical realities can be defined in physical terms. Conventional systems can be defined within the formalism of the system itself.

“Unless of course you believe everything is god-given”
God does not exist. It’s a metaphysical notion brought onto the world by ignorant fishermen and farmers a couple of thousand years ago.

“See what I mean?”
Should I?

“Defining art, and I think you’ll agree, is nigh on impossible”
It’s a logical mistake to think that no solution exists because one has not been found.

Now, don’t know what this will contribute, but no matter how much I’ve tried I still haven’t found an answer to questions like: is dada art? if movies are art then why isn’t the Alone in the Dark movie considered as a piece of art? is art more than a word to be used as praise for something? where is the line separating exquisite craft and art drawn?