(12-18-2014, 08:47 PM)MrBehemoth Wrote: But a game, as a piece of media, is what it is and doesn't say anything about itself. Therefore it is not pretentious.
I disagree. Games, just like movies, books, and other sorts of media all have some sort of developer intended tone, story, atmosphere, or message that is conveyed through depending on how the developer crafts it. The exact same story can appear vastly different through different forms of execution.
This is where the potential for games themselves to be pretentious arises. When a game has no real depth, whether emotional or otherwise, but still tries to dress itself up with a tone that makes itself look like it's better than it actually is then that would be being pretentious. It's something taking itself more seriously than it actually has any point in being.