I've had one argument with software engineers more often than any other - whether coding is an art. I'd consider it an art it terms of "art and craft" but not in terms of artistic interpretation. There is a right way to solve any problem in software, it's just that we can't know all the constraints, so things become about weighting of the requirements. That doesn't make it an art, it makes it hard.

Anyway, I was chatting to an arty friend of mine recently and the number of games I've been writing recently came up. A few people have commented on how I seem to be writing alot of games with distinct styles recently. The artist friend reckoned this was "finding my style".

Apparantly proper artists (you know the ones with little beards and quirky senses of humour) go through phases of development. First they learn the basics of drawing and construction. Then go on to experiment with different mediums and styles, eventually finding one that feels right (or several if they're a great artist).

This progression seems to fit nicely against what I've seen of other aspiring games developers. The more I think about games as an art form, the more is fits in my head at least. I guess everyone else knew this ages ago :)