When did games quit being about gameplay???

Now, this isn't true all the time, but I have certainly heard this before more than once:

"Well, the gameplay is meh/ok, but the story is great"

So, let me get this straight, you are playing a game because it has a decent/good story, but the gameplay isn't that good? Why not watch a movie or read a book instead? Most video games aren't known for their stellar storytelling..

Some are. A passive experience isnt as engrossing or impactful as an active one.

I'm not one of those people. I like my games to play well and/or to have the gameplay mean something if there's a story-based game. I know a majority of video games don't have the most stellar of narrative experiences. But games are starting to come into their own in terms of storytelling. You might not agree, but games are becoming more and more about how you you get immersed into a good story. And when games find that balance between excellent gameplay and great storytelling, you know you've made a great game.

And also, there are some people who are willing to overlook average or bad controls because they're able to work around them. Take for instance, awkward movement controls. I played on the PS1, which arguably had the most awkward games in terms of movement, so to me it doesn't bother me when modern games have the same issue. I'll make sure to note it when I write my review, but if it doesn't bother me, that's okay. I feel no reviews take into account what the experience was like when they play a game. Maybe that's just me.

Um never? There is only a select few games out there that focus more on the visuals/story over gameplay. Hell have you played any nintendo wii-u games!? there all about the gameplay dude. Plus there still games like halo, gears of war, forza, sunset overdrive, far cry, little big planet etc.. that all focus on number 1! the gameplay

Yeah I'm aware that more games are getting better in the story department, but if you look at the number of quality books or movies compared to games it is staggering. Granted movies and books have been around for much longer, but still.

What prompted this was I was talking to a friend the other day about an RPG he was playing and he said: "oh you know the gameplay isn't that fun, but it's an RPG, I'm playing it for the story".

@darkknight9174: Most JRPGs do tend to have a better narrative experience than a gameplay one, which is sad, but it does happen. I can think of a few examples where the gameplay is actually pretty damn fun, like Chrono Trigger, Xenogears, Earthbound, Xenoblade Chronicles, Vagrant Story, and recently Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch.

In the Western market, however, you have games like Mass Effect, Fallout, The Elder Scrolls, and many others that have good gameplay (depending on who you ask) while also having deep narratives filled to the brim with interesting lore.

i like games to have both... but if a game is forcing a bad storyline into my face I can't stand it and it ruins the game pretty easily. Worst games like this for me recently was Walking Dead, the was no gameplay at all, occasional crappy quick time event... and the storyline wasn't my type of thing.

The beginning of the last (7th) console generation. Games like Uncharted: Drake's Fortune were the big time perpetrators.

So let me get this straight, you're making a new post about a topic that has been discussed again and again and again and expect what? instead of just going back a few pages and look at the last time which wasn´t that long ago, the answers won't have changed.

I like a game like Wolf Among Us and Walking Dead. It doesn't always need strong gameplay. But when gameplay is a huge part of the game, it should have a certain quality

When you say "stellar" storytelling, I'm not sure what you mean. Are you comparing a game's story to Shakespeare? Stephen King? Ray Bradbury? Good storytelling is a very subjective experience. Some gamers find storytelling in the Halo games to be stellar, some gamers lean more towards the recent Final Fantasy games or even games like Journey and/or Shadow of the Colossus, which have virtually no spoken narratives to have stellar storytelling aspects. Once again, its all about perspective.

Preach fellow, preach!

I have no problem with a game's story being the main factor in motivating me to play through and finish the game. I don't simply watch movies, read books, or play games just for the sake of doing so. I do each of them because they specifically interest me in particular ie. I play Metal Gear Solid or Final Fantasy games because I want to experience them specifically. I'm not saying that I find anything wrong with the gameplay of those games in particular though.

@mastermetal777: loved Vagrant Story, I even downloaded it on to my Sony Expedia play amazing game even now

@xeno_ghost: I still have to beat it lol. I love the story and gameplay, but the weapons crafting requires soooooo much attention to detail. It's insane lol

Its been like that for years bro.... Didn't you get the memo ?

And trust me, the "so why don't you just watch a movie argument" is just the beginning of your long and confusing Mind ****, by hipster with excuses.

I keep things simple with these kinds of debate. Gaming sole purpose if for play. The primary function is to game. Everything else is secondary and its the sole reason it is and has been called games. Folks who want more story than gameplay are not really looking for a game.

Ok, so what are they looking for?

@Jacanuk

They are looking to change the definition of what a game is....

So you mean like your trying to do?

@darkknight9174: When megapublishers became extremely shallow, about how outlier western an eastern studios framed narratives for action game play.

"Cutscenes? We can do those too!"

Facepalm.

Some games clearly understood narrative and took the environmental storytelling route. Others failed to understand all that digital B "drama" (as excessive as it was) mostly just 'conditioning' and setups for puzzles you had to unlock, obstacles you had to pass, escort missions you had to slog through, bosses you had to fight, dialogue wheel choices you had to make, surprise moments etc.

Yeah I cannot get into a game unless the gameplay is great or the world is exciting to explore. Story driven games tend to have neither.

Uncharted 2 will forever be the poster child of what went wrong last gen. Mediocre to mind numbingly abysmal gameplay wrapped in a pretty package and the media outlets and masses ate it up like it was the second coming of Christ. I never understood it.

@Jacanuk

I'm not the one on trail here....

Now tell me how story makes up for average gameplay....

True, but i was just wondering if it was the same.

How can i tell you how to perceive something subjective? you might not think that a story is enough but you can a look at The Last Of Us, gameplay wise the game is average and not something spectacular, the thing that makes it stand out is the story.

@Jacanuk

The big issue is making a game in such a way that you lose atleast half the experience if you youtube it.

@Lulu_Lulu: I would honestly contest that. You lose a lot of story moments from The Last of Us if you just YouTube the cutscenes. The game takes about 12-16 hours to beat, and there is only about an hour and 40 minutes of cutscenes total in the game. Uncharted 2 takes 10 to 12 hours to beat, and only features about an hour and a half of cutscenes. Lots of story moments happen in those games that are more within the context of gameplay than most other games.

Now compare that to a game like Metal Gear Solid 4, where half the game is cutscenes.

The cutscenes and a lets play will never be able to give you the experience of actually playing the game, that is actually one of the biggest things about any game.

@Jacanuk: Pretty much. I never watched a Let's Play of a game and thought "hmm...I know how this game's gonna work and what the story is. I don't think I'll actually play it myself." It only makes me more intrigued as to how I'll be able to handle the mechanics if/when I ever do try the game out for myself.

Why don't you ask them? :|

@Pedro: I don't think they're really asking for story over gameplay. I think they just want better stories that coincide with good gameplay. And as for what people's taste in gameplay is, well that's entirely subjective as everyone has different tastes in terms of what kind of game they want to play.

Why would i ask anyone but you? its you argument that people who want more story than gameplay are not looking for a game.

So how about a answer?

@Jacanuk

Well sure, but narratively speaking, you really don't miss out on anything. I mean thats the trend now isn't it ?

mastermetal777

Actually in The Last of Us's case they included the scripted sections and you can get the full TLOU narrative experience in just 4 hours. Its not just the cutscenes, even in when interacting its still passive, and I think the only way to counter that is alil more Player Agency in the Story, since thats one thing you can never get from youtube, which really breaks my heart because Beyond 2 Souls won't make the cut. :(

@Lulu_Lulu: I've never had a problem with scripted sequences though. If a game wants to be linear, let it. And hell, some open-world games have scripted sequences. When you reach a certain location, the devs want something to happen there that triggers either the main quest or a side quest of sorts. Everything in a video game is scripted in some way, shape, or form. What matters is how the player views the event. Do they see through the deception, or do they allow themselves to get sucked into the world, gameplay, story, etc., and have it feel as though each event is something unique and organic in relation to prior events of the experience? When a game can fool a player like that, it means they've done a good job, in my opinion. Many games do scripted sequences fairly well (I think Naughty Dog is one of those examples, but that's just me), and usually it's a sequence that has the character either being caught in a situation where control is limited or taken away (falling, for instance) or when there are speaking moments that would feel stilted and out of place when you have full control. You might disagree, but I much prefer these instances as opposed to complete control where I could miss something the developers clearly wanted me to pay attention to because I have so much control that I'd much rather be playing around than focusing on the parts of the whole (Half-Life 2 is that example for me)

And as for The Last of Us: 4 hours of story in a 12-16 hour game. That means over 8 to 12 hours of nothing but gameplay. I fail to see the problem.

I dont agree with that, particular not when most LP´s are more about the scrub who makes it then the game.

@mastermetal777

Yeah, developers need to get over themselves, if you have a specific story to tell in a specific way then give video games a wide berth because thats the kind of thinking that leads to MGS4.

As for the problem.... In a Movie or Graphic Novel the story would fall apart if you were to remove the sound or video, or the Text or Pictures. In a game you can remove the gameplay and still have the story intact and vice versa. In other mediums all the components don't just work together to contribute to the story but they also do it simultaneously too. In games its just disconnected components coming together haphazardly, crashing against each other at every turn, and the ones that do get prais just reinforce how much better other mediums since thats pretty much what they do, apealing to our familiarity with other mediums instead of specialising in what only this medium can do, hence why cutscenes have become a "part" of gaming. Not because they actually but only because we're already use to that, its something we're very familiar with and thats just how they give it to us.

@Jacanuk

Then avoid the Scrubs.

I think there is a fine balance between gameplay and story, for the most part
Kinda agree with TC though; most games succumb to formulaic storylines (with some exceptions), and that's ok.

@Lulu_Lulu: In my experience, the gameplay only classes with the story if the cutscenes are showing the characters doing something that cannot be done in gameplay. That's where the problem lies. If you're showing people something awesome in a cinematic that cannot ever be done in gameplay, you're doing something wrong.

I will forever defend storytelling in video games, as they're a fantastic medium to present stories in. Yeah, we have some work to do before we "perfect" the formula, but when you really think about it...is there a formula to begin with? Just like with film, different genres demand different things. In action-heavy video games, the story doesn't seem to be all important, so the focus is on fine-tuning the gameplay. In narrative-heavy games, it becomes so that the gameplay must serve the story without sacrificing choice or agency from the player. How much is given to the player depends on the type of game the devs wanna make. Do they let you control the narrative or do they let you control the gameplay? That's something that, honestly, just depends on the game. Trying to make every game do the same thing is pretty self-defeating and goes against what gaming is trying to strive for: allowing more people to play and be engaged by games. Developers know this, and yet gamers insist that devs only make games the way that players are familiar with.

I have been trying experimental games since I first played games like Heavy Rain, because to me it's refreshing to see a new take on what kind of gameplay a game can have while still feeling like I'm both in control and engaged in the experience. I'm not looking for a "traditional" or even a "fun" experience anymore. I just want a game to be emotionally, physically, and mentally engaging (maybe a game that does everything all at once) while I'm still able to remain in control with a keyboard and mouse or a controller and not have to bother with things like "oh they should've allowed more input or more controls to these mechanics." That is ludicrous to me. Why should I have to worry about how "complex" the mechanics are when playing a game? If the mechanics serve their function for what that particular game is trying to achieve, I believe the game has done its job already. Obviously, I look for whether or not there is a well-written story, good sound, good music, and an overall sense of "bang for your buck," but that's all supplementary details for me. If the gameplay doesn't serve its function properly, it has failed in my eyes.

@SovietsUnited

Balance can be a bad thing if the total sum doesn't exceed 100%. In other words you can have 50% gameplay and 50% story, which kinda sucks compared to having 100% gameplay and 100% story.

@mastermetal777

The problem with you is classic passive story telling preference, it might be possible that games were never meant to "tell" stories in the 1st place. Games, unlike mediums is about lending control to the player, the more the creator wants to guide the player towards their specific story the more its going to hurt the gameplay, hence where this whole "Balancing" thing come from and its become a trend to make games that are "well balanced" instead of games that are well designed. However just because you can't "tell" a story doesn't mean you can't have one.

I think developers should make games that allow stories to be interpretted or even created instead. A series of seemingly disconnected events can come together to form a coherent story by simple interpretation of the actions performed. And the best part of this is its no longer an inversely proportional balancing act. Infact the better the gameplay the better the series of events can be interpreted. So yeah, I think this thing of developers "telling" stories is a major hurdle thats doing more harm than good. After all, games are not movies or books, theres no room for both the creator and player to express themselves, yes you can balance them but you can't fully blend them, eventually,one of them just had to move out the way, and in a game I much prefer if it were the Creator than me.

Most of the time, for any given game I like, the story is half the reason I love the game.

I love Tales of Xillia because it has a very well designed combat system that's loads of fun to play. It also have a very intriguing story that takes place in an interesting world with memorable characters and some really great character development.

Games that don't focus on their story very much I don't find as interesting. They don't motivate the player very much to continue. What am I gonna get for winning? A screen that says "Conglaturation, you have completed a great game."?

I'm really glad that there exist games that have stories. It would be such a waste if there weren't any.

Games without stories definitely have their place in the industry, and there are plenty that I like. But I really like having a story to follow, when I play an RPG like Ni No Kuni, or Tales of Xillia, I feel like I'm going on an adventure with these characters. And that adds so much more meaning to playing the game.

I take gameplay over story all the time. Games like Megaman and Castlevania that try to have some sort of story but are most of the time ignored because they either make no sense or the gameplay is too good are some of the biggest offenders. The Megaman X-ZX games "think" they have a story but, they really don't lol. It's the same thing over and over. Humans vs robots, save us X, Zero etc... I read the dialogue in horrible acting like in the dubbed Godzilla movies on purpose all the time for them and for Castlevania as well...

Game to film adaptations show what storytelling video games have. Complete garbage. Especially the developers who some people claim have good writing, like Bioware and Obsidian, they are actually the worst.

What gamers want in their games:

1- Completely predictable and uninspired plots.

2- Cliches, and more cliches.

3- No twists, just get given a goal and work towards it till the boss fight.

4- Good guys vs bad guys. You are the good guy.

5- Happy ending with bunnies and rainbows.

And the most annoying thing is: they confuse ambiguity with good writing.