Deepest Game You've Played (no pun intended)

[Shock and Awe]

Well, Halo has a story that is deep as shit, bt it does a meh job of presenting.

 

[MetallicaRulez0]

Mass Effect was pretty deep.

If you count ridiculous skill caps in multiplayer, both Halo 2 and CoD4 are incredibly deep. You could play for years and still continue to improve in both games.

 

[Piorn]

Spoiler

Losing someone you love because you try to protect this person too much. Realizing that you are not the savior but instead the threat. That's what the last level is about.

What happened to Tim? Who is the princess? Who is the greeter? We don't need the answers, the answer would make us stop thinking, and it's all about thinking, to philosophize about existence, relationships, mistakes, and the universe. If you don't like to think about existence, no problem, but I do it alot.
And no, I can't define what is deep and what not, you have to judge on your own, but I regard stories as deep if they make me philosophize.

Spoiler

No, no that's not what the game is about at ALL. The game is about the Manhattan Project and the development of the atomic bomb. Everyone always thinks the princess is a person. Think harder, grasshoppah. Did you not get the real ending where you actually get up to the top level and touch her?

- J

That's what makes the game 'deep'. The possibility to have more than one interpretation of the story. And yes, I actually got all stars.

Two men are dead in a cabin on top of a hill. Yes or no questions only. What happened?

The above is an example of a "Two-minute mystery" style of riddle. The objective being to ask questions until you discover whatever wordsmithing trickery is in place and thus come to understand what happened. In the above case, the "cabin" is actually an airplane cabin, and the two were a victim of a plane crash.

Does that imply depth? You had to think about it. You could draw multiple conclusions from it. But does anything about the way you view the world change as a result? Once you've gotten the answer, are you in any way improved? If you haven't gotten the answer yet, does the fact that you're still thinking about it imply depth, or simply that you haven't solved a puzzle yet?

Note that I think that Braid is an excellent game, but if I had to think of a word for the writing, "French" comes to mind far more rapidly than "Deep". In fact, that's what the writing reminds me of. A French arts film.

- J

At least we can agree to call it 'art', and you can't define art.

 

[z121231211]

Silent Hill 3 on hard puzzle mode. You need to be an english major just to get through those puzzles.

 

[DrunkenKitty]

EVE Online is the deepest game. Anyone who disagrees hasn't played it. There's enough depth in that game to warrant a master's degree at a university.

Those of you who listed named an FPS or any other action type game are fooling yourselves.

 

[antipunt]

Persona 3

 

[IntoxicatedKnight]

Fallout 3 for its sheer scale and options, Metal Gear Solid series for its story and ideologies.

 

[MelodyMan]

mass effect and persona 4.

mass effect was epic, and persona was a life simulator with an excellent plot, good soundtrack and some damn fine role-playing.

 

[Lord Thodin]

Not to knock Bioshock lovers, but to knock Bioshock directly that game is not deep at all. You are a name less, face less 50s test tube baby who comes back home to do what you were desgined to do. Kill Andrew Ryan. When thats done everything goes south, and you get your mind back to you, and kill your old master. Hows that deep? you cant feel for the little sisters cause they have the personality of wallpaper. Cant feel for Andrew Ryan cause its his fault hes under the sea surrounded by his own creations. Cant feel for atlas cause hes an asshole, but you cant feel anger towards him either because hes too laughable. His opening line after you regain conciousness is, would you kindly go get stepped on by a big daddy. No its not deep. The plots not that open. The only way this game would become deep is if they recreated it and you didnt have a linear story line you were just some unlucky sod dropped off in the middle of hell, IE Rapture. THEN it would be immersive, deep, and the thing that happens with Atlas/Frank Fontaine would seem surprsing depending on how you developed your character. A malicious bad ass, or a staunch good guy who gets screwd.

OH, and the deepest game ive ever played was Kingdom Hearts ONE! I actually felt for Kiri at the end when the worlds were seperating.

 

[MelodyMan]

Silent Hill 2.

Very philosiphical. (Is that how you spell it?)

This. In fact, i've never played any game quite like it. A masterpiece. Really, it's concepts are astounding.

That or Kingdom Hearts; the original one, not the second. It's story had me torn up so much, it was beautiful.

i actually liked the second one more than the first, and the kh series still remains as my favorite games off all time.

 

[NintenTim64]

hmm... I'd have to say Fire Emblem Path of Radiance it was possibly only game that I've played that really kept me playing for both the action of the gameplay as well as the story.

 

[darkfire613]

Fallout 3 just because of the great wealth of stuff to do. BioShock, because of the story and revolutionary gameplay mechanics. InFamous also managed to suck me in, I played that game practically constantly from the time I got it to when I beat it on evil 3 days later , which is slow for the amount of time I spent with it, but I had 30 hours on Far Cry 2 before I even did one story mission. I get that way with open world games, just exploring everywhere.

 

[Daedalus1942]

Storywise, I very much enjoyed the story of Zone of the enders (one and two, as they're essentially one game in two episodes).
I love the storyline for both, though way more of it was explained in ZoE 2.

 

[Daedalus1942]

Deus Ex. It's just such a deep world that gets deeper the more you play. It has an incredible build-up as well. It starts with a terrorist attack, then builds to a tale of international intrigue, and then goes further to bring in shadow organizations and rogue A.I.'s. So well done.

Thief also has a deep world. It's the type of world that deserves books and movies. The different religions, factions, gods, and creatures all wrapped-up in a Steam-Punk environment.

A final "deep" game I'll throw out there is a little different:

Virtua Fighter 4: Evolution. So many characters, moves, challenges, clothes, etc. For a fighting game it was huge and awesome.

Not to mention in Deus Ex the incorporation of the Majestic 12 (a real government organisation) was just awesome.

 

[jehuty_zero69]

Personally I cannot believe Braid is not mentioned here (although I have not read every post). As far as I'm concerned, games are simply not ready for the type of deep, abstract and interpretive story line that Braid is trying to convey. Amazing. Not to mention the game play (provided you can snub the temptation to cheat)is incredible.

 

[Daedalus1942]

Ristar, once you realize the whole game was actually a battle in Ristar's mind over his crippling freudian issues and his inability to commit to a relationship.

I love Ristar... he was the brainchild for that lovable little Red sneaker clad, Blue speedy hedgehog we all know and used to love.

 

[VaioStreams]

I'd have to say most the final fantasy games (most meaning some were eh) a few other RPGs. that's all story wise. game play wise. infamous, Mirror's Edge.

 

[Strategia]

Gameplay-wise, Red Orchestra (surprise surprise), Sid Meier's games (Civ, AlphCen, Col) and Paradox's grand strategy games (notably Europa Universalis III and Hearts of Iron II).
Story-wise and gameworld-wise, I'd say Fallout 3 (though I haven't gotten very far yet.....) and Half-Life 2+Eps.
Fun-wise, TF2 and Gmod.

 

[Aux]

Bioshock, I like how in order to get the "full" story of the game you had to find all the audio diaries.