Storylines? where have you gone?

[Proto Cloud]

Wow, you either live under a rock or are complete idiot here is a list of this gen games with great story lines...

Halo 3 (the games don't do it alone read the books and you will see how deep these games really are)
Oblivion
MGS4
Call of Duty 4
Bioshock
lost odyssey
Splinter Cell: DA
Mass Effect
Metroid prime 3
LoZ: TP

And let me ask you what games on the SNES ever had a story besides lets say LoZ and dear god help me if u say that continuing series of shit Final Fantasy!

Halo 3? Please. I think I'm not alone when I say that you shouldn't have to read some side stories to understand the 'amazing' story. It sounds like Bungie nickel-and-diming its fans to get the whole experience.

Now I have to disagree with the TC. There's a ton of great games with good storylines if you look out for them. If all you look at is FPS games (which are dominating this generation) you'll be gravely dissapointed.

 

[ElArabDeMagnifico]

And as for Metal Gear Solid: http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2001/11/30/metal-gear-stupid/

Haha if it wasn't for that deus ex machina at the end of that storyboard, and someone explained it to me, I'd ****ing play it for sure.

*see psychonauts w/brain harvesting dentists and secret agents trying to find a molotov tossing milkman*

 

[Littaly]

CoD4 is supposed to have an awesome storyline, and there is always Final Fantasy. I was majorly disappointed by Halo, everyone praised It's awesome storyline but it was basically just some ring with mushroom zombies, some aliens and some crazy robot globe.. oh and the most uninteresting main character i have yet to see (still pretty decent game though, I'm not a Halo hater ^^ just thought it was overrated). Waiting for Star Craft 2 as well, both SC1 and WC3 (and WoW, if you search for it) had amazing story lines.

 

[Shakes216]

The general dislike of "Storylines" doesn't fall so much to everyone being macho fuckwits who don't have any interest in narrative but more to the fact that the gaming community in North America has largely lost interest in the "cut scene storytelling" of the last 2 generations. The storytellers of this current generation of gaming have become increasingly interested in more interactive and less exositional forms of story, less "Metal Gear Solid 4" more "Call of Duty 4" for the best example.

The main problem for "Storylines" in games is the rise of Multiplayer as the primary driving force behind gaming, and that is the fault primarily of Halo, but Goldeneye certainly laid the foundation. Far too often these days we see a Multiplayer game with a crummy single player section tacked on almost as a bonus (see Battlefield Series and (sort of) Halo 3). Furthermore game developers are looking for cheaper ways to make money, and are discarding the high budget single player games with good stories for cheaper and more profitable projects like MMO's or casual titles like Rockband and Guitar Hero that have very little or nothing to do with Storyline.

One can also note the loss of "Story" in the Media as a whole, many movies are becoming more and more plotless as time goes on (sloughs of bad Rom-Coms, Spoofs and bad comedies all with derivative stories) and reality shows are causing the decline of the story. Because gaming has become more socially acceptable and more accessible the same demographic that has made Movies and TV stupider and less story focused are moving into the gaming medium, reducing the desire for story based titles considerably.

Thankfully studios like Ubisoft, 2k Boston (formerly Irrational), Bioware, Obsidian, countless Japanese developers and many other companies are still interested in producing interesting titles with good stories instead of profit generating, context light button mash fests that simply generate money.

I whole-heartedly agree on all major points. However, i would just like to point out some minor differing opinions.

It isn't just the rise of multi-player, but the rise of ONLINE multi-player that has contributed to the lack of story. It was the transition from having to go over to a friends house (or having them come over) to being able to sit at home, turn on the console, and (only if you have a Wii) calling a friend to play them online (or else just play complete strangers). When gamers had to physically move over to another location to enjoy a multi-player experience, the gamer needed another reason to buy a game when that option was not viable (ex. your friend is sick or on vacation).

Other than that I have nothing to argue.

 

[Alex_P]

I'm not really seeing the death of "story".

Some of the old superstars have yet to be surpassed -- I'm thinking of Torment and Deus Ex here -- but the average seems to be the same, if not improving.

Now, I don't always play the newest stuff right when it comes out, but I've been able to find a pretty steady supply of fun and story-ful single-player games recently.

-- Alex

 

[KimMR251]

There may be some good storylines, but IMO, I feel like the number of them are significantly fewer than they were say...back in the days of the NES --> PSX. IMO, I think it's because everything is so driven by graphics and aesthetics of a game...(I am guilty of going ga-ga over a really nice looking game, I won't lie), but because much is focused on that, I feel like the story is somewhat (not completely/always) pushed to the side.

I love it when I get attached to a game to the point it affects my emotions. I feel like it happens less these days, but when a story line is compelling enough along with it being easy on the eye...I gotta say, it's freakin worth it to wait for an awesome game like that to come along.

 

[Xhumed]

Just a few notes...

1. Grammar, punctuation and spelling - make this your mantra.

2. As much fun as Goldeneye was, it was a movie tie-in, so praising it for its story is something of a stretch.

3. There are plenty of games that have good stories and a complete lack of unrealisticly (sic) large breasts and some of them are FPSs

4. Flinging accusations around is not a good way to make friends or to keep your threads open.

to number 2 i was mentioning goldeneye as the FPS that brought FPS to life as the dominant gaming genre

Are you kidding me? Doom? Duke Nukem 3D? Quake? Ring any bells? No? FPS's were a big noise long before Goldeneye.

But yeah, on topic, I like a decent story to my Games. Stories will keep my playing because I want to know what happenes next. Now I even make up ones for my DoWC skirmishes, gives my army a reason to be slaughtering Orks/Impy Goo (my two favourite punching bags.)

 

[Logan Westbrook]

im just saying storylines nowadays are RARE, and hard to find, I pick up a game nowadays and i have to FORCE myself to enjoy it.

This never happened on SNES and Playstation 1. I put in a game, and it was FUN! it captured my attention from start to finish.

I just ask, why is it when an epic storyline comes along, its not really appreciated, but when a game like Halo and Devil May Cry (its fun, just not a good storyline) comes along, its treated like a man who shits gold bricks, everyone wants it!

Is it possible that the reason for that is that you were younger and less critical of games? You and I are similar ages, and I know that's certainly true for me.

 

[N-Sef]

Not every game of every genre has to have a masterful plot. Roleplaying games are mostly plot centric, as are Adventure games. Other genre's really don't need this kind of attention to plot to drive the gameplay forward, sure it's nice if the lead has a motivation for doing whatever he/she is doing but at the end of the day plots in games are usually just excuses for the things happening on screen.

You mentioned older games having great plots that kept your attention. I'm confused by this since the best games on older generations were games like Contra, Megaman, Super Mario Bros, Sonic etc etc, these games barely had a plot. Storylines these days are more prevalent in video games because people are looking for a reason for doing things. Even if they are poorly written and paced, this didn't stop Capcom from making Devil May Cry and Resident Evil one of the great big hitters in the industry.

Why are these games popular? Because they play great, I thought that was the defining reason why we play games in the first place, because of the gameplay. Sure an RPG can focus on storyline, but sometimes it gets too overbearing and they hardly let you play at all.

And games these days not having great plots? Are you serious? In the last 10 years we have been getting games with some of the best storylines on average. Like nilcypher (awesome Display pic, one of my favourite games ever) said maybe your just a little jaded these days and not giving games a chance.

 

[Radelaide]

- Assassin's Creed, the repetitive gameplay can die in a pit, but the story really kept me going.

Nothing like a little plot twist to make you go "WTF?!"

 

[Spidey78]

im just saying storylines nowadays are RARE, and hard to find, I pick up a game nowadays and i have to FORCE myself to enjoy it.

This never happened on SNES and Playstation 1. I put in a game, and it was FUN! it captured my attention from start to finish.

I just ask, why is it when an epic storyline comes along, its not really appreciated, but when a game like Halo and Devil May Cry (its fun, just not a good storyline) comes along, its treated like a man who shits gold bricks, everyone wants it!

Of course though, I believe another factor might come in when people say that storylines nowadays suck and aren't on game dev's top priority list.

Maybe it's because back then on the PSX and SNES when storylines first started actually appearing in games it was something new and you had never experienced it before and BLEW IT UP TO BE MORE THAN IT ACTUALLY WAS. Perhaps the story wasn't as epic as you thought it was? Maybe that game so long ago that you played didn't have such masterful storytelling and atmosphere? Perhaps it was just a new experience that you liked?

Also a man who shits gold bricks wouldn't be something I would want...

 

[GuerrillaClock]

Mass effect was surprising. At first it seemed a shit, average storyline. Then it twists it around completely at the end and is still reminescent in the back of my mind as sheer awesomeness.

Mass Effect was remarkable only in that its the only game ever to tell me NOTHING about the plot all the way through the game, then got a hologram to tell me the entire story in about 5 minutes of dialogue near the end.

 

[Geo Da Sponge]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, games are rubbish now, they used to be so great, balh blah blah...

You may have some valid points, but unfortunately we've heard it all before.

Edit:

Mass effect was surprising. At first it seemed a shit, average storyline. Then it twists it around completely at the end and is still reminescent in the back of my mind as sheer awesomeness.

Mass Effect was remarkable only in that its the only game ever to tell me NOTHING about the plot all the way through the game, then got a hologram to tell me the entire story in about 5 minutes of dialogue near the end.

What do you mean, nothing? You found out bit by bit about Saren's plan, starting with it seeming like a fairly mormal invasion with the geth involved, developing into his plan to bring the Reapers into our universe. Heck, you even TALK to one of them, the Sovereign, so if you considered that 'nothing' then you must of not been paying attention. It's explained how Saren is being controlled by the Sovereign, and how the geth worship the Reapers. The main role of The Reapers is constantly hinted at, such as how the Protheans were wiped out, so you must of guessed something. I could go on, but really, how can this be considered nothing?

 

[Sasha Janre]

Really Final Fantasy had a story? I just though it was a montage oh homo erotic clips with a lil button mashing in between...

what game were YOU playing?

 

[GeeDave]

There is an underlying point here I think, a story costs money to develop, quite a lot of money. So if it's possible to continue the game while skimping on the story. Then I'm sure that's what happens in some cases. And i'm sure that in a lot of cases, chunks of story are taken out so the game itself could be finished on time, or perhaps even poorly added bits are tagged on to aid the development of a certain something. A great design doc for a game would be overpowered with images, rather than text (i'm not saying there isn't any text, that wouldn't make sense). That's something a publisher would certainly latch onto as well.

There are certainly games out there that feature 'good' stories though, and what better way to find them than to state they don't exist and just the let the angry masses bombard you with lists. I wish I'd of thought of a similar tactic when writing my dissertation.

Speaking of which, on one of my rare visits to the library back in my Uni days, I did glance upon a 'trendy' looking "games design" book that stated games should be designed without story, because the story costs too much, and will get in the way of the game itself.

Make of that what you will. I did recommend that the book be removed from the library. Not because it was wrong, but because it was stating it as fact, and not stating that story's in games can actually be good, especially if the game strives to tell a story, or simply needs one to make any sense.

You may have noticed that I can't quite work out if it's "Stories" or "Story's"... or "Storys"... that's my bad.