Why do people care so much about storylines?

[xqxm]

You don't play a game solely for the gameplay you git, that would be like reading a paper because you like the smell of fresh ink.

Gameplay is one essential part of a game, and must be functional for the rest of the game to work, but one thing that games have an edge over traditional formats like movies and books in, is the storytelling aspect, because you feel much more immersed in the experience when you are playing it yourself.

At least if you're not playing some god-awful JRPG (read: all of them) with angsty teenagers and horrible gameplay.

 

[Velocity Eleven]

You don't play a game solely for the gameplay you git, that would be like reading a paper because you like the smell of fresh ink.

Gameplay is one essential part of a game, and must be functional for the rest of the game to work, but one thing that games have an edge over traditional formats like movies and books in, is the storytelling aspect, because you feel much more immersed in the experience when you are playing it yourself.

At least if you're not playing some god-awful JRPG (read: all of them) with angsty teenagers and horrible gameplay.

reading a book for the smell of the ink is like playing a game so that you can smell the disc
reading a book for the story is like playing a game for the gameplay

JRPGs with horrible gameplay, not seen many of those

 

[Rooks]

Dragon Quest

Gameplay is good and all, but the 'playing' part all revolves around a story & plot/setting.

With little/no story there's literally no point in playing. the gameplay becomes meaningless & boring. Not only is there no incentive to do anything, but people would just sit there thinking "well why the hell am I doing this?"

With no storyline, the plot doesn't move. There is no interest.

I strongly disagree

plz state a good rpg without a stroyline to follow during gameplay. and WOW and FF online do have storylines so don't even think about it

Dragon Quest

 

[Velocity Eleven]

Dragon Quest

if you're refering to the first one, then I know what you mean
Dragon Quest VIII however is fantastic

EDIT: hold on, forget that, I misread who you were replying to

 

[SomethingUnrelated]

What a redundant question...

Without a story, you have nothing to play. [Bearing in mind that multiplayer in any game is heavily linked to the single player story.]

 

[TheDoctor455]

Personally, I play games for both gameplay AND story.
However, since I guess I'm kinda in the "games are art" camp, I tend to view story as being much more important than gameplay.
Hence, I will forgive mediocre gameplay if the story is interesting enough, but I won't forgive a bad story just because the gameplay is awesome (the God of War series being the only exception to this rule. Awesome gameplay... lackluster story).

See, no matter how fun the gameplay is, my interest, and therefore willingness to continue experiencing the gameplay, drops when I don't have a good context or reason for doing it in game. Which is where story and characters come in. Now, bad voice acting on the other hand... well... I'll usually put up with it because it at least gives me something to laugh at. But in rare cases like Two Worlds, where the voice acting is so horrible that it makes seriously consider removing my ears so that I won't be subjected to more of this shit... well... with voice acting THAT bad, I will add to the list of reasons why I stopped playing the game.

 

[Velocity Eleven]

What a redundant question...

Without a story, you have nothing to play. [Bearing in mind that multiplayer in any game is heavily linked to the single player story.]

yes you do, you have a game

 

[SomethingUnrelated]

What a redundant question...

Without a story, you have nothing to play. [Bearing in mind that multiplayer in any game is heavily linked to the single player story.]

yes you do, you have a game

Yes, and empty game in which everything you do has no real point [In terms of single player].

 

[Velocity Eleven]

What a redundant question...

Without a story, you have nothing to play. [Bearing in mind that multiplayer in any game is heavily linked to the single player story.]

yes you do, you have a game

Yes, and empty game in which everything you do has no real point [In terms of single player].

you have challenges, goals, rewards, punishments etc.

by the way single-player >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> multi-player

 

[SomethingUnrelated]

What a redundant question...

Without a story, you have nothing to play. [Bearing in mind that multiplayer in any game is heavily linked to the single player story.]

yes you do, you have a game

Yes, and empty game in which everything you do has no real point [In terms of single player].

you have challenges, goals, rewards, punishments etc.

by the way single-player >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> multi-player

I know single player is greater than multi player, and the four aforementioned thingies wouldn't have any relevance without a plot. You wouldn't feel remotely compelled to do them. And if that's the only element to a game, there's nothing really to the game.

 

[Link112]

I've heard people say that people play JRPGs for the storylines cause their gameplay is limited. To me this was a huge "wtf?" moment, cause I always played JRPGs for their expansive gameplay elements and not their stories.

I would accuse JRPG's of many things, but expansive gameplay? It's basically the same formula in every game. You have your attack option, your magic option, your item option, and your run away option. Sometimes you get to combine different magical attacks, and some games even have an option for character specific skills. It's the same tired old formula that has been around since the original Final Fantasy.

 

[Velocity Eleven]

You wouldn't feel remotely compelled to do them

I would

 

[Ciran]

What a redundant question...

Without a story, you have nothing to play. [Bearing in mind that multiplayer in any game is heavily linked to the single player story.]

yes you do, you have a game

Yes, and empty game in which everything you do has no real point [In terms of single player].

you have challenges, goals, rewards, punishments etc.

by the way single-player >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> multi-player

Wait, are you trying to say that single player is greater than multiplayer, or that it leads to it?

 

[SomethingUnrelated]

You wouldn't feel remotely compelled to do them

I would

Why, then?

 

[thenumberthirteen]

A bad story makes a game worse than no story at all. You don't see an Action movie just for story, but a stupid plot makes it worse. We want to entertained not just blow things up.

 

[Velocity Eleven]

I've heard people say that people play JRPGs for the storylines cause their gameplay is limited. To me this was a huge "wtf?" moment, cause I always played JRPGs for their expansive gameplay elements and not their stories.

I would accuse JRPG's of many things, but expansive gameplay? It's basically the same formula in every game. You have your attack option, your magic option, your item option, and your run away option. Sometimes you get to combine different magical attacks, and some games even have an option for character specific skills. It's the same tired old formula that has been around since the original Final Fantasy.

dude, I've heard these types of complaints a lot, its easy to just scratch the surface of any genre and claim it to all be the same. Clearly there's vast variations in the development strategies and customisation methods throughout all of the games, I dont think i've seen 2 JRPGs that use the same method, well maybe if I searched long enough I would but its rare

I've heard all the petty complaints over and over again, its gotten to the point where any sort of debate in this regard feels worthless

 

[Velocity Eleven]

You wouldn't feel remotely compelled to do them

I would

Why, then?

for the challenges, goal, rewards and punishments

What a redundant question...

Without a story, you have nothing to play. [Bearing in mind that multiplayer in any game is heavily linked to the single player story.]

yes you do, you have a game

Yes, and empty game in which everything you do has no real point [In terms of single player].

you have challenges, goals, rewards, punishments etc.

by the way single-player >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> multi-player

Wait, are you trying to say that single player is greater than multiplayer, or that it leads to it?

greater than

 

[SomethingUnrelated]

You wouldn't feel remotely compelled to do them

I would

Why, then?

for the challenges, goal, rewards and punishments

Nice one genius...

I was asking why you would feel compelled to get those, if there is no real result?

 

[Velocity Eleven]

You wouldn't feel remotely compelled to do them

I would

Why, then?

for the challenges, goal, rewards and punishments

Nice one genius...

I was asking why you would feel compelled to get those, if there is no real result?

there is a result, the ones I listed

 

[SomethingUnrelated]

You wouldn't feel remotely compelled to do them

I would

Why, then?

for the challenges, goal, rewards and punishments

Nice one genius...

I was asking why you would feel compelled to get those, if there is no real result?

there is a result, the ones I listed

What you're poking at is the basic fabric of the plot of a video game, ie Character faces challenge, then character achieves goal, and character gets reward or is punished.