Why do people claim FPS have bad Story?

[Hawki]

Between the Slayer's testaments, the nifty codex entries for the monsters, the interesting characterization for the doom slayer (He's a rampaging nut, but not outright a maniac. There's lots of little moments that give him some added depth), and the intentionally cringy holograms that really sell just how insane the UAC became, and how fun Samuel was...There was enough that it kept me interested and wanting to know more. I'd say that's pretty good writing, especially for a game that's a throwback to "Guns over here, demons over there, kill they ass".

Not going to disrepage someone for getting enjoyment out of a narrative, but per the above points:

-Lots of games have codex entries - that isn't exactly unique to Doom. Now, bear in mind, I actually like codex entries as a way of fleshing out a setting, but they shouldn't be the be all and end all of fleshing out a narrative. The codecies for fleshing out the demons/UAC? Sure. They work. I think the Argent D'Nur/Wraith thing towards the end feels underdeveloped and thrown in at the last moment, like the writers were making everything up as they went along, but maybe it's functioning as sequel bait. However, that brings us to the issue of the Doom Slayer...

-Jim Sterling said that the Doom Slayer, despite never saying a word, is more fleshed out than most FPS protagonists. I certainly agree that he has more character than some FPS protagonists, but I don't think he can be called that fleshed out a character, or at the least, the fleshing out of his character isn't done in a manner I'd call "good writing." Almost the entirety of the Doom Slayer's character is fleshed out retroactively, as in, the characterization comes from reading codex entries about stuff that he's done in the past. There's a saying in writing that (paraphrased) "if you aren't writing about the most interesting time of your character's life, why?" Doom 2016 arguably has a mechanical/branding answer for that (wants in on Mars, with the UAC), but not a narrative one. To quote another saying in writing, "show, don't tell." There's far more 'telling' about the Doom Slayer than what's being 'shown,' in regards to backstory/character development. Because the Doom Slayer certainly doesn't undergo any personal growth in the story. Not that many FPS protagonists do, mind you, but I don't see people singing their praises in the same way as the Slayer.

So, within the narrative itself, what about the Doom Slayer? Well, I can think of three actual moments where he receives characterization. First is at the start of the game, where he throws the screen away when Hayden's talking to him, and thumps out the elevator panel when Hayden talks to him again - his gaze drifts to the UAC employee body at said elevator at the time. Second time is where he punches out the argent conduits rather than following Hayden's instructions. Third is towards the very end, where he saves a backup of VEGA. You can read into these actions how you want, but these are three moments of a ten hour game. THREE. There's all this talk about the Doom Slayer being fleshed out through his actions, but those actions are few and far between. And on the subject of his silence, since Quake Champions confirms that he is indeed the same Doomguy as the original series, why ISN'T he saying anything? I presume Hayden is actually talking English, but while this isn't the fault of the game per se, in retrospect, I'd argue the revelation actually weakens the Slayer in the game.

(Also a pet peave that 2016 is the series's second reboot, because Id can't seem to do anything with Doom's narrative beyond "demons invade Mars, but that's a separate issue.)

-On the subject of the holograms, that's another issue for me, because the game can't seem to decide on what tone it wants to set. At the very start of the game, everything's being treated quite seriously - Mars has 'gone to Hell,' the Slayer has awoken, and in the broader context of things, this is a serious situation. Hayden treats it seriously, Pierce treats it seriously, VEGA treats it seriously, and the Slayer, far as I can tell, is treating it seriously. Yet the holograms keep popping up with moments of "listen to these and laugh!" Except I'm not laughing, because the tone of the holograms is so at odds with the tone of everything else. I'm not saying that a serious story can't have moments of levity (if anything, I think it should), but this is beyond moments, this is in the realm of tonal whiplash. Doom has been both tongue in cheek (Doom 1/2), and serious (3), but 2016 can't seem to decide what it wants to be.

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

I think people are underrating the stories in games like Call of Duty and Far Cry.

Black Ops 2 had a story I was interested in and it had continuity with Black Ops 1.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

Sturgeon's law: 90% of stories are crap.

Personal videogame corrallary? And that's when they try.

 

[Squilookle]

People say FPSes have bad stories because whenever they try to aim higher and tell a thought provoking story like in say, The New Colossus, people like you pounce on them and tear them to shreds

 

[Casual Shinji]

People say FPSes have bad stories because whenever they try to aim higher and tell a thought provoking story like in say, The New Colossus, people like you pounce on them and tear them to shreds

That story was pretty crap though. And I say that as someone who loves the previous game's story.

 

[B-Cell_v1legacy]

People say FPSes have bad stories because whenever they try to aim higher and tell a thought provoking story like in say, The New Colossus, people like you pounce on them and tear them to shreds

That story was pretty crap though. And I say that as someone who loves the previous game's story.

not only story. both wolf games are pretty crap. one of the worst FPS released this generation.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

People say FPSes have bad stories because whenever they try to aim higher and tell a thought provoking story like in say, The New Colossus, people like you pounce on them and tear them to shreds

TNC seems like a bad example to me. TNO had a story worth telling, about the costs of fighting and the reasons to go on (as exemplified by the side arc of Wyatt/Fergus, where both struggles with the fact that they feel inadequate to continue the fight). BJs personal arc is about the fatigue of fighting a never ending battle, where even great victories end up having little effect.

TNC though? It retains the vestige of TNO, with BJs suicidality in the first half of the game. But it eventually drops that to deliver a fairly standard rise of the resistance story. TNC makes some good points on various topics on its' way through (like the sheer horror of Nazism, everyone's ability to contribute something etc.), but the story itself ultimately cuts a lot closer to a standard Exploitation movie of the 70's (from which TNC derives most of its' style) then it does the more thought provoking story of TNO.

It is an enjoyable romp and a serviceable story, but if it was a movie it'd be rightly dismissed as dumb action-schlock.

 

[CannibalCorpses]

Only filthy casuals like first person shooters

The story can be as shite as it wants, it's the piss easy mechanics and very short game length that cripple the value of the FPS genre...that and the complete lack of any progress or innovation since the quake/doom/duke days when they added the ability to look up and down. You can try to defend them all you want but basically the only thing that got better was the graphics and sales.

 

[Bilious Green_v1legacy]

Because the most high profile FPS are CoD and Battlefield, and the stories in those are ass, so people tend to extrapolate that mediocrity onto the entire genre. There are FPS with good stories, but they're nowhere near as well known as the big franchises, whose plots are mostly made up of stuff even Michael Bay discarded as too stupid.

 

[Souplex]

Why do people claim that water is wet?

 

[MrCalavera_v1legacy]

Who are those people? I don't really disagree with them, but who?

Deus Ex 1 imo has best story second to Mafia 1 and its kinda FPS if not pure FPS.

Not really, no. You can beat the game without shooting a gun once, afaik.

 

[Smithnikov_v1legacy]

Ya know, I would have been inclined to defend you if you'd used Undying as an example of a good FPS story, but since you didn't, I'm not.

 

[sXeth]

As mentioned, it varies pretty case by case.

You can carry an FPS a little more easily on raw moment to moment gameplay, where if you distilled an RPG to the same, you'd mainly get either a brawler or a strategy game. So there is a tiny nudge to an FPS having less need of a story.

In a historical sense, the FPS is 10 years(ish) behind the RPG. It makes sense that they'd be behind the evolution curve. As mentioned in my prior post, Ultima to Ultima 5/6 when the narrative started appearing propely was ag ood 5-7 years. Take that over to FPSes, and while Doom didn't come out so much, 1993-1997/2000 does see a similar jump in adding storylines to FPSes.

The other main factor is the popularity and mainstream push of FPS games. The reasons behind why FPS games are a frontrunning genre is a whole other threads worth, but when they were getting pushed out every year (or more), they obviously suffer from a lack of proper work on them. RPGs have always been more of a niche, and don't come out as fast as the demand isn't there, giving them more time to refine their sotryline. Doesn't always equate out to a better package, but is more likely to.

 

[Bobular]

Aren't System Shock, Deus Ex & Prey all RPGs more than FPSs?

Half Life & FEAR I'll agree have good stories for games (I haven't played Metro), but they were years ago, there hasn't really been a pure FPS that had a good story to it in ages, at least not one I can think of. Most FPS stories are just a cliched excuse to go from level 1 to level 2, I think that was most obvious in the reboots of Doom & Wolfenstein where you jump around from one area to the next with little tying you to the last place.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I dunno, why do people claim 5 is a higher number than 4?

 

[JohnnyDelRay]

Because the most high profile FPS are CoD and Battlefield, and the stories in those are ass, so people tend to extrapolate that mediocrity onto the entire genre. There are FPS with good stories, but they're nowhere near as well known as the big franchises, whose plots are mostly made up of stuff even Michael Bay discarded as too stupid.

I'd say pretty much this. Most people don't think about Metro and Deus Ex when you mention FPS games, so unfortunately the blanket statements that are made about FPS tend to come from the more widely played military shooters.

Besides, people don't think of Deus Ex as an FPS because it has more RPG elements in it than many other games, including some RPGs themselves. But the greatest FPS games in story telling still beg to differ, which is why I'm not even sure this statement of people claiming their stories suck is that warranted (I've certainly never heard it).

Half-life, Bioshock (no matter how much you hate it), STALKER, System Shock, etc. Heck, one of the best gaming stories I've ever played is Vampire: Bloodlines but I've never really thought of it as an FPS, more of a RPG by far.

 

[Hawki]

You can carry an FPS a little more easily on raw moment to moment gameplay, where if you distilled an RPG to the same, you'd mainly get either a brawler or a strategy game. So there is a tiny nudge to an FPS having less need of a story.

ARPGs are a thing though.

Off the top of my head, there's Torchlight. Now, I like Torchlight - like it enough that it's in my top 10 RPGs list. However, that's purely based on the merits of its gameplay. If I were to judge it by its plot however, it would be absolute garbage.

In a historical sense, the FPS is 10 years(ish) behind the RPG. It makes sense that they'd be behind the evolution curve. As mentioned in my prior post, Ultima to Ultima 5/6 when the narrative started appearing propely was ag ood 5-7 years. Take that over to FPSes, and while Doom didn't come out so much, 1993-1997/2000 does see a similar jump in adding storylines to FPSes.

Marathon came out in 1994 - that had a pretty decent story (least at the time) for a 'pure' FPS.

TBH, I don't think it's a matter of evolution, it's a matter of mindset. Doom, for instance, originally had a fairly intricate story, but it was gutted during development. I'm kind of projecting, but I have a feeling that the mindset is that story is pretty important to an RPG, while for FPS (at the time) it would be an unwelcome distraction. I do think that an FPS can work better without a story than an RPG (mostly), but while less so than the Gamergate days, there seems to be more hostility to narrative in FPS than than other genres.

 

[sXeth]

In a historical sense, the FPS is 10 years(ish) behind the RPG. It makes sense that they'd be behind the evolution curve. As mentioned in my prior post, Ultima to Ultima 5/6 when the narrative started appearing propely was ag ood 5-7 years. Take that over to FPSes, and while Doom didn't come out so much, 1993-1997/2000 does see a similar jump in adding storylines to FPSes.

Marathon came out in 1994 - that had a pretty decent story (least at the time) for a 'pure' FPS.

TBH, I don't think it's a matter of evolution, it's a matter of mindset. Doom, for instance, originally had a fairly intricate story, but it was gutted during development. I'm kind of projecting, but I have a feeling that the mindset is that story is pretty important to an RPG, while for FPS (at the time) it would be an unwelcome distraction. I do think that an FPS can work better without a story than an RPG (mostly), but while less so than the Gamergate days, there seems to be more hostility to narrative in FPS than than other genres.

Well yeah. ID's mindset was all about the technicals. And Apogee(later 3dRealms) as their partner mostly used story as a hook to sell you the next 2-5 episodes of a shareware game.

You could carry an RPG on the technicals, arguably thats how shallow open-worlds are succesful nowadays. They impress with size or fidelity despite their shortcomings. Not that we have shareware anymore (other then occasionally with Episodic titles will let their first installment go free), but the couple of cases I can remember of RPGs using that format ended up being very weirdly designed for it (Exile/Avernum for instance, had this weird case whee an entire half of an overworld map was gated at one spot, which was the shareware barrier was).

 

[Warhound]

You will find that a lot of people who claim things like CoD and such have terrible story have never played the games, they just spout it off because its the popular thing to spout off. You can spot them when they claim things like the Modern Warfare triology is all american military wank when if they had played it for more than a few minutes they would know that 90% of the time the americans incompetently dancing to the villain's tune and just make things worse while its the europeans bouncing around the globe trying to actually fix shit.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

I'd say pretty much this. Most people don't think about Metro and Deus Ex when you mention FPS games, so unfortunately the blanket statements that are made about FPS tend to come from the more widely played military shooters.

Besides, people don't think of Deus Ex as an FPS because it has more RPG elements in it than many other games, including some RPGs themselves. But the greatest FPS games in story telling still beg to differ, which is why I'm not even sure this statement of people claiming their stories suck is that warranted (I've certainly never heard it).

Half-life, Bioshock (no matter how much you hate it), STALKER, System Shock, etc. Heck, one of the best gaming stories I've ever played is Vampire: Bloodlines but I've never really thought of it as an FPS, more of a RPG by far.

Metro: 2033 also takes the plot wholesale from the book, which might explain its' good storytelling. It is also telling that among the games you list as great FPS stories, more than half are RPGs, one is a spiritual successor to an RPG (BioShock) and one is the early prototype for survival games (STALKER). That RPGs tend to have above average stories for games is pretty well established, even when said RPGs dip their toes into the first person view.

I think it is pretty important to distinguish between story and storytelling in these discussions. Half-Life and STALKER have piss poor stories (Aliens invade Earth after failed science experiment and brainwashed dude has to get rid of his amnesia) but their storytelling is really cool. STALKER lives on the fact that it can sell you its' story by having you read old documents in abandoned science bunkers while Half-Life is one long showcase on how to tell a story through environments and sparse dialogue. Games like Wolfenstein: The New Order succeed because its' story has a theme and message and because it manages to hammer them home in moment to moment gameplay.