Quote:
Originally Posted by OutOfTheCube
Hmm, imagine that…
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What are you trying to say here? This isn't a dichotomy where either "games can be ruined by gameplay" or "games can be ruined by story", but both cannot be true. I happened to quote DoubleF's post and cite my own example of a game with a story I liked being ruined by what I subjectively though to be bad gameplay: that doesn't mean I still don't think your posit that "games can't be ruined by story, because stories are 'inessential' to the medium" is nonsense. In fact it's a perfect counterpoint: the only reason that game was worth playing is
because of the story. The story 'makes' that game; it's ridiculous to me to believe that story cannot also 'break' a game.
DoubleF brought up
TLOU2 as perhaps what you're hinting at about "people complaining about a story ruining a game". A selection of my own thoughts about it are as such:
Spoiler!
Quote:
Originally Posted by timun
I have heard the first and second game's themes being contrasted as "what one man would do for love" and "what two women would do for hate (or vengeance)".
[...]
I recently completed Part II, and I won't lie: I didn't even want to finish the game's final conflict. I think that's why, at least in part, the second game was received somewhat controversially. Ellie makes regrettable decisions that I as player did not want to carry out. The whole point of the two games is ultimately, to me, to be left wondering "is the decision this character chose 'right'?" Joel's choices in the first one to mow down the Fireflies, save Ellie, and lie to her about it are interesting ones because it begs questions like "could he have found another way to go about this and not kill all those people?" and "if he truly loves Ellie, can't he find a way to tell her the truth rather than straight-up lie about it?", and of course "what would I have done if I was in that situation?" And I liked that the second game's narrative tied directly into this and showed that even in a post-apocalyptic world these sorts of choices have consequences.
But that said, the second game consists of a series of choices that I—and I think a lot of other players—absolutely would not have made. Or at least eventually, after a certain point, I wouldn't have made them. Joel's choices were somewhat limited in that he had few options, and critically I felt like he never would have had the option to walk away. Ellie and Abby could have walked away from their respective vendettas at pretty much any time, and quite purposefully didn't. I as player didn't want to go through with the game's actions and story near the end, because I would have walked away. And I think that's really bad storytelling, when you put a controller in a player's hands and make them go through with something they are half-heartedly doing for the sake of the game's completion.
It was also quite difficult for me to sympathize with Abby in the first place, not just because of the narrative jumping back and forward in time and thus not presenting as cogent a storyline as they could have, but because of the choices she makes being... awful. With Joel I felt like he was ultimately a 'good' guy who did 'bad' things, whereas there was a lot to dislike about Abby aside from her actions against Joel/Ellie. Even within her own friend group she was a bit of a POS, especially her relationships between Mel and Owen. |
All of that said I think
TLOU2 is, like
Uncharted, a perfect counterpoint to the idea that "story is inessential to making video games":
if not for the story I wouldn't have played it in the first place. It had great gameplay, there was nothing wrong with the gameplay, but the only reason to play the game—and the first
The Last of Us—was the story. The story was the overarching, central reason to even pick it up. So, logically, if one didn't like the story, then it's perfectly reasonable for that to be the reason why they didn't like the game.