Games with great stories

Mickeroo

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Well I don't even think it was done particularly well either. It did it's job but was nothing special and the so called choices that made a big difference made very minor dialogue differences really.

That's simply not true, sure some of the choices amounted to little more than differences in dialogue (

and we all know the very end of the game pretty much didn't take any of your choices into account anyway

) but some of the choices meant life or death for some characters and choices you made in the first game went on to effect choices you could make in the sequels. For example

there was no way for Mordin to live in the third game if you had not killed Wrex in the first game, plus Wrex plays a big part in 2 and 3 but only if you had chosen not to kill him in the first game (and he wouldn't appear in them if you hadn't played the first game too). How you did in the suicide mission also effected story/character archs in the third game too.

That stuff hardly equates to just minor differences in dialogue to me.

degrassinoel

There is always going to be So much hate for ME3.

Shame really, because the story itself and the culmination of all the decisions you made in ME and ME2 really turn this into a masterpiece. The heartbreakingly difficult decisions in ME3 are imo why the game is so brilliant. It dared to make me at least care about NPC's in the same fashion i would if watching them in game of thrones or some epic lotr type film. Personally i think the outcome including the extended cut dlc and all other dlc's including the multiplayer ones were all way above average.

People seem to forget that bioware went out of their way to give the extended cut for free across 3 platforms. For that alone i have a massive amount of respect for them despite them having dayonedlc in the form of 'from ashes', which btw, was included as part of the digital deluxe package, and separetly on day one. Sneaky but it's a money game, and this end to the franchise is entirely worth every cent and a whole lot more if you want a good story.

tldr: Great Story - Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, and especially Mass Effect 3

Mr Freeze

degrassinoel wrote: »

tldr: Great Story - Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, and especially Mass Effect 3

I think the series hit its high point with the Sovereign/Saren Citadel finale, It was amazing. I can't say a bad thing about Mass Effect 1's story.

I think ME2's story was great, and I was glued from start to finish, but I did think the whole Collector Base finale was a bit of a let down, while a great finale, it wasn't as good as ME1.

I won't comment on Mass Effect 3. Fan's are divided, Can't say anymore than that. It's been debated to death already.

Reekwind

Mr Freeze wrote: »

I think the series hit its high point with the Sovereign/Saren Citadel finale, It was amazing. I can't say a bad thing about Mass Effect 1's story.

Was there a story beyond 'go to these three settings, kill everyone there and then have a Hollywood cut scene'?

I was not impressed by ME1

ancapailldorcha

Reekwind wrote: »

Something of a strawman, no? The comparison wasn't with the best that other mediums offer but the best that PC RPGs have to offer. I think that's a valid comparison

Yeah, maybe not a brilliantly communicated thought on my part. I've only played a few PC RPGs but I think other games having better writing doesn't diminish what Bioware accomplished with the Mass Effect trilogy.

ancapailldorcha

degrassinoel wrote: »

People seem to forget that bioware went out of their way to give the extended cut for free across 3 platforms. For that alone i have a massive amount of respect for them despite them having dayonedlc in the form of 'from ashes', which btw, was included as part of the digital deluxe package, and separetly on day one. Sneaky but it's a money game, and this end to the franchise is entirely worth every cent and a whole lot more if you want a good story.

Mass Effect 3 is a great game and the ending is nothing more than a stain to me. However, I'm more inclined to blame EA for the ending as opposed to Bioware. I imagine the game was rushed (judging by the amount of bugs at least) meaning that a proper ending never got to see the light of day. In fairness, most of the various story arcs were satisfactorily concluded IMO.
The Extended Cut means nothing to me. It patches a few things but it was EA trying to salvage the damage the original ending had done to the franchise. They only care about fan opinion until the point where they know the next title will sell.

degrassinoel

Yeah i think the release was rushed too, and like i said i have a lot of respect for BW for giving the Extd-Cut and for free too. What was it, a month after release that they pumped that out?

Tell ye what though, playing through from scratch with all of the dlc's and most if not all of the bugs ironed out is quite an experience. The Citadel dlc is painfully hard get through without a wave of emotion shuddering through ye

Anyways, i'm dragging this off topic and as you've said this has been discussed to death

Grimebox

Well I tried to play through the first Mass Effect twice and got bored at the exact same point both times. Take what you will from that. I was on the way to some Matriarch and then zzzzzzz... I'm sure its great if I gave it another chance. I just found the combat boring and movement to be sluggish.

Gotham

Bioshock infinite does not have a good story. (so many flaws).

List:
Deus ex (the first one).
Final Fantasy 7 (and others of course, 7 is a staple though).
Silent Hill 2.
MGS (not easy to understand at all)
Sanitarium.
Beyond good and Evil (good game even if you dont like the story, characters make it).
Monkey island (1/2/3)
Planescape Torment.

edit: Backing more good suggestions i saw in the thread:
Max Payne (1 anyway, cheese but good)
Baldurs Gate 2

Grimebox

Chrono Trigger is up there for me. All other RPG's at the time seemed to follow the usual formula of evil empire vs band of gifted heroes, it seems like thats the case at first but then it takes a completely different approach. The only distinct bad aspect was that the main character was a mute. I guess the developers wanted the player to feel like they were that character but it didn't really work.

-( i )- Wicker

I loved the Single player campaign in the Modern Warfare series. Maybe not the most immersive characters but some great Micheal Bay moments that'll have you on the edge of your seat.

Red Dead Redemption too, great story.
Final Fantasy VII is always worth a replay.
Haven't played much of Thomas Was Alone yet but seems like an entertaining story.
Portal 1+2, and the Half-Life series.

Reekwind

Gotham wrote: »

Max Payne (1 anyway, cheese but good)

I actually quite enjoyed the story of the sequel. Both are (deliberately) cheesy, obviously, but told with a real character and style that you don't see often in games

-( i )- Wicker wrote:

I loved the Single player campaign in the Modern Warfare series. Maybe not the most immersive characters but some great Micheal Bay moments that'll have you on the edge of your seat.

This is a bugbear of mine. I don't consider any of these to have a story, script or characters to speak of. They've spectacle and set-pieces, yes, but there's a yawning hole where the story should be

johnny_ultimate

Mr.Saturn wrote: »

I'm not going to get into how it was integrated into the actual gameplay, or its value as evidence for the 'game-as-art' crowd, but I do know, that if David Cage had handed Heavy Rain's script, and just the script, in all its variants, into any self-respecting publisher or producer from just about every other line of media: he'd be laughed out the office.

Simple as, I think. Without even needing to mention the few plot-pitfalls that plagued it; the reveal of the killer was just flat-out cheap in its execution.

I mean, if you're going to just use elements that weren't included in the narrative in the first place, you may as well just roll in a mutant donkey as the culprit; at least you'd get points for imagination.

Completely agree. The last hour of Heavy Rain completely undermines everything else the game tried to do, because it becomes evident that Cage was bull****ting all along. It actively offends the audience's intelligence and relationship with the game to present its absurd twist - shattering its own internal rules, but to no worthy end.

The ending can literally make or break any narrative, be it in a game or otherwise, as that's ultimately what your final impression will depend on. It can finally make everything crystal clear even if you were uncertain beforehand, or conclusively reaffirm every impression, good or bad, along the way. It's like Battlestar Galactica - four seasons of glorious television, but everytime I think about it the last episode annoys the hell out of me!

I vaguely recall a few relatively well handled moments in Heavy Rain - all ultimately soured by the revelation that the whole thing is an unintentional joke at the player's expense that is less concerned with internal consistency or basic logic than being an exercise in adolescent pretension.

Grimebox

Reekwind wrote: »

This is a bugbear of mine. I don't consider any of these to have a story, script or characters to speak of. They've spectacle and set-pieces, yes, but there's a yawning hole where the story should be

I don't know, I thought "No Russian" was pretty powerful

ancapailldorcha

Reekwind wrote: »

This is a bugbear of mine. I don't consider any of these to have a story, script or characters to speak of. They've spectacle and set-pieces, yes, but there's a yawning hole where the story should be

I only picked up the Modern Warfare games a few years ago. Considering COD is famous for multiplayer, I expected next to nothing from the single player campaign and was very pleasantly surprised. Nice mix of settings and some recognisable voice actors lending their talents as well.
Also,

Paul Jackson's death (the nuke scene)

from the original Modern Warfare is a scene that will stay with me.

sin0city

returnNull wrote: »

The witcher 1 and 2

Would love to play these. When I get a new PC they'll be the first games I pick up, heard so much about them.

C14N

-( i )- Wicker wrote: »

I loved the Single player campaign in the Modern Warfare series. Maybe not the most immersive characters but some great Micheal Bay moments that'll have you on the edge of your seat

Grimebox wrote: »

I don't know, I thought "No Russian" was pretty powerful

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

I only picked up the Modern Warfare games a few years ago. Considering COD is famous for multiplayer, I expected next to nothing from the single player campaign and was very pleasantly surprised. Nice mix of settings and some recognisable voice actors lending their talents as well.
Also,

Paul Jackson's death (the nuke scene)

from the original Modern Warfare is a scene that will stay with me.

I generally hold up the Modern Warefares as being one of the absolute worst games for anything like story (basing this on the first two, the second was such a slog that I haven't touch a COD since) with "No Russian" being the absolute low-point of the series, if not video game narrative as a whole. It serves almost no purpose in the plot and makes no sense, it's purely there for exploitation and to get some free publicity from people who care enough to complain about it in the media.

The entire thing was just the same "shoot those guys, now move on and shoot the next batch" with the story and the actual motivations for shooting the guys taking a definite back seat. There are no interesting characters and the plot is completely predictable and handled without even really trying for the most part. I couldn't even give a toss

when the nuke goes off in the first one, since I had absolutely no love for or interest in the faceless, voiceless grunt that I was playing as.

It was about as emotional as stomping a Goomba for me.

World at War was a little better, but still just average as opposed to poor.

Sorry for being so disagreeable btw

ancapailldorcha

C14N wrote: »

I generally hold up the Modern Warefares as being one of the absolute worst games for anything like story (basing this on the first two, the second was such a slog that I haven't touch a COD since) with "No Russian" being the absolute low-point of the series, if not video game narrative as a whole. It serves almost no purpose in the plot ...

I've no idea why people say it serves no purpose in the plot when the events of that mission are the catalyst for the plot of the whole campaign (all 4 hours of it).

I never got attached to Paul Jackson but the idea of being able to walk around after the nuke went off and realising you were living your last moments

hit me. I didn't weep at my screen or anything, it was just an interesting moment.

C14N

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

I've no idea why people say it serves no purpose in the plot when the events of that mission are the catalyst for the plot of the whole campaign (all 4 hours of it).

I never got attached to Paul Jackson but the idea of being able to walk around after the nuke went off and realising you were living your last moments

hit me. I didn't weep at my screen or anything, it was just an interesting moment.

Okay, maybe poor phrasing. There are a ton of different ways that the rest of the plot could have sparked and they went with an option that was engineered to be excessively violent and controversial at the expense of having a way that actually made a lick of sense.

Maybe I didn't understand it completely but why exactly would a US agent be taking part in this mission? What could they gain from it? Why not just shoot the other guys (they gladly walk ahead after giving you a loaded machine gun)?

It's revealed after that the entire thing was set up by the terrorist group to leave an American at the scene to start a war but what did the Americans think the Russian terrorists were going to gain from it? The fact that the protagonist is told "no Russian" is kind of a red flag.

Why didn't they tell the Russian government about it in advance?

Doesn't the fact that the only American agent on the scene was shot as well indicate that it wasn't sponsored by the Americans?

How would a bunch of guys with automatic rifles just waltz into an Airport like that and take down the substantial airport security by just casually strolling through?

ancapailldorcha

I'm not denying that Modern Warfare 2 has plot holes but it can't be the worst example of storytelling you've seen in a game. It at least tries to tell a story compared to God of War II/III where you just play as an angry man shouting revenge over and over or Resident Evil.

keelanj69

Playing Ni No Kuni atm and I have to say it has me guessing whats going on.

ancapailldorcha

sin0city wrote: »

Would love to play these. When I get a new PC they'll be the first games I pick up, heard so much about them.

If you buy them on Steam, you can enter your CD key on GOG for free DRM-free copies of both.

Patser

Played through and agree with most of the games mentioned here - really enjoyed the ME series, Dragon Age Origins, etc

But of the ones mentioned Spec Ops: The Line is the one that sticks with me for story. In all others the choices I made were made knowing I was playing a game and trying to do well in the story. In Spec Ops when you start getting load screen messages like 'You're still a good person', 'You can stop playing' - you realise that game is playing you a bit, making/forcing you to make choices you don't like and questioning why you're still playing, just to get to an ending of a game. It's a brilliantly deceitful little game that starts off all gung go CoD, kill em all style and slowly leads you into Why!!!!!! territory.

Pushtrak

I'm really looking forward to playing Spec Ops. It's next on my play list. I bought it a bit over a month ago or so, but am only really getting to my backlog now.

CastorTroy

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

If you buy them on Steam, you can enter your CD key on GOG for free DRM-free copies of both.

Can you do that with all Steam games available on GOG? I think I have a few games in my library that are also on GOG

ancapailldorcha

No, it's just the 2 Witcher games as far as I know. You can get the links from each game's entry on the PC gaming wiki.

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

or you can just buy them on gog and directly support the developers.....

ancapailldorcha

How is buying from Steam any different from GOG? Both Valve and GOG have to be taking cuts and the publisher will be taking any profit before the developers see anything.

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

the witcher developers own gog

johnny_ultimate

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

How is buying from Steam any different from GOG? Both Valve and GOG have to be taking cuts and the publisher will be taking any profit before the developers see anything.

GOG is a subsidiary of CD Projekt Red who developed the Witcher, so therefore more of the money will be channeled straight to the source.