I think a narrative-heavy focus suits some games whereas it doesn't suit others. I've played a lot of visual novels/narrative-heavy adventure games on the PC and DS and I enjoy them. Modern console jrpgs though? A strong narrative can't carry games like those. There is a lot of boring, time-consuming tedious gameplay jam-packed in between the narrative and the narrative in those games isn't that good to begin with. Ace Attorney for me is a fun wacky ride. Hotel Dusk drew me in because I liked the characters, the film noir atmosphere and I wanted to see what would happen next.
Modern console jrpgs have failed to draw me in the same way narrative-wise as of late. And a lot of that has to do with the structure. Boring gameplay can really kill these games so narrative, even if it's good, can't be used as a crutch. Cutscene, boring encounters, cutscene, boring encounters, cutscene, boss battle that might be interesting if you are lucky, cutscene, go to town, go around town talking to people until the game allows you to progress the storyline (I HATE it when jrpgs implement this), cutscenes, rinse and repeat. FF7 and FF8 at the time was like a novel experience for me so they drew me in. But looking at FF7 and FF8 now? I would say those stories suck and those games are terribly overrated narrative-wise. Kaim's Thousand Years of Dreams in Lost Odyssey (which was written by an actual award-winning author so that may be it) were well done but narrative-wise, it seems like most of what's out there is mediocre or stale or just plain bad.
