| richardhutnik said: Before I begin, I want to say storytelling here refers to everything connected with telling a story. It isn't only the execution of the telling, complete with cinematic direction, good voice acting and dialog, and other things noted in stories and movies, but the fact the story is good. In the off and on checking of the best-selling games, particularly the most recent sales numbers (see here); http://www.vgchartz.com/worldtotals.php The closest game I can see anyone arguing for would be a Grand Theft Auto title at 16 (as of my writing this). Outside of that, I don't see where people would argue that Super Mario Bros. is great storytelling, not a cart game. And GTA is a sandbox game, which then argues people get into it to do mayhem, so then I drop down to Modern Warfare 2, and isn't that noted for the multiplayer? Would anyone argue that the single player for that had great storytelling? Oh I personally can say it executed well, but the story stunk with a lot of loopholes and an inane plot twist that made no sense. And World of Warcraft? That is an MMO with a developed world, but what story is it trying to tell? And then Halo? Isn't that just for the multiplayer? Ok, then we get to Final Fantasy VII, which I can say is argued to be real good storytelling. It is in the 40s currently. Did I miss anything else here? Anything higher than Final Fantasy VII in more sales, because of storytelling? Ok, that is sales, but how about longevity? What games can you name that have longevity in replaying, because of good storytelling? What games get replayed because the storytelling is real good? Lastly, it is tricky to separate sales numbers and longevity from popularity. I guess here would be the cultural impact that a game has. I do see this more so, such as God of War getting its own 7-11 drink like Halo. Cosplay has people dressing up as a number characters from different games, so maybe this would be a place where you see an impact of good storytelling. So, in short, anyone have their own thoughts on this? I would argue that storytelling may have an impact on popularity of characters, but not as much in regards to replaying a game, or sales. Anyone else care to give input here? |
I won't speak about sales, but I routinely replay games such as Psychonauts, HL 1 and 2, ICO, SOtC, Uncharted 2, Planescape, Zelda: OOT and MM because of their storytelling.
I even fire up emulators to play textual adventure games from Infocom and Magnetic Scrolls.
Not with the same rhythm with which I can replay a pick-up and play arcade title, but still enough that I would never sell them - because I know I'll replay them when the right tickle comes up, just as I re-read my books and re-watch my movies.
I'm the first to admit that I'm probably in a niche together with my friends who do the same, but it's a very solid hard core stemming more from computer gaming of yore than by arcade or console history.
