The topic here being Metroid: Other M, no? It is interesting to see the contrast in the two ideals from the Prime series, which were all about building the larger story around the little fragments that the game actually forced you through.

But inevitably it's a different kind of story that you'll tell with one method vs. the other. Such types of storytelling can rarely overlap, in that Morrowind would've had to be different if you tried to hedge an FF-style story on top of that world, and likewise the story of a game like Metal Gear or Other M, for what it *is,* has to be told that way

I would think that the techniques you use to tell the story depend on the story you have in mind, in that you say "this is the story i have in mind, now what techniques should i use to impart it," and not "i want to make a cinematic/non-cinematic game, now what sorta story should i do"

I'm pretty sure we're discussing games, not movies. Why are you mentioning MGS? :P

I'm kidding of course, even if the MGS series went downhill before it even reached the top.

THe perfect example of story-telling in games is either Portal or Half-Life, though for me Half-Life takes the cake. Bioshock also did the story-telling right, but the gun-play wasn't up to standard so I never got past the third hour.

Super Mario Bros? Story during gameplay?

I just went out to eat 20 minutes ago Khuutra. If I laugh too much I might throw up.

So what's your opinion on how best to tell a story?

Not something worth being shared in this context.

How about now?

I will have to say, that deus ex, mass effect... has cutscenes though not long ones. But probably have as many cutscenes as the other games. They just added interactivity to it to help the pacing.

For example. I feel Xenosaga Episode 1 has a much better story than the mass effect series. (I couldn't play 2 or 3 because the gameplay was so bad.) But the pacing was bad, and the cutscenes were obscenely long.

However, Mass Effect's 1 2 story, the interactivity makes up for the story. and the gameplay is miles ahead of xenosaga's.
edit: I'm not implying Mass Effect's story is bad as 1 is good, and 2... is barebones with good characters.

Also, the relationships in mass effect/dragon age is unique, granted there's limited amount of outcomes, but more outcomes than just one.

Now out of those choices I'd obviously choose Mass Effect 2 over xenosaga.

However, my 4 favorite games are FF8,10, Deus Ex, and OoT. and the way those games tells stories is quite different well FF8 and 10 are the same
but Deus Ex is wordy as hell but interactive.
FF tells it with cutscenes/non-interactive x button pressing
Ocarina of time, tells a very simple atmospheric, not wordy story. Oddly enough, I played final fantasy 8 because it was listed as a RPG at the time in EGM as zelda was and when I got it I was like wtf.

I love them all because they're different. I don't think there's any specific ways it needs to be done. And if devs started doing it all one way it would be boring. Or maybe evolve the genre... I am not a psychic.

However, there are ways for each of them, that can be done well and poorly.

There have been plenty of good games with good stories with each many different ways... some with cutscenes/text galore (xenogears), your favorite JRPG whatever it is most likely, MGS series. some interactive but wordy as hell games deus ex, planescape torment. Some atmospheric with less text/words such as , zelda, shadows of the collosus, half-life 2

now some of the ways might not fit the tastes of everyone. So you might not like the games I listed, but you can't deny that many people do like that method of storytelling.

yes but you pressed x a whole lot. I mean, instead of watching people talk.. you instead pressed x and read text.... if you like that's more that's fine... it's just in most jrpg's pressing x with text boxes was replaced with in game cutscenes etc.... like Xenogears. Is just as wordy as Xenosaga. Instead of pressing x... there's cutscenese galore.

Some cutscenes aren't bad, too many and too long ones are, if they are used to somehow remedy to dull gameplay. I can concede an exception to interactive movies openly declared as them: although I don't like the genre, in that case the importance of cutscenes is central.

Even thought the story told in it is very simple Metroid Prime 1 it's an example of story and gameplay completely bound toghether, there are almost no cutscenes and no dialogues.

In normal games cutscenes and dialogues other than contain the game plot, are also used to tell you what you have to do in the game and why you have to do that, MP works in the opposite way, in MP is the gameplay that directly tells the story as you play, it's your own curiosity to go on exploring as a player that makes you go on in the game, a while you do it the plot of the game is told by just observing the enviroments, your opponents and reading information with the scan visor, even in these cases it's your own choice as a player to read all the lores and datas, about what happened to the planet it's not narration forced by cutscenes or a mandatory dialogues with some guy. I don't know if you have played it, if not I guess it's difficult to understand what I'm trying to say.

I really like cutscene, I play mostly games that have them (RPGs). The PS2 era was great for my gaming taste. Usually, more there is cutscene in a RPG, more I like it :P.