So, I recently had a huge debate on my facebook about Pokemon games and nostalgia and such. I won't open that can of worms because that would lead to an entirely different debate. However, during this discussion, one of my friends said the following:

"Then I discovered the world of storylines, which was a lot more like being the main character in a book or movie, and now it's really hard for me to want to play it for more than 20 minutes if it doesn't have an intriguing storyline. 

Sure, I can play the latest MarioKart or Soul Caliber, but storylines are where my interests lie. Graphics, battle systems, and all the rest matter very little to me unless they interfere with my ability to do what I need to do to carry on with the story. Then they just make me angry."

This got me thinking about video game stories and reasons to play video games. A lot of my friends, her included, talk about their favorite video games and a lot of them cite how amazing the stories are/amazing character development/et cetera and, well, that really confused me.

I play video games for fun. I like challenge and adventure and puzzles and the like. (I'm a huge platformer fan!) I do, however, play a lot of RPGs, but the more I think about it, I begin to realize I hardly play a game for it's story. Some of my favorite RPGs are the Mario RPGS (Mario&Luigi, SMRPG, Paper Mario). None of these have an 'amazing deep storyline', but have more of a basic story line and some of the best comedy I've seen in a game. I enjoy RPGs that don't take themselves seriously and have excellent gameplay(like the Mario ones do!).

I'm also a huge fan of the Tales series. Now, this might seem silly because Tales games are very story driven, which is true, but a lot of the fun I get out of the game is the combat. In my opinion, the battle system in the Tales games is one of my favorite in any video game I've ever played. The story is nice and interesting, but not the reason I play it. Even with Final Fantasy...my favorite one is IX and the story in that game isn't that deep or involved. It's simple and straightforward and helps continue with the game. 

So, I come to you asking, what video games have you played that truly have great stories. I've played A LOT of games and none of the stories really pulled at me. I never really played a game that made me think the story was comparable to an actual book. If I want a good story, I'll read a book. I play video games for fun and challenge. Maybe I haven't been exposed to an excellent story yet?