You know, this is why I liked Mass Effect and the Metroid Prime games' stories so much. They don't shove everything in your face at once, and you can decide to know more about a certain race or a certain creature by looking at additional information when you want to (provided in the game that is). Mass Effect's story is simple on the outside, but it gets much deeper when you learn about everything, be it how they use their guns and where the ammo comes from or how they manage warp speed at their current time.

Still, with all that said, the Metal Gear story isn't hard to understand with cutscenes either. Kojima made those cutscenes quite simple, yet they show what needs to be shown. I don't get the many complaints about how he decided to show the story of Solid Snake.

In conclusion? It depends on how you manage your cutscenes that makes them interesting. Otherwise, stick with in-game information.

It's not hard to understand, it's just long-winded and repetitive. In storytelling, a lot of the "magic" comes from that "ah-ha!" moment when you realize a character's motivations, why something happened, or why something is going to happen. Kojima dumps all over that by explaining every little nuance in great detail four or five times during a cutscene.

BTW, I also greatly enjoyed Mass Effect. There's as much (or as little) there as you want. It's a simple, straightforward story that doesn't get in its own way. 

Which tells the better story?

A scene?

Or a simple image?

The scene spoonfeeds me everything, but the image allows me to use my imagination. In the image, I can wonder why there's dirty laundry on a book shelf, why that black man in the corner isn't sitting in a chair, why there seems to be a takeout bag attached to Samuel L. Jackson's crotch, and why anyone thought forest green was a good color for those walls. All of which never came to mind when I watch this scene in Pulp Fiction. Obviously the image wins.

The video?

Saying that an image is telling such a complex story is a bit off I think. It's your mind that's taking what it wants and thinking up all of these things, the image is merely providing you with the opportunity.

EDIT: I don't mean that in a bad way, in fact I think it goes to show that when we ponder these things, ask the questions, and think of the "stories" ourselves, they are much more impactful and give us a time to find out more about ourselves and the way we feel about various things.

Also, just because you watch videos with a simple mind, doesn't mean that someone else doesn't wonder those exact same things about the video that you notice about the picture.

At what point does an image lose it's story-telling?

Lets take an image and now we're going to make it into more of a motion capture and have the camera move around a bit. Now lets add some moving environments... people....sounds...voices....

And all of a sudden it's telling less of a story?

Also, if you go to Art Museums there are short videos in some rooms as well, which I think tell amazing stories. There was one that showed a huge crowd of men running from these crows who were trying to eat them all, and it was like a flight and fight for survival. The men ended up getting into huge hot air balloons and shooting the birds, but in the end the birds destroyed every last one and killed every man. I can't really do the video justice with my explanation....

All of the men where fairly generic and were all black. There were noises and faint sounds of voices, but nothing comprehensible. It was a really figurative and really mind exploring video.

It made me think a lot more and gave me more of an impactful story than most things I've seen in an art museum.

Death to cutscenes!

Except sometimes you can!

Also there is the problem of where you win a fight... like in two three blows... and then the cut scene after everyone is suddenly out of breath.

Or a battle where you fight the comic relief, and almost everyone dies... but everyone is making fun of the comic relief after.

That reminds me....

While playing through ToV for the first time last week, I had an impossible time trying to beat some of the first bosses in the game. The third boss (I believe) took me roughly 20~ tries to complete, and it was so ****ing ridiculously hard.

During the "battle end" scene where everyone in my party comments on the fight and it shows your performance, money, items, extp, etc. all my party members were talking about how easy the fight was, and someone had the balls to say "He didn't even put up a fight!"

I almost punched my tv. :P Well not really, but you get the idea!

TOV was actually my recent inspiration.  My girlfriend and I are cooping it and i let her play through the early parts... and she had like almsot died, so i had to take over... and like beat the two goons you fight.... just very barely.  Yet the story acted like it was an easy win.

I loves me some cutscene, but the way Fable 2 did it (dialog, mostly) and the way Half Life 2 did it (now, I realise why many called it the best game ever) really make me reconsider my preference.

I take each situation differently, but I still prefer cutscenes. They're like a reward for a job well done. Half Life's style is unrelenting, and (while absorbing) doesn't give me a moment to rest.