MGS series is all about story and stealth.

As a fan I love the msg story and was one of the primary reasons I played all games. MSG1 gameplay was groundbreaking with stealth... with time the gameplay became dated. But any fan of MGS played the game for the story.

If you dont understand the story, didnt played all games or simply dont like complex stories in videogame, then of course you wont like MSG.

MSG story range from politics, eugenics and genetics, technological advancements, cyborgs etc. Is not a hollywood story.... and that what makes interesting.

Go watch 007 and stop complaining of something you dont understand.

I am not complaining.  I just said that MGS has some of the best storytelling in the industry.  I guess you weren't talking to me though.

I find it weird that the mainstream are more open to video game with non-Hollywood stories than movies with non-Hollywood stories.  I mean, look at MGS and FF.  They are bestsellers to this day.  Yet, a movie with a non-Hollywood story tend to be box office bombs.

IM THE ANTI SNAKE!!!!!

Don't be silly. Some of us loved Metal Gear Solid because of its perfectly crafted gameplay mechanics, inventive use of the hardware, the way it interacted with the player, and having some of the best boss fights in the business. The writing and story, he over preachiness and the stereotyped characters and what passes for foreshadowing and cleverness? Those have always been the weak points of the series.

The problem with Metal Gear Solid is that it's a wonderful game, but a terrible movie, and there is a lot of movie in those games.

But Hideo Kojima isn't developing it (I think he's producing it?), and the accusations are that the game won't feature the original gameplay.

Don't be silly. Were Lord Byron's poems poor because they were short poems? Was 2001: A Space Odyssey a poorly written film because it did not have a lot of dialogue? Stop equating the amount of dialogue with the quality of the dialouge - they are entirely different things. I won't waste my time on you if you persist being so belligerent.

In this case, I agree Mario's games are not the height of Nintendo's narrative excellence, but I still did not bring them up. I was referring more to Zelda and Fire Emblem, which certainly would fall under the blanket of "Famous Nintendo games (with better writing than MGS)."

I'll pop in to second this - Aonuma's pet projects in particular (Majora's Mask, Wind Waker) are much better from a narrative perspective, and Fire Emblem is worlds better in terms of characterization.

Kojima just needs a better editor, that and there are always going to be quirks when translating Japanese to English. Don't like it? Then go play some game written by a westerner, and don't be surprised if the writing is still crap. Frankly, the best prose in a game this gen was during those interludes in Lost Odyssey.

Lord Byron's poems aren't videogames with a few words sprinkled here and there. They're poems, creations of word and sound and nothing else. Of course the writing is an important element in a poem -- it's all there is!

Is there prose, poetry, or dialog in a Mario game that would be worth looking at on its own merits? I always thought one of the main characteristics of the mario games was its focus on simple storytelling with often a total lack of writing. The metal gear solid games, from what I've heard, involve scripts comparable to a really long and wordy movie. And I'm pretty sure what people are doing in this thread is looking at the writing independent from the games, and judging it on its own merits.

Anyway, I'm sorry -- I had to speak up. That comparison seems a little ridiculous.



I can't join in the pile-on about the writing in Metal Gear Solid because I've basically never played a Metal Gear game. I'm glad the first one just showed up on PSN, though. Maybe I'll start from the beginning... wish me luck :)

I'm sorry, but what is the issue here? My point was merely that quantity, or complexity of plot, is not the same as quality of writing, even in pure prose like poems. You can't write something off simply because it is brief, or light on dialogue - what dialogue there is there can still be well written, yes? - which Akvod seems to think.