My take on the subject. Some games only need gameplay to be good. Others rely on both great gameplay and storytelling, and there are even rare games that relies almost purely on story.

I will admit I did push it a bit in what I wrote: "What kind of story does Portal have?" But the focus of the question was to focus on exactly what a story is, which is part of the discussion in this thread.  What I see with Portal is the following:

1. A set of goals, in a progressively harder set of game levels that are well designed.

2. A player character who doesn't talk (is a puppet for completing puzzles), and an antagonist character (GLaDOS) who gives you witty banter.  As you play, you learn more about GLaDOS (revealed through monology by GLaDOS), and scribblings on the background.

3. A game ending with a cut scene.

4. A detailed game environment, that has a feeling of realism to it (that does grow increasingly absurd).

What I don't see is a forced plot on the game, to make it tell a narrative.  What I do see is a series of puzzles, with the GLaDOS dialog added for entertainment value.  And I would say the lines start to get blurred here.  This blurring I believe would enable Portal to be transformed into a possible full story.  The series of Cube movies show this is possible. 

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I'm not getting you anymore. There clearly is a plot and a story in Portal, though the player is not forced to get interested in it nor even to understand or get all of its elements. This can't be argued over in good faith. There is clearly a timeline, a set of events, a change in how you -the player- consider the situation and your guide/antagonist. GLaDOS is not a timeless comic relief: as I said in a previous post the order in which you're presentd with the situations is meaningful.

The narrative clearly added much to the enjoyment of the game for some players. The fact that you can happily play the game without any consideration for the narrative is a testament to the quality of the puzzle gameplay, but it doesn't take anything away from the rest.

So are you saying that since some players enjoyed just the puzzle elements, then the narrative wasn't needed, or that there wasn't one? Because neither point stands. I wouldn't have enjoyed Portal nearly as much if it was just a series of puzzles of increasing difficulty order with no background and no narrative evolution. Thus the story was needed for me and for other players to consider Portal a great game instead of a very good one.

It seems that you have a very different view of what a story in a video game is. It explains a lot of things that I thought was wrong with your original post. Most of Portals story is happening inside the head of whoever playing the game, and for me that's an awesome way to do it. But even if you don't discover that part while you play it's impossible to say it's not there. It's a clear narrative, only not the usual way of telling it. Just listen to the premise:

'You awake in a sealed chamber in some sort of laboratory to the sound of a homicidal computer entity and made to go through a series of tests. Using all your skill you need to survive while searching for a way to escape and take the fight to the core of the malfunctioning computer.' Does that not sound like a story to you? You could find worse briefs on the back of just about any action movie. The story has clearly defined parts, such as the initial orientation, escape and buildup, all leading to the final climax.

 If you seriously thought Portal doesn't really have a story, I can understand how you could think that games do not need stories. But the narrative in Portal builds atmosphere, it gives the player purpose, it puts everything you do in context and it controls the pacing. If you remove the story the entire experience would lose it's cohesiveness, and it would fall apart.

I would also argue that even most of the games that have no background story is given a narrative through the experience of the player. Take Counter-Strike for instance. It doesn't have a story per se, but it contains an excellent framework for creating your own story. It has a clear beginning and end for each round, it has clear goal (defuse/set the bomb, Protect the VIP....). I could tell you tons of stories from CS about being outnumbered and sneaking around to finish all my opponents, defusing in the last second, awesome kills, spectacular failiures etc. These story-elements are all things that heighten the experience, and one of the main reasons Counter-Strike is so popluar. Compared to Deathmatch games, CS had a richer narrative that made the experience more immersive.

My initial impression of "story" was a forced narrative with game elements around, that used the game elements to tell the story. What you are seeing, from me, is a discussion of games with stories, and posting on here my thoughts. You are also seeing my considering things. My initial post wasn't meant for me to dogmatically argue anything, but to start a conversation. I happen to believe though that not all games have stories. However, I believe that there is working being done to improve the use of games as a narrative device, causing exactly how a story is told to be blurred further between it and what are traditionally called "games".

In regards to "games don't need stories", not all games do. Games that focus on trying to use games as a narrative device need games to tell a story. I will standby, as things are, that it isn't the story itself that makes the game good, but the fact that the story-game hybrid has good gameplay. If you, for example, took the same set up and environment from Portal, but didn't have a good physics based set of puzzles, how good would it be?

I was also saying how that if an environment is rich enough, players can create their own stories in it.  There isn't anyone writing the story, but the players create it.  One can debate whether or not players created stories is a game having stories in it.  I was saying it wasn't.

They aren't really needed. I was playing through Mass Effect recently, found the gameplay to not be as enjoyable as I thought it would be (I'm sure many like it, different strokes), noticed that some others have shared my view and noticed that the common response was, "you don't play Mass Effect for the combat, you do it for the story and taking a part in that story." This is something that doesn't sit right with me. I can appreciate what Bioware accomplished. But I would rather just play a dungeon crawler. And if I want a narrative-heavy story I'd rather play a visual novel (where the "game" is pretty much an entire cutscene with dialogue trees). For something like Mass Effect, it just comes off as tedious to me to go through combat I don't enjoy just to uncover more of that story (and it doesn't help that I'm not a sci-fi buff either). Stories in video games can enhance a game but in most cases it won't make a crappy game good unless it's pretty much almost completely fused in with the gameplay (like say Phoenix Wright or Hotel Dusk are. Phoenix Wright's gameplay isn't exactly all that exciting but if you dig the characters and the story, you'll dig the game. That's just how it goes).

I agree that games dont need a complex, intricate, or even good story or plot. But modern games (post Sony and FFVII?) are all about capturing "cinematic" sequences. Its saddening to see this form of entertainment try to clone itself into another. I, personally, vote for PLAYING a game, and not WATCHING one.

Course a solid story does make one want to continue to "play" the game, so it does on occasion serve as a catalyst for play, but games shouldnt rely on the story to get people to want to play.

Plenty of games can have lackluster stories and be good games. But that doesn't mean games (as a whole) don't need stories. Some games focus their entire concept around plot and character interaction (aka a story) and just tie in concepts like gameplay and player interaction on top of the narrative.

So the short counter-example to the opening post is that not all games need stories, but some games do.

Examples of games like that would be The Longest Journey, Dreamfall: The Longest Jorney, the Syberia series, Indigo Prophecy, Heavy Rain, Snatcher, Policenauts, Flower Sun and Rain, etc.  Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid arguably count as well.