User blog comment:Damac1214/Why Shooters Need Good Stories/@comment-1854594-20130516061406

I could make my own monster blog on this if I wanted to but I see no point. In short, no matter what the "smart" people say story isn't the most important part of a game, it's gameplay, gameplay can still make a game enjoyable without a proper story (see games like Timeshift and the original Doom plus almost every multiplayer game ever, do games like Natural Selection 2 have or need a story?) however even the most well-written of stories wouldn't work if the gameplay was so utterly broken the game was literally unplayable.

Three of my recent acquisitions for my Xbox 360 collection also adds to this conversation, I believe.

XCOM: Enemy Unknown - May not be a shooter, but this conversation that you are bringing up is something that applies to almost all forms of gaming, excluding non-"hardcore" types of games like Angry Birds. This game is amazingly intense and fun and has a massive ammount of replay value, I have wasted many hours on the game and will continue to waste many more. The story isn't the game's strong point, however, it's the gameplay and the tension you get from playing and having to make hard decisions, if anything you get more of a story out of your experiences then what the game set out for you, similar to the Civilization series. For the most part, you just get an expedition dump from the final boss alien during the final mission, this however didn't hinder the game in any way and it's now my favorite of 2012.

Warhammer 40k: Space Marine - This is an example of a game where the story actually hinders. The action is fun and it's not like the story shouldn't be there but there is too much emphasis on the story, the game is filled with cutscenes, and it's pacing is essentially broken because of how many times it abruptly takes control away from the player for a story that isn't even that great compared to other games that weren't cutscene filled.

Metro: Last Light and Bioshock: Infinite - Here are examples of what you are talking about. Story is what these games are about, sometimes sup-par gameplay asside. It's like a really good interactive film. These games are the reason I have as much love for the medium as I do, as I have a love for story-telling and have always said games are the best tools to tell most of them, and games like Metro: Last Light and Bioshock: Infinite are proof of this. This however doesn't mean every shooter needs a good story, it only means that they are capable of telling good stories.

Also "need" by definition means that it is required. You contradict yourself by your own gaming habits of spending most of your time on Call of Duty's regular multiplayer.