Summary
Sometimes, you can’t get the best of both worlds in terms of equally balanced and terrific gameplay and story. Not every game’s narrative can be as pleasing as Uncharted 4, TheWitcher 3, orRed Dead Redemption 2, but you shouldn’t count games out just because of that. Sometimes, the gameplay is beyond epic and can completely overshadow the story.
It’s actually a great thing for developers to show off their chops and make a well-designed, polished game, even when it is at the cost of the story seeming a bit lackluster. Fun gameplay is very important, and not every adventure has to have award-winning writing in order to deliver peak entertainment.
Publisher(s)
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Like the films the game is based on, 2015’s Mad Max is more memorable for its setting, riveting gameplay, and vehicle mayhem than its actual story.While Chumbucket is an excellent companionand there are some emotional story moments during Max’s journey, the actual storyline is pretty weak and predictable, with a villain that doesn’t live up to the ones in the film series.
The gameplay, however, is incredibly immersive and detailed, transporting you into the brutal wasteland and making you feel like you’re playing a new Mad Max movie. The VFX for the destruction of the cars and environment, the car customization and upgrades, having to fill your vehicle with gasoline and have Chumbucket repair it, as well as scavenging for food and watermake the experience realistic.
Made by Avalanche Studios (Just Causeseries) and published by Warner Bros. Games, the hand-to-hand combat is also extremely visceral. You feel every attack, and the game uses the Batman Arkham method of combat.
Days Gone is probably one of the most underrated zombie games, not because of its story, but rather for its unique and inventive gameplay spin on the genre. There exist better post-apocalyptic narratives from PlayStation with more well-written protagonists than Deacon St. John, likeThe Last of Usand theHorizonseries, but the zombie carnage is unmatched.
The infected AI (called Freakers in the lore of Days Gone) behaves like the rats inA Plague Tale: Innocence and Requiemor the zombies in World War Z, swarming you in massive hordes for you to escape and pick off. You also have the post-apocalyptic Pacific Northwest setting of Oregon to explore, and being on a motorbike and feeling like Daryl from The Walking Dead makes for badass gameplay.
No, it’s not ‘all about Eve’ and her jiggle physics as to why Stellar Blade is ending up here. It’s a sci-fi story crafted by a studio clearly influenced byNieR: Automata,yet the plot is not as compelling. Luckily, Stellar Blade makes up for that with its stellar gameplay.
Where the story fails to stick the landing, the core game loop is enough to keep you entertained. The enemy designs and UI are stylish and original, and the combat and graphics are very satisfying, an impressive feat for a debut title. It’s a sci-fi hack-and-slash reliant on boss fights with alien creatures, and you’ll find it to be a much more enjoyable experience than PlayStation’s other complex and confusing sci-fi game, Returnal.
Although theDishonoredseries and Prey from Arkane Studios measure equally in both story and gameplay, Deathloop is all gameplay and offers very little sustenance if you’re craving the same type of storytelling. This is mainly because the premise relies ona time loop mechanic of you having to die over and over againon a quest to kill eight Visionaries on the island you’re trapped on.
There is that sense of mystery and waking up not knowing what’s going on and being thrust right into the conflict, but the main character and game systems far outshine the main story.In addition to a clever upgrade systemthat ties well into the time loop design and having the extra obstacle of Julianna Blake spawning in-level to sabotage you in a duel, the combat abilities and weapons are BioShock meets Dishonored.
You might never understand Control’s story or the mind-bending and thought-provoking ideas and worlds Remedy creates, but you can’t deny its gameplay isn’t purely outstanding. All of Jesse Faden’s abilities as a parautilitarian (one piece of the highly complex puzzle of the story), whether it’s throwing objects at Hiss enemies, using her service weapon, levitating in the air, or interacting with Altered Items, are brilliantly executed.
There are very obscure concepts and pseudo-scientific jargon from Dr. Casper Darling and mysterious and weird bosses and entities like ‘The Board’ and the FBC’s janitor, Ahti, who may or may not be the gatekeeper to interdimensional travel. The follow-up game, Alan Wake 2, does a much better job of balancing both and helping weave some of these materials together, but Control remains an undefeated supernatural third-person action game.
Interestingly enough, our Executive Editor at TheGamer, Jade King, wrote a piece analyzing BioShock Infinite’s storyand concluded it’s “one of the worst stories in video games.“Again, it’s a case where the game had potential with really excellent ideas regarding the important topics of race and religion, but the overarching narrative and multiversal twists didn’t do it any favors and didn’t make it land as well as the first game.
Instead, BioShock Infinite’s Columbia proved a much better environment to explore and engage enemies in, and Elizabeth added a lot to the gameplay both as a character and her abilities as a companion. The Sky-Hook and rail system traversal is a nice feature, the Vigor abilities add fun new dynamics that some Plasmids didn’t, and the time tears that change the environment are such a thrilling mechanic way ahead of their time.
Sucker Punch is a PlayStation studio that’s not really known for its narrative masterpieces in the way Naughty Dog, Santa Monica Studio, and Insomniac are. They focus largely on giving you an immersive gameplay experience with very neat and original combat, as the Infamous series has shown, and now with Ghost of Tsushima.
In our 3/5 star review of Ghost of Tsushima, TheGamer’s Peter Glagowski writes “The basic story is incredibly predictable and rarely exciting.” While it may be a solid samurai sim with remarkable combat design, including duels and even a black-and-white cinematic Kurosawa Mode, and stunning scenic environments, you’ll find the story largely blandand lacking any real historical significance.
Don’t expect a narrative to the scale ofBaldur’s Gate 3orSkyrimwhen you get into the high fantasy world of Dragon’s Dogma 2, because that’s not ultimately the core aspect of the game. The story is not that in-depth and extravagant, but the traversal, world map, enemy creature AI, companion AI, and combat system are.
The Pawn system is one of the best and most inventive gameplay elements any game could include, allowing you to customize each companion’s appearance, throw them, or have them catch you in their arms if you take a fall. Then, you can get a Cyclops to make you and your party a bridge, get dragged away by wolves, or fly atop a Griffin while slaying it,not to mention all the Vocation options for the Arisen.
The Last of Us Part 2 took some big swings with its story (literally if you’re in Joel’s shoes), but the narrative foundations are ultimately very weak and reaching, merely created for the sake of telling another story in its universe. All of a sudden, the random Firefly doctor Joel kills becomes a very important character and creates this whole new plotline to explore themes of revenge. It’s certainly not quite as organic as the first game’s plot.
What you do have with The Last of Us Part 2 is phenomenal gameplay that entails an expansive apocalyptic playground of stealth and extremely detailed and realistic animations and gore. There’s also plenty of suspenseful level design and set pieces, featuring new enemies and bosses like the Rat King, and the PS5 remaster has even more gameplay to offer with Lost Levels and a No Return roguelike mode.
FromSoftware is a master at crafting rich visual landscapes, whether it be the gloomy Gothic city of Yharnam inBloodborne, the Medieval fantasy landscapes of Elden Ring,Dark Souls, andDemon’s Souls, or the historical Sengoku period of Japan inSekiro: Shadows Die Twice. And populating these worlds are also some of the most wondrous and extraordinary boss designs you’ll ever see.
That’s the distinct signature FromSoftware sets out to create with its Soulsborne line of games. Though there is plenty of supplementary lore you may search for, and the environments tell their own story sometimes, the punishing gameplay and countless defeats are truly second to none and are the main lure and highlight of these titles.
