OMG! Faris is a woman!! Damn you Kain, you turncoat! Damn you to hell! What? You mean my father isn't dead after all? And he's being controlled by the demon statue?! Damn you Jaquio! I guess Super Joe never made it out in time. Too bad. Hey! Wait! Don't go back in there!! OMG! Samus is a woman!! 007 373 5963 Sweet! Jimmy is the Shadow Boss? No way! Wait a sec.. I recognize him. That's Garland! WTF? Red Falcon is a chick??? Awesome. I finally found the princess. Another castle? F$@K!!
Second to Chrono Trigger. Also Secret of Mana and Final Fantasy 3 (6 in Japan). Maybe it was my generation (I don't keep up with video games much anymore), but those story lines really got deep.
neverwinter nights 2 in terms of immersion in the story baldurs gate 2: best crafted villain in any game ever
The real number one game is one that I can't really remember the name of. It was an early IBM game maybe 386 DOS era. The game started out where you were a rock star, and some how you ended up in the back alley of the club, and there were some old Negro league baseball players out there. There was this vortex thing that kept changing you to different locations. At one point there was some generalissimo character that had you prisoner I think. It was so bizarre and so very cool. Of course it was all text so the whole thing was story driven. Ones that I have a more concrete memory of are: Fallout 2 Balder's Gate KTOR These in no particular order
Planescape: Torment Of all the games I've played with great stories (The Half-Lifes, System Shocks, Bioshock, Shenmue, Max Payne, and so on), nothing has ever come close to Planescape: Torment. It was an RPG released back in 1999, and won all sorts of awards. It never really became very commercial successful though, and I have never met anyone who's played it. The game's setting is very different from the traditional Northern European, Middle-Ages realm -- the Planescape world is very harsh, abrasive, and urban. Your character, "The Nameless One" is immortal -- in the game, you uncover how he became immortal and why. When "The Nameless One" "dies", he loses his memory, so he's tatooed instructions on his body, and begins the journey of discovering who he is -- this is where you begin. The game features a TON of dialogue, and the dialogue choices you make have a notable impact on the game. You'll meet a bunch of characters throughout the game, and as the game progresses, you'll learn about a lot of people "The Nameless One" has known in past "lives". The characters have so much depth, and such interesting back-stories, that they stay with you long after the game is over. I really can't recommend this game enough -- if you have time to play it, you won't regret it -- Check out the Wikipedia Page
Chrono Cross is my favorite game of all time of any genre, and I have to say it features both my favorite story and favorite soundtrack. Xenogears had an absolutely fantastic plot as well. And hey, really, I loved the plots of a lot of RPGs... that is the point after all... props to FF7, FFX, & Chrono Trigger. The Xenosagas viewed as one game had a pretty dang good plot, too... Okami wasn't too shabby for an action game, and Def Jam: Fight for NY's story was amazingly good for a fighting game. This actually makes me think of another question though, which I might even make a thread on later if I get curious enough... but who was the greatest videogame villain ever? I feel that Xenosaga and FF7 both made an excellent living plot-wise off the strength of their villains more than anything else. Sephiroth is obviously a landmark villain... probably the consensus greatest videogame villain ever. But damn... for me Xenosaga nearly matched Sephiroth, between Albedo and Wilhelm. And hey, Luis Virgil had a pretty strong showing in episode 3, I thought. XS just did villains very well, for some reason.
I'll vote for this one as well. The depth of story, characters, world, etc. was absolutely amazing. I was completely absorbed into this game like few others.
Good choice. Jade Empire had a pretty decent story. I really liked the end of Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time Marathon 2 was a great story, especially for a shooter. I thought Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader was very interesting, set in kind of an alternate history. BioShock was good, with solid storytelling and a very interesting setting. I loved the original Fallout, not so much the story, which was very simplistic, but the setting, especially all the cartoonish Vault-Tec art.
I forgot about Planescape: Torment. That was an awesome game too. It's the only game where you could beat the "boss fight" through just dialogue, but only if you really knew the story, your character and the npcs.
BTW... is anyone up to the challenge of identifying all the games in my post at the top of this page? I'm thinking someone like AntiSonic or even Crisco might be up to the task...
FF7, FF3, Xenogears, Snatcher, Chrono Trigger, Vagrant Story, Suikoden, Phantasy Star 1 +2, MGS 1+2+3, Secret of Mana, POng, Pac Man, Bomberman, Mega Man, Strider, Bad Dudes, Double Dragon, Gradius, Contra, Space Invaders, R Type, Initial D, Valkyrie Profile, Hot Shots Golf, Nba 2k, Wii Sports, Doom, Half Life, Wolfenstein, Hexen, Quake, Sim City, Goemon, Animal Crossing, Castlevania, Ninja Gaiden, Streets of Rage, Street Fighter 2, Mortal Kombat, Killer Instinct, Primal Rage, Virtua Fighter, Magician Lord, Cyber Lip, Nam 1975, Allstars Baseball, Tecmo Super Bowl, Jay Chou, Jolin Tsai, Leehom Wang, Alan Luo, Charles Ying, S.H.E., Super Mario 3, Metroid, Tetris, Dr. Mario, Sonic, Night Trap, Afterburner, Space Harrier, Captain Commando, Final Fight, Nba Jam.
