Watch_Dogs, Titanfall, and Destiny’s Failures Prove That Stories in Video Games Matter

"For a whole year my desktop’s wallpaper has been the Traveller from Destiny. Aside from it just being pretty to look at, it made me look forward to enter a new world by Bungie. I mean we’re talking about the same guys who did Halo, which alone managed to come packed with its own lore and universe. But today my desktop wallpaper has been changed to Shadow of The Colossus which is still pretty to look at and made me look forward to playing it again."

[nicksetzer1]

Yea, two of the best selling new IP ever (watch dogs, destiny) and the number one selling xbox one game. Absolute disasters....

[Bodge]

Yeah they sold well, but that doesn't make them better games.

[JAT]

Yeah ... some games don't need a great story.

Example Diablo3 ... why even try?

Destiny doesn't need a good story, it's a coop-loot based game.
All it needs is a great premise that unfolds slowly ...

What it needs is CONSTANT updates to keep it fresh.

WatchDogs however, is a story based open-world game.
It needed one ... BAD

[Eddie20101]

Still selling well and being played a lot, doesn't necessarily mean they are bad games.

[guyman]

Sheep buy into hype. Just because a game sold well, does not at all mean the game is any good.

[hulk_bash1987]

Right but just because a game didn't live up to the hype built around it, it doesn't make it a failure or a bad game either.

[FPS_D3TH]

By that logic I'm guessing Kim Kardashians got one hell of an amazing game then huh? Success does not equal a great game. But you are definitely right, they are not failures to the publisher by any means. But I ask, how many of your friends are still playing Titanfall? If anything these games are indicators of how much hype goes into marketing these games and how many people bought into them because it. I am now not holding my breath for the Division or any game for that matter. The past 5 years have been pretty bad for hype vs expectations vs actual gameplay. Been that way since Dead Island for me (great game IMO but not what I was expecting)

[Roman3mPiRe86]

That's why I would recommend renting the game first for at least a few days and then make a decision whether it's u r type of game or not.

[Letthewookiewin]

The story is horrible in Minecraft, what a failure!

[gunnerforlife]

Yeah true, and yet they wouldn't get in majority of gamers top 100 let alone 50. There's a reason why TLOU was a success, story matters within a fame, no matter how awesome the MP is.

[Austin48]

agreed story does matter.

[mamotte]

Obviously. Just look to Wii Sports.

[700p]

Yeah none of these games failed. They all sold great and many people like them.

[ChronoJoe]

I think we should also bear in mind that last gen, early on we experienced titles like Assasins Creed which garnered similar 'average' critical ratings (between 70 and 80 on metacritic). Look at that franchise now, it's easy to see how a large studio can turn a good, but flawed game into something with more universal appeal.

[starchild]

The gaming community is neurotic. Over and over I hear that gameplay is what really matters, but as soon as a game isn't a narrative driven game it is suddenly deemed to be "soulless" and, by extension, "crap".

Personally I like a good narrative in games. I also like good atmosphere and visuals. To me these things are a very enjoyable part of videogames. But that doesn't mean that every game has to excel in all of these areas.

There are great games that don't have the best graphics...actually there are some great games with horrible graphics. There are other great games that have almost no narrative or a very bare-bones narrative yet are very fun to play (Demon's Souls might be an example). There are even games like Dear Esther that have almost no gameplay to speak of, yet are still engaging and enjoyable thanks to their storytelling and atmosphere.

The point is, games can be many things. They don't all have to have all of the same ingredients in exactly the same proportions.

[otherZinc]

I'll never buy another game that doesn't have a single player focus again.

TitanFall was the last & I won't buy TitanFall 2 if they pull the same s**t. And for Destiny, no splitscreen co-op.

That's why I like Halo & Gears. The games are great and can be played by yourself & Campaign
Co-op via Splitscreen.

[Hammtweezy2192]

For me, the stories get me into the game and keep me involved in it. I enjoy good stories and think that there just needs to be more depth to most of them (Watch Dogs, Ryse, Titan fall, COD, BF4, Etc...) All of the previously listed left me wanting more depth to the story in order to really pull me in. Destiny I don't know about yet as I just started it. I still think they are ok games and fun to play but the winning combo I think comes down to, as stated above GREAT GAMEPLAY and a deep story. JMO.

[smolinsk]

More of what The Last Of Us did please:)

[OpieWinston]

More of what Gears did.

Decent story
Amazing Gameplay
Strong Co-op/Competitive experience for hours of replay value (Beast Mode/Horde Mode/Multiplayer/Co-op Campaign)

I like The Last of Us but it had weak replay value. So no thanks, I want more replay value less "Shock value".

[Lionalliance]

....are you serious?

[Ravenheartzero]

What?

[ChronoJoe]

No thankyou, not another terrible Gears of War plot. The co-op is nice though, I do like games that offer the 'whole package' so to speak.

Gears has a rather dry storyline, The Last of Us has no co-op. TLoU could perhaps benefit from some co-operative play for factions, and Gears could benefit from some more capable writing, although it's premise itself is a little generic so it's hard to escape rather natural pitfalls.

[Outthink_The_Room]

I love how people talk about TLOU like they didn't break up gameplay constantly with cut-scenes and long drawn out linear tasks.

TLOU had great performance capture, which was achieved with pre-rendered cutscenes. Linear hand-holding structure doesn't leave much gameplay since everything has to be tightly defined.

Saying the TLOU should be the symbol of the gaming world is the absolute worst thing we could have.

All companies going forward will achieve better performance capture. Tech will advance where even smaller devs can have film quality capture.

Take away the pre-rendered cut-scenes and tell me if the characters are as believable. Joel was believable because of performance capture, not because of some average script.

Tech triumphed in TLOU, not the story telling method.

[gamernova]

I liked watch dogs and Titan fall. Destiny is an fps and I would think that just like cod, you don't get an fps for a story. You get it for competitive gaming. Watch dogs wasn't great but it was interesting. Titanfall is a lot of fun too. People spend more time talking crap than actually gaming nowadays.

[FPS_D3TH]

"You don't get an fps for story. You get it for competitive gaming"

Nope, I'd have to strongly disagree with you there.

You may not get a CoD FPS for story, as most people buy it for the competitive multiplayer, but there's nothing competitive about the incredible Half Life series. What about the story heavy, single player only, survival horror FPS Metro series that's getting 9s and 8s even before the Redux edition and has zero multiplayer beyond a level with a leaderboard for completion time. What about the newest Wolfenstein? What about S.T.A.L.K.E.R.? Bioshock? Dishonored? Thief? Far Cry? Crysis (I name the last two because hardly anyone buys those for multiplayer)

Don't get me wrong, there's definitely a demand for competitive fps games like COD/Halo/ CounterStrike but there's still a hell of a lot of people buying their games based on story alone too and as for myself if the story isn't good and the gameplay is only average ill end up passing on it cuz there's so many better games out there. However, I'll finish a mediocre game if the story can pull me in, like Spec Ops: The Line or metro 2033 for 360. (ughhh redux is soooo much better *pc can't handle it*) On that note though... Where the hell is half life 3 already...

[gamernova]

Yeah, you're right but I was talking about multiplayer fps games since you know, that is what this article is talking about (minus watch dogs). Man, we are all waiting for it. Valve can't count to three though. Ugh!
But yeah, I should have been more specific. Sorry about that.

That list brought back a lot of good memories. The bioshock trilogy was so good! Especially if you play the episode dlc on bioshock and you see the elizabeth story that takes place before the original bioshock. Pure awesomeness.

[pwnsause_returns]

thats like saying that I want Half-Life 3 just to crow bar the hell of people in Deathmatch...

[Clown_Syndr0me]

Not necessarily.
Counter Strike and BF2 never needed good stories and they're awesome.
I'm sure there are more but I cant think right now, I'm tired.

[zsquaresoff]

Story over multiplayer anytime.

Last of us, mass effect, arkham asylum and Gta over cod, battlefield and titanfall any day.

[ChronoJoe]

Just maybe it's possible to appreciate both types of games.

I like Batman, but also like Destiny, I like both of those games for different reasons. Does that not make sense?

[No_Limit]

Titanfall failed? Since when is an avg. 86 on Metacritic a failure? Titanfall never claim to have any story. That is like saying single player only game failed because it has no multiplayer mode. Destiny is a game that suppose to have both and from what I heard both the multiplayer and story are avg. at best. scratching head at the Title.

[ChronoJoe]

What does metacritic matter if it doesn't sell?

Not that Titanfall is a failure, I think it under-performed commercially but still did pretty well. However I just wanted to highlight the first port of call when gaging success really should be sales figures, not arbitrary metacritic numbers.

[starchild]

Wait, we have a bunch of people above saying that sales don't matter. And now you are saying critical reception doesn't matter either? Then what matters?

I mean, it's obvious we all have our own taste. But beyond that, how do we gauge how good a game is in general if not by review scores and sales?

[ChronoJoe]

If were judging a game as a success or failure then sales matter.

If we're judging a game on a hypothetical best objective measure of how good they are as a game, then arguably the best objective measure would be aggregate critical reception (but with consideration to range and standard deviation).

If we are judging a game on what to buy for ourselves, then all that is relevant is how much fun it is for us individually which can be inferred through a combination of demos, trailers and the opinion of others.

That's what I think at least.

[starchild]

Ok, we're on the same page. I agree with all of that. Well said.

[starchild]

Yeah, if I listened to the loudest voices in the gaming community I would have to come to the conclusion that Titanfall, Watch Dogs and Destiny are horrible games. Which is very far from the truth. All three games reviewed pretty well and I personally enjoyed Watch Dogs and Titanfall and will probably enjoy Destiny when I get around to playing it.

[Dudebro90]

None of the glaring issues with any of those games are the story. It's the lack of variety in game play that make the story feels worse.

Destiny has repetitive gameplay with a huge lack of mission variety. The multiplayer lack maps and is extremely unbalanced.(whoever on bungies teams thought keeping the class supercharge abilities in multiplayer should be slapped)

Watch dogs hacking mechanic became nothing more than a gimmick that didn't really change the game, so it felt repetitive about half way through.

Titanfall had a huge focus on multiplayer but lacked enough game modes to keep the multiplayer feel fresh, nit to mention only 15 maps for a multiplayer game only is not good value.

[Blackleg-sanji]

Heres what I dont get tho the other two mentioned still got high scores, honestly if I had to pick the only scores I agreed with are watchdogs. Titanfall had less content no single player and was overhyped. Destiny from my point of view just doesnt have enough content and the story could use work (but it has one) so how is destiny getting 6's

[Einhert]

Compare The Last of Us to these games.

It completely destroys them because the gameplay goes hand in hand with the narrative.

None of those games have solid narrative, Destiny has good gameplay but without the narrative it feels pointless and there is no incentive and the factions/lore is never explained so it feels alienated.

This is why The Last of Us Remastered is the best Next gen game.

[FPS_D3TH]

If you don't know the incentive to playing destiny then I don't think you've played it yet. Everyone knows it's to find better loot/gear and make a stronger character to become *ahem* "legend" ( sorry I puked a little I'm my mouth, that lines so cheese). And last of us is great but hardly much of a remaster with it being a year old and nothing extra beyond textures and frame rate boost. Had they waited a year it could've been a ps4 launch title and the silly "remaster" thing wouldn't exist, and for last of us I don't think it deserves that title, should just come out as last of us (ps4 edition if anything). GTA5 for new gen is just GTA 5, not GTA 5 remastered lol. Metro redux is hands down the best remaster to date, even if you're not a fan of the game.

[SpiralTear]

Nah, I think the low reception has more to do with the industry over-indulging on hype and the games failing to deliver on that astronomical level of expectation. The story seems like a contribution to that hype, but not so much that it matters more than anything else.

[error13]

Watch dogs was so underwhelming for me, I had high hopes and I hyped it up to my friends and family, but I was left disappointed.

[Dannylew]

the failure is the people that read shit reviews.

only an idiot can say that destiny is not a good game.

and.. the same idiot likes halo.

watchdogs is only "slow" in gameplay...
titanfall is complete shit... but it's completely normal because all microsoft exclusive is shit.. microsoft buy shit just to prove that have lot of money. classic for a USA corporate. quantity over quality is the claim for this compny.

[Imalwaysright]

Not necessarily. I'm expecting Bayonetta to be one of may favorites this year and I'm not holding my breath on the quality of its story.

[46889337]

Implying that three of the best selling new IP's are "failures". Gotta love the nonsense hyperbole coming from game journalists begging for clicks.

[Subaruwrx]

I really liked Watch Dogs. The story and characters may not have been top notch but they complimented the game play. I played that game for over 80 hrs - good bang for my buck.

[S2Killinit]

im loving Destiny's story. not sure why the media is trashing Destiny but I'm pretty sure its because Bungie held the reviews back to when the game was released, meaning that the critics didn't get their cut. they are upset and want to make an example of the game so others don't dare not bribe the critics in the future.

On that note, its really interesting to see the gamers who are more prone to sheep like behavior. Jumping on the "bad game" bandwagon because the pissed off critics tell them to.

As for me, I'm loving the game. Especially on hard difficulty which brings me to the only critic of the game. The "normal" should be called "easy"

this game has been one of the best bang for my buck games this generation.

[Tedakin]

Titanfall is one of the best reviewed games of the year. I don't see how it's a failure. People just like to say it is.

[Maxor]

Watch Dog is actually playable without grinding the same missions over and over for gear, and you won't have to spend dozens of hours to get to the "end game" for it to get good.

It doesn't belong in the same sentence as Destiny. It's not pure garbage.

[BLKxSEPTEMBER]

All these so called "failures" are million plus sellers. If thats a failure then please show me what a winner is. I swear these headlines will make you go into cardiac arrest...

[DarXyde]

In my opinion, stories matter, but not as much as we're probably imagining they do. The only fighting game with anything resembling a good story IMO is BlazBlue. What racing games have great stories? I know I didn't imagine the crazy fun I had with Burnout Revenge on X360 or Mario Kart 8. Story isn't necessary, but if there's an emphasis on it, it better be done well (The Last of Us being the expected example). I don't speak for everyone, but the story in Final Fantasy XIII's entries were actually pretty decent. The soundtrack was great and the battle system is heralded as the best in the entire franchise in many circles. So why was it poorly received?

Developers should worry about investing too much into a good story though. Unless it's absolutely amazing, they risk destroying a game's replay value. The magic of not knowing what happens disappears before long and suddenly the game is not so interesting anymore.

[jontrueno]

Failures? Really? I dont know why everyones trashing Destiny. I can't leave my PS4 since it came out, along with 4 of my best friends. Maybe its not for everybody, but not every fun experience has to be a ground-breaking innovation, In my meaningless opinion.

[Phar0ahad3]

To be completely honest since The Last Of Us came out video games just dont feel the same for me ...............Devs gotta start trying is it really that hard to have 20 cut scenes in a game ? with a fe voice actors just get some youtubers to do the voices there talented and cheap.

[AgentSmithPS4]

Not all the time, BF4 had forgettable SP but that wouldn't've mattered any to me if the MP would've been better from the start. And story can't fix bad balancing, poor design choices, bad AI, etc...

[Zero-One]

1. Unless you're Nintendo, then it can go both ways.
2. They've gotten their returns, their on the best-sellers list, and we all know they will be on SOMEBODYS 'game of the year' too.
They may not be perfect, but calling them "failures" is WAY too harsh of a word.

[Ninver]

I thought we came to this conclusion with TLOU. It's the best story in a game I have ever played in my personal opinion. Also the like of old FF games prove story matters. Gameplay is also important ofcourse.