Best Video Game 1988-1994 Round 3

[Blarg]

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FF6 losing (and by such a large margin) indicates to me that people simply haven't played it. There is no way that people who have played both games to end could even possibly have 20% that say SMB3. I think SMB3 is a top 10 game all time, but the ONLY thing it edges FF6 in is revolutionary stuff.

FF6 had better plot, music, theme, etc. SMB3 was "revolutionary"....then again so was FF6.


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LOL. you are trying to compare plot.. as if the plot means a damn thing in Mario 3 / any platformer game? In that case, RPGs should sweep every match I guess.

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Length or complexity does not a good story or plot make. RPG's would definitely not have the lock on good stories. Just long and complex ones.

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Blarg is correct. I'll indicate this in future threads with a BIC. However, I think that the size of the story's vehicle can help good stories play out to their fullest, and thus be their best. I think it's easier for a great story to come to fruition in an 800 page book than in the confines of a 2 hour movie, and moreso in an 80 hour game.

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I immediately thought of how Stephen King drags out stories painfully to make whopping fat books absolutely stuffed with filler, and how clean and sweat an economical short story can be.

And I then thought of all the people reviewing RTS's according to their story, calling them "revolutionary" because of this or that in the story or disappointing because of some other thing. I'm a huge fan of RTS's, but to me this is like rating pornos on the plot. Who the heck even cares? It's the gameplay that's the thing, and especially against other people.

I think what makes most games good is a good interface, good game mechanics, and a world that is good for what you can do in it on your own, without being guided. I've loved many games that have been criticized for their plots, which either most people or nobody really cared about at all - DOOM, Descent, Everquest, Total Annihilation, etc.

To me, plot is okay in a game, but it's mostly a passive aspect of the entertainment, what you'd get and enjoy while watching a show. When playing in a world, you make your own plot, and the plot at any rate is almost always of almost no consequence. You're there for the nailbiting decisions and action and pride and fun of doing something in the game really well. Plot? Meh.

In the rare game like Half-Life, it can matter, but mostly I'm too busy playing to care about a plot. I'd guess something like 1% of Everquest players knew more than a fraction of the plot, and it was by far the most successful RPG of all time for years on end.

I think plot has more than trivial significance for the average player in just a small(though sometimes high selling) segment of the gaming market, say in adventure games like Myst. Which probably 100 times more people bought or were given than actually played it much.