Games with great story but bad gameplay

[Iwata]

Maybe in the way the game plays... but i have yet to see a shooter with better enemy AI, even if they screwed it up a bit in the latest halo

I remember being VERY surprised with the A.I. in the first "F.E.A.R." game. I'd say it's better than the one in "Halo".

 

[Mr F.]

Gears of War 3.

Seriously, that story made me cry.

Gears of War 3 had bad gameplay? Since when?

Will snip this one in the bud, I dont think much of Gears at all and I think the plot is a pile of hilarious wank. But the gameplay is fine. Fun, to a degree. I was making a joke to try and cause mild irritation.

Bahahaha

 

[Cat of Doom]

I'll show my age and nominate the "good" Ultima games (IV through VII - the gameplay of the others was definitely bad too, but so were their stories ) Ditto the first couple of Fallout games.

And then yeah, I'd agree with a lot of the modern stuff above (ME1, Spec Ops, Alpha Protocol, etc)

I'l raise you ultima 8 Pagan. I first played it 15 years after release, so I diddn't play the completely broken version and found the story really interesting and different from the other games i'v played from the series (IX,IIX part one and 2). The game play however, OH BOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY. From broken platforming (WTF), randomly exploding chests, bland boxish world, Awful UI and constant crashing made the thing almost unplayable. See THE Spoony one's review to see just how bad it is.

 

[Nimzabaat]

I'll put a vote in for Too Human. The premise was interesting and I liked a lot of the story, but that horrible, horrible gameplay...

Oh and a vote for Dark Souls. Love the story, atmosphere and everything. But having a character who wields a dagger likes it's 50 lbs killed me... literally.

 

[The Typical American]

I would like to elect Soul Reaver from the Legacy of Kain series. I don't know about the rest of the series, but man, those were some weird control issues restricting the gameplay.

 

[Mycroftian]

Even though I love the game to death, I'd say Persona 4. One of the most engaging narratives I've ever seen, some of the deepest and most likeable characters in gaming, and a cool, unique aesthetic puts this game pretty high on my favorites list. Unfortunately it has a boring turn based combat system and visual novel style dialogue scenes.

I'm also going to put out Asura's Wrath. While I wouldn't call the story "good", I found it laughably entertaining. The issue is the game essentially plays itself, being a 8 hour long anime that occasionally remembers it was supposed to be a game and lets you do a few quick time events that have literally no consequences for failure. I'm reasonably sure there was less than an hour of actual gameplay in the whole thing

 

[Nonomori]

Planescape: Torment, Psychonauts and Rule of Rose. Good games to watch.

In my opinion, Bioware isn't that bad. I'm having fun with Baldur's Gate again, and I don't even like turn-based combat. The first Mass Effect is clunky and imbalanced, but more or less fun when you get used to it.

 

[miketehmage]

Dragon Age. I've only played the first one and the story is maybe a little cliché "oh look we need to kill a dragon". But I think some of the characterization was brilliant.

Utterly hated the gameplay though

 

[Semcat]

Xenosaga 2 - I loved the first game, the story was amazing but it seemed that in the second one they tried to change everything and it just didn't sit right with me

 

[daveman247]

Maybe in the way the game plays... but i have yet to see a shooter with better enemy AI, even if they screwed it up a bit in the latest halo

I remember being VERY surprised with the A.I. in the first "F.E.A.R." game. I'd say it's better than the one in "Halo".

Yeah fears good too, but halo's better. Theres a command structure in halo (all the grunts panicking once you take out an elite.)

Its surprising how few shooters have good enemy AI :/

 

[daveman247]

snip

Yeah the powers were fun in kotor, but the act of using them was still boring - choose from menu and watch. Same problem with the combat. Its definiteley the story/ characters/ choices you play for

 

[Artina89]

Deadly Premonition. I mean, everything aside from the story is bad, but I still found the game to be strangely enjoyable

I was going to mention Deadly premonition, but it is my favourite game and I can't wait for the director's cut to come out on the PS3 *waits impatiently*.

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

Spec Ops: the Line.
While the gameplay isn't terrible, it's rather bland, playing like gears of call of duty.

Have to agree. The shooting isn't in any stretch of imagination, but it's nowhere near spectacular or unique. Uncharted, a similar game (in fact, both protagonists are voiced by the same person) has this beautiful climbing mechanic, good melee use, and okay stealth. What does Spec Ops have? Sand. And sand is not even a gameplay feature, it's more of a scripted event that you can avoid entirely.

 

[BrotherRool]

Planescape: Torment -50% of the gameplay is bad. People are giving off the impression that gameplay is all combat/challenge based, but it's not and thinking of that hurts games in general because designers cram in unnecessary things so it "feels like a game". So the running around, collecting items and talking to people in Planescape was absolutely fantastic. The conversations were interesting, the responses were varied and allowed a lot of choice and expression (Which is why its gameplay. When was the last time you roleplayed a character in a film? It's like the Sims. Expression is a form of interaction). The items had these really intricate descriptions and could be used in lots of situations.

The combat was awful. Through the second half of the game I just ran through the levels instead of fighting anything.

KotoR 2 had a good dialogue system and an excellent influence gameplay mechanic that really helped connect with the characters. Combat was repetitive (animations were good though and lots of AoE spells)


And another vote for FFXIII. And no 50% business here either. 100% of the gameplay was bad and none of the story interconnected with the gameplay at all (barely even had boss fights or character expression through combat) which is I believe, why the really good story did not make up for the gameplay at all. It was like watching a film in the most awkward way possible.

And I don't think The Walking Dead should count because its gameplay was inspired. Last second choices? Having to actual decide who gets rations? Good dialogue options with a clever timing mechanic to make them seem natural? Fantastic gameplay decisions. The puzzles sucked a bit but I think what most people mean is that it didn't attempt to gratify people in a skill or challenge area, but thats not bad gameplay, its just different gameplay to how you were expecting

 

[namhorFnodroG]

Bastion perhaps? The gameplay was somewhat dull in my oppinion, It worked fine but It was pretty repedetive. The story was great thought

 

[spartandude]

Grand Theft Auto 4, well its not actually bad gameplay. just god aweful controls!

 

[RobotDinosaur]

I think the thread suffers from a lack of definition of 'bad gameplay.' I thought The Walking Dead was fantastic and the gameplay was great at supporting the story they were trying to tell. It was peculiar and different from other adventure games, but I wouldn't call it bad.

If you define this as games where the gameplay itself seriously gets in the way of enjoying a decent story... The Witcher 2 managed to get under my skin. Making combat more difficult and tactical than in the first is fine, but they might have swung it too far in that direction - the fight with Letho, and any encounter with more than 3 opponents, can be incredibly frustrating.

Also, Dragon Age: Origins. The Deep Roads quest is long and tedious enough that I almost gave up on the game rather than finish it.

 

[mateushac]

Probably all of Bioware's crap... I mean, I can only assume Mass Effect had a great story since I couldn't get myself to play it out because of the crappy gameplay

 

[Lunar Templar]

I would like to elect Soul Reaver from the Legacy of Kain series. I don't know about the rest of the series, but man, those were some weird control issues restricting the gameplay.

The rest of the series isn't much better.

and its said it took till page 2 to bring up LoK, it was the first thing i thought of

 

[Whispering Cynic]

The first thing that comes to mind is Mass Effect 2, changes made to combat system rendered it tedious, disappointing and overall boring. Biotics are pretty much useless (shielded or armored targets being immune to them is just bollocks), ammo system that makes no sense (all guns use the same clips, but they aren't interchangeable between weapons), the whole gameplay essentially being Tour de Chest-high-wall... fuck that.

The second one that stands out for me is Broken Sword 3: The Sleeping Dragon. A sequel to two point-and-click adventures, which doesn't utilise mouse on PC. If there ever was a shining example of horrid consolitis, it's this. Four directional keys for movement, four others for interaction. No accuracy whatsoever. The game itself isn't bad, but the controls are doing their best to kill the experience for you.