Are video game plots/intro's necessary?

[The Curmudgeon]

As technology advances, video games are becoming more and more stylized, not only in the terms of how they look when they're being played, but also in how they're presented. Movie style intro's, Hollywood grade talent providing the voice overs and often with an in-depth, layered plot.

Question is - do games REALLY need them?

It's not something I do myself, but I know people who just don't watch any of the opening titles or plot developing cut-aways. Maybe it's a sign of today's "now now now" culture, but I know a lot of gamers who just skip the shit. And, really, are they missing anything?

Mrs C recently got a new 3DS with (surprisingly) the new Mario game. Know what the storyline and intro to THAT is? Mario is walking along when a letter floats down from the sky. He opens it, it's a picture of the Princess in Bowser's evil clutches. Mario runs off the screen. Begin game. That's it. Compare that with the fucking torturous, can't skip intro to the RPG-like Paper Mario and, really, it's still the exact same story anyway.

So where do we stand on all of this? Do games need long, expensive intro's? Do they add anything to the game itself? Or do you click on the "START" button as soon as the game is loaded?

[trashcanman]

For me it is plainly and simply the reason I'm still a serious gamer. Watching the genre grow as one of the premiere storytelling mediums has been just amazing to me. There's a reason that gaming profits are leaving Hollywood in the dust. Games like GTA4, Arkham City, Mass Effect, Elder Scrolls, Fallout, Dragon Age, Resident Evil, and even shooters like Call of Duty and Halo give you all of the lore and stories and characters of tv and film, but allow you to participate firsthand. And when it's done right, the results are often stunning. So much innovation going on too. Remember way back when Sephiroth fucking killed one of your party members in Final Fantasy 7? People fucking freaked out. That shit was not done. It just wasn't. Not in video games. Grown men cried, and a generation of frustrated gamers were taunted throughout the game with items intended for the deceased healer they had to make do without. One of gaming's biggest urban legends (which persists to this day) was born out of the fact that people simply did and could not believe a game would completely kill off an important character like that. It made the stakes of the game personal in a way that had not been done before.

Then there's Mass Effect. Play these games if you want to know how far storytelling can be pushed in a mere video game. If I was offered a free screening of The Avengers AND the Dark Knight Rises today or a copy of Mass Effect 3, there would be no competition. Both Mass Effect games were better and more rewarding over 30-40 hours than any film can be in 2-3. The story outcome literally depends on your actions. YOU get to make the big decisions, and those decisions can cost you friends and lives. Also, decisions and relationships from one game carry over to the next installment and are supposed to pay off big in the upcoming trilogy closer. That is a level of interaction and immersion film can't compete with.

Catherine was fucking outstanding as well. A mature horror tale about sex, commitment, and the terrors of accepting adult responsibility wrapped up in a seriously twisted and challenging nightmare puzzle game mixed with RPG-like social interaction that seriously makes you think about life in a way that solves the "videogames as art" argument for good. LOVED IT. But without the killer story, it would be nothing.