Poll of the Day > What is the best story told in a video game?

(+) Yeah! (+)

How you qualify "best" is completely up to you, but please explain your reasoning. I'm curious as to what you think!

tetris

---

Probably FFT:WotL for me (never played the original).

It's just a really compelling story with a really well handled villain. Been too long since I played it to give a super detailed explanation.

Also has my favorite game quote from the villain after being told his dream isn't worth all the killing and stuff. "What troubled sleep have you known to speak of my dreams?". Ooh thats just such a good villain line.

---

Barbie Horse Adventures has a stunning narrative that gripped me from start to finish

---

YoukaiSlayer posted...

Probably FFT:WotL for me (never played the original).

It's just a really compelling story with a really well handled villain. Been too long since I played it to give a super detailed explanation.

Also has my favorite game quote from the villain after being told his dream isn't worth all the killing and stuff. "What troubled sleep have you known to speak of my dreams?". Ooh thats just such a good villain line.

Same for me. War of the Lions is my favorite game. Combines a fantastic story with strategic gameplay! I tend to enjoy tragic endings as well.

My favorite is Final Fantasy VII.

I thought it was an alright game until IT HAPPENED: Tifa saved Cloud in the Lifestream. That was some adorable, mind-blowing revelation.

---

rance 10

my god it was the culmination of decades of work of a company that revolutionized their genre while being on the verge of bankruptcy for part of it

---

SpeedDemon20 posted...

My favorite is Final Fantasy VII.

I thought it was an alright game until IT HAPPENED: Tifa saved Cloud in the Lifestream. That was some adorable, mind-blowing revelation.

I enjoyed VII quite a bit myself, though in terms of mainline FF games, VI is definitely my favorite. VII would be in the top 5 though, maybe top 3.

Have you played the Remake yet? It's one of the next games I plan on giving a spin. I have no faith in Nomura's storytelling ability anymore, but hopefully it will be at least entertaining.

SpeedDemon20 posted...

My favorite is Final Fantasy VII.

I thought it was an alright game until IT HAPPENED: Tifa saved Cloud in the Lifestream. That was some adorable, mind-blowing revelation.

I remember that scene hitting me really hard as a kid too! I felt like a whole weight went off my chest haha!

---

agesboy posted...

rance 10

my god it was the culmination of decades of work of a company that revolutionized their genre while being on the verge of bankruptcy for part of it

I haven't heard of this one! System? Genre? Premise? I generally like your taste when I'm lurking the anime threads, so I'm curious about this game!

JigsawTDC posted...

hopefully it will be at least entertaining.

Its frustrating from multiple different standpoints in multiple different ways, yeah

---

Fuck lemme give you a list

KH: 358/2 Days
FFX/X-2
The MGS series *chef kiss*
Red Dead 2 (Lenny. That is all.)
Fallout 3 and New Vegas
Far Cry 3/4/5
CoD WaW is a solid game to shout out, very gritty, staned that shit since the Nintendo Wii lmao
the Black Ops storyline is p good imo
FFXV

and probs like eight more I cant remember

---

JigsawTDC posted...

I enjoyed VII quite a bit myself, though in terms of mainline FF games, VI is definitely my favorite. VII would be in the top 5 though, maybe top 3.

Have you played the Remake yet? It's one of the next games I plan on giving a spin. I have no faith in Nomura's storytelling ability anymore, but hopefully it will be at least entertaining.

Yes! I played FFVII for the first time this year, actually. I loved it so much that afterwards I borrowed a PS4 from my sister and bought the remake.

Remake was alright. Tifa is the most fun to play as. Everyone else feels sluggish in comparison.

---

I'm also gonna give special mention to furi. Short game but the moment after you beat the last guardian and escape was incredible.

---

Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4

JigsawTDC posted...

I haven't heard of this one! System? Genre? Premise? I generally like your taste when I'm lurking the anime threads, so I'm curious about this game!

visual novel with heavy gameplay on the PC also a lot of porn

the setting is sort of like discworld in that things are comical and interesting but cruel seemingly by design, and rance himself is a laid back OP pervert that wanders the world explicitly just to get laid but accidentally ends up saving every single major country throughout rance games 1 through 9 (which are all more RPG-focused adventures). 10 is about the demon realm launching all-out war against a divided humanity, and rance ends up unifying them all through his personal connections with everyone as they take millions of casualties including most named characters if you take too long on each playthrough

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqyEY8H76TY

not in english yet but will be; 7 (sengoku rance) was released a year or two ago, 8 should be released in the next few months, and 9's mostly translated, but rance 10 is fucking MASSIVE (100+ hours barely scratches the surface)

rance 01 and 02 (the remakes of the first two games, originally released in fucking 1989) actually just got released recently

---

Oh for what little story it did have, Final Fantasy; Crystal Chronicles fuckin slapped

---

hamsarris_ posted...

Fuck lemme give you a list

KH: 358/2 Days
FFX/X-2
The MGS series *chef kiss*
Red Dead 2 (Lenny. That is all.)
Fallout 3 and New Vegas
Far Cry 3/4/5
CoD WaW is a solid game to shout out, very gritty, staned that shit since the Nintendo Wii lmao
the Black Ops storyline is p good imo
FFXV

and probs like eight more I cant remember

This is an interesting list. Of the ones I've played, I can agree Red Dead 2, MGS, and Final Fantasy X all have good, fun, and/or interesting stories. But 358/2 Days is the first Kingdom Hearts game I played that I did not enjoy. I feel like if III had come out sooner I might have appreciated it more, because that's where the real emotional pay-off to 358/2 Days is, but as it stands I just remember a bunch of painfully dull scenes of Axel, Roxas, and Xion eating sea salt ice cream.

And FFXV, while I liked the tragedy and thought it was a vast improvement over everything XIII, I still feel like it's one of the weaker Final Fantasy games in terms of story. The DLC for the villain gave some really interesting backstory and insight, but I feel overall, you can tell this game was started by one team and then a different team picked up the threads to wrap it up. It feels disjointed and like it doesn't know what kind of story it wants to tell.

Not criticizing your choices by any means, everyone enjoys different stories, just explaining why they didn't catch me in the same way.

YoukaiSlayer posted...

I'm also gonna give special mention to furi. Short game but the moment after you beat the last guardian and escape was incredible.

What's the premise of this one?

JigsawTDC posted...

What's the premise of this one?

You wake up in some sort of space prison, a donnie darko lookin rabbit head guy is freeing you and says you must kill the jailers, if you do that, you'll be free. The game is a series of boss fights (like 12 or so) separated by short walking sections where the rabbit dude explains stuff about the next jailor. As you proceed through the game you start to realize there might be a very good reason you are locked in a crazy space prison and that maybe your escape won't be such a good thing.

When you finally escape, it all becomes clear, and then you have 2 options which leads to 2 different endings. The moment you escape though is probably like, the best reveal in gaming. The music, the...truth of what happens, the last fight still being fresh in your mind. It's a magical moment and I don't want to spoil it.

The game in general is really fun, really hard, and has god tier music. Highly recommend. Whole thing probably takes 5-10 hours your first time depending on how quickly you master the fights.

---

Not sure I can really think of anything definitive. Mirror's Edge told a great story with amazing gameplay, although the combat was clunky (thankfully there wasn't much of it). In terms of story, Saints Row 2 might be my favorite but it's not necessarily a best story kind of thing. You get 3-4 great stories, where all of them kinda function almost as standalones. The Ronin shit was epic, the Brotherhood was intense at times (although the needless antagonism was a little silly), and the Sons of Samedi had a fun goofy feel. Then the shit with Dane Vogel, etc, was awesome.

And yeah, FFT was great but I never finished it so... can't really comment.


---

I like a bunch. But I liked Horizon Zero Dawn. Especially the Vantage Point Story. Still makes me cry...
---

the last of us part I & II

nothing really even comes close

---

Xenoblade Chronicles 1
Radiant Historia
Suikoden 1 and 2
Baten Kaitos Origins
Spec Ops: The Line
NieR Automata
Exit Fate

I'd say those are the best stories I've seen in video gaming
I still haven't gotten around to playing Planescape: Torment, but from what I've heard it's probably up there, too.

streamofthesky posted...

Xenoblade Chronicles 1
Radiant Historia
Suikoden 1 and 2
Baten Kaitos Origins
Spec Ops: The Line
NieR Automata
Exit Fate

I'd say those are the best stories I've seen in video gaming
I still haven't gotten around to playing Planescape: Torment, but from what I've heard it's probably up there, too.

I do really like the stories of all the games I've played on that list. I haven't played Baten Kaitos or Exit Fate, but I'll have to check them out based on that list. Planescape is also on my list. I actually own it and started it up a few months ago, but didn't get very far. Idk why, but it's hard for me to get into isometric RPGs. I'll give it another try though, because it is consistently praised as one of the best stories in video games.

DirtBasedSoap posted...

the last of us part I & II

nothing really even comes close

Definitely enjoyed the story of both of these myself.

LinkPizza posted...

I like a bunch. But I liked Horizon Zero Dawn. Especially the Vantage Point Story. Still makes me cry...

I recently beat this one myself. I really liked the premise, the setting, etc. I particularly liked the DLC portion of the story. I think it fell short for me though because I found almost all the characters to be stale. I'm not sure if it was due to the writing or lazy acting, but the characters just felt like actors and it broke a lot of the immersion for me. Still enjoyed a lot about it and plan to pick up the sequel! I definitely see a lot of potential in this series.

YoukaiSlayer posted...

You wake up in some sort of space prison, a donnie darko lookin rabbit head guy is freeing you and says you must kill the jailers, if you do that, you'll be free. The game is a series of boss fights (like 12 or so) separated by short walking sections where the rabbit dude explains stuff about the next jailor. As you proceed through the game you start to realize there might be a very good reason you are locked in a crazy space prison and that maybe your escape won't be such a good thing.

When you finally escape, it all becomes clear, and then you have 2 options which leads to 2 different endings. The moment you escape though is probably like, the best reveal in gaming. The music, the...truth of what happens, the last fight still being fresh in your mind. It's a magical moment and I don't want to spoil it.

The game in general is really fun, really hard, and has god tier music. Highly recommend. Whole thing probably takes 5-10 hours your first time depending on how quickly you master the fights.

That sounds pretty cool! I'll add it to my list.

DirtBasedSoap posted...

the last of us part I & II

nothing really even comes close

---

JigsawTDC posted...

I do really like the stories of all the games I've played on that list. I haven't played Baten Kaitos or Exit Fate, but I'll have to check them out based on that list. Planescape is also on my list. I actually own it and started it up a few months ago, but didn't get very far. Idk why, but it's hard for me to get into isometric RPGs. I'll give it another try though, because it is consistently praised as one of the best stories in video games.

Baten Kaitos is a pair of RPGs on the Gamecube by Monolith Soft, the same people behind Xenoblade. Both games you play as the guadian spirit of the main character rather than the character being a direct avatar of yourself (he'll look at the screen and ask your advice at times) and take place in the same world. The first game has one of the BEST plot twists of any story I've ever experienced, but the overall story is just ok and feels pretty generic until you get to the twist.
BK Origins, the game I listed, is a prequel set like 20 years before the first game. It also has plot twists...several great ones (none as strong as in the first game, though) and overall just a much better story.
I would suggest playing the first title before Origins just so you're more familiar with things, but maybe not...Origins has much more polished gameplay, the first game was fun but could be rough at times and way too luck-dependent. The battle system is card-based w/ random draws from a deck. But Origins vastly improved on the system and drastically eased deck management. Mind you, I usually don't like card-based games, but BK games are the exception.

Exit Fate was made by a fan w/ RPGMaker and was heavily inspired by the Suikoden series. You get a castle HQ, recruit and army and have full scale army battles (most similar in style to Suikoden 2 and 5, but I actually like Exit Fate's way of doing it more than either of those games), there's a teleporter, interviews of your recruits, and so on.... It's free for download and opens on a PC in its own window/program.
The story is much like a Suikoden w/ the main character forced out of his army for an incident he either didn't do or can't recall and ends up helping the opposing side, with lots of political intrigue and tension along the way. It's just...really freaking good. It's amazing one dude made it. Just try it....it's free! If you love Suikoden games, you'll love it, too.

You can get all sorts of info, guides, etc... about the game here and there's a link to where you can download it:
https://exitfate.webs.com/about.htm

EDIT: Here's a review of it
https://youtu.be/ejg5U-P3oVM?t=23

Planescape Torment: I got it a few years ago from GOG when they were offering all the old D&D games for like $2 each, but still haven't tried it. Yeah, I've heard tons of good things about it.

baten kaitos+origins had super great moments but the overall story was about average, i felt like. the battle system, while being card based, was still actiony enough to not feel card based

---

Is GameCube the only system it's accessible on? I'm sure I've got my GameCube buried somewhere back in California, but being on a more modern console would be cool.

afaik yeah only gamecube (but wii could play GC)

---

JigsawTDC posted...

Is GameCube the only system it's accessible on? I'm sure I've got my GameCube buried somewhere back in California, but being on a more modern console would be cool.

I don't think it came out on any other consoles, might be on Virtual Console?
Wii consoles except the late models were backwards compatible w/ Gamecube games, too.

Other than that...Dolphin emulator, I guess?

agesboy posted...

baten kaitos+origins had super great moments but the overall story was about average, i felt like. the battle system, while being card based, was still actiony enough to not feel card based

BK: EW & LO was mediocre, aside from the twist. I thought BK Origins was a really good story overall, though.
and yeah, despite being card based, the battles feel pretty intense and action-packed since you have the time limit to make decisions and (at least BK Origins, I think the first game was straight up turn-based) the active time battle system type deal. And it's so thrilling but nerve-wracking, trying to get off a full MP Burst combo, hoping to get it all in before an enemy turn comes up to disrupt it.