What game series do you think needs better writing

[LunarWeaver]

I want so hard to like Resident Evil and its characters, but the writing is so cheesy. Although at this point I've just accepted it for what it is. They are games I love despite it all. The new game for the 3DS looks to keep everything in cheesy order from the trailer, but then that stars Chris and Jill again, who are a boy scout and tits in blue and not much else. I mean, Jill has existed since 1996 and somehow has less of a personality than the Gears of War crew, and they all have exactly one trait assigned to them.

[Ryth]

Final Fantasy desperately needs better/good writing. Either the stories are outright awful (VIII) or fall apart near the end (IX).

[Goldenboko]

Final Fantasy desperately needs better/good writing. Either the stories are outright awful (VIII) or fall apart near the end (IX).

The fact that this is the second person to say FFIX was written poorly disturbs me greatly.

[Bolivar]

* I've got a feeling that this arose as a response to the charges in the 90s that games were gratuitous murder simulators, and thus a story-based justification for your heinous acts became necessary.

lol, probably in part, that's a good point.

[NeoCracker]

I'm probably in the minority here, but I find the world and characters of the Elder Scrolls games (Just III and IV, as I've not played the others) To be incredibally boring and lack luster.

Fall Out 3 was better in that regard, though still far from where I think it should be, though I could at least enjoy that setting more due to a funner setting, and at least a few interesting characters.

[Flying Arrow]

I'd argue they regressed as VIII, IX, X, and XIII are all complete and utter messes story-wise.

WHAT!? YOU GOT TO BE CRAZY!

No, actually I am perfectly sane and level-headed. Except for the ground-up bodies in my freezer (what can I say, I like my women like I like my coffee).

But really, there is some good stuff in IX's story, but not a lot. Most of the plot elements on their own could have been enough to carry the game (if written as such, that is) but smashed all together I find them to be a complete and utter mess. Especially the ending, dear Christ. Still love Vivi's story, though. Gotta love Vivi.

[Ryth]

Final Fantasy desperately needs better/good writing. Either the stories are outright awful (VIII) or fall apart near the end (IX).

The fact that this is the second person to say FFIX was written poorly disturbs me greatly.

I actually love FFIX, and I love most of the story, and it has probably the best cast of characters in the entire franchise. Like I said, the game simply fell apart at the end. A lot of character arcs finish prematurely-- Steiner stops mattering once he decides to stay at the castle, Dagger ends once she cuts her hair, Freya is totally forgotten by the end of Disc 2, and frankly Quina and especially Amarant don't even matter.

The plot should have been more about political tensions and empire-- they should not have had Kuja at all, and the plot was done once Terra came into the picture. I love the game to death, its one of my favorite in the series, and I think it has a better story than most of the games in the franchise, but it does suffer from mistakes so elementary that any semi-intelligent writer should have been able to catch and revise it without a second glance.

[Depression Moon]

IX's story is perfect in every way. The fighting game genre from all I've played lacked some serious story. I would like to see one someday that can have a great story along with great gameplay.

[Yue Kitsune]

Pokemon, i love it but holly c@&$% it'd be nice if i had a better goal than just catching all the pokemon and beating the champion. how about some convoluted conspiracy by a government agency (or a government of any kind for that matter, lol), or a war about to break out between two of the towns.

fighting games could use a coherent story also, the only problem with that is each character becomes the "main character" when you play through their story. i think BlazeBlue has done a fairly decent job of making some of the storylines match up, but since i just got it recently i can't say for sure.

and thinking about it, i'd hafta agree about FF IX. i'm playing through it again after years of not being able to; thank goodness sony made it downloadable. but i seem to remember some random final boss just ganking you at the end, no prior mention or warning or anything, just surprise but shex.

[Bunny]

Eternal Sonata was a game that could've been amazing had the storyline and subsequent dialogue not been incredibly campy and childlike. Infinite Undiscovery, The Last Remnant, and Blue Dragon are three more recent titles that pop to mind with lackluster dialogue that does nothing but hurt the otherwise intriguing story and setting.

As far as Final Fantasy games, their biggest link between games (aside from the inclusion of Cid, Chocobos, Moogles, etc) are the somewhat campy dialogue and the major use of the more frequent RPG clichés. The games are good but not as good as they should be.

[Slothy]

Bioware games.

Yeah, I went there. KOTOR relied on a bunch of Sci-Fi genre conventions that are old hat now, a fair few Star Wars cliches, including villains who are evil just because, and the whole thing is capped off by a plot twist so obvious that I still wonder how anyone is surprised by it, let alone how they could consider it one of the best plot twists in gaming.

Mass Effect is pretty much more of the same minus any attempt at a real plot twist. Same reliance on genre cliches, which wouldn't be a terrible thing except that they do a poor job of making me empathize with their talking heads so that even when dealing with issues like the morality of destroying an alien race to protect the galaxy or trusting them to play nice it all falls flat with me. In fact, the whole Mass Effect universe fell flat with me because the NPC's and areas generally aren't very engrossing.

And on the issue of morality in these games, treating every decision as being stark good and evil bores the hell out of me. I'll admit that I haven't played any of their games besides these, but I can't stand the way they handle moral choices in either of them.

[VeloZer0]

And on the issue of morality in these games, treating every decision as being stark good and evil bores the hell out of me. I'll admit that I haven't played any of their games besides these, but I can't stand the way they handle moral choices in either of them.

I find black and white decisions in games usually tends to make them unplayable. I'm the kind of person who when given the choice between option A and B will usually do option C. When a game starts dolling out heavy choices I usually just quit because none of the options are what I would do.

Pokemon, i love it but holly c@&$% it'd be nice if i had a better goal than just catching all the pokemon and beating the champion. how about some convoluted conspiracy by a government agency (or a government of any kind for that matter, lol), or a war about to break out between two of the towns.

Or flesh out the ecology of the world a little better.

[Meat Puppet]

The Elder Scrolls needs to look to Morrowind in future and pretend Oblivion never happened.

Morrowind and Oblivion

Fallout 3 was considerably better than OB but still pretty braindead. Hopefully Summerset Isle will be an improvement.

Agreed. I’m not sure what they were thinking with Oblivion... it’s like they just wanted to make it like this big epic action movie or something. Except somehow also be very boring.

What annoys me is that throughout the earlier games, and especially in Morrowind, there was a setup for the death of Uriel Septum or whatever the hell his name is. Like it was something the series was working toward. Including the ambiguity of Uriel’s sons (that they might not actually be his), unrest in the Imperial province and so on and so forth. Well, Uriel does die but luckily so do his sons (solving that problem) in an assault that would make Sly Stallone blush!
It’s like they just thought they’d wipe the whole thing clean in the first 10 minutes of the game because it would be too boring or something. Which comes back to my opinion that Oblivion was tainted by perverts who wanted it to be some blockbuster action title or something

[blackmage_nuke]

The plot should have been more about political tensions and empire-- they should not have had Kuja at all, and the plot was done once Terra came into the picture.

I disagree, I think the point of FFIX was to return to a simple fantasy without all the complex war and environmental sustainability metaphors which drenched the previous 3 games. In my opinion this bit of change was what made IX so enjoyable. It's a shame Necron made no sense whatsoever though.

[Bolivar]

Final Fantasy desperately needs better/good writing. Either the stories are outright awful (VIII) or fall apart near the end (IX).

The fact that this is the second person to say FFIX was written poorly disturbs me greatly.

I actually love FFIX, and I love most of the story, and it has probably the best cast of characters in the entire franchise. Like I said, the game simply fell apart at the end. A lot of character arcs finish prematurely-- Steiner stops mattering once he decides to stay at the castle, Dagger ends once she cuts her hair, Freya is totally forgotten by the end of Disc 2, and frankly Quina and especially Amarant don't even matter.

The plot should have been more about political tensions and empire-- they should not have had Kuja at all, and the plot was done once Terra came into the picture. I love the game to death, its one of my favorite in the series, and I think it has a better story than most of the games in the franchise, but it does suffer from mistakes so elementary that any semi-intelligent writer should have been able to catch and revise it without a second glance.

Gotta disagree there, although this shouldn't really turn into a IX thread. FFIX just wouldn't have been a Final Fantasy if it kept going on about the stuff in the beginning. All the games have to start off about one thing and end up about something else, like a good Simpson's episode.