I think KOTOR struck a good balance. But for the record, I\'m more interested in interactive movies (I guess thats what you guys want to call it) than a \'game\'. A game is a mindless waste of time, a thing for children. IMO. What I want is art. What I want is something that has me on the edge of my seat. Makes me feel something. Makes me think. Makes me want to get lost in the world. I had more fun simply exploring and wondering what awaited me in the story in KOTOR or Fable than I\'ve ever had with a \'gameplay first\' kind of game. The only games I play for \'gameplays sake\' are platformers and racers. Adventures, action/Adventures, RPGs (my favorite genres) I play for the story and graphics/immersion.
MGS2 and Xenosage - I wouldn\'t have a problem with all the cutscenes in them if I liked the stories or characters. The problem was, I liked neither. I generally play games (except for the two excluded genres above) with a \'I gotta get the gameplay/stat building/etc over with so I can see the rest of the story\' attitude. Combat is a chore imo, whether its MGS3 or FFX. If you took the story and good graphics out of all games, I probably wouldn\'t be playing them at all anymore.
But really, this is all beside the point. Graphics hype people up, make them say wow, convinces people there\'s a compelling need to move on from old hardware to new. Without the graphics pulling us along into each new gen, most casual gamers would never see much reason to upgrade. And Nintendo has expertly hyped the DS\'s features so far, despite my opinions of said features. But, and I\'m sure you don\'t agree, I don\'t think they can keep beating the \'were innovative\' drums and get people to march in stride with them. Eventually people are going to shrug and say \'enough of these gimmicky so-called innovations\'. Especially if Sony and MS are putting more distance powerwise between them and Nintendo with each new console.
Leave the innovation to the peripheral guys and the programmers - Nintendo as a console maker should be focused on bringing the most powerful console they can to stay competitive. There\'s a reason comments like Iwata\'s worry me. There\'s a reason a lot of analysts and game media people mention Xbox 2 vs PS3 and barely make a footnote of Revolution. I don\'t think everything going wrong in Nintendo land is their fault, but they aren\'t making me confident, or helping themselves with comments like that (and numerous others they\'ve made).
This is pretty off topic, no? I wanna play the puppy game. Wooo DS!
