Well, I never argued that story should be the main focus of a game. There are games though that being story centric suits them well (some examples I mentioned).
I did not state you did.
I definitely don't want one type of game to exist out there. I do i.e. enjoy adventures now and again still. Remove the story from them and they devolve in simple puzzle solving. Still fun but not really engaging at any real length…
It is not about removing stories. It is about not making them the primary goal.
You seemed to be arguing that simply because story in games can never achieve novel status it was hopeless and developers should stop trying to tell stories…
Not really. Video games problem is structural and belongs to video games. It does not depend on movies or novels.
Any writer once decided for video games has a medium to convey a story has to put up with the problem of the proportion of the story known to the players.
As video games cant structurally deliver properly a story, it is useless to expect video games to deliver properly stories. Hence the illusion of pressing for stories in a video game.
You actually used as an argument the impossibility of all users experiencing the same content… That is actually the main differentiator (narration wise) between novels/games imo not to mention one of the strong points of the Witchers actually… Being able (within reason) to shape your experience (and thus your "story") you know…
If it is a strong point of video games, it comes at the expense of the delivery of a story.
Anyone who sees it as a strong point must welcome CD projekt decision to make the most of the instrument they have in hand. Not blame them.
Story and strong writing has a very valuable role in RPGs in my opinion. Creating a setting fleshing it out with some lore and populating it with strong characters is part of what I enjoy in these games and what helps me suspend disbelief and get in the atmosphere, also quest design… It does have to deliver on the gameplay too of course
The main reason for a story to be in a roleplaying game is to provide situations to roleplay his/her character.
Stories are non essential in a role playing game. Role playing can happen without storytelling, without narration. All it takes is that the game universe provides the player with situations to roleplay.
I am not sure I agree that the demand for story is what is harming gameplay. It seems to me that the mentality that everything should be approachable digestible and easy to get to without investing time and effort (that you said it is an inevitability , or did you mean just the story? I did say other areas…) is what is harming (dumbing down) gameplay… Imo always… I hope I covered you regarding my views on the matter
Not the mentality displayed. CDP simply took into account that video games can not properly deliver a story.
It is not about dumbing down, it is about harming. Story focus harms the gameplay.
Narration comes with requirements like pace, rythm etc Narration is about flow. And this is linked to time. And another feature that escapes the control of a writer.
Therefore gaming events between two narrative events have to be thought relatively to the pace of the story.
If, to take strength, two narrative events have to be delivered close one to another, the gaming event between the two must be made accessible enough to allow the average player to cruise through it (hence the one button approach)
Many other things like being actively told a story ( when you fight a huge battle, the story tells a huge battle) and being passively told a story (depiction of situation)
Narration comes at the expense of timed quests following this opposition between active and passive. Sense of emergency is created through depictive means while active means relay infinite amount of time to solve quests or a story. The story of emergency is here, the gameplay is not. Most games have dropped timed quests for these reasons, because it introduces factors that the writer can not control.
Following, the narration has also imposed the reduction of failures. It makes failure hard to handle as to narrate, you must progress from one narrative event to another.
Cant control really where the player will fail so it is better to control that the player wont fail, cant fail with no consequence etc… so that the story progresses.
When the story is made primary, the gameplay is thought in regard with the story, coming with constraints that reduces the gameplay.