Never been much of a blogger. Always short on words and to the point I am. Yet here I am writing one on Giantbomb mostly to get the blog quest out of the way since I've recently been bitten by the quest bug and partly to actually voice an opinion:

I like my video games video gamey.

Over the course of my video gaming career (hobby,) video games have gotten progressively more movie-esque. Cut scenes abound. Characters have, well, character. Everything has a bloody plot. I feel like I spend as much time - if not more - watching video "games" than playing them these days.

This isn't a bad thing. I'll never forget plowing through Final Fantasy VII in my dorm room, skipping classes and generally wrecking my GPA back in the nineties. Xenogears was a transcendental experience despite the second disk of rocking chair Citan blathering important plot points that I never got to take part in. The first God of War (I skipped most of the PS2/Xbox/Gamecube generation until late) blasted unused synapses into action with over the top QTEs and raging Kratos badassery. Even more recently, I was permitted to step into the shoes of Batman even, through a couple of great games by Rocksteady.

However, I miss the 2-dimensional (literally and figuratively) characters, inexplicable "plots", general weirdness and resulting sense of mystery that came prepackaged standard with the games of yesteryear. Call it nostalgia if you must, but there's something alluring about the hero whose only characteristic is his senseless name and apparent desire - manifested through my actions - to wipe all evil from the face of whatever world it is I'm saving today. I was free to imagine my character being any sort of person/automaton/benevolent force without the strict characterization thoroughly administered by today's Uncharteds and Gears of Warses.

The most fun I've ever had with video games was with those with zero plot, and a whole lot of pixel smashing action. Shmups, 2D platformers, on-rail shooters. Bring back the visceral and simple. Blah blah blah.

<insert conclusion here>

I'm a little drunk on a Friday night and about to play some Dead Space. Yeah!

Man, I can't disagree with you more. Story driven games with deep and interesting characters are far more exciting to me than video games with zero plot. Of course, I do enjoy the Super Meat Boy's of the world as well. But I had to choose between one or the other, I'm going with the story-driven game more often than not.

Hey, to each his own. That's what blogging is for right?

I love story driven games, MGS1, The Walking Dead, Heavy Rain and Asuras Wrath are good points of this.

Have you played Just Cause 2? N+? Rayman Origins? Super Meat Boy?

I do agree that there's a sort of pureness to a game that is almost all gameplay and very little story, but I do like a good game with story. Still, I wish less games this generation put you on such an extremely linear path with QTE boss fights and force you to watch their excellently-rendered explosion. No game this generation that is like that has impressed me much. Crysis, Skyrim, Deus Ex HR, the aforementioned Just Cause 2, those are the kinds of games that I feel will be remembered the most.

I love games that make me have feels, though they're not the only games I'll play of course. Different strokes for different folks. The best thing about games is that for the time being they're still churning something out for everyone's preferences, there's a developer out there with the very same mindset as you expanding on what you two love most, though he's probably not as drunk. There's also the added bonus of independent releases being so accessible, you'll never have to worry about your favorites fading away.

I adore story driven games, but the older I get the more I like games with a real gameyness to them. There has been a real shift in my tastes in the last couple of years, when I was younger I was all about JRPG's and long story cut scenes, but the more and more of that I see these days the more I just want games where I hold down a button and watch things on screen explode.

There's enough variety nowadays to keep everyone happy. You just need to know where to look for the games you want.

Story all the way for me. If a game does not have a point i feel like i'm wasting my time. Obviously im wasting time either way, but i just can't get into games like Mario,Super Meat Boy and games like that.I Don't see the fun in it.

@Sinusoidal: I'm with you man. My favourite games all involve dumping me into some huge game world and letting me get my wander on.

Saint's Row, Just Cause, Far Cry, Fallout, Skyrim, Rayman Origins, The Saboteur, Red Dead Redemption, the list goes on and on. I realise these games have different degrees of story from really good to really bad but the one thing they all have in common is that they give me the ability to play for dozens of hours on end without even touching anything plot related.