[mlindner]

A movie is something you watch, a game is something you play. It's not there to tell you a grand story. It's there to wrap some good gameplay in some storytelling packaging. A game is closer to a novel than it is to a hollywood movie. The most loved games (high replayability is a key component) often have quite lacking "story" if any story at all. What makes them shine is how they feel to play, even better if they encourage your own imagination to invent your own story. When you try to make a game into a movie the true focus is lost. If your game can only be played "once" (not including tacking-on achievements/side-quests/etc) then your game is a movie and not a game.

[falcor84]

Thanks for clarifying. I understand your perspective now, but just want to say that this is really different from mine, which might be influenced by my having a relatively strong Need for Closure[0]. I've been a life-long gamer, and have almost never had any interest in replaying a game (at least not until it's been perhaps a decade). When I finish a good game and get to the credits, I have a very strong sense of catharsis, which leads me then to enjoy clicking on that Delete button and starting on the next game. And just to be clear - it's not that I am trying to rush things and be done with the games; I take my time with most games, and I do think a lot about the good ones after, but it's pleasant memories of my time with them, rather than any desire to go back into the fray.

As you can imagine, I mostly enjoy single-player narrative games with exploration and some RPG elements, rather than multi-player ones, or open-ended ones with infinite-replayability mechanics. For reference, some of my favorite game franchises include: LBA, Zelda, The Last of Us, Mass Effect, The Witcher, Portal, Talos Principle, GTA, Kotor, Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closure_(psychology)