Does EVERY thread on here have to degenerate into anti-drm rants? :-(
Future Shock and Dark Forces had nice stories... though it didn't make them better than Doom2 which had none. They were all great games, but story is merely one possimble element o the experience.
Whoever gave the THPS example was spot on... storyy ruined those games...

I think people are mistaking AAA games from blockbuster games. Yes, they often go hand in hand, but in reality they're quire different and can easily be seperated. An AAA title is a game that is considered a must-have, one that is of such astonishing quality that it would almost be a sin to not buy it if you're a fan of the genre, and one that you should check out anyway regardless if you're a fan of the genre or not. Blockbusters, I think are games that are hyped to the heavens and back, cost a fortune to make, sold a "billion" within a day, regardless of quality. In many cases the quality is AAA, but in many cases they're not.
A low-price budget game can still be an AAA game.
And regarding the whole story debate, I'd say that in some cases, a good story adds to a game, while in others it can ruin or just be pointless. Why would you need a football game with a story? Unless you call Be A Pro or Become A Legend from FIFA or PES story-modes.
And who really cares about the so-called "stories" in Tekken? Plus, story ruined games like THPS.

Just one point I'd like to make, Wolfenstein 3d, Doom and Doom 2 all had stories... just because the actual "game" parts had none in, doesn't mean you should exclude the little intro/outro stuff in the games.
Just because a storyline is bare bones, doesn't mean its not there.

I personally like having stories in my games. Perhaps that stems from having read too much fiction in my life but I just can't help it. It doesn't have to be an epic story, just as long as it gives some purpose to killing Monster X and Y.
Also, I don't think the addition of a story ruined the Tony Hawk series for me. I rather enjoyed the ability to roam around the various sections of the city and just do tricks while listening to a kick ass soundtrack. The story made the game feel a bit more fleshed out, in my humble opinion rather than just skating around with a time limit and levels. Another positive aspect of the story based Tony Hawk games was the fact that performing the various missions in the city was a bit more dynamic and flowed better than just going through levels with a loading screen every now and then. Of course, this is just my opinion and your mileage may vary.

Hey, thats pretty much a custom made list of games I wouldn't play! They're also multiplayer focussed games almost exclusively, those never have a story and quite often not even single player modes and if they do its mostly just MP with bots.

congrats on 100!
Anyway, then howabout PokerSmash, Peggle, or many other fine puzzle games?

gah this 'forum eating my posts' game is getting old in a hurry
cheers mate. When did you get your second star, 150?
A pure puzzle game of that nature doesn't really need a story, it's a direct challenge from machine to player to complete a single task rather than appearing as component of an integrated experience in an adventure game.
I mean what could there be as a puzzle game story? "You must complete this 500 piece jigsaw within 10 minutes or the evil Dr Nutjob will be able to activate his 5 story tall robotic Sonic Death Monkey and the word and all its inhabitants will be destroyed (or at least get that Gardenian song stuck in their heads)!"

EVERY single game you listed is an Online game. Obviously story is not intended for an online FPS. Did i not stress enough in my posts SINGLE PLAYER First Person Shooters? And even saying that, most of those games DO in fact have storylines, just very very minimal, where a game like Tetris Attack, has none.
But those most confusing thing about your post is the fact that you are totally contradicting your original post. You at first were complaining that games should have no storyline and that Developers should be focused on gameplay, but now your trying to disprove me by giving me a huge list of modern games WITHOUT storyline. So aren't you just proving my point that there are plenty of games if not a majority of games with either no storyline or a bare minimum storyline?

Well unless I'm remembering incorrectly, return to castle wolfenstein had a single player mode but it was your bog standard piece of crap single player mode tacked on at the last minute

you're incorrect my friend, Return to Castle Wolfenstein has a very involved single player storyline.
Also, Hammerfall, Tetris Attack does have a very minimal story tacked on, but Puzzle League does not. Also, The main point of the thread is intact, I mostly just wanted to get people talking about games that have a good story, no story, or a story that is tacked on last minute. I just used a really good hook to do so. :D

Involved? I admit I didn't play it much but I don't really remember anything about the story so I figured it was one of the usual "look, nazis, get killing boy!"