A good post, but you want a good story? Hmmm. That's tricky. The last story in a game that I remember well is Team Fortress 2. Those characters have back stories, tons of personality, and they are not boring or forced.

Strange choice, but that's my choice! :)

I totally agree! Again, that comes from fantastic writing and strong characterization. There never even was a plot in TF2 until the recent Engineer comics gave a bit of backstory.

I think you've hit on another strong point there, Lance. Personality is often lacking in characters. All too often a game's protagonist is just a vehicle for you to mow down baddies while one liners are spit out.

Hmm. A plot to FF13 in a brief period? A group of people persecuted by their government because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time, manipulated by other parts of said government, all journey with their own motivations and weather betrayals and forge friendships, ultimately defeat the portions of the government that sought to control them. Simple enough? It's about as detailed as your description of Uncharted. 

But then you have to explain the Fal'Cie or whatever, the dynamic of the two worlds, blah blah blah. I know there's more detail to Uncharted as well, but it still isn't nearly as complicated.

Bayonetta's story was utter nonsense but it was handled in such a cartoonish, over-the-top way that the fact it didn't really make sense ceased to matter; it was all about the spectacle. For some games I think that's okay. Look at the number of films that do well that are pure eye-candy. I'd argue that it's perhaps more acceptable for a game to be nonsense in the story department—but only if the gameplay is up to scratch. Bayonetta delivered on that front, so the fact that it was nonsense was less important.

I think we are starting to see more and more in the way of good stories. The examples you cite are all great ones. I'd like to draw particular attention to Dragon Age for having a relatively simplistic story, but one of the richest settings I've ever seen. It's one of the only RPGs I've ever played where I actually read every book and codex entry. They're all optional, but knowledge of each gives the player a greater understanding of the game world and the characters. Little references that characters make suddenly make sense. It's extremely well handled.

Can't beat a bit of Uncharted, though.

AJ: 

Why do you need to explain the Fal'cie? You didn't explain Eddie Raja's pirates or any of the other groups, you didn't mention the curse and the deformed spanish. At the same level of detail you left out the same kinds of stuff. All of the Fal'cie and L'cie are just labels for different groups. At a basic level, it's just those who govern, and those with odd abilities they are either trying to persecute or control.

@Ek Fair enough. Still, as pointed out by Tycho of Penny Arcade, by the time one progresses what people call the "tutorial stage" of FFXIII, you could've gone through Uncharted 2's entire narrative arc three times over. Again, it just depends what you're looking for in a game. Different strokes for different folks and all that.

I'm OK with that myself. It has to do with how branchy the game is and what the replay value is. I played Uncharted about 4 times and feel that I got my money's worth from it. those 4 times took roughly the same amount of time as beating FF13 once. But after beating FF13 I don't feel like playing it again from the start, and I didn't need to replay it to feel like I had gotten my money's worth. With Uncharted, the game actually forces you to play through twice if you want to get all of the trophies in the game. FF13 on the other hand only requires a single playthrough. 

I still don't agree with the assessment that the first 20-30 hours is a "tutorial" stage. I consider that the "storyline" stage where it's basically alternating gameplay and storyline. At 10-12 hours you've unlocked the paradigm system and most of the classes, and the tutorial is mostly over. The rest of the time is spent utilizing your new abilities to play the game and unlock more storyline details. After 30 hours, the storyline fades mostly into the background for the next 10-20 until you head back to Pulse. If you consider 30 hours of FF13 to be a tutorial, then Uncharted is still in tutorial mode all the way until you get out of the Nazi base, because the game is still teaching you new ways to play and use your weapons and completely shifts you to a new playstyle to learn at that point.

Here's another counterexample to the complaint that FF13 is too long.

The game that I felt cheated most about in the past year? Last Rebellion. It was 14 hours 43 minutes to both completion and platinum trophy, and it was an RPG. There was no replay value whatsoever. I felt like I enjoyed the game, but certainly didn't get my $40 worth out of it. Add to that the difficulty curve was like an upside-down check mark. (Moderate at the start, tough in the early middle, then it plummeted down to too darn easy.) 

I'll take a short game as long as it has replay value, or I'll take a long game as long as I don't need to replay it again to get all of the content done. Short replayable RPGs can be done. Look at SaGa Frontier and Romancing SaGa for some examples of 20-25 hour games with multiple playable storylines. I would have preferred it if Dragon Age had followed their lead instead of tried to make a 60 hour epic where you couldn't see all the content on one play through.