Play the Game, Skip the Story: Difference between revisions
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<!-- %%comment%% This trope isn't inherently bad. Players who just want to get to the action are not 'bad players' any more than players who are interested in the lore. Don't criticize either in the examples. And conversely, don't gush over how amazing and epic and tearjerking your favorite plot is just to prove how horrible people are for ignoring it. -->
{{examples}}
== Video game examples
=== Adventure Game ===
* ''Ring: The Legend of the Nibelungen'' is basically ''[[Der Ring Des Nibelungen]]'' [[Recycled in Space|in space]]. Some reviews complained that the story was [[Mind Screw|almost impossible to get]], except maybe if you are both a gamer and a Wagner fan, but oddly for an Adventure game, it's not that hard to finish the game without getting it.
=== Fighting Game ===
* ''[[Super Smash Bros.]]. Brawl''. The overarching plot of ''The Subspace Emissary'' was mostly ignored by players. It doesn't help that a great deal of detail is left vague due to all of the characters being [[Heroic Mime
** Pirated versions of this game usually cut out the ''Subspace Emissary'' cutscenes (among other things), so the game can fit on a single-layer disc. And since it's one of the most popular games for [[Wii|the most pirated seventh generation console]]...
* Arguably, almost every single tournament [[Fighting Game]] in existence. There are detailed backstories, different endings per character, and even events in sequels that tie in to past story elements. But with the exception of some hardcore fans who care about such things and compile vast [[Universe Compendium
* The ultimate example is ''[[Tekken]]''.
** By ''Tekken 6'' there are more characters than Namco can fit into the main plot, so many of them have been reduced to having joke plots and endings or simply unrelated to the main story.
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=== First Person Shooter ===
* ''[[Doom]] 3'' has a story created by a novelist. Which may lead people to say, "It has a story?" The [[Big Bad]] was passed up for the title of [[Mad Scientist]] Who Makes A [[Deal with the Devil]] #69,105 for being too generic. A handful of [[
* In ''[[Halo]]'', there's two groups of players: those who deeply care about the story, and the ones that are indifferent to it altogether. The former wants to shoot people ''and'' immerse themselves in the [[Backstory]], the mythology, and characters and all. The latter see the former as dorks for being so enthralled in the story, while the former hold them in equal disdain as low-brow fools who spam Xbox Live. Thankfully for the former group, the [[Expanded Universe]] exists for them.
** Its predecessor, ''[[Marathon Trilogy|Marathon]]'', has a complex and highly-detailed [[Backstory]] that is still being investigated by fans to this day... almost none of which is essential to actually play the game, as it's contained mostly in incidental data screens in out-of-the-way locations.
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** ''[[World of Warcraft]]''. The quest writers intentionally try to keep the quest descriptions brief because people will just ignore them anyways. Even in Cataclysm, which made all the zones have their own unique story arcs, many of which even tie into later zones or even end-game content, a lot of quests are just ignored since people level up alts with heirlooms and barnstorm through the zones. Unless they're Thousand Needles, which people stopped and enjoyed their ride through.
* ''[[Runescape]]'' varies between this and [[Excuse Plot]]. This is a more subjective example; some of the quests are rather bland, especially the ones you get for free but some of the others in the members world really have a lot of detail in the history of Runescape. Lately, the older quests have been integrated more closely to the main storyline.
* ''[[Maple Story]]'' has a story long and detailed enough for an [[Archive Panic]]. Problem? Almost ''all'' of the players who can actually do the quests to find out the storyline are a ton of [[Munchkin
* ''[[Air Rivals|Ace Online]]'' has a relatively long and interesting plot spanning all 3 episodes, from the colonists starting Bygeniou City (BCU) in Episode One, to the machinations of the Shrines and Phillons and the defection of Arlington City (ANI) in Episode Two (which introduced the Nation Wars mechanic), to the new frontiers and the breaking of an uneasy truce between ANI and BCU in Episode Three. Most players just pick a nation with their friends and go warring/mobhunting, ignoring walls and walls of political cloak-and-dagger text in the mission briefings.
* ''[[EVE Online]]'' has an incredibly detailed gameworld with four factions who each have their own unique history and the constant political squabbles between them. The website is regularly updated with short stories which further flesh out the game world. All this background detail has little to no impact on the actual game, and roleplayers are few and far between. For a long time there has been only one roleplayer faction holding any 0.0 space and that was due to a "gentlemen's agreement" amongst [[PvP]]-oriented factions that they be left alone. A change to game mechanics made them too inviting a target and this tacit understanding subsequently collapsed.
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* Believe it or not, ''[[Ragnarok Online]]'' is actually more than killing (cute) monsters and loot drama. Granted, you need to connect the pieces to know that Rune-Midgard has a long, long history, and some parts of it are [[Nightmare Fuel]] hidden by the cute graphic (I'm looking at you, Light Halzen... or maybe I shouldn't have).
* ''[[City of Heroes]]'' has, in its Mission Architect, absolutely brilliant stories written by players (many of which are dev-sponsored), with custom enemies, fairly unique plots, et cetera. Most players seem to just jump for the grindfests set up for the sake of easy leveling.
** Enforced in the case of
=== Platform Game ===
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=== Shoot Em Up ===
* [[Shoot'Em Up|Shmups]] can fall prey to this as well. [[Sin and Punishment|Some of them]] [[Radiant Silvergun|have detailed]], [[Ikaruga|intricate backstories]] [[EXceed|and stories]] [[Do Don Pachi|which go]] [[Mushihime-sama|mostly unnoticed]] [[Hellsinker|by their]] players, who are just there to test their skills against the [[Nintendo Hard
=== Third Person Shooter ===
* ''[[Dirge of Cerberus]]'' is filled with [[
* Surprisingly averted most of the time in the original ''[[Operation Flashpoint]]'' series, especially its expansion pack ''Resistance''. Though the game would at first seem as a no-thrills no-nonsense military sim, the story and characters are compelling on their own and heavily intertwined with what's generally going on, which lends the whole affair a very personal and immersive feel about ''being a soldier'', instead of "playing as a soldier who just shoots everything that remotely moves". Note that the main plot of ''Cold War Crisis'' is about the eruption of a short war between two small garrisons of NATO and Warsaw pact soldiers stationed in a Ruritania nobody cares about... which could get out of hand and lead to [[World War Three]] and [[The End of the World as We Know It]] if the player didn't work to stop it. The aforementioned ''Resistance'' expansion makes you really feel like the leader of a band of freedom fighters and makes no qualms about how under-equipped and vulnerable you are compared to the enemy. There's also a [[Sadistic Choice]] you have to go through in one of the first missions. Simply put, you can't escape the game's overarching story even if you go frag-hunting on an enemy patrol. The ''[[Spiritual Successor|ARMA]]'' series, while not having such a thrilling background to the overall story, still maintains a similarly in-depth-personal-and-asskicking-at-the-same-time narrative structure.
* ''[[Bullet Witch]]'' actually has quite a complex plot, regarding a guy who summoned the demons to bring back his dead daughter and how [[Dark Action Girl|Alicia]] got her powers. Too bad the players only wanted to shoot stuff.
== Non-video game examples
=== Film ===
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