To continue a little bit;

Although I do like Portal (as a game and as a gameplay experience), its "story" is hardly any less clichéd than any other game criticized on the response thread (e.g. Mass Effect). Or have rebellious, omnipotent machines become more than a trite, obvious 1950's plot device? And while the article praises the "rebellious" fervor killing GLAdOS generates, no triumph over authority has ever been more hollow. GLAdOS was dead from the beginning of the game; the game was designed with her death in mind, and killing her represents the player fulfilling the wishes of authority (the developers), not flaunting it. Abusing a glitch is the true gaming equivalent of rebellion.

The most telling part of the article, I found, was a caption on the second page. "It's hard to empathise with Warrior Within's Prince of Persia unless you're very angsty". It's hard to sympathise with, say, King Lear unless you're REALLY emo. Most storytellers tell in the third person, where they can easily create and manipulate characters for the gain of the story. It's hard to think how King Lear would be improved if it improved if the story included a 20-something who shoots Lear in the face in the first Act, because, behind the fourth wall, he knows nothing is really at stake. Games have checkpoints and saves, books have page numbers and bookmarks. But, although I can reanimate any character by flipping back in the book, my ability to empathise is not empared. It IS all about bad acting, crappy storytelling and Jill sandwiches.

Which is better, a sandbox game with 700 in-game choices or 701? Or 70000? Until that number is infinite, the game's story is limited in the same creative way that straight, single path games are. If a true sandbox game was made (with an infinite number of choices), what, apart from the gameplay, would separate the resulting story from simply imagining one? The only difference is the overall creative direction of the writers/designers, which is limiting.Games with conventional storylines like MGS only differ from the sandboxes the article praises in the level of creative input. Put another way: both types of game storytelling are ultimately didactic. The advantages all stem from the input of other creative talent, which will limit the player's input (even if the player is free to make all the choices, do they decide the consequences each choice will have?). If you want a 100% interactive game, play whatever game you like and imagine whatever story context you want (this is what I do when playing games with poor stories anyway). Anything less is didactic, which, according to this article, is Bad.

The advantage paintings have over photographs is their ability to include elements that aren't seen in life. This doesn't mean that every painting has to be a pseudo-realistic Picasso, or that a photorealistc painting is "mixed media". Not all paintings use the color blue. This doesn't mean that painting with or without blue are mixed messages. The same can be said for cutscenes. And, if we're talking about playing an enjoyable game, I'd rather have skippable MGS-style cutscenes (even if they're not well-made)than the unskippable Valve FPS cutscene, where a character talks while you can freely inspect the floor.

Besides, the difference between games and other media like books or movies ISN'T the choices- books can have choices included (if choice A, turn to page X. If choice B, turn to Y), and it would easy to do the same for for a movie. The difference is that video games have gameplay. The difference between Portal and other FPSes was mentioned on this site a while ago. Portal is a non-violent FPS with feminine gameplay symbols, while Bioshock and Half-Life are essentially no different from any other game that has you running around, shooting things. Same with MGS- it was a game with cutscenes and avoiding conflict by remaining hidden. The story was peripheral to the experience. For games to mature, they don't need to become sandboxes, they just need to expand the range of gameplay, and use it as the message the story underlines. Bioshock was, to me, a failure, because the elements in it that gave choice (such as the Little Sisters) has almost no impact on gameplay, only on the story. Really, what mattered in Bioshock was what plasmids you used, not how you got them. There's no reason a game can't have a story as good at least as any film, but that's peripheral to the gameplay. Using gameplay as a shell for the story is "mixed media".