[Classic] Old games are great, don't forget

Something else that I think is hurting modern games is the overemphasis on cutscenes. In the FF12 thread, Denicalis mentioned something about the game's poor pacing, and it occurred to me that it's become a problem in a lot of modern games, even the ones that shouldn't be focusing heavily on story bits. In going out of their way to cram in pretty FMV scenes, fully voice acted dialogue, and whatnot, they break up the actual game portion.

Let's go way back and look at Ninja Gaiden, the game that invented the concept. How long does it spend on the cutscenes? Maybe a couple minutes tops? Then you're right back to flipping out and chopping people's heads off. Zelda 3 had terse bits of dialogue even at critical plot points, and then shut up so you could navigate the dungeon. Final Fantasy 4 doesn't feel the need to linger excessively on any one plot point, since it's not trying to sell you on visual flash. You can blip through the dialogue boxes as fast or as slow as you care to.

Compare to a lot of modern games where they seem to think they need to stretch everything out to a tedious degree. It's even infected Zelda - look at how often you sit down and do nothing while the game hits you with story stuff. The really good games integrate the story seamlessly with gameplay, ala Half Life. The not so good games segregate the two elements, and even favor the story over the game itself.

Jam it back in, in the dark.