What is the most important element of a video game to you?

[El Héroe Oscuro]

This can be anything from story, music, engaging characters, graphics, replayability, difficulty, combat system, controls, immersion, gamers ability to do what they want, and the list goes on and on.

For myself, it's the soundtrack of the game. I find that when a game has a very good soundtrack that I become very immersed with the game. I'm very keen on this- Ori and the Blind Forest, Dark Souls 3, Shadow of the Colossus, Wind Waker are just some of the games hat I've found myself loving even more than a normal game due to the great music playing in eh background.

 

[L'Belle]

One thing: Is it fun? It's hard to explain, if it's not fun when I play it, I don't play it anymore.

 

[Lunar]

I tend to find the game's world one of the most important aspects for me, if I really like the world, somewhere like Skyrim or the regions in Pokemon I have a really easy time enjoying the game.

 

[Keiran]

The most important thing to me is that the controls are simple and not frustrating. I played StarFox Zero for a total of like 1 hour. I *love* the Starfox series. But I couldn't get into Zero because the controls were annoying and were harder than the game itself.

The second most important thing to me is the lack of a "theme-park" or movie feeling. While Sun and Moon (obviously) had simple controls, I didn't enjoy it because half the game felt like a cutscene and I constantly felt like my only goal in the game was to reach the next checkpoint to view the next cutscene. My favorite Pokemon games, Black 2 and White 2, do something similar but it was a lot better paced and gave you more of a pause between each plot advancing scene. Hand-holding is also why I haven't enjoyed Dark Moon enough to beat it, because E. Gadd calls you like every 30 seconds. Luigi's Mansion is one of my favorite games, however, the only real difference is E. Gadds involvement.

So if you combined these two, I guess you could say my favorite element is freedom. Freedom to just enjoy a game. Annoying controls and constant hand-holding really restrict my enjoyment of a game because these 2 things constantly remind you of their presence.

 

[Judge Mandolore Shepard]

When it comes to what is the most important element of a video game to me is either the music or the story.

 

[Arsenic]

I'm tied between story and gameplay.

I think I lean more towards gameplay since there are plenty of great story games I havent beat simply because the gameplay is bad or bores me...

 

[Necrum]

This is a weird question for me. I view games very much as the sum of their parts. I may praise individual features but ultimately games are very dependent on those elements meshing and creating a singular experience. So I guess what I would say is most important to me is cohesion. A game can have great mechanics but if the mood is not set right to work with those mechanics it can be very easy to lose interest. Doom 2016 is a fascinating example of all its pieces perfectly meshing. The gameplay; the AI; the music; the level design; the monsters; even the way the story impacts the Doom Slayer; all of it works together to reinforce a behavior of aggression in the player so that it taps into your base instincts and allows you to play the game as it was intended. A good example of failed cohesion I would say is in Farcry 3: Blood Dragon. I don't think it's a bad game by any means, I actually find it quite charming, but the retro style of the game does not mesh well with the very modern play style created by the Farcry franchise which for me leads to a disconnect. I think this is why even mediocre and bad games can still be fun to people despite their flaws. Games like Earth Defense Force are tons of fun even though no one in their right mind would praise them as masterworks.

 

[Yukari]

The Gameplay. Hands down. If a game isn't fun to play for whatever reason I'm not going to play it. Now, it doesn't have to have incredibly creative gameplay or anything of the sort; it just has to be fun to play.