My feelings on the Last of Us are complicated. Last of Us in isolation is good, TLoU and TLoU2 together are bad. Way better story than Crimson Desert’s, though.

Mass Effect… I’m sorry but everything past 1 was bad, and 1’s story was good because of the expectations set up for future games. Like Kliff, Shephard is a nothing character — only there’s an actual narrative driven by him/her and the rest of the cast + the events from the previous game.

We’ve discussed Zelda and Dark Souls, but I think Valheim is actually a point against what you’re saying — yes you’re reacting to the world but Valheim has next to no story (I’d say no story but I haven’t played it in a while).

Kliff could have been anyone. You could replace Kliff as the main character with Damiane and the story literally wouldn’t change (only you can’t because the Abyss can only be accessed by Kliff).

Only for >!this to mean absolutely fucking nothing because Oognka goes where he pleases.!<

I think the world is beautiful and you could subtract the entire beginning of the story and filled the game with only side quests and side stuff in the world — it would have been a better experience. Simply deleting the dogshit Yann and Naira quests would make it a better experience. If a game’s story would be strictly better with half of it deleted, I’m sorry but the story is just bad.

Edit: not a huge spoiler but I’m sorry, I meant to be spoiler free.

Edit: Forgot Shephard is unisex.