It is always a retrograde halcyon dream to place the past in a privileged place just because it doesn't mimic the present's day-by-day persistent grind. But...there are always those "buts". I had downloaded the new announce trailer for Ubisoft's remained hi-def imagining of Prince Of Persia, only to be greeted with the same "a hero to save the world", dark-versus-light shtick the so often greets us in trailers for children's films nowadays.

Okay, so Mario and Link were the anointed and singular saviours of The Girl and The World respectively, but the sheer repetitiveness of the storylines from one version of the game to the next and their almost cursory enumeration at the outset of each new outing ("Princess Peach has been kidnapped, again") made an oddly reassuring impression on me. Then again, I was twelve at the time.

Now I am older, I have imagined I have changed (I figure I must have changed) in the past fifteen years or so. I expect...more. I expect games whose plots surpass the disappointing reality of the kidult Hollywood offerings that flood cinemas every time the sun threatens to crack a sunbeam: I expect games which approach the characterisation of great theatre and cinema, which challenge our ability to retain our adolescent and young-male propensity to remain dried-eyed. Hell, maybe Princess could actually fight back once in a while. Maybe just a Manolo to Bowser's groin, Peachy.

The great problem with games is that, when they dare to challenge the lone-saviour-against-wall-of-evil formula, they go frickin' crazy. Take Metal Gear Solid 4. Hideo Kojima tends to think that "complexity" in a plot means fifteen plot twists and a double salko thrown in for good measure during the pre-credits sequence. What is so disconcerting is that this kind of naked self-indulgence leaves me as hollow-feeling as the most dour army of one narrative that Ubisoft can imagine. At least the recent Ninja Gaiden 2 is so incoherent as to render any attempts at storytelling redundant and almost touchingly throwaway in the storytelling department. Like Miyamoto's creations before it, Tecmo's hack 'n slasher basically says "this is a game about gameplay, the lameness of the story reminds you a game should be played". It is everything Metal Gear Solid 4 is not, and, considering it is video game, for that I am thankful for its essential honesty.

All too often, modern games market themselves between the stools of throwaway storylines and interesting plot lines and complex characterisation(s). The stories are too serious to really be called "throwaway" and not developed enough to deserve any lasting scrutiny. The stories created and marketed in this hinterland all too often suck out my enjoyment from a game. In a nutshell, they remind me of what games are but should not be: they are a money-making exercise, a way of extending a "franchise" (one of the worst words in the English language), a way of appealing to the most people without really engaging any of them.

The black art of video games of the 2D era was the very lack of realism, the very lack of any claim to seriousness. Games of the 2D era were comic books, with stories to match their bright and breezy colour palette. Nobody asked why you were a giant pig called Michael in Parodius. You just were.

Console games were generally ports of arcade games, which were in turn designed to reel people in so they would put more coins into the hungry cabinet. Gamers often make the link between the decline of arcade gaming and the parallel lessening of difficulty in games (an obvious correlation). What is pointed out less often is that the death of the arcade coincided with the end of the "crude" 2D representations of games. In other words, 3D games were the point where games entered the same space as people's video and DVD collections. Tellingly, it was here that the holy pact between the formulaic drudgery of Hollywood cinema and the Hollywoodized video games representational system was cemented. This point is crucial.

Games like Grand Theft Auto 4 have triumphantly broken out of the mold of hero-worship so prevalent in gaming. Even the dualistic choice system in the game is a move ahead of the essentially linear man-versus-zombie/man-versus-soldiers/man-versus-aliens, etc. formula in gaming. However, the sheer amount of story in any game means that the costs of making games are pushed up. And when costs go up, risks are cut. A largely adolescent male market will be catered for, with the things that come readily to them: no emotional or awkward questions asked means there are rarely honest or embarrassing answers given.

This small essay is certainly not meant to give answers: I can't even give suggestions, really. Consider this more as a lament for times past. Video games are an increasingly slickly-marketed dream factory, where the images count more than the empty messages therein.