A story is three things: lore, plot, and narration.
The lore is the background details, the design of the world, the personalities of the characters and how they're built. If you think of a story as a board game, the lore is both the pieces and the board itself and how they're set up. The plot is the things that actually happen in the story, the string of events. It's the movement of the characters in the board of their world. The narration, or sometimes I call the storytelling, is how the story is told, the execution of ideas. It's every sentence written in a book, every line uttered in dialogue, every small bit of gameplay that contribute to how you perceive the story.
When we talk about how a story is good, we're often referring to one of these three, although it's not too uncommon that a a story excel in all three. When we say a story is bad, it's often because all three of them are bad, or because one of them is bad enough that it's to the detriment of the overall work.
I wrote a bit about this a couple of years ago, about how the execution of a story can be more impactful than the plot (i.e. the things that actually happen). I was analysing the game The Lion's Song for that post, which has a very basic story but told it through various gameplay mechanic that makes it richer. I find this applies to every medium: a comic with a simple plot can elevated by the emotions in its art, a short story about nothing much can become more when told through interesting methods. A mediocre plot + excellent execution = excellent story.
I'm thinking about Fire Emblem Fates, infamous among fans of the series as the one with weakest story despite arguably the best gameplay. When analysed on a textbox-by-textbox basis, it's not too bad. Exaggerated anime tropes, sure, but that's a staple of the series and in any case the dialogue flows; both the writing and translation are excellent. It's narratively fine. But then you look at it beyond just a snippet of dialogue, at the overall plot, and uhh what the heck is going on here. The connection between events are loose and contrived. Characters do things contrary to their established personality just to advance the plot the way the plot wants to advance; no amount of skilful storytelling can make that better. The lore isn't much better. It feels like a world built by going through a checklist of features, glued together by vague handwaving.
A couple of weeks ago I criticized the game Coffee Talk for "not being spicy enough". It has great characters told through decently-written atmospheric dialogues, so what's lacking? It has zero plot, or an exceedingly minimal one. The narration only relays each character's story, their lore. The thing tying them together, the fact that they happen at the same time and told in the same place, is loose and not played on enough. This would still appeal to a lot of people, but it bothers me.
Hmm. Well I'm just musing out loud here. It's an interesting way to look at story, to realise that a story is more than just what you see, more than just a string of events, more than watching characters play off against each other.
