There does need to be to read and dsicover. I am working on (and will hopefully finish) modifications to make doing so in the labs more rewarding.
The argument of “gameplay over lore” is asinine, though. Adding more in-game stories to encounter is improving gameplay, for everyone that plays for the joy of exploration and discovery, although it certainly doesnt need to be explicit backstory or world lore.
Take Bioshock - the recordings you could collect were not just fluff - they were gameplay. They provided incentives to search, they established mood, they altered player behaviour by their exitence. That is something we need more of.
But we need better systems to convey those first, because right now we can’t easily do stories that are interesting and promote good gameplay. The newish snippets system is a great example of progress on this front.
None of this means that the stuff described in that first post should be among the elements included though. In fact I would argue almost nothing from there is really worth sticking in except tangentially or indirectly. The player should have to work for explanations, and certainty should be elusive.
Saying gameplay is more important than lore is as silly as saying lore is more important than content. In both cases the second is simply a method for delivering the first.
