I'm not saying story is a bad thing. It's not, but it seems like a lot of devs focus so heavily on coming up with an engaging story and good visuals that they forget to actually make the game fun to play.
I think about some of the games I've played over the years, and a lot of my favorites either had fairly limited or even downright absurd plots that basically boil down to an excuse to make the gameplay loop happen.
Just a random musing.
Heck, look at STALKER for example. The story in of itself is... well, kind of interesting in a lore kind of way, but not especially engaging most of the time.
What is engaging however is the kind of shit you run into wherever you go. And it's not like a haunted house carnival ride, with linear jumpscares along a linear track either.
All of which makes up the basic setting and overall gameplay experience. The story in actuality only ends up serving as some kind of context for what's going on.
See also any Fromsoft game for examples of this.