Nothing is more immersion breaking than getting plopped right into a cutscene you have no control over.

I much prefer games to tell the story through the eyes of the player, and to allow them to (at the least) move their head as what goes on, well, goes on.

Half life and Half Life 2 are excelent examples of this. They never force you through a cut scene and instead all of the story you know is seen through Gordon's eyes. It seems small but having some control makes all of the difference.



So really, I hate cut scenes. Some games it is fine, because they aren't exactly narrative experiences, but for story driven games cut scenes are the best way to bore the player and make them wonder why they just didn't rent a damned movie instead (I'm looking at you, MGS4).