My exact thoughts! I'm currently working on a indie project, and somehow, our manager is focusing more on the gameplay than the story itself. When I finally got to try out the game (Still in pre-alpha mind you!), it just didn't feel right. I couldn't find the 30-second-of-fun over and over; it was only fun to play for at least 10 seconds, and at the point of time, I just knew something wasn't right. Whenever I see my project manager, I would be asking him for a story to understand the flow of the game, he would just reply a summary of what the game is about, nothing particular in where the turn point or the climax of it. So beyond that point, I would have to do some educational guess on what the games is all about. There are some cases, where there can be a game without the story, but it would be something similar to an arcade/free-will game. Games like Minecraft (Even though it does have a story in it), focus more on the gameplay and enduring that experience for the players. Especially pacman!

It does sound troublesome if you haven't found the "Toy" of your game.