10 Gaming Opening Levels Which Surprised Us All

3. The Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild

Fahrenheit game
Nintendo

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild brought an unprecedented level of freedom to the franchise through its vast, teeming open-world, and also by allowing players to make an immediate beeline to the very end of the story should they so wish.

After getting through the short prologue sequence, the game flashes up your ultimate objective - "Destroy Ganon."

Hilariously, sufficiently determined players can head straight to Ganon and attempt to take him on, though all but the most prepared are sure to suffer a swift death.

Even so, it's a refreshing break from AAA linearity that players can attempt to wreck the Big Bad in record time and wrap the whole story up before it's even really begun.

We're so used to developers guiding us along a semi-linear path, even in open-world games, that for one to set your final task in stone from the outset was a hugely pleasant surprise.

Less surprising was the fact that the speedrunning community ended up having a ton of fun with this.

Contributor
Contributor

Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.