10 Levels That Should've Been Cut From Recent Video Games

Man, what a letdown Forspoken was - a thunderously generic open-world action game with not a single original strand of DNA in its body.

But the game really didn't stand much of a chance to hook players considering how much of a leaden slog its wildly overlong prologue is.

It's several hours before the world of Athia opens up to the player, before which they're forced to sit through reams of tedious, exposition-heavy cutscenes and are funnelled down a linear gameplay corridor as they learn the basics.

Onboarding is such an important part of any AAA game, and in this case Square Enix desperately needed to streamline the process.

Giving players the keys to Athia needed to be far more of a focal concern than it was, because by the time it finally happens, there's a good chance many are already mentally checked out.

In a year where so many incredible games were released and players had so many other options, taking two hours to remove the shackles and let players go off was a colossal, possibly flop-inducing mistake.