10 Video Games That Open On MAJOR Plot Twists
Most intense video game openings EVER.
Generally plot twists are deployed in movies, TV shows, books, and video games near the end of a story to fundamentally alter the context of the hero's journey, and perhaps provide one final hurdle before the day can be saved.
But on occasion, storytellers decide to buck the trend and field out a plot twist right at the start of the narrative instead, as is perhaps no more jarring than when it occurs in a video game.
Given that you're likely to spend far more time playing a video game than you will a single movie, a game that bamboozles players with an expectation-subverting twist early on is taking a major risk that threatens to lose them from the get-go.
In many cases, some of which appear on this list, the first-act twist left many players irate and confused, if not crushingly disappointed, while in other examples they were near-universally praised for cleverly reshaping what players expected and giving them something they didn't know they wanted.
No matter how everything turned out, though, these games all opened with jaw-dropping surprises that players won't ever forget...
10. Morgan's Apartment Is A Simulation - Prey
2017's Prey reboot opens with one of the most audacious and unexpected rug-pulls in recent gaming history, with protagonist Morgan Yu waking up in his apartment and heading off to join a research team on the space station Talos I.
But first, the player is transported to a lab to perform a series of tests, effectively serving as the game's tutorial.
At the conclusion of this sequence, the scientists and soldiers on the other side of the plexiglass are attacked by the vicious aliens known as the Typhon, while Morgan passes out as a sedative gas is released.
Morgan wakes up back in his apartment, and after a moment it's clear that something isn't right.
He's warned to quickly exit his apartment, leading the player to shatter the literal facade of their apartment window, revealing it to actually be a simulation intended to make Morgan think he's still on Earth.
In fact, Morgan is already on Talos I and has been for three years, and the Typhon outbreak witnessed prior has actually happened for real.
Talk about an opening that toys with player expectations and sets an "all bets are off" vibe from the outset.