12 Greatest Opening Video Game Sequences Since 2000

12. Uncharted 2

Easily the best instalment in a very highly-acclaimed series, following the stellar first Uncharted's was never going to be an easy task, but Naughty Dog nailed it with flying colours. Starting out Tarantino-style by putting our loveable explorer Nathan Drake in a rather precarious position - dangling over the edge of a cliffside - control then switches over to you to make your escape. Coming from a background comprised of platformers Crash Bandicoot and Jak and Daxter, the Uncharted series was a chance for them to flex their programming muscles, and as they've repeatedly stated in interviews they wanted to challenge themselves to deliver amazingly interactive set-pieces that would make you feel as though you were right in the centre of the experience every time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7BAelqlxwI#t=69 Although the majority of these moments come later in the game - a level set on a moving train, a collapsing office building and another on a series of moving vehicles for example - this opening scene as you clamber out a destroyed train just as it topples over the edge is the perfect primer for what's to come. This would be The Last of Us' lead writer Neil Druckmann's first major release, and you can feel his personable style everywhere from the epic action-scene directing to the affable script that helped cement Nate and his friends' tale so dearly in all our hearts.