10 Games That Transform After One Hour

How a game starts is crucial for attracting players and ensuring its success. The first hour needs to grab their attention and make them want to continue. The following games understand this, but they take a unique approach. Some begin slowly, building up to a large-scale story, while others start with a prelude that takes place before the main events. Here are 10 games that significantly change after you’ve played for about an hour.

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty

The beginning of Metal Gear Solid 2 cleverly sets up Solid Snake as the main hero, making players feel comfortable and familiar with the series. However, the game takes a surprising turn after just an hour. The story jumps forward two years, and Snake is believed to be dead. From then on, you play as Raiden, a new character who, while less experienced and charming than Snake, is more agile and capable. Raiden’s biggest advantage in gameplay is his ability to quickly roll between cover. But many players were initially frustrated by the change because Raiden lacked Snake’s personality and iconic voice. It felt like a beloved character had been put on the sidelines with no promise of a return. Looking back, we now appreciate Raiden’s development and his impressive role in Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, but in 2001, there was no guarantee that Solid Snake would ever regain the spotlight.

Prey (2017)

The beginning of Prey is brilliantly designed, immediately grabbing your attention and pulling you into its world. Though it shares a name with the 2006 game, this Prey isn’t a direct sequel, but it does start with a similar, everyday scene that quickly turns into a sci-fi thriller. You play as Morgan, starting their day in a futuristic San Francisco apartment. The game lets you interact with almost anything, picking up and throwing objects, and there are emails and notes scattered around to give you background information. It’s easy to get lost exploring the detailed environment. After a helicopter ride to work, a terrifying creature attacks, and Morgan loses consciousness. When they wake up, things seem normal at first, but it quickly becomes clear that something is very wrong. The apartment building is revealed to be a simulation on board a space station, and the rest of the game focuses on Morgan’s struggle to survive on the isolated and dangerous Talos I station. Everything you thought you knew is turned upside down.

The Last of Us Part 1

The gameplay of The Last of Us truly begins about an hour into the experience, but this isn’t because of lengthy or unnecessary tutorials. Instead, the first hour carefully establishes the game’s world and sets the stage for the story to come. You don’t immediately start as a tough survivor fighting zombies; you begin as Joel’s daughter, Sarah, exploring their home and learning about their lives before the outbreak. After a chaotic evacuation and a car crash, you take control of Joel, desperately trying to save Sarah from the infected. Following a particularly heartbreaking moment, the game jumps forward in time, and you finally play as the hardened Joel we know from the rest of the game. It’s a brilliant introduction to a zombie game that builds tension and anxiety without even giving you a weapon.

Red Dead Redemption 2

Rockstar Games usually gives players a lot of freedom to explore from the start, but Red Dead Redemption 2 is different. It takes about an hour before the main story missions stop being so guided. Players eager to experience the open-world western adventure need to play through the initial story setup first. While the opening hours are certainly exciting and engaging – introducing shooting and combat with rival gangs – much of it involves a slower pace, like riding through snowy mountains while characters talk. RDR2 offers even more open-world freedom than the original game, but it takes longer to unlock that expansive experience.

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

If you’re looking for a game that starts slowly and builds tension, 2006’s The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess is a perfect example. The game begins with a peaceful, almost Harvest Moonlike introduction, where Link simply chats with villagers and completes farm chores. The village of Ordon feels idyllic and safe, with only a basic slingshot tutorial to hint at anything more. While Link eventually embarks on a grand adventure, it takes a considerable amount of time to get there. Twilight Princess is known for being one of the darker entries in the Zelda series, incorporating horror elements with its villain, Zant, and the unsettling Twilight realm. Despite its later fast-paced action, the peaceful beginning is surprisingly effective. The brilliance of the opening lies in how well it establishes what’s at stake – it shows that even a tranquil place like Ordon can be threatened and destroyed by evil. In some ways, Ordon serves a similar purpose to The Shire in Lord of the Rings*.

Death Stranding

The beginning of Death Stranding gives you a hint of what the game is about, but it doesn’t prepare you for how strange it gets later on. The game starts with a confusing, dreamlike introduction filled with unusual terms and backstory. The opening section is mostly cutscenes – about 40 minutes – with only 20 minutes of actual gameplay. You briefly get to control your character, picking up and delivering cargo through rainy mountains, before the action is interrupted. It’s a good tutorial for the core gameplay, but doesn’t offer the freedom you’ll eventually have. It takes about an hour before the game’s main features unlock. What makes Death Stranding special is its beautiful and unusual open world, with diverse landscapes and stunning views. You don’t really experience the core gameplay – connecting with other players by building structures like bridges – until later in the game. While there are still long cutscenes throughout, they’re balanced by long stretches of open-ended delivery missions, something the opening section lacks.

Kingdom Hearts 2

The beginning of Kingdom Hearts 2 surprised many fans by starting with Roxas instead of the main character, Sora. The opening also took place in a completely new location, creating a mysterious and unsettling atmosphere similar to an episode of The Twilight Zone. Roxas’s time in Twilight Town served as a way to teach players the game’s controls, though key elements like magic and the Gummi Ship aren’t used until Sora appears. When Kingdom Hearts 2 first launched, players were immediately asking: “Where are Sora, Donald, and Goofy? And who is this new character, Roxas?” A key strength of the game is how it gradually answers those questions as the story unfolds.

The Stanley Parable

Honestly, The Stanley Parable is one of those games that just grabbed me with its weirdness. It feels less like a traditional game and more like…an experiment. From the moment you start, this narrator is laying out this whole office scenario for this guy named Stanley, and immediately you start wondering, do I just do what he says? Or do I totally ignore him? That’s when things get cool. Every choice you make sends you down a different path – there are so many. The first hour is a total whirlwind of possibilities, and the more you rebel against the narrator, the more his personality comes out. It’s really something else.

Control

Control is a unique game that surprises players with its strange world and narrative. The entire game unfolds inside a constantly changing skyscraper called ‘The Oldest House’. This building is like a maze, with an interior that’s far bigger than it looks from the outside. The first hour is already quite unusual, introducing you to the building and your character’s powers. However, the game’s full scope and strange story don’t truly reveal themselves until you unlock more abilities and uncover more of the mystery.

Firewatch

Firewatch is a truly captivating story-driven game. It puts you in the shoes of a fire lookout over a month, and surprisingly, it never gets dull. Instead, it becomes increasingly intriguing as a mystery slowly unfolds, with subtle clues suggesting something is off. While the gameplay itself – exploring, using a flashlight, and talking on a walkie-talkie with your colleague Delilah – remains fairly consistent throughout, the game’s ending is so different from its beginning that it makes it a standout experience.

2025-12-08 21:16