Best Game Opening

[Peder 🚀]

I love the intro of The Dig!

It really do make you feel like your watching a movie!
But there is also alot of other great intros, I like the BASS one and FoA also has a great intro!
And many others that also is allready mentioned above.

[aussie]

You all are wrong.

The winner is Monkey Island 1.

In case you are forgetting, I'll remind you.

[Island shot]
[Fire pit near woods]
[Playable character enters screen]
[The game begins]

You just get thrown into the game. Awesome.

---
Seriously, I'm surprised we accepted that at the time, and still accept it.  I love it dearly though. There can be beauty in simplicity.

I'd have to go with that too.

At a time when only the old sierra games were around, the first Monkey Island was such a revolution...

[Erenan]

Wasn't that also basically the introduction to Hero Quest?

[Hero walks in from the side of the screen]
Hero: All right! I'm ready to become a hero!

[Ghost]

Hm, I don't know if simple introduction equals good introduction. From the narrative's point of view, I agree: Adventures that leave much to the player's imagination are often very worthwhile, more worthwhile than games that strap the player to a chair and hurl cutscene after cutscene...

But is the introduction of MI really such an astonishing thing? Most IF games started very much like that without even using graphics, so they must be even more brilliant: The player woke up from a dream, or was introduced with a cheesy line, and that was that. This, in my eye, always leads to the player putting a lot of himself into the character, and I for myself don't play a game to play a digital version of me. I would be X-rated, too.

A good introduction should establish the setting and tone of the game, include a reason for the game to start AND, to me, offer something about the player and why I would like to be him. Or her. I want a character to relate to, not a hollow shell. Insofar I consider the MI opening sequence nothing too special, apart from introducing the most unusual name ever.

[Max]

I must agree that interactive intros are some of the best - I remember how great Fate of Atlantis was when I first played it.

[TheJBurger]

In my opinion, an intro should establish the setting, the main character, and your goal.
I hate it when adventure games start me out and they expect me to walk around aimlessly to figure out what to do.
This works some of the time, but I'd much rather be told what I'm expected to do instead of trying to figure out myself. (There are probably some exceptions, but I won't go into them here.)

Good intros:
In Automation:
You are told that you are a scientist in a lab. You know that you have to rescue the robot. That's all you need to know, so then you are given control of the character, and you go out to solve this problem.

In Reactor 09:
You are presented the case of the prisoner and the guard. Your first goal in the game is just to revive the guard, and once you do that, you are presented with more goals until the end. Simple and effective.

In Trilby's Notes:
Your first goal to achieve is find Simone (was that her name?). Once you do that, you are sent to the hotel where you are ordered to find your contact.

In all of these games, you are given the setting, main character, and then a goal to achieve. Simple and effective.

[Ghost]

I'm so glad. I was prepared for some pretty intense discussion...

But it's true. Adventure games are, after all, still part game, part story. A story is set, even though the player takes part in it. And no story could ever roll without a good, establishing start.

I agree on the Fate of Atlantis comment. That was fun, and it added a lot to the tone. Were there other commercial games trying the technique? I can't remember one right now...