10 Open World Games That Are Fun From the Start

The first five minutes of any play, film, show, or video game are critical to the success of the given subject as it will determine whether or not audiences will be immediately enthralled by the product or will even stay for the product's entire duration.

In terms of video games, especially for narrative-focused ones, the first five minutes are typically regulated to displaying cutscenes that help establish the game's world and characters, but sometimes games let players get straight into the action within the first five minutes.

Both introductory instances are particularly important when it comes to open-world games, as many open worlds feature vast, intricate, and complicated worlds filled with diverse factions and issues that need to be intriguingly established within the game's first five minutes.

While there are many open-world titles that still feature engaging worlds and stories despite featuring somewhat uneventful introductions, here are 10 open-world games that will instantly hook players of all kinds within the first five minutes due to their exciting setups and early gameplay exhibitions.

10 Ghost of Tsushima

Japan's First Mongol Invasion

Sucker Punch Productions' Ghost of Tsushima is, in many ways, a perfect example of how to expertly engage players within the first five minutes of an open-world game, as it not only establishes Tsushima's historical setting but also perfectly establishes the game's cast and gameplay.

Set in 1274 during the first Mongol Invasion of Japan, Ghost of Tsushima begins with protagonist Jin Sakai talking about how the Mongols invaded Japan as he and other samurai march to the frontlines of the western island of Tsushima to confront the foreigners.

This intro cutscene not only positions Sakai and the rest of the samurai as selfless underdogs, as they only have 80 samurai defending the island from an entire fleet, but showcases the brutality of the Mongols as Lord Adachi is dishonorably killed by being set on fire and decapitated by Khotun Khan before he can even unsheathe his sword.

Before the first five minutes of Tsushima are over, the game dives players straight into the action as Sakai, his uncle Lord Shimura, and the rest of the samurai attack the Mongols on horseback before subsequently fighting them in dynamic sword standoff combat.

9 The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Link's Mysterious Awakening

Most of the mainline entries in The Legend of Zelda series tend to have enigmatic introductions that quickly get caught up in gameplay tutorials, typically spent helping local villagers, but The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild arguably has one of the best intro sequences in the entire LOZ franchise.

Breath of the Wild immediately begins with a mysterious voice telling Link to open his eyes and wake up, only for the Hylian hero to find himself in a water-filled machine within the mysterious Shrine of Resurrection.

After acquiring the peculiar yet familiar Wii U GamePad and Nintendo Switch-like Sheikah Slate, Link uses the tablet to open a door out to the wilderness with the mysterious voice calling him the light of Hyrule and declaring that the light must shine on the land once more.

From here, just before Breath of the Wild reaches its five-minute mark, players can immediately begin exploring the game's vast open world to their heart's desire or continue the game's main quest, with the game even allowing players to go and try to defeat Ganon straight from the tutorial area.

8 Marvel's Spider-Man

The Life of Peter Parker

Today, Spider-Man is one of the most popular comic book characters of all time, and while many people know his story from the live-action films, Insomniac Games still perfectly summarizes his story and life as a veteran hero within the first five minutes of Marvel's Spider-Man.

This Spider-Man isn't based on any specific film or book incarnation of the character, so Insomniac expertly establishes his history by having the camera pan over a spider, pictures of Peter Parker's friends and family, drawn concepts for web shooters, leftover food, empty money jars, and newspaper clippings of his heroic exploits.

All of this explains to the player that Peter has not only been Spider-Man for a while now, but showcases how tech-savvy he is and that he has difficulty balancing his hero life with his regular civilian life. He can only afford cheap Chinese food and is past due on rent, and this is just shown in the first minute of the game.

The rest of Spider-Man's first five minutes has Peter donning his iconic but dirty suit to respond to an issue at Fisk Tower, the headquarters of the Kingpin, with the game going straight into gameplay by having Peter jump from his window and begin web swinging to the tower, making players instantly feel like they're living Peter's heroic life.

7 Prototype

Alex Mercer's Vengeful Hunt

Movies and TV shows often begin their tales by opening with engaging, drama-filled, or action-packed sequences before going back in time to explain how things got this way, a method known as in medias res, and one open-world game that utilizes this method of storytelling perfectly is Radical Entertainment's Prototype.

Set in modern-day New York City, Prototype begins with a cutscene depicting the city already ravaged by an unknown virus and protagonist Alex Mercer hunting down Blackwatch soldiers while cryptically explaining that he is the reason the city is like this, but is bent on hunting down whoever turned him into a monster.

Another cutscene then depicts Blackwatch eliminating zombie-like infected civilians before Mercer shows up and uses his shapeshifting abilities to rip the soldiers apart, withstand rocket shots, and morph his body to look like anyone and deceive others, which he does to locate a Blackwatch commander.

By the three-minute mark, Prototype finally gets into gameplay, with players controlling Mercer to brutally take out more Blackwatch troops and tanks and use his shapeshifting abilities to sprint up buildings, leap great distances, and rip apart grotesque, mutating people, showing how Prototype has both an intriguing story and fun, albeit very violent gameplay.

6 The Forest

A Plane Ride Unlike Any Other

Sometimes, the best intro sequences for games are those that feature little to no dialogue at all, allowing events and the game's environment to speak for themselves, with a perfect example of such being seen in Endnight Games' The Forest.

The Forest begins with the player-character, Eric LeBlanc, waking up on a midair flight to see his young son, Timmy, resting against his arm before picking up a wilderness survival guidebook.

Suddenly, the plane begins to travel through intense turbulence, resulting in it crashing into a remote, heavily forested peninsula, with Eric briefly waking up to see a man covered in red paint take away the still unconscious Timmy.

That was all in The Forest's first minute and a half, prompting the player to search the island for Timmy while striving to survive on the peninsula, which players quickly learn is inhabited by dirty, near-naked, and violent cannibals and other grotesque mutants.

5 Fallout 4

Witnessing the Beginning of the End

Each of Bethesda's Fallout games begins in intriguing ways, setting up either Vault life or life in the radioactive wasteland of the former United States, but Fallout 4 arguably has the most unique and unsettling opening among all Fallout titles.

Fallout 4 actually begins with a cutscene depicting World War 2 before transitioning to depicting the U.S. in the 21st century, utilizing nuclear energy in nearly every aspect of life, leading to the Sino-American War between China and the U.S., with the veteran Nate lamenting over the state of the world in 2077.

The game then transitions to players either embodying Nate or Nora in their 2077 Massachusetts home with their infant son, Shaun, and their kind Mister Handy robot Codsworth, before a Vault-Tec Rep comes to their home to register the family for a place in the local nuclear shelter Vault 111.

At this point, the game had reached its five-minute mark, but for fans of the series, this intro was immensely intriguing as it was the first proper and playable depiction of Fallout's pre-war U.S., and it was exciting to see just how this family would be impacted by the inevitable nuclear destruction of The Great War which began the same day Fallout 4 begins.

4 Halo Infinite

The Wrath of Atriox

The Halo series dabbled with open world environments before with Halo 3: ODST, but its first proper open world entry was 343 Industries' Halo Infinite, which saw the UNSC Infinity, the largest and most advanced human ship, and Master Chief journey to Zeta Halo in an attempt to end the Created threat.

Halo Infinite opens with a calm shot of Zeta Halo before immediately panning over to see the Infinity getting rammed and bombarded by three massive Banished dreadnoughts, with Banished Phantoms boarding the human ship and shooting down any human vessel attempting to evacuate.

The cutscene then transitions to Master Chief attempting to repel Banished troops inside the Infinity, only to get brutally attacked by the massive Jiralhanae leader of the Banished, Atriox, with his gravity mace Chainbreaker, all while the AI Cortana whispers about how people would live their lives differently if they knew how they were going to die.

Master Chief is then thrown in defeat by Atriox into space, with the cutscene then transitioning to a lone UNSC Pelican pilot known as Echo 216 as he struggles to repair the ship and gets upset looking over a hologram recording of his family, with both scenes setting up Infinite to be one of the most shocking and emotional entries in the entire Halo franchise.

3 Horizon Zero Dawn

Aloy's Introduction to a Primal World

Many games open with bombastic, action-packed sequences like Halo Infinite to get players hyped about getting into the action themselves, but some of the best opening sequences are those that are relatively calm, with a perfect instance of which is seen in Horizon Zero Dawn.

Horizon Zero Dawn begins with shots overlooking a cottage in a snowy, mountainous wilderness, before focusing on a primal, caveman-looking man called Rost calmly reassuring an infant girl before going off on their journey to perform a ritual to declare the girl her name.

During their journey through snowy landscapes, green forests, and ancient ruins of skyscraper-filled cities, Rost explains to the girl and the player the traditions and beliefs of his tribe, and the status of him and the girl as outcasts, with the girl having no mother, before encountering gigantic, awe-inspiring, animalistic machines that roam the land.

This culminates in Nora High Matriarch Teersa blessing the girl's naming and Rost declaring the girl as Aloy from a mountaintop before High Matriarch Lansra abruptly ends the ritual and calls Aloy a curse, with this entire sequence establishing the wonder and mystique of Horizon's world while also showcasing the prejudices Aloy must overcome.

2 Assassin's Creed Origins

Bayek's Ruthlessness

The long-running Assassin's Creed franchise has had many great opening sequences over the years, but arguably its best opening that will hook most players within the first five minutes is that shown in Assassin's Creed Origins.

Set towards the end of the Hellenistic period in Ancient Egypt, Assassin's Creed Origins opens up in the Siwa Oasis in 49 BCE, with Pharaoh Ptolemy XIII marching through the village atop elephants while the Medjay Bayek of Siwa and Aya of Alexandria look upon him in disgust.

The screen then shows flashes of masked men attacking Bayek before jumping one year later to the Bent Pyramid, where a disheveled Bayek has cornered one of the masked men, Rudjek, declaring that he is Medjay to no pharaoh, and subsequently crosses off Rudjek's name from his arm with an arrow before killing the man with his own mask.

The game then immediately transitions to gameplay outside the pyramid, depicting Bayek being forced to kill Rudjek's towering bodyguard Hypatos, with both the cutscene and the gameplay showcasing AC's new focus on RPG-like gameplay and displaying Bayek as a lethal but incredibly intriguing main protagonist.

1 Batman: Arkham City

The Kidnapping of Bruce Wayne

Without a doubt, the best open-world game to feature an incredible opening sequence that will instantly hook anyone to the game within the first five minutes is Rocksteady Studios' Batman: Arkham City.

A sequel to Batman: Arkham Asylum, Arkham City actually has two opening sequences, with the first only initially being available as DLC and featuring Catwoman as a playable character for the first time in the series, stealing a computer chip from Two-Face.

Arkham City's main opening sequence begins with Bruce Wayne publicly speaking out against the opening of Arkham City, a portion of Gotham City that was walled off and reestablished to be a prison area for Arkham inmates, before being kidnapped by TYGER security under the orders of Doctor Hugo Strange, who knows Wayne's true identity as Batman.

Wayne is then admitted into Arkham City with the goal of attempting to stop Strange's mysterious implementation of Protocol 10, making players excited to figure out just how Arkham City works, how Strange knows Wayne's true identity, what Protocol 10 is, and what role Catwoman has in all of this.