Poll: Annoying Game Beginnings

What Game Beginning Are You Most Sick Of?

#1: The hero's town burns down, killing his/her parents. The hero swears for revenge.

This is a popular one. In almost every RPG, something catches fire. It's usually a town and then lots of people die. So whether or not our hero knows who did it, s/he seeks revenge.

If you really want to kill off a character close to the hero, I'm pretty sure you can be a little more creative with it. Poison. Arrows. War. Toxic gas. Shove them off a cliff. A fire is just a way to escape the process of coming up with something original.


#2: Someone wakes the hero up, tells them he or she is lazy and to get to the daily chores...And something goes wrong.

There are a couple reasons why this sucks.
#1-- If we wanted to do chores, we would stick to reality, not a game.
#2-- It's usually an in-game tutorial that most people don't want to play

If you want to throw in an in-game tutorial, at least give the player an opportunity to blow the guy off. If you want chores to be done, make it one chore that has some critical meaning. Have the player go into a tiny opening in a cave because s/he is the only one that can fit. Don't have us go feed the sheep or ask around town for someone we don't care anything about.


#3: Someone needs the hero's help for something and you have to run around for an hour trying to figure out who the heck the person is and where s/he is at.

This one doesn't bother me too much until I realize I have no idea who I'm looking for or where and it takes me an hour to accidently find them. If the town is small, no real problem. If the place requires a map or a "You Are Here" marker, forget it.


#4:You're fighting someone and you don't know who they are and why they are trying to kill you.

This one is a little more exciting, in my opinion, but I would still like to know why I have to beat up all these people. If you're showing off your totally awesome battle system, then whatever. But if you just have no idea how to start a game and your battle system is incredibly weak, don't do it. Just make sure it actually GOES with the story... Don't have me get my butt kicked and then "Oh, you're pardoned. It's cool." What?


Note: I'm not against any of these openings if they're done right. It's all about angles.


What do you guys think?