Summary
- Elden Ring offers a spectacular story and climax, setting it apart from other games in the series.
- Half-Life 2 continually spices up gameplay and features one of the best climaxes in gaming history.
- Baldur's Gate 3 expands and branches out, offering players more enticing things to do as the game progresses.
It's a well-known developer fact that oftentimes, the first level in the game is the last one that the developers worked on. It makes sense, as what better way to capture the attention of players than a level made only once the developers already know exactly what the game should play like?
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That's not to say, however, that there aren't a few games that invite players on a crescendo of quality, emotion, and gameplay stakes that doesn't stop until the end credits roll. Let's have a look at some games that start great, and only get better until they're over.
1 Elden Ring
Better And Better, Harder And Harder
Elden Ring
- Released
- February 25, 2022
WHERE TO PLAY
- So many incredible sights to be seen
Many argue Bloodborne is the greatest game in FromSoftware's catalog. While that might be correct, it's just not a game that keeps on getting better as players come close to the end. In fact, the game does start fantastically well, has no quality drop in its middle section, but features some of the most disappointing boss fights in the series right before the end.
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While these open-world games might have their fair share of frustrating elements, pushing past them can still deliver some great experiences.
That's not true when it comes to Elden Ring, a game that gives players much more freedom in terms of how to proceed, and they all build up to a spectacular story and gameplay climax that's not seen in many games - even from the regularly excellent FromSoft catalog.
2 Half-Life 2
The Mechanics Never Stop Getting More Fun
Half-Life 2
- Released
- November 16, 2004
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- M for Mature: Blood and Gore, Intense Violence
- Genre(s)
- Shooter
- The gravity gun gets better and better
The original Half-Life is known for featuring one of the greatest intro sequences ever, which immediately sets a hard standard to follow up on, let alone improve upon. Half-Life 2 features just as great an intro, and then does an even better job at following up on it. Half-Life 2 excels at organically inserting better and better set-pieces, but that's not all.
It also does a great job of continually spicing up the gameplay with new weapons, as well as giving it one of the best climaxes of all time, which takes place right at the top of the citadel, with the super-powered gravity gun. Half-Life 2's final moments remain some of the most fun physics-based gameplay anyone has ever had with a video game.
3 Far Cry
The Only Game In The Series To Switch Up Its Campaign
Far Cry
- Released
- March 23, 2004
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- M For Mature 17+ Due To Intense Violence, Blood
- Genre(s)
- FPS, Open-World
- The series should bring this kind of unpredictability back
Although this is an unpopular opinion, many defend that the Far Cry series only ever got worse after the first entry. One of the reasons for that is that it began to suffer from many of the problems plaguing other Ubisoft games. Another is how the first game only gets better until its brutal climax. Far Cry, from the get-go, is a beautiful game. Never before then had players seen such beautiful beaches in a video game, so continually improving after that was a tough challenge.
Still, the game never stops giving players new things to do - instead of just having them climb towers for Ubisoft-related reasons - and, very importantly, new things to kill. Yes, not all enemies in the original Far Cry are the same regular soldier, and the introduction of new and more powerful enemies that won't be spoiled here greatly enhances the experience right until the very end.
4 Baldur's Gate 3
Only Gets More Engrossing As It Goes
Baldur's Gate 3
- Released
- August 3, 2023
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- M for Mature: Blood and Gore, Partial Nudity, Sexual Content, Strong Language, Violence
- Genre(s)
- RPG
- The best classic RPG of all time?
This one shouldn't come as much of a surprise, as Baldur's Gate 3 quickly became one of the most celebrated RPGs of all time. That's for many reasons, but one of them is the fact that this game excels at story progression and will beautifully respond to all of the players' decisions.
Baldur's Gate 3 is strong even when it's being intimate, but it sure knows how to expand and branch out, and never stops giving players more and more enticing things to do, whether they're pursuing the main quest or other activities.
5 The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind
The More Players Learn, The More They'll Know How Tiny They Are
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
- Released
- May 1, 2002
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- T For Teen due to Blood, Violence
- Genre(s)
- RPG
- Probably the most satisfying campaign in TES history
Despite Oblivion being more popular and Skyrim being way more popular, The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind does a much better job when it comes to delivering a sprawling main campaign. Players first show up in a completely alien world, and will have to find out where to go and piece together the strange inner workings of this place mostly by themselves.
Morrowind provides players with one of the most original narratives in RPGs, one free from most of the tropes seen in so many incredibly tired Elves vs Orcs stories out there. Anyone looking for an RPG with a campaign that'll take them to truly unexpected places should look no further - even if Morrowind is already over twenty years old.
6 Split Fiction
Unbelievably Inventive
Split Fiction
- Released
- March 6, 2025
WHERE TO PLAY
- Never a dull moment
Hazelight's Joseph Fares' game development philosophy is too rich in expletive deleted content to state here, but the man is absolutely right. Translated for Internet friendliness, the man believes in trying out new stuff for every level of his games.
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He sure does prove he'll live and die by his words with Split Fiction, a game that introduces wildly fun new gameplay mechanics with every new level it puts players in. The same also applies to It Takes Two, another fantastic game by the same team that won many GOTY awards, though Split Fiction feels like an improvement over even that.
7 Titanfall 2
The Poster Child Of Neverending Improvements
Titanfall 2
- Released
- October 28, 2016
WHERE TO PLAY
- ESRB
- M for Mature: Blood and Gore, Language, Violence
- Genre(s)
- FPS
- New mechanics, all the time
Much like Split Fiction and It Takes Two, the people behind Titanfall 2 at Respawn also knew that the way to make a great campaign was to never let it go stale. And what better way to go about doing that than by introducing new and increasingly more fun mechanics in each level? The only difference here is that whereas a lot of the fun coming out of the aforementioned games comes from the interaction with your partner, Titanfall 2's campaign is single-player only.
Good thing the mechanics contained in Titanfall 2 are even more impressive than anything any other game has put out, and the game gives players both a mission where they can mess with time and alternate dimensions - a mission that remains, to many, the best in the history of FPS games - then outdoes it in the final mission where it has players straight-up feeling like a god. That's how to pull off a single-player campaign.
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