Intro video - how important?

#1 Must be easily bypassable. Nothing will piss off a user more than if they are forced to watch over and over the same cut scene or intro.

#2 Intro videos should only be played after a moment of so of being idle at the title screen. i hate it when a video loads up before then and i have to click repeatedly to make it go away. or make it an option on the titlescreen to play intro movie.

#3 What about Blizzard style? They would show it to you the first time you play (but still be able to skip it). Then after that it would just be the Blizzard logo video.

#4 ----

#5 Well, i think intro videos are wasted, considering the amount of work that goes into them. People will only view them once and bypass them everytime they launch the game.

That is the reason why, i'm integrating the intro video into the main menu GUI. Basically the video will run in the background.

#6 I say get to the action as fast as possible :)

#7 I like intro videos for games that have a detailed background, but don't do one just for the sake of it. Also it should only auto play the first time you run the game, be skipable via escape or some easy button press and finally a button on the title screen to replay the movie incase you skipped it by mistake or want to rewatch it.

I quite like intro movies for setting the scene. Eve-Online has recently added an intro movie to their game, 2 years after its first release and it makes a great difference in the feel of the game imo. Intros don't have to be flashy full feature film quality rendered graphics, they can be as simple as still artwork with voice over (see eves) or use in game graphics.

Whether rendered videos are better than videos made using in game graphics, I'm not sure. I personally like a good intro video. However I prefer ingame cut scenes to use in game graphics and be either scripted or ideally part of the gameplay itself.

#8 I was thinking of doing the exact same thing. instead of the bitmap background you see in most games main menu just have an intro playing behind the menu. I was also going to try to implement video recording and have it play those player recorded videos as well as the intro. Of course i'd have to give the ursers an option to turn that off if it's too distracting.

#9 I love intros! I watch every intro i can get! I even download intros! ;)

But it seems i'm the only one who's thinking that way... most of my friends, skip intros... even the best ones!

Gary Preston said: "...don't do one just for the sake of it." That's right. If you have a bad intro, just throw it away. If a game doesn't have an intro it's not that bad...

But when you have an intro and it's a good one then you should do it the "blizzard" way. Show it once (with the possibility to stop it) and then put a button into the main menu...

#10 I hate intro movies , i want to play the game :)

#11 As long as you allow the player to skip them

#12 The biggest considerations for me are (1) how will it affect download size? Your game must be kept small if you plan on offering it through the web, so a real-time video and not a pre-rendered one is usually in order, but even then you don't want to go overboard on size-adding dialogue, etc. And (2) how will allocating resources towards an intro video take away from other areas of the game's development, i.e. core gameplay? Personally, as an indie, my resources are so limited that any extra bandwidth I have needs to go into refining the gameplay, keeping bugs to a minimum, and polishing user interfaces... not throwing days or even weeks into what may amount to a minute of animation that could be just as easily told through more efficient means, i.e. illustratively.

#13 If you can do them relatively easily with the game engine, and still get the look you need, then do them that way. It would add minimal amounts to the download, and there's no need to mess about with fancy codecs. Plus, if your engine is cross-platform, your video sequences will be too.

Personally, I always watch the intros/logo screens the first time I play a game. After that I tend to skip them, so make sure you can turn them off.

Also, if you have videos/logos pop up before the game reaches its menu screen, make sure you can turn those off as well. If I use something like GameSpy to find an empty server, I don't want to have to wait ages to get through the startup sequence of the game. With some games, I've found that by the time the game gets round to contacting the server, it's filled up.

#14 Most intro videos I've encountered do let the player skip through if they wish, and that is a good thing.

I have to say though, despite the inordinate amount of time and resources generally spent making them (the good ones anyway), they do add a level of polish and professionalism to the end product... IMO.

#15 I would much rather drive a motorcycle off a 100 meter cliff, leap off halfway down, and crash through the skylight of a building guns blazing, then watch my character do it in an intro video.

I always see these great sequences done in FMV and wonder why I can't do them in-game. I think the best thing to do with your intro video is to make it part of the gameplay. Start the game with a bang, but do it in a way that keeps the controls simple. Beyond Good and Evil did this very well, starting with one of the most exciting and polished battles in the whole game right at the beginning.

#16 Intos/video intros are nessecary for story telling, I however would never make a game where you couldn't bypass the intro. In our current project, the intro is very nessecary to tell the player where he is, and how he got there, even if it doesnt tell his life history. It gets you in the mood.

Other games, I have played in the past, which had long intros that you couldn't bypass got old real quick. Games like Homeworld, the intro is very usefull to realize the gist of the game. Games like Warhammer Dawn of War, the intro was incredibly cool (Though, you couldn't bypass it the first time it played, which can be a neat feature)

How important, it depends on the project.

#17 If your game has a story then it's important. If not then nobody will miss it. I personally like intros. Games like Metal Gear are great for telling stories and usually have lengthy intros.

One game that pisses me off is SPlinter Cell: Chaos Theory. I like the game but they make you watch an add style trailer that's about 2 minutes long every time you boot the game up and it's unskippable. That is the only game I've ever played that has forced me to watch every time. It's not even a story intro. It's just clips from different stages as the main character does his moves on the enemy soldiers. Like a 2 minute commercial. "I've already bought the game!! Why are you trying to sell me on it now??" As a result, I find that I don't play Chaos Theory as much as I did the first 2 even though I like it the best.

Yes I think intros are important. I like them. I think they should play every time you boot the game up but you definatley should have the option to skip them. No matter how small, don't do anything to cause the player to dred booting up your game. That's just basic game developing knowledge and common sense.
-Ajari-

#18 As a quick point, I've played games that don't have an actual story per se', but have intro videos (skippable) that do help set the mood and tone of the game.

Quake 3 anyone?

Yeah - maybe I'm a sucker, but that video of Sarge vs. the Strogg kicked major bootay IMO. You could say... Bigbutay! (Cheesy Bukaroo Bonzai reference for the non-geeky b-movie inclined).

#19 Making them skippable isn't good enough. Even if when you skip them it still takes time to load the video. There needs to be an option to disable them entirely. Like in Battlefield 1942 there were 4 (!) intro videos, one for the publisher, one for the developer, one for the game, and one for the background in the menu. Even if you skipped all of them, it was like 20 seconds of loading and skipping. Luckily, you could just delete the movie files and the game would load in like 2 seconds.

That said, BF1942 had a great intro movie and it really helped set the mood for the game, even though it was just an online multiplayer game. The intro to Mechwarrior 2 was also great for it's time (though it's downright cheesey by today's standards).

#20 Some games really do enhance the experiece of the game no matter how many times you watch it. A good example of this is the Tekken series on the PS2/PS1. The creators of that series really make an intense intro which, in a way, psychs you up for the game action. Though this dosn't always work well, the Tekken sereis seems to have intros down pretty well.

I think for story heavy games, intros are not necessary if it is before the main menu. It may be a good idea to have an intro for a game like that, but only when you actually start a "new game" from the main menu.