Your biggest "Whoa" moments in video gaming (Possibly Spoilers)

YouSavedMyLife

Title say it all.

Off the top of my head ill list afew of mine.

The intro to Final Fantasy 8. The CGI in that was amazing at the time and the music coupled with the action on screen just blew me away when i first booted it up the game. I restarted the PSone as soon as it finished just to watch it again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q09quI356sQ

The murder of Poseidon in God of War 3. The fight itself was amazing, but i was kinda spoiled by watching half of it on the net weeks before release. But I didnt see the cutscene/quicktime section where Kratos is brutally beating the crap out him. But the icing on cake was that for the whole section your view is the FPS of Poseidon instead of Kratos! Genius move!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEQc8n-844k

Everything Uncharted 2. Man that game was total eyecandy. The beautiful graphics, vibrant colours, the stunning vistas. Id sum up this game in a word it would be, GLORIOUS! Not to mention the killer gameplay sections: The Tank, The Train, The Plane. Its gonna be a tota media blackout of me on Uncharted 3. Review scores be damned this game will be GLORIOUS!

The first encounter with the Reapers in Mass Effect. The conversation with the repear was spine chilling. The type of language the use gives you a sense that they are the ultimate being, gods even. After that convo you just think.



I had more when i thought up the idea for this thread 2 days ago but i have forgotten :rolleyes:

obliviousgrudge

DRIV3R
Tanner leaves to Jericho to live, only to get shot and end up in ER, and the game ended with a cliffhanger, which is yet to be answered. Best FMV ever!

Xluna

Aeris dies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wx3duFYCcho

SFII for snes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_ZP_a389Dw

Realising how bad FFXIII sucks. That was a big "whoa" moment.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTY-WxSyqxY

Discovering the fantastic Suikoden series

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HBAaL0I1rI

The many plot twists of Terranigma

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCnfHFiUuvE

pablomakaveli

My biggest whoa moment was playing Vice City for the first time.

I got it with my brand new PS2 and had'nt played GTA3 so it was my first time playing GTA in 3D. I remember tearing around in a jeep to Billie Jean on christmas morning.:D

Another moment was playing a demo of MOH frontline (which was the second level. ) I remeber i had the sound up loud so when i got to the machine gun at the start of the level just hearing it drilling into the germans was pretty special.

Playing Oblivion all the freedom and the size of the world i had to explore was also a bit of a whoa moment.

As mentioned Aeris's death in FF7 came as a suprise too.

Getting the magnum in Res 2 and blowing a zombies head of it made me go whoa.

Playing Call of Duty 1 when it first came out. When the mortar explodes beside you and it affects your vision and your hearing - no game had ever done that before.

Max Payne - the first time you enter Bullet-time mode.

VenomIreland

Finding The Master in Fallout.

His/Her/It's voice(s) scared me.

Gi joe!

I've always found bosses that were GIGANTIC to give me that 'whoa' feeling. Just the feeling of being dwarfed used to scare the hell out of me as a wee lad.

The stone temple boss in Majora's Mask, can't remember it's name exactly, but it was big centipede about 100 times the size of you. The coolest part was you had to wear that mask to grow a few stories just to fight it.:D

Don't know why I've never played SOTC. Sounds like that game was made for me.

Agricola

PscyhoMantis in Metal Gear Solid.

When he mentioned that I played alot of ISS Pro, I nearly bricked it!

Decerto

Onimusha 3 intro, hands down best intro to a game ive ever seen, this youtube clip doesnt do it justice due to the quality
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3nil3KC3n0&feature=related

Jaafa

seeing this on tv for the first time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccWrbGEFgI8

bazzosh

all the GTAs after 3 blew me away! especially in GTA4 the vistas are mind boggling!

Being locked in the cell in MGS 1. that was kind of a wow moment.

The detail in the lighting and shadowing and texture of the weapons and surroundings in COD mod 2.

so many good times....

Blatter

Going back to Shadow Moses in MGS4 was amazing.

Daemos

Both in Uncharted 2

Shooting the guy who had the missile launcher in the distance and seeing the tower blow up and collapse. Made all the better by Drake's "sh1t, did I do that?"

And in the train yard after you crash the train through the wall, and you're surrounded with enemies, gunfire and grenades coming at you from every direction.

fuzztone

Medal of Honour Allied Assault - The Omaha Beach level.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piTTgwSR-K0

Shadow of the Collossus - Seeing Valus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cbqt_XlXRl4

Zelda 3 - Visiting the Dark World for the first time.

Oblivion - Leaving the sewer for the first time.

kwalshe

coming on to the beach in an early MOH game. When i completed the level and zoned out, my heart was racing and i was breathing like i'd just been bonking the oh

chin_grin

My face did this -> :eek:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgjdFlUtgHI

Mr E

Finding Polito in System Shock 2 is one of my favourites.

From recent games, the whole scorpion fight on the last level of Enslaved Journey to the West.

Blatter

I was only around 10 or 11 when playing this and I nearly **** myself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eTjMjehifY

Liber8or

In no particular order:

Medal of Honour: Allied Assault - When the front panel of the landing raft drops and you make your way up the beach.

Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic -

Finding out you are Revan

Half-Life 2 - The Physics Gun.

World of Warcraft - Taking a flight from two very distant places and seeing the vastness of Azeroth or Kalimdor.

World in Conflict - The nuke; everything from that sound burst to the sheer devastation.

BioWare games - How easily they draw you in and keep you gripped with compelling stories and characters for hours/days on end.

Mortal Kombat - Pulling off a gruesome but awesome fatality.

To be honest, there are many many moments that make gamers go "whoa", I just can't remember them all! Great memories though!

fuzztone

Oo I nearly forgot this!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfoXXefZVhc

Penn

Has to be Psycho Mantis in MGS. Reading your memory card, moving your controller (cheap trick, but still brilliant), then the method with which you have to beat him. An absolutely genius bit of work that completely blew me away at the time.

Others include your first encounter with a Licker in Resident Evil 2 (I'd never played RE1 so didn't know what to expect), the ending of Soul Reaver 1, the opening scene in Devil May Cry. Probably so many more but hard to think.

ProjectColossus

This early section from Half Life 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a82z5T02P9M

It was a real "Holy shiiiiiiiiiiiiit!" moment.

tonydude

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fe6srxp1-9I

Was very young at the time when i played this, when i saw it for the first time i actually turned the ps off and didnt play it for weeks. Scary stuff

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aalAPyVwlcg

My jaw fell off when i first saw this and to this day its amazing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNv-oJ8nB_8

Maybe ye remember this game, was a ''woah'' game for me anyway

K.O.Kiki

Secret of Mana -- Boss Thanatos music

Still sends chills down my back.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLWc6iG-iuI

Tenchu 2 -- Stealth kills
I remember once dropping onto a guard's head (jump kill), then I had to quickly kill his mate (3m away, side kill).
JUST as the animation ended, a 3rd guard came round the corner, so I quickly ran up and just about got him before he could raise the alarm.
Felt GLORIOUS.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhbAR9uOjv8

And...
Shadow of the Colossus.
Final boss (#16, Malus).
...
yeah.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqeA106E0Qs

corcaigh07

shenmue-some incredible moments in the 2 games. best one i think of is actually the most unimportant one, its when you get your ass handed to you by Izumi in Shenmue 2, the 3rd floor of the casino. a cool way to lose!

red dead redemption-the moment after the bridge has collasped and John is looking down at the river. the water effects are amazing, a real WHOA moment. also was the first game i was stuck into after finally buying a HDTV. worth it even just to see that as intended...

marco_polo

For sheer initial impact, 12 years later this is still tops for me personally.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAqbdtsK6NI

L31mr0d

Intro to Shadow of the Beast II on the commodore amiga. I was 8. I was sleeping over at a friends house. We woke up in the middle of the night to sneak down stairs to the back room to try out this new game he had gotten his hands on. To put some context to it, he lived in a country home in the middle of nowhere, and the house was freezing at night. So we sat shivering in front of his A500 in the dark, and booted up this game for the first time.

We where snickering about being up at 3am, and scoffing back frosties (the candy). Then the intro started.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-_8vz6eGf0

By the time it was over we where both white as a sheet, eyes fully dilated. Staring at the screen in shock.

Optimalprimerib

The very first time i played super mario bros. I had played a few games but died at the exact same spot doing the exact same thing each time. The next time i pressed start, the music began. The first few games i thought i was playing was just the demo. I nearly yet myself when the real game began.

Every little discovery i made in that game after that aswell.

The first boss battle in zelda ocarina of time. The sheer size of it had my jaw hit the floor.

In the same game returning to the rock people when you are grown to discover one of the children named after you. I nearly cried.

The free flowing gameplay of prince of persia sands of time. When this was released, games were bogged down with huge inventory systems and collectables. This was just pure gameplay.

The theatre level and napolean level in psychonauts. So so clever

The claw boss in half life. Sneaking past that had me backed up against a wall in a cold sweat.

Was Half Life the first to have introductions like that? I know Medal of Honour and Call of Duty had similar ones.

Pretty recent one, but from about 2:33 til about 4:21 of Dead Space has been the biggest "woah" moment for me in recent history

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=we1oLVRobYQ

Oh- probably hearing Guybrush Threepwood speak for the first time in Monkey Island 3. I had grown up with these games so it was a monumental occasion for me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mL0086T-u6A

Sephiroth_dude

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xucr6uBGxFY

Finding out master is actually liquid,my heart literally leapt out of my mouth.

JamBur

Agricola wrote: »

PscyhoMantis in Metal Gear Solid.

When he mentioned that I played alot of ISS Pro, I nearly bricked it!

or when he tells you to put controller on the floor and then moves it using the vibrate function...... was brilliant!

Overheal

WoW - after all that walking, as a tiny little gnome, then finally taking a flight between Ironforge and Loch Modan was eye-opening

Zone of the Enders - strapping into Jehuty

Halo - the flood intro level

Sonic 2 - Golden Sonic

FF7 - Cid pulls the lever at the end of Disc 2

Better Yet - Playing FF7 and being absolutely stunned that the game didn't end after the end of the Midgar chapter. I just popped it in when I found it on a friend's shelf, played it straight throughout the night, and I had no idea what I was in for.

and hundreds more that dont spring to mind this morning

Mark Hamill

Silent Hill 2 - When you, er, find out what its all about (dont want to spoil the ending for anyone who hasn't played)

Dytalus

BEWARE SPOILERS

Oblivion - Just seeing the world once I left the sewers.

Bioshock -

"Would you kindly..."

I was literally unable to speak for a good ten minutes.

Kingdom Hearts -

Nah, that ain't Riku. "It is I, Ansem."

COD4: Modern Warfare - The nuke level as a US soldier. If you've played it, you know what I'm talking about. I still maintain it's one of the greatest cinematic moments in gaming ever.

COD6: Modern Warfare 2 - The airport massacre. 'Nuff said.

krudler

God of War, errr, pretty much every part of the 3 games lol

Highlights though:

The Hydra, THIS is the first boss?! the games 5 minutes in!

Dying, then giving death a big FU and fighting your way back out of Hades , go Kratos you demented bastard you!

The Minotaur

Seeing just where Pandoras box is located

The Colossus of Rhodes

Fighting Atlas

The timeshifting finale with the Sisters of Fate, mental but brilliant, seeing yourself fight Ares in the background and how the time points all mesh was genius.

The ending to GOW2/beginning of GOW3, perfect.

Poseidon

and the grandadddy of them all, Kronos, my jaw was on the floor when I realised I had to fight the fcuker, seriously, a boss thats what, 2 miles tall? complete lunacy. I saved right before it, beat him, then reloaded the save and did it again, incredible moment.

krudler

COD6: Modern Warfare 2 - The airport massacre. 'Nuff said.

Some people call it pointless controversy, I call it the moment where games grew up.

caspa307

Jaafa wrote: »

seeing this on tv for the first time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccWrbGEFgI8

that still gives me chills

Blatter

Ohh how could I forget, when you find out who the killer is in Heavy Rain!

pablomakaveli

SOCCER4LIFE wrote: »

Ohh how could I forget, when you find out who the killer is in Heavy Rain!

Ha ha. I was just coming on here to post that.

I thought that was a great surprise.

landsleaving

Realising I hadn't finished the game after 3 dungeons in Link to the Past.

That moment at the start of Super Mario World where you can hit a line of koopas with one shell, the perfect way to tell you 'try things out, this is supposed to be fun'

Walking out of the Vault in Fallout 3 and seeing the glare of the sun, then the huge empty wasteland stretching out for miles.

Kefka becoming the true villain in FFVi

That point in Super Metroid when suddenly you realise its not just a shooter or a platform game, but so much more.

Finding the warp zone in level 1-2 in Mario Bros. on the NES

Getting Shenmue and getting absolutely lost in its world, just wandering around looking at everything

Sephiroth_dude

Riding the bike in ff7 was cool

gimli2112

"[(Final Fantasy VII)
*The death of Aeris... I don't think I need to elaborate much on that... That depressed me to no end."

Jebus this brings back bad memories. Did I have to read this Monday morning!

humanji

Some of my favourite moments have been mentioned before:

Star Wars: Knights Of The Old Republic:

Finding out you're Revan

Hard Rain:

Discovering who the killer is

TES: Oblivion: When you first leave the sewers and look around outside


Also, I decided to try EVE Online yesterday and when it started up, I thought it looked pretty impressive. I decided to open the map and get my bearings. The map showed the star system I was in and the surrounding ones. Then I zoomed out to see thousands of other star systems to explore. This game is fupping HUGE!

And I think it was Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (but I can't be sure as all FPS's are so similar these days they blend into one), where you play

an american soldiers dying moments after a nuclear blast causes his helicoptor to crash. It was surreal because you expected to have some sort of objective other than to stagger around and then die.

Edit: also, even though it's not strictly gaming but it is connected (or should I say Kinected? Ba-dum-tish!). This blew my mind and opens up a whole load of possibilities for games and movies:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttMHme2EI9I

whiterebel

Firing up Gran Turismo on the PS1. It looked absolutely glorious, still brings back memories.

chin_grin

humanji wrote: »

And I think it was Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (but I can't be sure as all FPS's are so similar these days they blend into one), where you play

an american soldiers dying moments after a nuclear blast causes his helicoptor to crash. It was surreal because you expected to have some sort of objective other than to stagger around and then die.

Edit: also, even though it's not strictly gaming but it is connected (or should I say Kinected? Ba-dum-tish!). This blew my mind and opens up a whole load of possibilities for games and movies:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttMHme2EI9I

Yeah was CoD:Modern Warfare 1.

The OpenKinect project is freaking me out all right.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgLp-KyK5g8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nm2oiESuTc

Yitzhak Rabin

When I saw this intro video when I was a kid, I thought graphics and gaming had reached their pinnacle. Really great game as well, I wasted an awful amount of time playing this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bQ-WsquMwE

Lemming

Doom 3: The only time that game genuinely sent a sheet of cold sweat running the length of my spine

The poltergeist with wet feet followed shortly thereafter by a baby crying

Fallout: The master
TES Oblivion: Getting out of the sewers and seeing some spectacular vistas.
Half-Life: Intro and the lead-up to the "missile silo".

Those tapping sounds...

StarWars Galaxies: My first jump to lightspeed
Planetside: The first time I ran towards a major battle and could see it in the distance; air to air, air ground attack, artillery barrages, tanks, masses of infantry, etc.
COD: Pegasus bridge (with a 24bit sound-card, 5.1 surround, and maximum difficulty; could practically hear the bullets hissing past me)
COD4:

The Nuke

chin_grin

Lemming wrote: »

Doom 3: The only time that game genuinely sent a sheet of cold sweat running the length of my spine

The poltergeist with wet feet followed shortly thereafter by a baby crying

What bit was that at? Early\late in the game. Just played it recently and that's wrecking my head trying to remember!

The one bit in Doom 3 where I went "Oh f*ck" was

when you signalled for help and you get the message that you've just doomed them/Earth/humanity.

EDIT: Adding another. The bit in FEAR (not sure if it's the first or second.......pretty sure it's the first), where you find out

you're Fettels' brother.

Greyfox

The original super mario bro's on the nes which belonged to my cousin Laura, it wasn't the first game I ever played but it was the first game where it becamse impossible for me to put the control down. me and my brother were pretty much "visiting Laura" every day for months, since we got the snes though we didn't see her for about 3 or 4 years as truthfully none of us liked her and still to this day we don't like her but I'll always be thankful of her for introducing me to Mario...thern it was on to many nights playing mario all-stars through the night, their was just something so simplistic and utterly addictive about mario

Zelda 3: A link to the past - Realising theirs a dark world
Like most people who played it I thought I was right at the end of the game once I got the three pendents as if the game had of ended here it would of still been a long game...but no, I was only a third of the way through the game

Resident Evil: A game absolutely full of whoa moments:

The dogs through the window scared the sh** of of me and made it very clear to me I was playing a gaming experience that is nothing like I've played befor
The intro to the hunters, a really scary sequesnce of the hunters racing across the courtyard ends with you realising their now in the same room as you, those bas**rds were so, so f**king difficult to kill and they were now everywhere!
Also the build-up up the end of the game, with the alarms going off and the Tyrant which you thought was dead coming back through the roof, my hands were sweating by the time the rocket launcher is dropped from the helicopter, easily the most intense gaming experience of my life

Final Fantasy 7:
The death of Aries is utterly unforgettable as over the previous 40 hours the dialogue between Cloud and Aries has been really touching, as a love story this was even sadder then Casablanca, gone with the wind, the notebook or Titanic
For me the Sephiroth backstory just after he's killed Shinra's president is just as unforgettable, it's a very long backstory and it's the first time in my life that I became utterly immersed in a games story

Metal Gear Solid:
Theirs just too many to pick one:
The whole strange Psycho mantis fight
The very emotinal death of Sniper wolf
How you get Meryls radio frequency
Master miller reveal
That ninja's fight and then Snakes realising he's GreyFox who "died" in Zanzibar, also Greyfox's - the truth about Naomis parents and his final farewell
The truth about your mission (foxdie)
Liquid still alive...after you've killed him about 20 times
The hind d fight which was just so much fun
And of course your first "it's just a box" moment

Tombraider - the T-rex moment, also the replica alien that mimics your every move

chin_grin

Greyfox wrote: »

Final Fantasy 7:
The death of Aries is utterly unforgettable as over the previous 40 hours the dialogue between Cloud and Aries has been really touching, as a love story this was even sadder then Casablanca, gone with the wind, the notebook or Titanic

<nerd OCD> Aeris\Aerith </nerd OCD>

weiland79

Loads and loads but most recently was COD Mod2. The storming of the oil rig is the level i show my none gaming mates.

You pop up out of the water to pull the enemy in, then slit his throat while your team mate is doing the same. The body sinks into the abyss and you are then hauled out. The vibrante colours, the water running down the screen and your team mates locking and loading...... bring it on!

nb. level gets a bit boring after that.