Nowadays, it is not a surprise to see a tutorial show up when a game is booted up for the first time. This is especially the case in titles that might be a little more complex in their mechanics such as fighting or character action games. The truth is, while tutorials are usually a welcome addition that don't take up too much of the player's time, there have been a few instances where they really weren't needed.
Whether it's because the game is already easy to pick up and play, or simply because the tutorial itself did a poor job of supporting a player, these are the games that would have massively benefited from skipping over the tutorial entirely so that players can spend more time enjoying the story and core gameplay for themselves.
7 Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon
While the Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon expansion was met with a lot of praise from both critics and fans, this whacky and vibrant DLC package did come with a fairly clunky and unnecessary tutorial section that ended up harming the pacing of this otherwise exciting 80s thrill ride quite a bit. After a colorful arcade-inspired cutscene and an intense helicopter turret section, the player is dumped onto an island while a few prompts occasionally pop up to cover nearly half of the screen.
It's definitely a little jarring, but considering most players were already jumping off Far Cry 3 and the controls are virtually identical, it really didn't make much sense. It's ironic that while this tutorial is trying to act as a mockery of actual video game tutorials featured in many triple AAA games at the time, it ends up being quite flat and boring.
6 Halo 2
While the majority of the Halo games start with a fairly dull tutorial section that prompts the player to look in each direction to test out Chief's vision, the whole section is especially long in Halo 2. After the initial test, the soldier accompanying Chief will ask him to walk over to a different panel to test out his shields to ensure that they are still able to recharge.
After a moment, the shields turn off before the soldier then advises Chief that taking cover would avoid damage in the heat of battle, something that should be more than obvious in an FPS game. It's directly after this segment that fans are treated to the amazing intro cutscene showing the Arbiter being cast out from the Covenant, so starting off here instead may have been better in hindsight.
5 Jet Set Radio
Despite Jet Set Radio being well known for its high-speed skating gameplay, the tutorial feels like it takes forever to complete, especially when Beat performs the same dance animation each time he completes a single challenge. The game also throws players into the deep end right from the start of the tutorial with each section requiring a very precise set of actions to complete which are incredibly specific and needlessly long.
The rest of the game more than makes up for it though, with it now being one of Sega's classic titles that seems like it will earn the remake treatment at some point. Still, it probably would have been better to skip straight to the Shibuya GG mission and just let the player test out the controls at their own pace as opposed to what we got.
4 Fallout 2
It's long been rumored that the dreaded Temple of Trials in Fallout 2 was actually a last-minute addition by the higher-ups at Black Isle Studios who feared that newcomers wouldn't understand the top-down gameplay right away. When playing through this long and bland area though, it really does seem like an afterthought.
Once players step into the Temple, they will then enter a gameplay loop of killing ants, looting chests, and running through very bland-looking corridors, with the most exciting part being a locked door that requires a lock pick skill to open. Some of the encounters in the Temple of Trials are also a little too challenging since the player is ill-equipped at this point in the game in regard to weapons and armor, so it's heavily advised that players going through it save regularly to avoid losing any progress.
3 Kingdom Hearts 2
Switching between characters after the first few hours of a story isn't exactly a new trend in gaming. Metal Gear Solid 2 is a game that does this very well, but the Twilight Town prologue of Kingdom Hearts 2 really doesn't feel necessary in any way, and the fact that Roxas largely came off as a fairly bland and uninteresting newcomer to a series which is known for its over the top characters also didn't help the situation.
The beginning of Kingdom Hearts 2 felt like it was trying too hard to make the player emotionally attached to a new cast of characters they had never met before, and this inevitably made the tutorial itself overly long, feeling a lot like padding which served only to extend the game time until the fan-favorite Sora eventually arrives.
2 The Witcher 2: Assassins Of Kings
While facing an enemy one on one in Witcher 2 isn't too difficult, when Geralt is faced with multiple bandits or monsters that he must take down, things can get a little more complicated. The tutorial of the game begins when Geralt reminisces on his fateful encounter with Aryan La Valette during a castle siege, but rather than gradually walking players through the dense and complex combat system, they are instead thrust into an all-out war from the very beginning.
Tiny prompts will occasionally pop up letting the player know how to attack, parry, switch weapons, and use Signs, but they only remain on the screen for a matter of seconds before disappearing, and most of them also don't automatically pause the game either. This section actually proved to be so frustrating that CD Projekt Red had to completely redo the tutorial in the Enhanced Edition, but since the whole sequence is a flashback anyway, a cutscene would have been a more suitable way to recount the events of Geralt's past.
1 Red Dead Redemption 2
Quite possibly the longest tutorial ever seen in a game, Red Dead Redemption 2 begins with a very slow burn as we see Arthur and the rest of the Van der Linde gang trying to escape from a blizzard that has struck a mountain after the failed robbery of Blackwater. While it does help to establish a few of the characters such as Sadie for example who actually joins the gang at this point, this hours-long section essentially just acts as an extremely sluggish tutorial.
To complete the chapter, players will need to fire off their revolver at a few enemies, eat plenty of canned foods, and get a good feel for the movement, but they aren't allowed to freely roam the world just yet. Players will also need to wait for long stretches until the next tutorial prompt even shows up, making th game feel extremely unnecessary. The length of the tutorial also harms subsequent playthroughs, with there even being mods now available that cut it out entirely, something Rockstar probably should have done from the get-go.