3. RESIDENT EVIL 4 (GCN, PS2, PC, WII)
This is one of the greatest games ever created. A top three spot for it on any list it is included in is practically assured, simply because of just how much this game does, and how well it does it.
Resident Evil 4 is Capcom’s masterpiece. I will be bold enough to proclaim that they have never created a single game that has been better than what this game is. Fast and lightening paced, thrilling, foreboding, dark and ominous, terrifying and atmospheric, eerie and haunting, Resident Evil 4 did everything right, and it stands to this day as a game that will likely never be topped.
The one thing it did particularly well was QTEs. There can be no doubt that the QTEs in this game were perhaps unfairly cheap, appearing at random and expecting split second reflexes from the players, but there can also be little doubt that they all added so much more to the tension and atmosphere of the game. Indeed, it was the QTEs of the game that bridged the gap between its story and its gameplay, a divide that, prior to this game, Resident Evil games had historically been unable to cover.
2. GOD OF WAR II (PS2, PS3)
And yet, for all of Resident Evil 4’s greatness, there is one franchise that has consistently outscored any other gaming property’s attempts to truly be the forebear of QTE based gaming, and sure enough, Resident Evil 4, too, finds itself thwarted by the God of War series. More specifically, it finds itself thwarted by the single best game in the franchise, an epic of monstrous proportions (no, seriously), that spans not only an incredible story told extremely well, but also the best integration and implementation of QTEs, ever.
Just have a look at that video above. What other game could have its final boss battle entirely QTE based, make it look epic, and then get away with it? It’s pure epicness, I tell you.
1. SHENMUE (DC)
And yet, God of War II cannot secure the top spot on this list. That honor goes to Shenmue, the game that is perhaps singlehandedly responsible for QTEs in the first place.
Sega’s magnum opus is a conflicted game, and it elicits responses that are equally mixed from the gaming public at large, but there can be no denying that this fighter/adventure/RPG hybrid was way ahead of its time. Nowhere else is this evidenced more than in the game’s slick integration of QTEs into its real time gameplay, which makes it almost impossible to differentiate the game’s cutscenes from its actual in game footage.
However, Shenmue is not only notable for being the first game to do QTEs, it is perhaps also notable for doing it the best. Whereas future generations will probably look back at God of War or Resident Evil as the point when QTEs moved out of the niche and became truly mainstream, the fact of the matter is that those games and franchises did practically nothing, since the entire groundwork and refinement was laid down for them by Shenmue. To this day, whenever your game initiates a QTE, it is just mimicking something that Shenmue did over a decade ago.
For QTEs, then, Shenmue is perhaps the equivalent of Super Mario Bros. They both even have their names begin with an S!
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