BioShock
BioShock drops you into Rapture, an underwater city built on a philosophy that failed, with plasmids in one hand and a wrench in the other. The recordings you find are the only account of what happened there.
Games on PlayStation 3
5 games in the database.
Games on PlayStation 3
Fallout: New Vegas
New Vegas hands a courier with a bullet in the head a desert split between the NCR, Caesar's Legion and a man running the strip from a tower, and lets you decide which one ends up owning it.
Grand Theft Auto V
Grand Theft Auto V puts three criminals in Los Santos and lets you switch between them mid-mission: a retired robber, a repo man and a pilot who talks too much. The same city is the setting of GTA Online, which has been running as its own game for over a decade.
Half-Life 2
Half-Life 2 puts Gordon Freeman in City 17 with a gravity gun and no cutscenes: every scene is staged while you are still holding the camera. Physics is not decoration — it is a tool and a weapon.
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Skyrim sends a prisoner with a dragon's voice across a province of nine holds where nothing is gated: you can walk to the far side of the map at level one. Factions, dungeons and houses are all waiting in any order you like.