History Main / LoadingScreen

* ''VideoGame/{{Okami}}'' has two mini-mini-games in its loading screen, which, if completed, grant you [[GlobalCurrencyException Demon Fangs]]. One of them involves pressing the X button in sync to the pawn prints appearing, and the other is just button mashing until the Demon Fang appears (though you need longer loading times to be successful). The Wii version removed these minigames.

* ''{{Okami}}'' has two mini-mini-games in its loading screen, which, if completed, grant you [[GlobalCurrencyException Demon Fangs]]. One of them involves pressing the X button in sync to the pawn prints appearing, and the other is just button mashing until the Demon Fang appears (though you need longer loading times to be successful). The Wii version removed these minigames.
* Long before any of those was ''InvadeALoad'', the tape loader for several games published by {{Mastertronic}} for {{Commodore 64}} home computers. It was a clone of ''VideoGame/SpaceInvaders'' that could be played for five to ten minutes while the main game was loading from the C64's very slow cassette interface. ''Ghostbusters'' on C64 featured this. [[http://www.lemon64.com/games/list.php?type=publisher&name=Players+Software Players Software]], too, used this kind of loader at least in some of its games (such as [[http://www.lemon64.com/games/details.php?ID=1377 Joe Blade]]. C64 loader games have even been trotted out on forums as prior art to potentially invalidate Namco's patent.

* ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'' has the elevators between test chambers.

* ''MySims'' has to load not only when you start or continue a file, but anytime you enter or exit a building, or go to a different section of town. The load screen features a tessellation of wooden blocks, one of which has a spinning green crystal on it. The bottom has the usual notices about how loading may take a few moments, and telling you not to push Reset or the Power button. What puts them in ''this'' category is that it displays tips, such as telling you that holding B lets you place multiple copies of the same block without having to go get another one, or telling you that "I wish I had a pickaxe..."

* The loading screens in ''MySims'', which occur ''every time you enter or exit a building'' in addition to the obvious times, give you one or two random game hints.

* The first ''VideoGame/{{Civilization}}'' is remembered for its epic slideshow during world generation. When ''Civ IV'' came around they got LeonardNimoy to do it as a voice-over.

* ''MetroidPrime'' sticks with the series staple of shooting doors to "de-energize" the locks on them. How much time passes between de-energization and when the door opens generally varies depending on how big the next room is (i.e. how much there is to load). The first Metroid Prime had many small corridors filled with enemies that are designed to slow you down so the next room can load by the time you reach the door.
*** This gets annoying in ''Hunters'' since it means that the timer during {{Timed Mission}}s ''still counts down during the loading sequence''! FakeDifficulty at its finest.

** VideoGame/BatmanArkhamAsylum uses a similar trick. The game also adapts the length of the opening animation to the loading time required: a high-security door may spend some time scanning you and slowly unbolting, or it might open instantly if the level behind it is already loaded.

** Similarly BatmanArkhamCity has a series of screenshots with text reviewing recent events

* ''VideoGame/{{Mass Effect|1}}'' has elevators. Anybody who's played the game can tell you that there are a lot of elevators. Shepard goes through more elevators in a day than most people do in a month in the first game.

** ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' replaces the elevator sequences with ''loading videos'', which also include gameplay tips. Most are pretty straightforward, like control reminders, but one stands out: "There are no decent galactic dating services. If you want to find romance, you must talk to people." No matter how quickly the game actually loads, you're stuck staring at the loading screen until the video finishes playing.

* ''VideoGame/{{Ghostbusters}}'' uses prerendered cut scenes not only to tell major parts of the story, but to disguise load times. This is very evident when loading a checkpoint--which uses the "give some in game information" trick below--or when playing the PC version, which does neither.

* ''VideoGame/Ghostbusters'' uses prerendered cut scenes not only to tell major parts of the story, but to disguise load times. This is very evident when loading a checkpoint--which uses the "give some in game information" trick below--or when playing the PC version, which does neither.

[[caption-width-right:350:''VideoGame/GrandTheftAuto'' games give you both a progress bar, and pretty pictures.]]

* ''Left4Dead'', when loading between levels, displays player statistics about the previous level. The loading screen for the first level, however, is a static [[FilmPosters film poster]].

* In the 80's Commodore 64 (along with many other computers from the same period) used tapes as storage medium for both homebrew and commercial software. While the accessories of [=C64=] included also a disk drive and while disks were also quite common medium, many individual owners at least in Europe had only tape recorders. This resulted in LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading with commercial games. Eventually it became common for publishers to include loading screens and music for player to watch and listen while waiting for the loading to finish (while commercial games often used their own loading software to make loading faster, the increasing size of games meant that loading times were still notable). The tape releases of ''VideoGame/TheLastNinja'' and ''Last Ninja 2'' were notable for having individual loading themes for every single level [[hottip:*:Disk release of the former had no music during loading. However, it had separate title screen, which played the loading themes of the tape release in the background for those who wanted to listen to them. While the disk release of the sequel did not play the music during loading, either, it did show the loading screen for the next level and played the respective loading theme of the tape release ''until'' player pressed fire and the disk version would actually start loading the level.]]. Other "gimmicks" include slowly drawing the picture during loading (often used by Ocean) and having scrolling text in one of the loading screens with additional information [[hottip:*:Used also in the tape releases of The Last Ninja, Last Ninja 2 and Last Ninja Remix (later rerelease of Last Ninja 2 with new intro and entirely new soundtrack - unfortunately without separate loading themes).]].

** KerbalSpaceProgram has "Patching Conics..."

* Games of ''Touhou'' series have a funny loading message after starting the game.

** Interestingly, when they made the remake for the Gamecube the developers were able to all but eliminate loading times. Playtesters reported that moving from room to room so seamlessly felt unnatural, so the "door opening" sequences were added back in to ''extend'' the (perceived) loading times. However, when a Door gets destroyed you can just go straight from one room into another.

** {{Game Mod}}s for Brawl replace one of the tournament-banned stages with that training room so as to have more neutral stages in TournamentPlay: Brawl+ replaces New Pork City, while Balanced Brawl cuts Hanenbow. Why anyone would want '''two''' Final Destinations (let alone [[Film/FinalDestination five]]) is beyond us.

** {{Game Mod}}s for Brawl replace one of the tournament-banned stages with that training room so as to have more neutral stages in TournamentPlay: Brawl+ replaces New Pork City, while Balanced Brawl cuts Hanenbow. Why anyone would want '''two''' Final Destinations is beyond us.

** The original Amiga version had also loading screens with images depicting the present location and text descriptions scrolling below those images. While in the C64 version the loading screens were text-only, there were more of them with more text than in the Amiga version. However, the actual loading times were still shorter in the C64 version, which was released on the cartridge [[hottip:*:While some of the early games for C64 were released on cartridges, the storage capacity of these cartridges was very limited when compared to cassettes or disks. However, C64 received later more advanced cartridge format, which was supported by both the original C64 and commercially failed [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_64_Games_System C64GS]]. Unfortunately very few games were released on these new cartridges despite both the high amount of available space and short loading/data access times. However, Shadow of the Beast was one of these and benefitted greatly from the format.]] (although there is at least one cracked disk version based on the data of the cartridge release) while the Amiga version was on floppies with no direct hard drive support.

* ''{{Bayonetta}}'' let you practice your combos during the loading screens, providing a handy list of button combinations on the right side of the screen. By pressing select you can actually stay in traning mode even after the game has finished loading.

* ''KaneAndLynch 2: Dog Days'' retains its digital camcorder-based StylisticSuck even while loading, replacing the traditional loading screen with the "Buffering" animation found in Website/YouTube videos. Both games in the series also include short snippets of dialogue to help advance the plot between missions.

* The next time you're waiting for a video to load on Website/YouTube, press the arrow keys, see what happens.

* ''LocoRoco'' features the locos bouncing and playing on the loading screen. It's cute enough that you're almost sad when the game finishes loading.

** ''GarrysMod'' normally tells what it's actually doing during a load screen, but if it takes more than a few seconds to load something it'll start showing nonsense like [[Memes/ValveSoftware "Breaking update" or "Delaying Episode 3"]].