History ChekhovsGunman / VideoGames

** Early in the game, a blue-haired lady asks you to keep her moon rock until she comes back another day. She looks like one of the few special customers with their own [[ScriptedEvent scripted transactions]], [[spoiler:but she's revealed at the end of Week 6 that she's actually Jihye, an OldFriend of Jisu Cha... [[TomatoInTheMirror who turns out to be]] ''[[TomatoInTheMirror you]]'' if you have been kind to your customers. If you reveal your identity to her, she gets shocked that you lost your memories of her, and she offers to take you to "the safest place in Mindlesia" if you can prove to her that you are her missing friend for the next two weeks.]]
** Actor Yeongmi Mo can sometimes be found mingling with his fans near the shops or sipping coffee at Mindlesso. Other than visiting your store twice and his signature being included in Darcy's manual, he seems to be one of the few unique but minor customers... [[spoiler:unless you turn out to be his OldFriend Sangsu Ahn if you've been greedy in running your shop. If you reveal your identity to him, he tells you that he and his boss had been looking for you, and he offers to get you back to your old job as a brainwashing microchip seller to Bluebird if you can prove your identity to him for the next two weeks.]]

* ''VideoGame/EldenRing'': At the game's opening sequence, several Tarnished of note are mentioned, though [[spoiler:Hoarah Loux]] [[TheGhost goes completely unseen throughout the entire game]]. Then, right before the final boss, [[PlayerCharacter the Tarnished]] returns to Leyndell only to find [[spoiler:Godfrey, the First Elden Lord]], who otherwise has also only been referenced here and there but never seen thus far, blocking their path to the Erdtree. [[spoiler:Fighting Godfrey and depleting his health to half leads to TheReveal that Godfrey and Hoarah Loux ''[[TwoAliasesOneCharacter are one and the same]]''; Godfrey [[GodzillaThreshold killing Serosh]] and unleashing his [[BloodKnight bloodlust]] as he reclaims his true name indicates that he acknowledges the Tarnished as a WorthyOpponent, and that [[TheGlovesComeOff he's not going to hold back any longer]].]]

** Sometimes you can find a little orphan girl in a yellow dress playing with her pet cat around Ajik City. This later turns out to be Eggie Yoon, who ran away after her parents got [[EmotionSuppression Fixed.]] If you befriend her, she'll return your kindness by [[ItemCaddy giving you free items every week.]]

** Actor Yeongmi Mo can sometimes be found mingling with his fans near the shops or sipping coffee at Mindlesso. Other than visiting your store twice and his signature being included in Darcy's manual, he seems to be one of the few unique but minor customers... [[spoiler:unless you turn out to be his OldFriend Sangsu Ahn if you've been greedy in running your shop. If you reveal your identity to him, he tells you that he and his boss had been looking for you, and he offers to get you back to your old job as a Potato Chip (brainwashing microchip) seller to Bluebird if you can prove your identity to him for the next two weeks.]]

** Early in the game, a blue-haired lady asks you to keep her moon rock until she comes back another day. She looks like one of the few special customers with their own [[ScriptedEvent scripted transactions]], [[spoiler:but she's revealed at the end of Week 6 that she's actually Jihye, an OldFriend of one of the three people who went missing during the fire at CARI... [[TomatoInTheMirror who turns out to be]] ''[[TomatoInTheMirror you]]''. If you reveal your identity to her, she gets shocked that you lost your memories of her, and she offers to take you to "the safest place in Mindlesia" if you can prove to her that you are her missing friend for the next two weeks.]]

* ''VideoGame/NoUmbrellasAllowed'': Early in the game, a blue-haired lady asks you to keep her moon rock until she comes back another day. She looks like one of the few special customers with their own [[ScriptedEvent scripted transactions]], [[spoiler:but she's revealed at the end of Week 6 that she's actually Jihye, an OldFriend of one of the three people who went missing during the fire at CARI... [[TomatoInTheMirror who turns out to be]] ''[[TomatoInTheMirror you]]''. If you reveal your identity to her, she gets shocked that you lost your memories of her, and she offers to take you to "the safest place in Mindlesia" if you can prove to her that you are her missing friend for the next two weeks.]]

* ''VideoGame/NoUmbrellasAllowed'': Early in the game, a blue-haired lady asks you to keep her moon rock until she comes back another day. She looks like one of the few special customers with their own [[ScriptedEvent scripted transactions]], [[spoiler:but she's revealed at the end of Week 6 that she's actually Jihye, an OldFriend of one of the four people who went missing during the fire at CARI... [[TomatoInTheMirror who turns out to be]] ''[[TomatoInTheMirror you]]''. If you reveal your identity to her, she gets shocked that you lost your memories of her, and she offers to take you to "the safest place in Mindlesia" if you can prove to her that you are her missing friend for the next two weeks.]]

* ''VideoGame/NoUmbrellasAllowed''': Early in the game, a blue-haired lady asks you to keep her moon rock until she comes back another day. She looks like one of the few special customers with their own [[ScriptedEvent scripted transactions]], [[spoiler:but she's revealed at the end of Week 6 that she's actually Jihye, an OldFriend of one of the four people who went missing during the fire at CARI... [[TomatoInTheMirror who turns out to be]] ''[[TomatoInTheMirror you]]''. If you reveal your identity to her, she gets shocked that you lost your memories of her, and she offers to take you to "the safest place in Mindlesia" if you can prove to her that you are her missing friend for the next two weeks.]]

*** In a seemingly throwaway appearance [[spoiler:punctuated by controller vibration]] at the ''very beginning of the game'' is [[spoiler: the third character you meet -- the gas station attendant]]. He turns out to be [[spoiler: [[BigBad the one directly responsible for everything that happens]], which you don't find out [[GuideDangIt unless you're on the road to the True Ending]]]]. This is also particularly well hidden because the player has been trained by this point to assume that anyone without a portrait is irrelevant to the plot -- [[spoiler:up until the reveal, the gas station attendant only has a normal, inconspicuous character model. He only gets one ''after'' TheReveal]].
*** Made all the more effective by the fact that [[spoiler:while players will note the vibrating controller, plus the fact that the MC feels nauseated after meeting him, the game is so long, plus the fact that any other contact you can have with the Attendant are the optional mini-conversations that you can have with any other NPC, that most players will forget about meeting him at all before the first in-game month is out!]]

*** During the storyline where Gardlund's citizens mysteriously disappear, an unassuming human jester named Pujyu takes credit for the disappearances after Sage Marine's monster form is defeated, collecting the doll and flying away. Aside from instigating a separatist group named after Astoltia's Ogre god, he isn't seen again in the game until Nadragle is defeated by the Hero and Tobias, dropping a strange looking seed that Pujyu takes after they leave. Later during the start of Version 5, he shows up and steals an identical looking seed from the Hero by using a decoy of Anluica from the same doll during the Gardlund storyline and is chased to the doors of the Netherworld, where he and the Hero fight. He once again disappears from the game after his defeat and using the Shock Seed to open the doors to the Netherworld, but shows up again during the game's 5.4 update and is revealed to be more than just a trouble-making jester:[[spoiler:He's one of the 7 Evil Gods of Jagonuba!]]

*** During the storyline where Gardlund's citizens mysteriously disappear, an unassuming human jester named Pujyu takes credit for the disappearances after Sage Marine's monster form is defeated, collecting the doll and flying away. Aside from instigating a separatist group named after Astoltia's Ogre god, he isn't seen again in the game until Nadragle is defeated by the Hero and Tobias, dropping a strange looking seed that Pujyu takes after they leave. Later during the start of Version 5, he shows up and steals an identical looking seed from the Hero by using a decoy of Anluica from the same doll during the Gardlund storyline and is chased to the doors of the Demon Realm, where he and the Hero fight. He once again disappears from the game after his defeat and using the Shock Seed to open the doors to the Demon Realm, but shows up again during the game's 5.4 update and is revealed to be more than just a trouble-making jester:[[spoiler:He's one of the 7 Evil Gods of Jagonuba!]]

* ''VideoGame/BaldursGate'' the first companion is Imoen, just a last-moment addition to allow players to have a good-aligned thief for their adventures. She has very few lines and no dialogues after you recruit her. Comes the sequel, she becomes the centre of the plot.

* ''VideoGame/MassEffect1'':
** There's a {{sidequest}} in which Shepard has to deactivate a rogue Alliance VI that has apparently [[AIIsACrapshoot achieved sentience]]. Very late in ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'', it's revealed that [[spoiler:the AI was actually a very early prototype of EDI, the ''Normandy'''s artificial intelligence in the second and third games and a squadmate in ''[=ME3=]'']].
** Another optional sidequest involves an asari diplomat hiring Shepard to rescue her sister who was kidnapped by mercenaries, which turns out to be a ruse to manipulate Shepard into killing her since she was blackmailing the former. The diplomat, Nassana Dantius, shows up again in ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' as the focus of Thane's recruitment mission where we get a better glance at how bad she is.

* In ''VideoGame/StarCraft'', we have Duran, the ghost who betrayed the UED and disappeared sometime during the Zerg campaign of Brood War. Turns out he's been taking the alias Narud in Wings of Liberty seeking Xel' Naga artifacts and is in league with the true BigBad of the series, the Fallen One.

*** During the storyline where Gartland's citizens mysteriously disappear, an unassuming human jester named Pujyu takes credit for the disappearances after Sage Marine's monster form is defeated, collecting the doll and flying away. Aside from instigating a separatist group, he isn't seen again in the game until Nadragle is defeated by the Hero and Tobias, dropping a strange looking seed that Pujyu takes after they leave. Later during the start of Version 5, he shows up and steals an identical looking seed from the Hero by using a decoy of Anluica from the same doll during the Gartland storyline and is chased to the doors of the Demon Realm, where he and the Hero fight. He once again disappears from the game after his defeat and using the Shock Seed to open the doors to the Demon Realm, but shows up again during the game's 5.4 update and is revealed to be more than just a trouble-making jester:[[spoiler:He's one of the 7 Evil Gods of Jagonuba!]]

*** At the beginning of the DS remake, the player character and his father are sharing boat with Rodrigo Briscoletti and his two daughters Nera and Deborah, with no indication they will be important later. After getting off the boat, the player character will not see them again until the midpoint of the second act, when he has to decide who he will get married to.

*** In the original version a couple of characters mention a Demon Lord that's trying to enter the world, though you don't even learn Grandmaster Nimzo's name until near the end of the game.

* ''VideoGame/SyphonFilter2'' introduces Chance as an unassuming RedShirt G.I., but at the end of the game, he is revealed to be [[TheMole an Agency mole]] who was calling the shots behind Logan's back the whole time.

*** In [[VideoGame/KingdomHeartsI the first game]], it has Riku battling Roxas at The World That Never Was, and Roxas meeting Xemnas at the Dark Margin. While Xemnas is confronted as a BonusBoss in ''Final Mix'', he and Roxas won't be properly introduced until ''[[VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII II]]'', which also explains the context of both scenes.

** Likewise, the [[UpdatedRerelease Updated Re-releases]] always feature a BonusBoss that will play a role in future games. This is why they are not to be missed despite most of them being [[NoExportForYou Japan-exclusive for a long time]].

*** ''III'' reintroduces Yozora as a BonusBoss.

* Stage 2 of the ''Franchise/TouhouProject'' game ''VideoGame/TouhouYouyoumuPerfectCherryBlossom'' features the nekomata Chen as midboss and boss. She is written off as an unhelpful nuisance, like most bosses before Stage 4. [[spoiler:In the Extra Stage, she returns as the midboss - she's the shikigami of Ran Yakumo, the Extra Boss and herself shikigami to [[BonusBoss Phantasm Boss]] Yukari Yakumo]].

*** Speaking of which, The Trickster Norstein Bekkler is an inversion of this trope combined with a GuideDangIt: He appears as a special character, but is simply the introduction to several minigames, which have almost no impact on the actual game. [[spoiler:However, later you are required to find someone who can produce a Clone of Crono to save the poor boy from oblivion. Guess who you have to find?]] Granted, you don't actually have to accomplish this task to continue with the game, but [[spoiler: reviving the main character is kinda important]].

** And in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeII'', during the first scene of Act I, an imperious armored woman with blonde curls glares down at a pickpocket as she passes by. Much later, she turns out to be Knight-Commander Meredith, head of Kirkwall's [[ChurchMilitant Templars]] and [[spoiler: the game's FinalBoss]].
*** A small sidequest in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeII'' has Hawke tracking down a young elf mage for his worried mother. On the way, he/she runs into a scruffy ex-Templar, now lyrium addict, who points the way to a bunch of slavers. This is Samson, who will show up later in the game in a conspiracy against Meredith [[spoiler:and again in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeInquisition'', where he leads the Red Templars.]]

* ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV'' has this with the main characters from ''The Ballad of Gay Tony'', Luis Lopez, and ''The Lost and Damned'', Johnny Klebitz. Niko meets Johnny at a party and both are tasked with a drug trade that goes south for both of them. The main game deals with Niko's escape while ''Lost'' shows how Johnny escaped. Later Niko helps hold up a bank where Luis is taken hostage. Next Niko and Johnny meet up again at a smuggled diamond exchange at a museum, which also goes south when Luis shows up and shoots up the place. Each game deals with how they got out of there. Finally Niko and his friend Patrick exchange a hostage with Luis and his boss Gay Tony for the diamonds. Then in ''Lost'' Johnny has a mission where he sees Luis, Tony, and Tony's boyfriend, new character Evan Moss get the diamonds initially, and steals them.

* In ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'', the seemingly generic Dark Jedi to whom [[GuestStarPartyMember Trask Ulgo]] [[HeroicSacrifice sacrifices himself so you can escape]] is later revealed to be [[TheDragon Darth Bandon]], [[BigBad Malak]]'s apprentice. You also meet Mission, Zaalbar, Canderous, and Calo Nord in the Taris Lower City before they become important characters.

* In ''VideoGame/{{Singularity}}'', towards the beginning of the game, Captain Renko is sent back in time to 1955 where he unknowingly saves a wounded Demichev, and a man in a burning room shouts to you that you must not allow Demichev to live. While you do figure out quickly that Demichev is essentially the BigBad and that was probably a mistake on your part to save him, the real kicker is the man telling you to let him die. [[spoiler: It's yourself from the future, who is trying to stop you from repeating the same loop, and has left semi-cryptic messages everywhere warning you everyone who you are both allied with and against are all completely wrong about how to stop the anomaly, which is to go back in time and kill yourself]]. The interesting thing is, by the time you learn who that was, you likely had completely and entirely forgotten his existence since he is little more than a background character introduced in the first few minutes of the game, and his identity isn't revealed until pretty much the last few minutes of the game. Furthermore, with the building burning down, you're likely far more interested in paying attention to getting out of the building rather than some shouting maniac. [[spoiler:It doesn't help the game cheats a bit by not ever showing your face, so you wouldn't have recognized him even if you did notice him]], and the messages written by this man all address you but never make direct mention of who they were written by.

* Amy of the ''VideoGame/SoulSeries'' first appeared in a minor role in the AttractMode of ''Soul Calibur II'' hiding Raphel from Guards. She returns as a playable bonus character and Raphel's main motivation in the next game, revamped for the arcade version into a full character and then revamped again for ''Soul Calibur IV'' as a full character.
** Also, Algol in ''Soul Calibur IV''; he's been mentioned as the "Hero King" who created Soul Calibur in pretty much every game beforehand, finally getting a fully-playable reveal in ''IV''.

** One of Ansem's Secret Reports in ''II'' mentions the names of Xigbar, Vexen, Lexaeus, Zexion, and Xaldin's Sombebodies: Braig, Even, Aeleus, Ienzo, and Dilan. It isn't until ''Birth by Sleep'' that we actually see them.

** In ''VideoGame/MegaManStarForce 2'', at the hotel lobby in Grizzly Peaks, you meet a mysterious white haired boy that tells Geo to mind his own business and stop investigating the events regardings the UMAs. But Geo keeps involving himself in the recent events and he ends up meeting that boy again. Turns out [[spoiler:he works for the BigBad and he's the LastOfHisKind of the Atlantis the villains are trying to resurrect. He also becomes Geo's rival for the rest od the game and the following installment]].

** Also, a possible subversion... In the ''VideoGame/MegaManStarForce'' anime, as the FM-ians are outside the TV station ready to gate-crash Libra's show, Hope Stelar/Akane Hoshikawa (Geo's/Subaru's mum) is seen walking nearby behind them (And with an arrow pointing her out in a style similar to how every ChekhovsGun in ''Manga/OuranHighSchoolHostClub'' is pointed out). Amusingly enough, she '''does''' end up as a contestant in Libra's show and beats Cancer at it, but she ends up losing all importance afterwards.

* ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiPartnersInTime'' used Toadbert, an amnesiac Toad from the present who was one of Peach's bodyguards. [[spoiler: After the Shroob Mothership, Kylie Koopa falls on his head, which causes him to rush to the Bros. to tell them that he has the fifth Cobalt Star Shard, but the Cobalt Star Shard won't defeat the Shroobs. His efforts to stop the Bros. are in vain thanks to the Elder Shrooboid]].
* ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiBowsersInsideStory'' has Durmite, a seemingly random boss fought within the first few hours of the game. [[spoiler:She is revealed to hold the first Star Cure and must be fought again in her sage Wisdurm form to get the Cure]].
* ''VideoGame/MassEffect1'' has a {{sidequest}} in which Shepard has to deactivate a rogue Alliance VI that has apparently [[AIIsACrapshoot achieved sentience]]. Very late in ''VideoGame/MassEffect3'', it's revealed that [[spoiler:the AI was actually a very early prototype of EDI, the ''Normandy'''s artificial intelligence in the second and third games and a squadmate in ''[=ME3=]'']].

* In ''VideoGame/MegaManBattleNetwork 2'', every so often, a gray haired kid who doesn't speak when you talk to him pops up in random places. Sure enough, [[spoiler:he's the BigBad]].
** Same thing happens with a certain Russian scientist in ''Battle Network 3''...

* ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor'' played this trope pretty commonly. Of note are Flavio and General White, who both debuted at least five chapters before they were needed. Another example is Goldbob, who appeared in several chapters in different locations with his family before his major role. The game had a running gag about Mario running into several unimportant recurring characters each time he arrived in a new locale, and Goldbob blended in perfectly.
** The original did this with Parakarry.

* In the original ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros'' game, killing the Fake Bowser with fireballs at the end of World 3 will actually turn him into a Buzzy Beetle. Buzzy Beetles actually do not appear until World 4-2, and [[GameplayAndStorySegregation unlike the one mentioned above]], cannot be killed with fireballs.
** Another example is the first Fake Bowser, who is actually a gray Goomba. In the final level, all Goombas there are colored gray.

** Xigbar in ''II'' was an entertaining, if forgettable, member of Organization XIII who mentioned once that he knew Keyblade wielders before Sora. ''Birth by Sleep'' reveals [[spoiler:Xigbar may just be the only character in the entire series who knew everything that was going on. As Braig he worked for Master Xehanort, and when Xehanort got amnesia after possessing Terra Braig was the one who pushed him down the path to fulfill their plans]]. ''III'' pushes it even further when it's revealed that [[spoiler:Braig is actually [[VideoGame/KingdomHeartsX Luxu, one of the Keyblade apprentices of the Master of Masters]], and he has been engineering the events of the whole series to summon his fellow apprentices, the Foretellers, to the current universe]].

* Averted with the Professor in ''VideoGame/RomancingSaGa3''. They have a unique sprite, are conspicuously introduced, and have two different quests associated with them. Most other characters with all these traits can join your party... but the Professor is just a minor NPC with no relevance outside their associated quests.

** [[spoiler: Magus]] takes this concept UpToEleven. He gets introduced as simply being the BigBad of the Middle Ages, but his real significance to the plot is revealed slowly over the course of the game. [[spoiler: He is revealed to be the reason why Frog is in his amphibian form, then we first meet him trying to summon the FinalBoss. ''And then'' we meet him in 12,000 B.C., in two forms at once. He is conspicuously introduced as both a bizarre prophet who is using his own knowledge of the future to {{manipulat|iveBastard}}e the Queen of Zeal, and the young Prince Janus (who is a ChekhovsGunman in his own right), who is later shown being blasted into the Middle Ages, after (in his adult form) both he and the player party lose a HopelessBossFight against Lavos. ''And then again'', he is later recruitable]].

** Goes UpToEleven with Nue. To her credits she's an Extra Boss in Touhou 12, but by her own admission, she's [[GiantSpaceFleaFromNowhere not directly connected to the story]]. Who would have thought that she has connection with Mamizou, who is [[TheCavalry supposed to defeat]] Toyosatomimi-no-Miko in Touhou 13.

** The parrot that Brandt's mom Kuore keeps as a pet in ''Videogame/FinalFantasyThe4HeroesOfLight''. [[spoiler:It's actually King Horne as a BalefulPolymorph. The guy in the castle? That's ''Satan''. The spell breaks after his defeat]].