As You Know / Video Games

As You Know, video games are games designed to be played on your computer or specialized video game consoles...

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• In the Babylon 5: I've Found Her game tutorial this was deftly lampshaded: engineer filling in (instead of instructor) explained controls to presumably experienced pilot as introduction to new craft, with implications of Newtonian dynamics smuggled in as reminder about consequences of said craft's propulsion superiority.
• In the beginning of Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, you can say you are having temporary amnesia from the cruel experiments you've been subjected to just prior, but the first characters you meet — some of your party members from the first game — are inclined to recap their relationship with you even if you don't.
• In Bayonetta, Enzo recaps how Bayonetta woke up in a coffin 20 years ago with amnesia except knowing how to fight and that she needs to kill angels every day or else she goes to hell. Bayonetta snarks that she didn't ask for her biography.
• Bendy and the Ink Machine: The note from Joey specifies that he and Henry worked at the animation studio thirty years ago and have fallen out of touch.
• All over the place during a conversation with Executioner Alfred in Bloodborne. Alfred tells the player all about the healing church, even beginning his exposition with 'As you know...' It seems to be justified because the player is an outsider to Yharnam and presumably knew little about the healing church, but Alfred had no way of knowing that, and thinks he is telling an established Yharnamite hunter things they should already know. Unless the player silently told him they were a foreigner, in which case why did he say 'As you know?!'
• Circus Electrique:
  • Amelia notes during her first interview with the Ringmaster that she already knows her uncle's Backstory; however, she figures that she could use some direct quotes for the articles she has to write about him.
    Amelia: So people believe how dumb you are.
    Ringmaster: How flattering.
  • Since the Maddening has made it incredibly difficult for most of the newspaper staff to venture outside and gather new stories, they occasionally reprint old articles that just happen to document various important events from the past, such as the rise of STEEM and how their Mecanquies became such common sights throughout London.
• Part of the challenge of Consortium is that this does not happen; nobody explains stuff that is common knowledge in their world, nor things Bishop-6 should know from their training, because why would they? You can ask about said things anyways, which elicits increasingly confused reactions from crew members and eventually convinces them that you're either incompetent or going crazy if you ask too many, too often.
• Lampshaded in Dark Cloud: At one point it's necessary to ask your mother what furniture was in your house before the start of the game. She tells you, but also wonders aloud why you can't remember what your own house is supposed to look like.
• Dawn of War: Soulstorm:
  • "As you know, most of our Battle Brothers..." Boreale reminds Space Marines of the reinforcements waiting in orbit to be used against enemy forces invading their stronghold. However, due to the weird timing and accent, it ends up sounding hilarious (see here).
  • Also the Imperial Guard mission, where a Commissar tries to pull this on General Vance Stubbs and fails miserably.
    Commissar: Tank crew, munitions, and parts are arriving on schedule, sir. As you know, it takes only the most highly trained crew to properly operate a—
    Stubbs: I know.
    Commissar: Very good general.
  • The Retribution expansion pack of its sequel Dawn of War II plays with this trope during the intro level of the Blood Ravens campaign. After reviving an incapacitated sergeant who went in solo to attack a Chaos position, Diomedes will reprimand the sergeant and ask him to explain himself. Martellus will then remind Diomedes that the sergeant in question would not say anything since he had taken an oath of silence out of penance for deeds committed.
• This trope is used to explain the Zero Gravity mechanic to the player character in Dead Space. It's especially weird however, because the player would have already dealt with zero gravity by that point and the character himself has operated in that kind of environment for a good few years! Even more jarring, Hammond had just been complaining that the radio was full of static moments before. However, his "As you know..." transmission comes through loud and clear. Immediately after Hammond's perfectly clear transmission, tutorial text pops up telling you how to jump in Zero-G.
• Characters in the Light World of Deltarune talk about past events with Kris to convey information about their backstory to the player.
• Samuel Hayden in Doom Eternal starts retelling events of Doom Slayer's accomplishments to Doom slayer. This is most prominent in Taras Nabad level.
• The Elder Scrolls:
  • Morrowind averts this in terms of the main quest. As an outlander, the Player Character isn't going to be any more aware of the local Dunmer politics and religion than the player in the real world. Even the non-natives living in Morrowind can be ignorant of such things, since a common response to asking a non-Dunmer about the Nerevarine Prophecy is "some Dark Elf superstition." So as the character learns more about these things, so does the player. (This applies to a Dunmer player character as well, since they were born and raised outside of Morrowind).
  • Averted in Skyrim as well. The game assumes the Dragonborn is a foreigner to Skyrim, even if they are themselves a Nord (in which case you were born outside Skyrim and trying to sneak across the border for some reason, which justifies your capture at the start of the game; you are basically an illegal immigrant). So the player learns about ongoing events (the dragons, the civil war, Skyrim's history, etc.) as the Dragonborn themselves do.
• Final Fantasy:
  • Fallen into in the unskippable tutorial in Final Fantasy XII, which seems perfectly plausible until you realize that while you as the player really need the information on basic controls, your current character is a soldier in the middle of battle who really should not have to be told how to attack enemies, open gates, and run away from battle. The military cannot have been that desperate.
  • Final Fantasy VII:
    • Actually done as an Establishing Character Moment right at the beginning of the game. Barret asks Cloud if it's his first time in a Mako Reactor. Cloud says no. Barret launches into an explanation of what a Reactor is, ignoring Cloud entirely. Cloud gets understandably annoyed and tells Barret he doesn't care about any of this and he's just here to do his job.
    • Inverted. Cloud can enter a tutorial hall to brush up on the basics, but when NPCs offer to give him pointers, he will decline and instead offer to teach them. He makes it clear that he knows his stuff.
  • Final Fantasy X: Tidus is an accomplished Blitzball player; before the big game, Wakka offers him a recap of the rules of Blitzball. Slight modification in that since Tidus is slouching and looks rather bored in the scene afterward, it's implied he wasn't really paying attention and that Wakka was just drilling his team, who are uniformly awful. Additionally, given Tidus has been insisting he's really from an ancient, ruined city that hasn't been inhabited for centuries, Wakka may think Sin's toxins messed with his memory of Blitzball's rules and needs some reminding. The truth is that Tidus hadn't lost his memory- he's just ignorant about Spira's history and customs.
  • In Final Fantasy XIII, Hope gives Vanille an explanation of relations between Pulse and Cocoon, the nature of fal'Cie and l'Cie, and why a Cocoon resident really doesn't want to wind up a l'Cie of a Pulse fal'Cie. The trope is played with a bit in that Hope clearly believes that Vanille ought to know all of this, but she's not acting like he thinks she should if she knew it. It's an early hint that Vanille is actually from Pulse, and trying (not very well) to hide it.
  • Final Fantasy XIV offers a justification when Y'shtola gives a brief summary of what the group's current goal is and the main obstacle in their way.
  Estinien: "We know this, so why have you sent for us? Have you learned aught of value or not?"
  Y'shtola: "Patience, good ser - one must introduce the subject before launching into specifics."
  • In Celes' recruitment event in Dissidia Final Fantasy: Opera Omnia, Setzer tells Celes herself that she's the Imperial General Celes Chere with the reputation of never being defeated in battle, mainly as a way to prove that he's not another of the hostile dopplegangers roaming the landscape. Recruitment events usually do include these little bios for players who might not be as familiar with those games, but it's usually characters talking to people from other worlds.
• Fire Emblem:
  • Supports in general often do this when it comes to information that both characters know already. For example, in Fire Emblem Engage, Ivy recounts how old Hortensia was when Hortensia's mother, one of their father's mistresses, died, which is obviously one of the most important events in Hortensia's life.
  • Played with in Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones. After the battle in Chapter 6, Seth tells Eirika, princess of Renais that her own kingdom houses one of the Sacred Stones. When Eirika replies that the stone is in the temple, Seth reveals a secret that the king entrusted to him- that the stone there is a fake, and the actual stone is beneath the castle, sealed away by Eirika and Ephraim's bracelets- and that Grado has somehow learned this secret, hence why they want Eirika's bracelet.
  • Early on in Fire Emblem Fates, Corrin's siblings and servants recount details about their and each other's lives for the player's benefit, the most obvious being Xander telling Leo, "As I've always said, you're a talented mage with formidable magical abilities." Some of this helps establish character dynamics, though, and Lilith's reaction to Camilla's story about the "baby bird" Corrin saved helps foreshadow that Corrin actually saved Lilith in her astral dragon form.
  • Fire Emblem: Three Houses
    • Played with during an early scene, when Seteth privately criticizes Rhea's decision to make Byleth a teacher at Garreg Mach. Rhea points out that worrying comes naturally to Seteth to imply that his concerns are unfounded. Seteth then asks whether Jeralt was the one who disappeared during the fire 21 years ago (which is later revealed to be before Seteth came to the monastery) and reminds Rhea that Flayn is with them to explain the reason for his cautious attitude. Of course, the player is not told who Flayn is until later, and the same goes for Shamir, whom Rhea mentions in passing as investigating a suspicious individual. In short, the "as you knows" are primarily for the sake of making points, and a good deal is not explained to the player.
    • Played straighter earlier on, when Jeralt remarks, "As you know, the majority of folks in Fódlan are devout followers of the teachings of Seiros. The leader of that ridiculously large religious organization is the archbishop, Lady Rhea."
  • Fire Emblem Engage has an especially blatant example in the second chapter of the Fell Xenologue. As Alternate Celine pressures Alternate Alfred to invade Brodia, Alfred reminds Celine of how their retainers died in the war, as did their world's Divine Dragon, and that while taking control of Brodia's mining economy will help them, the risks are too great. Celine also gets in on this, remarking that Alfred was stronger-willed before the war, and mentions his sobriquet as the "Prince of Strewn Flowers."
• Lampshaded hilariously in Grim Fandango. Manny clearly has been working as a Reaper for years, but since the game dumps you into the plot without much backstory, the basics still have to be explained. The first character you meet that you can talk to is Manny's boss's secretary Eva, who, if you keep bothering her with questions in order to figure out what to do, asks Manny if she has to explain his job to him again. Answering "yes" leads to her describing Manny's job like a movie plot, in the third person, complete with "our hero." It's revealed Manny is just hitting on Eva, and Eva eventually tells him to stop wasting time doing that and go to the poisoning already.
• The flash game Gyossait plays with this in a very ominous fashion. A sudden and brief Exposition Break ends with "but you know all of this" in red font - because the mid-boss has figured out who and what the main character, Oyeatia, is. The very next area is the Boss Room.
• From Half-Life's manual:
  "As you know, Dr. Kleiner, your former professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, ..."
• Played with in Harvester. The main character Steve has amnesia, but no matter how many times he says it, nobody will believe him. Not that they won't play along anyway and answer any questions about things Steve should already know if he didn't have amnesia. This is one of many hints to The Reveal that you're in a twisted virtual simulation; all the townsfolk talk like NPCs explaining stuff for benefit of the player because that's exactly what they are.
• In Icewind Dale II, the first time the mayor of Targos will actually talk to you - after clearing the docks of goblins and collapsing their insertion point - he starts with "As you no doubt already know, Targos has been under siege from the goblinoids for months now..." but this is just a preface for him to start filling you in on useful information.
• Done to death in Infinite Undiscovery. Every other scene, someone is stopping to explain to the main character something that the rest of the cast takes for common knowledge.
• Played with all over the place in Injustice: Gods Among Us. Aquaman asks an Atlantian historian about Superman's rise to power, something that is common knowledge. When the historian is confused, Aquaman explains that a recap might help him gain a new perspective for his upcoming diplomatic talks. In actuality, Aquaman is from an alternate dimension and has no clue as to how Superman took over the world. Further complicating the matter, the tie-in comics suggest that the historian was actually the Martian Manhunter in disguise, who would have telepathically known this.
• In Jade Empire, you, the senior student at the Two Rivers school of martial arts, can quiz a junior student serving as a guard for information on health, chi, focus and other topics. This is at least preceded with telling the student that if he's to be a gate guard he should be able to endure a little testing. Choose not to test Si Pat, and it never comes up.
• Kingdom Hearts:
  • In Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, Axel recaps what happens when a person turns into The Heartless. Annoyed, Larxene points out she already knows this, and then Axel gets to his point that unlike a normal person, Sora was able to retain his feelings when this happened to him.
    • Similarly, Sora and company recap the events of the first game multiple times, although it's justified because they're losing their memories and they want to remind themselves why they're in Castle Oblivion.
  • In Kingdom Hearts II, if you choose to hear the Struggle rules during the prologue, the NPC who explains them will begin "You already know the rules, but a refresher can't hurt." Later, Master Yen Sid recaps the Heartless to Sora, Donald, and Goofy before introducing the Nobodies to explain how the two enemy types differ and relate.
  • Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep has Master Eraqus telling Terra and Aqua “As You Know”, Yen Sid is no longer an active Keyblade Master. This is new backstory for Yen Sid who starting in this game takes on more of a central role in the series, but something Eraqus has obviously advised his apprentices on given they are familiar with their master’s colleagues.
  • In Kingdom Hearts 3D [Dream Drop Distance], Sora's side of the Prankster's Paradise chapter starts with Jiminy Cricket talking to himself and recapping Pinocchio's origins and quest to Become a Real Boy as part of a "what was that boy thinking, running off on his own like that?" lament.
  • Kingdom Hearts 0.2: Birth by Sleep -A fragmentary passage- has Yen Sid recapping the events of Birth by Sleep and Xehanort's plot from Dream Drop Distance, something Riku and Mickey are aware of. However, it's justified — he's also explaining it to Kairi, who wasn't around and therefore needs to be brought up to speed.
  • Kingdom Hearts III has several scenes, particularly early on, where the characters recap events that happened in prior games of the series. One scene works as Mickey recaps the history of Xehanort’s splitting into his Heartless and Nobody as he finally deduces Terra’s part in it.
• Knights of the Old Republic:
  • Used in the first game and played with in the second. The first NPC you meet in KotOR 1 spends a few minutes telling you things your character would obviously know unless the Jedi mind-wipe only just cleared up. In 2, however, in many cases it is avoided as your character can respond in ways that imply you know the information, given that they have a real history with a lot of the events mentioned.
  • Also, in the first game, there are limits to what the first NPC will tell you before even he starts to think it's stupid. Specifically, he'll react to your not recognising the name of the ship you're on (which the player can only guess at that point and so may well ask about) by asking if you'd recently suffered a head injury.
  • In the second game it's played with, as after escaping from the first planet, Atton and the player character are Mr. Exposition back and forth to each other about the events of the first game, which the player can either agree with or correct and explain what really happened. This is used by Obsidian to avoid having to make use of an Old Save Bonus to maintain consistency with the somewhat customizable nature of the plot of the first game.
  • HK-47 lampshades this if the player character asks him about the Mandalorian Wars or Revan, pointing out that as a veteran of the Mandalorian Wars that served under Revan he's surprised that he should even have to explain any of this.
  • It's also averted to tease the player. The Battle of Malachor V is a major part of the backstory for the Exile and several other characters, but since they all know exactly what happened (and it's a traumatic memory to most) they never make more than passing references and the player doesn't find out until just before the endgame when circumstances force them to return and see just what they did to the planet. There's also a lampshade when the Exile first meets Bao-Dur; while he and the Exile served together for years, and one of the dialogue options when he's first mentioned takes this into account, the player has never seen or heard of him before, and you can also react as such, which leaves Bao-Dur rather bemused.
• In L.A. Noire, when you are playing as Jack Kelso, the receptionist at his place of work tells him where to find his own office.
• In the Lord of the Rings game War in the North, at one point you meet a Dunedain ranger who, as thanks for helping him, can give an overview of the history of his people. The thing is, while one of the playable characters is a dwarf who'd have little reason to learn about the history of rangers half a world away, the other two are an elf of Rivendell (one of the Dunedain's historical closest allies), and another Dunedain ranger.
• Mass Effect:
  • Done in the games. Much of it is optional, and there are things brought up that it's not unreasonable to believe your character is unfamiliar with, but once in a while, you can ask about something your character really should know all about^note Usually through phrasing such as "Tell me about...". Though often, if you do that, the NPC you're talking to will be surprised at your ignorance about the topic.
  • More egregious in the sequels, when returning characters often introduce themselves with way too much detail ("Hello, I'm Shiala. You met me on Feros. You saved me from the Thorian".) Which would make sense for newcomers to the series who don't know the backstories as much — but unfortunately they will get generic characters anyway, so it is not even of use to the player. However, given that acts of heroism and life-saving can very much be a case of But for Me, It Was Tuesday from several years ago to Shepard (and thus the player) a brief reminder (both in and out of universe) is not entirely unreasonable. This particularly helps when many characters look alike with only minor cosmetic differences.
• Mega Man Battle Network: How many times has Lan gone through some sort of homework assignment, field trip, lecture from his dad, etc., learning the basics of battling against a bunch of Mettaurs? Slightly justified in the first game that he hasn't done any serious net battling yet — though it's implied he's still rather knowledgeable on the subject — but it gets increasingly odd as the series goes on seeing as how he's used these exact skills to save the world multiple times before...
• In Medieval Cop 7: Adam and Eva Dregg encounters Eva at a murder site.
  Dregg: Eva, the soldier from Balboa who killed the lawyer E. Vil and tried kidnapping the Princess.
  Eva: Aww, you remembered me... I am flattered...
• Metal Gear:
  • Metal Gear Solid pulls an aversion in some rare circumstances, when Snake does know what another character is trying to tell him. For instance, if you call up Master Miller in the cave, he'll start to talk about the wolf-dogs inhabiting the area. Miller only gets as far as explaining that they're a cross between huskies and wolves before Snake, who's spent the previous six years as a musher, steps in to explain why they were bred and how they didn't work out for that purpose.
  • In an attempt to reduce this in Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, Kojima had a player character who didn't know as much information, allowing the other characters to tell the player things as the character was also learning them. In terms of conveyance, it sufficed but there were issues that made it less than perfect — partly because many players hated the new guy, and partly because Kojima infodumps are so exhaustive.
    • Sons of Liberty also plays it straight in the prologue act, where Otacon gives Snake a lecture on what organisation he is working for and what they do, which Snake should know perfectly well seeing how he is a co-founder of said organisation. He doesn't so much as grunt in annoyance at any of the unnecessary exposition outside of when Otacon misnames his gun.
  • Done in a redundant manner in Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots during the 4th chapter briefing. It opens with video footage gathered by the MKII of Liquid Ocelot explaining his plan to go to Shadow Moses island and use Metal Gear Rex to launch a nuclear warhead at the core of the Patriots' AI in orbit. The video concludes, and Snake, Otacon and Campbell then proceed to spend a considerable timespan reiterating Liquid's plan in the process of discussing their next move against him.
  • Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance does this, though it does get lampshade hung in the cutscene at the start of the Abkhazia insertion mission, where Raiden tries to say that he's been through the briefing material, only for Kevin to insist by reminding him of a Noodle Incident presumably brought about by Raiden previously averting this.
• In MindJack, Deuteragonist Rebecca Weiss exposits at one point about the mind-hacking technology that the main character has been using the entire game. Part of this exposition is that someone who's being mind-hacked is entirely unaware that they've been mind-hacked in the first place.
• The final case in Murder, She Wrote 2: Return to Cabot Cove begins with Jessica telling an employee of the place how very much she appreciates being able to use the library at "St. Brigid's College here in beautiful Waterford, Ireland."
• My Child Lebensborn: During the tutorial, the child is sometimes telling the Player Character things they already know, but that the player would be unaware of, such as the girl named Liv they are talking about being their best friend or the local store being closed on Sundays.
• Oracle of Askigaga: The armor shopkeeper in Castle Askigaga, in contrast to the weapon one, who just says the first sentence, but customized for his own wares:
  Finest armor in all of Askigaga! But, silly me, you already knew that! Right, Highness?
• Overwatch: The Are You With Us trailer starts off like this, with Winston sending a message to his old teammates asking them to get back together. He initially plans on making a grand dramatic speech recounting the history of Overwatch, but stops half-way through when he dejectedly sighs that they already know all of this, so instead he cuts to the chase: "The world is going to hell without us, I think we should do something about it, who's in?"
• Paper Mario as well as Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga occasionally did this during the tutorials with characters asking if they needed to explain things and otherwise say things like "Oh sorry, of course you know how to do that! Silly me!" (After all, He Knows About Timed Hits.)
• In the Persona series:
  • Shuji Ikutsuki does it verbatim in Persona 3. "As you know, I can't summon a persona." He's speaking directly to Mitsuru, who is aware of this, but the main character, Yukari and Junpei, who do not know, are also listening. Of course, he's Mr. Exposition. At least, in the beginning part of the game.
  • Persona 5:
    • Most of the game is framed as the Player Character being interrogated. Occasionally, when the scene snaps back to the present, the interrogator will ask for more details on a person or plot point that was just met/mentioned, only for Joker to brush her off or tell her to wait until he (and the story in flashback) gets to that. Justified, as the protagonist was drugged prior to the interrogation and putting everything together in order is the only way he can get the story straight himself, to the point that he doesn't even remember that his capture was a deliberate attempt to engineer this exact situation until he gets up to right before his story gets to the opening sequence.
    • A much straighter example occurs between two of the main villains of the game (Akechi and Shido) who spend ten minutes telling each other about their shared history, modus operandi, motivations and current plans, all of which they both know perfectly well — to the point that they finish each other's anecdotes. The Info Dump is purely for the player's benefit, to straighten out a part of the plot that has happened behind the scenes.
    • At the very start of the game, the protagonist meets Sojiro Sakura, who will be looking after him while he's on probation. Sojiro tells the protagonist that after he tried to protect a woman from a man forcing himself on her, resulting in the protagonist being convicted of assault, expelled from his old school and forced to transfer to Shujin, the only school that would take him. It's somewhat justified in that Sojiro is informing the Heroic Mime protagonist that he's aware of his circumstances and establishing his somewhat cynical nature. It's also the only time the protagonist's parents are mentioned in-game.
• In Phantasy Star II, the first person you meet hits you with a triple whammy: "Good morning, <player>. How are you? Almost two years have passed since you started working for me, the Commander of Mota. As you know, Algo has been brought up by Mother Brain..."
• All but invoked in Pokémon Gold and Silver when asked by your mom if you know how to use the Pokégear, as she says practically the same thing even when you say you know how to use it:
  Mom: (when answered no) I'll read the instructions. Turn the Pokégear on and select the Phone icon. Phone numbers are stored in memory. Just choose a name you want to call. Gee, isn't that convenient?
  Mom: (when answered yes) Don't you just turn the Pokégear on and select the Phone icon? Phone numbers are stored in memory. Just choose a name you want to call. Gee, isn't that convenient?
• Puyo Puyo Puzzle Pop: The characters get a short introduction with their name and a short description of them when they first appear in the story mode, despite almost all of them having appeared in a game at least once before (Puyo Puyo is a three-decade old series as of 2021), to introduce new players to them as soon as possible.
• Rather egregious in Quest for Glory III, which begins with an "As you know..." where the events of the second game are related to the main character, who actually caused all of them to happen (and mere days earlier, at that.) Either he has Swiss cheese memory, or Aziza does.
• Your engineer and personal shopkeeper in Red Faction: Guerrilla, Samanya, is all about this trope. Because you'll be popping in to buy upgrades roughly every twenty to forty minutes throughout the campaign, the game feels that this is a good time to remind you of vital plot points. Unfortunately this can lead to Sam telling you that the Hydra is coming and that we're all doomed about thirty times, and the player character Mason demonstrates repeatedly through his actions that he's aware of the plot points in question.
• In Resident Evil 0, Wesker and Birkin, who are both Umbrella scientists, feel the need while having a conversation to specify that the research into the T-Virus is almost complete and that the G-Virus is a more powerful strand of T, both things they would've already been perfectly aware of. What makes this especially funny is that this is a prequel, which means the audience is also quite likely aware of these things, as Zero is rarely the point most fans join the franchise.
• In the first chapter of RWBY: Grimm Eclipse, this is how Professor Port fills you in on what you're actually meant to be doing (aside from slaughtering Grimm by the dozen).
  Professor Port: As you know, we've been having some trouble with the security network in this area. We need boots on the ground to investigate. That means you, team! Onward!
• Sam & Max: Freelance Police has this due to how much continuity piles up in Telltale Games. Lampshaded in "The Penal Zone", when Grandpa Stinky complains about Sam doing this.
  Sam: Max is all short-term memory; I occasionally have to bring him back up to speed.
  Max: Aah! GIANT TALKING DOG!
  • Also occurs in season one, episode 5:
    Max: It's a good thing your protective hat and my non-compatible brain render us both impervious to hypnotism!
    Sam: And it's a good thing you've been taking those classes in subtle exposition.
• The introduction to the flash game Specter Knight is a spirit telling the Specter Knight who s/he is and how s/he died.
• Spirits of Mystery 8: Illusions:
  Nanny: Princess, as you know, the kingdoms of our land have been fighting Queen Mortis for over 500 years.
• Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People: Subverted in "Homestar Ruiner". When Strong Bad tries to run the Race to the End of the Race in disguise as Homestar, he asks Coach Z to explain the rules. Coach Z refuses because Homestar should already know the rules, having trained for weeks beforehand. As a result, Strong Bad (and the player) is forced to blunder through all three obstacles without instruction, and between that and Strong Bad being out of shape he does horribly.
• Justified in Sudeki. While the combat tutorial is excessive basic for season soldier Tal, he's putting on a show for a visiting dignitary. And while using her staff and combat magic to smash pots is overkill for Ailish, she's showing off for someone at the time.
• Trauma Center:
  • Trauma Team has Gabe's computer, RONI. Lampshaded by Gabe at many points.
    Gabe: Yeah, thanks for giving me a tour of my own office.
  • Done in the first Trauma Center game and its remake, where the player character is given a tutorial and infodump despite having just finished his residency. The character giving said tutorial is the senior nurse who was training Derek up until that point, though, and she admits it was only out of habit once she realizes she's rambling.
  • The mainline Trauma Center games also have the nurses, Angie and Elena. While some players find them annoying and redundant, they're actually a justified example. As Elena points out at one point, it's their job to know what has to happen during the procedure, so the surgeon can focus on actually doing it.
• If you Talk to Froderick in A Vampyre Story, you don't have a conversation with him then and there; instead, Mona has a flashback to when they were just shooting the breeze and doing nothing in particular. The conversation is laden with exposition, but, bafflingly, Mona has chosen to flask back to a conversation where she and Froderick were talking about stuff they already know; particularly the story of how the two met, which Froderick seems to be getting a little sick of telling over and over.
• World of Warcraft:
  • In the new Goblin starting area, Sassy Hardwrench tells your character things about their life that they should already know about themselves. That you're in the running to be a Trade Prince and that you're very close to doing so.
  • Justified a bit more in the Gnome starting area. A couple characters give you some pointers about Gnomish culture and the more important Gnomes around, then mention that they're telling you this because the radiation in the city you had just escaped from could have resulted in memory loss.
  • In the initial zone of the Demon Hunter campaign, the player can ask Kayn about the planet they are on (Mardum), even when the player character is supposed to be the leader of the expedition.

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