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Their wordsThe general trend I see in successful games is that they tend to show a great deal of their coolness (but not all of it) in the first few minutes to half hour of gameplay.
Their wordsBurying the best content at the end is generally not a good idea, but it's a question of degree.
Their wordsGet rid of the intro movie with the publisher's logo, the intro movie with the developer's logo, the legal screens (put them as an option on the main menu), and any other non-content cruft you can find.
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