Dishonored

Arkane's 2012 stealth game hands you a set of tools and an unusual amount of trust. Corvo is the disgraced bodyguard of a murdered empress in Dunwall, a plague-ridden industrial city running on whale oil, and the Outsider grants him powers built for movement rather than combat: Blink teleports short distances, Dark Vision sees through walls, Possession puts you inside a rat or a guard. Every assassination target has a non-lethal resolution hidden somewhere in the level, usually more disturbing than killing them, and the world responds to how much blood you spill - the plague spreads, the streets get worse, and the ending shifts. Levels are built like small dense boxes with three or four viable routes through them, and the Golden Cat and Lady Boyle missions are still taught as examples of the form. It is short if you rush and enormous if you read, and it launched a studio identity that carried through Dishonored 2, Prey and Deathloop.