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* Unlocking Japanese as an audio option for Theater Mode instead of the default English in ''[[Kingdom Hearts II]]: [[No Export for You|Final Mix+]]'' requires having a finished ''[[Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories|Re: Chain of Memories]]'' save file on the memory card. Notably, ''Final Mix+'' added a few cutscenes not in the original edition of the game, which means that there is no English voiceover available for them. ''This'', in turn, means that these cutscenes ''are essentially muted'' until you get around to finishing the other game. Which, naturally, is [[Guide Dang It|entirely in Japanese]]. At least ''Re: Chain of Memories'' [[Embedded Precursor|comes with]] ''Final Mix +''...

** The ultimate example is [[Sierra]]'s ''[[Quest for Glory]]''. Every game in the series after the first allows importing earlier characters, meaning that if you played your cards right you could start each game significantly stronger than a brand-new character, and with a ton of cash to boot. In ''[[Quest for Glory II: Trial by Fire|Quest for Glory II]]'', a player who's conducted the entire game virtuously and gone well out of his way and against common game mechanics (for instance, returning a reward) to do so will have his character receive a [[Flaming Sword]] and the hidden "Paladin" class as the last scene of the ending; both are only usable in the sequels. Fittingly enough, the Paladin's hat is selfless good. Since it could very easily be [[Lost Forever]], ''[[Quest for Glory III: Wages of War|Quest for Glory III]]'' features a Paladin quest that only takes up half the game, while ''[[Quest for Glory: Shadows of Darkness|Quest for Glory IV]]'' lets one change an imported character due to a bug in reading the old save files.

* The ''[[Wizardry]]'' series of video games let you do this in the second, third, and fifth games by letting you import characters from previous games (except the fourth, which was a standalone adventure) to make descendants as playable characters. These had greatly lowered stats, and were at level one. However, they kept the same job as their parents, letting you start out with the advanced classes.

** ''Wizardry VIII'', the last game of the series, pushed the envelope by having you not only keep your character, but some of the allies and affiliations they had made in the previous game. This changed your starting location to your ally's base, and severely altered the way in which you could resolve the plot... assuming, that is, you were one of the few who still had their ''Wizardry VII'' saves from '''ten years ago!'''

* Many, ''many'' [[Dungeons and Dragons|Dungeons & Dragons]] licensed games published by SSI featured this, forming several separate continuums. The classic "Gold Box" games included two separate series set in [[Forgotten Realms]], and one in [[Dragonlance|Krynn]], in addition to the sci-fi [[Buck Rogers]] games. Later series which also allowed character importing include ''[[Eye of the Beholder]]'', ''[[Dark Sun]]'' and ''[[Ravenloft]]'' series.

** Playing ''[[Kirby]] Canvas Curse'' with another ''Kirby'' game in the GBA slot allows you to play as a Waddle Doo before unlocking it regularly (which is extremely late post-game).

** If you had ''[[Animal Crossing]]'' for the Gamecube, and linked a Gameboy Advance to the Gamecube, it would allow the player to reach a summer island minigame on the Gameboy --- which provided fruit worth a lot of money.

** Putting the Japan-only first ''[[Ace Attorney]]'' GBA game into the DS remake will unlock all five cases from the start.

** ''[[Super Robot Wars W]]'' and ''K'' both give you very good mech parts if you use one of the Japanese GBA cartridges in the Slot-2.

** Having ''[[Yggdra Union]]'' in the GBA slot while playing ''[[Knights in The Nightmare]]'' gives you the opportunity to recruit Pamela at a random point later in the game, and the tutorial will have Yggdra as its guide instead of Maria, with arranged music from Yggdra Union in the background.

** In ''Monster Farm DS'', one method of unlocking monsters is by inserting a game - any GBA game - into the GBA slot, and some formula works out what monster to make, but is still played straight as there are two special monsters that can only be unlocked with this feature, with the required games being the two GBA games of the Monster Farm franchise. (That is, the Japanese versions of those games. "Monster Rancher" is the English name of the franchise, and the English versions of the game do NOT give the special monsters.)

* [[Halo: Reach]] gives you extra money for [[Cosmetic Award|armor]] if you've made progress in ''Halo3'' & ''[[Halo 3: ODST|ODST]]'' beforehand.

* The [[Sega Dreamcast]] version of ''[[Shenmue]] II'' allowed players to transfer collected items over from the first game. Unfortunately, the American version was never released, so the few U.S. gamers who imported the European version could only exploit this feature by hacking the ''Shenmue I'' save file to add the flags indicating it is a European save file (though the game does play fair by giving Ryo a few collections by default to sell for cash).

* ''[[Ace Combat Zero the Belkan War]]'' had a couple of these. If you had an ''[[Ace Combat 04 Shattered Skies]]'' save on your memory card, you could unlock one of the superplanes, the X-02 Wyvern, from the very start of the game for $430,000. If you had an ''[[Ace Combat 5 The Unsung War]]'' save, you could unlock the ADF-01 FALKEN without having to get all three Supreme Ace medals (instead settling for the 3 Ace medals). However, if you had saves from ''both games'', you unlocked both superfighters just by completing the first mission in the campaign.

* A saved game of ''[[Castlevania: Lament of Innocence]]'' would net you a special item near the start of ''[[Castlevania: Curse of Darkness|Curse of Darkness]]'' that could either be sold for a good amount of cash or be used once to completely fill up your life bar.

* ''[[Wild Arms 4]]'' will give you bonuses if you have a ''[[Wild Arms 1|Wild ARMs: Alter Code F]]'' save.

* ''[[The Legend of Zelda Oracle of Ages]]'' and ''[[The Legend of Zelda Oracle of Seasons]]'' were meant to be played one after the other (in either order.) Data was transferred between the games by a generated password allowing you to fight Twinrova and rescue Zelda in the second game. There were also dozens of passwords you could get from NPCs to perform multi-game sidequests, unlocking bombchus, special rings, the Master Sword, Biggoron's Sword, and arrow/bomb capacity upgrades.