Does it run off of your harddrive or CD-Rom? Most games require the CD now, but lets jsut assume it's all HDD.
You've got to load the map, the textures, the lighting, the game engine, etc. It's not just one file...there are many many attributes and such. The game has to pre-load responses to what the user wil do, otherwise if you do something unexpected, the game will pause while you are playing it, and then simulate a response (makes for incredibly glitchy gameplay.) Don't forget loading cut-scenes, sounds, etc.
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