But I've noticed that, at least in my case, it's far harder to do this right with the player character. From my experience, it can be an effective device if it's done almost immediately after the start (the fakeout protagonist), if it's very clearly telegraphed so that the ensuing character swap feels like a choice, or if it's nearly or actually the final scene of the game. Anything else seems to take my investment in the story right with it and usually leads to either save scumming or quitting the game if there's no way around it.
(there's also the option of just making the protagonist either really unlikable or barely a character at all, but that feels like it doesn't count)
Anyone else have thoughts on it?
Some specific examples in nested spoilers since it's impossible to talk about any of this without them. I tried not to pick any examples where just seeing the title would be a particular spoiler, since you probably already know or could reasonably expect it to be a possibility.