fcgamer | 5,032 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 Those who only 1CC games won't do this, but I just play for fun and the 1cc thing isn't for me. Sometimes if I start a new stage with 0 lives, I'll purposely die, just to continue with a full set of lives, full weapons, etc. Take Super Mario Bros for example. If I get to world 8 on my last life, I might find it more beneficial to commit suicide and start again, rather than play, screw up in the third stage (8-3) or wherever, then have to complete all those stages another time. Or with the rematches against the robot masters in the Mega Man games, it might be a similar situation. So does anyone else sometimes commit strategic suicide while playing games? One could also do it to collect more items / lives or whatever too. 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sumez | 3,176 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 3 minutes ago, fcgamer said: Those who only 1CC games won't do this Lol tell that to Garegga players 3 minutes ago, fcgamer said: but I just play for fun and the 1cc thing isn't for me You're right, trying to beat a game without dying too much isn't fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ifightdragons | 234 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 (edited) Absolutely! Just like you described, that will be my go-to strategy in Mega Man. Rather than facing a hopeless boss battle with low health, whilst wasting special weapons ammo, a well timed death can do the trick. Edited September 10, 2021 by ifightdragons 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alder | 243 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 I've definitely done this in both SMB and Mega Man. I know I've also done it in 3D platformers to get a quick teleport back to the main area or something, instead of walking all the way back. In the Tree Tops level in Spyro if I missed a jump, I'd just sacrifice a life since it was faster to respawn than to run all the way around to try again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gloves | 12,351 Administrator · Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 A 1CC allows for deaths; a 1LC does not. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DefaultGen | 5,737 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 (edited) I've beat Ninja Gaiden III without dying except for the last act timer, so I always take a death on the last checkpoint in the game here to reset the timer. I gotta learn some speed strats one day. The timer is ridiculous. Beating the entire 9-part stage plus 3 bosses on one timer is the hardest part of any Ninja Gaiden game IMO. I wonder if they intentionally made the timer difficult as the final NG challenge or just figured most people would probably die at some point to reset it. Edited September 10, 2021 by DefaultGen Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mbd39 | 2,122 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 4 minutes ago, DefaultGen said: I've beat Ninja Gaiden III without dying except for the last act timer, so I always take a death on the last checkpoint in the game here to reset the timer. I gotta learn some speed strats one day. The timer is ridiculous. Beating the entire 9-part stage plus 3 bosses on one timer is the hardest part of any Ninja Gaiden game IMO. I wonder if they intentionally made the timer difficult as the final NG challenge or just figured most people would probably die at some point to reset it. Same. I know the last act can be done in one go with careful use of the spinning fire shield, but I've never been able to do it. Before I was any good at NES Batman, I'd deliberately game over if I lost a life before the Joker so that I'd have three lives to face him with. I think this is a common tactic. There's a suicide attack in Genesis Shinobi 3 and Revenge of Shinobi that does a lot of damage to bosses. Suiciding is used in some speedruns to get a full healthbar and/or fresh set of lives. I know it's done in Ninja Gaiden pacifist. In Battletoads co-op runs, one player has to game over at Clinger Winger because of the glitch there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
docile tapeworm | 4,276 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 18 minutes ago, DefaultGen said: I've beat Ninja Gaiden III without dying except for the last act timer, so I always take a death on the last checkpoint in the game here to reset the timer. I gotta learn some speed strats one day. The timer is ridiculous. Beating the entire 9-part stage plus 3 bosses on one timer is the hardest part of any Ninja Gaiden game IMO. I wonder if they intentionally made the timer difficult as the final NG challenge or just figured most people would probably die at some point to reset it. Just now, mbd39 said: Same. I know the last act can be done in one go with careful use of the spinning fire shield, but I've never been able to do it. Before I was any good at NES Batman, I'd deliberately game over if I lost a life before the Joker so that I'd have three lives to face him with. I think this is a common tactic. There's a suicide attack in Genesis Shinobi 3 and Revenge of Shinobi that does a lot of damage to bosses. Suiciding is used in some speedruns to get a full healthbar and/or fresh set of lives. I know it's done in Ninja Gaiden pacifist. In Battletoads co-op runs, one player has to game over at Clinger Winger because of the glitch there. get good 1 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
docile tapeworm | 4,276 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 35 minutes ago, Gloves said: A 1CC allows for deaths; a 1LC does not. #no death or you suck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
the_wizard_666 | 1,338 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 When I hear "strategic suicide" I think of Hitler. Just saying 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NESfiend | 1,565 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 Growing up I also did that with mega man games. Dont want to be limping into a robot master at 0 lives, so Id kill myself off if I died before reaching half way point of the level. Im sure there's a few other examples, but that is definitely the one that comes to mind Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sumez | 3,176 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 The PS2 remake of Fantasy Zone 2 only allows you to get the good ending if you buy an expensive item and use it on the final boss after beating it. But if you die, you lose all items, and the last shop appears at the beginning of a long boss rush which ends with the final boss fight. The biggest problem here is a really difficult fight against some fast-moving spiders that try to wall you in (like in a Snake game) right before the boss. What I do here, and see a lot of people opt to do, is intentionally die to the spiders, which respawns you at that fight with access to a shop, and don't buy the special item until this moment. And also buy an extra weapon to help guarantee a win against the spiders. You can of course see how far you get and just die later, but by not buying the item earlier on you're essentially planning on dying some time after the spider fight starts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reed Rothchild | 9,984 Editorials Team · Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 Sometimes suicide attacks are the best course for tricky bosses. Specific examples are escaping me right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Count | 607 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 Voltorb has entered the chat. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
docile tapeworm | 4,276 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 @mbd39 @DefaultGen you can take your time in ng3. the timer is tough but you can miss a jump or teo and still get it done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy_Bogomil | 869 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 A key strategy for speed running in a lot of games as it can kick you to the checkpoint or eliminate back-tracking. Can also be used to take advantage of invisibility frames after a death to nuke a boss or something. I typically do it for classic NES games when I'm on 1 or zero lives and know I'm likely going to die anyway and start way back at the beginning of the stage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tanooki | 5,162 Posted September 10, 2021 Share Posted September 10, 2021 Strategic death honestly is probably factored in by the developers in some games. They know people will struggle, they know they will never likely put the hours the game testers/staff developers would have on the game and have those docs to get through. It's a blank slate, and what better can you do when you see something ugly and it's better off to start fresh... drop dead, it pays off. It was a good strategy I used with the NES games in the 80s into the 90s on GB and SNES as well. It just makes more sense, especially as you learn the game more and get a bit deeper. Or maybe you've finished it, and since it wasn't a ROM whoring paradise you played again what you had and retained more information. You'd learn the best spots where it was stupid to stress, take the death, get the refill (life, sub items, checkpoint, etc) and move along. It's not cheating or gaming the system, it's just a strategic retreat to ensure victory. Classic combat tactic. 3 hours ago, the_wizard_666 said: When I hear "strategic suicide" I think of Hitler. Just saying Dude, you're stalin, answer the question. 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
the_wizard_666 | 1,338 Posted September 11, 2021 Share Posted September 11, 2021 3 hours ago, Tanooki said: Dude, you're stalin, answer the question. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
asmikace | 69 Posted September 11, 2021 Share Posted September 11, 2021 Some shmups is pretty much suicide to start of the game if you die and lose your powerups. There are some shmups that is impossible to continue back to square one power. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Estil | 1,292 Posted September 11, 2021 Share Posted September 11, 2021 You know when I first started RPGs in 2013, I noticed with the NES Dragon Quests that if you/your party is knocked out (they're not really "dead") you come back to the king/queen you last saved at (I think in the first DQ game there's only one king/place you're allowed to save at)...you are given a choice of whether to save your progress (at the cost of 1/2 your gold) or to reset and try again from your last save point. This is kinda like in American football where you can choose to accept or decline a penalty that was charged to the other team. Sometimes it's better to reset and try again and not save if let's say, you didn't get very far and the 1/2 gold loss penalty would be too much. OTOH, if you got a lot of experience points and/or made significant progress then it's probably better to go ahead and save and eat the 1/2 gold loss. I guess this wouldn't be a strategic suicide as such but more like a strategic reset...maybe? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phart010 | 1,798 Posted September 19, 2021 Share Posted September 19, 2021 (edited) Suicide is part of the speed run in Axiom Verge. The way deaths are handled in that game, you keep items that were acquired. There’s one spot where you go deep into an area to get an item then die so you don’t have to backtrack. It brings you back to the beginning of that area. In Megaman X2 if you die after getting heart or energy tanks, you keep them. I seem to recall getting power ups that were on spikes with the intention of dying immediately after. I’m not totally sure where but I think one of the spots is in the ostriche level if you accidentally break the motorcycle after you get to the end part with the heart tank. Edited September 19, 2021 by phart010 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
G-type | 2,843 Posted September 19, 2021 Share Posted September 19, 2021 In Kid Icarus, if you get an Eggplant curse too far from the hospital might as well just suicide. Not really worth the time to try and make it all the way back. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tanooki | 5,162 Posted September 19, 2021 Share Posted September 19, 2021 That is the ONE reason I don't play that game, I love it otherwise, but it's utterly infuriating it doesn't(like in the GB sequel) time out after some time. Even limited veggitude is enough to get you destroyed pretty fast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
T-Pac | 8,368 Graphics Team · Posted September 21, 2021 Share Posted September 21, 2021 Strategic suicide? Like ... dying on purpose? Yeah, that's definitely what I was doing. Definitely. -CasualCart 1 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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