Strategic Suicide

[fcgamer | 4,754]

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.

[Sumez | 2,995]

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.

[ifightdragons | 234]

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

[Alder | 243]

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.

[Gloves | 11,841]

A 1CC allows for deaths; a 1LC does not.

[DefaultGen | 5,436]

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

[mbd39 | 2,030]

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.

 

[docile tapeworm | 4,204]

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  

[docile tapeworm | 4,204]

35 minutes ago, Gloves said:

A 1CC allows for deaths; a 1LC does not.

#no death or you suck

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

When I hear "strategic suicide" I think of Hitler.  Just saying

[NESfiend | 1,517]

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

[Sumez | 2,995]

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.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,588]

Sometimes suicide attacks are the best course for tricky bosses.  Specific examples are escaping me right now.

[The Count | 532]

Voltorb has entered the chat.

[docile tapeworm | 4,204]

@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.

[Andy_Bogomil | 815]

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.

[Tanooki | 4,952]

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.

[the_wizard_666 | 1,325]

3 hours ago, Tanooki said:

Dude, you're stalin, answer the question.

[asmikace | 68]

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.

[Estil | 1,265]

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?

[phart010 | 1,708]

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

[G-type | 2,533]

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.

[Tanooki | 4,952]

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.

[T-Pac | 7,590]

Strategic suicide? Like ... dying on purpose?

Yeah, that's definitely what I was doing. 

Definitely.

-CasualCart