Multiple lives are a fairly classic element of video games as a whole. Originally appearing in arcades, a lives system served the purpose of limiting how many times a player could attempt a challenge in a game before needing to insert a quarter. It was a business tactic in order to make money. When games came to the home market with consoles, developers fell into the old trick of making their games incredibly difficult in order to artificially lengthen their titles. The original Ghost ‘n Goblins and Battle Toads come to mind in this regard.

Though as games have evolved, become more ambitious and quite a bit longer. I have to ask myself the question, why do developers still feature classic lives systems in their games? Extra lives existed as a way to make money from arcade cabinets, yet home console games are now paid for upon purchase and most triple A titles are more than lengthy enough to satisfy the consumer.

Multiple lives are a relic of the past that serve little purpose in games nowadays. That isn’t to say the concept can’t be used well but, that I’ve found few modern games that benefit from having a life and game-over system. 

Limitations to Exploration

Mario in the Metro Kingdom

Super Mario Odyssey is a fantastic example of a modern title that ditches the traditional lives system which helps the pacing when exploring kingdoms. In past 3-D Super Mario titles, players would have a limited number of attempts at a mission before being kicked to the game over screen and forced to make their way back to the world. Think Super Mario 64 and how upon losing all your lives, you have to race all the way through Peach’s castle to attempt the mission for the stars again.

This was a decision that I’ve always thought dragged the game’s pacing down. You’ll have to stop your exploration or attempt at a star after an arbitrary number of failures only to slowly make your way back to re-attempt it. Being kicked out of the painting and losing progress was already a fine enough penalty for failing so, kicking players out of the castle entirely, doesn’t particularly add anything positive to the title.

Super Mario Odyssey circumvents this however by simply having a more innovative lives system. Rather than losing a life and being flung out of the kingdom, coins are lost upon death. This helps the pacing immensely as now exploring the kingdoms is one seamless experience rather than the weary walk back to the objective. Losing coins as a penalty works fairly well due to the fact that without coins, players can’t purchase any of the collectable costumes, so death is still discouraged while not sacrificing the enjoyment of the gameplay.

Difficulty through Death

Madeline on Celeste Mountain

What if we’re discussing a game where death is expected, such as Super Meat Boy or Celeste. These are titles that expect the player to die hundreds of times before they even come close to reaching the end. Now how would a title like this work with a lives system? Simple, they don’t actually have one. Celeste and Super Meat Boy use a checkpoint system, meaning any time the player progresses to a new screen, their progress is saved.

This works remarkably well for similar games because while death is frequent, players will only lose about thirty seconds of progress, leading to a far less frustrating experience. Compare this to some classic NES or SNES titles that operate on a classic lives system like Battle Toads. The constant loss of progress is draining with death being a common occurrence, leading to extreme frustration which only worsens performance on the more difficult stages. 

Another way Celeste avoids this is due to how quickly players respawn after death. While progress is still lost in Celeste upon death, you respawn so quickly that the forward momentum is never broken. This works in tandem with the lack of lives or a game over screen to mitigate frustration.

Aiding in Collectables 

Crash Bandicoot 4

Speaking of losing progress, what about titles that are all about collectables. The challenge in games like these comes both from the interknit platforming one must perform as well as having to collect items along the way for one hundred percent completion. Plenty of modern games involve this but, I believe the recently released Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time is the perfect example of how to handle this. 

Crash 4 is quite a difficult game, both to play as well as to complete. With the large number of gems and wumpa fruit to collect, attempting the games later challenges could become far too stressful to be enjoyable. That would be true if not for the fact that the game once again, lacks a traditional lives system. Rather being booted from the level and redoing everything upon death, Crash 4 instead features both checkpoints and a death counter. Naturally, the check points allow you to respawn before a challenging collectable you may have died trying to get but, with the infinite lives, a player could even use death to die and spawn back near the collectable they missed, giving them infinite attempts to perfect their skills.

However, to collect all six gems assigned to each level, players must complete them while dying three times or less,, which creates a less stressful experience when combined with endless tries. Rather than being restricted to three lives before you must attempt the whole level over again, having a limited number of times you can die gets across the same idea for more hardcore players looking for one hundred percent completion while allowing casual gamers to take their time to learn the level layout.

Conclusion

These were just a few examples of modern games that have found ways to challenge the player without forcing them to completely reattempt a level. This isn’t to say that extra hard levels with no checkpoints such as Champions Road from Super Mario 3D World don’t have their place or can’t be enjoyed. Rather that games have evolved past the need to punish players with completely redoing a level or challenge. 

Now this is where I throw it to all of you. What are your thoughts on classic lives systems in video games? Do you believe they should no longer be the norm? Join the discussion down below and until next time, thank you for reading…

If you’re interested in more opinion articles than check out our piece on Destiny 2 and the latest episode of our Podcast can be found here