Self-Imposed Challenge: Difference between revisions

A '''Self-Imposed Challenge''' is a playthrough of a game wherein the player plays under a restriction not required by the game itself in an attempt to increase the difficulty (or immersion) and replay value. These restrictions can range from the fairly simple (a refusal to make use of a [[Game Breaker]], for example) to the near-impossible ("Hey, can you beat ''[[Super Mario Bros.]]'' without [http://tasvideos.org/1332M.html pressing the "B" button]?"). Check a message board for a game that's been out for a while and you'll undoubtedly find players reporting on their progress in various exotic Self-Imposed Challenges.

This type of gameplay is one of the staples of the [[Challenge Gamer]]. See also [[House Rules]]. [[I Am Not Left-Handed]] is an in-universe example of this, or rather, an in-universe example of giving up on a '''Self-Imposed Challenge'''.

== Video[[Anime]] gameand examples[[Manga]] ==

* ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask|The Legend of Zelda Majoras Mask]]'' has the three-day-only challenge, where you can only play the Song Of Time once, and that's when you get the Ocarina of Time from the Skull Kid from the first time loop. For a game that's pretty much made of [[sidequest]]s, it leaves you with barely much to face the final boss with. Did we mention that you'll be rolling and spinning '''everywhere'''? And let's not get started on the Zora eggs...

** Think that's good? Try it ''[http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9BE435004584413C gathering SEVENTEEN'''seventeen''' non-transformation masks]''.

*** A friend of mine did this on his first playthrough of ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess|The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess]]''. Without using any faeries. Including the Cave of Ordeals. He had to quit without saving (losing progress) quite a few times to avoid collecting heart fragments in chest...

*** ''[[Link to The Past]]'' is a good example of a game in which to attempt this, and due to an easterEaster egg, when the Master Sword is seemingly required to deflect Aghanim's beam back at him, one can use the Bug-Catching net instead.

** Also, completing a Zelda game without ever dying is a challenge, because some games such as ''[[The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past|The Legend of Zelda a Link To T He Past]]'' have a counter for number of deaths. This feat is acknowledged in ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening|The Legend of Zelda Links Awakening]]'', which includes a special addition to the ending sequence if you complete it without dying. This is extremely difficult in the original NES game, though, because you can only save at the Game Over screen, meaning you'd have to play through the entire game in one sitting.<ref>Or know about a secret code involving the second controller.</ref>

* ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword|The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword]]'' features [[Harder Than Hard|Hero Mode]], a mode where you take double damage and enemies can take more damage, and the enemies never drop hearts (but your sword beam starts off at its endgame strength). Now try playing the mode without potions, extra heart containers, upgrades and any medal, and using only the most basic shield available(or no shield at all). And no using the [[Sword Beam]] either, except when it's absolutely needed. [[Schmuck Bait|Go ahead, try it.]]

** LetsLet's not forget the 1-kill playthrough of ''Symphony of the Night'', requiring you to kill ONE''one'' enemy throughout the entire game. You're still beating it at 200.6%; you're just limited to killing a puny Blademaster. This is quite difficult, as the mandatory boss fights count as kills. Once you become extremely adept at glitching through walls, itsit's not terribly difficult, but it will give you a run for your money if you arent mentally prepared.

* Variant formats for Collectible [[Card Games]] may be considered a form of Self-Imposed Challenge, especially those that aren't supported for [[Tournament Play]]. ''[[Magic: The Gathering]]'', for example, has Rainbow Stairwell, in which the player's deck must contain six cards of each color, one of which costs one mana, another which costs two, et cetera, up to six, and Highlander (AKA Singleton), where players build a deck with no more than one copy of any card that isn't a basic land.

* ''[[GoldenEye 007 (1997 video game)|Golden Eye 1997007]]'' and its [[Spiritual Successor]] ''[[Perfect Dark]]'' feature unlockable difficulty settings (called "007" and "Perfect Dark" respectively) that allow the player to alter the challenge by fine-tuning certain enemy properties: their health, accuracy, damage and reaction times. Level runs done with minimum enemy health and all other settings on maximum (meaning both player and perfectly-accurate guards will die in a single hit) are known as "Licence to Kill" (LTK) settings. Runs with ''everything'' set to maximum, so that guards have ten times more health than normal, are known as "Dark LTK" runs. In ''[[GoldenEye 007 (1997 video game)|Golden Eye 1997]]'' this is stupidly hard since a dead foe doesn't drop enough ammo to kill the next one; in ''Perfect Dark'' it's ''marginally'' more manageable thanks to the game's quirk that [[Boom! Headshot!|headshots on unshielded NPCs are always instant kills]].

** In ''Diablo 2'', a user on the inc.gamers forum demonstrated the story of [https://web.archive.org/web/20111209183615/http://diablo.incgamers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=480035 Anna Goanna]. She was an Amazon-class hardcore, as in "if you die you die permanently," character who completed the game on all difficulty levels with only cracked/low-quality items, a summonable NPC support fighter and a hireling fighter. Some bosses took hours to finish. When she finally beat the last boss on the [[Harder Than Hard]] difficulty, her name-personalized cracked sash sold in-game for multiple high-value items.

** There's also a player who levelled without any weapons or armour, and at least one [https://web.archive.org/web/20090501023245/http://www.wowinsider.com/2008/01/08/15-minutes-of-fame-noor-the-pacifist/ pacifist].

** The Iron Man challenge has recently gained a lot of popularity for [[''WoW]]''. The basics are that you may only use the worst gear in the game (no magic items at all), you can not spend talent points to improve your character, you may never trade with another player to get any stuff, and a lot of other more or less ridiculous requirements. And the big one: if you die, you're out.

*** Or even worse, try playing it without getting ANY''any'' non-manditorymandatory stage points. [[Raocow]] is doing [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKR9M3kCauI&feature=channel_video_title this right now].

** ''[[Mega Man (video game)|Mega Man]] 9'' and ''10'' both have an item called "The Book of Hairstyles" that can be bought for the ever-so-low price of 20 screws. This item removes Mega Man's helmet, revealing his hair. But wait. Without his helmet, Mega Man takes MORE''more'' damage, and if he loses even ONE''one'' life, his helmet comes back, thus requiring the item to be bought...AGAIN ''again''. If you're looking to obtain the achievement for beating all 8eight bosses without your helmet, expect <s>your screw expenses to overflow</s> [[Incredibly Lame Pun|to be screwed over.]]

** Thanks to people who spent their time figuring this out, there's a not-so-obvious ''Mega Man X'' challenge: Beat the entire game without any upgrades from the get go. Unfortunately, since it's not possible to defeat Chill Penguin without running into the Boots upgrade (or it is, this editor hasn't figured that out), it's technically not from the get go. The password you need is: 4764 8488 7716. To make this even more fun, try without using boss weapons.

* Expert players of ''[[Spelunky]]'' have attempted many different flavours of this. There's the common stuff, like speedruns, no-damage runs, high-treasure runs, and so on. The game has some built-in optional challenges which unlock stuff, but these are generally considered extremely easy. That is to say nothing of the no treasure, no kills, no action button, no damage runs in [[Game Mod|Gates of Hell Spelunky]] that people have attempted.

* Try playing a ''[[Ratchet and Clank]]'' game without ever buying ammo from a vendor, i.e. ammo crates are your only method you have of reloading weapons. For added challenge, never use a max-level weapon, and play on the highest difficulty, if possible. Warning: In the games where ammo doesn't reset if you die, this becomes a major case of [[Unstable Equilibrium]], the more you die, the harder it gets. Doing this in Deadlocked on [[Nintendo Hard|Exterminator difficulty]] is next to impossible.

* ''[[Fantastic Contraption]]'', a flash-based physics-puzzle game, lends itself to this. Players will try to complete the goal with as few pieces as possible, or without using certain kinds (gravity power, no catapults, etc.). The fact that you can save and share your contraptions for others to watch in action aids in this.

* ''[[FreeCell]]'': The most obvious one is reducing the number of free cells, sometimes even to zero (69 out of the original Microsoft 32000 can be solved with no freecells). Some software implementations will have this as an option. Another is to make the biggest "flourish"<ref>cards automatically going to the home row at the end of the game</ref> you can. There are a few games where it is possible to set up a 52-card flourish, taking the home row from empty to full in one move flat.

* It is possible to complete a lot of co-op chambers in ''[[Portal 2]]'' without any help from a partner (as in they don't place a portal or interact with anything) and very few of them require glitches. Finding a partner who will let you do this is a problem, though.

* Enter the [[Day Nine]] [[Star Craft 2|Daily]], where we learn to be a better gamer. Except on mondayMonday where we just dick around. Indeed, on Funday Monday, the host, [[Day Nine]], imposes a self-imposed challenge on your gameplay such as, "You must only attack on creep", "You must make a planetary fortress at your opponents natural", or "Make all your pylons outside your base." The best and funniest entries are casted by the host on a live stream.

*** To say nothing of the [[Do Well, But Not Perfect|all-Great]] challenges. MUCH''Much'' harder than it seems.

** ''Pop'n Music'' has even more opporunitiesopportunities for self-imposed challenges. Newer installments have "Challenge mode," which is essentially the game's normal mode, but after picking a song, you can choose up to two objectives to complete within the song for extra "Challenge Points." These challenges range from the tame (such as scoring ''x'' points or getting less than ''y'' misses) to the not-so-tame (having the scroll speed of the notes multiply or notes do spiralyspirally animations at regular intervals) to the insane (having song characters go into "Dance Ojama" mode and block your view of the notes or completing the song with a perfect score). If you get enough Challenge Points, you'll get an extra stage. Should you desire even more challenge, there's the Cho-Challenge Mode, which is the same as Challenge Mode but with the "Cool" note judgment (in addition to Great, Good, and Bad), which makes scoring <s>Nintendo</s> [[Beatmania]] [[Nintendo Hard|Hard]].

* Recent{{when}} ''[[DJMAX]] Technika'' tournaments have employed the "Nobody Knows Next" ruleset, in which each round, instead of just trying to get a high score, you're also required to fill another condition, such as playing with only one hand, playing with only your pinkies, or playing with the machine muted while you listen to completely different music via headphones hooked up to a portable player. There's also the "Miss Attack" challenge in which you try to get as many Misses as possible ''without failing'', and [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vyv51IglOFY "roulette" mode] in which multiple players line up and take turns on the machine on a per-swipe basis.

* ''[[Space Channel 5]]'' and it'sits sequel leavesleave room for these. Failure mode where you rescue nobody and get the minimum view rating, Mirror mode is when you play through the game with the mirror code activated... and Purge mode, in which you shoot the hostages and rescue the robots.

* ''[[The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion]]'' has the "Chuck Norris" challenge; this one is [[Older Than They Think]], but didn't become popular until ''[[The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion]]''. You play as a fighter with no weapons or armour throughout the whole game. You are, however, allowed to use spells that buff your abilities. ''[[The Elder Scrolls]]'' series is ''made'' for this sort of thing.

** A blogger named Christopher Livingston decided to play ''[[Oblivion]]'' as a [[Non-Player Character]], and [http://livinginoblivion.wordpress.com wrote about it here.] ''PC Gamer'' magazine later hired him to give ''[[Skyrim]]'' the same treatment ([https://web.archive.org/web/20131018095701/http://www.pcgamer.com/author/clivingston/ look here]).

* Play the Laterlater ''[[Shin Megami Tensei]]'' games that have a demonic compendium, but do not use the compendium. Or do a Nuzlocke run of the game.

{{quote|*** No evolving your pokemon

*** No dark, Psychic, or Ghost pokemon/moves

*** No Ekans, Arbok, Seviper, or Serperior

*** Pokemon must be LV 22 before they can breed

*** Pokemon of the same gender can not share a daycare center

*** It is your duty to keep any egg pokemon in the party til LV 18

*** Legendaries are false idols, and should be killed

Cant*** Can't use Fossils, Game corners, or drugs (PP Up, Rare Candy, etc.) }}

{{quote|*** Must have Starter in party at all times.

*** Number of Pokemon you can own (both in party and PC Box) at one time cannot exceed 1+ the number of Gym Badges you have.

*** You can include one Legendary among Pokemon you own; if a Legendary is featured on the game's box art, it must be that Legendary. For ''Red'', ''Blue'', or ''Yellow'', choose Zapados, Articuno, or Moltres.

*** Other than your Starter and the one Legendary, you can only battle using Pokemon that can be captured in the region you are battling in.

*** You must release ALL''all'' Pokemon you own after beating a Gym, other than your starter and the aforementioned Legendary. This rule does not apply after you defeat five Gyms.

*** Good luck!}}

* Many hardcore [[Shoot 'Em Ups|Shoot-Em-Up]] fans attempt to beat Shoot-Em-Ups on a single credit. In fact, one could argue that this is the only legitimate way to beat such a game, since having and utilizing unlimited continues defeats the challenge of avoiding enemies and enemy fire.

* Certain [[Shoot 'Em UpsUp]]s where it's possible (e.g. the ''[[Touhou Project]]'' games) have challenges such as No Horizontal/No Vertical, which, depending on the stage or the game, can be deadly hard, if not outright impossible, even on Easy. Others include no Focusing, which requires innate knowledge of the player's hitbox, 1lc, which is not dying at all, 0b1lc, which is the same thing... but no bombing either.

* ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]''{{'}}s Self Imposed Challenges come in four varieties: players abstain from some gameplay feature (like not brewing any liquor), starting build-related challenges (like starting with only unskilled dwarves, or skills, but no items except tools to make other items, etc), location-related challenges (like building a fort in a place with an aquifer or goblin tower), and megaprojects (huge constructions undertaken only to satisfy the player's ego).

** Particularly notable is the so-called "Hermit Challenge" where 6six of the 7seven embarking dwarves and every single immigrant get killed off and caravans are ignored or killed. Check out [http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=15572.0 One Dwarf Against The World], the story that made the name "Urist" popular in the DF fandom.

** It could be argued that completing a runthroughrun-through without allowing a single character to die (which, given that every unit is uniquely characterised and not easily replaceable, is a common practice) is a self-imposed challenge in itself; after all, the survival of only the Lords and mission-specific characters are necessary to progress. And, since many of the games that Western players know autosave after every move made, the player must restart the mission from the beginning if they wish to keep a character that had just been killed. In fact, a playthrough in which all deaths (that don't result in a game over, of course) are accepted could well prove to be a test of the player's willpower.

* ''[[X-COM]] (Video Game)|X-COM: UFO Defense]]'' has several possible challenges. They range from simply avoiding [[Game Breaker|GameBreakers]] such as psionics and blaster launchers, to complex rules such as "only officers can use certain equipment" and "don't sell your superior weapons tech". Also try using only a few soldiers. Or [[One Riot, One Ranger|one soldier]]. Or "Bruce Lee" - 1 man, 1 stun rod. You can even win by attacking only a single alien battleship!

** Some have actually succeeded in completing the challenge of slaying the Enderdragon in Hardcore Mode, a mode that deletes your save file should you die, so this becomes a no -death run. Getting TO''to'' the dragon is a challenge in itself, requiring lots of materials, time, and patience, even by normal game playing.

** There's also the Skyblock challenge, in which you're spawned onto a small island in the sky with one tree, and must complete certain objectives (make a tree farm, make a stone generator, etc.) being compounded by even MORE''more'' self-imposed challenges.

== Non-video[[Web game examplesComics]] ==

=== Anime[[Real andLife]] Mannga ===