more lives =/= more power

[Captain]

Pretty simple question compared to my other polls, in fact, this isn't even a poll.

Lets say that the power increase is exactly the way you prefer (be it range, utility, mechanics, raw damage, whatever), and that lives and loss of lives is unrelated to scoring.

Having that in mind, what would you think about a shmup giving you more power the less lives you have?

[Cagar]

Hmm yeah why not.
Just don't overdo it.
But how do you give the player more power without it still affecting scoring somehow?

[Shepardus]

Gunnail does something like that except with score rather than power.

But yes, as Cagar said it's hard to give the player more power without it affecting scoring. Maybe if scoring were primarily graze-based.

[Captain]

Well, power doesn't have to mean your attacks are more powerful.

Perhaps your bomb gets an upgrade, or you get an additional mechanic to use, like a short lasting shield you can use every minute, or maybe you just get different weapons that aren't necessarily more powerful but work differently.

That said, proper balancing is missing the point, I merely want to know what you guys think of this concept.

As for scoring, other than counting lives at the end of the game, it can be entirely separate from scoring.

[Shepardus]

It could work well, but I personally prefer it when lives aren't (directly) connected to anything other than how many times you can get hit before game over.

[Skykid]

Quite a cool concept I think! If you could work it in properly it could really be something special, especially if it was tied to scoring - suiciding twice off the bat for the hardcore players and coasting on one life, max power, would be a pretty cool 1cc goal.

Someone make it happen.

[NeoStrayCat]

Well, IIRC, Caladrius also does this as well, of course though, you have to work for it for a little bit to essentially power up your weapons. (Of course, you actually have to do this on purpose though. [Ex: Score up a bit, intentionally lose life to power up, and then repeat the process again once more.])

Not unless I'm thinking besides the topic title...Less lives - More power? Hmm...

[copy-paster]

At least Salamander 2 have few examples here (the more you die the more you get powerups, if you die in certain spot).

[Jeneki]

Hmm, Soldner X games have "berserker mode" right before you die. Or Border Down where the whole stage changes and things get easier or harder. And of course, dying for more bomb fragments in Raizing games is a legit strategy.

[Strikers1945guy]

Is this not just a different take on Yagawa Rank? Ibara I suicide to make the game easier and having extra lives in stock raises the rank. Or suiciding to gain hadous to milk bosses. So in your game I would just suicide twice at the beginning to max my power which would benefit scoring I'm assuming.

I get your idea it sounds kind of like the gunnail bonus or whatever you get more reward for beating the entire game with no extra lives in stock so the only way to ever score high is just suicide twice st the beginning and ride the whole game out with 1 life.

How would your extends work here ?

[Illyrian]

Akai Katana already does this by increasing the size of your phantom bar when you lose a life.

It's awesome.

[HydrogLox]

suiciding twice off the bat for the hardcore players and coasting on one life, max power, would be a pretty cool 1cc goal.

This is already "a thing" in Under Defeat as each end stage bonus is higher the fewer lives you have left.

The way I initially read "more lives =/= more power" was that weapon strength would increase as lives are lost so that enemies could be destroyed more quickly - however that really would need to be balanced off by a score penalty (i.e. fewer shots to kill the enemy translates to a lower score). In the end that would simply degrade into a decrease-rank-as-lives-are-lost scheme.

[Captain]

This is not the same as rank by any means.

While rank adjusts difficulty to how you play, and opens up some hidden strategy, this concept can reward riskier play or outright help a novice player. (unlike rank which will eventually rise back up).

The way I initially read "more lives =/= more power" was that weapon strength would increase as lives are lost so that enemies could be destroyed more quickly - however that really would need to be balanced off by a score penalty (i.e. fewer shots to kill the enemy translates to a lower score). In the end that would simply degrade into a decrease-rank-as-lives-are-lost scheme.

Fair points. If this concept would be used, heavy balancing would be needed.

My idea: A timer that determines if losing lives has a penalty. If you truly and quickly suicide to play risky, you get no penalty, but if you gradually lose lives, you do.

[Strikers1945guy]

This is not the same as rank by any means.

While rank adjusts difficulty to how you play, and opens up some hidden strategy, this concept can reward riskier play or outright help a novice player. (unlike rank which will eventually rise back up).

Okay but to score well abd be at max power as fast as possible I need to suicide twice right away and always skip extends / suicide depending on how they would work right?

[Captain]

You're a ninja, typing that just as I edited my old post.

[ACSeraph]

SDOJ 360 Arrange is also like this in a way, since you gain additional "power" via the shot laser that drains your energy to dangerous levels when used while building hyper at an extremely fast rate. It's interesting to push yourself to the edge of death in pursuit of higher scores, especially when there some immediate visible benefit to doing so. Shikigami no Shiro also does this in a way by visibly powering up your shot as you graze. Not exactly loss of lives, but it's a similar concept. Definitely think it's more interesting when tied to scoring.

On the not related to scoring side, as NeoStrayCat said, Caladrius also does this. But in Caladrius death has a very negative impact on score, and the power up is really just intended to be a sort of adaptive difficulty. It's a very different approach, but also a good one imo. I never understood why older shmups make post death recovery so incredibly hard. If you died in the first place chances are you need a little help rather than a violent lashing. Obviously resetting rank is one way to do this, but a visible power increase actually does a lot to motivate you to keep playing after a stupid death rather than falling straight into restart syndrome.

[Captain]

Both punishing and rewarding deaths are good systems, but it depends on the game.

Older games were focused more on survival than scoring, so of course they want a punishing death, it's part of the experience.

[NeoStrayCat]

On the not related to scoring side, as NeoStrayCat said, Caladrius also does this. But in Caladrius death has a very negative impact on score, and the power up is really just intended to be a sort of adaptive difficulty. It's a very different approach, but also a good one imo. I never understood why older shmups make post death recovery so incredibly hard. If you died in the first place chances are you need a little help rather than a violent lashing. Obviously resetting rank is one way to do this, but a visible power increase actually does a lot to motivate you to keep playing after a stupid death rather than falling straight into restart syndrome.

Yeah, but its better to do this kinda early in the run, more importantly, stage 1, yeah, you won't score much on that stage (really insignificant), but an extra kick to your firepower would work wonders, at least it did on a 1.10 Very Hard run with a custom setup. (At least I got lucky enough to survive the run right after.)

And yeah, I agree Captain, lol. X3

[Squire Grooktook]

Is this not just a different take on Yagawa Rank? Ibara I suicide to make the game easier and having extra lives in stock raises the rank. Or suiciding to gain hadous to milk bosses. So in your game I would just suicide twice at the beginning to max my power which would benefit scoring I'm assuming.

Yeah, Rank determines enemy HP in the Bat Trilogy, so technically it's a similar effect come to think of it.

The idea isn't quite my kind of thing, but I'm sure it would work.

[Lord Satori]

Yet another game mechanic to encourage people to kill themselves.

[Weak Boson]

I think it's a really cool idea. I think players suiciding to express their mastery over the game is what's specifically cool about it, and incorporating this into a mechanic that helps floundering players is a neat way of making the game more forgiving without reducing the game's "true" difficulty.

BUT I would have serious reservations about reducing power as lives increase. Of course these are two sides of the same coin, the thing to avoid is situations where it's like "I practiced this boss with X lives, but that's no help now I have Y" or "Playing that stage when I have Z lives just isn't fun!"

It's OK to challenge players a little like this, if that's the sort of experience you want to give, it's just a precarious thing to get exactly right, since the number of lives a player has is something neither player nor developer has complete control over (well, you could argue that, but let's say this is only achieved when the player is a true master of the game) It would take great ingenuity to make it a kernel part of the game. Making it a simple/small benefit/adjustment that a player can choose to exploit if they want (like Akai Katana) might be less ambitious but it's still pretty cool..