Checkpoints vs. Instant Respawns (Design Discussion)

[CaptainKraken]

Ahoy there! I'd like to talk about checkpoints in shmups.

Background

Back when I started making/playing STGs, I had this internal philosophy that the best games would be bullet-hell, have bombs, but you don't need to use them; everything's dodgeable. I wasn't even a fan of bullet-canceling; thought it diminished the euphoria of dodging. (My first love in terms of STG content was Touhou LNNs/perfect runs, no surprises there).

Lately, (and this started when I played Crisis Wing) I've been reading up on/looking into the Toaplan design philosophy, with its memorization and checkpoint-based structure. Before playing CW I thought (presumably with the majority) that dying and getting sent to a checkpoint was just an outdated thing, a real buzzkill and led to silly chain-deaths always. But then I tried out that game, with its instant-respawns disabled, and found it to be a rather edifying experience. I found myself learning stages/tricky sections a lot faster than if I could just die and skip the section. The death->checkpoint->retry cycle provided a significant mental 'jolt'- like 'oh shoot, that's how that pattern works' or 'oh shoot, that enemy formation comes from the sides!' instead of 'oh, I died there. Welp, on to the next thing'. As a result Crisis Wing was a blast to 1cc, despite its being very long and memo-heavy.

I even found myself forgiving obvious first time traps that will just kill you if you don't know they're there. There's this really egregious one on the TLB (is it a TLB if you fight it every time? Small ship that comes out of the final boss, anyway). On the final phase, there's a pattern that will just wall you if you're standing in a normal position when it starts. Intentially, mind you. And then you're sent back to the last checkpoint. Which is before the final boss's first form and even before a silly memo enemy gauntlet. And ya know what? I wasn't mad. More amused. I might've given a chuckle or two. I spent quite a long time practicing that final checkpoint. Despite some of the patterns being a bit silly, the thing as a whole felt like a worthwile pursuit. Like something I had to apply my mind to, more than "just dodge better". Would I, as a game designer, have put the troll final pattern in there? No, definitely not, but for some irrational reason I like that it's there, in this game.

I find myself wondering what some other games would be like with checkpoints. Crimzon Clover for instance. If there was a checkpoint before the stage 3 snake section I'd probably have figured out a way through it by now, haha. CC is kind of a silly example, to be fair. Games like that would need major tweaks to work with checkpoint design. There are no lulls (well, barely any) in the action where a checkpoint could go and there's no power system so the only 'recovery' is time. Come to think of it that's basically Touhou 15's pointdevice mode.

I still haven't played any actual Toaplan games, or OG Gradius (not the biggest hori guy). I'll probably give V-V a shot eventually; it looks really cool. Maybe Truxton if I go insane and want to do that to myself.

Design Discussion

I've got it into my head that it may be cool to have my next game be an older-style checkpoint game. But with bullet-hell elements because I still like that sort of thing. I wonder if "Truxton, but with more bullets and a smaller hitbox" could work as a game concept. I like the idea of checkpoints because it forces you to actually learn the game instead of just blowing resources on bits you don't immediately understand, and then maybe coming back later to grind stage practice.

To that end, I'd like to hear some thoughts on checkpoint vs instant-respawn stage/game design, because now I understand both styles to be valuable and interesting in their own way, just different.

My initial thoughts:

Pros and Cons

Checkpoints
Pros:

• Learning stages and bosses is more deliberate and necessary
• Recovery can be an interesting mechanic, and switch player priorities for a while.
• Memorization is less of a hassle since if you haven't memorized a section, you get sent backward until you have.
  I've found this also provides a secondary goal for the next run- I want to get to that section with full power so I can use my newfound knowledge to optimize it.

Cons:

• Long, spectacle boss fights with loads of patterns like in modern games may be tedious.
  I suppose you could break them up into multiple phases each with a checkpoint?
  But then, if the game has power-ups you'll probably be toast.
• Unbroken action is not ideal. You need some dull spots in which to put the respawn points.
• Potential for frustration if you can't make progress. I tend to think this is more a player-side issue though.

Instant Respawns
Pros:

• Fast, uninterrupted gameplay is viable (and preferred).
• Player can sacrifice resources to get through overwhelming sections (at least until they go back and learn them).
• More intricate, longer bosses with many patterns to learn are (more) viable and often the highlights of the game.

Cons:

• Lives and bombs sort of mesh together in terms of utility- especially if there's autobombs.
• Difficult sections may feel even cheaper. Like "You must sacrifice a life to this part" instead of "You must learn this part".
• Powerups are either meaningless (you get them back when you die) or run-enders (you respawn with nothing and immediately die again).
  Makes sense why a lot of modern bullet-hells forgo powerups entirely, or only knock you down 1 level or something upon death.

Design Considerations

Checkpoints

• Checkpoints MUST be thouroughly tested to make sure each one is recoverable.
• Powerups are a more significant game design element that probably should be included to make recovery interesting and nontrivial.
• Stages are the "main course" of the "meal", while bosses are shorter and the "dessert" (analogy from SpidersSTG)
• Raw reaction challenges are more "expensive" than memorization challenges, for player engagement.
• Bombs are more of a secondary weapon. Planning bombs is usually necessary.
• The scoring system must take into account that the player can re-play sections of the game.
  Care must be taken to avoid "checkpoint milking" becoming the main scoring mechanic and overwhelming everything else.

Instant Respawns

• To avoid chain-deaths, either have no powerups or give the player power back after they die.
• Memorization sections are more "expensive" in terms of player engagement, imo, since they won't be practiced immediately after the player dies.
• Games tend to lean more on bosses as the main "meat" of the game.
• Bombs are more of an "oh, crap!" tool than a secondary weapon.

If you read this far, have a cookie
I'm interested to hear everyone's opinions on this topic. I know my opinion has certainly changed over the years.

[aak]

I think the way the Parodius series does it (on Auto mode) is great. Colored bells explode out of you after you die, so you can pick up a blue screen-clear bell or green invincibility/big bell and use those to quickly regain power-ups or have a fighting chance against a boss. So even though you don't have the checkpoints to restock on power-ups, you still don't usually feel completely helpless. However... Semi-Auto is usually better than Auto anyway since you can get multiple speed-ups and Semi-Auto doesn't have instant respawn sadly (except in Jikkyou Oshaberi and the SNES port of Gokujou, if you turn on that option)

[Lethe]

Instant respawn has nothing to do with danmaku design principles (besides enabling bosses so ludicrous that you have no choice other than to spend lives on them). It became favored over checkpoints for business reasons. Checkpoint-based games ran too long resulting in terrible operator ROA, they were too exploitable for scoring purposes, and they were hostile to the casually curious who just wanted to see more of the game. All of these things had been identified well before danmaku existed - refer to the famous statement about Twin Cobra being made into a "drunk game" because it was believed there was no overseas audience who would bother to learn it properly. Some of this was also motivated by the novelty of the genre wearing off over time, resulting in casual players being less invested, and the skill level of dedicated players increasing dramatically.

Since anyone can "beat" an instant respawn game via credit mashing, the design focus shifts to scoring. This also happens to benefit from instant respawn as, as you've identified, it makes games harder to learn. It obfuscates optimal routing by giving you only one attempt per run at each segment. Further evolutions in this direction like hiding the TLB behind 1 credit - or DOJWL's infamously vicious instant boot off the machine on a loop 2 game over - can be seen as attempts to claw back some survival-essentialist appeal without giving up the other benefits of instant respawn.

Personally I think danmaku games actually are the best vehicles for checkpoints, for all the opposite reasons they make for good arcade business. Gorilla play, randomness and granular scoring match extremely well with being able to or forced to replay segments, while the rote aspects of "classic" schema games do not benefit beyond the second dimension of recovery (which is itself not limited to any particular design type or to checkpoints). The fact that Progear has checkpoints is the most likable thing about the entire game TBH. Look at the round-based versus microgenre (TSS/TH03/TH09) for ideas of how checkpoints can be made to work with danmaku-ethos scoring.

[Faith]

I think Gunvein is a good implementation of checkpoint system.

If you Die = instant respawn, like most STG. If you Continue = need to resume from checkpoint, and they are put in good areas.

Also, for Gunvein, if you Continue, your score is converted to points before being reset to 0.

Those points, you can use during a quick "mini shop" after the Continue screen, where you can like buy an extra bomba and a few other little goodies to help progress.

So, I feel that helps a bit with recovery. For my goal, I always play to 1CC, but, often times my initial goal will be 2CC/3CC first.

Reason is... it helps me practice earlier stages first, but also to slowly get familiar with later stages as well. I think this system is very fair, friendly, and also balanced.

Overall, personally, I feel that this is the sweetest balance so far.

Also in Gunvein, Continue is limited supply. You can buy more from the "mini shop," but still need to play/score well to get those points; so it still incentives good play.

[CaptainKraken]

I tend to see continues as kind of a weird thing to be in modern shmups at all, especially ones that aren't actually released in arcades. The idea that you even can credit feed to "beat" a game is super weird. I tend to respect games bold enough to just say "Oh, you ran out of lives? Get back in line, bucko!"

However, what if the reference frame was shifted a little? Lives become "Shields" and Credits become "Lives". That seems to be more along the lines of familiar action game mechanics- i.e. you can take a few 'hits' but then die and get sent back in the level (for example- NES action platformers; Ninja Gaiden, Mario etc). Of course a lot of old action games also had continues in addition to this but a shmup like that definitely wouldn't benefit from them imo.
I know this has been discussed before.

On a different note, instant-respawn games have this somewhat bizarre narrative quirk (especially if there's a story involving the pilot of the ship). Like, you get hit, lose a life, and your ship erupts into a blazing inferno of death. Like, no two ways about it, that pilot is toast. And then he respawns from the bottom of the screen like nothing happened. You can obviously get around this by having the "lives" be represented as shield points or whatever, but that's much less visually striking when you get hit.
I also kinda like checkpoints for that reason. Like, yes the character died but now we're re-starting the story from back before that happened.

[Ixmucane2]

Computer shmups and console shmups shouldn't blindly inherit the structure and pacing of arcade shmups.
Before worrying about what happens when the player gets shot down, the idea of playing the complete game in a single run (susceptible to being ruined by respawning without adequate firepower) as opposed to interrupting and saving games or playing one stage at a time, should be questioned.
Stages can be so short that perfect success and total failure are the only possible outcomes, with no need to worry about comebacks; detailed memorization can be a special ingredient for tricky places rather than the relentless driving force of credit feeding for practice; progressive power inflation can mitigate the need for player skill and ensure progress.

[Sumez]

I think the first post in this thread is a really good unbiased deconstruction of the qualities of both checkpoints and instant respawn, and the mechanics and design philosophies that separate them. Obviously both approaches have merit, and I think it's really shallow minded to just dismiss either.

I have two points I'd like to add, although Lethe kind of touched on them already:

In my experience, checkpoints are usually favored by "genre tourists" who don't have as much insight into the genre but still enjoy the casual game of Gradius, while many genre fans, danmaku players especially, often gravitate towards "checkpoints are bad". For some reason the former seems to be more frequently tied to horizontal shooters, and the latter to vertical ones. I think it's not a coincidence that also overlaps with the frequent design differences between the two - with vertical STGs often having more of a focus on pure shooting and dodging, and horizontal ones often relying on actual stage design moreso than just enemy design and bullet patterns.

But I think this also ties into the approach you bring to each subgenre, and the setting that you play it in (especially arcade vs. home). People who have no hesitation to just credit feed through a game and call it a "clear" famously get turned off by arcade ports with infinite credits because "the game is short and easy". Obviously, the reason for this is a misunderstanding on behalf of the player, but regardless that's what happens.
The checkpoint approach is much more marketable in that regard. Even if you have no qualms using infinite credits, making it through a stage will still require learning a section and finding a way to make it through it without taking a hit. And honestly, even if you *do* have some sort of limitation on using continues, I still think it will sit better with a wider audience.


The other point is something to add into the "Design Considerations" section - It's much harder to balance a good scoring system in a game that's not just a single pass through everything. If you can suicide intentionally and milk points out of the same section, that can ruin a score challenge (or just make it boring) if it's too exploitable. It's not uncommon for high scoring strats in checkpoint games to be based around double KO'ing the final boss.
That said, if such an approach is deliberately built into the game, there is probably also a way to use it to your advantage and actually make scoring *more* interesting.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Checkpoints

Checkpoints MUST be thoroughly tested to make sure each one is recoverable.

This is probably the main reason I am opposed to Checkpoints in shmups. In a game where your power or abilities don't really change and you have a strong core base moveset, such as your average Mega Man, Checkpoints work fine. But when checkpoints go bad and aren't well tested, they go real bad. Mega Man 2, Wily stage 4 is a great example of a bad checkpoint in a non-shmup, namely due to the boss being weak to only one weapon that you need to grind and max out on due to checkpoints not refilling your special weapons.

I don't trust the average amateur shmup dev to properly playtest and implement checkpoints well. I'm not crazy about checkpoints in shmups even when they're well implemented, for that matter, because:

Instant Respawns

Lives and bombs sort of mesh together in terms of utility- especially if there's autobombs.

This is actually a good thing. If a shmup has a checkpoint a player is struggling to figure out, they can keep dying repeatedly without feeling like there's any real progress made. Lives being able to act as a safety net to progress can be a good thing, especially in a game with no bombs or particular special ability to provide the player with safety such as Ikaruga, where the homing lasers are not defensive at all in nature; using it carelessly can cause lots of revenge bullets to suddenly fire at you.

Lives and bombs and autobombs can all still be made to feel very distinct in how they're used by making each one meaningful. Autobombs typically suck if the benefit of manually bombing isn't made significantly better than autobombing. Rolling Gunner is a good example; autobomb is short duration, weak, and costs full stock in Original and Expert modes, and even in the lower modes manual bombing lasts a long time and gives you a chance to pointblank enemies to rapidly recover your hyper meter.

It's not uncommon for high scoring strats in checkpoint games to be based around double KO'ing the final boss.

Very true. Checkpoint milking can become a very abusable thing. Probably the biggest example I can think of is Formation Armed F. A typical 1cc score with no milking will get about 1.5 mil. But, with checkpoint milking by double KOing the final boss over and over cranks it well over 8 million. Basically, you keep killing the final boss and ramming into one of his bullets before the stage clear registers. It's possible to avoid this kind of design if you're aware of it, but it's an easy pitfall to forget about in a Checkpoint shmup.

[CaptainKraken]

Computer shmups and console shmups shouldn't blindly inherit the structure and pacing of arcade shmups.

I agree. Keyword "blindly" though. I think arcade design has lots to offer that remains a benefit to home games (like the difficulty/requirement to learn the game).
I'm very open to the idea of a shmup with "individual level" modes (score attack modes?) but a lot of the appeal of the genre is going for a full run imo, so I think that should always be an option. At least to string some levels together for a run.

Progressive power inflation can mitigate the need for player skill and ensure progress.

I disagree with this in the context of action games, especially legacy genres such as shmups. A lot of the appeal for me is the fact that I have to improve myself to see the end of the game, instead of the game changing significantly to accommodate me. Plus power inflation makes the beginning of the game (when you're weak) pointless to revisit later (when you're strong). Bullet Hell Monday had this problem (in addition to you starting off too weak). There was a 'challenge mode' which was basically arcade mode, and balanced for full power, but the main game was a bit of a slog.
I think one could create a progression-like effect by unlocking different ships/special weapons/bombs as the campaign goes on, ensuring every new addition is balanced with the default options, but maybe situationally useful.

The other point is something to add into the "Design Considerations" section - It's much harder to balance a good scoring system in a game that's not just a single pass through everything.

Oh, yeah, good point! Someone here has suggested such a drastic measure as reverting your score back to before the checkpoint, haha! I wouldn't go that far but it's certainly a consideration.
I think you can probably get around this with end-stage bonuses or maybe multiplier dropping when you die- anything to make the milk worth a lot less than just playing it normally.

[Sima Tuna]

The main design conflict I see between checkpoint games and instant respawn games is credit feeding. Checkpoint games don't really allow for a credit feeding approach, while instant respawns cater to credit feeders.

Some players vastly prefer the ability to credit feed IF they choose, while others will perhaps argue that any game that allows mindless credit feeding will inevitably be maltreated by casual gamers, who see it as "a 20 minute game" and dismiss all depth. Because of their own decision to feed credits.

With a checkpoint game, even the casuals have to engage with the systems enough to go from checkpoint to checkpoint. And some checkpoint games send you back to the start of the level if you run out of lives and Continue. So you have to clear a level on a single credit (although you can still die.)

I know I prefer instant respawns, but that's my preference. I totally get why some people think checkpoint games require more skill. I just would rather have the option to feed in credits when I'm trying to learn, and usually I will credit feed the first couple of runs just to get an idea if the game is one I even want to try to learn. But my perspective is also not that of the casual player (entirely,) because I have heard casuals dismiss shmups as "20 minute games" that are "easy" precisely because those shmups allowed the casuals to credit feed the entire game. They used 34 credits or whatever and act like the game was easy.

[Sumez]

This is actually a good thing.

Correction: This can be a good thing.
Fortunately shooters can be different things and still be good

The main design conflict I see between checkpoint games and instant respawn games is credit feeding. Checkpoint games don't really allow for a credit feeding approach, while instant respawns cater to credit feeders.

I think we agree here, since your points are similar to the things I already outlined. But the phrasing above is odd.
Checkpoint games cater to credit feeders by still allowing them the experience of meaningful progress regardless of how many credits they use.

[CyberAngel]

Checkpoints are an instant turn off for me. Sometimes I want a satisfaction of a quick run. So I won't respect the game that doesn't respect my time.

If I want to get better I can use practice mode to play as if the game has checkpoints. Except that has the benefit of NOT needing to spend who-knows-how-long to get to the place I actually need to practice in the first place.

[...] any game that allows mindless credit feeding will inevitably be maltreated by casual gamers, who see it as "a 20 minute game" and dismiss all depth. Because of their own decision to feed credits.

With checkpoints those same "casual gamers" would eventually get stuck somewhere and then dismiss the game as "badly designed unplayably hard trash", so that's a bad faith argument. At least credit feeders have a chance to get hooked on gratification from clears and have a reason to play the game repeatedly.

That said, there's already a known solution to discourage settling for credit feeding - don't show them the ending. Works like a charm, judging by Touhou series.

Let's think of what's the point of checkpoints in games, anyway. They make sense for platformers that have bottomless or inescapable pits. What's the point of them being in autoscrollers? The only thing that I can think of that might undeniably justify them is when the game has a nonlinear powerup system, to give you a chance to try out the different options. The problem is that, unless you give enough powerups after the checkpoint to max out, you end up giving extra punishment to the players for a single mistake. And if you do then that raises the question of why do you have powerups in the first place. So it's hard to make such a system not feel like an arbitrary limitation. Which usually tends to be interpreted as sadism towards players.

[Sumez]

Let's think of what's the point of checkpoints in games, anyway. They make sense for platformers that have bottomless or inescapable pits. What's the point of them being in autoscrollers?

Why do they make more sense in one context than the other?
Platformers with instant respawn (Contra, Strider 2, etc) will just respawn you next to the pit.

[CyberAngel]

Why do they make more sense in one context than the other?
Platformers with instant respawn (Contra, Strider 2, etc) will just respawn you next to the pit.

There could be a long stretch of collapsing non-respawning platforms. I immediately remember being stuck in Contra Force due to respawning over a pit for an example of how easy that is to screw up. For shmups the only way an instant respawn could screw you over is if you get depowered too much. Which is not necessarily helped by checkpoints, as Gradius III shows.

[Sima Tuna]

The point of checkpoints is to force the player to learn how to play, at least to the extent of being able to clear that segment without dying. From my perspective, it's the same reason in both genres. If a platformer instantly respawned you then people could just spam every possible button input/type of jump/type of movement until they got past the section, without ever learning whatever the section was designed to teach. I don't see any difference between that and checkpoints in shmups. R-Type is a really good example, because it's so heavily focused around memo and an almost "puzzle-esque" approach to level design. If you can instant respawn then you never need to solve ANY of the puzzles in R-Type. You can just die your way through them to victory, then declare the game easy or that it sucks, poorly designed etc. Because you never learned anything the game tried to teach.

Some checkpoint games are more bullshitty than others. I personally don't think Raiden needs to be as harsh with the checkpoints as it is. Most people will practice on the instant respawn version of the game anyway. And the trap design in Raiden can be rude. In R-Type, even if you fuck up, you can theoretically block with the force/bits or move out of the way. In Raiden, if you fuck up/incorrectly memo, you can get into a no-win situation very easily. Your ship cannot move fast enough to get out of the way of enemy bullets. Raiden ship speed +Psikyo bullet speed. So the checkpoint in that case is more... I guess just a memo check. "It looks like you fucked up that memo section there. Would you like some help with that? Sorry, fucko! Get gud."

Checkpoint games cater to credit feeders by still allowing them the experience of meaningful progress regardless of how many credits they use.

I mean, I guess? But the instant respawn games cater to credit feeders by allowing them to credit feed and see the entire game in like 20 minutes so they can then write it off and pretend the game sucks. At least with checkpoint games, it's almost like the credit feeders are forced to Single Segment play.

With checkpoints those same "casual gamers" would eventually get stuck somewhere and then dismiss the game as "badly designed unplayably hard trash", so that's a bad faith argument. At least credit feeders have a chance to get hooked on gratification from clears and have a reason to play the game repeatedly.

I don't know what you mean about bad faith argument when I'm just giving, like, my opinion man. About video games. Sure, casuals are gonna dismiss most arcade games as either "too easy" or "too hard" because they got filtered. But that doesn't mean what I said is wrong. A lot of people who play arcade games casually will absolutely credit feed the game, die 69 times, finish the game and then say "yeah, it was ok but pretty short and easy." Or they'll say the game is shit and impossible to play without credit feeding and that credit feeding is the "intended" game design. That you're supposed to feed.

With a checkpoint game, credit feeder casuals can't make that argument because the game forces you to complete entire segments without hitting a game over. Sure, you can still credit feed a checkpoint game... It's just that credit feeding isn't NEARLY as powerful. In some checkpoint games, it's actually better to restart the game when you game over, because checkpoint respawning with zero power is harder than restarting. So it almost forces the player to consider 1cc mentality and think about reset vs continue, and checkpoint design has to be carefully considered too (from the dev side.) With a free continue system where you instantly respawn, the player is able to brute for anything with enough credits. Even bosses will eventually time out, so a determined feeder doesn't even need to shoot. Just mash the credit button and respawn button.

I prefer instant respawn as a player but there are merits to the checkpoint system imo. It tends to work well in slower, more thoughtful shmups that design their levels like layered puzzles and feature a lot more stage hazards rather than purely bullet patterns.

I immediately remember being stuck in Contra Force due to respawning over a pit for an example of how easy that is to screw up.

Absolutely! I think it's much harder to design fair checkpoints than it is to build a game around instant respawns.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Absolutely! I think it's much harder to design fair checkpoints than it is to build a game around instant respawns.

Particularly in a shmup (or any game really) where your power level can vary significant or gets drastically reduced upon a death. It's less of an issue in a game where your resources and abilities don't change after dying, but in an autoscrolling shmup I think it's typically not a great idea.

[Light1000]

With relation to the topic of: "do "normie" / casual players like credit-feeding checkpoints or instant respawns more"...
I would have to say that near universally, I don't think anyone has ever actually enjoyed credit feeding with instant respawns. An extremely casual person may like doing it on an arcade cabinet where they pay maybe just over 5 dollars in total to blast through a game, but in the home market, no one (casual) has ever credit fed through a ($10-30) shmup's typically half an hour campaign and thought anything else but "that felt shitty/lame. I don't want to play again. Why did the game never allow me to lose?"
I think forcing respawn to the beginning of the level on continue with no power loss is something that would work in practically every game.
One of Zeroranger's biggest boons when it comes to drawing in new players is the fact that it does not have on-the-spot continues.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

I think forcing respawn to the beginning of the level on continue with no power loss is something that would work in practically every game.

It's already done in Progear's second loop on every death and when you continue and it's functionally a big fun-sucker in what would otherwise be a great game. The reason continues are supposed to not reset you are is that they're a way of being able move on and practice stuff you haven't been able to reach in one credit, and effectively you're proposing killing that. Not a great idea.

Disallowing continues, the other end of the extreme, makes the game feel too unforgiving for more casual audiences.

As has been said, there's already a great solution for allowing for continues but educating people that credit feeding isn't going to get you the best ending of the game and generally doesn't count as beating it:

That said, there's already a known solution to discourage settling for credit feeding - don't show them the ending. Works like a charm, judging by Touhou series

[CaptainKraken]

The fact that Progear has checkpoints is the most likable thing about the entire game TBH.

I did not know there was a CAVE game with checkpoints, that's very interesting.

It's already done in Progear's second loop on every death and when you continue and it's functionally a big fun-sucker in what would otherwise be a great game.

And so the battle lines are drawn.

The reason continues are supposed to not reset you are is that they're a way of being able move on and practice stuff you haven't been able to reach in one credit, and effectively you're proposing killing that. Not a great idea.

I understand that for actual, physical arcades, but in today's landscape where the vast majority of STG players are on home consoles or PCs, isn't that what stage practice/select is for? Like, you get to a level and unlock it in stage practice. You don't need to credit feed; you can just select the right practice option. Modern shmup releases are usually heartily criticized if they don't have extensive practice options, haha.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

And so the battle lines are drawn.

I'm not overly concerned about the opinion of someone who apparently loves the checkpoints in loop 2 so much (and nothing else apparently) that they have zero score submissions for the game (both here and on Restart-Syndrome).

Like, you get to a level and unlock it in stage practice. You don't need to credit feed; you can just select the right practice option. Modern shmup releases are usually heartily criticized if they don't have extensive practice options, haha.

Modern shmup releases that don't even allow continues get criticized rightly that much more. It's not an either/or setup for practicing. It's useful to have both. The Windows era of Touhou games as well as modern CAVE ports were pretty much the gold standard for design.

[Sumez]

I really don't understand your absolutist stance on this, Roo
There's nothing to be lost

Using continues to practice in an arcade setting is great - that's how I practice for most of my 1CCs since I usually play on original PCBs. And having checkpoints for that context is almost never a bad thing - often it's actually a help with practice since you get to repeat sections that you might have fluked.
For boss fights, what I usually do (either with checkpoints or without) is just stop trying to damage the boss, and seeing how long I can survive.

The much bigger obstacle to practice with credit feeding, on original arcade hardware, is when games have really heavy rank. So after dying (and especially after continuing), what you're practicing is never what you'd actually encounter in a full run.

Also, what you responded to, which Light1000 suggested, isn't a stage restart on *every death*, but only on continuing. Pretty much exactly what most home games did in the 8-bit era, and some of the 16-bit one. Comparisons to Progear makes no sense to me IMO, as it's distinctly a different approach. They send you back to the checkpoint on every death, and each stage has multiple checkpoints. Also, it's adding checkpoints into a (style of) game that (presumedly) wasn't designed around having them, so there's a bunch of issues with this approach.

I absolutely agree with them, that for a home release forcing a level start-over on every continue (regardless of whether the game otherwise uses checkpoint respawns) is always a good idea in order to get people engaged regardless of their approach and history!
If your issue with that is that it impacts practice sessions, I think that should always be fixed with a practice mode. I also think adding quicksaves to every game in lieu of a real practice mode is equally lazy and suboptimal.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

They send you back to the checkpoint on every death, and each stage has multiple checkpoints.

Progear only has one checkpoint per stage in loop 2: the very start of the level. There are no mid-level checkpoints whatsoever. Reaching a boss disables checkpoints so basically the challenge in each level is being able to reach the boss with your default resources. I agree that it's a very extreme example and out of scope for this discussion, but I wasn't the one who brought it up first, and I'm mostly annoyed none of you pushed back against the claim that the checkpoints are the best part of the game.

So after dying (and especially after continuing), what you're practicing is never what you'd actually encounter in a full run.

Really depends on the rank in the game. If the game features a high minimum rank value at that point, continuing won't feel all that different VS a no-miss clear and can be quite useful. It really, really varies.

for a home release forcing a level start-over on every continue (regardless of whether the game otherwise uses checkpoint respawns) is always a good idea in order to get people engaged regardless of their approach and history!

I'm not particularly opposed to continues forcing a level restart on console releases, but I do think the way Touhou does was better, where the player is educated that Using Continues = Bad if you want to good ending and naturally teaches that a 1CC is the standard for Beating The Game. You still have the option to credit feed to "see" most of the game that way if your skill won't carry you through, but if the game has a good range of difficulty options so as not to alienate beginners then forcing level start continues I don't see as a negative.

[Sumez]

Really depends on the rank in the game. If the game features a high minimum rank value at that point, continuing won't feel all that different VS a no-miss clear and can be quite useful. It really, really varies.

Yeah. Pretty much every arcade game has rank. I'm talking about the more extreme examples like Gradius and Parodius. But I've definitely been thrown off many other times with arcade games like that - Most recently, Strider will feature completely new enemy spawns based on how well you did, and seemindly some randomness too.

[friedrich]

Modern shmup releases that don't even allow continues get criticized rightly that much more. It's not an either/or setup for practicing. It's useful to have both. The Windows era of Touhou games as well as modern CAVE ports were pretty much the gold standard for design.

Can you give some examples of games that don't offer continues? I'm not aware of any of them.
I'm curious to read the discussion about it. I'm currently starting to make my own STG and it will definitely not have continues.

[Ixmucane2]

Can you give some examples of games that don't offer continues? I'm not aware of any of them.
I'm curious to read the discussion about it. I'm currently starting to make my own STG and it will definitely not have continues.

Countless console, computer and phone shmups and other action games have a sequence of levels and it's either die and retry the level or succeed and reach next level.

It's actually a matter of time scale: a relatively short level needs no internal checkpoints, and a short run of a single level doesn't need multiple lives because failing is a modest loss.

[Sumez]

Ok, but they were asking about examples of shooters that don't offer continues

I'm sure they exist, but I'm not really aware of any either

[Steven]

Slap Fight does not have continues. Pretty sure Tiger-Heli also lacks them but I don't remember.

[xEbb1993x]

As much as I consider Einhander to be an absolute classic, the checkpoints when you die is what nearly kills it for me. So yeah, checkpoints are obsolete.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

Modern shmup releases that don't even allow continues get criticized rightly that much more. It's not an either/or setup for practicing. It's useful to have both. The Windows era of Touhou games as well as modern CAVE ports were pretty much the gold standard for design.

Can you give some examples of games that don't offer continues? I'm not aware of any of them.
I'm curious to read the discussion about it. I'm currently starting to make my own STG and it will definitely not have continues.

For friedrich,

If you check out the twin-stick based shooter of "Death Ray Manta SE" (with it's visual flair and nod/tribute towards Eugene Jarvis' classic Robotron shooter circa 1982) on Steam or the Nintendo Switch gaming platforms, you'll find out there's no continue option to be found -- thus making it quite an addictive shooter in it's own right with the single life given to make it last as long as possible and with it's "just one more attempt/try" to see if the player can get a bit further in the higher difficult levels later on. DRM-SE looks quite trippy/awesome if played on an OLED-based gaming monitor or with the OLED Switch variant released console -- give it a spin and find out for yourself.

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[Sumez]

I think it goes without saying that older games designed more around looping indefinitely and seeing how far you can survive, rather than reaching an ending (Galaga, Robotron, Commando, etc.) don't have continues - it doesn't really make sense for those games even.

But I doubt those were the ones Roo were talking about, especially given the specification of "Modern shmup releases that don't even allow continues"