Gaming's Most Brutal Continue Screens

The days of video games being confined to arcades have long since passed and, while many still flock to those old cabinets for the sake of nostalgia, most games can be played comfortably at home. The key goal of arcades was always to keep gamers engaged and spending money. One of the best ways to do this was to create continue screens that, instead of giving players a flat game over, allowed them to keep playing if they put more coins into the machines. Of course, these games weren't going to wait around all day while you decided whether or not it was worth another quarter to continue your journey. Thus, the intensely brutal continue screen was born.

While these continue screens are most often found in classic arcade games, there are a handful of newer games that have utilized this strategy to hold players' attention. The most effective continue screens seem to be those that create a sense of panic or urgency in the player, usually by putting their character in some sort of mortal danger that can only be stopped by continuing the game. Whether it's the threat of death or horrible dismemberment, these brutal continue screens have no problem exploiting your emotions to get more time (or coins) out of you.

Tecmo's 1988 action-adventure hack-and-slash game Ninja Gaiden made a big impact upon its release. It was one of the first games of its kind to use cinematic cutscenes to move the story along, and this only added to the positive reception it received. Playing as the ninja Ryu Hayabusa, gamers travel to America at the bidding of their father to make sure two statues that could potentially end the world don't come into contact with one another. In true hack-and-slash fashion, fights break out and chaos ensues.

If players are unfortunate enough to run out of lives while playing through the unending fights, they're treated to a particularly cruel continue screen. Ryu is found tied to a table as a circular saw slowly lowers towards him, threatening to cut him right in half as he struggles. In a truly bizarre and unexpected twist, Ryu is also surrounded by what appear to be wolves and demonic trees, all of which look just as anxious to kill him as the ever-descending saw. Luckily, you're able to save your hero by simply continuing the game. That seems worth a few coins and extra play time.

The Mortal Kombat franchise is known for its graphic violence and brutal takedowns. It was the first game that really put parents on high alert for violent content in video games. More than likely, many young gamers had to sneak over to a friend's house to play it. While Mortal Kombat felt pretty brutal where blood and gore were concerned, Mortal Kombat 4 was particularly brutal for a different reason.

Losing a game is already harsh enough without having to think about the consequences of your virtual defeat. But Mortal Kombat 4 wasn't going to let gamers off the hook quite so easily. Instead, if you managed to lose the game, you were treated to a tense guilt trip that had you desperately searching your pockets for more coins in order to stay your player character's unfortunate demise. 

Whichever character you'd chosen to play as would show up in a seemingly bottomless stone pit, falling continually while the ominous countdown clock let you know how much time you had left to push that continue button. Should you decide not to continue, your character would fall onto a bed of sharp spikes, effectively impaling themselves and, in true Mortal Kombat fashion, bleeding profusely all over the screen. If that's not enough to guilt you into continuing, we don't know what is.

Quest's 1990 platformer Conquest of the Crystal Palace is pure gaming gold. Playing as Farron, you and your trusty dog Zap must traverse several bizarre and perilous zones on your quest to return to your kingdom, which has been forcefully taken from you and your family. Getting assistance from a shopkeeper and a princess you manage to rescue along your way, you and Zap are able to overcome the forces of evil to set things right. Hopefully.

If you don't manage to conquer all of the forces of evil thrown at you in this game, you're given a heartbreaking continue screen that will get any animal lover to continue playing the game just to satisfy your trusty pup. Farron is seen dangling from a rope over a rising river of what appears to be lava. He is helpless and waiting for you, the player, to press continue to save him. 

Meanwhile, Quest used a little animal collateral to make sure you keep playing the game. Off to the side is your dog Zap, barking desperately at you as he attempts to save you. He, of course, can't get to you, leaving the player as the only hope in saving Farron. If that isn't emotional manipulation at its finest in your eyes, you may not have a heart.

This one gives a whole new meaning to the term "clapping out."

In JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, a 1998 multi-platform fighter based on the animated series of the same name, you won't a lot that deviates from other games in the fighting genre. The title was developed by the same team at Capcom that worked on Street Fighter 3, so the two games definitely shared a similar aesthetic and had a lot of gameplay mechanics in common. Where JoJo's Bizarre Adventure blazed its own path, however, was with its continue screens, which were slightly more nasty to the player and definitely encouraged the quick surrender of any remaining quarters.

When you met your temporary end in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, you were sent to a continue screen to watch your character wobble in front of Daniel J. D'Arby, a gambler who relished in having his Stand, Osiris, steal the souls of those who lost their bets. You, as the character, wagered your life in a battle that you ultimately lost. And those quarters in your pocket? They were a chance to go double-or-nothing in D'Arby's mind; that is, if you were quick enough to funnel them into the coin slot.

If you weren't — or if you were fresh out of quarters to feed into the machine — D'Arby summoned Osiris to collect. And with a single clap of his hands, your character was squashed, leaving nothing behind but a casino token. Ouch.