Continue

In games, a continue is a mechanic which allows a player to carry on playing even after a game over. Over the years, the continue has taken many different forms from needing to be purchased to being free, from being quite limited to unlimited, and from having many drawbacks to no drawbacks at all.
Although it's possible to win a game while using continues, many players don't view a game as being truly won unless it can be finished without continues, which is why the term one-credit completion became popular.
Contents
Personal
Most of the first video games I played were on the Atari 2600, of which, very few feature a continue mechanic. On the rare chance I played an arcade game I often saw a continue screen, but, always strapped for quarters, I almost never was able to use them. However, I do remember dumping several dollars into Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and NARC. In the late 1980s, I got an NES and many of the games I had for it utilized the continue mechanic. When I was still pretty awful at games, the continue feature was very useful, as it allowed me to get further in the game than my skill at the time would allow, however, I also felt like it was a bit of a tease because, even with the additional continues, I could rarely ever beat a game.
History
The continue mechanic appears to have originated in arcade video games in 1981 where several different companies started using it around the same time. These include Konami's Super Cobra in March, Tose's Vanguard in July, SNK's Fantasy in October, and Namco's Bosconian in November. In each game, buying an additional credit would let you continue your game from the stage you left off on, but it would wipe out your score, a drawback that would be used in pretty much every subsequent game.
Continue screen in Super Cobra.
Continue screen in Vanguard.
Continue screen in Fantasy.
Continue screen in Bosconian.
Most early home video games were just ports of arcade titles, and the porters typically included the ability to continue. However, since home games couldn't charge the player to continue, it was typical for the ports to limit the number of continues a player could use. By the end of the 1990s, lives and game over screens were falling out of favor in home games, and many of those games which still employed them began giving the player unlimited continues.
In the 2000s, as mobile gaming became more popular and players had their credit cards tied to their phones, microtransactions began to take off. Many games were made at this time which used a commercial model where the game could be played for free, but the player could buy helpful features, one of them being continues.
Usage
A game's designer must consider many different options regarding the use of continues, the most important is whether they will use them at all. Many early arcade games, like Missile Command, simply didn't allow for the player to continue, and, when you ran out of lives, you got a game over. When continues are used, there are a large variety of ways to handle them.
Early arcade games like Missile Command do not allow players to continue.
Acquiring continues
If a game designer wants their game to have continues, they have to consider how a player will get access to them. Over the years, several methods have been devised.
Buying continues
In arcade games, players are typically required to buy a continue with money. It typically costs the same as a credit, although, there may be a discount like two coins to start the game, but only one to continue. In order to prevent the game from sitting at the continue screen forever, arcade games usually institute a time limit, and many allow the player to speed through the time limit by pressing buttons. This can be useful if a player doesn't want any other players to continue from where they left off.
Fantasy make it clear: continues cost money.
Trying to continue in Street Fighter II: The World Warrior requires another credit.
Home games didn't have a way for a game publisher to charge the player for continues until it became common to tie a credit card to a a person's gaming device, and microtransactions were implemented.
Free continues
Because home games typically require a large up-front cost, players don't expect to have to also buy continues, so most home games which use continues give them to the player for free. Mega Man II, for example, lets the player continue for free each time they get a game over.
The player gets infinite continues in Mega Man II
Earning continues
Some games start without any continues, but allow the player to earn them, often by finding them, buying them with in-game currency, or getting them as a reward. For example, in the NES port of Bionic Commando, the player start with zero continues, but, by defeating powerful enemies, they can earn eagle badges which let them continue.
Eagle badges are dropped by strong enemies in Bionic Commando. Collecting them allows the player to continue.
Hidden continues
Not all games advertised their ability to continue. For example, in Super Mario Bros., if a player received a game over, they could hold down A on the controller and press start to continue on the same world they left off on, however, this ability was not described in the game or manual. Many other games had similar hidden "cheats" or "debug" features which could be discovered through word-of-mouth or by buying hint magazines.
Limiting continues
Some home games, like the NES port of Guerrilla War, gives the player infinite continues, pretty much guaranteeing they will beat the game if they're persistent. However, this was quite rare in the 1980s and early 1990s, and most games which used the continue mechanic also limited it in some way. For arcade games, there is an intrinsic limit with the price, but, other designers have come up with additional limits.
Finite number
Certainly the most common way to limit to continues is simply to give the player a finite number of them. For example, the NES port of Contra gives the player three continues, but, once they're used up, it institutes an unavoidable game over.
You only get three continues in Contra.
Disabling
Some games allow the player to continue as much as they like until they reach a particular point in the game, after which, continuing is disabled, and a loss after that point results in a inescapable game over. Special Criminal Investigation, for example, doesn't let you continue if you fail in the final stage, and Vanguard only let's the player continue on the first set of rounds.
Vanguard clearly states you can only continue during the first pattern.
Continue drawbacks
In order to discourage players from simply continuing their way through an entire game, designers often introduce a variety of drawbacks that come with continuing. Drawbacks were more common in earlier games, but modern game design is less harsh.
Score wipe
Probably the most common drawback to using a continue is zeroing out the player's score. This mechanic was popular in arcade games the moment continuing was implemented and served as a way to prevent players from buying their way onto the high score list. Most early home games ported this drawback as well. However, as scores became less popular and designers stopped using them, this drawback became meaningless.
Sent back
Another common drawback is requiring the player to restart from the beginning of the level or world, rather than where they last left off. In the NES port of Life Force, losing a ship lets the player carry on immediately from right where they died, but having to use a continue always forces them to have to replay the level from the beginning.
Continues instead of lives
Many games, especially those that try for realism, don't uses lives at all and instead give a game over if the player's character dies. However, these games usually give the player infinite continues. This can be seen in adventure titles like The Legend of Zelda and Metroid.
Unlimited continues in The Legend of Zelda serves a similar purpose as lives.
Implementation
From a programming stand point, it's usually easy to code continuation into a game. This is especially true with games which already features mechanics like lives and game over, as they already have subroutines for adjusting lives and restarting the game, and a continue screen can be built onto that existing system without the programmer having to write very much new code. For example, the game will probably already have a "start of game" routine where the code set's the player's starting lives, clears the score, and sets the game to the first level. All the programmer need do is run the "start of game" routine with an additional argument telling it to not change the level and it will double as a continue function. There may still be specifics for handling drawbacks or a finite number of continues, but these are also pretty trivial and fit into existing routines.
Links
- giantbomb.com/continue/3015-635 - Giant Bomb.
- svg.com/145490/gamings-most-brutal-continue-screens - Brutal continue screens.