Have you ever been playing a game, forgot when you last saved, and then had to save again for the safety of your save being deleted? Or maybe you don’t trust the accuracy of auto-save and feel the need to compulsively save manually to compensate? Those are all reasonable reactions; no one wants to lose their hard-earned progress in a game.
Of course, what if the game was a bit more malicious? Some games are devious, going out of their way to delete your save file. Sometimes it’s all part of a meta-commentary, other times it’s simply thematically appropriate. Every time it’s devastating.
We’ve also added a small bullet point to each entry summarising how and when the games will delete your save files.
While Yoko Taro may have gotten international acclaim throughNier Automata, his meta-fictional commentary upon human philosophy, it was far from his first game, or even the first Nier. Much of what defines Automata was created in Nier Replicant and Gestalt, including the most famous act of Automata.
Deleting your save file isa renowned moment in Automata, having to give up your own save data in order to help other people succeed. However, this actually started with the original Nier. To save your loved ones, you have to give up something of your own. It’s beyond just your own personal belongings, but being willing to let go of the past to work towards something new.
5Furi
Furi is a game styled after a very specific intention - what if every battle was a boss battle? The game has you battling through a labyrinth of challenging bosses, each and every one a unique encounter, and all of them revealing more about the world and your own imprisonment.
The game features multiple endings too, as well as DLC that expands upon it as well. At its core though, your file is always deleted. This is not a choice made by the player, nor is it a permadeath scenario. You witness your ending, and so the story is done with no reason to go back. Thus, your save file is deleted. Whether this is purely practical or thematic is for you to decide.
In regards toUndertale, just abouteverything you encounter is subjective. Longstanding traditions like skipping dialogue suddenly become a commentary unto themselves, and you can’t really take any of its systems for granted. They all play into the core of what you’re doing.
Cue the battle against Flowey. They claim they save over your file. This istechnicallytrue, in that they make a new save where you have to battle them until you win or give up. This goes even further though, as following a genocide run the game actually deletes your save file, forcing you to start all over again. Really, it’s hard to condense the amount of file manipulation Undertale does into two paragraphs.
Equally known for being a beloved platformer as it is for its long-standing absence from new gaming releases,Banjo and Kazooiehave a wonderful selection of games with a colourful style and lovable (if not a bit mischievous) characters. What you likely didn’t expect, however, is that those mischievous streaks stretch to deleting your save file.
In the original release of Banjo-Kazooie, you had the option to enter cheat codes, like many games of the era. The exception here, however, is that Gruntilda would appear after two cheats were entered to warn you that entering another would cause her to delete your save file. True to her word, your save file is deleted after a third cheat code. You can’t say you weren’t warned.
This specifically only works on the original N64 release and is absent from the more modern Xbox 360 release.
Though Obsidian Entertainment is primarily known for their work on Fallout: New Vegas and The Outer Worlds, much of the studio is made up of developers from Black Isle Studios, the developers of the original isometric Fallout games. you may see that expertise put into play withPillars of Eternity.
Playing as one known as a Watcher, you’re able to see the lives of those who have died, and seek to find the reasoning behind your own existence. With this also comes a permadeath mode, the Trial of Iron. In many ways, it is like a standard permadeath mode. However, attempting to make a copy of your Trial of Iron save file will reveal a message from the game’s director, commenting upon your choice to duplicate a save file from a game mode that is explicitly permadeath.
1Doki Doki Literature Club
Doki Doki Literature Clubis likely a game well past its surprises anymore. It is a game, like many others on this list, that exists as a meta-fictional commentary upon its own subject matter. What makes dating sims so appealing, and what lengths will you as the player go to ‘succeed’? And what if the scenario was twisted, and these girls had to win you instead?
Without spoiling too much, Doki Doki breaks free of its own loose facade fairly quickly, even bringing up your own file names as a means of distressing you. And though the game itself doesn’t delete your save file, you’ll need to delete it yourself if you want to break free of the game’s story.
