History Main / SaveGameLimits

* The three Creator/{{INiS}} DS [[RhythmGame Rhythm Games]], the ''VideoGame/OsuTatakaeOuendan'' duology and ''VideoGame/EliteBeatAgents'' only allow you to keep one save file per copy of the game. And you can only save one replay per mission, at least in the case of ''Agents''.

[[quoteright:255:[[VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry2DiddyKong'sQuest https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/kong_college.png]]]]

[[quoteright:255:[[VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry2DiddyKongsQuest https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/kong_college.png]]]]

Speaking of saving in general, there's ExportSave, for when the game lets the player make a backup save, presumably outside of its regular save mechanics, and transfer them from device to device at need.

** Just to make sure the game doesn't stick you in a bad spot with a dodgy autosave and make the game [[UnwinnableByMistake unwinnable]], it keeps a [[CheckPoint separate save]] for the last time you rested at the [[TraumaInn inn]] or accessed a Rift Stone. That way, when you manage to just barely survive a dragon's ambush ("Now Saving...") and keep getting murdered immediately after by a chimera, you have a nice, safe, save file to fall back on.

* ''VideoGame/LiEat'': First game: Save anywhere out of battle. 20 save slots in 5 pages of 4 slots.

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* Placing restrictions on when/where the player is allowed to access the save-game function, such as in between stages/missions, on the world map or the HubLevel, or at a TraumaInn, or an explicit SavePoint.

* Requiring a certain (usually consumable) SaveToken to access the save-game function, thus limiting how often the player can save.

* A [[SuspendSave "quick-save" or "suspend" option]] that saves and quits (in addition to [[{{Autosave}} dynamically saving every few minutes/seconds]] to prevent progress loss in the case of shutdowns and crashes), then deletes the quick-save data after it has been reloaded (which helps prevent SaveScumming, though industrious players may still find a way to cheat the system). When this is in place, you can save & quit whenever you want, but death will still take you back to the last CheckPoint. In some games, such as {{Roguelike}}s, this may be the only save system present: Quitting the game saves your progress, and winding up in any Unwinnable situation means the save file is effectively unusable and the player must restart the game from scratch.

Compare CheckPointStarvation, for when a level (or entire game) has very few, if any, {{Check Point}}s or {{Save Point}}s. Contrast {{Autosave}}.

** [[VideoGame/MegaMan1 The first game]] has ''no'' saves. Subsequent games give you a password after every level, except these passwords don't record progress through the endgame stages. After Capcom started overusing the [[HijackedByGanon fake-new-Big-Bad]] story starting with ''4'', these endgame levels grew to be ''half the game''.

* ''VideoGame/LiEat'': First game: Save anywhere out of battle. 4 save slots.

* ''VideoGame/{{Persona 3}}'' allows you to save at Tartarus' foyer, which you can access at any time (provided you find the teleporter back to the first floor). Sensible enough. However, outside Tartarus, you can only save at the dorm; exiting the dorm and reentering it immediately (even in daylight) will make it nighttime immediately. This forces you to play a whole day of choices, [[RelationshipValues Social Links]], and shopping, without saving. In extreme cases (such as weekdays) making a bad choice during an afternoon quest will force the player to replay the entire schoolday, plus the previous night - or worse, if it's an exam week (which runs uninterrupted from Monday to Saturday), the ''entire week''. The PSP version mitigates this somewhat by adding a save point in the classroom, providing a more convenient opportunity to save during the day.

* The ''FireEmblem'' series is a mixed gab of different forms of this.

* ''VideoGame/EternalDarkness'' will let you save only if there are no enemies nearby. Weakly justified in-universe by the fact that said enemies are basically mini cthulhus and it's not safe to save around them, still annoying when this means frequently you cannot save for over half of a level and have to start the whole thing over if you die.

* In the ''VideoGame/HarryPotter'' game series, there are completely made up "save books" in games one through three. In the first game, there was the annoying limit that generally there were only two to three save books on a level, and none throughout the extremely difficult, tedious, and easy-to-die endless-pit jumping puzzle. On another note, the jumping puzzle has lethal pits in it, despite the fact that it was made by a teacher to train you how to use spells. You'd think that the SPCC would start suing Hogwarts. Oh, and the level was completely silent, except every few minutes, at which point an evil laugh would sound.
** Also, in the first game, save books could only be used once. They would never reappear. This wasn't normally a problem since you couldn't return to previous levels, but the last save point in the game is a few feet in front of a treasure chest containing a few chocolate frogs (this game's healing items). And every single time you die at the final boss, you have to open the treasure chest again (which takes about 5 seconds of animation, plus actually collecting the chocolate frogs, which move around randomly).
** Unless you go for debug mode, you also have to watch the cutscene before fighting the boss again, which takes 30-40 seconds. The two subsequent games replenished the saving books after a short while, and they auto-saved your progress before most battles.

-->--''"[[http://www.cracked.com/article_16196_the-7-commandments-all-video-games-should-obey.html The 7 Commandments All Video Games Should Obey]]"'', '''Website/{{Cracked}}'''

On the flipside, an unrestricted ability to save one's game literally ''anywhere'' can (as players using save states on [[UsefulNotes/{{Emulation}} emulators]] can attest to) leave the player stranded in an {{Unwinnable}} condition should they choose to save at the wrong time (...unless you have ''more than one'' savefile)] and placing limits on the player's ability to save can prevent this, making it a double-edged sword. Properly spaced {{Save Point}}s can also serve as useful hints about when the player should save.

* ''VideoGame/{{Hitman}}'' series. The first game has no in-mission saves whatsoever. Bad in a shooter, absolutely inexcusable in a stealth game. The other games allow for saving, but they are limited and there's often a catch (the fourth game, for example, allows saves but they are deleted when you quit as they are intended to be on demand {{checkpoint}}s rather than actual saves). One of the biggest differences between the difficulty levels in the later games is the number of saves allowed -- which, at the highest difficulty, is zero (as in ''Silent Assassin'', ''Contracts'' and ''Blood Money''), or one save in a single run (as is with ''Hitman (2016)'' and ''Hitman 2'').

** ''Absolution'' continues the series' trend, limiting saves to a single checkpoint midway through larger levels - and those available only at lower difficulty levels. The saves are erased if the player exits the level, and seems to keep track solely of the player's position and inventory - any enemies the player has already engaged will respawn when the save is reloaded. Oh, and if you're lucky, the save point ''might'' not be in an insanely out-of-the-way location.

[[folder:Unsorted]]

* ''VideoGame/FarCry'':