History Main / TenSecondFlashlight

* {{Justified|Trope}} and {{downplayed|Trope}} in ''VideoGame/NearDeath''. [[PlayerCharacter The Pilot]] is stranded in an abandoned base ''way'' deep in the Antarctic, in the middle of winter, and the outside temperature reaches ''negative 80 degrees Celsius'' according to Sutro station's thermometers, and alkaline batteries become extremely inefficient and short-lived in sub-zero temperatures. The surprising thing is, as far as Ten-Second Flashlight goes, the Pilot's flashlight actually has reasonable runtime despite being used ''a lot'' due to [[WhoForgotTheLights the constant darkness]] from [[TheNightThatNeverEnds the weeks-long winter night]] and the lack of lighting in all buildings before the Pilot restores power to parts of the station.

* In the classic computer game ''VideoGame/ManiacMansion'', there is a flashlight item that, when first acquired, is one of these. However, when you acquire fresh batteries, it becomes an InfiniteFlashlight. Ironically, the ten second batteries can last you quite a while in the game as long as you're just exploring the darkness, but [[PlotDrivenBreakdown they burn out in a nanosecond if you try to use them in the single place in the game where you actually need a light]].

* In a variant, the chemical glowsticks from ''[[VideoGame/NancyDrew The Curse Of Blackmoor Manor]]'' will fail at least twice in a game, no matter how recently you acquired or activated them.

* Played straight with the "Luigi's Ghost Mansion" game in ''VideoGame/NintendoLand'' -- the flashlights have a limited charge, and you'll have to find another battery if it runs dry. Even the extra-large batteries run out in a minute if you leave them on continuously.

* Gleamin' Bream is an enemy fish in ''VideoGame/DonkeyKongCountry3DixieKongsDoubleTrouble'' - once Enguarde pokes it, it will give off enough light for you to see for some 20 odd seconds before it goes back out. It's usually enough time for the player to reach the next Gleamin' Bream.

* ''VideoGame/Alice2022'': The PlayerCharacter's video [[POVCam camera]] has [[NightVisionGoggles a night vision function]] that drains battery life the longer it's used. This can be rectified by finding more batteries.

* ''VideoGame/{{KOJOUJI}}'': There's a picture of a battery on the bottom right corner of the screen, which shows how much power the flashlight has.
* ''VideoGame/TheObscuraExperiment'': [[PlayerCharacter Priya]]'s tablet has a [[NightVisionGoggles night-vision function]], allowing her to use it as a flashlight. This will drain the battery, which can be filled back up on the recharging stations around the ship.

* ''Amnesia'' series

** ''VideoGame/AmnesiaRebirth'' also makes use of an oil lantern for portable lighting, but the lantern's capacity is smaller and oil pickups are rarer than in ''The Dark Descent'', forcing you to use consumable matches (the equivalent of the old tinderboxes) to light up early areas.

* ''VideoGame/{{Smile|2020}}'': The flashlight you have includes a battery meter, which shows how much battery power is left.

* The flashlight in ''VideoGame/TodayIsMyBirthday'' has a circular meter at its base that lets you know how much power remains.

* Played wonderfully in ''VideoGame/{{Cryostasis}}: Sleep of Reason'', where you find a soviet flashlight that runs long enough for you to forget how long it's been on, and always seems to cut out just about when the creepy noise happens. You can then turn it on again instantly.

** The lantern in VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaCDiGames ''Link: The Faces of Evil'' and ''Zelda: Wand of Gamelon'' lasts for just a handful of seconds.

* ''VideoGame/{{Smile}}'': The flashlight you have includes a battery meter, which shows how much battery power is left.

* ''VideoGame/{{Unreal|I}}'' features the flashlight as a reasonably common inventory item scattered throughout the levels. Its batteries last exactly 60 seconds of use and the light [[TentativeLight dims down to nothing in the last 5 seconds as the battery dies]]; when it flatlines, the whole flashlight is discarded and a new one must be found[[note]]getting a new flashlight when you still have one also discards the old one[[/note]]. [[JustifiedTrope It's likely that they belonged to other survivors, and they would have been used, battered, simply left lying for a long time, or all of the above]]. There are also the more common flares, which burn for some 20 seconds when tossed. Both are the crux of Prisoner 849's illumination tools until she finds the [[InfiniteFlashlight searchlight]], which, while not actually infinite in the game code, has enough juice in it to last until the end of the game, be it the core campaign or the expansion pack's campaign. Defying the usual standard, the ten-second flashlight is much "dimmer"[[note]]the beam is narrower and has a low color temperature, implying it's incandescent[[/note]] than the "infinite" searchlight.

* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZelda''

** ''Blood II: The Chosen'' includes an angle-head flashlight with a battery that lasts exactly one minute and forty seconds[[labelnote:+]]100 seconds[[/labelnote]] and a set of NightVisionGoggles that drain twice as quick as the light and don't actually help Caleb navigate, they just make enemies and items bright green a la ''VideoGame/DukeNukem3D'' while dumping everything else in a duller and darker green filter. Since it's AlwaysNight in the game, the torch tends to run out at the most inconvenient times, making the several choices of MuzzleFlashlight useful. Perhaps most insultingly is that the manual claims they're both ''supposed'' to be {{infinite|Flashlight}}.

* ''VideoGame/{{Custodial}}'' has the titular character use his smartphone as a light source when the power goes out. It doesn't last even a full minute.

* ''VideoGame/Ashes2063'' has the Solar Lantern. It drains very quickly when used, but can be recharged if you're in a sunlit area, i.e. in a sector with sky above. It does not recharge at all in levels that take place at night; in these, your only option is to find another lantern. The short runtime is even more pronounced in ''Afterglow''[[note]]described by the manual as due to wear-and-tear[[/note]], though there's a new battery pack you can get as a quest reward for [[spoiler:finding the scavver Porcelain and bringing her back alive to Violet]], which significantly increases the lantern's runtime at the cost of slightly slower recharging.

* Jason's flashlight in ''VideoGame/ShadowComplex'' expires in about two or three minutes and then recharges to full in a couple of seconds. Due to the somewhat slow drain time and speedy recovery, it's more forgiving than other video game flashlights.

* The flashlight in ''VideoGame/LIT2009'' lasts for only a minute or so. Not exactly an issue for the most part, as its only purpose is to let you scope out the room without venturing into [[DarknessEqualsDeath the insta-killer darkness]]. If necessary, [[{{Waggle}} shaking the Wii-mote]] recharges it.

** Downplayed in the classic ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' games with the [[NightVisionGoggles Light Amplification Visor]], a pickup that turns your whole view into fullbright. It only lasts two minutes, but given the pacing of the games, that tends to be long enough to explore the dark sections of the maps the LAV appears in[[note]]with the notable exception of [=E2M6=]: Halls Of The Damned, since [[BlackoutBasement so much of it is dark]][[/note]]. Curiously, it's the non-permanent powerup with the longest duration in ''Doom''.

* The ''VideoGame/Ashes2063'' [[GameMod total conversion]] for ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' has the Solar Lantern. It drains very quickly when used, but can be recharged if you're in a sunlit area, i.e. in a sector with sky above. It does not recharge at all in levels that take place at night; in these, your only option is to find another lantern. The short runtime is even more pronounced in ''Afterglow''[[note]]described by the manual as due to wear-and-tear[[/note]], though there's a new battery pack you can get as a quest reward for [[spoiler:finding the scavver Porcelain and bringing her back alive to Violet]], which significantly increases the lantern's runtime at the cost of slightly slower recharging.

** ''Episode Two'' goes back to [[VideoGame/HalfLife1 the first game's]] concept and {{downplay|edTrope}}s the trope, this time by separating the flashlight from the auxiliary power supply and giving the light its own, much longer-lasting energy gauge that recharges in less than 5 seconds. A HandWave explains that the crash at the end of ''Episode One'' broke the old flashlight, and the new one was an improvised replacement[[note]]the real reason is because Valve noticed that playtesters struggled a lot in the underground chase section, as they tended to leave the light on and that drained power until they couldn't sprint; the devs didn't want players to stumble in the dark, so they separated the power gauges[[/note]]. It's plausible to think that the new torch uses more advanced and efficient Combine technology than the original.
** ''VideoGame/BlackMesa'' finally ditched this trope altogether and went for [[InfiniteFlashlight the complete opposite]], probably as a concession to the fact that [[WhoForgotTheLights there are a lot more]] [[BlackoutBasement setpieces where you really need it]] compared to the original. The flipside is that the beam is fairly dim.

** Downplayed in the classic ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' games with the [[NightVisionGoggles Light Amplification Visor]], a pickup that turns your whole view into fullbright. It only lasts two minutes, but given the pacing of the games, that tends to be long enough to explore the dark sections of the maps the LAV appears in[[note]]with the notable exception of E2M6: Halls Of The Damned, since [[BlackoutBasement so much of it is dark]][[/note]]. Curiously, it's the non-permanent powerup with the longest duration in ''Doom''.

* ''VideoGame/Alice2022'': The [[PlayerCharacter Player Character]]'s [[POVCam video camera]] has [[NightVisionGoggles a night vision function]] that drains battery life the longer it's used. This can be rectified by finding more batteries.

* ''VideoGame/TheObscuraExperiment'': [[PlayerCharacter Priya]]'s tablet has a [[NightVisionGoggles night-vision function]], allowing her to use it as a flashlight. This will drain the battery, though. Good thing there are plenty of recharging stations around the ship she can use.

* ''VideoGame/NearDeath'' {{justifie|dTrope}}s its usage of this. It's 1982, a time of already inefficient incandescent flashlights; alkaline batteries (the only ones available in bulk at the time) lose a lot of potential in extreme cold; and the [[NoNameGiven Pilot]] is stranded in an abandoned base ''way'' deep in the Antarctic, in the middle of winter, and the outside temperature reaches ''negative 80 degrees Celsius'' according to Sutro station's thermometers[[note]]which makes sense, as the absolute coldest temperature ever documented was recorded in '83[[/note]]. The surprising thing is, as far as Ten-Second Flashlight goes, the batteries actually last for a decent amount of time despite being used ''[[WhoForgotTheLights a lot]]'' due to [[TheNightThatNeverEnds the weeks-long winter night]] and the lack of lighting in all buildings before the Pilot restores power to parts of the station.

* ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}''
** Downplayed in the classic games with the [[NightVisionGoggles Light Amplification Visor]], a pickup that turns your whole view into fullbright. It only lasts two minutes, but given the pacing of the games, that tends to be long enough to explore the dark sections of the maps the LAV appears in[[note]]with the notable exception of E2M6: Halls Of The Damned, since [[BlackoutBasement so much of it is dark]][[/note]]. Curiously, it's the non-permanent powerup with the longest duration in ''Doom''.

* ''VideoGame/{{Wick}}'' has the candles. They burn down over time and must constantly be replaced by others of different sizes that you find lying around. [[spoiler:The exception is at [=5AM=], when there is only one infinite candle, not that it's of much help.]]

* ''VideoGame/DeepRockGalactic'' manages to have both this ''and'' InfiniteFlashlight. Your headlamp is of the Infinite variety, always on but quite mediocre. Your flares are much better for lighting up an area, but are both a limited resource (maximum of four carried, with a slowly recharging supply) and very temporary. Despite being industrial glowsticks (nominally a lifespan of 12 hours in real life) they burn out in a bare 30 seconds in-game. Most cave floors are practically carpeted with spent flares by the time all is said and done.

* ''VideoGame/DeepRockGalactic'' manages to have both this ''and'' InfiniteFlashlight. Your headlamp is of the Infinite variety, always on but quite mediocre. Your flares are much better for lighting up an area, but are both a limited resource (maximum of four carried, with a slowly recharging supply) and very temporary. Despite being industrial glowsticks (nominally a lifespan of 12 hours in real life) they burn out in a bare 30 seconds in-game. Most cave floors are practically carpeted with spent flares by the time all is said and done.

* ''FiveNightsAtFreddysSecurityBreach'' contains ''three'' examples with different modes of lighting. The standard flashlight is mostly used for navigation, has the brightest bulb, and needs to be recharged at power stations every few minutes. The Faz-Cam is meant to be used to stun enemies, but the low-light camera bulb has a larger range than the standard flashlight and doesn't need recharged unless you use the camera flash, but ''doesn't'' need a power station to recharge. The Fazer Blaster, another weapon meant to stun, also emits a light that lasts even when the weapon's power is depleted, but has a red light that's hard to see detail in and the smallest area lit up.