History Main / UnWinnableByMistake

If the game has specifically been programmed to place the player in an unwinnable situation, it is UnwinnableByDesign. If you deliberately did something convoluted in the game that rendered it unwinnable, it is UnwinnableByInsanity.

There has been serious research in using verification techniques to automatically detect Unwinnable By Mistake problems in games, e.g. Martineau's PNFG (2006). For example, in ''VideoGame/{{Halo 2}}'' and ''[[{{VideoGame/Halo 3}} 3]]'', if you die a certain amount of times at a checkpoint, you revert to the previous checkpoint.

There has been serious research in using verification techniques to automatically detect Unwinnable By Mistake problems in games, e.g. Martineau's PNFG (2006). For example, in ''{{Halo}} 2'' and ''3'', if you die a certain amount of times at a checkpoint, you revert to the previous checkpoint.

!!Subpages:
[[index]]
The following companies and/or series have their own pages:

[[/index]]

And yes, that's a lot of mistakes.

* UnwinnableByMistake/LegendOfZelda

!!Categories:

* UnwinnableByMistake/MarioBros

UnwinnableByMistake situations are generally the result of either a [[GameBreakingBug game-breaking glitch]] or a design oversight, such as allowing a player to advance through the game without picking up a vital item and not letting them return to get the item afterwards. Saved games may also be made immediately before imminent death or with too little health to survive the current predicament. Making every save viable requires [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defensive_design building the game around it]] and is not always feasible. Games with save-anywhere systems are particularly susceptible, as emulator users with save states often find out.

There has been serious research in using verification techniques to automatically detect UnwinnableByMistake problems in games, e.g. Martineau's PNFG (2006). For example, in ''{{Halo}} 2'' and ''3'', if you die a certain amount of times at a checkpoint, you revert to the previous checkpoint.

* UnwinnableByMistake/{{Sierra}}

* UnwinnableByMistake/TombRaider
* UnwinnableByMistake/{{Infocom}}

* UnwinnableByMistake/GuildWars

* UnwinnableByMistake/MarioBros
* UnwinnableByMistake/PrinceOfPersia
* UnwinnableByMistake/{{Pokemon}}
* UnwinnableByMistake/WorldOfWarcraft

* UnwinnableByMistake/CardGames

UnwinnableByMistake situations are generally the result of either a [[GameBreakingBug game-breaking glitch]] or a design oversight, such as allowing a player to advance through the game without picking up a vital item A and not letting them return to get the item afterwards. Saved games may also be made immediately before imminent death or with too little health to survive the current predicament. Making every save viable requires [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defensive_design building the game around it]] and is not always feasible. Games with save-anywhere systems are particularly susceptible, as emulator users with save states often find out.

* [[UnwinnableByMistake/{{Pokemon}} Pokémon]]

If the game has specifically been programmed to place the player in an unwinnable situation, it is UnwinnableByDesign.

* UnwinnableByMistake/{{Pokemon}}

!!Examples

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder: Sierra]]
* In ''[[KingsQuest Kings Quest IV]]'', you're given two love arrows. They're the only ones you can get in the game. One is for the unicorn, and the other for Lolotte. But if you shoot the unicorn with one arrow too close to the edge of the screen and then ''accidentally walk off the side'', then the arrow will wear off and the unicorn will run away from you again if you get back on the screen. It will be unattainable without using the other arrow -- the one you need to kill Lolotte. Thanks, {{Sierra}}. Thanks.
* Due to a spot of bad programming, a timer at the end of ''[[SpaceQuest Space Quest IV]]'' runs based on hardware speed. Nowadays, it can take less than a second.
** So is the zombie/robot timer at the beginning, in some versions. On modern computers, either shows up the moment you arrive where they ''can'' show up.
** An antidote is available for computer-savvy hardware-speed timers: DOSBox. Just use this with an appropriately low number: @@cycles=auto limit ...@@
* ''Gold Rush'' has the opposite timer problem: The faster your computer, the slower a hidden timer runs. It means that even on a computer as slow as 1998 speeds, the realtor at the beginning never shows up in any reasonable amount of time. (Setting the game speed to "slowest" makes the timer run faster, so it's passable if you know about this glitch.)
* ''[[QuestForGlory Quest For Glory 4]]'' has an insidious bug which causes the game to crash on faster computers when the player enters the screen with the Chernovy. This makes it impossible to fight the Chernovy, which you must do to beat the game. (There are third-party solutions, like running the game under DOSBox or using a program to slow down your computer.)
** There's also the Domovoi conversation. If you didn't talk with the inn domovoi by midnight of Day 5, then you won't be able to get the doll out of the cabinet because [[GameBreakingBug it will have mysteriously disappeared.]] You need the doll to give to Tanya later.
* In importing a magic user from ''[[QuestForGlory Quest For Glory 2]]'' to the third game, players are given the chance to make them paladins. These players must think of buying the throwing skill (or have the forethought of [[spoiler:wishing for it from the djinn at the end of the second game]]). Lacking the throwing skill makes the game unwinnable if you are a paladin -- winning a throwing challenge against Uhura is needed for the Leopardman prisoner event to occur. (An unconverted mage can earn a staff to trigger the event, but a paladin can't.) This only affects paladins who were mages; former fighters and thieves already have throwing.
** Likewise, it's possible to import a character as a mage, even if they were formerly a fighter or thief and never bought the magic skill. At least a little magic is required in order to solve some mage-mandatory puzzles. Of course, in any case, the game tries to persuade you away from changing your class on import if you didn't earn it (as with becoming a paladin).
* Sierra game developer Al Lowe attempted to [[DefiedTrope defy]] the {{Unwinnable}} trope in ''[[LeisureSuitLarry Leisure Suit Larry 5]]'': There is ''never supposed to be'' an "unwinnable" point in the game no matter how much you mess up. (You can't die in this game, either - another interesting inversion!). Still, one thing slipped through... if you forget to write down the numbers of the various [[strike:cab]] limousine companies you must call throughout the game at the single time they're shown in each location, then you're still up Unwinnable creek without a paddle.\\
\\
There is a related [[GameBreakingBug bug]] that can be triggered whose ramifications are not fully realised until later; any savegames made after the bug is triggered are {{Unwinnable}}. After arriving at any destination airport, the player must find a means to summon a limousine to travel to a target location. A phone number for a local limousine company may be found in every airport: this is the number that the player must memorize or write down because calling it again is required to return to the airport and advance the plot. But in one airport, a number for a "green card" company may also be found. If you call the green card company number first, then Larry will request limousine transportation, which will arrive and take Larry to his next destination. But the green card company number cannot be used to transport Larry back to the airport; it simply will not work, and it will be treated like any other invalid number. If you have left the airport without even seeing the number for the limousine company, then your game has been rendered {{Unwinnable}}. Moreover, because viewing the limousine company advertisement at the various airports is a scored event, and thus [[EventFlag a game flag,]] failing to activate this flag will cause the game to error out (with the rare but uniform "Oops!" error used in many Sierra adventure games), making the scenario likely {{Unwinnable}} even if the player has obtained the proper phone number from a guide.
* While later Sierra games tried (and failed badly!) to avoid unwinnable situations, many contained game-stopping bugs that caused them. For example, at least one version of ''Daryl Gates' Police Quest: Open Season'' had a {{game breaking bug}} or programming oversight in which, if you failed to show the bone to SID on Day 3 before you gave it to the coroner, then the final scene of the day with the reporters at the morgue would fail to happen, which would make the game Unwinnable. Other {{Game Breaking Bug}}s could cause the game to crash on the map screen at the beginning of a day (it would happen every time with the saved game).
* ''[[PoliceQuest Police Quest III]]'' had the "endless highway" glitch: if you stopped a speeder or other criminal on the freeway near the "end of your jurisdiction", instead of turning around afterwards, you would get stuck in an infinite stream of stoplights. Hope you have an extra saved game.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Final Fantasy]]
* Final Fantasy VIII:
** There's a point where the characters have to stop a missile launch, but to get the codes you have to help out some enemy soldiers. If you refuse to help them, then you cannot change the missile launch, and it's possible to save after refusing to help, which means you'd have to start the whole game over if you don't have a back-up file.
** After having access to chocobo, it is possible to ride a chocobo through shallow water onto a barren island in world map, get off, and get stuck. Consider that the world map is the place where saving anywhere is possible, it is entirely possible for a player to save here and essentially get stuck for eternity.
* In ''FinalFantasyVI'', in the World of Balance, there's a tiny patch of land to the right of Nikeah just big enough to land the airship on. But if you land there and go into the town, then there's no way to get back--the town blocks you from reaching that patch on the World Map, and all of the exit points within the town spawn you to the ''left'' side. There's nothing preventing the player from saving the game in this situation. And without the airship, the game is unwinnable. This example is especially sinister when you consider that the primary reason a player is likely to take the airship to Nikeah is to pick up Mog's Water Rondo dance, which is {{Lost Forever}} after a brief window of game events.
* ''FinalFantasyAdventure'' requires the player to know in advance that they need Mattocks and Keys. The need of Mattocks is eventually eliminated by the Morning star weapon; but if you don't have enough keys before entering Dime Tower, or if you save when you don't have enough keys and can't go back...then you can't beat the game.
** But that's not all. It is entirely possible to [[LostForever miss]] the Morning Star. You receive it as a reward from a boss battle; but the battle is optional, and getting to it requires [[TheMaze traveling through a frustrating maze]].
*** At the very least, a key will eventually be dropped by an enemy in the last area, although only rarely. This may apply to any area.
* ''FinalFantasyII'' has enemies that are only vulnerable to magic. The Flans, one such type of enemy, are also practically impossible to flee from. Random battle with several Flans when you are out of MP = either wait a good half dozen (or more if your characters are well leveled) turns to die, or turn the game off.
* In ''FinalFantasyX'', there is an airship battle against "Overdrive Sin" near the end of the story. Meaning that, basically, you can only inflict damage with magic because of how far away the target is at the start of the fight (the only one who can hit it with melee the entire time is Wakka). Sin's [[LimitBreak Overdrive]] gauge will fill up a bit every turn, and once it's full, it'll use an attack that causes an automatic game over. Doesn't even inflict damage, because it's plot. If you have only one file, you save right before the battle, and you're underleveled or have been neglecting to train Wakka or your magic users (primarily Lulu at that point), then you're completely screwed.
** The siege of Bevelle immediately after fighting Evrae is also like this for some people if they're under-leveled, although having some equipment abilities can make it drastically easier (Stonestrike, Fireproof/Fire Eater).
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Legend of Zelda]]
* ''{{Legend of Zelda}}: Link's Awakening'' was notorious for a door that could only be unlocked with an InterchangeableAntimatterKey. The door in question was located across a moat that you were meant to cross after [[SuperDrowningSkills gaining the ability to swim]]. The designers failed to realize that Link could ''just barely'' clear the moat by jumping, leaving him with neither the swimming ability needed to finish the dungeon nor the key needed to get that ability. (If you can't make the jump, then you're probably playing the DX version, where they fixed this.)
** You can also get stuck in Eagle's Tower. If you drop one of the orbs down a certain hole, it won't respawn properly, preventing you from completing the dungeon.
** You can also trade your shovel for the boomerang, and then another shovel will appear in the shop. Buy this shovel, and then your inventory will be too full in the last dungeon to pick up the Fire Rod. Whoops!
* In ''Twilight Princess'', there's an [[GameBreakingBug infamous glitch]] where saving and quitting at the scene where you find the big cannon before talking to an NPC makes the game unwinnable. Several known workarounds exist to allow players to talk to the invisible NPC and allow them to escape the "unwinnable" situation.
** That bug only occurs in the Wii version; but there's another [[GameBreakingBug game-halting bug]] that occurs in both versions. After crossing the Bridge of Eldin and bombing the rock wall, a piece of the bridge will be warped away to somewhere else (later found to be the Gerudo Desert). If you happen to save and quit between here and the Twilight, then you will be reloaded on the wrong side of the broken bridge with no way to get back across.
* In ''PhantomHourglass'', it's possible to use the hammer to enter the Goron Temple without first becoming an honorary Goron. If you claim the pure metal without doing that, then your fairy won't let you leave until you become a Goron... which you can't do because one of the Gorons grew up. You can no longer talk to every Goron, which is one of the requirements for becoming one. But it's totally worth it because you get to see two Gongorons.
** If you get the Hourglass, save right away, turn your game off, and start right again, then the hourglass is ''gone''. LostForever. As you can probably imagine, you cannot complete ''Phantom Hourglass'' without the Phantom Hourglass.
* In the original game, if you pick up a Clock in a room with Wallmasters, they will get stuck in the wall. If it happens to be a room where the doors are locked until all enemies are defeated, your only option is to reset or use the "quick end" code.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Mega Man]]
* The very first ''Game/MegaMan'' game has one of these: in Elec Man's stage, there is an item called the Magnet Beam hidden behind some blocks. A level near the end of the game is impossible to complete without this item, and there's no way to go back and get it. Even better, you have to have one of two specific weapons to get the item; if you go through the stages in the wrong order, then you have to visit this stage (and fight its boss) ''twice''.
** That is, unless you're able to take advantage of a [[GameBreaker game-breaking glitch]] which allows you to zip through walls and other boundaries.
*** Amusingly enough, once you gain the Magnet Beam, such zipping becomes easier to do, even allowing you to skip ''all the boss rematches''.
** You can still go back for the Magnet Beam by losing all your lives and choosing a new stage from the Game Over screen. You can also avoid fighting Elec Man again with another Game Over after collecting the Magnet Beam. You do lose your score this way, however; and first-time players may have forgotten all about that suspicious object trapped inside the wall by the time they reach Dr. Wily's castle, making this a GuideDangIt.
* In ''2'', if you reach the final boss without having enough [[spoiler: Bubble Lead ([=BubbleMan=]'s weapon)]] energy (from using it all up against earlier enemies in Wily's fortress), fail to connect said weapon with the boss too many times, or were foolish enough to use any other weapon (which ''restores'' the boss' health!), then it is impossible to win the last fight. That's not all: when you start your next life, [[PointOfNoReturn the checkpoint where the game dumps you at]] has no enemies; therefore, it is impossible to recharge the weapon required to win the fight. Result? Welcome to the game's HopelessBossFight, where you'll have to suicide yourself for the number of lives needed for Game Over. If you reset the game in rage, then you ''did'' write down that password to get back into Wily's fortress, right? Oh, and it only puts you back [[NintendoHard at the beginning of the fortress]]. To negate this problem, the player can go for the Game Over and then continue; you get all your weapon energy back and start at the beginning of that level instead of the whole fortress.
** Of course, if you're using "Invincibility" via Game Genie, then ''you cannot die'' and thus have to restart. At least it is noted in the code booklet.
** Oh, you could wind up with an unbeatable situation earlier than that. If you reach the fourth Wily stage boss (before Wily himself, of course) without a full complement of Crash Bombs, you are screwed. Not only is it the only weapon that can kill the boss, but it's also the only weapon that can bust through the walls keeping you from shooting the boss in the first place. While the corridor you restart at if you lose a life to it ''is'' full of enemies for you to restock your energy on, they're some of [[GoddamnBats most annoying and powerful enemies in the game]]; any attempt to restock your Crash Bomb energy with them is a battle of attrition.
*** And you only have ''just'' enough Crash Bombs to break the walls and kill the boss turrets -- and there are more walls than you need to break. You also need to climb around the room with the floating platform Items 1 and 3 (jetboard Item 2 in a pinch) while the turrets are shooting at you. You should have more than enough item energy and possibly a few Energy Tanks, but falling down too many times will leave you with no platforms to stand on. And if you miss a single Crash Bomb shot (thankfully, they have a splash radius), then you might as well kill yourself right away to save ''some'' weapon energy.
* The fan-made [[GameMaker RPG Maker]] game, ''Mega Man: The RPG'', has a couple of cases of this, clearly unintended:
** If you use one of the teleportation items while you're in the [[GetOnTheBoat raft]], then the raft comes with you, which gets it stuck in the square where you land. If you had any need to use the raft to get anywhere, then let's hope you saved before you did that.
** When you first meet Dr. Wily, it's as Mega Man alone, and it's a HopelessBossFight. Immediately after that, cut to Cut Man and Elec Man finding a way into the same room. Dr. Wily sees them and taunts you; your characters get healed; and the battle begins again, winnable this time. Well, that's what happens if both Cut Man and Elec Man are alive when you get there. If not, then you get a Game Over screen after the taunt, even though [[WordOfGod the author has stated that they never intended this.]] To make matters worse, due to another error, the item that's supposed to be a revival item doesn't work as a revival item. Another item, which is meant for healing status ailments, ends up doing that job. Since status ailments are relatively rare and non-threatening in this game, if you didn't know this, then you might not have any of that item.
* In the first ''MegaManStarForce'' game, it was possible to get stuck between an NPC and a wall. If you did this while not on a Wave Road, then the only way to get out was to reset and load from your last save; hopefully, you knew better than to save while stuck. Later games fixed this problem by briefly allowing you to run ''through'' [=NPCs=] if you get stuck.
* In ''MegaManX 6'', the [[JungleJapes Amazon Area]] has a portal to an alternate exit. This area requires the air dash ability to cross a bottomless pit. If you reach this area with X's [[NinjaPirateZombieRobot Shadow Armor]], which is incapable of air dashing, then ''you're screwed.''
** The same can be said for Ground Scaravich's Stage. The gimmick of the stage is having a random room every teleport you have to go through. Sometimes, one of the rooms contains a jump that requires Air-dash. If you are wearing the Shadow Armor, or if you're crazy enough, no Armor, you really don't have much choice but to die, and hope the stage doesn't teleport you to that room.
** Unless you also happen to have a specific combination of upgrades equipped (Hyper Dash and Speedster) and a specific one NOT equipped (Jumper), meaning you can get through [[GuideDangIt if you know about this beforehand]]. Oh, and the necessary parts can be LostForever if you fail to save the reploid holding them.
** There's a jump almost exactly like this in the final stages. The same situation can arise, requiring either an air-dash or the parts listed above. The penalty for being unable to perform ''this'' jump is much more severe: you'll have to replay [[{{Understatement}} quite a few stages and bosses]].
** A similar problem arises if you're trying to get the Dr. Light capsule in Metal Sharkplayer's stage. There is a large chasm you have to jump that requires a certain combination of upgrades, and possibly Blizzard Wolffang's weapon. If you don't have those, then you can't make the jump. Die, and you respawn directly in front of that chasm with no way to get back to the stage's main path. And if you kill your remaining lives off to get a game over, don't hit continue, or else [[MeaninglessLives you'll once again respawn in front of the chasm with a full allotment of lives]].
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Tomb Raider]]
* The Wii version of ''[[TombRaider Tomb Raider Underworld]]'' had a glitch in which exploring a watery passage without exploring down the hallway first would cause a switch later in the area to fail to spawn. Naturally, you need that switch to open a door. Without it, you're trapped forever.
** In the PS2 version, it is possible to abandon the motorcycle at a spot that is hard to reach with it and impossible to reach without it -- before you're done with it.
* In the original ''TombRaider'', if you happen to save the game while sliding down a ramp that seems to lead to the next area but instead leads to a [[BottomlessPit Bottomless Pit]] (or similar), then your only choice is to restart the game from the beginning (or load an earlier save-state, which probably won't exist). This problem is only present in the PC versions. On the PlayStation (1), you have the option to restart from the current level or a previous one.
** Lara is able to navigate pits of spikes if she walks through them. However, if the game is saved while she is standing in the spikes and that save is later reloaded, then the game assumes that she's fallen on the spikes. She dies instantly.
* ''[[TombRaider TombRaider: III]]''. You need the quadbike. You will continue to need the quadbike. Don't leave it parked somewhere stupid where you can't reach it.
** The game has an easy quicksave, and it will allow you to quicksave in the middle of certain-death situations, such as sinking in quicksand.
[[/folder]]


[[folder: Infocom]]
* {{Infocom}}'s ''Enchanter'' text-adventure might have the quickest-to-unwinnable-state of them all. The first command of the game can be FROTZ ME, magicking the player character into a light source. The thing is, FROTZ can't be turned off, which makes it impossible to find the correct portrait in the picture gallery.
** In practice, there's the [[GoodBadBugs ridiculously helpful bug]] that "EXTINGUISH ME" works[[hottip:*:Essentially making the intended "can't [=unFROTZ=] something" effect completely nonexistent. Brilliant programming, there.]]. FROTZ originally used the same code as the command to LIGHT or EXTINGUISH a normal light source like a lamp or a torch. It wasn't originally intended that you could "turn off" a glowing object (such as yourself) that had a magical light spell cast on it. When Infocom corrected this "error" in a later version, a common player trick for making sure you were never deprived of a light source suddenly became instant unwinnability. Infocom eventually decided it was better off changing it back, even though the text you get from EXTINGUISH SELF is rather nonsensical.
** You see this problem crop up in later games. ''Sorceror'', the sequel, makes it a firm rule that [=FROTZed=] objects can never be [=EXTINGUISHed=], always allowing you to make the game unwinnable (by Design) on the first move. The final game in the trilogy, ''Spellbreaker'', goes 180 degrees on this and explicitly allows you to EXTINGUISH [=FROTZed=] objects (with the message "You dismiss the magical glow, and it fades"). But in that game, there's hardly any point in doing so, short of turning yourself into a grue.
* Infocom's only console game, the NES adventure game ''Tombs & Treasure'', succeeded in playing like its PC cousins too well. There are places where combining items in the wrong order, or forgetting an item, makes the game unwinnable.
** Not so much combining items in the wrong ''order'' than combining them at the wrong ''time''. At one point, you find a magnetized rod and a shallow bowl. You put them together to form a compass to navigate a maze. Pretty smart, right? Well, don't do it right away, or else you won't be able to use that rod to remove a small iron key from inside a hole too small for your fingers.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Metroid]]
* ''SuperMetroid'' could be made unwinnable this way: The Gravity Suit gives you the same effects as the Varia Suit (heat shielding) in addition to its freedom of movement in liquid environments, and so one could skip the Varia Suit by [[SequenceBreaking fighting Phantoon first]]. Most energy tank upgrades aren't necessary if you're particularly adept at avoiding damage, and so it's possible to save in Tourian's second save station just before Mother Brain's chamber with only a few of them. [[spoiler: Mother Brain's beam does 600 damage if you only have the Gravity Suit equipped, but is reduced by half if the Varia Suit is present.]] So, you've saved in Tourian past the PointOfNoReturn with only the Gravity Suit and less than six energy tanks...
** For those that are wondering, this is Unwinnable because [[spoiler: you do have to get hit by Mother Brain's beam at least once before the Metroid hatchling will appear.]]
** Quite frankly, if you're so good that you can get that far without the Varia Suit and with minimal Energy Tanks, then you should already be aware of [[spoiler: Mother Brain's death ray]] and prepare appropriately for it.
** Mother Brain has another unwinnable scenario for minimum item files. Defeating Mother Brain's first form takes 15 missiles and 7 super missiles. If the player reaches Mother Brain with less than 7 super missiles she is impossible to defeat because only regular missiles can be replenished at this point and replenishing them requires the player to leave Mother Brain's room. Mother Brain recovers all damage when the player leaves her room.
* ''[[MetroidPrime Metriod Prime 2]]'' includes a number of rooms that have several switches that must be shot in order to progress. If the player triggers some of the switches and then leaves the room, the game becomes unwinnable (or some items become [[LostForever inaccessible,]] depending on which room) because the game resets the counter but does not reactivate the switches.
** You can also trigger a super-jump glitch while fighting the boss Chykka, letting you leave the room (the doors don't lock). If you do this, however, then Chykka is gone for good -- along with the reward for that fight, the Dark Visor, which is required to beat the game. You can play with the super-jump glitch safely, but only if you beat Chykka first.
* The first ''MetroidPrime'' game had a similar Unwinnable bug that was fixed in later releases. When you beat the Phazon Elite, the doors unlock and he leaves behind the Artifact of Warrior. If you're careless enough to leave the room without collecting the artifact, then it will never return.
** The Wii "Trilogy" re-release uses the original Metroid Prime version as a base. Even though some elements from later versions (such as Fusion Metroids in Omega Pirate's room) were added in, it retains this bug. Oops.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Ultima]]
* ''[[{{Ultima}} Ultima IX]]'', as released, has a number of killer bugs that make the game unwinnable. The most notorious one occurred about two-thirds of the way into the game: some bad clipping code on a screen at the extreme edge of the game map caused some people to literally fall off the edge of the world with no way back into the game even though, visually, you were only one step away from being back on track. Worst of all, your saved games became invalid; you were forced to start over. Thanks to ExecutiveMeddling and the general destruction of Origin by ElectronicArts, only three patches were released officially, and there were still game-breakers uncorrected by those patches.
* ''[[{{Ultima}} Ultima IV]]'' omitted dialog entirely from a key character. The talking Horse in Iolo's barn was supposed to give you the answer to The Riddle. Instead, when you talked with it, it said "A". If you asked about "A", then it replied with "A" and asked you "A? (y/n)" If you replied yes, then it answered "A". Oops, default dialog! Unfortunately, this was the answer to the ''very last'' question you had to type and hit RETURN to win the game - the Codex's final question, of what Truth, Love, and Courage are made of. (Hint: [[CaptainObvious it isn't literally "A."]])
** If you had taken proper notes, particularly during meditation sessions at each shrine (which were required), then the answer was fairly obvious. Still...
** This became a running joke in the series. In each of ''Ultima V'', ''VI'' and ''VII'', Smith the Horse will say, "There was something I forgot to tell you" and give you a vital clue - to a puzzle from the previous game.
* In ''[[{{Ultima}} Ultima VII]]'', flying over the wrong mountain on the magic carpet would trigger a door lock in an area near the final showdown, which makes it impossible to complete the game.
* In ''[[{{Ultima}} Ultima VII Part 2: Serpent Isle]]'', a generic-looking bottle of "Serpentwyne" that can be picked up early on turns out to be critical to the plot. If you happened to use that bottle on one of your hungry party members, or if the game automatically chose it when you used the 'f' key, then you can't advance past the point where you needed it. The point where you will get stuck without it is most likely days after you picked it up. An identical bottle will not suffice, either.\\
\\
Another ''[[{{Ultima}} Ultima VII Part 2]]'' bug: on your way to the teleported mint, you pass a house with ghosts in it. The ghosts, unfortunately, have the dialogue of ghosts you meet much, much later in the game. Talking to them here can cause the game to become unwinnable.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Guild Wars]]
While the main game in ''GuildWars'' cannot be made unwinnable, some missions and quests are made Unwinnable by bugs or accidents:
* A mission relatively early into Prophecies can be made unwinnable if the wrong boss spawns at one spot. If the Monk boss spawns right next to a group of mobs, then you'd best get ready for a wipe...you can't kill the monk or even the other monk mob because they just won't die unless you happen to have been getting run through!
* Several times, it's possible to aggro everything in the instance. Warriors/Monks got a bad reputation for this.
* A bug in Vizunah Square would cause Mhenlo and Togo to stop dead in their tracks. When they couldn't move, you can't complete the mission.
** As an added bonus to Vizunah Square. Before you could command henchmen, they would follow you unquestioningly. When Factions came out, on the condition that the Canthan group would only be comprised of eight henchmen and no players, they would attempt to reach the Tyrian group. This results in them leaving Master Togo (who needs to be alive) completely defenseless, so he dies before you are even able to reach him. They fixed it a few months later.
* Another bug would make the final mission in Nightfall unwinnable! You have to kill Titans to be able to damage the final boss' health; a bug would make them not stop spawning, leading to an eventual party wipe.
* Treasure chests randomly spawn at widely scattered locations all over the game. If you're really unlucky, one will spawn right in the preprogrammed path of an important NPC, bringing them to a halt and making whatever quest you're doing with them impossible to complete without restarting.
* In one of the ''Eye of the North'' missions, "G.O.L.E.M.", you're expected to protect a golem factory from invading Destroyers and then use the newly manufactured golems to help you kill the remaining Destroyers. If your party is so efficient that you manage to kill all the Destroyers, including the end bosses, before any of the golems are completed, then the mission becomes unwinnable. (This can be avoided by staying well clear of the boss spawn points until at least one golem is ready.)
[[/folder]]

[[folder: ZX Spectrum games]]
There are many ZX Spectrum games which can become impossible to complete due to bugs. Search [[http://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/ the World of Spectrum forums]] for "impossible": there have been at least two threads devoted to such games.

* A particularly {{egregious}} example is ''Xavior'', in which the end-game routine to unlock the final room doesn't work. This remained undiscovered for some 20 years because the game's designer went for quantity instead of quality, giving the game 4,096(!) rooms and thus making it infeasible to complete even on an emulator allowing one to periodically save one's position.
* ''ImpossibleMission'' series.
** ''Impossible Mission'' centered on assembling nine puzzles to prevent a MadScientist from blowing up the world. The catch? There was a bug in the programming of the {{Atari 7800}}'s NTSC version, and of [[http://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/showpost.php?p=40508&postcount=17 the Sinclair ZX-Spectrum version]], that made the mission ''literally'' impossible: some of the puzzle pieces were hidden behind unsearchable objects, preventing you from obtaining them. This was specific to these two versions; the Atari 7800 PAL version and other formats had no (reported) problems.
** ''[[ImpossibleMission Impossible Mission II]]'' had many ways to render the game Unwinnable, such as destroying a music safe by accidentally placing a mine instead of a time-bomb in front of it, rendering an area inaccessible with a mine hole, or running out of floor-moving or robot-disabling items in a tower, thus resulting in a music piece or passcode number being LostForever. Many players also saved the game with too little time left on the clock.
* The original release of ''JetSetWilly'' could never be completed due to bugs -- most notably, the "Attic Bug," which would permanently corrupt the game's data because a certain enemy in "The Attic" level travels past the ZX Spectrum's video memory and overwrites game data. As a result, some rooms would from there on kill the player instantly as soon as he entered. The developer/publisher originally claimed that the bugs were ''intentional'' (saying that the affected rooms were filled with poison gas) but later released some memory-writing hacks to correct them. According to TheOtherWiki, about half of the releases of ''JetSetWilly'' (it was released on multiple platforms) were UnwinnableByMistake. The Commodore 64 bug made it impossible to reach all of the objects in ''The Wine Cellar'', this may have also been corrected by people hacking the code.
* The [[FanNickname Speccy]] port of ''Tiger Road'' was so bad that Your Sinclair took the manufacturers to court over selling goods of unmercantile quality. The judge ordered the software company to release a version with the bug fixed. This was only after Your Sinclair tried to use an infinite lives cheat to complete the game - and found out that, at one point, you either get hit by a bullet or fall down a hole. (Many players got around this by rewriting the code.)
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Mario Bros.]]
* A glitch in ''[[SuperMarioBros Super Mario Bros. 3]]'' can cause the game to be unwinnable. In World 5, it is possible for the airship to land on the land-based portion of the map, displayed in miniature in the upper left corner of the sky map. When you then chase it down to ground level, it's nowhere to be found.
** If you're ''really'' unlucky, then you can trigger an N-spade to appear on top of a hammer bros, causing [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3lznozAfYo this]] to happen.
** [[http://www.unforgivingminute.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/mario.jpg This.]]
** An example thankfully restricted to one level - in World 7, one level has a Hammer Bros. Suit in it (other than this one, they're only available as world map items found in mushroom houses). If Mario is in statue form from the Tanooki Suit when he grabs it, he becomes a greyscale version of the usual Hammer Bros. Suit that can't use the pipe needed to continue the level. Fortunately, this only makes it impossible to clear that level on that life. This was corrected in the SNES and GBA remakes.
** The beginning of 6-2 and a part of 7-5 are impossible to pass with the Frog Suit. In the latter, you can't kill yourself if you get stuck there, forcing you to wait until time runs out.
** If you push B while going down a pipe in the Tanooki Suit, you turn into a gray Tanooki, who can't enter pipes, making the level unwinnable if you are required to do so. You also can't kill yourself, other than by BottomlessPit.
* In the American version of ''SuperMarioBros 2'', one could make the game unwinnable by crouching (works with the small characters as well, IIRC) and sliding into a passage of only one block height. Since the player can't auto-slide out like in the rest of the games, the character gets stuck permanently; since there's no time limit, the only solution is to reset the game and start again.
** Not quite, at least in the Super NES version. If you resume ducking and attempt to repeatedly jump left or right, your character will eventually move out from under the block.
** Not sure if this is a glitch or UnwinnableByDesign, but if one of Fryguy's pieces touches you, the exit door sometimes fails to appear. The only way out is to reset or use the [[PressXToDie suicide code]] (Up+A+B on the pause screen).

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Prince of Persia]]
* ''PrinceOfPersia: the Two Thrones'' has a glitch that makes a critical jump unfinishable. The only way to progress if you strike that bug is to download a savegame from someone who didn't.
* ''PrinceOfPersia: Warrior Within'' is riddled with {{Game Breaking Bug}}s that can land you in Unwinnable situations. For example, the "Sand Wraith bug," which occurs early in the game if you save in the wrong place, gets you turned into the sand wraith before you're supposed to. The subsequent Unwinnable situation happens near the end of the game, right before the final boss. You end up having to start the game over after coming all that way.
** A different glitch with the same ultimate result: You can glitch right before the final boss if you go back to the previous room to save before going through the portal. When you return, the portal will no longer react -- and you can't go further back than the save point.
** Other unwinnable situations arise from oversights rather than glitches. In some rooms, it is possible to move platforms to locations other than their intended ones and still exit the room if you do it all fast enough. When you return to those rooms as the Sand Wraith, the platforms will be too low or too far apart to make it across.
** Late in the game, it's possible to return to various sections to collect upgrades you missed earlier; but, due to a glitch, one of them is a dead end with not one, but two, save points in it, making it easy to save yourself into an unwinnable state.
* In ''PrinceOfPersia: Sands of Time,'' there's one room near the end where Farah waits by a switch. She will not pull it until you complete a set of puzzles. Once everything is ready, Farah ''should'' pull the lever automatically... but sometimes she doesn't. She will stand there silently while you jump around in anger and grope for the 'reset' button.
** There are two other oversights in ''Sands of Time''. There are two areas in the game where you can fall off beams, survive the fall, but fall too far to get back to where you were, making the game unwinnable.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Other Video Games]]

Moved to [[UnwinnableByMistake/OtherVideoGames its own sub-page]] due to it being so large that [[SelfDemonstratingArticle it broke the page.]] That's a lot of errors.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Board Games]]
* In some board games, it is possible for a player to be in a situation where there are no legal moves to be made, such as stalemate in {{chess}}. In contemporary chess, a stalemated game is a draw; historically there was no standard rule, and stalemate was sometimes considered a loss for the stalemated player -- or sometimes a ''win''. Chess also has a rule that the game is drawn if no possible sequence of moves from the current position can lead to a win. The most obvious example is when both players have only their king left, but there are other possibilities, such as the 16 pawns forming a complete blockade, that [[TheDevTeamThinksOfEverything are covered by the rule]] even though they will never arise in realistic play.
** The 50-move rule (the game is a draw if no pawns have been moved and no captures have been made after each player has taken 50 moves) was added because it was thought that the game was Unwinnable when it had devolved into such a state. Then someone found a way to mate a player this way...
* ''Dragon Realms'' has the potential to create this for one or more players and make things very annoying for the others. If a player is very low on cash, a natural disaster like a flood can destroy enough of their railroad that they can't afford to repair it and are cutoff from any city where they could make more money. As a last resort they discard their contract cards and draw a new set of contract cards hoping to get one that will get them the money to proceed. However, this increases the chance that another disaster card will be drawn which only makes things worse. They have legal actions in the game but those actions get them nowhere. The other players now have to deal with the possibility of a natural disaster card every other round instead of every five to six rounds. Also having one player sit around for another hour or two locked in an unwinnable situation is not a pleasant experience for everyone. Since lending other players money is not allowed, the others players will find a way to pay the stuck player rent money for using their railroad just to get them back into the game.
* In the board game ''Hero Quest'', it is entirely possible to lock the game into an unwinnable state by making either the Elf or the Wizard use the spell "Pass Through Rock" then passing through one of the many boulders that are used specifically to stop you from going to rooms to have no way in and nothing of interest thus trapping you on one side of the board with no way out.
** An ObviousRulePatch changed it so that if you "Pass Through Rock" and end your turn in one of the empty rooms or hallways, you are considered to have ended your turn inside solid rock, and [[TeleFrag died messily.]]
* ''BetrayalAtHouseOnTheHill'' boasts fifty Haunt scenarios that are randomly chosen each time you play. However, due to the [[LuckBasedMission random nature]] of the game, it's sometimes possible to end up in a situation where one side literally has no chance of winning. For instance, the Traitor becomes a near-invincible monster with one weakness... only by sheer chance, they happened to ''find'' that item and were carrying it when the Haunt started. Leaving the heroes with no way to retrieve it. To make matters worse, some of the scenarios as originally published had conflicting or unclear rules, which could also render a scenario Unwinnable. However, since the nature of this game is not very competitive, in most such situations reasonable players will elect to veto the haunt in favor of something more [[RuleOfFun fun]].
** It says something this game ended up getting a ''20-page'' errata book to correct all the errors, and some are still there.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Game Books]]
* Some Gamebooks may require you to document usages of items, and if you accidentally forget you had an item...oops! Unwinnable!
* Generically; if you got one from the library, you might have had a page ripped out so that you couldn't complete it.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Card Games]]
* There's an old strategy in the ''{{Yu-Gi-Oh}}!'' TCG known as the Lockdown, a deck that forces a continuous loop that -- once in place -- makes it impossible for the opponent to counter.
** There still are forms of this strategy. Combining any Tuner on the field, Imperial Iron Wall, Cannon Soldier, and Quillbolt Hedgehog makes an infinite burn loop that ends in an OTK. Considering how the game goes a player can easily leave a destruction card in their hand for later, only to be met with this happening as soon as the second turn.
*** This can be pulled off more easily if you have Dark Verger, which eliminates the need for Imperial Iron Wall but requires a Plant-type Tuner.
*** There are many other [=OTKs=] involving Cannon Soldier or Mass Driver. More are discovered all the time. A current popular OTK or FTK is the Frog FTK revolving around Substitoad, Ronintoadin, Swap Frog, and Mass Driver.
** The first popular lockdown combo was the Yata-Lock combination. The player needed to have a Sangan or Witch of the Black Forest on their side of the field, and have one LIGHT and DARK monster in their Graveyard. They remove the two cards to Special Summon Chaos Emperor Dragon and then pay 1000 Life Points to nuke the field and players' hands. The effect of Sangan or Witch would be activated; they would be sent to the player's Graveyard, and the player could search their deck for Yata-Garasu and add it to their hand. Then they could play it and attack their opponent with it. It only did a tiny bit of damage, but its effect prevented your opponent from drawing a card on their next turn, which left them defenceless. When the Ban List was first released, these cards were quickly placed on it.
** There are also combos which force your opponent into an unwinnable position. If you played Last Turn and chose a monster that forbids the opponent from special summoning, you instantly win because the opponent would have no other monster on their side of the field. This was likely never intended in the card's design.
** There are also loops in which they never resolve. The biggest offender is Pole Position. If two monsters on the field had similar (but not the same) ATK, and the weaker one became the stronger through a spell card, then Pole Position would continually activate. It makes the strongest monster immune to spell cards and takes away the ATK boost -- but now the monster is only the second strongest. So Pole Position would shift to the other monster -- and then back to the first one when the spell card kicks in again... ''ad infinitum.'' They had to make a new rule: in such a situation, you are not allowed to activate the offending card, even if you normally could.
*** Most loops which can never willingly be stopped are not allowed to be activated intentionally at tournaments.
** Lockdown is every bit as much a valid strategy as brute force, milling, burn or satisfying an InstantWinCondition. Those cards were banned due to their nature as [[GameBreaker game breakers]], not because you shouldn't be allowed to employ a lockdown strategy. To illustrate, they never banned any aspect of the blood lock combo: Toll+ Dark Door+ Chain Energy, which requires both players to pay lifepoints to do anything. Render your opponent under 500 lifepoints, and you can finish your opponent with a burner, or just be GenreSavvy enough to keep a few extra cards in your deck and wait for your opponent to deck out before you do (most players keep to the 40 card minimum for speed purposes, but there is no limit to the number of cards you are allowed to have in your deck).
*** There are a few lockdowns intentionally made for the game, such as the earlier Tornado Wall card. However most intentional lockdowns only affected one aspect of the game and/or had an upkeep that would eventually kill the player for using it too long. Almost all of the other lockdowns were created when players used the cards out of their intended purpose (for example, the aforementioned Last Turn card was meant to be a duel between two Monsters. The Special Summoning part was just to simplify the rules so that they didnt create a whole new mechanic just for this one card. However a literal interpretation of the rules made it unwinnable for whoever isn't in control of Jowgan the Spiritualist, the monster who forbids special summoning after he is summoned).
** Amusingly, Yugi uses a loop to win in the anime, so it indeed seems a legal strategy. Naturally, YuGiOhAbridged has fun with this.
-->'''Kaiba:''' Yugi, you took advantage of a glaring flaw in the duelmonsters-rulebook. Truely, you are an honorable duelist.
* You can do this with quite a few card combinations in ''[[MagicTheGathering Magic: The Gathering]]'' as well. The rule is that if the game ends up in an unstoppable loop, it ends in a draw; the most common of these involves [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=159249 Animate Dead]] and [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=35056 Worldgorger Dragon]]. If it ''is'' stoppable, the players simply decide how many times the loop occurs.
** Actually, the usual trick with Animate Dead and Worldgorger Dragon is to combine it with another effect which can take place while one of the infinite looping abilities is on the stack, usually [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=984 Bazaar of Baghdad]] to fill up the graveyard so Animate Dead can get a 20/20 with haste and flying or something similar.
** The rules have on occasion been changed (used as a tournament rule when a draw is not an option) so that an unbreakable loop counts as a loss for the player who created it.
** This is not to be confused with actual Lock strategies - decks that make it impossible (or almost impossible) for the ''opponent'' to win, often long before the Lock deck itself wins. There have been many decks in {{Magic The Gathering}} that do this, such as [[http://forum.tcgplayer.com/showthread.php?t=409 Scepter-Chant]]. Very few if any of those are
** Play a [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=116724 Stuffy Doll]], but target ''yourself'' with its damage-sharing ability instead of an opponent. Then enchant it with [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=135248 Pariah]], which bounces damage off of you and back on to the Doll. Then tap it to deal one damage to itself. Boom! You now have an infinitely increasing stack of damage constantly bouncing between you and the Stuffy Doll, with no way for it to ever resolve. Unless your opponent is sitting on a Disenchant, in which case he just waits until the damage is up around 10 billion or so, and then disenchants the Pariah...
** Magic also has a bunch of cards with the Nightmare creature type. The most (in)famous of these is called [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=108840 Faceless Butcher]]. What this does is that when it comes into play, it removes a creature from the game other than itself. When it leaves play, the removed creature comes back. So, to hopelessly draw the game, make sure there are no creatures in play. You need three Butchers (let's call them A, B and C.) Play Butcher A. Nothing happens since there are no legal targets for his first ability. Play Butcher B. B has a legal target: A. Remove A from the game. Play Butcher C. Butcher C has a legal target: Butcher B. Now B has left play, so the second ability triggers and resolves: Return the removed creature to play. The removed creature was Butcher A. A comes into play and has a legal target for its ability: C. Remove C from the game, which bring back B, which removes A... unless someone can either counter one of the abilities (only two or so cards in the entirety of the card pool targets triggered abilities) or can kill one of the butchers before the abilities happen, you've created an infinite loop and the game is a draw.
*** The Lorwyn/Shadowmoor blocks had several creatures with the Champion ability, which removes a creature you control from the game, often with restrictions on the sort of creature it can target. This can be used to create similar loops.
*** Also note that such loops can lead to a game-ending condition if combined with other cards like [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=108862 Pandemonium]].
*** These days in Magic, the O-Ring Lock is better known than Faceless Butcher, with three of [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=220586 Oblivion Ring]]. Works exactly the same way, though, so if there are no other non-land permanents, you've just locked the game.
* A particularly famous - albeit rare - example in the Pokemon TCG involves two primary cards to establish a perfect stalemate: Mewtwo LV.X (Legends Awakened), a Pokemon protected entirely from non-evolved Pokemon; and Uxie (Legends Awakened), a card able to return itself - and all cards attached - back to the deck via its Psychic Restore attack. So, when both players are using decks with both cards, as well as no evolved Pokemon, the game often ends perfectly tied, with no remedy per the rules in site.
** To make matters worse, this stalemate has no practical remedy in tournament play at all: if it happens, you're in for a long, drawn-out 40 minute round. When it's all over, the judges will either A) make you go to sudden death all over again, where this could repeat indefinitely, or B) simply give you and your opponent double game losses for delaying the event (ties are not allowed).
** In the early game, before all of the fancy stuff a simple locked game could be formed with both players having only a Mr. Mime on the field and nothing to cancel abilities.
*** The problem arose with Mr. Mimes Pokepower: ''Whenever an attack (including your own) does 30 or more damage to Mr. Mime (after applying Weakness and Resistance), prevent that damage. (Any other effects of attacks still happen.)'' They had only one attack: ''Does 10 damage plus 10 more damage for each damage counter on the Defending Pokémon.'' And a weakness to psychic which at that time would mean damage was doubled. Each player could attack once doing 20 damage, then all subsequent attacks would deal 60 damage, more then double what the wall says it will resist. The only hope is that someone can deck the other player.


[[/folder]]

[[folder: Live Action TV]]
* Though not always consistent, the children's game show ''LegendsOfTheHiddenTemple'' had an end game that can become unwinnable depending on certain situations. First, there were the Pendants of Life, needed to get past three Temple Guards that will yank a contestant out of the temple during the end game if they don't have a full one, and which are rewarded in a GoldenSnitch-type 1-1-2 three game system; one half pendant for the first two games, a full one for the last. Because of this, it's possible to make it to the end game with only 1 and a half or even a singular Pendant (though in the case of the former, the show gives the contestants the chance to find the other half-Pendant inside the temple), and depending on where the Temple Guards are hiding and which doors in the temple are locked, it's very possible (and has happened several times in the show's run) to be forced to encounter all three Temple Guards with only one pendant, a definite no-win situation.
** If the team is doing well enough it can also be a no-lose situation. If the team is doing well enough and gets BOTH pendants, then they cannot lose unless they were to run out of time.
* In the first season of ''TheAmazingRace'', three teams were essentially eliminated on leg nine, as poor course design made it impossible for the two teams who technically did survive to ever catch up to the lead pack. Over the next four legs, the 3rd and 4th place teams were arriving at the Pit Stops over twelve hours behind the top two teams, meaning they were actually arriving ''after'' the leading teams had already started the next leg. This meant that by the last episode of the season, they were doing tasks that the other teams had completed in the previous episode, making their continuing to race merely a formality. Subsequent seasons added deliberate equalizers, points at which teams are forced to be evened up with each other, to go along with the looser "bunching points" that caused many of the problems near the end of Season 1.
** At the time, a CrowningMomentOfAwesome for some fans, [[NonGameplayElimination as it led to the season's "villain" team being informed that the race was over in the snows of Alaska]] while every other team welcomed the first- and second-place finishers in Central Park then posed for a season-ending group shot. However, Bill & Joe are far more well remembered now than the teams who beat them, and were even invited back for All-Stars (as were the 4th place finishers, Kevin & Drew).
** Similarly; accidents have caused the game to become unwinnable for individual players. Such as players accidentally losing their passports or money.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Sports]]
* A good half of College Football programs are de facto ineligible for the BCS Championship game before a single down is played. "Mid-Major" teams (those not in the oldest and largest conferences) cannot ascend high enough in the computer poll rankings because the teams they play are not good enough to satisfy the strength of schedule requirement. They cannot play elite teams because they must schedule the games years in advance, before the Mid-Major knows if their team will be any good that season. And then when they ''do'' play those elite teams ''and win'', it almost always occurs at the beginning of the season, which poll voters have forgotten by the time they are ready to pick the Championship pairing. Utah, Hawaii, and Boise State have all gone undefeated in recent years without a realistic chance of playing for a National Title. The disparity has gotten so bad that it has spawned congressional hearings to investigate it. Whether this is UnwinnableByMistake or UnwinnableByDesign (keeping the big $ in the BCS) is a matter of intense debate.
** The "By Design" theory got stronger in 2010: The first official BCS poll (the top two in the poll at the end of the season played for the championship) came out in late October. The top team was... Oklahoma, who was #3 in both human-voted polls. Oregon was #2 (1 in the human polls), Boise St. was #3 (#2). When Oklahoma lost the following week, that week's new BCS #1 was... Auburn - again, ranked #3 in the human polls.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Tabletop Games]]
* It is possible to win a game of Warhammer 40,000 by killing all of the enemy units that can claim objectives, making the game unwinnable for that side.
** Other units can still contest objectives, so while the player can no longer win, he can still make the game a Draw.
** This is actually built into one of the armies, the Necrons, who literally just disappear if more than 75% of their army is utterly destroyed. Note that "army" in this case means the total number of units with the "necron" rule (there is a considerable amount of units without this rule). This will supercede all other official mission rules.
** Close Combat with certain units. Due to the "you cannot wound creatures with a toughness that's 4 higher than your strength" rule and the "roll a D6 and add the result to your strength for Armour penetration" rule, it is very possible for you to run into combat with a dreadnought or a Wraithlord, only to realise there's absolutely nothing you can do other than wait till every single one of your models in that unit is curbstomped to hell. 5th edition got a little better where even the most basic units carry Krak grenades, which are strong enough to hurt Dreadnoughts (but still not Wraithlords). The Soul Grinder is even more dangerous, as it has an Armour rating of 13, meaning that unless you brought dedicated anti-armor close combat weapons against it, not even your grenades will help you (and in some cases, the weapon wont even help).
*** There is also an army-wide variant of this. Any wise opponent would bring at least some form of anti-armor against you, especially if they know you to use tanks. However, if you destroy all their heavy weapons, it's very possible to win by default (only in certain missions, however, like Annhilation). This is especially obvious with the new Imperial Guard Codex, where most of the [=MTB=]s have an armor rating of 11 on the back, meaning most people would be unable to even break those tanks in close combat, making the game very literally unwinnable.
** Deepstriking units are not placed on the table and randomly come in during the game. However, if all your available troops are killed before the Deepstriking ones arrive, you automatically lose since you have no more units. This can be caused by a considerably bad roll, but is much more pronounced for Daemon Armies, where the entire army must deepstrike, which stands a very good chance that either all of them would get shot to hell in the first turn before the rest of your army comes (you can only shoot or run on the turn you deepstrike and only one type of unit in the army can actually shoot, meaning the entire army is slowed by at least a turn), or you scatter into other units and/or off the table, destroying what little troops you start with and fork over an automatic victory to your opponent.
* ''DungeonsAndDragons'' adventure I5 ''Lost Tomb of Martek''. The three Star Gems must be placed in the altar in the Garden of the Cursed so the {{PC}}s can continue. However, the Star Gems are also needed much later in the adventure to revive Martek, but there's no way for the {{PC}}s to know this. If they assume the Star Gems have fulfilled their purpose and forget to remove them from the altar, they're in trouble. The Crystal Prism area effect that teleports the {{PC}}s to the Citadel of Martek only works once. Once they reach the Citadel, even if they use the Teleport wall in the Citadel to return to the Garden of the Cursed to get the Star Gems they can't get to the Citadel of Martek again.
** If you're supposed to be raiding a tomb and leave gems behind, you deserve what's coming to you.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Other]]
* This is what happens in the BadFuture of ''{{Homestuck}}''. [[spoiler: John gets himself killed by fighting his [[ThreshholdGuardian Denizen]] [[SequenceBreaking far earlier than he's supposed to.]] Without him, Jade (presumably) dies since she is unable to enter the Medium and escape from the meteor that later strikes her house. Dave and Rose can't progress past a certain point without their help, and Dave is forced to travel back in time to SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong.]]\\
\\
The whole [[spoiler: kids' session of Sburb]] could be considered this too, at least as far as winning it normally is concerned, because [[spoiler: they accidentally [[OneWingedAngel prototyped]] [[DimensionLord Becquerel]] [[ItGotWorse and gave all of the enemies in their game]] [[RealityWarper ridiculous game breaking godlike powers]] that broke the game so badly that one of their bosses [[BeyondTheImpossible escaped their universe and messed the trolls' session up]] - sort've like [[EpicFail failing on your video game so hard that someone else in a different city's game disk scratches]].]] This is compounded by the fact that [[spoiler: [[BigBad Jack]] [[TimedMission started the Reckoning way, way early]] and the kids game basically started just as they ran out of time for some reason]]. The characters involved realise something went wrong and are trying to figure out how to salvage the situation.
* In the [[ShowWithinAShow Game Within A Show]] from ''ScoobyDoo And The Cyber Chase'', the gang is [[{{Tron}} trapped in a video game]], where they must find and pick up a hidden box of Scooby Snacks on each level to advance to the next. In the dinosaur-jungle level, Scooby is picked up by the trapped baby pterosaur he just rescued, and grabs up the box of Snacks an instant before it flies away with him, preventing the box from being destroyed by molten lava. As a player of the actual game might not spot the box in time, this looks like an UnwinnableByMistake that would need fixing. Justified, as it's evidently a Beta-test version that they're caught in.

[[/folder]]

* In SphinxAndTheCursedMummy, the titular mummy eavesdrops on a conversation between Set and one of his henchman. Afterwards, the character is given a save point just before an open door. If the character saves there and then reloads the game from that save point, however, the door is closed, with no way to open it, leaving the player trapped in the room.

* This can result from a HolodeckMalfunction (although generally not if the characters need to win the game to escape). For example, in one episode of ''StarTrekTheNextGeneration,'' Data is playing a ''SherlockHolmes'' game and has determined that TheKillerWasLeftHanded. However, foreshadowing a more serious glitch, the handedness of every NPC is wrong, so the right-handed killer laughs in Data's face.
** This example in particular is also one hell of a ''Wallbanger'' - seriously, the robot with the positronic brain doesn't notice that the guy's got his pipe in his right hand. Really? ''Really?''
*** Data proved in an earlier episode that he can [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard figure who did it before the game even starts]], so he may have been deliberately overlooking the clues as he assumed he already knew how it ends.

* While playing with [[{{Emulation}} Emulators]] in general, nearly if not all games can be rendered Unwinnable by saving a game state in a situation that will always cause definitive Game Over (Example:Surrounded by enemies, with one Hitpoint, no Lives and no Continues) with no saved battery files or backup states.

Moved to [[UnwinnableByMistake/OtherVideoGames its own sub-page]] due to it being so large that it broke the page. That's a lot of errors.

* The second ''LoneWolf'' book has an inexplicable section where a forked path in a cave is really no choice at all: both paths force you to confront an enemy which is undefeatable without a special item from earlier in the story which is quite easy to miss.
** Even if you do have it, you will be offered the choice to [[TooDumbToLive give it away]] to your traveling companion who stays behind to fend off your pursuers. If you do so, you are literally throwing your own life away.

** The first ''MetroidPrime'' game had a similar Unwinnable bug that was fixed in later releases. When you beat the Phazon Elite, the doors unlock and he leaves behind the Artifact of Warrior. If you're careless enough to leave the room without collecting the artifact, then it will never return.
*** The Wii "Trilogy" re-release uses the original Metroid Prime version as a base. Even though some elements from later versions (such as Fusion Metroids in Omega Pirate's room) were added in, it retains this bug. Oops.

* A few of the unused levels in ''SuperMarioBros3'' (hack or cheat code needed to play) were unfinished and included no goal or exit. The only ways to get out of them are to suicide or wait until the time runs out.

* The MinusWorld.

* In ''[[SuperMarioBros Paper Mario 2]]'', it's possible to go to the moon with pitiful HP (sometimes down to 1) with no recovery items. Oops! There's no health-recovery block on the moon, but there is a [[SavePoint Save Point]]! Oh, and there are two mini-bosses you have to fight right before getting to the recovery block. Sure, they're [[AIRoulette AI Roulette]]-based enemies, but the chances that they'll use no attack moves before you beat them is almost [[YouHaveNoChanceToSurvive nil]].

* They did it again in ''[[{{Ultima}} Ultima V]]''. A side quest was to retrieve Lord British's Sandalwood Box. It wasn't hinted well, and there was nothing stopping you from entering the magic mirror ''PointOfNoReturn'' without it. When you meet Lord British in his prison in the mirror, he asks if you brought "it". If you say no, then he will say the Sandalwood Box. If you still say you don't have it, then he replies, "Then we shall be here for a very long time". (reload) Interestingly, even if you HAVE the box, you are in an unwinnable situation if you tell him you don't. (The box contains the orb of the moons. You can never open it when it is in your possession.)

* ''OcarinaOfTime''
** It is an extremely common belief that the Gerudo Training Area in can be made Unwinnable if you use the keys in the wrong spots, largely because it is necessary to have the Silver Gauntlets to get one of the keys (which you almost certainly won't have when you first enter). If you ''do'' have them, all doors can be unlocked. A few keys are very much GuideDangIt, though.
** ''OcarinaOfTime'' can be made unwinnable through a glitch that can turn any item, including the titular Ocarina, into a bottle. You'd have to deliberately do this, however.
** Well, if you turned the Ocarina into a bottle, you can use another bug to use another item as an Ocarina...