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In Action Games and Adventure Games without RPG Elements, the standard means of increasing one's Life Meter.
Games get more difficult as they go on. This is nigh-on universal. But when the Elite Mooks start dishing out epic levels of hurt, what's a poor hero to do? Well, they could Level Grind— if they were in an RPG. But they're in a Platform Game or some other variety of Action Game! Experience points are (almost) unheard of! Status Buffs are equally uncommon! Healing Potions and Health Food are dropped maybe once a level! What now? Enter the Heart Container—a well-hidden, but oh-so-rewarding, item that permanently increases the Life Meter of the lucky adventurer who finds it. Even games that don't have well-defined "stats," like Attack or Defense, can feature Heart Containers— lots of games do have Life Meters, after all, and the ability to take more hits without vaporizing is always a nice reward. It can even aleviate the pain of later levels somewhat.
Heart Containers usually come as a reward for doing something "big," like defeating a boss or completing a big ol' sidequest. Sometimes, they're just well hidden in the game world itself, inviting the player to search every nook and cranny for these valuable items. If they're too hard to find, it can lead to a Guide Dang It, and if they're too challenging to get, it can lead to Unstable Equilibrium. Some games use a "Piece of Heart" variant, where a player must collect X fragments of a certain item in order to gain the health boost. In games with icon-shaped Life Meters, it's highly likely that these life-giving MacGuffins will be shaped like their display counterpart.
The Trope Namer is the Heart Containers from The Legend Of Zelda.
Examples
- Of course, the trope naming and trope making Heart Containers from The Legend Of Zelda. Full Heart Containers come as rewards for beating bosses, while later games introduced Pieces of Heart that can be found as rewards for beating Mini Games and doing Sidequests, as well as exploring the heck out of the environment.
- The very first game had 4 full containers in very well hidden areas and the second game repeated this again, but the idea got scrapped in all future games.
- Five for the first game, actually. Three were found or given, and two were a choice between a Container and a red potion. The second game did have four full Heart Containers.
- The first games's second quest also featured a few old men that could take one full container away if you couldn't pay their price. Yes, the second quest was Nintendo Hard, why do you ask?
- Similiarly, Phantom Hourglass only has full containers... and some of them aren't even hidden at all, they can be bought at a shop.
- While LttP introduced the quarter Heart Container, there were also several full ones in the game, though most of them were collected from bosses.
- All them were collected from bosses except for the very first one, which is in a chest in Sanctuary. This was repeated in Minish Cap, where one very obscure Side Quest gave you a full Heart Container instead of the usual partial ones.
- Twilight Princess abandoned the traditional 4 pieces in favor of 5. Better get hunting.
- Metroid, which came out in the same month, had Energy Tanks. And continues to have them to this day.
- Banjo-Kazooie had Empty Honeycombs. In the original, 6 Empty Honeycombs equaled one new section for your Life Meter. In the sequels, an NPC named Honey B. would exchange increasing numbers of Empty Honeycombs for new segments on your Life Meter.
- Rocket: Robot on Wheels, a somewhat obscure N64 Platform Game, had Power Packs. Because Rocket was a robot, this kind of makes sense.
- Game Boy Color Metroidvania Shantae had Heart Holders, genie bottles shaped like... hearts. They were found only in out-of-the-way places.
- Psychonauts had brains, which increased your "mental health." No, really. The game justifies this by saying that, once you rescue your friends' brains, they add their positive psychic energies to yours, making you stronger.
- Beyond Good And Evil has the PA-1s. Unlike most Heart Containers, they stay in your inventory instead of getting used, letting you transfer them between yourself and your Sidekicks at leisure.
- Even though the Castlevania games since Symphony have used EXP, a lot have heart containers—both for life, and the ammo that is known as "hearts." Games that have Magic Points have MP boosters, as well.
- The Mega Man series has Sub-tanks, which are effectively whole spare life meters which can be drained to fill the real one, and Heart Tanks in the X series, which add a small boost to your maximum health, and some Cyber-Elves in the Zero series which could increase your maximum health at the cost of your rank. The ZX series adds more standard Heart and weapon energy containers.
- Before that, there were E-Tanks in the original Mega Man classic games from Mega Man 2 on (except 8, where it was replaced with Rush dropping random powerups). While sometimes these were just handed out, other times you needed a weapon to access it or do some alternate death course. But then you could just buy them.
- Alundra has crystals as your life force. Huge ones added one more.
- Resident Evil 4 had Yellow Herbs.
- The first Ratchet And Clank game let you add first one, then three more health ("nanotech") spheres by buying Premium and Ultra Nanotech cans. The second game had an experience-based system for gaining health, but nanotech tubes could be found which would increase your maximum health by one, as well as recharging all your existing health and letting off a lightning zap thing which killed everything in sight.
- Then, in the third game, the nanotech tubes were abandoned in turn, and the series now uses the experience-based system exclusively.
- The Bonk's Adventure series had blue hearts which added an extra hit point each.
- Ninja Gaiden has this with Life of the Thousand Gods and Life of the Gods.
- Assassins Creed has a version of this, with your synchronization bar.
- The 3D Prince Of Persia games have special drinking fountains that extend your life bar.
- The original Prince Of Persia had giant potion bottles that functioned like this in mostly hidden areas; you could get from 3 hearts to 9 over the course of the game. Interestingly, at one point your Shadow steals one of these from under your nose - but when you merge back with him later, you get the extra life point then.
- Seen in the later Kirby games.
- Okami has solar energy. If you collect 3 sun fragments, it will give you another unit of solar energy. (Additionally, you can use praise points to increase your solar energy.)
- The maximum amount you can have at any time is 20 Solar Energy, but praise points alone can only raise your maximum Solar Energy to 15. If you want to reach the full 20, you must find all 15 sun fragments scattered throughout the game.
- Mystical Ninja 64 Starring Goemon has silver and gold Fortune Dolls (those "lucky cat" statuettes with one paw raised), which function like the Zelda series' Pieces of Heart and Heart Containers, respectively.
- Mega Man Battle Network and Star Force both have Hit Point Memories.
- In Donkey Kong 64, Candy Kong, along with giving instrument upgrades, occasionally gives your characters extra watermelons to give them more health.
- Devil May Cry basically cloned the Heart Container idea. You'd collect blue orb fragments, and each four you collected extended your health bar. There was the occasional whole orb, but most of those were bought rather than found.
- The third and fourth game allow buying whole orbs as well as getting fragments from SecretMissions, eventually quadrupling your starting Life Meter.
- Action-packed multiplayer games like Quake, Unreal and Halo also have special items that temporarily boost your various health meters beyond their normal limits. Quake and Halo even go so far as to continually whittle away at any health “over the brim” in order to discourage cowardly playstyles.
- In God Of War, Kratos can collect Gorgon Eyes to expand his health bar, and Pegasus Feathers to expand his magic bar.
- In the Chronicles of Riddick video game, there were two types of medical machines—small ones that restored your health, and larger, single use ones that permanently increased it.
- The SNES Zelda/Breakout hybrid Firestriker used these, mostly found after bosses, though a few were found in optional areas. There was one such area right before the final boss that could be repeated indefinitely, allowing the player to max their life meter even if they'd missed an expansion along the way, or had needed to use a continue, which reduced your max health to its initial capacity.
- Blood has the literal hearts, ripped from bodies, as the "health packs". Creepy, huh?
- Cave Story has Health Capsules. However, most are in plain view and only require some thorough exploring.
- Brave Fencer Musashi has Minku, who are like Heart Containers that you have to chase and throw. They look kind of like rabbits with blue ears, and can only be found at night, although This Troper has seen them as late as 10:00.
- Collecting 3 gold rings in Star Fox 64 increases your life bar... for the duration of the level. Collecting another 3 gold rings in the same level after that grants an extra life.
- Although there's nothing to collect, in the original Metal Gear Solid, Snake's LIFE increases every time he defeats a boss...unless you're playing on the hardest difficulty level, in which case it just kind of... sits there. This was removed in the remake and sequels, where you simply start with maximum health.
- Your maximum health in the original Metal Gear for the MSX increases when you gain in rank, which increases or decreases depending on how well you play.
- The NES's woefully overlooked Startropics series had this. Your max health, represented by hearts, usually increased automatically after clearing a boss. However, there were a rare few Heart Containers scattered around the game, which you could find fairly easily if you were thorough enough. Additionally, if you had less than the maximum, 16 Hearts, picking up a Vitamin-Z capsule would bring your health to the max, though it would slowly decrease to your maximum over time.
- In Bionic Commando, while there weren't "Heart Containers" per se, picking up enough "bullets" that the enemy dropped when killed would increase your Max HP by 1 block, until your health topped out, at which point they would do nothing.
- There's also the helmet, the bullet-proof vest and the crucifix. The pendant deflected one bullet and was recharged by dying or completing a level, the helmet deflected 3, and the vest deflected every other bullet (the first one that hit, the 3rd, the 5th, etc.)
- Each of the Legacy Of Kain games had something like this to extend your health: Blood Omen let you find blood vials that increased your health, and as it turned out, there were more of them than you could actually use. Soul Reaver had special wedge-shaped power ups, and every five would boost your health, while Soul Reaver 2 gave you an upgrade every time you activated a Reaver forge. Blood Omen 2 gave you an upgrade when you drank enough blood. This Troper doesn't remember the exact mechanism for it, but is sure there was something similar in Defiance.
- Cosmos Cosmic Adventure has items with the functionality of permanently adding an extra hit-point to your character. There are only two in each of the three episodes, so you'll never have more than five bars of health at any given point in the game. Mind you, those extra hit points come in very useful on the later levels of the episode.
- Dynasty Warriors uses trays of Dim Sum to extend the Life Meter, though the RPG Elements might also affect it (this might vary by title). Equipment and weapons can also give extra life.
- The Dark Cloud games have food items that increase the characters' stats, and are given as rewards for successfully reconstructing towns. Fruits of Eden would increase hit points, and can be used by any character —making the player reach a balance so as to keep all characters strong enough for upcoming challenges— while personalized items, such as Potato Pies or Witch Parfaits in the sequel, would increase other stats.
- Wario Land Shake It had heart vessels with this purpose, which you had the chance to buy after each world/boss battle was completed.
- Canisters in the Geneforge series function as either this or Upgrade Artifacts, modifying your DNA to make you stronger, let you throw fireballs, etc. Side effects include rampant egotism and extreme temper problems, and unlike in the later BioShock, this does apply to you.
- Later games in the Touhou series introduce star pieces that grant the player one-fifth of an extra life; they're typically received for successfully clearing spellcards.
- Battle of Olympus for the NES had Ambrosia, which increases the player's maximum health. There are five of them found throughout the game.
- Planet Harriers featured heart containers purchasable from the shops at the end (and sometimes in the middle) of levels. This was a game where you were jetpacking through planet landscapes,
- Adventure Island IV on the NES has heart containers and heart container halves in special rooms which require to complete a jumping puzzle to reach them.
- Dewys Adventure has Health Shards, which generally appear after you defeat a Mook Maker.
- Dead Rising Chop Till You Drop has the white drinks, which restore and increase your health (the original game increases your life with levels).
- The Worms games have health crates which randomly drop between turns; any worm which collects a health crate recovers a fixed amount of HP. This counts as a Heart Container since worms technically do not have maximum HP levels; a worm at full health that collects a +25 crate will gain the full +25.
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