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No-Damage Run
aka: No Death Run

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A type of Self-Imposed Challenge or Challenge Run where the goal is to win with no damage, or at least no deaths (which is commonly referred to as "Hardcore Mode" and is sometimes directly supported as part of the game's coding). This usually requires a lot of experience with the game in question, and due to the randomness/unpredictability of many games it can be very challenging, if not impossible. For example, this is virtually impossible in most (at least turn-based) RPGs, due to Random Encounters and Scratch Damage. This is also exceedingly difficult in the higher levels of Fighting Games (where someone is bound to hit you once with a weak punch) and First Person Shooters.

Some Nintendo Hard games required the player to perform No Damage Runs as a matter of course. This also boils down to making your run entirely of Flawless Victories.

Many tool-assisted Speedruns are also No Damage Runs, since the player can control the character precisely and manipulate random events in his favor. You'd think it would be "most", but taking damage or even dying actually saves time in many games, thanks to Mercy Invincibility and the often-resulting knockback from taking damage which usually ends up being the fastest way to move or respawn points strewn across long travel distances, so they can be used for Sequence Breaking.

A variation common among Shoot-em-ups in particular is the 1CC, or "1 Credit Clear", meaning that the game is completed without continuing (dying is still permissible). Given that Shoot-em-ups will often provide the player with infinite continues, and that each credit has finite lives, most fans agree that to claim to have beaten a shmup requires a No Continue Run. A No Death Run (aka 1LC, "1 Life Clear" or "No Miss Clear"note ) is even more impressive, especially considering that most Shoot-em-ups have the player as a One-Hit-Point Wonder. This is where most Bullet Hell games get their difficulty from.

In Rhythm Games, hitting successive notes accumulates a Combo; thus, a No Damage Run of a whole stage is known as a "Full Combo", or FC.

This trope is a very common contributor to That One Achievement.

If a No Damage Run is too much for you, you can instead strive for a No Death Run or a No Continue Run, or select Final Death Mode as a difficulty level for an in-game No Death Run. If the goal is to deal no damage, see Pacifist Run.


     Video Games That Recognize No Damage Runs 
  • Most games that have a Boss Rush mode will grant you a high score or rank if you beat all the bosses without dying. Dying once means the whole run is invalidated or you get a low score.
  • Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation awards you with the Platinum Ace medal if you go through the story mode and avoid any damage.
  • Adventure Story: Defeating a boss without getting hurt gets a note in the Achievement System.
  • One of the achievements in Alien: Isolation is to beat the game without dying once. Probably the game's most difficult achievement even on Novice Mode, due to the game's randomization and the extremely unpredictable enemy AI. However, there is a programming oversight that can make this easier; if you were to die at any point, you can reload from a mission save to still get the achievement (with the only downside being that this means having to redo whatever level you were on all over again). Similarly, there's also another achievement for completing the Alien Hive level without ever dying.
  • Much like I Wanna Be the Guy's Impossible difficulty, The Angry Video Game Nerd Adventures has "YOLO" difficulty. The same restrictions apply - in short, this is required for that mode.
  • Some screens in Bad Piggies award you one of the three stars for reaching the finish point with no damage to your vehicle.
  • Several games in the Batman: Arkham Series offer point bonuses for never getting hit during a combat challenge: No Hit for never being hit during a round, and Perfect Knight for getting through the entire challenge without getting hit once. While these point bonuses are optional, some challenges have incredibly strict point requirements to the point where the Perfect Knight bonus is essentially required to get the best ranking.
  • In Bayonetta, you can only get Pure Platinum medal by scoring lots of combo, finishing the level fast, and most importantly, dodging everything the game throws at you. A scratch will instantly drop you to a mere Platinum.
  • The Binding of Isaac has a few examples:
    • There are in-game achievements/unlocks for beating each "Chapter" (or two floors) of the game without taking damage - "Basement Boy" for The Basement/Cellar/Burning Basement, "Spelunker Boy" for The Caves/Catacombs/Flooded Caves, "Darkness Boy" for The Depths/Necropolis/Dank Depths, "Momma's Boy" for The Womb/Utero/Scarred Womb, and finally "Dead Boy" for beating The Chest or The Dark Room.
    • Beating a single floor without taking damage unlocks Samson.
    • Enforced with Rebirth's super secret character, The Lost, who is a One-Hit-Point Wonder. Downplayed in Afterbirth, where donating enough coins to the Greed Machine will let him start with the Holy Mantle, which lets him take one hit per room.
  • BIT.TRIP games reward the player with a flashing rainbow PERFECT! on the high scores table for not missing a single beat or other collectible (later games add the requirement of not getting hit by specific projectiles). The difficulty of such a run depends on the game, but they are notoriously difficult, enough that the official site recognizes anyone who manages to accomplish such a feat.
  • Bubble Bobble games, where the characters are One Hit Point Wonders, impose this in order to view any secrets at all. And the first secret is 20 rounds away.
  • Required (until one reaches the secret boss, at which point it's lifted) to get each character's second ending in Bushido Blade.
  • Carrie's Order Up! has this as one of the special challenges to complete in each level. On a larger scale, completing all 20 rounds of Service Mode in one go, without a single game over, is one of the ways to unlock Calcia.
  • In Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, each boss yields a special Medal if defeated without taking any hits, making this a game-encouraged challenge. It's even easier when you get the Death Ring, which boosts your stats absurdly (meaning less hits needed to kill a boss), but kills you if you take even a single hit while it's equipped (which makes retrying easier).note 
  • One of the bosses in Cave Story gives you a Cosmetic Award when killing it with no damage taken. Of course, no damage runs are fairly common in that game. Especially in the Wii version's "Hard" mode which removes all Heart Containers from the game, against enemies that do increasing amounts of damage.
  • Celeste: After completing the Core's B-Side, players are able to enforce a No-Hit Run for any of the by picking up a golden strawberry located at the start of the chapter for any of the nine chapters and their corresponding B- and C-Sides. When picked, the player has to complete the chapter without dying once in order to collect it.
  • In Copy Kitty, clearing a level while taking less than a certain amount of damage, usually 0, sometimes 5, sometimes 10, rewards the player with a yellow star, and with it, the custom weapons menu, granting access to any one weapon in the game. Yes, even boss-exclusive weapons and the overpowered weapons obtained from the superbosses. This includes boss stages as well, letting you demolish the harder bosses in the game with ease. There's even an unlockable Modifier, a.k.a Achievement that turns your character into a One-Hit-Point Wonder to attempt this, although ironically, it requires taking damage and dying to an attack that deals only one Hit Point of damage. Good luck, especially in Hard Mode.
  • To obtain the perfect ending in Crash Bandicoot (1996), you have to break all boxes in every stage without dying. This gets REALLY hard in the later stages. Some levels in the sequels require you to go up to a certain point without dying to unlock a Death Course. Also, the third game introduced the time trials, where there are no Checkpoints but more Aku Aku crates to make up for it. The N. Sane Trilogy remake makes it so that it's only the colored gems that you can't die to obtain in the first game. In Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time, while playing with the lives system is optional, getting one of the level gems requires you to beat the level under three deaths. That game also contains Flashback Tapes which require you to get to them without dying once, and finally N. Sanely Perfect relics require you to get all gems but Hidden one without dying at all as well.
  • Both Crystal Caves and Secret Agent give you a lot of bonus points at the end of level for clearing stages without getting hurt.
  • To obtain an S rank in Cuphead you must beat an boss in Expert mode without getting hit unless if you have heart charms as well as defeating the boss in under two minutes, perform three parries and using all of the six cards. It also unlocks the achievement/trophy "Perfect Run".
    • Also one achievement/trophy "Rolling Sixes" in which you must defeat King Dice without getting hit unless if you have more than three hitpoints as long as you don't have less than three hit points.
  • Dariusburst Chronicle Saviours awards 3 million points for completing a Zone without taking any damage; this includes shield damage. AC Mode, a port of Dariusburst Another Chronicle, has achievements for completing the hardest routes of Original and EX modes without taking any damage. Another Chronicle itself has a 10 million point award for beating the game with no ships lost between all participating players, although that one allows taking damage, just not losing any lives.
  • A requirement for most of Dead Space 2's Hardcore mode; while you still have infinite lives and can take a few hits, dying/continuing places you back at the beginning of the game or your last save (thus undoing hours of progress), there are no checkpoints note , the game is permanently stuck on the hardest difficulty (very strong enemies and few items), everything from your inventory (including upgrades) cannot be carried over through New Game +, and you can only save three times over all 15 chapters. And all you get is the same unlock hard mode gets you; another suit with slightly different stats. And a novelty foam finger with "#1" on it for a gun. And Issac shouts "BANG!" when it's fired. And it annihilates enemies in a single shot.
  • In Death Rally, finishing the race with 2% or less damage gives the player a nice bonus, with the sponsor claiming not a scratch on it. Players can fake out a pristine-quality car by picking up enough repair powerups to reduce their vehicle's damage to the required range, but as far as the sponsor is concerned, it was untouched.
    "It was a snowball's chance in Hell. Through that Bullet Hell blitzkrieg, and not a shadow of a scratch on your paint job."
  • Devil May Cry games have traditionally made no damage running part of the requirement for getting some Bragging Rights Rewards.
  • Spoofed in Distorted Travesty 3: at the beginning of the game, The Virus has taken away the heroes' ability to do literally anything, including move left and right. A minor enemy then bumps into them, causing Jerry to complain about how cheap that was and Chao to laugh that No Damage Runs have now been rendered impossible.
  • Doom:
    • A variant used in the community is the "Maximum Minimum Health" run, where the player attempts the level on "Ultra-Violence" or "Nightmare" mode. Their score is the lowest health they had at any point in the level, or, if they didn't take any damage, their final health at the end of the level.
    • There's also the unofficial "Reality" challenge: finish a level without ever taking damage (the reasoning being that in real life you die when shot), and without using the plasma rifle or the BFG (since these weapons don't exist in real life.)
    • The Doomworld forums have a monthly "Ironman" challenge, where the participants are challenged to get as far as possible in a given mapset without dying. Harder mapsets may include a mercy rule where after dying, the player can restart the last reached level on a lower difficulty (up to two times).
  • Completing a mission map in Dragonica without taking any damage earns you the "Fly like a Butterfly" medal, which boosts your maximum HP by 100 points when equipped.
  • The original Duke Nukem offers a number of possible bonuses at the end of each level, worth 10000 points each, for various achievements, such as destroying every camera. Number 2 is not getting hit at all, and the game manual notes that it's quite hard to do.
  • DUSK: Completing a level without getting hit by enemies yields an "Untouchable" award.
  • In Fable, you can take optional boasts during quests (which gives extra Renown if you succeed in completing the boast), one of which is taking no damage. It's incredibly easy to pull this off once you get the game-breaking Mana Shield spell, since taking a hit with the shield on doesn't count.
  • Fairy Bloom: Clearing a stage without getting hurt gets 200000 points.
  • There is a community of players for Fallout 4 and Fallout: New Vegas who play on Survival Difficulty, which is already extremely difficult on its own, what with limiting saving and incredibly strong enemies. Players will go into Survival after making a build and deleting their save file if they die even once. As one can imagine, most runs don't end up going very well.
  • The Bozjan instance in Final Fantasy XIV have special bosses that can be fought with several parties teaming up to take them on. Certain bosses can trigger a duel challenge from the same boss or a boss related to the previous boss where you get to fight said boss in a one on one duel. If you get knocked out or take damage from an attack that can be avoided, you won't be able to sign up for the duel.
  • In order to get the "Can't Touch This" achievement in Gatling Gears, you must complete a level in the final chapter without getting hit at all. Fortunately, it isn't that hard to do in the first stage of the chapter as long as the player is careful.
  • Going Under: This is how to get a successful date in Winkydink, where the rating goes down from 5/5 one by one, as each hit lands.
  • Grand Theft Auto
    • One trophy/achievement in the The Definitive Edition from Grand Theft Auto III "Without a Scratch" requires you to drive a car rigged with a bomb to the Cipriani's Ristorante without even damaging the car in Mike Lips Last Lunch.
    • In Grand Theft Auto V Online, each set of Heists (the original ones, and Doomsday) has a build in challenge called "Criminal mastermind". Despite the fact that if even one player dies the whole run has to restart, the no player dying is the easiest part. The other two requirements has "do all the missions in order" (easy enough on it's own) and "do them all with the same team". Finding a team is the hard part.
  • Hitman: Absolution features an achievement for getting through the entire bar brawl without a single hit landing on 47.
  • It is possible in some Hogs of War missions, and you even get a nice medal for it, however, in the course of the single player game any pig that dies in more than two invidual battles is Killed Off for Real. It's nigh impossible to finish the entire game without losing at least a few good pigs.
  • Subverted in In the Hunt, if you got to the final form of the Final Boss on one credit, It's a Wonderful Failure, and you'll get the special Downer Ending where you submarine doesn't escape the exploding enemy headquarters (after beating said boss). If you want the good ending, you'll have to see the continue screen at least once.
  • Required to beat I Wanna Be the Guy on the highest difficulty, since you're a One-Hit-Point Wonder and every save point in the game is removed. You will not want to try this, as only TWO people have EVER finished it on that difficulty. One of them went on to make a fan sequel.
  • Jamestown: Legend of the Lost Colony has an achievement for beating the game in Gauntlet mode without continues, called "Won! See? See?" There are two more achievements for doing so on Divine and Judgement difficulties, and another two for doing it without taking a single hit on those difficulties.
  • Completing Ketsui with no lives lost, AND no bombs used, AND at least 120 million points, grants you access to a harder version of the second loop.
  • Kero Blaster:
    • Each game mode has an achievement for winning the game while wearing the jacket, an item that serves as a one-hit shield. There's a jacket to be found in every final level, so the main challenge comes from defeating the final bosses without taking any hits.
    • In Normal and Zangyou modes, the "one-credit clear" variant (play through the whole game without running out of lives and continuing) is also an achievement.
    • In Pink Hour, you need to keep the Important Document intact for the best ending. The document shields you from damage and breaks just like the jacket does.
  • Some of the Treasure Hunt challenges on Kid Icarus: Uprising require beating a specific chapter without taking any damage at all.
  • Kingdom Hearts:
    • Typically, the sorts of people who attempt a No-Damage Run also import the Final Mix games, and play them on Critical. Blocking is mandatory.
    • For the Updated Rereleases on the PS3 and PS4, the Undefeated trophy requires that the player beat the game without dying.
  • Kirby:
  • A few Konami Platform Games, namely Rocket Knight Adventures and the NES version of Bucky O'Hare and the Toad Wars!, force this on Hard mode by making the player a One-Hit-Point Wonder.
  • In The Legend of Zelda games:
  • Several LEGO Adaptation Games have this. There's an achievement for doing this in one level of LEGO Indiana Jones, while LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy ups the ante and gives every level an achievement for beating it without taking any damage. The DS versions of the early Star Wars games also had it where each vehicle level required a No Death Run for a minikit piece, and since DS vehicle levels make you a One-Hit-Point Wonder it's effectively still a full damageless run to get.
  • LittleBigPlanet has the "No Lives Lost" challenge available in all levels, also known as "acing" a level. Get through an entire level without dying once (including use of the Retry command if you get stuck in a level), and you get some extra goodies at the Scoreboard. Required to get 100% Completion in Story Mode, because completion is measured by how many items you've collected in all levels, and items given by No Lives Lost definitely count. Some levels, like Survival Challenges, are literally impossible to do this, because to finish you MUST die somehow (usually part of the challenge, like collect Score Bubbles while staying out of the Horrible Gas), but these aren't counted in this; you just have to complete the Survival Challenge levels to add to your completion percentage. Player-made levels have this option, so the creators can give extra gifts to players who are really good at their levels, but these aren't required for 100% completion.
  • MadWorld has level challenges which require clearing the stages without getting hurt.
  • Mega Man:
    • Mega Man 9 and Mega Man 10 have separate achievements for doing a run with no continues, no deaths, and no damage. A no death run can actually be easier than most expect by using a lot of items, but good luck doing a no damage run!
    • In Mega Man X5, the only way to make the Cannon fully destroy Eurasia (thus saving you the trouble of going through the remaining four stages, and also giving you bonus exposition on the Zero Virus) is to complete the first four levels and the Dynamo battle without using a single continue.
  • This is part of the reason why the Combat School missions are hard in Metal Slug 7: In order to get the best possible score, you not only have to clear the challenge in the fastest time, but do it without dying once. In a Shoot 'Em Up where your character is a One-Hit-Point Wonder.
  • Minecraft has a Hardcore Mode that used to delete the entire game world if the player dies. Since the entire point of the game is to explore the world and shape it through building, mining, and crafting, this can be a very painful experience if the player has been working on a world for a while, and has grown attached to it. Hardcore Mode also locks the game on the highest difficulty setting, maximizing the amount of damage dealt by monsters, and otherwise making survival as difficult as possible. As an extra kick, the game forced you to press the button that irrevocably deleted your world yourself, rather than doing it automatically upon your death. Hardcore Mode was eventually made available for multiplayer servers in addition to single-player gameplay. It was then changed so you can still spectate the world.
  • Mushihime Sama Futari Black Label has a True Final Boss that can only be challenged by completing the entire game on God Mode (the hardest difficulty level) up to that point on a single life.
  • Trying not to get hurt is the basis of some of the challenges in NES Remix.
  • Finishing the original NES version of Ninja Gaiden is already difficult enough as it is. Completing it in a single life is widely considered one of the hardest gaming challenges you will ever undertake in your gaming career. Completing it without taking a hit period wasn't achieved until 30 years after the game's release.
  • Night Striker combines this with Pacifist Run. You get a pacifist bonus at the end of a level if you complete it without getting hit, AND not firing any shots. Very hard to pull off, especially in later stages.
  • There is an achievement for a No Death Run in Ori and the Blind Forest. Given that ending the game with a triple digit death count is downright easy, this generally considered That One Achievement, only possible to achieve through Save Scumming. Better yet, the Definitive Edition adds One Life Mode, which enforces this by immediately deleting your save when you die as well as disabling save copying.
  • Painkiller has this as an optional card condition for Orphanage, the first level in the expansion pack Battle Out of Hell.
  • PAYDAY 3: A recurring challenge on most heists is "Tough as Nails", which requires finishing a heist in loud without going down once. Pulling it off earns you some Infamy Points.
  • Pizza Tower: If you defeat a boss without taking damage and collect all the extra health they drop, you get a P Rank for that level. Each boss also has an achievement for P Ranking them.
  • The Papillion suit in PN03 turns Vanessa into a One-Hit-Point Wonder - completing the game while wearing this means never taking a single hit.
  • Punch-Out!!: In the Wii game, one of the Exhibition Challenges in Title Defense requires you to defeat Piston Hondo without depleting a single heart from Little Mac's stamina. This requires not taking damage, not blocking any attack and not having any of Mac's punches blocked. There are also a few One-Hit KO tricks against certain boxers that can only be performed as long as Mac never takes any damage.
  • Rabi-Ribi has the "Dodge Master" series of achievements, which require the player to beat each boss without taking a single hit, something easier said than done in a Bullet Hell game. Some of the later bosses are fairly long fights, and allow the player to take one to three hits before failing the achievement. There's also an achievement for clearing the entire game without taking any damage from spikes.
  • Old Taito arcade game Raimais allows you to skip levels if you beat all the previous without dying.
  • Ratchet & Clank series has these as requirements for some of Skill Points, which can turn them into That One Achievement if they're put into one of more tedious locations. From second game onwards they're also condition of winning some of arena challenges. Funnily enough in second game you can use Shield Charger/Tesla Barrier to cheese them up. Not so much in third game, since developers wised up and your Shield Charger/Tesla Barrier ammo gets emptied at the beginning of challenge having this as requirement.
  • The "no deaths" version is required in Rockman 4 Minus ∞ to fight Shadow Man in Wily Stage 4.
  • Rhythm Thief & the Emperor's Treasure has Full Contact Challenges for the various songs. A single "Harsh" ranking results in you failing the song.
  • The true last challenge in Something. Mario has to complete a Boss Rush, but he has to do it without power ups.
  • Some of the more recent Sonic the Hedgehog games have an achievement for this:
    • Sonic Generations has one for beating the final boss without getting hit. In addition, the Challenge act that rewards Modern Sonic's Endless Boost skill requires one, as the skill turns him into a One-Hit-Point Wonder.
    • The 2011 remake of Sonic CD has one for defeating Metal Sonic without getting hit.
    • Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode I has one for beating the E.G.G. Station Zone with no damage.
  • In order to reach the true ending of Soul Calibur III, the player must complete a No Death Run with at most one ring out.
  • Splatoon 2: Several of the tests in the Octo Expansion DLC require completing the objective without ever taking damage.
  • In Spore, there are achievements for completing the creature and tribal stages without dying, "Survivor" and "Watchful Parent."
  • Four of the new skill points introduced in Spyro Reignited Trilogy are earned by beating four of the bosses without taking a hit.
  • An Youtuber called Grant took upon himself to complete all three Starcraft II campaigns without losing a single unit on "Hard" difficulty.
  • Beating each of the bosses without taking a hit in Starward Rogue grants you an achievement.
  • In Streetpass Mii Plaza's Mii Force game, one of goals in each level is beating it without taking a single hit. In order to obtain all the Plaza Tickets you need to do this in every stage. Additionally, the unlockable Arcade Mode has a Hard difficulty, where you only have a single weapon, and thus only one hit point to get through every stage in the game in one run.
  • Super Mario Bros.:
  • Required in Super Meat Boy for a series of achievements titled "Iron Boy" runs, which require you to complete an entire world without dying. The achievements start out relatively easy with the first few worlds, but eventually get harder, going all the way up to Impossible Boy, which requires you to beat the Cotton Alley Dark World without dying, which is somewhat of an inhuman feat, considering the game's difficulty. Only 0.1% percent of all Steam users who have the game also have this achievement, and a good majority of them are cheaters. Depending on the world that is being played, the game will let players use alternate characters (with the exceptions of Steve? and Meat Ninja) for the run, and let players play levels out of order, so it's more flexible with this trope than other games.
  • In the very first Super Monkey Ball, beating all 70 stages of Expert, Expert Extra, and Master in a single no-death no-warp run would actually be acknowledged by the game with a special message during the credits (which varied depending on which monkey you chose to play as). In addition, the Play Point values were set up so that such a feat would net you exactly 9,999 Play Points; die once or use a single warp to skip a level and you'll end up with less.
  • Super Smash Bros.:
    • Super Smash Bros. Melee:
      • Clearing the entirety of either Classic, Adventure, or All-Star modes without taking damage gives you a special bonus. If you're going for the Diskun trophy that requires earning every bonus, this is gonna be one of the Last Lousy Points. Luckily, all three modes grant the same bonus, so you only have to do it once.
      • There's also two bonuses for clearing a single round without taking damage — Impervious, if you dealt damage to any enemies, or Switzerland, if you didn't.
    • Super Smash Bros. Ultimate: There is a challenge to beat the True Final Boss with no K.Os. Naturally, unless you decide to do the fight on Easy Mode, it's a difficult challenge to do. Unlocking it gives you the Mew support spirit. You also get some additional points in Classic Mode if you get a perfect on a section, which would give you a very high 'Nice Play' score.
  • To get the 'I Will Survive' trophy/achievement for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time Re-Shelled, you are required to play "survival mode" where you only have one life to get through all eight levels of the game.
  • Thwaite has an alternate ending for a No Damage Run, where the culprit is never discovered. Then the game accuses the player of TASing.
  • Touhou Lost Branch Of Legend: Only relevant for non "Normal Enemies":
    • The Danmaku Dodged contribution to EXP / Score:
      Defeat an Elite without taking damage.
    • The Elegance award perquisite is:
      Defeat a Boss without taking damage.
  • In Unleash the Light, there's an achievement for completing a Rose's Room run without anyone fainting.
  • Beating VVVVVV unlocks a No Death Mode, which challenges you to play through as much of the game as you can on a single life. All checkpoints are removed, you can't save, one room is modified so that you no longer need to die to nab the Shiny Trinket in it, and dying ends your game and kicks you to a results screen. Successfully completing the entire game in No Death Mode awards you a trophy.
  • Completing every stage in Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune 2 and its successors without a single defeat grants a few bonuses. First, you get a special title: "Undefeated Winner of the Highway" in 2, or "Undefeated Highway Dominator" in 3. Second, in 2, you get two final tuning blocks instead of one (if you lose, you simply have to finish Story Mode and then drive 5,000 kilometers), and in 3 you unlock the Wangan Midnight R soundtrack.
  • In some World of Warcraft quests, there are achievements for completing them without taking any damage, such as a quest in which you must retrieve an item from a collapsing and booby-trapped ruin. These are fairly challenging, but not quite as difficult as some of the examples listed above, since they tend to be shorter and the dangers are telegraphed more (such as a shadow where a rock is about to fall, or a red circle around an enemy area of effect attack).
  • X3: Terran Conflict has Dead is Dead mode where your save is erased when you die. It also has an achievement for finishing all the quest lines in DiD.

     Non-Video Game Examples 
  • Batman: Wayne Family Adventures does this in-universe; the Batfamily have a tradition where, if none of them get injured on patrol, Alfred will welcome them home with a Food Porn-level spread of pastries
  • Cutthroat Kitchen recognizes Flawless Victory by winning the full war chest ($25,000 in regular episodes, $50,000 in tournament finals). The show has it's version of this trope by having the winning contestant take no penalties and no sabotages. Taking no sabotages in this show requires you to forfeit your Flawless Victory by bidding and winning sabotage auctions. This has been accomplished only once.
  • A game show example is from the final two seasons of Tom Bergeron's run of The Hollywood Squares. For this part of the run, the Bonus Round worked as such: the champion was given 30 seconds to agree or disagree with facts about the celebrity, and for every correct answer, a "bad key" from a set of 9 would be eliminated; picking the right key would either start a car, unlock a safe full of cash, or unlock a trunk for a trip. On at least two occasions, the contestant managed to answer all nine questions correctly, meaning all the bad keys were eliminated.
  • In The Legendary Moonlight Sculptor, the main character of the Virtual Reality MMORPG Continent of Magic is perfectly capable of this because of his relentless training as a martial artist and sword user, and it is in fact necessary in serious battles, as his melee class is a bit of a Glass Cannon. However, he often spends most of his time when fighting ordinary battles with little to no HP, dodging and parrying (not an in-game skill) all attacks... because that is the game's condition for raising the endurance stat (the endurance stat reduces incoming damage).
  • Sporcle has minefield quizzes which expect you to do this: type (or click) a wrong answer and it ends.
  • A pinball example: Star Wars (Stern) has a Video Mode where the player must dodge asteroids while controlling the Millennium Falcon, and a hefty point bonus is awarded if they manage to avoid all of them.

 
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Alternative Title(s): No Death Run, No Continue Run

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Origami King no-damage bonus

Mario gets more coins if he defeats all the enemies in a battle without getting hit.

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