History Main / FailureIsTheOnlyOption

* In ''VideoGame/SpiderManPS4'', there's a mission where the player briefly controls ordinary human Miles Morales who has to sneak past a bunch of gun toting henchmen. If he's spotted, it's an instant failure, and the player has to try again from the start. Upon successfully completing the mission, a cutscene plays... where Miles is immediately spotted by the gun toting henchmen that the player just spent the last several minutes sneaking past.

* In ''VideoGame/SpiderManPS4'', there's a mission where the player briefly controls ordinary human Miles Morales who has to sneak past a bunch of gun toting henchman. If he's spotted, it's an instant failure, and the player has to try again from the start. Upon successfully completing the mission, a cutscene plays... where Miles is immediately spotted by the gun toting henchman that the player just spent the last several minutes sneaking past.

** After the above happens, the game restarts, but the whole thing's ''wrong''. It's acting like Sayori never existed, everything and everyone except for Monika starts glitching in horrific ways, and your friend (or girlfriend, depending on which route you take) Yuri undergoes severe SanitySlippage, [[spoiler: later revealed to be due to Monika [[MindRape Mind-Raping]] her by messing with her code]]. She hands you a poem heavily implied to have been both written in her blood and covered in her pee, violently cuts herself out of the ecstasy of being in your presence, and begins loosing her grip on reality. She's somewhat aware that she's going insane, and [[ReluctantPsycho hates it]]. It all culminates in a very obsessive, disturbing love confession, and you being given a choice to accept or reject. No matter what you choose, the next thing she'll do is [[spoiler: take out a knife and stab herself thrice: the first two times in the gut, the last time in the heart]]. If you rejected her, it's because she was too heartbroken to take it. It's unclear why she'd do it if you accepted her, but consensus is that either a) she wanted protect you from what she was becoming, or b) Monika was right about her having a fetish for knives.

** After the above happens, the game restarts, but the whole thing's ''wrong''. It's acting like Sayori never existed, everything and everyone except for Monika starts glitching in horrific ways, and your friend (or girlfriend, depending on which route you take) Yuri undergoes severe SanitySlippage, [[spoiler: later revealed to be due to Monika [[MindRape Mind-Raping]] her by messing with her code]]. She hands you a poem heavily implied to have been both written in her blood and covered in her pee, violently cuts herself out of the ecstasy of being in your presence, and begins loosing her grip on reality. She's somewhat aware that she's going insane, and [[ReluctantPsycho hates it]]. It all culminates in a very obsessive, disturbing love confession, and you being given a choice to accept or reject. No matter what you choose, the next thing she'll do is [[spoiler: take out a knife and stab herself thrice: the first two times in the gut, the last time in the heart]]. If you rejected her, it's because she was too heartbroken to take it. It's unclear why she'd do it if you accepted her, but consensus is that a) she wanted protect you or b) Monika was right about her having a fetish for knives.

** After the above happens, the game restarts, but the whole thing's ''wrong''. It's acting like Sayori never existed, everything and everyone except for Monika starts glitching in horrific ways, and your friend (or girlfriend, depending on which route you take) Yuri undergoes severe SanitySlippage, [[spoiler: later revealed to be due to Monika [[MindRape Mind-Raping]] her by messing with her code]]. She hands you a poem heavily implied to have been both written in her blood and covered in her pee, violently cuts herself out of the ecstasy of being in your presence, and begins loosing her grip on reality. She's somewhat aware that she's going insane, and [[ReluctantPsycho hates it]]. It all culminates in a very obsessive, disturbing love confession, and you being given a choice to accept or reject. No matter what you choose, the next thing she'll do is [[spoiler: take out a knife and stab herself thrice: the first two times in the gut, the last time in the heart]]. If you rejected her, it's because she was too heartbroken to to take it. It's unclear why she'd do it if you accepted her, but consensus is that a)she wanted protect you or b) Monika was right about her having a fetish for knives.

* ''VisualNovel/DokiDokiLiteratureClub'': Your childhood friend Sayori's [[spoiler: suicide]]. The day before it happens, she confesses two things to you, a) that she has had lifelong depression and b) that she is in love with you. You're then given an option to reciprocate or to turn her down, but keep her as your dearest friend. The next day, if you picked the former option, you'll walk into Sayori's room to see her [[spoiler: corpse hanging from the ceiling]], and [[SurvivorGuilt blame yourself]] because you didn't realize that, before everything else, she wanted things to stay the way they used to be. If you pick the latter, the same will happen, but this time you'll blame yourself because you didn't give her the relationship that she wanted.

* ''VisualNovel/DokiDokiLiteratureClub'': Your childhood friend Sayori's [[spoiler: suicide]]. The day before it happens, she confesses two things to you, a) that she has had lifelong depression and b) that she is in love with you. You're then given an option to reciprocate or to turn her down, but keep her as your dearest friend. The next day, if you picked the former option, you'll walk into Sayori's room to see her [[spoiler: corpse hanging from the ceiling]], you'll [[SurvivorGuilt blame yourself]] because you didn't realize that, before everything else, she wanted things to stay the way they used to be. If you pick the latter, the same will happen, but this time you'll blame yourself because you didn't give her the relationship that she wanted.

[[folder:Web Videos]]
* ''WebVideo/Lonelygirl15'' - Goal: bring down the Order of Denderah.
* Youtuber NicoBBQ commonly does coinless challenges in Mario games. Come his Super Mario 35, where he receives coins even if he didn’t collect any himself anyways.
[[/folder]]

* Like ''Lost in Space'' and ''Land of the Giants'', ''Series/TheTimeTunnel'' was an Creator/IrwinAllen series in which the protagonists were lost and trying to return home. In this case, two scientists were bounced back and forth through history by the titular TimeMachine, while their colleagues tried to retrieve them. As with the other series, ''Time Tunnel'' was canceled before the heroes could accomplish their goal/

** This trope is lampshaded by Piccolo in the Saiyan Saga after he gets [[WhatTheHellHero called out for berating Gohan for getting frightened]] while fighting [[TheDragon Nappa]]. Piccolo silently admits that it doesn't matter how they do against Nappa, then realizes that if [[ArcVillain Vegeta]] is [[AuthorityEqualsAsskicking ordering Nappa around than Vegeta much be even stronger]], so even if Nappa is defeated, the heroes would have to face an even stronger villain. He was right, as not even Goku was able to defeat Vegeta.

* ''Manga/ShamanKing'': From the beginning, Yoh's goal was to become Shaman King. Later on, it gets to the point where [[spoiler: Yoh admits that his brother Hao/Zeke is going to win...period]]. There's only a matter of what to do next.

* The goal in [[Anime/FullmetalAlchemist the 2003 anime version]] of ''Manga/FullmetalAlchemist'' is to create the Philosopher's Stone, and [[spoiler:once it's actually created, the only way for the brothers to accomplish their goal is to have Al die (don't worry, he gets better). Failure IS the only option, even until the end]].

* ''VideoGame/{{Bioshock 1}}'': At the start of Fort Frolic, [[MadArtist Sander Cohen]] has chained one of his proteges to a piano and is forcing him to play a song he's composed. If the protege misses too many notes, the dynamite strapped to the piano will detonate. Real-life pianists have analyzed [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRl4-CKtSzI the song]] and declared it ''nearly impossible'' to play correctly, even when you ''aren't'' fearing for your life. [[StuffBlowingUp Needless to say, he doesn't last long]].

* In ''VideoGame/DiabloII'' the unnamed protagonist is met with failure at every turn due to arriving ever so slightly too late to have stopped the villain from doing what they were trying to do.
** Act 1: The hero arrives too late to catch Diablo in his new body and Andariel is successful in delaying his venture to the east to go after Diablo.
** Act 2: The hero arrives in what couldn't have been more than a few minutes after Diablo got there and freed his brother, which is precisely what you were trying to stop him from doing. They leave Duriel there to delay the character's pursuit.
** Act 3: You make it to Mephisto mere moments after he activates the power of the soulstones on his brother Diablo and opens a portal to hell for them to escape to, staying behind himself to delay the player's pursuit.
** Act 4: You actually make it to Diablo and kill him before he does anything too terrible, but that's only because he wasn't actually trying to do anything to Sanctuary at that point, and Baal was still at large in Sanctuary (although fortunately, he didn't manage to find Marius or retrieve his Soulstone until some time after Diablo's defeat, so you don't exactly fail). However, while you do manage to catch up to what the Prime Evils are planning, you squander that lead in the months leading up to...
** Act 5: Halfway through, you arrive just too late to interrupt Baal from getting an object that will allow him to walk right through the front door of the Worldstone Keep. You then get to Baal and - surprise, surprise - he doesn't seem to have corrupted the Worldstone yet. You fight him and defeat him thinking that you arrived just in time to stop the world from being destroyed, but wait! Tyrael then tells you that the mere act of Baal touching the Worldstone corrupted it completely, meaning that after the fight you find out that yet again you arrived too late, once again by mere minutes at the very most.
** The entire quest you set out on in the beginning of the game turns into failure after failure. Sure, you destroy 5 of the most powerful evil beings in existence, but not before they succeed in doing the very thing that they set out to do in the first place. And let's not forget Diablo is using the body of the Warrior from the first game.

* In the first episode of ''Series/ForThePeople'', the lead federal public defender tells her idealistic new proteges that "You are going to lose". Their opponent is the US Federal Government, who have unlimited money and power and win 95% of their cases. Indeed, almost every case ends with a conviction or, best case scenario, a plea deal for reduced prison time. Unusually for a CourtroomDrama, full-on acquittals are very rare.

* In the first episode of ''Series/ForThePeople'', the lead federal public defender tells her idealistic new proteges that "You are going to lose". Their opponent is the US Federal Government, who have unlimited money and power and win 95% of their cases. Indeed, almost every case ends with a conviction or, best case scenario, a plea deal for reduced prison time. Unusually for a LegalDrama, full-on acquittals are very rare.

* ''WebAnimation/RedVsBlue''. Most of the Blue's and Red's plans end horribly. The only time they really win is when they work together. When they are trying to kill each other, for obvious reasons, they can't.\\
\\
In ''Revelation'' it's revealed that [[spoiler: Alpha was tormented by being placed in scenarios where it could never succeed. Also, because Tex was based on the Director's memory of a woman he loved, but her death was the thing he remembered most clearly, she also can never succeed; this is the reason why she never really accomplished her goals in Blood Gulch. She was designed to fail at the last moment]].

* ''Series/TheInvaders1967'' subjected both the hero and the villains to this trope. David Vincent was trying to prove the existence of [[AlienInvasion alien invaders]] [[TheyLookLikeUsNow disguised as humans]] on Earth; in turn, the aliens were trying to silence him. The series forat depended on neither side being able to accomplish their goal. However, near the end of the series, Vincent met the Believers, a group of people who were already aware of the invaders, which changed the status quo since at least he now had dependable allies.

* ''Series/TheInvaders1967'' subjected both the hero and the villains to this trope. David Vincent was trying to prove the existence of [[AlienInvasion alien invaders]] [[TheyLookLikeUsNow disguised as humans]] on Earth; in turn the aliens were trying to silence him. The series forat depended on neither side being able to accomplish their goal. However, near the end of the series, Vincent met the Believers, a group of people who were already aware of the invaders, which changed the status quo since at least he now had dependable allies.

** Colonel Klink's actor only participated in the show under the condition that the Nazis would never, ever come out on top in anything. This being a comedy and Nazis being AcceptableTargets, it wasn't hard to pull off.

* ''Machinima/RedVsBlue''. Most of the Blue's and Red's plans end horribly. The only time they really win is when they work together. When they are trying to kill each other, for obvious reasons, they can't.\\

* ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' - Goal: find a way home. [[spoiler:They finally do it in the last episode, thanks to a time travel paradox.]] A while in the writers realized some of the backdraws of this trope, and began to allow ''partial'' successes (they can't get all the way home, but they ''can'' use whatever the technology of the week is to cross some substantial amount of space in a matter of minutes, shaving years off the journey). Having them succeed was also considered as an option for {{Retool}}ing the show.

* ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' - Goal: find a way home. [[spoiler:They finally do it in the last episode, thanks to a time travel paradox.]] A while in the writers realized some of the backdraws of this trope, and began to allow ''partial'' successes (they can't find a way home, but they ''can'' shave years off the journey). Having them succeed was also considered as an option for {{Retool}}ing the show.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'' makes a living off this trope with nearly everyone. Not only are the villains meant to fail, but the main protagonists are basically failures themselves, except Brock (and he's got some failures himself). There is a whole section on [[Wiki/{{Wikipedia}} The Other Wiki]] about how, according to WordOfGod, the theme of failure is very key.

-->'''Spike:''' What happened to the million-woolong reward we got for that last guy?\\

* ''VideoGame/{{Patapon}}'': In Patapon there is a mission called Despair, in this mission there is a trick, at first you encounter some Zigoton towers with Yumitons, these towers take a lot of time to take down, if that wasn't enough, this mission always has wind against you, favouring the Yumitons and weakening your Yumipons, by the time you are done with the two towers, your troops will already be weakened, and then, you encounter a huge Zigoton gate full of traps that simply stop your Patapons from getting close to it, shall they do it, they will simply perish as the gate's mechanisms are too strong for them, you are supposed to lose this mission in order to continue the game, since here, the Patapon army canonically loses to the Zigotons for the fist time... Normally. ''It is recommendable to bring the Tailwind Juju if found to aid your Yumipons and weaken the Yumitons, and easen the mission a fair bit''
** After you lose, a cutscene with Meden and a Scout Yaripon will take place, where the Scout tells Meden and the Almighty Patapon about a Zigoton catapult that Patapons can steal and take up to the Zigoton gate to destroy it. Altho... you can actually take down the tower without the catapult in the fist try, you just have to be either very powerful or play the most strategic way possible, but that is unlikely for the moment you reach there unless you grind a lot for it, if you manage to take the gate down without the help of the catapult, you will receive the items you skipped from the other missions when stealing the catapult, and also Meden will point out your Mighty strength to take down the gate without the catapult.

* ''Franchise/SuperMarioBros'':
** ''VideoGame/SuperMarioBros1'' featured Mario storming castles and fighting hordes of monsters, alone and with very little firepower, to save Princess Toadstool, only to [[YourPrincessIsInAnotherCastle keep finding out that he's stormed the wrong castle]]. He gets there in the 8th and final castle.