Sprint Meter

aka: Stamina Meter

A brother to the Life Meter and Mana Meter, the Sprint Meter, or Stamina Points / Meter is a graphical depiction of some aspect of a player character's condition other than their remaining health. Generally, this represents stamina, and often more precisely their ability to run at high speed; when the meter empties, the character must either take a moment to catch their breath or be unable to run until it is recovered. This allows a game to put a limitation on a player's ability to flee from danger, which makes such meters popular for Survival Horror games. For purely gameplay purposes, this meter usually runs out so fast that plenty of people who probably don't think of themselves as particularly fit would expect that they would be able to run longer that some video game protagonists, but it probably wouldn't be very interesting for a lot of games if players were designed around the expectation that they could sprint away for multiple minutes at the sign of trouble.

A Sprint Meter can also be used to indicate the capacity for a swimming character to hold their breath (where it's called an Oxygen Meter) or other quantities. The defining characteristic of the Sprint Meter is that it refills automatically over time when it's not in use. Since dashing while swimming is often impossible anyway, the sprint and oxygen meters can share real estate on the screen.

Where Life Meters tend to be red, and Mana Meters tend to be blue, the Sprint Meter will often be green or (less commonly) yellow to round out the color trio.

See also Run, Don't Walk; compare with Nitro Boost, a temporary boost of speed. Stamina Burn is for when this meter's value can be lowered by non-player action or effects. Sub-Trope of Status Line (a display element showing the current disposition of the player, e.g. score, health, ammo, etc).

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Examples:

Action Adventure

• The Legend of Zelda:
  • In games that include Epona, pressing the A button spurs her to a full gallop, which is regulated by a line of carrots (implying that feeding her carrots acts as an organic Nitro Boost) or spur icons. The meter will refill gradually when partially depleted, or all at once if fully depleted, but only after Epona slows noticeably for several seconds, which is enough to lose you the Racing Minigames in Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask. The recommended technique for maintaining a high speed is to keep at least one carrot on screen at all times.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword introduced a general Stamina Meter used for sprinting (which lets you run a short distance up walls to reach somewhat higher ledges and go up steeper hills), climbing, spin attacks (but not regular attacks), carrying heavy items, and keeping yourself afloat in sand. It takes the form of a green circle divided into wedges; especially rigorous actions take off one or more wedges at a time. (The Oxygen Meter has the same design in blue.) This gives it a resemblance to the cross-section of a citrus fruit; appropriately, the Stamina Fruit pickup instantly refills the meter, giving Link the ability to run long distances in certain areas by zig-zagging from one fruit to the next. Drain the meter completely and Link can't do anything but move around slowly until the circle refills, including actions that don't normally run off the meter. There's a specific potion that slows how fast stamina is burned for three minutes, which conveniently only becomes available after you complete a dungeon with a large number of stamina-based puzzles that would be trivialized by that potion.
  • The meter returns in Breath of the Wild, in improved fashion. It now depletes much more slowly, doesn't come into play as often, can be augmented and recharged more easily, and Link's regular jogging speed (which does not reduce the meter) has been increased. There is also a Good Bad Bug where by whistling for your horse and tapping B you can run indefinitely.
• Averted in Mirror's Edge, where Faith can sprint for as long as she needs to and never gets tired. Instead, it simply takes a short time for her to accelerate to a sprint (save for abuse of a certain glitch which allows you to instantly achieve full speed from a stop). There is also a less obvious meter that fills up when sprinting and allows you to briefly activate Runner Time for tricky jumps or disarms. This meter is not visible on the screen, but your screen will flash blue once it is filled.
• Shadow of the Colossus has a variant that indicates your stamina: your ability to hold onto stuff without falling off, your ability to hold your breath underwater, etc. More often than not, this meter is more important than the Life Meter.
• Sundered has a Stamina Meter represented by yellow pips. The player spends this meter to dodge-roll, air-dash, and fire the Valkyrie Cannon, with each action consuming one pip per use. The pips regenerate after a few seconds of inactivity, and the meter can be increased by spending Shards in the Trapezohedron Tree.
• Tomb Raider:
  • The series had a sprint move (and meter) from the third game until Legend. Underworld brought back the sprint with no visual gauge (although you can still only do it a certain amount of time).
  • Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness features a stamina meter for climbing and shimmying, as well as the more standard Oxygen Meter for swimming under water.

Action Game

• Carrie's Order Up! lets Carrie spin in order to dodge customers. However, doing this too much causes her to turn red and work up a sweat. If you don't stop and let her return to normal, you'll lose a life.

Action RPG

• In Demon's Souls and its Spiritual Successor Dark Souls, the stamina meter goes down with everything your character does except walking and magic—and even magic takes stamina in Dark Souls II and Dark Souls III. Attacking, blocking, rolling, and running all drain stamina while holding a shield up makes it recover far slower. Stamina is based on Endurance, which is why most players make raising Endurance a high priority.
• Genshin Impact has a stamina bar that's shared between running, swimming, climbing, gliding and using your charged attacks, with different consequences if you run out — if you're running, you will simply slow down to a normal jog and be unable to dodge for a few seconds (not the best situation if you're fighting enemies); if you're swimming, you will drown and be teleported back to the coast you started from with all your characters losing 10% of their max HP; if you're climbing or gliding you will fall and be subject to Fall Damage possibly disabling the character you were using at the time until they're revived. The only way to increase your max stamina is to collect items called "oculi" scattered around the map and offer them to special statues, which encourages players to explore every nook and cranny of Teyvat. Also certain characters have passive abilities that decrease the stamina consumption of certain activities while they are in your party, and some foods also temporarily decrease stamina use while sprinting.
• Jade Empire has a variant. Instead of your character speeding up, time slows down, enabling the player to run around pretending they're Keanu Reeves.
• In Let It Die, your stamina meter is represented by a beating heart appearing over your Fighter when you sprint, dodge, or attack. It beats faster the more you exert yourself, and your Fighter will be forced to stop and take a breather, leaving you open to attack, if you overexert yourself.
• Mass Effect had an odd example of this: The ability to sprint (ie, move faster than normal) was only available during combat (ie, once enemies were actively trying to hurt you). Shepard could then sprint for a short period until the bar was depleted or combat ended, abruptly turning off your ability to sprint. This was changed in Mass Effect 2 so that Shepard could sprint on command, in or out of combat, but still at the mercy of a Sprint Bar. Still helped get around faster. Mass Effect 3 removed the Sprint Bar, allowing the player to sprint as long as they pleased.
• Monster Hunter: The stamina meter is used not just for running, but also dodging and guarding. The stamina meter's maximum value decreases every so often, more quickly so in very cold areas, requiring the player to eat meat to restore it. There's also two items that temporarily grant infinite stamina. Monster Hunter Tri introduces two status effects that affect the stamina meter: Waterblight, which makes it recover more slowly, and Iceblight, which makes it deplete more quickly. And Glacial Agnaktor is capable of inflicting both. If you're carrying a heavy object and you deplete your stamina meter entirely, you drop the item, it shatters, and you have to start over again. It should be noted that "sprinting" while carrying a heavy object is akin to the speed of walking when not carrying one.
• The World of Mana series (as well as Secret of Evermore) combined the sprint meter with the Charge Meter — you couldn't attack effectively immediately after running, and you couldn't even walk at full speed while charging for more powerful attacks.

Adventure Game

• Quest for Glory:
  • The hybrid RPG/Adventure games have stamina that run out the more strenous activity your character partakes in without stopping to rest or drinking a stamina potion. Stamina also runs out faster if you run instead of walking, and upon reaching zero the game starts taking from your health meter, and you get messages saying things like "you're so tired everything you do hurts" and repeatedly warning you to get some rest before you die of exhaustion.
  • In the first two games, running out of stamina in battle is instantly fatal. The explanation is that, being exhausted, you will be unable to attack or defend effectively, or even run away, resulting in a quick death. From the third game on, fighting with zero stamina does, in fact, drain your health. In the third game in particular, it drains remarkably fast, meaning you can fight yourself to death.
  • The fourth is a little more kind, simply preventing you from attacking if stamina is nearly gone. Of course, since the in-combat stamina regeneration is tied to the computer's CPU power, any modern system will completely regenerate the hero's stamina in seconds.
• A Short Hike is built around building up your meter to scale ever-higher vertical cliffs until Claire can reach the summit. You start without a meter until you get your first Golden Feather, with each subsequent one expanding it. Golden Feathers also allow Claire to sprint and to fly up while gliding.
• Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley: Snufkin has a stamina meter which drains as he runs and refills over time. His maximum stamina can be increased by progressing through the Muskrat's sidequest, in which you find ingredients for his stew (which gives you more energy when you eat it).

Eastern RPG

• In Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden, a sprint meter appears when Barkley is running, indicated with a sneaker image. It depletes quite quickly on top of recharging slowly.
• In Baten Kaitos: Origins you have a bar that represents the power of your "wings of the heart" which allow you to dash around. If the bar runs out your wings disappear and the character has to stumble around until the bar refills.
• In Lunar: Dragon Song, Sprint Meter and Life Meter are the same — running depletes your health. Characters start panting at about 2/3 HP, and your party can no longer run if a member hits 1/3 HP.

Fighting Game

• In Def Jam: Fight For New York, the player's Momentum (which controls when you can use the character's "Blazin'" (super) move) also controls how long they can run. Apparently, you can only run for long periods with the consent of the crowd.
• In JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle, Vanilla Ice possesses a unique stamina meter that slowly depletes in Stand On mode, and regenerates in Stand Off mode. All attacks in Stand On cost stamina to use, to counterbalance the fact that they're completely invulnerable, unblockable, and hit like a truck.
  • All Star Battle R introduces Pet Shop, who has a special Flight Mode that allows him to fly freely in the air, attack while moving, and dash repeatedly without limit. However, using this mode consumes stamina, which can only be recharged by resting on the ground.
• Magical Battle Arena has a Sprint Meter that doubles as a Mana Meter for your normal ranged attack. When Fate switches to her Sonic Form, not only does her speed increase, but her Sprint Meter's rate of consumption while dashing drastically decreases as well.
• The Mortal Kombat 3/UMK3/MK Trilogy games had a Run meter, which allows you to dash forward for a brief while until the meter runs out. It also worked as a Cap for combos, so that you (supposedly) can't do a combo or run immediately after doing the other. This mechanic is also present in Mortal Kombat 4 (and by extension Gold) and Mortal Kombat X.

First Person Shooter

• Battlefield during the Refractor era. In Battlefield 2 how long you could sprint was determined by your class, with some having heavier armor at the expense of not being able to run as long.
• Call of Duty:
  • Call of Duty: United Offensive and then Call of Duty 4 onward add the ability for the player character to sprint for short durations, which is useful as your AI allies have always typically run faster than you can and rarely wait for you to catch up; there's only an actual meter present in United Offensive, where it depletes far faster than in later games. The perks from multiplayer's Create-A-Class also have frequently included ones that allow you to sprint faster and/or longer than normal starting from Modern Warfare 2.
  • Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019) and onward go for a different system: regular sprinting is now infinite, but there's also a slightly faster Tactical Sprint that lasts for a short time.
• Introduced in the Fan Remake of Command & Conquer: Renegade known as Renegade-X. The original did not have this mechanic—instead, it had a "toggled walk or run" system. As walking was functionally useless in both the campaign and multiplayer, it was replaced with sprinting in the remake. Both sprinting and jumping deplete the meter, which is most likely intended to reduce the prevalence of bunny-hopping.
• Contagion has a sprint meter which depletes so fast when running, you can't jog 100 meters with it, despite your pick of character also including a veteran soldier that's still at work. It also gets consumed when jumping, which is reasonable enough... and when holding a melee weapon poised to strike, which really isn't, especially when you consider it goes down as fast as when you run.
• In Crysis 2, sprinting draws energy from your nanosuit's energy reserves. Justified in that the player character wouldn't even be alive let alone fighting if it weren't for the suit, so he can't exactly run unaided.
• Enemy Territory: Quake Wars subverts this. You can sprint as long as you have an open path in front of you, but your character will pant loudly after a time, which will alert other players.
• Far Cry has a Sprint Meter that also functions as a Jump Meter and Oxygen Meter. If it depletes your character won't be able to sprint, jump, or hold his breath underwater until after it at least partially restores itself. Jogging also slows down the meter's regeneration speed. Interestingly enough, it's a blue bar instead of the usual colors.
  • The "sequel", Far Cry 2, has a sprint meter that functions much like the above. While it's not actually represented by the interface, you can tell you're about to tire out when the edges of the screen start to blur, resulting in the entire screen becoming blurry when you're completely exhausted.
    • The game also gives a convenient explanation on why the player character, who is by all accounts a badass, can't sprint for more than 50 meters. It's because you are dying of malaria, the amount of sprinting you can do decreases as your disease worsens.
  • Far Cry 3 onwards went the other way, giving you a limited faster sprint that then slows down to a slower but unlimited sprint. There's an unlockable skill that removes the limit on the faster sprint, too.
• Present in FEAR 2, although only really useful for the sliding kick. Running in this game is a good way to get shot up.
• Half-Life 2 made the odd decision to have running, the flashlight, and oxygen be a single "Auxillary power" meter. Dashing causes your flashlight to run out, swimming with the flashlight on reduces your time underwater, etc. In Episode 2, however, the flashlight energy is separated, to allow the player to run in a certain underground section when they are expected to have their flashlight on.
  • A way to Hand Wave the former decision is that, since the suit power's auxillary power is used to help Gordon Freeman both sprint and use a flashlight; Freeman doesn't want to tire himself out and make himself incapable of fighting, and so, refuses to sprint outside of being aided from the suit. The flashlight regaining a separate meter is similarly handwaved as it being a backup after the original was broken by the Citadel's explosion at the end of Episode One.
• Halo: Reach features a meter that gauges the energy of armor abilities, one of which is a sprint ability. Like most examples, it recharges with time. The game handwaves sprinting being an armor ability as it removes the Restraining Bolt on your Powered Armor, letting you achieve higher speed temporarily without damaging your armor or injuring yourself.
• Visible on the HUD in Outlaws is a thermometre whose mercury drops when you're jumping or running and grows back when you're standing still (so performing exhaustive tasks makes you lose temperature?). When you dive underwater, it turns into an Oxygen Meter.
• S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: All three games have it, and it depletes when sprinting, jumping and even walking, sneaking or crawling (though at a slower pace). It's very generous, provided you don't get over your weight limit, which upon being trespassed, makes the meter drop so fast that even walking can tire you out quite fast, and it only gets worse the heavier your loadout is until you suffer from Critical Encumbrance Failure at 10kg over the limit. In all games, a can of energy drink can immediately fill up a large part of the depleted endurance meter, and there are stamina-enhancing artifacts that, if stacked, can make the meter infinite, though they're only really practical in Shadow of Chernobyl, where they're not radioactive; in the latter two games, you can't really use them if you don't also have a powerful radiation-clearing artifact like the Wrenched or Bubble.
• The team-based, online FPS Tremulous has a sprint meter for humans, but not for aliens. This is to capitalize on the aliens' amazing mobility vs. the humans' lack thereof. Jumping also takes 'stamina'.

Hack and Slash

• No More Heroes: One of the unlockable abilities in the game is the "Technique of Bizarre", AKA the ability to run, stopping in exhaustion for a few seconds should you sprint the meter completely empty. The beam sword charge gauge pulls double-duty as the sprint meter, so you can't actually run while in battle. It's still a good way to get around the alleys in town that a bike has trouble maneuvering in, and it's practically a requirement to get a good score in some of the side-jobs. Sprinting makes Travis cannonball forward with enough velocity to outrun a car for about fifteen seconds. And he's winded for three. No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle doesn't have one (nor any of the other Lovikov skills), mostly because Travis doesn't need to sprint at any point (due to the city of Santa Destroy being turned into a glorified menu). No More Heroes III still lacks a sprint meter and does bring back the playable overworld, but Travis runs a little faster to make up for the absence.

Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game

• Inverted with some character archetypes in City of Heroes who have inherent powers — like Domination for Dominators — that have corresponding bars on the interface to indicate their level of effectiveness. Most of the the time these bars run down if the player isn't doing something to keep it up (such as engaging in combat for Brutes). Sprint, itself, was a toggle power all characters had immediately upon starting, and drained the Endurance bar as any other. For the lower levels, draining the bar to nothing was fairly easy, meaning a player could neither flee quickly nor fight until it recharged. At higher levels with the right builds, players could easily have Sprint activated permanently, in addition to their other travel powers.
• EVE Online has a general-purpose capacitor gauge which effectively functions as a sprint meter when using an afterburner or a microwarpdrive. In addition, warping to a celestial object uses a chunk of the energy stored in the capacitor up front. If you don't have enough, the game drops your ship out of warp prematurely.
• The original PlanetSide has health, armor, and stamina bars. Stamina is drained by jumping and using implants (such as the Surge sprint implant or the personal shield), and cannot be regenerated at the typical brisk jogging pace. If you completely drain your stamina, you're stuck moving at a slow crawl and panting loudly until it goes above a certain threshold. If you die and a medic revives you, your stamina will be completely drained.
• Running in RuneScape goes on a sprint meter, which refills faster as you level up in Agility. Your character can also recover "run energy" by resting, listening to music (by bards), drinking potions, or getting help from a SUMMONED BIRD.
• Star Trek Online features a sprint meter in ground missions but only when you're actually in combat. Out of combat, it never appears, allowing you to sprint to your liking.
• Vindictus has the stamina meter goes down when you sprint, pick up heavy stuff, use magic as Evie, block attacks as Fiona, or use smash attacks.

Platform Game

• Garfield's Fun Fest: Garfield has an energy meter, which depletes even from walking, let alone jumping. It is only replenished by eating food.
• In Road Runner's Death Valley Rally, the Road Runner has a Turbo Speed Meter, which is refilled by eating bird seed.
• The boat's boost meter in Submerged. The amount of time you can boost can be increased by collecting boat upgrades.
• The Turrican homage game Hurrican uses a regenerating meter to limit use of the energy wheel.

Simulation Game

• Ace Online has a boost bar that allows players to temporarily fly faster.
• Freelancer and the FreeSpace series of Space Sims have a meter showing how long you can use the afterburners on your ship. The meter refills over time. (Wing Commander had a similar meter for its afterburners, but they wouldn't recharge during a mission.)
• In MechWarrior, the speed-boosting Myomer Accelerator Signal Circuitry is typically tied to some form of sprint meter. In Mechwarrior Living Legends, MASC puts out a tremendous amount of heat on the Humongous Mecha's reactor, but has no hard cap, meaning one can literally sprint their way into the grave as the mech overheats around them. In Mechwarrior Online, MASC has a direct sprint meter; albeit starting from 0% and going up. Above 75%, the mech's leg actuators start to jam up, causing continued leg Subsystem Damage.
• In the Paleo Pines demo, both the player and their helpers have stamina. Whenever they perform certain actions, such as destroying objects, dashing, or plowing, they lose a set amount of stamina. It doesn't regenerate automatically.
• In Potion Permit, You have a stamina meter that's separate from your HP meter, which tells you how much energy you have left to use your tools. It can be recovered by eating food, sleeping, or relaxing at the bathhouse. Unlike with HP, running out of stamina will not instantly make you faint, although your running speed will be decreased.
• Wolf (DOS) has an Endurance meter which is used for running at top speed for a certain distance; it's represented by what looks like a green liver, and refills any time you're not running (it refills faster if you sit down). However, you can trot for days at a time with absolutely no need to rest except for stopping to eat or drink; sleep is one thing you can do without.
• In X: Rebirth, the massive boosters on the Albion Skunk draw their power from the ship's regenerating Deflector Shields. Higher capacity shields and more powerful thrusters enable the ship to traverse longer distances before pausing to regenerate.

Sports Game

• In Backyard Baseball, you have a juice meter which measures your stamina.
• NBA Jam has the "turbo" button that makes the character run faster, pass faster, and jump higher for a short time.
• In both the NES and Wii Punch-Out!! games, Little Mac's stamina is indicated by a heart gauge with a number. Blocking a punch the opponent throws or having one of your punches blocked takes away one heart, and getting hit takes away three. When the gauge hits 0, Little Mac becomes tired and can't throw any punches. He has to either dodge the opponent's punches or recover from a knockdown for the heart gauge to refill. There's nothing special that having stamina enables you to do, so it's more like one half of a Sprint Meter.

Survival Horror

• Blood Breed: A large blue meter labelled "Stamina" is located in the bottom left corner of the screen. It decreases for as long as the Player Character runs.
• In Cold Fear, the "Resistance" meter doubles as this, depleting when Tom runs. The Resistance meter running out during Smashing Survival or Press X to Not Die is often a very bad thing, so exhausting yourself when near hazards or monsters can end poorly.
• In Deadly Premonition, York has a general stamina gauge that monitors his heartbeat, which is also why it raises when he peeks into people's houses, though very slowly.
• In Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, you don't have a visible meter. You have different characters, and the amount of time each can sprint is roughly proportional to the size of the person's de facto condition. Bianchi and Max are both rather hefty and consequently can't sprint for long. Pious is strong enough, but he's in heavy armor and exhausted; he also can't run for long. Anthony is immortal during his chapter, but his curse cripples his sprinting progressively, regardless of his health meter. Characters like Karim or Michael, on the other hand, are strong and unencumbered, and thus able to run for a long time. Even Peter can (& has to) book it for quite a while, aided by his youth and weight.
• The Evil Within also justifies your limited sprinting ability with the player character being a heavy smoker, but you can unlock upgrades to extend the sprint gauge.
• Hanako: The Player Character has a sprint meter that starts depleting when you start running. It replenishes when you start moving.
• Karen Sees: Bob's resides in the top right corner of the screen under the complaint counter. It gains a green ring around it that starts depleting whenever Bob starts running, and replenishes before disappearing whenever he stops.
• Mr. Hopp's Playhouse: Ruby has a Stamina meter that drains when she runs.
• Murder House: Emma off-handedly mentions having pulled a tendon before arriving at the titular house, giving her a sprint meter that the child Decoy Protagonist lacked.
• My Dear Sister: A white sprint meter appears at the bottom of the screen whenever Alice starts running. It can drain pretty quickly, too.
• This is played with in Neverending Nightmares; you can run for a limited time, but calling it a "sprint" is being generous. You can only run a short distance, during which you move progressively slower and slower before stopping to have a mini asthma attack. Since there's no HUD elements, there's no actual meter; instead, you have to listen to Thomas' rattling breaths to let you know how far you've run the meter down.
• The Obscura Experiment: A sprint meter appears in the center of the screen whenever Priya starts running. It starts replenishing when she stops running, and disappears once it's filled up.
• Outlast II: Blake has a hidden stamina meter that drains when he runs or swims in water.
• Project Zomboid: No meter is shown, but if you run too much, your character will be forced to walk, and your melee attacks will become weak.
• SCP – Containment Breach has not only one for running, but also one for blinking, since actively watching SCP-173 is the only way to prevent it attacking you.
• SCP: Secret Laboratory added a sprint meter in the Scopophobia update, which limits how much human players can sprint. Said meter is quite generous - it fully regenerates in four seconds, and a full meter lasts for twenty.
• In Silence of the Sleep, Jacob can only run for short distances before having to rest up. Thus, it has to be saved for when you're fleeing from enemies.
• The protagonists of the Silent Hill games all have a hidden stamina stat that, after some time of running, eventually forces them to jog at a slower pace; Harry in the first game will become winded and start panting when he stops, but he can run more or less indefinitely. It is only really problematic in Silent Hill: Origins, as the protagonist, Travis, has the misfortune of being a smoker AND having a sedentary job of a truck driver, and so when he's tired he is very slow; fortunately 0rigins features Energy Drinks that instantly restore the sprint meter when used.stal
• Today Is My Birthday: The sprint meter shows up when Thomas starts running, and refills when he stops.

Tabletop Games

• Pathfinder has an optional Stamina system that functions much like those in video games: the PC gains a pool of stamina points that can be spent to perform special abilities in combat, running out of stamina causes fatigue, and the points are recovered by resting for several minutes.

Third Person Shooter

• In S4 League, you have a SP gauge which allows you to perform tricks like sprinting, dodging, wall jumping, and using skills. Because such usage of the skills makes it hard for any player to be hit, when carrying the ball, your SP is depleted so that it would be easier for the opposing team to kill you.
• Star Wars: Battlefront II has an "energy" meter for both on foot and in vehicles. Sprinting/turbo gradually drain the bar, while other actions (rolling, jumping from a sprint, or performing a trick in a starfighter) take away a set amount of the bar, up to and including going into a negative value that requires a longer recharge period before you can do anything that requires energy. While on-foot you can recharge the meter faster by picking up yellow canisters that enemies sometimes drop alongside the more typical healing bacta canisters and ammo boxes, and one of the awards you can get in the game, Endurance (for making twelve points in one life) grants you a bonus that lets your meter recharge faster.

Turn Based Strategy

• The Jagged Alliance series feature an energy bar beside the life bar. Running for too long, carrying too heavy a load, or getting hit by stun grenades and tear gas would deplete it (in the latter two, almost all in one shot). If it ran out, your character would pass out until it refilled, though you could drink water to speed up the process. In Jagged Alliance 2, the maximum energy would deplete over time, representing how tired your character was. You could only raise the maximum back up by sleeping.

Web Games

• One of the rewards in Amorphous++ allows you to sprint and outrun the nastier Blob Monsters. Unfortunately, that took up your sprint bar, which would only recharge if you stood still.
• The Decision series has a sprint meter that becomes infinite once the sprinting and health upgrades are maxed out.

Western RPG

• Arcanum: Of Steamworks & Magick Obscura had separate meters for Hit Points and Fatigue. The latter would run down when running, fighting, heavily encumbered or casting spells, justifying the Robe and Wizard Hat since robes were among the lightest non-technological apparel in the game.
• In Diablo II, completely depleting the sprint meter means having to wait for it to fill up completely before sprinting again. Potions exist to temporarily nullify it. Also, the game is kind enough to freeze the meter in the non-combat areas, allowing you to sprint all you like.
• The Elder Scrolls has a Fatigue meter in all games, which works somewhat differently between entries. Common between them, however, is that it drains when you sprint or use your weapons.
  • Arena and Daggerfall have a Fatigue meter that drains slowly but surely over time and can only be restored by resting, casting a spell, or drinking a potion. Sprinting makes it drain much faster. Running out of Fatigue makes your character fall unconscious for an hour. Also has a minor interface version of Damn You, Muscle Memory! in that Fatigue is the red bar with the green bar indicating health, unlike the later games.
  • Morrowind changes it so that the Fatigue meter functions partly as this. Running and jumping cause it to drain rapidly, though it will replenish over time if you stand still. If being struck by an unarmed attack or hit by a fatigue-draining spell causes it to reach zero, you will collapse for a couple of seconds. A low fatigue makes melee attacks more likely to miss and makes actions (spell casting, lock picking, persuasion, etc.) more likely to fail.
  • Oblivion is mostly the same as Morrowind...except that there's no longer a sprint button in the first place. Instead, moving slows the Fatigue regeneration rate based on your Athletics mastery level. Higher mastery levels reduce and even outright remove the regeneration penalty once mastered.
  • Skyrim brings back a Fatigue-draining sprint (which drains faster than Morrowind sprinting), and is otherwise similar to Oblivion. The same meter also covers your ability to perform power attacks, and to zoom in while aiming a bow.
  • Online has a meter similar to Skyrim's, and is spent to sprint, dodge, block, interrupt casting, break free from crowd control effects and use most weapon-based abilities.
• Evil Islands: Curse of the Lost Soul combined the Sprint Meter with the Mana Meter: it was depleted by either spellcasting or running, and it only replenished when the character was motionless.
• In Fallout 4, sprinting utilizes the Action Points normally used in VATS. Action Points are also drained whenever you use your Powered Armor's jetpack. Before it, Game Mods introduced this function to Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas.

Wide Open Sandbox

• Dragon Quest Builders 2 has a stamina meter that is shared between both swimming and running (the latter being to compensate for the fact that islands are much larger than they were in the previous game). The meter automatically upgrades at several level checkpoints.
• In Grand Theft Auto, your character does not have a visible sprint meter, but he will get winded if you force him to run for too long (there's a similar effect when riding pedal bikes). This distance gets longer as your Stamina stat improves, and can become unlimited by finishing the Paramedic side missions.
  • In IV and its expansions, the protagonists can sprint indefinitely. This is justified as Niko is a war vet, Luis is a bouncer, and Johnny could be explained as him being really good at running away from the cops, being a high-ranking member of an outlaw biker gang and all.
  • V makes the meter visible, represented as a blue meter below the map (which doubles as your oxygen meter). Continuing to sprint after it empties will start draining your health. It increases as you keep running, and once your stamina stat hits level 100, it becomes infinite. Chances are, you'll naturally max it out over the course of the story for all three characters.
• Running in Minecraft depletes your stamina meter, which can be refilled by eating. If you have three muttonchops on it or less, you're unable to sprint. If it's empty, you start to starve, possibly to death.
• An all-around stamina metre appears in Planet Explorers, limiting the player's ability to sprint, jump and utilise a sword. Mining and logging also drain the metre, but the player can keep doing these activities at a reduced pace.
• There's a Stamina meter in the Saints Row games, and in Saints Row IV also allows you to glide in the simulation. Upgrades increase the size and eventually give you unlimited meter.

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