No Save

Ludic Temporal Structure persistence_reversibility · no_save

The corpus provides no restoration of an earlier state. A failure or a character’s death is final; the process state cannot be turned back. No Save is the zero point of reversibility – every consequence persists.

Design question – Is progress irrecoverably lost on an error or abort – and is that irreversibility the experience?

Reference example – Jenga: a collapsed tower stays collapsed. Chess: touch-move – in a tournament no move is taken back. Minecraft in Hardcore mode: whoever dies can only return to the world as a spectator.

Compatible with

• Crescendo (DU-01) – Rising stakes because nothing is repeatable.
• Implosion (DU-06) – The one fatal moment.
• Rupture (DU-12) – The sudden, final break.