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Harmful touch

Video game concept

*123*
618
games
90
platforms

Simply coming into contact with your enemies is enough to hurt or even kill you. It is most commonly seen in platform games.

Notable people involved: Shigeru Miyamoto, Hiroshi Yamauchi, Thomas Mahler, Gennadiy Korol and Andrew Lackey

Alternate names: Killing touch, Creature collision damage, Contact damage

See also: chargers, instant death, collision attacks (when player attacks in similar manner)
Simply coming into contact with monsters, enemies, whatever else is enough for them to harm and even kill you without them having to raise even a finger to attack you. It's as if the protagonist is hyper-allergic to his/her enemies and either instantly dies on contact or shortly thereafter (on prolonged contact). Does not imply instant death although it is common (especially in older games).

Should NOT be used when two moving vehicles, especially aircraft, are in question. Or an aircraft and a solid structure (do you really expect an aircraft to survive a fullspeed collision with a highrise?).

This is sometimes reversed. For example, when Sonic does his spinning thing. Or when the game uses jumping on heads as a form of attack.
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Parent groups

Artificial difficulty, Damage, Game-like elements

Games by year

79818385878991939597990103050709111315171921 36918270

The first Harmful touch video game was released in 1979.

Nintendo, Software Projects, Ocean and Sega published most of these games.

Related site

Platforms

Linux74
Windows61
Amstrad CPC45
MS-DOS26
C6423
NES21
GB21
Amiga20
Apple II E17
ZX Spectrum15
GBA15
Atari ST13
Mac OS X13
MSX12
SNES10
Android10
Mega Drive9
Memotech MTX8
X3608
GBC8
Atari 400/8008
Arcade7
Wii7
Master System7
C16/Plus47
iOS6
Atari 78006
Tandy Coco6
BeOS6
BSD5

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