If you play as many video games as we do, it's inevitable that you'll see characters die on screen. Death happens a lot in the gaming world. Thankfully, it's easily cured by pressing the reset button.
Still, we can't help but notice that while some characters meet their demise in relatively simple and painless manners, the vast majority of them kick the bucket in horrendous ways that we would never want to endure ourselves here in the real world.
These are our Top 5 worst ways to die in a video game. Check out the list and then tell us about the kind of death you'd like to avoid.
Tell us: What are your Top 5 worst ways to die in a video game?
-- Ken Smith";
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Spine ripped out
\"Mortal Kombat,\" Midway's classic hand-to-hand fighting franchise, has plenty of crazy ways for players to die. You can have your heart ripped out, be frozen solid and then smashed into tiny pieces, or burned to death – all bad ways to go.
But we think the worst way to die is by having the character Sub-Zero rip your spine out, decapitating you in the process. There's something truly awful about the thought of being torn apart in a way that leaves your central nervous system in one piece.";
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Sawed to pieces
It doesn't matter if it's done with the chainsaw in \"Doom,\" with the Blades of Chaos in \"God of War,\" or with a lightsaber in any of the \"Star Wars\" games – being cut to pieces is never good. Any way you slice it, you're dead.
But Microsoft's \"Gears of War\" adds insult to injury by attaching the weapon that cuts you (a chainsaw bayonet) to a high-powered rifle. You could have been killed swiftly and simply with one shot fired from a distance, but instead your opponent gets up close and personal and saws you violently in half.
Ouch, that really hurts.";
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Stomped to death
It's one thing to be stomped to death, but it's another thing to be stomped to death because some guy just shrunk you to the size of a gnat with his ray gun. And that's exactly what happens in Apogee's \"Duke Nukem 3D.\"
As Duke, you use your Shrink Ray weapon to shrivel up your enemies, and once they're super small you simply step on them with your big boot. And you thought growing pains hurt!";
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Eaten by a shark
Human beings – having the good fortune to exist at the top of the food chain – don't usually have to worry about becoming an animal's dinner. Another thing we don't normally have to fear: sharks popping out of the sand. But both things happen in LucasArts' \"Armed and Dangerous.\"
In this game, one of the crazy weapons at players' fingertips is a Land Shark Gun. Simply pull the trigger and it shoots a baby shark into the ground. Within seconds the little thing grows into a full-size shark that devours any enemy that has the misfortune to be near it. Now that's a disturbing way to go out.";
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Flattened by a semi truck
Thank goodness you're not Konami's \"Frogger.\" He lives in a dangerous world filled with cars and logs zooming by, a world where harm is never more than a second or two away.
But of all the threats he faces, it's the semi-truck we find the most horrifying, because when a large truck hits you there's no doubt who's going to win. I hope you like frog's legs on your road pizza because that's what you got.
Tell us: What are your Top 5 worst ways to die in a video game?
";
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