Gheebee, how many more points could you score while using as many lives as possible? It's not like lives are tallied up at the end.
i.e. dying at the end, and restarting on the high point value levels/checkpoints.
I've thought about that quite a bit but never tried it, even though I've played so many times part of the fun for me is trying to do it all with 1 life or, in most cases, as few as possible. Usually when I play I reset the game after I die (love that select+run reset!) unless I just want to complete it and be done or feel like I'm on track for a high score when I die that first time. Still though, it seems like something that might be worth mastering if I ever try for 500000! Hell, it might be a good challenge just figuring it out seeing as how some secrets can only be had once and carryover items from previous levels often make a difference with what you can get and how many points you can score.
Agreed: the most-satisfying way to achieve a high score is with one-life (less opportunities to scam points).
Now, folks can still milk stuff in a 1CC (especially for games where there are respawining enemies and lots of extra time), but thankfully the lifebar in NAI keeps things relatively fair.
I don't begrudge the person who creatively milks a high score (exploiting extra lives), but it is qualitatively different category of "high score".
