Power-up
In videogames, power-ups are objects which add extra abilities to the game character, and\or increase the player's score upon being collected. The character typically picks up power-ups simply by touching them.
In the early games, they were often in the shape of coins or fruits, perhaps in homage to the symbols used in fruit machines (slot machines). In today's games, their shapes and general appearance may vary depending on the game's genre/plot, or even according to the power-up function itself. Often a hierarchy is established by color, in order to distinguish weaker power-ups from stronger ones of the same type.
Examples of power-ups from famous vintage games:
- Pac-Man: The fruit, which provide extra points, and the "power pills", which allow Pac-Man to attack the ghosts pursuing him.
- Bubble Bobble: The many objects, mostly food, which enemies transform into upon being attacked.
- Mega Man: The weapons earned from the bosses upon defeating them.
- Sonic the Hedgehog: The shields, speed boosts, and temporary invincibility earned from smashing into the small monitors scattered around the zones. The rings and Chaos Emeralds aren't usually considered power-ups, however.
- Mario: The Super Mushroom, Starman, Feather Cape, etc., which typically emerge from '?' blocks when they are bumped from below. The coins aren't usually considered power-ups.
Certain kinds of power-ups are very common, seen time and again in many different games. These include speed boosts (typically represented by a shoe), temporary invincibility (typically represented by a star or sparkles), shields (sometimes a literal shield, sometimes a "force field" surronding your character), three-way shots and homing missiles (mostly found in scrolling shooters), and junk food or herbs which restore hit points.
