I dunno… I would think that the four white mages would be easier, in the end game at least. Eventually, it gets to the point where it doesn’t matter what a character is, just the items they’re carrying (not necessarily even equipped). Four white mages give you four platforms for Heal Helmets, Mage Staff, Black/White Shirts, Thor Hammer, etc.
The guy who played the pacifist necromancer in Diablo II (note: He only went pacifist starting in Hell) also made a spellcasting barbarian (was not allowed any weapon attacks at all), and the ultimate in a crippled Diablo II character: A hardcore (not allowed to die, ever) naked (no equipment at all) sorceress with no stat points or skill points/spells assigned. He actually managed to get past Andariel (the first major boss) before retiring her.
And I just remembered a couple more of mine: I often beat a round of Scorched Earth against nine Cyborg triple-turret tanks allied against me, without firing a single offensive weapon (so only things like Dirt Charges, Diggers, and Tracers). I once even managed to beat a round without firing any weapon at all (combination of falling onto enemy tanks, and undermining them to cause them to fall)
And in Hexen, I once played through the entire game (including secret levels) with the Mage, using only his starting weapon (the little wand with the unlimited-ammo ranged attack). It’s surprisingly easy: The only really hard part was Traductus (the cleric master in the Necropolis), and to a lesser extent Menelkir (the mage master). Zedek (the warrior master) and Korax (the final boss) are surprisingly easy with the wand (in fact, it’s probably the best weapon to use against them, due to its infinite range), and all of the other bosses and monsters can be handled with it (albeit with a lot of patience). As an added bonus, since your ammo is unlimited, you can tape down the “fire” button, and just continually shoot at everything.
One summer my friend brought his rig over to my place, and we somehow came up with the idea of a ninja run through Hitman in the Budapest hotel level.
The idea was knives only (I think we stole one from the kitchen), and we’d basically slit everybody’s throats without raising any alarms. We declared a draw about five hours in, when we’d pretty much filled up the pool with respawning hotel guests and bellboys and the machine could only manage five frames a second. Body count: 200.
Also did a nonlethal (tranq and baton) run of Deus Ex. There’s one plot character who has to die, but that’s it.
Played Fallout 2 with 1 INT. Great fun, this, though you’re pretty much barred from doing sidequests because your character can’t converse properly.
Played Jedi Outcast online as a kung-fu master - i.e., without any weapons. Given good ping I’d usually come in top in an FFA server by simply kicking everyone off ledges (Bespin, Nar Shadaa) or to death. Then the patch came out and I switched to being a forcethrowwhore for a while before the next patch came out that calculated damage by the amount of time in contact with the saber, which pretty much made everything I’d learnt up to that point useless, so I quit the game.
I made it two thirds of the way through Thief 1 Lytha style on Expert. It was fun. Eventually I got kinda burnt out on it, though, because you have to move at a fairly glacial pace in certain parts for it to work.
Back in Diablo 1, I’d play characters naked (no equipment) to see how far I could get.
The only thing I can think off is completing Super Mario World on the SNES without doing the 3 switch palaces.
Meant you completed the game with 93 levels done, some of which were quite difficult to open up without the switch blocks being activated.
Not old games (or not as old, anyway), but still fun:
Final Fantasy Tactics -
*Solo Ramza
*All Story Battle (i.e., no wandering around to trigger random encounters)
*No Special Abilities (i.e., can’t spend your job points)
*“Naked” (i.e., no equipment, which actually saves your butt on some later story battles)
*etc. etc. etc.
Super Mario World -
*No Yoshi (I haven’t tried this, but it’s not difficult, I’m sure)
*No Powerups (which I haven’t tried either, and frankly, is Nearly Freaking Impossible in the Special stages)
*etc.
Worms -
*Ninja Rope + Prod (especially great on those levels with a lot of steep drops into water)
*Grenades Only (I always lose those because I have no aim)
*Shotguns Only (Ditto)
*etc. etc. etc.
If you have a fast modem and lots of disposable hard drive space, you might be interested in this website, a collection of video files of people completing both old and new games quickly.
Okay, I have to ask, in Thief, in the level where you have to break the guy out of prison, how on earth do you manage to get past the guards who are in the cell block control rooms without knocking them out? Seems impossible.
Also, you have to abuse your character’s absurdly long reach while the guard’s back is turning. Timing and patience.