It's a mechanic as old as games themselves: perform poorly and you lose a "life". Experimental Dutch title GlitchHiker went a little further, though: perform poorly and the whole game died.
An entrant in the Dutch Global Game Jam 2011 earlier this year, GlitchHiker was tied to a central server which was programmed to literally destroy the game with each life lost. Players could earn lives by playing well, but if they didn't, the game would experience increasing defects until it was rendered unplayable.
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Despite a weekend of people trying their best to "save" GlitchHiker, it is now no more. Well, you can download the thing if you want, but it won't work.
GlitchHiker [Glitchhiker, via Gamefreaks]