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[Parsely]

Self-imposed challenges are the poor creative man's way of getting replayability out of a video game. Back in the day there weren't many good or easily attainable free games, and it's a trait that's highly sought after in modern titles which generally back away from the Nintendo Hard difficulty of the old NES days.

What is a SIC exactly? Here's the TV Tropes definition:

A Self-Imposed Challenge is a playthrough of a game wherein the player plays under a restriction not required by the game itself in an attempt to increase the difficulty (or immersion) and replay value.

Even if there's an in-game reward for the challenge, as long as the game itself isn't holding you to the restrictions, it's a SIC!

This is a place to discuss and brag about SICs you've started or done, and maybe even to propose and organize group challenges to see who can win first!!

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I've completed FOXHOUND/Big Boss Extreme (BBE) runs of all the main Metal Gear Solid games except 3. It involves completing the game within a certain time limit, on the hardest difficulty, without being spotted, killing any enemies (including bosses), using any healing or special items, and a limit on saves. I've done MGS1 once, MGS2 twice and MGS4 once, I've made short attempts over the years on MGS3 but I always get bored and quit. -.-

I've also completed two SL1 playthroughs of Dark Souls (beat the game without leveling up).

[scrdest]

I used to do this a LOT for old mobile phone games, particularly all the mobile Splinter Cells.

But as for PC stuff, I've got one for Hitman: Blood Money. Hotline Challenge - an exercise in playing the game wrong - essentially, play the game like Hotline Miami and go LOUD.

Mind you, it's more than just 'I fucked up, guard spotted me, shooting time!' - you may NOT use silencers, you should play on Professional difficulty on a fresh save, you should use a stash weapon if possible (i.e. the unconcealably large weapons like the assault rifle or the shotgun), you may not use disguises, you should not sneak up on people - just run in, gun down everyone, and run out.

It is really. Really. Hard.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I've done a Gravity Gun Only run of Half-Life 2. It started with the Ravenholm achievement but I had gotten so tactically aligned to the gravity gun afterwards that I just never stopped using it exclusively.

Have done endurance runs of Spyro 1, Spyro 2, Ape Escape, and MGS1.

Speedran Pikmin 1.

I'm currently embroiled in a controller-passing game for Super Mario Sunshine with two other people. We would have finished it long ago but can only have a session every couple of months. As is we have everything but the blue coins Shines, the final Shine, and the very first shine of Bianco Hills.

I did a thing for Hitman: Blood Money where I killed everybody on a level without gaining notoriety.

There are probably more, but I can't remember right now.

[Octobomb]

It I'm against a really bad team in Titanfall, I play in curious George mode.
Rules:
You are a visitor to a zoo.
As a pilot you must only kill grunts for titan time. They are pests and must be removed.
As a titan you must clear out the other visitors (titans). Allow them plenty of time to evacuate (let them eject safely) and pests (grunts). Pilots are not to be disturbed, although rodeoers can be removed.
It freaks people out to see you shuffling around without killing them. Be sure to avoid charge rifle and archers with a dash. It's good fun, especially when they're all new to the game.

[nogoodnames]

I'm currently trying to complete a sl1 all bosses run of Dark Souls. I just have to kill Kalameet, Manus and then finally Gwyn. The two DLC bosses are proving to be my hardest challenge so far. In addition to being the hardest bosses in the game, they both have absurd elemental resistances which render my best weapons useless.

[Parsely]

^^Not a single dead pikmin you mean? That sounds impossible.

I'm currently trying to complete a sl1 all bosses run of Dark Souls. I just have to kill Kalameet, Manus and then finally Gwyn. The two DLC bosses are proving to be my hardest challenge so far. In addition to being the hardest bosses in the game, they both have absurd elemental resistances which render my best weapons useless.

Four Kings are simply the worst. Asylum demon round 2 and fire sage demon also give me a lot of trouble. Everything else wasn't so bad actually. I really do need to get my hands on those DLC.

[Parsely]

That's crazy, tell me about your strategies and stuff. It does sound nice in a certain way since at some point you won't have to collect Pikmin anymore.

[Sir Charles Doofus]

Doing a nuzlocke run of a Pokémon game is fun.

You catch one poké per route and when it faints, it's dead.
It's the only way to get some challenge from the kid-oriented games without playing some badly level-curved hack. (There's some exceptions.)
It's made me the saddest I've ever been over a handheld game. (Any game, actually.)

Demopan in TF2 probably counts as a self-imposed challenge, too.

[nogoodnames]

Four Kings are simply the worst. Asylum demon round 2 and fire sage demon also give me a lot of trouble. Everything else wasn't so bad actually. I really do need to get my hands on those DLC.

Actually I found the Four Kings to be relatively easy. Pyromancy really helps for stacking on damage, and you can usually heal through the damage of one King when you get in close. You just need to make sure you kill one before the next one can start attacking you.

[Flying Carcass]

In City of Heroes I had two characters with which I'd sometimes try to defeat an arch-villain or giant monster solo (sometimes I succeeded, sometimes I didn't). In World of Warcraft I had a character with which I'd try to solo dungeons and other group content while leveling, also soloed some Karazan and some lv 60 raids at 80 on him.

[Fniff]

Hotline Miami
Milo the Drill: You can only kill enemies with the drill. Believe it or not, I got through most of the game in this run. Granted, I didn't do Assault or Chapter Five because A. that is insane and B. I got A+ on those levels anyway and that was the main point of the run. Still intense.
Sperlunky Classic
I Fought The Law: Kill a shopkeeper ASAP. This is quite fun but aggrevating: I think a whole game could be based around the idea of running from the law in a permadeath platformer not designed for shooting. Get ready to dodge buckshot.

[Itnetlolor]

I've done a challenge of going through E2M2 of Doom All-100% fists only before. Took me 2 1/2 minutes to complete in a single run.

Another more recent one I did was inMomentum, on levels with walls that you can turn off, don't switch them off, go around them instead. I beat my times by a few seconds, and they opened all those doors too. I was laughing at the absurdity of it. It also gave me some clever solutions to optimizing my speedruns.

I'm tempted to do a Speedrunners challenge of no using weapons to win a ranked match (including defensive ones like boxes).

EDIT:
Forgot to mention that the Doom challenge was on Ultra-Violence difficulty.

[Geltor]

But as for PC stuff, I've got one for Hitman: Blood Money.

oh my god i remember having soooooooooooooooooooooooooooo many of those.

kill everyone on the map using only silent melee weapons with no bodies found - aka impossible

[itisnotlogical]

Final Fantasy Tactics Advance
In missions that allow you to choose your party, only use one character. It's surprisingly easy if you cheese it but it gets tense during the Jagd missions (characters that remain KO'd at the end of those missions are dead forever). I only do it for single missions or rather late in the game, because it's practically impossible except with certain class/ability combinations. It's a great way to get tons of EXP though, especially if you haven't used that character in a while (underused chars get extra EXP).

Doom
I've never actually attempted it, but UV Tyson runs have always fascinated me: Ultraviolent difficulty with fists, pistol, infighting and chainsaw being the only weapons allowed. I don't remember if this challenge prohibits healing items or not, but it wouldn't surprise me. It's actually possible to beat all of Doom and Doom II this way, including the final boss of II via an exploit.

[Metalax]

Here are a few of those I've done in the past.

Half-life - Crowbar only.
Similarly for HL2 and the episodes crowbar only except where you are absolutely required to use another weapon.

Deus Ex - Non lethal completion, prod and tranq-dart takedowns only. Managed to get a fair way through a no weapons/items run at one point(reached versa-life) but lost the save during a computer migration.

Skyrim - No merchant run. Only able to use what you can loot/steal. This includes spell-books, you have to find them as loot. Variants of this in the other Elder Scrolls and Fallout 3/NV games, but Skyrim is the only one I've actually completed the main quest and a good portion of the side-quests/major storylines.

Fallout - New Vegas - Varmint rifle only. That rifle you are given for target practice at the beginning of the game? Your only weapon you are permitted to fire. Can carry other weapons to repair with but not for use. Have fun with deathclaws.

Fallout 3 - Similarly to the above, the BB gun you get during the intro is your only permitted weapon. Spend a lot of time running between merchants trying to find ammo. Excludes points where you lose access to your equipment such as during operation Anchorage.

X-Com - no plasma weapons/alien weapons, no armour above personal, no psionics. Actually managed to complete this one after many attempts with the alien brain shot down with a pistol.
X-Com - Hawaii single base run. Managed to get surprisingly far with this, up to my second alien base assault before it collapsed.

Bloodbowl - Orc, all lineman team. Managed to make it through to win the cup, but so many deaths of rookie linemen. Attempted this with a halfling team once. Much squishing.