Here's more about the four basic views toward emulator saving: 

The paranoid saver is someone who often actually uses the one-button save and load buttons as controls. For example, this person would, when playing, have his fingers on F5, F7, the A button, the B button, Select, Start, and the arrows, actually incorporating the save and load buttons as part of the controls. He usually hits the save button every two seconds or so. If he dies, he reflexively hits F7 and keeps on playing without flinching. This is the type of person who wants only to beat the game and doesn’t care about actually playing the game through or getting good at the game.

The frequent saver is someone who plays, hitting the save button every five or ten seconds or so, but keeps his hands on the normal controls. Every so often (such as five/ten seconds, as said before) this player will move his hand up reflexively to the save button and hit it. If he dies, he also hits F7 and keeps on playing. This is the type of person who sort of wants to beat the game and sort of wants to play the game as it is and get good at it, too.

The occasional saver is someone who finds saving a nuisance, and therefore only saves maybe every minute or so, or if some landmark is achieved. In BC, for example, he might save whenever he enters a door or beats a level. For this kind of person, saving is cheating if abused, and wants to actually play the game through to a degree, and wants to get good at it as well. This kind of person is often someone who actually played the game on the original system, and wants to relive old days.

The abstainer regards any saving as cheating, because in the real game you couldn’t have done so. Therefore, this type of person is essentially playing the original system (e.g., the NES, SNES, etc.) on his computer without any extra benefits. This kind of person is also often someone who actually played the game on the original system, and wants to relive old days.

Which of these techniques is the “best”? It depends. If you’re only playing to beat the game, you might as well be a paranoid saver. In terms of building skills and getting through the game at the same time, frequent saving is excellent. If you have a grasp of the game and are working on skill at that game, occasional saving is excellent. Abstaining is good if you’re a fan of the original game and/or are a master of the game. It's really up to you.

  Miscellaneous but VERY IMPORTANT point: If you entered a level and have to get out, hit A+B+Start. You’ll exit the area just like that (and it’ll play a weird sound somewhat like an explosion.) In this walkthrough, I’ll refer to pushing A+B+Start as [manually] “exiting” or “leaving” the level.

I could write another page about using A+B+Start. However, it is part of the original game, so you can guiltlessly use these three keys right before you're going to die. This is sort of cheap, though. It's a lot like using the save and load functions; you can prevent dying. This is also for you to decide. However, in any case, you should use this no matter what in some cases; if you're low on lives, for instance.

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