Video Game Difficulties: Too Hard or Too Easy?

[calmwaters]

That game was tough at times. I think I wanted to break my wiimote in the Lanayru mines several times.

Was that in the part with the volcano? Or the desert? I know I hated that temple in the desert: I hated that more than the volcano, actually. (Can I say one more thing regarding this?) I wish that you could've just slashed through the enemies instead of having to strategize. I know this is part of the classic Zelda games, but there were just some times that I got angry and wanted to decapitate things that move.

 

[WhiteMaze]

IMO, just ramping up enemy damage doesn't make a game harder, it makes it bullshit.

Couldn't agree more.

I find it terribly enraging when a game's hard mode means you will get killed if I hit you once, instead of twice. There are more ways to add difficulty to a game. Simply overpowering adversaries is stupid and makes the game less enjoyable.

 

[Ryukouki]

Couldn't agree more.

I find it terribly enraging when a game's hard mode means you will get killed if I hit you once, instead of twice. There are more ways to add difficulty to a game. Simply overpowering adversaries is stupid and makes the game less enjoyable.

THere wasn't any reason to add an uber counter on the first stage in Fire Emblem Awakening's Lunatic+.

(although, I think I'm more bitter towards that game because I loaned it to a cousin and he fucking deleted the completed Lunatic+ to make his own shit. )

 

[Sop]

I played that game too!

This is why I like Dark Souls.

Dark Souls isn't that hard, I'm up to NG + 11 on one character. That is NG+++++++++++

 

[Fishaman P]

There are many exceptions, but overall I'd say the difficulty is declining.

 

[MelodieOctavia]

For me it really isn't an issue. While, yes, sometimes I do like a challenge, I'm more concerned about the story and the experience overall. There really is no reward to me for being punished over and over again in the same area. Most folks would have a reaction like "Yeah! Suck it! I'm Awesome!" Me, I'm more like "Good god, thank fuck that's over."

 

[WhiteMaze]

(although, I think I'm more bitter towards that game because I loaned it to a cousin and he fucking deleted the completed Lunatic+ to make his own shit. )

I hate when someone does that to me.

 

[anhminh]

Why do your think they make cheat code?
Not everyone can play game without frustrating when they fail. I never forget the first time I play Mario, I always end up jump right in to that koppa face.
That just to say it not the game too easy, you guy are just too hardcore, that all.

 

[WhiteMaze]

Why do your think they make cheat code?
Not everyone can play game without frustrating when they fail. I never forget the first time I play Mario, I always end up jump right in to that koppa face.
That just to say it not the game too easy, you guy are just too hardcore, that all.

Mkaaaaaaaaay ._.

Well I still think videogames are indeed getting easier in order to appeal to the casual gamer. After all, ever since the Wii that we know that that's where the big bucks are.

What a shame..

 

[Sychu]

I have felt this way since the advent of the Wii. I always tell people that mario galaxy would have been my favorite out of the series had it not bored me to death for most of the game with its difficulty level. Easy/Casual games sell far far greater than more traditional cut-throat games but i beleive the key is to always give the player an option in difficulty which many casual games have failed to do.

A buisnesses no.1 priority is always "thier" bottom line and if they can make more $$ by doing things a certain way then it will be done:

Tripping in brawl > >
Casual oriented game system the Wii (I actually am fond of the motion controls for certain titles)
Bullet Magnetism in many FPS games ()
Increased Randomness in mario kart (honestly mario kart DD was the last great mk imo though mkds was awesome too.)
Casual mode in fire emblem (atleast we got to keep normal mode)
Watered down zelda (i stopped playing after twilight princess, tp was such an awesome game but just so glaringly easy and thus bland.)
e.t.c e.t.c. e.t.c.

Now compare the sales of each of those games in comparison to there counter-parts and more likely than not the casual version will have broken records in sales. Of course this is just my hunch i haven't "really" looked into it yet so if im wrong then i'll accept the fact.

Also i find that with this new era of casualness the arcade and indie scenes have also risen to the top on the sidelines with many challenging and unique games so its not like hard difficulty is gone for good. Can't wait to play Mighty No. 9!

 

[EMP Knightmare]

Honestly I can't remember the last time a game challenged me It might sound cocky if you will but when you're as old as me things tend to repeat themselves in various forms. Same thing just wrapped differently . . . . . . . . . kinda sucks really

 

[ILuvGames]

I am surprised no-one has mentioned the difficulty of the early 80's arcade games, especially japanese shmups. Or maybe my memory and my reactions are just getting slower in my old age .

 

[grossaffe]

I used to think that games were harder when I was younger simply because I was younger, but I've gone back and played some of those games, and they were legitimately difficult. Super Empire Strikes Back? Game's still hard to this day on EASY mode. Back in the golden-age, it was an accomplishment to beat a game. These days, it's an inevitability. I love you, Zelda, but I yearn for the days when Navi annoyed you to teach you the mechanics of the game, not solve the puzzles for you and tell you what to do. Only game I can think of relatively recently that I've played and been unable to finish was Sin and Punishment: Star Successor (that final boss on Hard mode is HARD!).

 

[elgarta]

Hmm, I wouldn't say games are becoming too easy, but rather that they were previously too difficult. Remember, alot of older games were built around the "succeed through repetition" or "coin eating" philosophy.

Alot of games do start off rather easy, but they get harder as they go along, and in many cases you can still create your own challenge by using the game mechanics.

Look at Super Mario 3D land for example. I felt it was way too easy until I got to the second set of worlds, and boy was that difficult for me at first. Now, for me the game was very easy whenever I had a tanooki tail/suit, since the slow fall was a god-send. If I wanted to ramp up the challenge, I could play through levels with no powerups or stick to non tanooki powerups since I don't do so well otherwise. And my son-in-law who is now 8 years old finds the game difficult anyway, and he has been playing Mario games for a while now. He still has trouble with NSMB on the DS, but he isn't exactly bad at the game or anything.

Even Final Fantasy XIII-2, which I thought was in itself the easiest Final Fantasy game I have played, made it easy for me to control the difficulty curve, as did XIII (although by default it was harder I thought). Since you control your leveling to an extent, you just hold off on boosting your characters. XIII-2 was a fun and occasionally difficult game for me when I leveled sparingly. The bosses offered more challenge, and even the random encounters took a few attacks to take out. I thought it made it more fun, but if I wanted to do a quicker re-play I could just level whenever I had points and breeze through it.

 

[marksteele]

IMO, just ramping up enemy damage doesn't make a game harder, it makes it bullshit.

That's my issue with a lot of games now, especially FPS's. What ever happened to games like goldeneye, where difficulty meant NEW objectives. My idea of a hard difficulty is having harder enemies in conjunction with harder objectives. That's what game devs really need to do.

 

[calmwaters]

I used to think that games were harder when I was younger simply because I was younger, but I've gone back and played some of those games, and they were legitimately difficult. Super Empire Strikes Back? Game's still hard to this day on EASY mode. Back in the golden-age, it was an accomplishment to beat a game. These days, it's an inevitability. I love you, Zelda, but I yearn for the days when Navi annoyed you to teach you the mechanics of the game, not solve the puzzles for you and tell you what to do. Only game I can think of relatively recently that I've played and been unable to finish was Sin and Punishment: Star Successor (that final boss on Hard mode is HARD!).

I need to play this game; I want a good challenge. Kick some tail (now there's something I haven't done in a while.) And I like how you say that the final boss on hard mode is hard. This is so satisfyingly amusing.

 

[DaggerV]

I've started to come of the opinion that difficulty is mostly psychological. Take Dark Soul and Demon Soul, mostly Dark Soul for me since I only played the latter a few hours, that game was kicking my ass most of the time, normal simple enemies, fuck the bosses. Even after owning the game I year, I still couldn't beat it. However, one day I was at a friend's house and he was playing this game, and the way he played felt soooo much like monster hunter, a game i dominated at. I loaded my game back up and flew through the game, dying only to the crystal dragon really a few times. Once I got over the oh shit I might die and moved on to I'm going to kick you ass, the game was a breeze. Same with the old Ghost and Goblin, I was a bit rusty picking that game up for the first time in over a decade, but I flew through it, and it's dubbed one of the hardest game ever I believe.


Also didn't read thread, drunk, will come back tomorrow.

 

[Vipera]

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[mr. fancypants]

yep playing with a shiny leaf mario is pretty easy u only have to touch yes touch bowser to win (in-game cheating)

 

[Psionic Roshambo]

Wow this is a complex question that I have never really considered that much. I often will say a game is too easy or too hard and I know on the surface that game balance is one of the tougher issues in game design.

Part of the equation is fun factor, if a game is too hard its not fun and if it's too easy it has no challenge so it's again no fun. Another factor is player skill, sure I can rip through most any game in hours if it's not an RPG (then I enjoy the grind for some odd reason I really enjoy being OP in those cases.) So trying to balance a game for your target audience is also a super hard challenge.

I guess it's like trying to guess what kind of chili people like, some people like a lot of beans some people hate any beans and there are a million different recipes, as long as it's labeled right I guess you can kind of get an idea of what your getting into...