I've also noticed a generational difference in the 20-some years I've been in the workforce.
Millennials and Gen X were/are given shit wages too, but still gave a fuck because their Boomer parents sold them on the lie that you will get recognized for your efforts if you just work hard enough (because it was true for them up until the Reagan era). I'm a Millennial and even to this day I notice that I put more effort into doing my job the way I'm supposed to compared to my younger coworkers, even though I know now that I'm being exploited. I can't help it; it's in my programming.
Gen Z, on the other hand, was born into a world where everything already went to shit decades ago, raised by jaded parents who didn't sell them on the same lie because it was never true for them. So they don't give a fuck because they were never programmed to believe that hard work will result in higher income.
Doing a good job has value in itself. Yes, it's better to get compensated for that, but taking pride in your work at least makes the workday go faster.
Then again, I'm a millennial, so I guess I was sold the lie.
For me it's more about simply someone paid for this thing and how I get paid (unfairly but still) and it isn't that person's fault my company sucks. I feel bad if I don't give the customer what they expect and paid for. Like I can't fuck other people over just because I'm being fucked. On the other hand I understand why the McDonald's person doesn't give a shit and I don't blame them at all. The lie is deeply engrained in us.
Whether your company sucks or you're compensated fairly isn't particularly relevant IMO.
Doing a good job and feeling pride in your work has value in itself. Don't do it for the company, do it for yourself, and you'll probably be happier. And then look around for jobs that reward that.
Sometimes, I wanna pretend it is 2005 again, and aak the clerk aboit something. Of course, it won't be at GameStop and more at a local mom & pop shop, and I get most of my games online these days, but yaknow...
fallout 4 fixed that with survival mode. its actually terrifying going against raiders because one well placed molotov and you are fucking done for. and dont even think of fighting those bloodbugs, if you get spotted you have to RUN or youll be toast
Played the game last year, survival with a few mods, namely a huge modern gun pack, a ghoul mod and some super mutant mods.
EVERYTHING was terrifying. Walking through a city, if a hostile NPC noticed me before me them, a single headshot from a long rifle would drop me with full health.
Not playing on a harder difficulty ? I’m sorry if I missunderstood something but if you don’t like enemies having more HP don’t play on a high difficulty
Please don't use common sense on online forums, we don't do that here.
Jokes aside, difficulty settings should be redesigned. How is the question ofcourse. Better AI and complex movesets maybe? Fighting in general is difficult to design around, unless u go for a more puzzle like fights.
Unique mechanics like the Metal Gear delete your saveslot is a prime example of thinking outside the box that we don't see nowadays. Atleast not in AA & AAA.
I do enjoy settings like Ghost of Tsushima, where both the player and enemies die quicker.
I stopped playing on harder difficulty due to it being only about enemy health and damage.
I enjoy a good challenge, hence why I tried hardest difficulty first.
Difficulty can be done right if its done by using more or increasingly complex game mechanics and by improving enemy strategy.
One of the mods that helped fix this used the setting as a way to make things more difficult: enemy factions had strength and weaknesses. For example Animals faction was hard to sneak grab since most of them could break your hold whereas Tiger Claws were experts with Smart weapons and would counter your own smart weaponry. Chrome up dudes whose name eludes me at the moment were very difficult to Quickhack.
Other small adjustments also increased the difficulty like having enemy Netrunners use a wider variety of Quickhacks on the player.
Sandevistan is way overpowered, with any weapon. For example: knife thrower with sandy and the one that slows time on aiming. Sandy with a Katana or Mantis Blades.
Post game of borderlands 3 is stupid in this regard. Normal enemies becomes a question whether full ammo in all weapons deal enough damage combined, given that they are all headshots.
In a quick comparison Valheim vs Terraria. Terraria is numbers not mechanics.
I've challenged myself to kill mobs way before I was supposed to in epic souls-like battle and succeeded. There were even streamers trying to clear the game in "reverse" boss order.
Dude, Valheim and Terraria are both numbers. Don't think there's a single survival crafting game that isn't numbers. Your not beating any of the late game bosses in starter armor, even existing in the areas they reside requires bigger numbers. Not so say their aren't mechanics, but they both rely on enemies getting spongier to force you to make your gear (numbers) better. Basically if you can use gear to brute force a solution, it's numbers.
Ninja Garden is mechanics. Shooters are mechanics. Furi is mechanics. Your power level stays more or less the same, the enemies change but don't really get tankier, but they force new/different tactics. If you get upgrades it's mostly to bypass older enemies which you've already mowed down dozens of times.
Project Zomboid might be a mechanic intense survival crafting game. Armor and weapons only improve survivability slightly. Movement and experience save you from getting boxed in or losing from material means.
They make the biggest difference for each individual player. But an experienced player will take a CDDA character (scenario where you start with a bad character, naked, sick and with bad wounds all over in a flaming building in the middle of winter) and somewhat easily make them into the ultimate survivor, whereas you can give a seriously op character to a newbie with all the skill already maxed out and no negative traits and they'll probably die to the first zombie encounter.
A lot of words to say that PZ is neither a numbers game nor really a mechanics game. Ultimately it's more of a knowledge game
I think God Of War is similar in that you can do lots of side stuff pretty early and under leveled and if you are good enough you can pull it off, ofc it gets easier with better gear, but better gear is locked behind story progression
Valheim is absolutely numbers. Every fucking thing you do in that game is determined by your skill level in said thing. Running, attacking, crafting, even sleeping. It's all fucking numbers.
That describes the start, a bit hyperbolic but accurate.
The whole experience is more like "the zombies are always hard to kill, but you can get good at killing them" vs "the zombies are hard to kill, then you get gear or whatever, then the zombies are easy to kill".
Like you need good reactions. But I guess dancing & rhythm games fall under that too.
The other would have been "RPG" or RPG Elements, which meant your helicopter could "upgrade" its weapons, hull, manuverability etc. for xp/gold/cash/...
Not all hard games (or ones that can be hard based on settings) are about twitch reflexes though, sometimes slower strategic processes are involved and how rapidly you can click doesn't really matter so much as how much you can plan ahead.
I was thinking something like Factorio or Rimworld that can be a very slow paced difficulty without using bullet sponges.
Defeat could be the result of hours of just barely clinging on and finally collapse. Rimworld lets you reload or change difficulty, Factorio usually you get a decent enough idea fairly early on as to how hard it will be and if you are going to struggle then that is clear within the first 20 minutes or so of a game. Generally neither game lets you get 12 hours in easily and then you are stuck at an impossible wall outside of big mods or some very custom settings.
What exactly are you doing with this headset? Are you putting it on the zombie and putting on Joe Rogan's podcast until the Zombie's remaining brains melt?
There's precision, complexity, timing, punishment, and resource consumption.
With precision, you have to do things in a certain amount of space. To make something more difficult with precision, you shrink the spaces that the player has to fit through. Think of having a smaller road with for a racing game, having a boss with bigger attack hitboxes so the player has less space to dodge to, or having a smaller keypress window in a rhythm game.
With timing, you have to do things in a certain time window. You make games more difficult timing-wise by shrinking the time window. Think shorter time frames for a race, faster attacks from a boss, or tighter keypress requirements in a rhythm game.
Precision and timing are closely tied to one another so they are often treated as the same thing. In Rhythm games, for example, they are near-inseparable.
With complexity, you have to do a certain number of things. you increase difficulty with complexity by increasing the number of things you have to do. Think More turns back-to-back on a racetrack, more unique attacks you need to memorize from a boss, or longer rhythm game courses.
With punishment, you have to do things while only failing a certain number of times. To increase difficulty with punishment, you shrink the number of times you can fail before losing. Think of racing games where your car degrades from collisions or where there's cliffs on the track sides, where the boss attacks do more damage, or where you get fewer miss allowances in a rhythm game.
With resource consumption, you have to do things with access to a limited amount of time, energy, items, etc. to increase difficulty with resource consumption, you shrink the amount of resources available and/or how long resources last during use. Think giving a player less health, a boss more health so each attack is worth less, giving a player fewer health potions, make the player have to fight more enemies total (not necessarily more per fight).
All games shift difficulty with any number of these. a mechanics game will increase difficulty by demanding better precision and timing, increasing complexity, etc, usually a combination of all methods I mentioned.a numbers game will change difficulty almost exclusively by increasing resource consumption, usually by increasing enemy health pools and nothing else. It's also common for difficulty to increase by just making good items more scarce.
I want to also add on the last part; often the difficulty is composed of all of those elements, because each single difficulty element scales very badly.
For example game that only focused on the precision and timing has some limits where the game just breaks because it is no longer possible to move fast enough to keep up. At this point increasing the duration (adding numbers) of the 'encounter' becomes a better way to increasing difficulty.
Good example of this would be "Through the fire and flames" in guitar hero. It already tests your precision and timing to the extreme, then adds a long song duration (7+ minutes)
TL;DR: Game balance is incredibly complex, and the amount of attention to detail required is insane in order to keep all of these in check. You can do anything with anything if you know how.
Just to piggyback, it's actually possible to do any of these with mechanics or numbers, although depending who you'd ask this breakdown is either spot on or the wildest shit they've ever heard because game balancing is a weird difficult concept.
Precision Numbers: Think overflow. Whoops, you missed the mark by 1 or 2 and wasted some points.
Precision Mechanics: Best example I can think of is a bullet hell or a racing game as you explained. More enemies/bullets = less space to maneuver.
Complexity Numbers: Think bloated idle games and daily quests (aka Tedium)
Complexity Mechanics: Like adds on a raid boss. Extra things to worry about.
Timing Numbers: Time attack in a racing game is a great example of this
Timing Mechanics: Quick time events, but only if they're done well
Punishment Numbers: Less HP, more damage, etc. fairly obvious
Punishment Mechanics: Again going back to rogue likes, it's not uncommon to have multiple types of HP which swings Punishment around depending on how those types of HP work.
Resource Consumption Numbers: Drop rates, mana, health pools
Resource Consumption Mechanics: Usually this is where layering resources occurs, gear and a skill tree or a skill tree and temporary buffs, etc. Metacurrency can be considered either mechanical or numbers based depending on how it's handled.
Timing Mechanics: Quick time events, but only if they’re done well
You could also increase the reward for the correct response and increase the penalty for an incorrect response. For a fighting game, this means executing the correct combo at the right time does extra damage, and using the wrong combo or missing the time window leaves you open to getting wrecked.
Resource Consumption Mechanics: Usually this is where layering resources occurs, gear and a skill tree or a skill tree and temporary buffs, etc. Metacurrency can be considered either mechanical or numbers based depending on how it’s handled.
I also think forcing players to change the types of resources they use instead of sticking with the kind they prefer fits here. For example, if you only use the shotgun in an FPS, you may be fine on lower difficulties, but you need to switch to more effective weapons on harder difficulties (in Half Life, crowbar for headcrabs, assault rifle for people, and shotgun for head crab crowds or close combat, etc). If you use the right tool for the job, you'll have enough resources.
Man, this is why I love lemmy. There's always some extensive and insightful info in the comments somewhere. Great explaination! I might use some of these concepts in my dnd campaign
Like in Elden Ring you can beat late game bosses with a low stat character if you are really good. So basically you rely on your own gaming skills rather than on big number defeats smaller number. Sure Elden Ring is a mix between mechanical and numbers difficulty, bosses are hard because of high HP (numbers difficulty) but their difficulty also comes from their attack patterns (mechanical difficulty) which you have to dodge at the right moment and attack when there is an opening, so it’s also relies on the mechanical skill level of the player.
While in turnbased RPGs like Final Fantasy 7 you rely purely on the character stats to defeat enemies. Sure there is tactics involved but it’s impossible to defeat a late stage boss with a low stat character in those type of games. Since it is purely a big number defeats small number type of game. So that’s numbers difficulty. Of course you can defeat bosses that a low stat character shouldn’t defeat if you load up with a ridiculous amount of items like potions. But that’s still numbers difficulty. There is no mechanical skill involved from the player.
There is no mechanical skill involved from the player.
Right. But there is some mechanical skill, so a good player can defeat a given boss at a lower level than an unskilled player. But that highlights another aspect here: difficulty based on numbers means grinding can cover for a skill gap, whereas numbers won't help much w/ a mechanics-based difficulty.
I've never heard it phrased this way, but from context I'm guessing it's the difference between big bosses that have arbitrarily high HP, or if the game mechanics themselves are difficult.
Tetris is difficult because you need to be good to play it, mechanics. WoW is numbers difficult because you can buy the best equipment and then pwn the noobs even if you don't really know how to play your character.
Mechanical difficulty is how difficult it is to play it
Number difficulty is how easily you die or how hard it is to kill enemies
Dark Souls is mechanically easy (just learn patterns and dodge) but it has high number difficulty because you can die in 1 hit and it takes more than 1 hit to kill enemies
Mechanically difficult would be those fighting games where you have a list of 100 different button combos
Edit: Note instead of kill/die I should say win/loss to apply to more genres
Dark Souls is mechanically easy (just learn patterns and dodge) but it has high number difficulty because you can die in 1 hit and it takes more than 1 hit to kill enemies
I see it as the opposite.
Dark Souls is mechanically difficult because you need to get good at the mechanics to succeed in the game, gaining levels really won't help.
There are still plenty of mechanically difficult games, such as:
Titan Souls - you and bosses have 1HP
Cuphead
Celeste
There are plenty more, but each of those is mechanically difficult and there's no way to grind to make up for lack of skill. Dark Souls is an honorable mention here because you can make up for some lack of skill by finding better gear, but it's still more on the end of "mechanically difficult" than "numbers difficult."
You want low mechanical difficulty because it’s easy for the player to pick up and start learning
Titan Souls - you and bosses have 1HP
If that’s what makes it hard then it’s a number difficulty - a clue is that you used a number. If you gave the player god mode then would it still be as hard? If so then it’s mechanically difficult
If that’s what makes it hard then it’s a number difficulty
I disagree. Giving both the player and bosses 1HP means there are no numbers because one hit kills you (and them). So the only way to adjust difficulty is through mechanics, as in boss movesets, constraints on controls, etc. It's quite literally the opposite of a "numbers" game.
The opposite would be a typical JRPG. Bosses are more difficult if you're under-leveled, easier if you're over-leveled. Getting better stats, gear, etc makes the game easier because you have better numbers, so grinding is encouraged if you're having trouble.
In short:
"numbers" - adjust difficulty by adjusting access to better numbers (XP, gear, abilities, etc); players improve by grinding XP, gold, etc
"mechanics" - adjust difficulty by adjusting mechanics (movesets, speed, variety of enemies on screen, etc); players improve by practicing
Yeah but having discipline to grind and find an efficient grind method can be hard.
Some games like runescape are mechanically easy but number hard because the difference between optimal path and suboptimal is one of "never getting this within realistic time frame" which essentially is equivalent to a mechanic defeat.
If the "optimal path" still sucks, it's just poorly designed. Runescape sucks because even the optimal path sucks. I did the math and found the optimal way to grind mining, for example, but I gave up around level 50 or so because it was clearly a game of diminishing returns and I hadn't been having fun for months.
Unlock jokers? It has an "unlock all" button in the collection section, if you don't mind missing out on achievements which I don't. Never understood them.
I believe that was implemented for people getting the mobile version after having played on another platform and not wanting to unlock everything again?
But yeah, you can certainly go that route, making it all mechanics and no numbers
I feel like anon could’ve researched this online ahead of time
Yeah, nobody should ask clerks about their product anymore, that time is over. Most chains don't give a fuck about returning happy customers.
They also don't pay the clerks enough to give a shit.
I've also noticed a generational difference in the 20-some years I've been in the workforce.
Millennials and Gen X were/are given shit wages too, but still gave a fuck because their Boomer parents sold them on the lie that you will get recognized for your efforts if you just work hard enough (because it was true for them up until the Reagan era). I'm a Millennial and even to this day I notice that I put more effort into doing my job the way I'm supposed to compared to my younger coworkers, even though I know now that I'm being exploited. I can't help it; it's in my programming.
Gen Z, on the other hand, was born into a world where everything already went to shit decades ago, raised by jaded parents who didn't sell them on the same lie because it was never true for them. So they don't give a fuck because they were never programmed to believe that hard work will result in higher income.
Hmm, sounds like crappy parents.
Doing a good job has value in itself. Yes, it's better to get compensated for that, but taking pride in your work at least makes the workday go faster.
Then again, I'm a millennial, so I guess I was sold the lie.
For me it's more about simply someone paid for this thing and how I get paid (unfairly but still) and it isn't that person's fault my company sucks. I feel bad if I don't give the customer what they expect and paid for. Like I can't fuck other people over just because I'm being fucked. On the other hand I understand why the McDonald's person doesn't give a shit and I don't blame them at all. The lie is deeply engrained in us.
Whether your company sucks or you're compensated fairly isn't particularly relevant IMO.
Doing a good job and feeling pride in your work has value in itself. Don't do it for the company, do it for yourself, and you'll probably be happier. And then look around for jobs that reward that.
Asking a store clerk to know intricate details of every one of their products is an insane ask regardless of how much you pay them.
Sometimes, I wanna pretend it is 2005 again, and aak the clerk aboit something. Of course, it won't be at GameStop and more at a local mom & pop shop, and I get most of my games online these days, but yaknow...
It's all just bullet sponges..
Vanilla Cyberpunk 2077 is like that on higher dificulties and it sucks. Luckily there are mods to fix that.
Skyrim does this too, fortunately mods fix it. I want hard to mean I can die as easily as everyone else.
On most games that I can i play on easy to normal so enemies aren't bullet sponges. But to balance I never invest any points in health
fallout 4 fixed that with survival mode. its actually terrifying going against raiders because one well placed molotov and you are fucking done for. and dont even think of fighting those bloodbugs, if you get spotted you have to RUN or youll be toast
Played the game last year, survival with a few mods, namely a huge modern gun pack, a ghoul mod and some super mutant mods.
EVERYTHING was terrifying. Walking through a city, if a hostile NPC noticed me before me them, a single headshot from a long rifle would drop me with full health.
dude one time i tried going to goodneighbor and everytime i tried raiders or gunners would kill me before the bridge
the ONE TIME i made it past the bridge, a yao guai comes out of nowhere and kills me
Like,
Not playing on a harder difficulty ? I’m sorry if I missunderstood something but if you don’t like enemies having more HP don’t play on a high difficulty
In many games harder difficulty means more, smarter, more aggressive or higher damage enemies. Increased HP is often the worst option
Please don't use common sense on online forums, we don't do that here.
Jokes aside, difficulty settings should be redesigned. How is the question ofcourse. Better AI and complex movesets maybe? Fighting in general is difficult to design around, unless u go for a more puzzle like fights.
Unique mechanics like the Metal Gear delete your saveslot is a prime example of thinking outside the box that we don't see nowadays. Atleast not in AA & AAA.
I do enjoy settings like Ghost of Tsushima, where both the player and enemies die quicker.
I stopped playing on harder difficulty due to it being only about enemy health and damage.
I enjoy a good challenge, hence why I tried hardest difficulty first.
Difficulty can be done right if its done by using more or increasingly complex game mechanics and by improving enemy strategy.
One of the mods that helped fix this used the setting as a way to make things more difficult: enemy factions had strength and weaknesses. For example Animals faction was hard to sneak grab since most of them could break your hold whereas Tiger Claws were experts with Smart weapons and would counter your own smart weaponry. Chrome up dudes whose name eludes me at the moment were very difficult to Quickhack.
Other small adjustments also increased the difficulty like having enemy Netrunners use a wider variety of Quickhacks on the player.
The issue witn those adjustments is that they are very specific
For example, they are all countered by one of the most popular builds: the shotgun sandevistan
Sandevistan is way overpowered, with any weapon. For example: knife thrower with sandy and the one that slows time on aiming. Sandy with a Katana or Mantis Blades.
In the original thief game, the higher difficulties added more objectives
Interesting!
Post game of borderlands 3 is stupid in this regard. Normal enemies becomes a question whether full ammo in all weapons deal enough damage combined, given that they are all headshots.
Fake. This guy has never been called “sir”.
Anon doesn't even get called by tech scammers
yeah, the odor is just too strong
Gay: if the cashier was male, he would've loved the game.
Holy shit I never heard of this before but totally get why I love Valheim. It's actually got some mechanics and not only numbers!!
Edit: clarifying not just mechanics but a mix.
In a market plagued by generic survival crafting games, valheims devs wondered "what if we were the most generic of all?"
In a quick comparison Valheim vs Terraria. Terraria is numbers not mechanics.
I've challenged myself to kill mobs way before I was supposed to in epic souls-like battle and succeeded. There were even streamers trying to clear the game in "reverse" boss order.
Can't pull that in most games.
Dude, Valheim and Terraria are both numbers. Don't think there's a single survival crafting game that isn't numbers. Your not beating any of the late game bosses in starter armor, even existing in the areas they reside requires bigger numbers. Not so say their aren't mechanics, but they both rely on enemies getting spongier to force you to make your gear (numbers) better. Basically if you can use gear to brute force a solution, it's numbers.
Ninja Garden is mechanics. Shooters are mechanics. Furi is mechanics. Your power level stays more or less the same, the enemies change but don't really get tankier, but they force new/different tactics. If you get upgrades it's mostly to bypass older enemies which you've already mowed down dozens of times.
This is all imo.
Very valid. Valhiem has more mechanics than most sandbox games.
But it's numbers because its impossible to beat the end boss in starter gear.
Project Zomboid might be a mechanic intense survival crafting game. Armor and weapons only improve survivability slightly. Movement and experience save you from getting boxed in or losing from material means.
Doesn’t Zomboid rely on numbers in terms of skill levels for shooting, running, etc?
Mechanics come into play, sure, but the weapons and skill levels seem to make the biggest difference.
They make the biggest difference for each individual player. But an experienced player will take a CDDA character (scenario where you start with a bad character, naked, sick and with bad wounds all over in a flaming building in the middle of winter) and somewhat easily make them into the ultimate survivor, whereas you can give a seriously op character to a newbie with all the skill already maxed out and no negative traits and they'll probably die to the first zombie encounter.
A lot of words to say that PZ is neither a numbers game nor really a mechanics game. Ultimately it's more of a knowledge game
I think God Of War is similar in that you can do lots of side stuff pretty early and under leveled and if you are good enough you can pull it off, ofc it gets easier with better gear, but better gear is locked behind story progression
Valheim is absolutely numbers. Every fucking thing you do in that game is determined by your skill level in said thing. Running, attacking, crafting, even sleeping. It's all fucking numbers.
I don’t get it. Someone explain to me Plz
Some games test your skills. Other games test your patience. Both are hard, but the latter is a lot less fun.
It's the difference between a zombie only dying from a carefully aimed headset, vs only dying after smacking it with a stick 274 times.
That describes the start, a bit hyperbolic but accurate.
The whole experience is more like "the zombies are always hard to kill, but you can get good at killing them" vs "the zombies are hard to kill, then you get gear or whatever, then the zombies are easy to kill".
Which one is "The zombies scale as your character does, so the longer you play the harder they are to kill"?
Numbers
Could be mechanics, if the zombies get upgrades as the game goes on.
If difficulty goes up because gameplay changes, it's mechanics. Otherwise it's numbers.
I wanted to make it more clear for those not too familiar with gaming
We used to call them twitch games IIRC.
Like you need good reactions. But I guess dancing & rhythm games fall under that too.
The other would have been "RPG" or RPG Elements, which meant your helicopter could "upgrade" its weapons, hull, manuverability etc. for xp/gold/cash/...
Not all hard games (or ones that can be hard based on settings) are about twitch reflexes though, sometimes slower strategic processes are involved and how rapidly you can click doesn't really matter so much as how much you can plan ahead.
Yeah, I didn't like how they claimed they're all twitch games either.
Timing is usually a factor, but it's not like they're all fast paced. In my opinion shit like Dark Souls is pretty slow paced a lot of the time.
I was thinking something like Factorio or Rimworld that can be a very slow paced difficulty without using bullet sponges.
Defeat could be the result of hours of just barely clinging on and finally collapse. Rimworld lets you reload or change difficulty, Factorio usually you get a decent enough idea fairly early on as to how hard it will be and if you are going to struggle then that is clear within the first 20 minutes or so of a game. Generally neither game lets you get 12 hours in easily and then you are stuck at an impossible wall outside of big mods or some very custom settings.
Well of course. Chess comes to mind :-)
I'm looking at the headset hanging on my wall with apprehension now.
What exactly are you doing with this headset? Are you putting it on the zombie and putting on Joe Rogan's podcast until the Zombie's remaining brains melt?
You break the headband and use it as a pair of nunchucks
There's precision, complexity, timing, punishment, and resource consumption.
With precision, you have to do things in a certain amount of space. To make something more difficult with precision, you shrink the spaces that the player has to fit through. Think of having a smaller road with for a racing game, having a boss with bigger attack hitboxes so the player has less space to dodge to, or having a smaller keypress window in a rhythm game.
With timing, you have to do things in a certain time window. You make games more difficult timing-wise by shrinking the time window. Think shorter time frames for a race, faster attacks from a boss, or tighter keypress requirements in a rhythm game.
Precision and timing are closely tied to one another so they are often treated as the same thing. In Rhythm games, for example, they are near-inseparable.
With complexity, you have to do a certain number of things. you increase difficulty with complexity by increasing the number of things you have to do. Think More turns back-to-back on a racetrack, more unique attacks you need to memorize from a boss, or longer rhythm game courses.
With punishment, you have to do things while only failing a certain number of times. To increase difficulty with punishment, you shrink the number of times you can fail before losing. Think of racing games where your car degrades from collisions or where there's cliffs on the track sides, where the boss attacks do more damage, or where you get fewer miss allowances in a rhythm game.
With resource consumption, you have to do things with access to a limited amount of time, energy, items, etc. to increase difficulty with resource consumption, you shrink the amount of resources available and/or how long resources last during use. Think giving a player less health, a boss more health so each attack is worth less, giving a player fewer health potions, make the player have to fight more enemies total (not necessarily more per fight).
All games shift difficulty with any number of these. a mechanics game will increase difficulty by demanding better precision and timing, increasing complexity, etc, usually a combination of all methods I mentioned. a numbers game will change difficulty almost exclusively by increasing resource consumption, usually by increasing enemy health pools and nothing else. It's also common for difficulty to increase by just making good items more scarce.
Very good and detailed explanation!
I want to also add on the last part; often the difficulty is composed of all of those elements, because each single difficulty element scales very badly.
For example game that only focused on the precision and timing has some limits where the game just breaks because it is no longer possible to move fast enough to keep up. At this point increasing the duration (adding numbers) of the 'encounter' becomes a better way to increasing difficulty.
Good example of this would be "Through the fire and flames" in guitar hero. It already tests your precision and timing to the extreme, then adds a long song duration (7+ minutes)
TL;DR: Game balance is incredibly complex, and the amount of attention to detail required is insane in order to keep all of these in check. You can do anything with anything if you know how.
Just to piggyback, it's actually possible to do any of these with mechanics or numbers, although depending who you'd ask this breakdown is either spot on or the wildest shit they've ever heard because game balancing is a weird difficult concept.
Precision Numbers: Think overflow. Whoops, you missed the mark by 1 or 2 and wasted some points.
Precision Mechanics: Best example I can think of is a bullet hell or a racing game as you explained. More enemies/bullets = less space to maneuver.
Complexity Numbers: Think bloated idle games and daily quests (aka Tedium)
Complexity Mechanics: Like adds on a raid boss. Extra things to worry about.
Timing Numbers: Time attack in a racing game is a great example of this
Timing Mechanics: Quick time events, but only if they're done well
Punishment Numbers: Less HP, more damage, etc. fairly obvious
Punishment Mechanics: Again going back to rogue likes, it's not uncommon to have multiple types of HP which swings Punishment around depending on how those types of HP work.
Resource Consumption Numbers: Drop rates, mana, health pools
Resource Consumption Mechanics: Usually this is where layering resources occurs, gear and a skill tree or a skill tree and temporary buffs, etc. Metacurrency can be considered either mechanical or numbers based depending on how it's handled.
You could also increase the reward for the correct response and increase the penalty for an incorrect response. For a fighting game, this means executing the correct combo at the right time does extra damage, and using the wrong combo or missing the time window leaves you open to getting wrecked.
I also think forcing players to change the types of resources they use instead of sticking with the kind they prefer fits here. For example, if you only use the shotgun in an FPS, you may be fine on lower difficulties, but you need to switch to more effective weapons on harder difficulties (in Half Life, crowbar for headcrabs, assault rifle for people, and shotgun for head crab crowds or close combat, etc). If you use the right tool for the job, you'll have enough resources.
Man, this is why I love lemmy. There's always some extensive and insightful info in the comments somewhere. Great explaination! I might use some of these concepts in my dnd campaign
Like in Elden Ring you can beat late game bosses with a low stat character if you are really good. So basically you rely on your own gaming skills rather than on big number defeats smaller number. Sure Elden Ring is a mix between mechanical and numbers difficulty, bosses are hard because of high HP (numbers difficulty) but their difficulty also comes from their attack patterns (mechanical difficulty) which you have to dodge at the right moment and attack when there is an opening, so it’s also relies on the mechanical skill level of the player.
While in turnbased RPGs like Final Fantasy 7 you rely purely on the character stats to defeat enemies. Sure there is tactics involved but it’s impossible to defeat a late stage boss with a low stat character in those type of games. Since it is purely a big number defeats small number type of game. So that’s numbers difficulty. Of course you can defeat bosses that a low stat character shouldn’t defeat if you load up with a ridiculous amount of items like potions. But that’s still numbers difficulty. There is no mechanical skill involved from the player.
(edit: spelling)
Right. But there is some mechanical skill, so a good player can defeat a given boss at a lower level than an unskilled player. But that highlights another aspect here: difficulty based on numbers means grinding can cover for a skill gap, whereas numbers won't help much w/ a mechanics-based difficulty.
I've never heard it phrased this way, but from context I'm guessing it's the difference between big bosses that have arbitrarily high HP, or if the game mechanics themselves are difficult.
Tetris is difficult because you need to be good to play it, mechanics. WoW is numbers difficult because you can buy the best equipment and then pwn the noobs even if you don't really know how to play your character.
Mechanical difficulty is how difficult it is to play it
Number difficulty is how easily you die or how hard it is to kill enemies
Dark Souls is mechanically easy (just learn patterns and dodge) but it has high number difficulty because you can die in 1 hit and it takes more than 1 hit to kill enemies
Mechanically difficult would be those fighting games where you have a list of 100 different button combos
Edit: Note instead of kill/die I should say win/loss to apply to more genres
I see it as the opposite.
Dark Souls is mechanically difficult because you need to get good at the mechanics to succeed in the game, gaining levels really won't help.
In short:
Maybe players view it differently because we’ve moved away from making games mechanically difficult
There are still plenty of mechanically difficult games, such as:
There are plenty more, but each of those is mechanically difficult and there's no way to grind to make up for lack of skill. Dark Souls is an honorable mention here because you can make up for some lack of skill by finding better gear, but it's still more on the end of "mechanically difficult" than "numbers difficult."
Finding better gear isn’t number difficulty
Mechanical difficulty is your entry barrier
You want low mechanical difficulty because it’s easy for the player to pick up and start learning
If that’s what makes it hard then it’s a number difficulty - a clue is that you used a number. If you gave the player god mode then would it still be as hard? If so then it’s mechanically difficult
I disagree. Giving both the player and bosses 1HP means there are no numbers because one hit kills you (and them). So the only way to adjust difficulty is through mechanics, as in boss movesets, constraints on controls, etc. It's quite literally the opposite of a "numbers" game.
The opposite would be a typical JRPG. Bosses are more difficult if you're under-leveled, easier if you're over-leveled. Getting better stats, gear, etc makes the game easier because you have better numbers, so grinding is encouraged if you're having trouble.
In short:
Is it myth of the sword or myth of the gun, tell me retail employee. Tell me!
Numbers isn't hard. It's just tedious.
I read tedious as tendies lol
If they were tendies, anon would prefer numbers instead of mechanics. 😎
Yeah but having discipline to grind and find an efficient grind method can be hard.
Some games like runescape are mechanically easy but number hard because the difference between optimal path and suboptimal is one of "never getting this within realistic time frame" which essentially is equivalent to a mechanic defeat.
It's really not.
If the "optimal path" still sucks, it's just poorly designed. Runescape sucks because even the optimal path sucks. I did the math and found the optimal way to grind mining, for example, but I gave up around level 50 or so because it was clearly a game of diminishing returns and I hadn't been having fun for months.
At least a woman laughed at him. That's worth good money to some people.
So which type is balatro
Largely mechanics, apart from the need to unlock jokers.
Fun for a game so centered around numbers to not actually be numbers
Unlock jokers? It has an "unlock all" button in the collection section, if you don't mind missing out on achievements which I don't. Never understood them.
I believe that was implemented for people getting the mobile version after having played on another platform and not wanting to unlock everything again?
But yeah, you can certainly go that route, making it all mechanics and no numbers
Luck.
There are plenty of mechanics, but whether you win is determined more by what cards you see than your actual strategy, at least after a point.
Remnant vs Sekiro
Remnant 2 is all just numbers until the final boss, who is a bigger load of bullshit than Promised Consort Radahn.
Have you tried shooting it in the head and dodging the red lasers?
It's the "randomly going blind and teleporting to an entirely different arena, vs an entirely different entity" that made it shit.
Better yet: Pokemon vs Titan Souls.
In Pokemon, if you lose, you grind. In Titan Souls, if you lose, you try over and over until you win (or give up).
Still a hard game though.
nah i get it.
Anon is Sanraku from Shangri-la Frontier.