Three developers' different philosophies on difficulty for their games
cross-posted from: https://piefed.world/post/612204
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I think Terraria has a really good approach to this.
Your first playthrough is on "normal" mode. Boss fights aren't about skill, you don't have to be on your toes constantly, etc. — except, that doesn't matter. Because your first playthrough is hopefully blind and without the wiki, meaning you'll have really bad, inefficient gear, and most of the challenge will come from finding and understanding good gear and how the world works before you can even find and beat bosses. Normal mode on your first playthrough has its own kind of challenge.
After that you will know how to progress and want more challenge and excitement for your second playthrough. Enter "expert" mode. New loot, new super powerful cool accessories, everything is way harder, even basic mobs hit twice as hard. Now everything is about staying on your toes, showing your skills in boss fights, meticulously crafting plans — but you're rewarded for it by a new experience and what feels like a new, more exciting Terraria. If you get tired of expert mode (I'm gonna say 200–300 hours of playtime later), there's the ridiculous "hard" mode. And "hardcore." Endless possibilities.
But everyone is given a chance with normal mode, which is really extremely easy. Everyone gets a chance to get to know the game. But you are rewarded with the full game, in a sense, for playing the proper difficulty.
I don't mind any of these approaches. Personally I'd want a single difficulty that is made challenging but with specific accessibility options. Like disable quick time events, loose lock on, and other things to make the interface more bearable if you have a physical or mental disability.
While I don't care if a game has an easy mode, a lot of the "easy mode is accessibility" arguments feel similar to the "AI art is accessibility" arguments. Unless you can't properly interface with the game, having low skill is not a disability or something needing accessibility support. If you practice you'll get better at it.
The "but I don't have much time" argument feels especially weird, like would you demand a cliff notes version of a book or TV show because you don't have the time otherwise? If you just want the story just find a playthrough online.
If a game has an easy mode, great, it appeals to a wider audience. If it doesn't, great, it's catering to a specific audience. A game's not worse for having an easy mode and a game's not inaccessible for asking you to practice its mechanics.
If I buy a game for €50 and the game is too difficult for me to get past the tutorial, even with practice, I cannot access 90% of the game I paid for. You could call it catering to a small audience but it is different than a game like "pc building simulator" which also caters to a small audience that can at least be fully accessed by everyone (not considering impairments)
If there is no way of scaling down the difficulty then I would like a refund of the money I spent on content I could not access.
The 'just watch a playthrough for the story' argument doesn't work for me. Games are a unique medium in a sense that the story is shaped by player decisions. Even if there is not a branching story, giving the player agency over small decisions like cosmetics makes the player more invested in the character and allow for roleplaying. That's all lost when you watch someone else play the game.
Sweet Summer child...
Yes, there are dummies like that. I remember reading about someone actually bragging about "reading more" by asking for book summaries via AI.
Yeah I know about those services, though I wish I didn't...
Souls ganes has easy modes. Usually there’s an OP build or archetype which makes the game much easier
I think that is what Miyazaki's philosophy is. Not everybody needs to be a parry god, nor do you need to defeat the boss naked with a broken sword in order for it to "count". The souls games and their contemporaries are as difficult as you want to make them. If a boss is too hard, come back when you are overleveled and stomp it. Or use some cheesy build to trivialize it. That's what he means by "fac[ing] that challenge" and "overcom[ing] it in some way that suits them as a player".
I think Souls games went too far tho. If we stayed at DS1 level that'd be one thing, but the Elden Ring DLC just went stupid with it.
There’s a lot of “you made your art wrong” in here. If you don’t have legs, you’re not going to be able to play soccer. You can make your own no-leg soccer if you want, but I’m just going to make an “ew” face at you if you say that soccer needs to change for you. Try arm wrestling!
The best argument against games (or any software) that don’t work for you is that you often can’t get refunds, and that’s a valid concern, but it has nothing to do with the content itself.
A nonverbal person joined one of hubs Delta green games on discord and he accommodated it but was confused as to why they didn't just join one of the text chat based games on the same server. His theory is they were just used to getting whatever they wanted because they then proceeded to insist on playing a shadowrun character until they just kind of broke down that it wasn't working with the game and ghosted.
Difficulty settings are accessibility settings and anyone who disagrees can kiss my ass.
As long as the setting accommodates everyone, including people who want a difficult game
Yeah that's the point at least in my eyes. I don't see why it has to be one way or the other. You have absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain from difficulty accessibility options. If someone sees difficulty as some sort of status symbol... Well, don't project that onto me.
This is why I didn't finish CO:E33. I'm a from soft fanboy. I have beaten everything they made other than king's field. I head into brick walled the first Claire obscura optional boss after the intro. But it got way too inconsistent about halfway through. So I switched it to easy and it was just incredibly too easy so I lost interest. Wish they had something in between.
But yeah, if a game is too easy it doesn't captivate me.
You're not supposed to be able to beat every optional boss you find the first time you see it, unless you really are a parry God. The game allows you to circle back to optional bosses at later opportunities quite regularly.
Yeah, this was the first optional boss. I had such difficulty with the mandatory ones mid game is when I set the difficulty to easy.
Itagaki's comment here reminds me of Malmsteen's "more is more"
Aw little ying weeeeeeblebleblbledoodlesedledoodlewedleedleweereeeeeeeiiiiiii
Making a game hard for the sake of making it hard is a cheap way to increase difficulty.
The challenge shouldn't come from enemies being damage sponges or the AI having superhuman reaction times. It should come from player skill.
Balatro is one of the best examples of this. The game naturally gets easier as the player learns its systems and gains experience through playing.
Destiny 2 also had excellent skill progression. Say what you want about the game as a whole, but the core gunplay and the mechanics of its three classes rewarded players for improving their own abilities.
Even games like Madden and NBA 2K have, to a lesser extent, systems that reward player skill rather than simply inflating difficulty.
Many older games were made extremely difficult because they were relatively short. The increased difficulty extended playtime and made players feel they were getting more value for the price. That's one of the reasons games like Ninja Gaiden on the NES earned their reputation for being brutally hard.
As for Soulslike games, they're simply not my cup of tea. I fully acknowledge that they're well-made games, and if you enjoy them, that's great. They're intentionally designed to be challenging. While the original Dark Souls was developed under a tight schedule and has some rough edges, its high level of difficulty was a deliberate design choice rather than the result of bugs or glitches.
Isn't this the case for most Roguelites? It's not even necessarily player skill, so much as unlocking permanent upgrades (Jokers in Balatro, abilities/cards in Across the Obelisk or Slay the Spire, stat boosts and weapon modifiers in Hades, etc.).
Making enemies soak up more damage and deal more damage is lazy difficulty. Giving enemies more tools to use against the player is the better way to handle game difficulty IMO
Sekiro was my first Souls-like and honestly, it's way too hard. There are moments in the game that lock you out UNTIL you defeat a boss. I even got the mod where it makes you near invincible, and I still struggled to fight bosses. Delivery and world was awesome, gameplay was impossible for people like me.
Then I played Elden Ring where you can literally be over-level. I was getting beat up in one zone, then moved to another area. When I returned, I was better equipped/more powerful/better as a player.
That to me is the perfect balance. Lemme go wander and git gud (by overleveling or finding useful items that make the bosses easier). Every game should allow the player to beat a boss with skill, or plow through them through cheesing/overleveling.
Sekiro bothered me, too, and I played all the Souls games. I got to the boss that wants you to jump and redirect lightning, and I stopped. I understand the philosophy behind making bosses unique, but it’s basically a QTE without the button prompt on the screen, and that’s not what I wanted from From. Also that weird fog that wants you to use consumables. I don’t do consumables.
I like to tell people that Sekiro is a rhythm game disguised as a Soulslike. It's not bad, it's just... different. Fully understand how it would be a turn-off for many.
Celeste did it perfectly imho with their Assist Mode. Just add those difficulty options in for accessibility, with a statement that it is not how the developers intend for it to be played, but still to use it freely if need be.
"Celeste is intended to be a challenging and rewarding experience. If the default game proves inaccessible to you, we hope that you can still find that experience with Assist Mode."
It is 2026. Gamers should be able to enjoy any game they want at any difficulty they want without judgement, as long as it does not affect anyone else.
Exactly. I love Souls games but I think having an option somewhere for people that need it wouldn't ruin the intended experience. Especially if there's a disclaimer before you choose it.
I'm not mad they don't have it or anything. But like, shouldn't there be a way to play if you literally can't otherwise?
I think it would be a pretty good joke if they made the combat of the next souls game turn based. Still monstrously difficult, release the game on an April 1st and have the entire gaming subset of players switch their stances
The first philosophy is why so many modern AAA games are complete crap. Why not just have FMV of the actors doing the scene and have the audience press X to continue to the next scene?
One of these days, maybe we won't even have to press X anymore! It can just go scene to scene while we relax! Imagine it!
All art should have difficulty sliders. I want to listen to avant-garde jazz but I think it should be in 4/4 time signature and they should play the most melodic notes. And I think art house movies should have a version where the script is rewritten so the characters explain the allegories and symbolism of the movie while I'm watching. And I think opera should have someone reading what is being sung because I find it hard to follow along with the singing
I mean we literally do have accessibility settings for most art lmao what do you think subtitles and sign language interpreters are
Sure and we have subtitles in Fromsoft games so it's all good right?
Yeah maybe we should have even more accessibility settings too. Things that don't fundamentally change the game like changing the time signature on a piece of music changes that piece of music. Like, it wouldn't fundamentally change Bloodborne if there was an option to make Rom the Vacuous Spider take fewer hits to kill.
It wouldn't even have to get in the way of players who enjoy spending 5 hours slashing at a blob of flesh. That's the beauty of options! They're optional!
If From thought they could add difficulty settings without diminishing the vision of their game don't you think they would? I'm not against difficulty sliders if a dev wants them. I am against difficulty sliders if devs cant or won't do them. My point is artists should be making THEIR art and not art that caters to the most amount of people.
I know this is just a joke, but art should have a difficulty slider when possible if it will require active participation by the audience. Otherwise, it is just excluding people and essentially gatekeeping. Even art house movies and have subtitles, and music is often translated to text or sign.
Disagree. There are plenty of games out there that try to cater to the widest base possible, plenty of games with a bunch of difficulty sliders and adjustments. From should be able to make their art without having to cater to every single person.
That was not my argument. My argument was art movies should explicitly spell out the meanings and symbolism in their movie via dialogues so I don't have to do it myself. Avant-garde jazz musicians should make albums in popular time signatures and be more melodious. Otherwise people are excluded from enjoying those art forms
Now imagine there's a song that comes out that you like the themes of. It's catchy, it hits your buttons just right. One problem: When you play the song, it turns your volume to maximum. Others insist that max volume is part of the artistic intent. You just need to keep on listening at max volume over and over until you can appreciate it. If you could listen to it at a lower volume, it would be a lesser experience. Why? You don't see what this specific volume has to do with the things you enjoy about the song. People can listen to it at max volume, but there's plenty of people who would rather listen at the volume they choose. Why not allow for a volume slider?
There's plenty of music that I can't connect with for one reason or another. I don't demand artists make music I enjoy, I go out and find artists I enjoy and listen to their music. If an artist made a song that somehow turned the volume up to full everytime I put it on, that is their right as the artist to make regardless of whether or no I or anyone else enjoyed it. I fucking can't stand country music, so I simply listen to other music. If I demanded all country musicians made music I enjoy, I wouldn't expect anyone on earth to respect my requests because it's not a respectable request. There are many other devs out there making games with plenty of difficulty adjustments. You should play those games.
Everyone who is opposed to difficulty sliders should be forced to spend 200 hours on each game using a controller that simulates dyspraxia by randomly adjusting every movement of the sticks by a random degree and lagging every button press by a few microseconds before they're allowed to play it normally.
Add an additional 400 hours if they also say smug shit like this when pretending their ableism and elitism are just devotion to artistic integrity.
The devs who make games without difficulty sliders should never get their undoctored controllers back.
That seems like a lot more work than just trying a new hobby.
If someone wants to gate their game to people who can handle the level of difficulty, that’s their choice. There are plenty of developers who are willing to be accommodating, to get hung up on games that don’t
"There are plenty of ADA compliant buildings, don't get hung up on the ones that aren't"...
Are you suggesting that games that don't provide difficulty settings violate the ADA?
Personally I oppose difficulty sliders because I think they are overly broad and stupid, looking at you Bethesda and your lowsy ass health bar padding. Give me more zomboid and owlcat style difficulty setting where I can customize them in all minutiae.
But no seriously fuck difficulty sliders cause 9/10 they do overly broad gameplay things that some of which I may not want. This is coming from a guy who beat Boltgun on its hardest difficulty with the clown vomit filter so it's not like I can't enjoy ulta hard difficulty but what some consider ultra hard I may consider annoying as fuck see yet again Bethesda health bar padding. I do like NV 4s hardcore/survival mode though.
I think Mortal Kombat does it best. When you die to a boss, that boss becomes ever so slightly less difficult. Unnoticeably so at first, but as you die more and more and more, they get slower and slower and slower
Honestly adaptive difficulty has basically the inverse issue of fucking with shit when I don't want it. But there is a subtype of it that I do like, that being thingd like the narrative AI in the Dead Space remake which can do really neat shit to fuck with the player and keep them on their toes. Though for me it just made everything foggy especially that one level where it's just a bunch of cat walks which I'm pretty sure is already a low light area, seriously I couldn't see shit and kept getting lost in what amounted to a five foot area.
But yeah doing that for a skilled based game like Mortal Kombat seems... cheap. Like maybe I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure there is a difficulty setting in MK which if that is the case that means the game decides to stop the player of their agency and accomplishment rather than let them learn the boss. Not to say you can't do adaptive difficulty but as a general rule there's a good reason it's so rare, sometimes it's just fine but I rarely see it.
The game taking into account the players actions and effecting the game though to counter that is fun IMO. Like how high casualty runs in Dishonored make the game noticable harder since difficulty only really effects health, enemy, numbers, and detection rate also it serves the narrative of the story well. Also Adam Smasher tayloring his gear to counter the player which can be subverted to catch him off guard rewarding the player for knowing the world. Or the aformentioned Dead Space narrative AI which apparently decided I'm gonna play Dead Space after the crew of the USG Ishimura had a ship wide Silent Hill themed party.
We should abolish all art since there will always be someone with a disability who isn't able to enjoy it.
I really don't know where I land on this. I have severe concentration and coordination issues that flair up post covid, this means that I frequently can't play Fromsoft games. Admittedly I'm lucky enough that this is not constant, but I think I'm still glad their games exist in the way they do. They are just one developer and it's a niche genre.
I have wicked adhd and there are plenty of authors I can't enjoy because their prose is too dense. I don't demand they write to my level, I choose books that I can enjoy reading. Video games seems to be the only art form where people feel entitled to enjoyment rather accepting there will be things that your just not capable of enjoying. If Fromsoft thought they could make their vision with difficulty sliders I'm sure they would. But if they can't do that then they should never feel obligated to reduce their vision to something lesser to make it more palatable to wider audience
i feel that.
I've never heard a blind person demand that all paintings get narrated. I've heard them get real excited when it does happen, which is super nice, but the common expectation is (in my experience) and probably should be, you aren't able to experience everything. So just enjoy the things you can instead.
I worked as a guide at a rather large museum. We would frequently have various 'disability friendly tours'. One of em was for blind people (i took them almost exclusively to multimedia or otherwise sound, touch, smell based works unless specifically asked don't worry).
NEVER have i encountered someone upset that the art was not made available for them. Simply never was an issue. At all. And considering this was a 20 people pr group, many tours a day for years thing, i must've had well over a thousand people through. Never been an issue.
Do you think the entire artistic value of soulsikes is in their difficulty? That it would ruin them if players with worse reaction time were given the ability to progress at the same rate as players with exceptional reaction time? That Dark Souls would be essentially the same if instead of Gwyn, Lord of Cinder, there was just a floating hitbox with 4,185 health? What a fucking insult to Miyazaki's writing
I mean the entire theme of souls games is overcoming rediculous challenges in the face of what seems like an impossible task. These aren't games with amazingly written dialogues, or intricate in depth stories. The game you play is the story of your character dieing repeatedly until they overcome a great challenge to meet their goals. It would fundamentally change the game if you could just slide a bar to make it easier.
Let me ask you this, why do you think every game should cater to you? Isn't it OK for some art to not be for everyone? Isn't that what we tells chuds when they whine and moan about main characters being women or poc? Why can't some art be about the overcoming a challenge?
Sure, and what counts as a ridiculous challenge depends on the player. I can promise you that you have an easier time beating the Dancer of the Boreal Valley at 5,111 health than I would if she only had 2,500. We are playing at different difficulty levels already. The challenge is harder for me.
I don't. I don't like visual novels because there's not enough action, so I don't play visual novels. I don't care for sports, so I don't play sport games. I don't enjoy the basic mechanics of fighting games, so I don't play fighting games.
I do enjoy Fromsoft games. I apparently like the stories more than you do since you're actively insulting them, and everything between boss fights is fantastic. Literally the only thing I'm asking for is the ability to play a game that I already like at the same level of difficulty that you play at. Again, it would not fundamentally change the game if the Ancient Wyvern had half as much health.
Since I’ve seen your other reply, this got even funnier. “Do you think the entire point of pizza is sauce? What a fucking insult to cheese.”
“Pizza has sauce and cheese. People like pizza that has sauce and cheese.”
“I LOVE PIZZA, I JUST THINK PIZZA SHOULD HAVE LESS SAUCE! IT WON’T CHANGE THE PIZZA!”
How exactly do you think your analogy works? Because I think it actually makes perfect sense to let people put less sauce on their pizza if they want less sauce on their pizza
EXACTLY. What you’re missing is that you’re asking for alterations to someone else’s pizza rather than making your own or finding a different pizza.
No I'm not lmfao do you think I'm demanding that they make the game easier for everyone? Why don't Fromsoft fans understand the concept of options? The whole point is that you should be able to play the game at whatever level of difficulty is appropriate for you
Difficulty options aren't there to offer different experiences with a game, they're there to offer the same experience to players of different skill levels. People who are better at Dark Souls are playing it and its clones at a reduced difficulty compared to people who are worse at it.
But the more you play the better you get...
Like hell. I hit my skill ceiling in these games a long time ago, and I'm not getting any younger.
Maybe, but that's okay. Not every game needs to be for every player. I used to be very much into action heavy games, even did a big Nintendo Blockbuster tournament back when I was a kid and placed 4th regionally. And I was really big into the 2D fighting scene, particularly Street Fighter 3 and Guilty Gear series.
I'm in my 40s now, and I don't really play those kinds of games much anymore. Action heavy games are fun from time to time, but they make my hands hurt. Also, I just don't have the time to learn the meta, pokes, skills and strategies for fighting games anymore. And button mashing (like Mortal Kombat's "test your might" sections) is right out. I don't see the issue. Time marches on and we enjoy the things we can.
These days I'm more likely to play RPGs, indie, and retro games, with occasional dips into modern games, and while I still like fighting games, I'm more inclined to play ones that have a single player campaign and lower skill ceiling, like Soul Calibur 6. Anything with tons of button mashing or joystick waggling for range setting will have my hands hurting over time if I keep at it.
🤷. I'm old.
Both are perfectly acceptable philosophies, but many Souls players need to learn that losing at a game for 150 hours is not what other people find fun.
Most of us get that, but non souls player must also understand that dark souls on easy mode is just a bad game. There are no big cinematics, the story is scarce, there are only a few npcs. Those are games that puts you on your toes, you must be wary at all times, and learn to master the game bit by bit. It's not for everyone, or everytime (I think everyone can play souls game but they need to be in the right mindset) but they are my favorite games. But yeah gatekeepers suck
You're making the game on easy sound pretty good to me.
Gatekeepers make things good by keeping those who aren’t serious out.
mumble about keeping non-serious people out
(You can just ignore non-serious people as they don't affect you btw)
If non-serious people are the reason a game series I love gets worse, then they have affected me. It happened to Monster Hunter, and I don't want it to happen to FromSoft games too.
Why would have an option for easy mode make it worse for you?
Because it doesn't just end with an easy mode. It ends with Monster Hunter Rise and Wilds, and an entire series losing everything that made it unique all so it can keep chasing the lowest common denominator, who always start their erosion of a once-great series with "it's too hard. :( Why are the devs so mean to the twelve people born without thumbs?!? Also you should totally remove all of the hunting aspects from the game because it's super unfair to make me use my brain for more than half a second."
So I'd rather keep the dwindling number of games I enjoy as they are, and y'all can go play something else, thank you very much.
Top 10 things that never happened*
*in my experience at least, if this alresdy happened make some examples please
The difficulty slider is intrinsic to the system and the world. The whole point is that you have to make it easier by engaging with it on its own terms, rather than by forcing a change upon the world to make it suit you. This is never made explicit; the creator just wants you to either dig deep or bounce off it because struggle is the whole point or something, which is why we have to talk about it forever. Blah
You can just play a different game. It's a toy. This shit doesn't matter.
Diagetic difficulty is specifically not forcing play the way the creator wants. Its using lack of balance and making it part of the experience.
Why? Do Souls players not accept others not liking the games? Thats not my experience but maybe many are like that?
Also, usually Souls players dont lose for 150 hours straight. Most of the time its winning, but sometimes youre set back a bit and sometimes youre stuck. Some people like earning their wins. Some dont deal well with the difficulty and get frustrated, I get thats not fun for them. To each their own.
Yeah, the position of most FromSoft players in my experience is: "You don't have to like the games, but you can't just demand that they change for you."
Some people need to understand that not all games are for all people. I don't like RTS games, and so I don't play them! What I don't do is demand that they all add a turn-based option that would destroy game balance just because that's what I prefer to play.
Like, what an insanely entitled thing to demand. And for some reason it's only Soulslikes that have to deal with this craziness. There are thousands of other games out there for you to play, people.
The difficulty slider in Souls games is how many levels you've invested into health
You often can't do that until you've made a little bit of progress. The real difficulty curve early on is knowing that picking the heavy armour class will make things much harder for yourself, that the real progression is knowledge of enemy attacks and opening shortcuts, and that losing your currency when you don't have enough points to reach the next level isn't really a big deal.
And the janky camera controls. Those, sadly, can't be mitigated much.
That and some very strange ideas about where the jump button should be.
Why does everyone think every game has to be made for the lowest common denominator? If you don't like a game, don't play it. Besides, souls games can actually be quite forgiving, the difficulty adjustments just isnt in sliders. Especially in elden ring, you can beat every fight in a pretty brainless (i mean like not needing to dodge almost at all) way if you take the time to set up for it.
I tried Dark Souls and I tried Demon Souls.
It’s not my thing, but I’m glad they are a lot of other people’s cup of tea
Idk if soul players need to learn anything. Not your style of game thats fine, but all fights in souls games are fair in the sense that anyone can eventually beat it with practice, or overleveling, or innate skill (those who have, ahem, gotten good), and any combination of the three.
Have known a lot of people who played dark souls at a time in their life where they needed the lesson of getting up after getting knocked down.
I have that shit in real life. (Being taken down and having to get back up)
I work. I have to take care of the house/family. I had a leukemia...and I DID fucking rise up again from the dead....literally. With 3 prosthesis after, but hey, its just means im in a different game now (cyberpunk)
But we are talking about fucking games.
I am not a teenager with the time. Or patience. Those are both used on real life...you know...the bigger game. The real game.
I'm Not saying you can't have the difficulty in your...playthings.
I am saying that there are people who want to play the games you like, they are great fucking games, but we just don't have the time and energy to waste a few hours in the same fucking level/battle.
And that's the conversation: Having the possibility to change difficulty. That exists. It's not impossible.
You do you. No one is robing you of your experience.
Its just a shame....the gatekeeping.
Edit: I'm loving the responses missing the point.
I’ve never picked up a Souls game myself, because that kind of challenge isn’t what I play video games for. But I’ve also never felt like I was being cheated out of an experience, there are plenty of other games out there for me.
I think if a developer doesn’t want to add an easy mode because they feel like that would be an inferior version of their game, it’s their prerogative not to do it. When an author writes an intellectually challenging book, nobody serious complains that the author refused to include cliff notes or explanations. Why don’t we treat video game designers the same?
Hey sorry you had cancer; glad you survived.
I mean that, but you are bringing some weird antagonist monologue energy to this thread.
Difficult sliders are simply bad for certain games, soulsborne games are one of them.
You are also robbing your own experience BTW. Give yourself a fair shot at beating these games without taking the easy route.
And lots of people want to go to hawaii but it's a long flight and people with jobs might not have the time to go. Welcome to real life!
Play something else. (I don’t play games at all anymore but the last thing people want is a square coming into the circles room to complain there’s too many rounded edges.)
Gamers are so entitled they will argue with other gamers on matters of taste. “That game is not to my specifications! Instead of finding one that is I’ll complain until the game is changed! People that like it the old way need to know i have a job!”
I'm not paying for a game that doesn't allow changing difficulty if I want/need. I work two jobs and have to do most home cleaning and maintenance. I used to game competitively back in the early 2000s, but I don't have time for that shit nor gatekeeping.
Yeah I wasted money on 2 soulslikes before I realized it. Now I avoid them like the plague.
Which 2?
Dark souls I and Elden Ring
With Elden Ring, were you expecting a more “living” open world, like The Witcher 3 or RDR2?
Basically I met the first advirsary and spent 2 hours falling to defeat him. I looked around for another couple hours for something to make defeating him possible. Encountered other creatures I couldn't defeat. Never opened it again.
I'm a middle aged guy with a family. If Im gonna "git good" at something, it will be something useful I need in my life, not a soulslike. I play games to relax not to add to my very long list of problems in life.
Good news: Dwarf fortress is free.
Strike the earth!
Is it still available for free? I kinda assumed once it went up on steam it wouldn't be.
The steam version is the nice graphical one. The original is still free.
The original is capable of pretty nice graphics too.
Oh that's cool I didn't know there was a difference between them
Doesn't the Steam version just give you different graphics?
It also adds a lot of quality of life stuff you would have to mod the original to get access to, though as I understand it, the Lazy Newb Pack mods include most of those QoL changes. Though, them being integrated into the game itself will almost always be smoother than requiring the installation of a mod.
let's be real here, the steam version is mostly a tax on people who find technology scary and can't install a few things on their own
... or mostly a cool way to support two guys who have poured their LIFE into what has become one of the most notorious computer games of all time. Exhibited by museums, beloved by million, and distributed for free. Best 30 bucks I've spend in a while. If anyone deserves that money, it's the Adams brothers.
But sure think of it as a mean spirited idiot-tax if you want
It's also a way to support two stellar devs
I suppose you could think of it that way, though buying it on Steam, even if you're not going to play that version, does help support the continued development of the game overall. Their Patreon donation stream was apparently waning before the Steam version released, plus there was the family health scare Tarn revealed at the time of the announcement too. I'd prefer the entire project not get put on a long hiatus because the devs got unexpectedly bankrupted by the absurd healthcare costs prevalent here in the US. And the fact that they didn't take down the free version after the Steam release on its own shows that they didn't make that version for the sake of greed.
A lot of people in this thread don't seem to have gotten the subtle meme post in this image. Itagaki was the dude who made the Modern Ninja Gaiden titles and the Dead or Alive franchise. The dude was always a massive troll to both the media and players but was very dedicated to the vision he had for the games he wanted to make. He also had a very close friendship/rivalry with Katsuhiro Harada, the main dev for the Tekken franchise starting at Tekken 3 and recently cutting ties with Namco to found a new company that is, unfortunately, owned by SNK. Itagaki sadly passed away last year and a lot of old school devs mourned for his loss, but probably none harder than Harada given just how long they had been actual irl friends.
You know, the darksouls creator's quote pisses me off. Not because of his opinion, but because the extreme soulslike fanatics will yell, kick, and scream about how difficulty sliders are the devil and how the game itself has its own way of making it easier for you but if you don't play the game with their specific build, your play through doesn't count.
EDIT: had an extra "their" for some reason
Well first off, fuck them. That's just what happens when people lose at PvP.
His quote is absolutely right, and especially with Dark Souls 1. There's so many ways to approach the game that isn't the meme pvp build everyone references out the gate.
It's absolutely not right. I am not good at soulslikes, so the games are harder for me. If you have fun with it, that's because the game is easier for you
Well, "soulslike" is a pretty garbage category, honestly. I have played a lot of games that call themselvea soulslikes, and I pretty much only trust Miyazaki with that genre.
Miyazaki's quote is wrong for what the gaming industry labels 'soulslikes', but not necessarily the games he has designed and created. Because a lot of soulslikes don't do what Miyazaki tries to do.
And I get what you mean about the game being easier as relative. But there's also the fact that people do challenge runs in all kinds of games. It's that drive to be challenged and do something harder, so it is not easier, is at the root of what draws people.
No, it's still wrong for the games that he has designed and created. Let me attempt an analogy.
If you give Sean Evans or Chris Schonberger a spoonful of sriracha, it will not be spicy to them. The same spoonful of sriracha would be overwhelmingly spicy if you gave it to someone who doesn't use hot sauce. Same capsaicin content, wildly different experiences.
You need to add difficulty options if you want everyone to have a similar experience. Otherwise, you're just making the game harder for some people for no reason.
Some people enjoy a more challenging experience. Give them options to make it a more challenging experience. Nobody is asking anyone to take options away from players who like the games to be excessively difficult.
So with the Hot Ones analogy. The show is about interviewing guest tackling the challenge of hot sauces.
People tap out, and that's a part of the show. There's challenges within the show as well: (no milk, etc.)
If guests just ate the first wing 10 times, or it was just Sean Evans eating the wings and asking questions it'd just be a different show. (And there are shows where the guests just eat nornsl chicken wings, which is fine. They just sren't Hot Ones.)
If Sean Evans weren't eating the wings, however, the premise of the show is still there. Him joining in just helps the guest keep trying.
You can quit, you can not even play at all. If you're not having fun you shouldn't feel forced either way. Tap out, drink the milk, eat the ice cream.
At a certain point there's going to be a "Challenge Mode: The Game" that is not conducive to an Easy Mode.
I wasn't talking about Hot Ones the show. Those are just the first names that came to mind in terms of people who can handle spicy food.
I'm just going to have to restate the exact same analogy and hope you get it this time. If you feed a spoonful of sriracha to someone who's used to eating hot sauce in the hundreds of thousands of scovilles, and to someone who irregularly puts a couple drops of Tabasco on their pizza, the two will have wildly different experiences of the same sauce.
Miyazaki's stated goal was to bring everyone to the same level of discussion and the same level of enjoyment. In order to do that, the experience must be tailored to the player's ability. Giving me access to mild hot sauce does not reduce your access to the extra spicy stuff. Letting me reduce the Guardian Ape's health by half in my save file does not reduce the Guardian Ape's health in yours. It just ensures that we both have an equivalent experience to each other.
The analogy doesn’t work because your philosophy clashes with someone else’s. My fun is from eating progressively spicier hot sauces to build a tolerance to capsaicin, until I can talk with Sean Evans about our opinions on General Satan’s Colon Evaporator. If you extracted the capsaicin from General Satan’s Colon Evaporator, it is no longer General Satan’s Colon Evaporator, and you can’t actually contribute to the conversation.
“Everybody” that plays in the NBA is literally on the same playing field. “Everybody” at a basketball convention likes basketball. But those are two very different groups of people.
I am just trying to engage with the context of your points. I used Hot Ones to build on it and offer a counterpoint: the games are about how you tackle the spicy mountain, which by design is the same as everyone else's spicy mountain.
All true and fine.
Fundamentally we have not. An 'extra mild' The Bomb Beyond Insanity, that is an actual palatable smoke flavor, is just not the equivalent experience as suffering through the real deal.
But, for the record, it's 100% appropriate to clown on people who suffer those million scoville hot sauces on their food like it is an enjoyable culinary experience. Don't play the game if you don't have fun, and no one should suffer the fools who think you should.
Ninja gaiden black was such a great game.
Match the type of a game, sheesh.
Bethesda like open world? Gimmie difficulty levels - nothing will change with them except that people will be able to tailor the experience more.
Narrative and/or choice heavy game? Leave difficulty choice off to let the original vision of the author speak for itself - havimg parts too easy or hard due to watered down or pumped up difficulty can ruin the story.
Arcade/Dark Souls games? I...don't really see reasons for difficulty settings here except for harder than baselines ones? Like new game +. In these games, learning patterns and gettimg good is the game, there is no way around it.
All in all - not every game is for everyone, we have genres for a reason. Having difficulty tailored for arcades in open world exploration game makes no sense just as much as having watered down difficulty levels in narrative heavy games.
Some have limited time and want to enjoy a good game without being one-shot or learning patterns for 5 hours to beat a single boss.
This is really such an weird argument. Like arguing that you want to be able to drive a nail with any tool you find, so no matter if these are scissors, a spoon or an actual hammer, all need to be usable as a hammer.
We have genres for a reason. If you do not like soulslikes, pick another game. If you have no time to play arcade style games, pick another genre. There are thousands of games available, and genre overlap is huge - don't play games that aren't meant to align with your requirements and then complain they don't.
Like, this is borderline egoistical of you.
I think it’s a valid argument. For example, if someone wants to read Shakespeare but they aren’t a strong reader, you could provide a simpler version, while acknowledging it isn’t as originally intended. It allows for accessibility for a larger audience while not changing the experience for others. You wouldn’t tell someone to read a different story genre instead. This isn’t tools, where we have to bend the laws of physics, it’s changing some numbers in a database, and something already done for higher level difficulty settings, so just allow a version that is easier. No one is forcing anyone to play it that way.
You're way overblowing the difficulty of the Souls games.
I've beaten most of them, and my reactions are shit. 90% of the difficulty is from not knowing how it differs from other games.
I never said all, have I?
Lol yes, I dropped High On Life at the first boss because after trying to pass it ten times, I just couldn't be bothered.
That's just not a game to me. It's just packaged frustration, and I'd rather do something else. So that got uninstalled rather fast.
Sounds like you'll need to play a different game then.
Sounds like you need to learn to respect the boundaries of others.
What? I am not interacting with your boundaries at all. I'm not forcing you to play anything that doesn't suit you. You are complaining that you want to play a game that doesn't suit you. Maybe you'll just have to get over the fact that it doesn't suit you and play something else?
Sounds like you are telling me what my taste is supposed to be
I am aware of it and have already decided it not being my cup of tea.
I am talking about those that like a moderate challenge but do not enjoy being stuck for 10hours at a stage without any meaningful progress to achieve.
You: "I don't like the characteristic elements of Souls games."
Them: "You may want to play a different game then."
You: "Stop telling me my taste!"
Maybe they should pick a game that provides a moderate challenge and not one that provides "being stuck for 10h at a stage without any meaningful progress"?
Can’t be real.
So…. Play a different game? Not everything is for you? Does this actually need to be said?
Otherwise it's fruit ninja lmao which is a fun game you should get if you want an easy sword slashing experience
I had to double check that Tomonobu wasn't responsible for steel battalion. (A game that deleted your save if you didn't press the eject button in time)
I mean, lots of games have "iron man" modes wherein you cannot save scum.
Tbh dark souls 2 has extra hard difficulty setting
Just join the covenant at the tree in Majula
It increases enemy dmg by 50%
Reduces your dmg by 20%
Prevents summoning (but you can still be invaded)
Dark souls games start off in easy mode. You can make it harder by your gear/stat decisions or by going into NG+.
All souls have player difficulty adjustment. Just find better gear, grind XP etc
Honestly when that player is me, this is just going to mean playing a different game. I'm old and busy, I really don't have the time or energy for hard games.
Me, having beaten the game on the highest difficulty level, going back to play it on easy mode in the next playthrough: sometimes I just want to relax while I utterly massacre some bad guys.
Playing an "anything goes" run after a Soul Level 1 run.
They all challenge you on different ways.
DS3 is actually quite interesting to finish on SL1. You can cast one basic spell, lots of weapons are available to you, but you need to think carefully about your loadout so you've got a good set of resistance and buffs for each area.
DS1 limits you to terrible weapons with boring movesets, and by the time you've heard the pyromancy noise for the ten thousandth time, you'll be ready to chuck your monitor out the window.
DS2 is hellish. Your dodge is tied to your agility, which only a few items boost, and for the first 3/4 of the game, you'll only get that from a crap armour set. Only a couple of weapons are available to you. You'll need to know basically every boss inside out; some of the ones that were comedic before are no longer so funny.
Scholar is like DS2, but you can't run into the DLC early on any more to get some of the powerful rings that are in there. I almost cried when I finally got the ring of the embedded.
Wouldn't know about finishing ER on RL1/no summons. Cleared out the four demigods easily enough, but Morgott was a run ender. RL1 does not leave you a lot of room for mistakes, put it like that.
I've done DS1 no pyromancy all bosses SL1, and I'm almost finished with my first DeS SL1 run currently. Not really interested in doing the other games, but I might do some sort of similar challenge run for Sekiro
Itagaki was a pretty big bastard if I remember right, or was that someone else I’m thinking of.
As someone who's done Video game QA, working with Tomonobu Itagaki doesn't sound pleasant. Those campaign sprints are hard enough as is
Also Hideo Kojima: Can I add a setting to have lots of feet. Do you all like feet? more feet!
I think difficulty settings are nice for letting more people play how they want without having to use mods.
I don't care for the gatekeeping b.s.
I played RE Village with an unlimited-bullets-mod cause otherwise I couldn't get past choke points.
I play with a controller and shooting is just not great with a joystick unless there is aim assist. Can't recall if this game had it or not but either way I kept dying when swarmed by werewolves.
I like horror games and I get that the point is to make you anxious about ammo or health. To build tension. But I just find it frustrating sometimes.
I like the video games with a difficulty selector having a joke difficulty
Stick of Truth.
Tangential, but I really dislike the industries trend toward super forgiving difficulty settings
Like the new Halo you can change basically any setting you want to make, to "customise" your difficulty
Yeah fuck letting new players have a similar experience with the game as more experienced players. If you haven't spent 20 years playing Halo then you don't deserve to have fun with it
You don't need 20 years of experience to play the game on easy.
All of your comments in this thread just scream "mad because bad".
If a game doesn't have customizable difficulty, then git gud bruh.
Or don't, and go play modern Halo. But either way quit insisting that others dumb down their art to your level.
I did git gud. I beat the fuckin games, and at a harder level of difficulty than you had to deal with. I just want more people to be able to enjoy these games too. Do you have anything to add to the discussion, or are you just looking for a gate to keep?
They already can enjoy them, just like you did. They can get good, like you apparently did, or they can play something else.
Contra?
Game should only have 1 difficulty that the developer wants . Simple . Having different difficulty to cator weak is very weak . Same can be said for laws though otherwise it would be a primitive fight between 2 people and whoever wins , wins the freedom while other perish in fire
Are you fourteen?
Judging by the username... probably yes, lol.
Just tired of my life . Does anything matter when you will die one day . Does it matter if it has difficulty or not .
In my case a similar feeling was caused by depression. After several different drug combinations I finally found one that works for me. And life has become significantly better.
i mean, we determine what matters by spending time and attention with things
What if the developer wants to have multiple difficulties? You know, like Wolfenstein, Doom, and Quake?
Ya no, some people do it for the story and choices, and maybe the gameplay is a chore to get through with their limited free time...
The Witcher is "meant to played" where you have to run fetch quests to build the right equipment and consumables for every monster contract you take. I'm sorry, but I play games to have fun and that is not fun for me, it's a job.