been a bit of time between videos, but I hope you are well.
@Bullzi009
11 ай бұрын
No worries ❤
@CausedEel667
11 ай бұрын
Wish I could be better. But your voice helps.
@i_am_bort
11 ай бұрын
As always, take as much time as you need. Gonna watch whenever you upload. Happy Halloween!
@Syk398
11 ай бұрын
Likewise hope things are well for yourself and family.
@aceplace3357
11 ай бұрын
I’m doing good thanks for asking man
@Choteron3
11 ай бұрын
I hate when hard difficult just means that enemies deal more damage and have more health.
@smallbutdeadly931
11 ай бұрын
Good old Bullet sponge 1-shot enemies really make it challenging 😐
@arcanealchemist3190
11 ай бұрын
i think the issue that makes this approach seem cheap is when it is done to a game that is already lacking. if the normal difficulty means you can kill an enemy before even seeing its full range of abilities/moves, then increasing its health means you get more gameplay, and more challenge. but if at normal difficulty you already see everything that enemy has to offer, increasing its health doesnt lead to anything new or interesting happening. instead youre just stuck seeing the same stuff for longer. the same goes for damage. if at normal difficulty enemies aren't always threatening enough to make you engage in the games mechanics fully (for example, knowing you can just ignore an attack because it wont do enough damage to matter for the encounter, or never concerning yourself with elemental resistance since the elemental damage of enemies attacks is negligible.), then an increase that makes you consider changing your build to survive specific, difficult attacks, or forces you to learn to avoid damage instead of ignoring the smaller enemies entirely will make you engage with the game more. where this fails is when there isnt more of the game to engage in. in that case it just makes the game less forgiving. for some people, that isnt a problem, but most gamers arent trying to play the game like a "no hit challenge run" in dark souls. being allowed to make a few mistakes is good, because it gives the player a chance to respond and adapt to the challenge instead of just sending them to a loading screen repeatedly until they've memorized the correct sequence of button presses to pass the first enemy. so yeah, tl;dr i totally agree but there definitely are reasons those values get changed sometimes
@the11382
11 ай бұрын
Difficulty modes have been reified to exactly that, unfortunately.
@superdog619
11 ай бұрын
Unfortunately I’ve always had that mindset. I’ve never bothered with anything higher then normal because of the whole dmg sponge and double dmg.
@timogul
11 ай бұрын
In a lot of games it would be better to leave those numbers alone, and to just slow down certain attacks so that players have more time to react.
@agenerichuman
11 ай бұрын
Adaptive difficulty is great in horror. A lot of people don't realize this but you don't want a horror game to be too hard. This might seem counterintuitive but it's true in most cases. The moment the game gets too hard and you start dying a lot is the moment the game stops being scary. If you see death is just an annoyance, you stop fearing it. It becomes familiar at that point. Good horror is all about making you feel helpless, like death lurks around every corner. It's an illusion though. And a great way to break that illusion is to change the difficulty too much. I hope I didn't spoil the magic for a lot you. I just find it fascinating.
@agenerichuman
11 ай бұрын
Though outside of horror, I hate adaptive difficulty.
@YungRamo
11 ай бұрын
great point
@Psycho1343
11 ай бұрын
horror is different for everyone though, in truth, no one should be scared at all by horror because you cannot die in real life when playing horror games, therefore all fear is gone immediately. also i think horror has that affect only once and then it's like "whatever", jump scares aren't really horror either, cheap trick for the mechanism of the body, they can be done well though.
@_-Lx-_
11 ай бұрын
Yeah, When you repeatedly get destroyed by the same roadblock in a horror game it starts feeling frustrating instead of tense/scary. Leads to becoming desensitfied much faster, so the best balance keeps things near the brink as much as possible where you feel like you COULD die often, but never actuall do so too frequently.
@Skallva
11 ай бұрын
@@Psycho1343It's less about the fear of death and more about maintaining the tension. A good horror game will attempt to keep the tension going for as long as possible. You want the player to be constantly on edge, fearing that the game will suddenly force them in an uncomfortable situation that they may have to face again if they fail. But what if they _do_ fail? Well then they're sent to the game over screen. The scares are gone. There is no danger. They are given an opportunity to catch a breath in peace. The tension is lost and the player is forced to revisit the section knowing what's up ahead. And do it enough times and the feeling of dread will be replaced with the feeling of frustration, which is the number one way of undermining the horror. Things stop being scary when the illusion breaks and you're simply annoyed you can't get a move on. Of course everyone finds different things scary but for those scared by the game, it's best to make sure the game is not too challenging for them for the aforementioned reasons.
@steelazuredragon
11 ай бұрын
the only thing this video lacks is a brief explanation on the difficulty / punishment thematic. Celeste for example can be very difficult, but its punishment is nearly nonexistant, there is no downtime, you just get reset to the beginning of the screen/levelpart. you can also have games that are mostly a cakewalk and still feel unfairly difficult because in case you die you need to replay the last hour.
@convection20
11 ай бұрын
This is an extremely good point. It’s something I noticed while playing Super Meat Boy, Hotline Miami, Celeste, etc. I normally do not enjoy difficult games, but these games became my favorite despite being harder than most of the other games I played. And then I realized that the punishment for failing is a more significant factor in how frustrating the game feels than the actual gameplay difficulty itself.
@Ixarus6713
11 ай бұрын
I noticed this in Slime Rancher. Those games are super chill and breezy to play, but if you miss the drop and run off a cliff? You lose everything in your vac-pac. And that kinda sucks.. especially in 2, there are way too many blind drops to warrant that amount of punishment. You can turn off tar and the angry slimes, why not this?
@jamesrule1338
11 ай бұрын
This is why I think the difficulty of Souls games are exaggerated some. Death is likely, but the cost of death is negligible and even what is lost can usually be regained.
@AntsanParcher
11 ай бұрын
This comment made me realize that I like games with high punishment and games with almost no punishment. I hate having to redo the same sections of a game over and over, I hate grinding. If I have to redo something, it better be highly variable during playthroughs, so that on the next playthrough I don't feel like I have to repeat stuff, and if that's the case, reloading an earlier state of my current run seems less interesting than just starting a new run entirely. So I play roguelikes, which are made for permadeath, modern Paradox titles which are mostly about simulation and which will punish you with you losing options but hardly ever with ending the game and stuff like Disco Elysium, which doesn't ever end the game until you've reached The End, but will give you lots of options inbetween on how to get there.
@rowanmiller7062
11 ай бұрын
Something that rubs me the wrong way is a game taking away your abilities because of mistakes you’ve made. For example, if in the depths of dark souls you become cursed, your health is halved until you collect a rare item, a devastating punishment which makes the following areas much harder.
@kyledabearsfan
10 ай бұрын
I just go for whatever the normal mode is and then increase it to make it a thoughtful game if need be. I stopped caring about playing on the highest difficulty ages ago, found out I was having less fun for no purpose. One other massive benefit for 1 difficulty that is set, is you can really discuss games with friends under the same lens. It helps the Souls communities really relate, because everyone deals with the same challenge.
@jensenraylight8011
7 ай бұрын
yes, if anyone ever thought what this junks of item or Crafting is used for, it's often very important in a very hard game mode. but because people play it in normal mode, they're often can finish the game without using any of the mechanics, often, blasting thing randomly will solve the problem. i also agree, that game like Dark Soul and Monster Hunter is really good, because you've to use everything to be able to win, use every items and trick to our advantage, and it was very rewarding. some game like starfield even become an entirely completely new game when you change from normal to hard, because instead of only relying to looting, you're forced to crafting & Modification, and creating your own buff, seeing that your weapon finally effective against the enemy is one of the most rewarding moment. i think game should scale the Enemy, let people learn the rope, the techniques on the go, not the difficulty.
@thedoomslayer5863
7 ай бұрын
Well even in souls this is flawed as some people say, actually LEARNED Malenia and beat her sword vs sword whereas many likely did mimic tear comet azure instant kill for both phases. You'll have skilled player A who learned Malenia say she was a challenge but one that felt very good to beat. Whereas unskilled player B will say he felt nothing upon killing her and that she was easy. Even under one global difficulty the cheese available ruins that "we all faced the same challenge" thing. Sekiro is the closest to that. As it has the least amount of cheese and doesn't even have stat grinding. And even there some think x is harder than y and vice versa. One example being fire cracker spamming into mortal blade to cheese some enemies. You'd need a game like sekiro but without ANY cheese. So sekiro with just the grapple to get around and katana. That's it. Then players would have a identical challenge no matter what. Then you know most people who fought say, Isshin for the first time likely struggled a similar amount to you. And you wouldn't have these "I beat this boss by using this cheese haha so easy"
@BananaWasTaken
7 ай бұрын
It’s just a shame for older games where you can’t change your difficulty whilst playing (Arkham asylum and Arkham city)
@jborben
7 ай бұрын
@thedoomslayer5863 by definition it doesn't really "ruin" facing the same challenge at all- it just means overcoming a challenge in a different way, regardless of how cheesy it can feel to other players
@scary5455
7 ай бұрын
But not doesn't help everybody relate. My girlfriend playing No Mans Sky on the same difficulty as me doesn't relate, because it's too hard for her but easy for me. When she makes it easier, then we relate, because it feels equally difficult for both of us. You act like everybody subjectively feels the same difficulty.
@cyuria
11 ай бұрын
So i started playing the witcher 3 recently for the first time, and i decided to start on death march (because why not). "Certain enemies are impossible to beat without specific game mechanics" and the werewolf on screen hits hard
@razbuten
11 ай бұрын
That was the moment where I was really like "okay, we really gotta pay attention to shit now"
@eneco3965
11 ай бұрын
Don't you get less xp on higher difficulties? It seems like it would be better if it were the opposite.
@ReleaseZeKrakken
11 ай бұрын
Ngl Death March made me love Witcher 3 all over again.
@AusSP
11 ай бұрын
@@eneco3965 Huh, it does give less EXP. Didn't realize. Even so, there's enough EXP in the game to be well above EXP requirements, you just have to do more sidequests, so there's no problem for completionist types, and there was already EXP scaling, so this more tries to avoid excessive overleveling. Definitely not a "beat the game quickly" mode.
@brookspn
11 ай бұрын
I find the Witcher 3 combat too clunky for DM to be enjoyable, especially at early levels. Great game though.
@dirtywhitellama
10 ай бұрын
Another thing about adaptive difficulty and games that get harder as you get better - it also takes away from the sweet feeling of "these guys used to be hard and now I can wreck them because I got better"
@AugustRx
10 ай бұрын
For one mechanic of one game? At what cost cost? Losing immersion and burning out?
@jaye2997
10 ай бұрын
Yes! I hate when enemies "evolve" with you, so they never get easier to take down. I've gotten better weapons and leveled up 40 times, why do I still have to spend time on you?!
@AugustRx
10 ай бұрын
@@jaye2997 Git gud noobie
@TheSkyfolk
10 ай бұрын
Not really an issue, because there is a ceiling. If you cap out the difficulty cieling early, you can enjoy progressing against enemies that are as hard as they can be.
@YammoYammamoto
9 ай бұрын
That was soo me - on the second play-through of Elden Ring, beating the Tree Sentinel knight outside the starting cave. I was like - how did I ever think this guy was hard?! :D
@1Henrink
11 ай бұрын
I appreciate so much when a game just says "this is the intended experience difficulty"
@MrConredsX
11 ай бұрын
I wish more developers told us which difficulty was play tested and balanced. Sometimes Easy and Normal are just not fun due to lack of challenge, but sometimes Hard is just unfair with no difference to AI.
@Maxx__________
11 ай бұрын
@@MrConredsXor just didn't have those settings to begin with
@slothomatic
11 ай бұрын
When that option is available I pick it 100% of the time on a first playthrough.
@Glownyszef
11 ай бұрын
Except in Pathologic 2, that game's intended difficulty can go fuck itself
@MrMariosonicman
11 ай бұрын
is there a game that ever had the easy difficulty be called the "intended experiance"? it makes me curious what kind of reputation it would have in the community.
@jimmyryan5880
10 ай бұрын
I like the way control and others do it. One definitive difficulty level and if people can't get through it treat it like accessibility features. At least for smaller studios it makes sense to focus on one experience.
@andytheaardvark1
9 ай бұрын
My young sister definitely would not have played Celeste had she not been able to turn on unlimited dashes. i definitely agree
@jeremymullens7167
8 ай бұрын
I prefer Mario odyssey and Kirby game approaches. It allows an adult to assist a child. With a very young person they can be the helper. Since the adult doesn’t need help it doesn’t matter how good they are and they still get to play. The helper usually is invincible. Then when a child is older / more skilled, you play the helper character. Then the game is over when they die but you can add in extra help. Usually those games have options to swap out and in. It does require multiplayer so might not be best for the scope of some developers
@Quazlyy
11 ай бұрын
I like how Hades deals with difficulty. Once you have enough skill and upgrades to get to and defeat the final boss reliably, you can enable options to make the game more difficult, spawning more enemies, giving them armor or buffs, limiting upgrades, adding time limits, new boss move sets, etc. The fact that each run can be quite short makes it particularly fun to experiment with those options and finding a challenge you enjoy
@Quazlyy
11 ай бұрын
@@SimonWoodburyForget I agree that having that many options can be overwhelming. But while the player is encouraged to play with the settings, this is not absolutely necessary. Also, not all permutations need to be checked. I see it more as the game providing the player with options to increase difficulty to their taste. E.g., I never really liked the addition of a time limit, so I hardly ever played with that option enabled. But having more enemies spawn and giving them additional buffs can be quite fun. If it becomes too much, I can simply dial down some of the settings in my next run. You can think of this approach more like gradient descent (i.e. taking small steps until you find a setting you like), rather than exhaustive grid search (i.e. trying out all options and then choose the one you like best)
@cantrip7
11 ай бұрын
@@SimonWoodburyForget Sort of, but you're encouraged to only turn on 1 at a time, win a run, add another/swap it out for one higher value, and so on until you clear 20 heat with each weapon. So considering it only unlocks once you clear a run, I think it's as much complexity as a winning player can handle & ramps up in complexity very, very slowly. Also, the Fates encouraage you to try each one once, which further narrows choice (like, "oh I need to turn _this_ one on to get the in-game cheevo").
@dusathemaid
11 ай бұрын
I don't know what you guy's opinions are, but I think that a difficulty system based on removing the player's abilities is a really bad way of doing it.
@wyattarent857
11 ай бұрын
one of the greatest games of all time
@lProN00bl
11 ай бұрын
@@SimonWoodburyForget That's why in Hades those options aren't there right away.
@Eksratu
11 ай бұрын
I found the notion that "player skill" is at some set level to be interesting. In my experience, my own "skill level" is wildly malleable, fluctuating up and down with my mood, my energy level, and the situation at hand. And by just playing a game and gradually accumulating knowledge, my skill level's "baseline" also goes up over time. Not slowly, either--that baseline goes up fast.
@zeosummers3984
11 ай бұрын
How is that interesting. You just described learning.
@Eksratu
11 ай бұрын
@@zeosummers3984 lol true, i believe that players have some responsibility to "learn" a game (in addition to developers designing a fair challenge)
@Ghorda9
11 ай бұрын
@@Eksratu "fair" should just be replaced with "fun", fair isn't necessarily fun and unfair isn't necessarily unfun.
@luckygozer
11 ай бұрын
@@Ghorda9 Eh.. Yes I agree that unfair and unfun aren't necessarily the same thing even if they can be related. But I'm not sure I like the word fun either. Because when I am first banging my head against a really difficult boss fight dying over and over in that moment I'm not really having fun per se. Rather I'm actually getting a little frustrated but it's the release of all that build up frustration that creates for such a satisfying moment when I finally do overcome the challenge. That FUCK YESS moment. Fair in that sense works a little better for me. Because when the difficulty is coming in part from the game being poorly designed that moment doesn't always happen.
@Spazza42
11 ай бұрын
@@zeosummers3984It’s interesting because it’s clear that devs don’t take this into account and force you to keep learning. Difficulty should scale dynamically depending on how easy you’ve progressed through the game.
@Axame1
10 ай бұрын
The customizable difficulty settings part reminded me of Hades. It's amazing how you can customize your runs to achieve the perfect challenge.
@danielbeattie9509
10 ай бұрын
The other thing that hades does which is cool is just the whole rogue like style in general. Its supposed to be insanely hard and you are supposed to die and fail over and over but make small progress with each attempt that helps you eventually succeed. For some people they will rely more on skill and succeed faster while others can organically rely more on powering up from each fail. This way its still fun for everyone despite your skill and despite the difficulty and no one thinks about the difficulty but instead focuses on just doing there personal best and mastering the gameplay and builds. Great game design overall.
@lucienfantke
10 ай бұрын
Sniper elite 4 and 5. Totally customizable
@crowsandcryptids
10 ай бұрын
.... ive had that game for nearly 3 years and I'm only now learning that there's difficulty settings... i haven't been able to get past thesus and the minotur (I'm not bitter about not finishing any runs I really love the game play loop so it dosen bother me but I would love for the chance to finish it one day)
@Varindran
10 ай бұрын
Not just Hades but all 4 games from Super Giant have that sort of system and they all work so well in making the game as much of a challenge as you can take.
@savannaha5038
10 ай бұрын
@@crowsandcryptids if you want a couple tips, i'd say go for killing the minotaur first, and then theseus once he's dead. you don't want both of them in their second phase at once, and at least without extreme measures 3 on, theseus' second phase is a lot harder than asterius'! also don't forget to use your cast with boiling blood to make him take 50% more damage, and if you can survive to there without dying more than twice use death defiance instead of stubborn defiance :) also, athena's call is super great for dealing with theseus, since when he first uses his call he stops using his shield, and if you're invincible while it's happening you can just beat him tf up while he's vulnerable instead of dodging. i actually save my greater call if i have it until theseus' second phase even if it is fully charged before then!
@SortaSora
10 ай бұрын
One of my favorite approaches to difficulty is The World Ends With You. It starts you off on Easy, and you unlock the other difficulties as you go. The game changes which enemies you fight and how difficult they are to beat by difficulty, but it also affects what drops these enemies have. You also unlock the ability to lower your maximum health in exchange for higher drop rates. This essentially incentivizes the player to experiment with difficulty, and feel free to change it up and down as it benefits your experience. Also gives replayability, since you can replay each section with difficulties unlocked later in the game.
@placekpie
Ай бұрын
Wait a second wasn't TWEWY that DS VN tho? (I have it on my backlog but still didn't play it)
@SortaSora
Ай бұрын
@@placekpie it is on the DS, but no it is not a visual novel. It is an action rpg
@lazydroidproductions1087
11 ай бұрын
I like it when games have a “this is our intended difficulty” marker on one of them, regardless of if it is the “normal” difficulty mode
@crishernandez6657
10 ай бұрын
Like heroic on Halo
@emperorborgpalpatine
10 ай бұрын
Fromsoft does it right.
@coltonwilkie241
10 ай бұрын
@@emperorborgpalpatine Yes. Their intended difficulty is "stop being shit at the game" as it should be in damn near every game.
@ungabungacaveman9021
10 ай бұрын
@@emperorborgpalpatineI think it’s right for their game. I don’t think an immersive rpg like Skyrim is made better by being made difficult.
@littlehamham3281
8 ай бұрын
skyrim difficulty scaling is so horrid getting insta killed with a custcene attack by a dragon on legendary even though your 70% hp ;c@@ungabungacaveman9021
@rudetuesday
11 ай бұрын
This is timely. I'm at the end of my youth, and arthritis is becoming a factor in how I play, among things. Difficulty and accessibility have become part of my decision making process when figuring out what to play. Thanks for making this video.
@sinister7290
10 ай бұрын
Gg
@Detank2002
10 ай бұрын
Carpio g2.0
@IAmNotASandwich453
11 ай бұрын
What you mentioned around 27:00 was exactly my experience, but I just saw it as a kind of reward: Me being overpowered was a reward for exploring a lot and beating a lot of bosses. Some of the late game bosses like Hoarah Loux and Radagon were a piece of cake with my strength build and I wasnt disappointed by that. I felt like I deserved that by enduring all the stuff before
@minidandyjr
11 ай бұрын
It’s honestly a very realistic approach to RPGs in general. You suffer now to thrive later. I see it as an absolute win lol
@timothymoore2966
10 ай бұрын
Couldn't have said it better myself. Ppl forget Elden is not Dark souls. you are meant to become powerful in this game. Its literally in the story but I digress.
@boxonothing4087
11 ай бұрын
I also have this feeling "normal" difficulty is now what easy used to be, but I also can't tell how much of that feeling stems from me being more experienced at games. What you learn in games carries over to those you'll play later. Another feeling I also frequently get is how some difficulty can be punishing leaving you with a "thank god it's over" feeling, closer to victory by attrition after countless die/retry runs. I enjoy difficulty when it feels rewarding, not when it comes as a relief.
@skeetsmcgrew3282
11 ай бұрын
No games are definitely easier now. But I don't think that's a bad thing. For example, arcade games were made to be purposely impossible to force you to pump in quarter after quarter. Also back in the old days movement was limited by the crappy equipment so a lot of it was less intuitive. You can't play Ghosts and Goblins or Contra and tell me it feels natural and smooth. So not only were you overcoming the obstacles you were overcoming the game itself. That being said, the original Halo is stupidly easy and then when they made the second one they said, fk you nobody gets to beat Legendary now lol. Make games accessible to a wider audience isn't a bad thing necessarily
@dudeinanofficechair7662
11 ай бұрын
I can't remember who said it but I think there is truth to the idea that back in the old NES/SNES days they couldn't put much game into a cartridge, so they just made them crazy hard to ensure you got your 40-50 hours of play time out of them. Now open world landscapes are so cheap I routinely find areas I assume were for some encounter or side quest that didn't make it into the final game because there's a big open side area that looks interesting/intentionally designed but doesn't have anything in it.
@TonyTynebridge
11 ай бұрын
Imo if 3 difficulty options go hard, if 5 go hard not very hard
@princessjellyfish98
11 ай бұрын
That's so true! I was thinking that during the whole intro section. Razbuten felt underwhelmed by Normal because he has a baseline ability to play games similar to the Witcher 3 already. And he's right about how it's weird we have to guess what difficulty we'll like based on if we've played similar games before (and that's a guess based on info we have before we even play). So many online conversations around difficulty are about the same types of games (action games with elements like live combat, large open worlds, etc), and so many of the people talking about it ONLY play those games (or mostly those games), and are super used to them. Is "normal" meant for someone who's used to those mechanics? How familiar do you have to be? It makes sense that the guy who does a whole series where his non-gamer partner tries different titles would have so many nuanced things to say about this topic. I can say it gets a little frustrating whenever this conversation comes up, as someone who IS a gamer but not "that" type of gamer, so I rely on easy mode in most action games just to experience them at all. I sometimes even get stuck in the easiest "cinematic" modes, like the one for death stranding.
@MorbidEel
11 ай бұрын
There is also another option. I've found that the way I select games to play have changed. It used to be more on ratings and now it is more on the gameplay but this change is only possible after playing a bunch of different games and figuring out what I like and don't like. The feeling of difficulty is also tied to how much you are enjoying the experience. It's like someone working at a job that they really like not feeling like it is a job versus working at a job where you just show up for the paycheck.
@paddycakes6244
10 ай бұрын
One thing I've learned in all my years of always playing games on whatever the hardest difficulty is. The tutorial/first couple fights/encounters are always the hardest, either they have been overlooked in the balancing and design aspect, or I just havn't been able to *git gud* yet.
@underdog353777
11 ай бұрын
There's another interesting side effect with dynamic difficulty where players begin to gameify it. In RE4 for instance, I picked up on the fact that enemies would drop more bullets when I was low on ammo - so I became more reckless with my shots knowing I'd always be good down the line. It actually removed an important part of the conservation mechanic for me, which was somewhat unfortunate, because I couldn't unlearn that mechanic. It also made me prioritize weapons with high magazine capacity, as the game seemed to only consider reserve ammo - not what was already loaded. This isn't necessarily bad, but it does have interesting consequences.
@ookiemand
10 ай бұрын
Was it more or less fun to play this way?
@cattysplat
10 ай бұрын
Could also bank all your items in the item crate and the game will give you more ammo and health pickups, which makes it easier and less items to manage. You could see this also as the game compensating for those who are badly prepared, big part of survival horror was managing what you take out of the safe room with you but this is now gone, with dynamic drops based on what's in your inventory you don't need to try. When I watched most streamers playing the modern REmakes, they almost all "failed" their way through the game but the game kept them alive barely, so for first playthrough tension I guess it does it's job.
@underdog353777
10 ай бұрын
I think it took away part of the anxiety that is appropriate for the setting of not knowing whether I'd have enough to continue, knowing that I always would. I stopped caring about missed shots because I knew they'd be replaced. The thing is, the game is quite easy (even on professional) when this decision becomes less important. Without that pressure, good shots don't matter as much - and therefore you can let loose much more than you would without that knowledge. It's not at all like having infinite ammo, but it sometimes feels close to it.@@ookiemand
@ookiemand
10 ай бұрын
Thank you Underdog for your elaborate explanation!@@underdog353777
@trailmixvids
11 ай бұрын
I've been thinking about difficulty lately myself. Whenever I play games, I usually choose easy and bump it up later. I'm a slow learner which is why I go at my own pace. I never choose "story" modes if there is one below easy. Lately though, Ive realized that choosing story mode actually IS the best option for me. I always found myself feeling guilty that I don't play harder than easy. I feel like I'm not getting the "intended" expect if I don't force myself to learn the battle system. But lately I realized, that doesn't and shouldn't matter to me. What matters isn't if I'm a master at the combat, it isn't if I'm throwing myself at bosses for hours because I can't beat it. What matters is if I'm taking something positive away from the experience. If harder difficulty hurts my experience in the game... Then I shouldn't force myself to do it.
@SnoFitzroy
11 ай бұрын
This is pretty much what I do too. And also the main reason I refuse to touch any Souls game and hate when people call newly difficult games "the dark souls of " because if, for example, Pokemon Legends: Arceus REALLY was "the dark souls of pokemon," I wouldn't have beaten it so easily??? Or at all???
@mikeostwald9645
11 ай бұрын
@@SnoFitzroy Well if you refuse to touch any Souls game you will never know if you are actually good at them lol. Souls games are hard but fair, there are no 100% hit attacks or anything like that so you are guaranteed to succeed if you spend enough time learning the attack patterns. But I'm also the kind of guy who enjoys fighting a boss 20 times and is kinda disappointed when I finally defeat them because I want to fight them a little longer so if you don't like to feel challenged then just ignore my recommendations. The cool thing about From Software Games in my opinion is that you always know why you died. You can immediately identify your mistakes and improve, try a different approach or timing there is always something for you to try.
@zaleskar
11 ай бұрын
Same for me. Sometimes my pride is the hardest boss fight. I've played a lot of games on story or easy and I couldn't care less about the difficulty. I just remember the story, the characters, the world. Nowadays I play on normal if I know I'm "comfortable" with the genre, but I won't hesitate to bump it down immediately if I get frustrated. Always remember, the point of videogames is to have fun. If the game is too easy, bump it up, if it's too hard, bump it down. If someone judges you for playing on a specific difficulty, just ignore them and move on.
@GodWarsX
11 ай бұрын
@@SnoFitzroySimply being "difficult" is an enormously reductive way to view that series. And you're greatly limiting yourself if you refuse to touch it because of that viewpoint
@sleepinbelle9627
11 ай бұрын
@@SnoFitzroy Sorry bud, you've activated the souls game sleeper agents, they will not rest until you say that learning to be good at Dark Souls opened your third eye and cured your medical anxiety.
@SmileyXY
11 ай бұрын
I tend to play on easier difficulties because way to many games just raise the enemies' health so I catch myself thinking "what if I'll just have to deal with bullet sponges all the time on hard mode" when it comes to deciding the difficulty.
@XenomorphgamerBR
11 ай бұрын
I agree with you, also I prefer not having too high of a difficulty in horror games, because encounters will stop having any impact to me if I already done them like 10 times because I died to something.
@smergthedargon8974
11 ай бұрын
Dying Light suffers from this MASSIVELY. That game is just straight up not fun on its highest difficulty due to how durable EVERYTHING becomes.
@GarrulousHerald
11 ай бұрын
Be careful not to call them bullet sponges too quickly. Sometimes it's to incentivize combos or to push you to learn about the game's combat mechanics or to utilize skills or weapons you otherwise wouldn't. But yes, sadly a lot of games don't use it as a teaching tool, but more of a... I'm not exactly sure what the intention is really. I guess, a quick mandatory setting for the "hardcore gamers" out there. Added right before shipping. The ultra super easy modes tend to be added post-production as well for the game journalists. And sometimes hard mode just does become... Longer mode. Fun may or may not be included. Enter at your own risk.
@smergthedargon8974
11 ай бұрын
@@GarrulousHerald Nah, in Dying Light it's absolutely a problem of some enemies being TOO durable.
@Service_Spovz
11 ай бұрын
people who have played S.T.A.L.K.E.R are tumbling on their beds reading this lol
@Cathowl
8 ай бұрын
I watched this because I've got two game designs on my mind that I'm going to try making. The one waiting on the side will be a "one difficulty, take it or leave it" platformer, and the one I'm working on now will be a "here's a gazillion settings to play around with" text-based RPG. You've got me thinking a little bit deeper about the philosophy and tradeoffs between each of those choices. I don't plan to change either, but it's good to think about it more.
@Spectrum0122
7 ай бұрын
Curious, how would a platformer have more than one difficulty?
@Cathowl
7 ай бұрын
@@Spectrum0122 Enemies could move faster. You could have less health. Some platforms could be removed to easier jumps aren't available and you have to make trickier ones.
@filipkohout4704
2 ай бұрын
@@Spectrum0122 You can be weaker, stronger, jump low, run fast, the platforming can be different, reworked abilities and many more.
@heibk-2019
11 ай бұрын
I like Crosscodes approach, where the difficulty is set to the intented difficulty at the beginning but they offer you 3 sliders, where you can turn down damage taken, enemy attack frequency and puzzle speed.
@lootlabgames1342
11 ай бұрын
Coming from the standpoint of a game developer myself, I would say giving enough choices for everyone is important. Some people don't want to be bothered with min/maxing stats and mixing potions for just to a single encounter. But at the same time you don't want the elite players to get bored. It is a tough balance for sure.
@LostHope84
11 ай бұрын
Maybe I’m alone here, but I play video games to escape and relax, to have fun… not to spend weeks improving so I can complete a difficult, frustrating experience. Imagine if you could only watch half a movie because it was too difficult to continue without not wasting a week on it.
@olololololishe
11 ай бұрын
You definitely not alone in this, the thing is word "fun" is hard to define and measure so it will differ from person to person. That's why there is so many books and science work on the topic. For some one concept of "fun" as you described - just to relax, but some people find that boring and "fun" for them is overcoming difficult games.
@cattysplat
10 ай бұрын
There is a massive chasm in what constitutes enjoyment and skill levels for different people though. Comparing games to movies will forever be a fallacy because they are two very different things. If you had to stop a movie and fill out a test or write an essay on what you've seen so far, that's somewhat similar.
@hachikuji_mayoi
10 ай бұрын
You can relax while improving though. If the game has like no resistance at all, I'd rather just watch a movie than be forced to interact with the game.
@Nickelback8469
10 ай бұрын
I 100% agree. There's nothing wrong with challenging games that some people find rewarding to overcome, but I often just roll my eyes when some of them start preaching about how rewarding it was for them and will be for me too if I just spend hours or days of my free time grinding through frustrating gameplay loops to perfect my skills. Games like the Witcher I mostly play for the story, with the gameplay just being the loop I jump through for the next cutscene. I'm not interested in being forced to learn all the mechanics or utilize all the oils and potions in my kit, so I usually just play on the easiest difficulty to save myself the time and frustration.
@gosymprod.
10 ай бұрын
I never thought about the difficulty affecting the experience you get that much until this video.
@AaronBowley
10 ай бұрын
cuz you always play on easy mode
@stackflow343
10 ай бұрын
Literally how was this not your immediate inference?
@amyb2589
11 ай бұрын
This is a very interesting topic to me, I have a friend who has very minimal game experience but loves the game Hades as a classics student, but even with the assist mode she's still frustrated by it as she wants to progress the story but is hindered by her lack of experience and reactions. I also had her and another friend come over several years ago and try Spiderman PS4 - she liked the swinging and picked the movement up very fast, but our friend took over the fighting sections for her. Interesting to me how different people handle different challenges!
@BlazeStorm
10 ай бұрын
I felt the same way as her, I wanted to see the progress of the story. But that's why I love Hades so much, you still get most story dialogue after a failed attempt! I did a second playthrough where I won a lot very early on, and I had to die a bunch over and over just to get the stories going
@greatday19
10 ай бұрын
@stevhen42 and unfortunately most gamers take their skill for granted... I've been trying to introduce my wife to video games, but I've had to be very selective about what i suggest (something with a minimal barrier of entry, low skill level, and that's aligned with her interest so that she is internally motivated to play during her free time) and very careful about how i react to her struggles (not taking things for granted, not being patronizing, putting her down, getting exasperated)... I loved Razbuten's Games for Non Gamers series because of how eye opening it was. Most recently, I've been trying to teach her to use a controller (a input method a lot of gamers prefer because of how comfortable it fits in your hand), but it's a completely foreign tool for her, constantly having to look at it to see what buttons are where... I tried introducing her to smash, and quickly realized first she needs to get comfortable with a controller before even considering approaching a fighting game...
@greatday19
10 ай бұрын
@@random99789 that's actually sth that's been on my mind a lot: why are the majority of games centered on combat? When looking at MMOs (or, well, any RPG), the first thing that gets reviewed is the combat... I was recently looking into introducing my wife to Skyrim, a game which i love because of it's quests, npc interactions, exploration, and breadth of life skills. However, when i pulled up the trailer to show it to her to see if she'd be interested, all that was showcased was combat, something which is part of the core gameplay loop... We see this even in Minecraft... If you want to play pure survival, you need monsters enabled for resources like slime balls, string, and bone meal, resources which are needed to craft tools like leads, fishing rods, bow and arrow, and for wolf taming... (Basically, you need these ingredients for a farming play style). Sure, technically they're all obtainable in peaceful, i do appreciate that it is possible, but a bamboo forest is one of the rarest biomes in the game (which is where pandas live that produce slime balls)...
@m0xilia
10 ай бұрын
There are a lot of open world games you might enjoy that don’t focus on combat, especially in the indie scene. They might be smaller in scope than the massive AAA maps but they make up for it in quality and detail. Off the top of my head: - Outer Wilds - A Short Hike - Firewatch - Subnautica - Astroneer - Slime Rancher (more of a farm sim but you do a lot of exploration)
@Hehe-nt4oe
10 ай бұрын
I did a similar thing with my little sister when breath of the wild first came out
@zelo3238
9 ай бұрын
Qhenever i invade someone or get summoned in dark souls 3, i usually drop them a bunch of embers before we do anything. Someone did that for me when i was new and it was a nice way to show me that i was never alone.
@Hephaeston
10 ай бұрын
As a games designer where my main job is balance of systems, after decades of back and forth on this, I came down on the side of accessibility. Challenging core combat is usually only one facet of your game and difficulty modes when done right (either through an obvious menu, adaptive mechanics or a clear ability to play in an easier way - personally they're all classed under difficulty options for me) are essential to opening up as much of your game to as many people as possible. Which is what it's all about really. More people should have the chance to enjoy the experience you and hundreds of others have made over many years. Even if it's only a part of it.
@HazhMcMoor
10 ай бұрын
Then again easy game may instead "close" experience of accessing a mechanic. Like what he said about Witcher 3 where it's possible to never even consider maybe enjoyable gameplay like potion. Designing really is hard.
@kathycoleman4648
9 ай бұрын
@@HazhMcMoor When developing a slew of mechanics, one thing I developer must consider is how many of them an individual player is going to access. There can be good reasons that every tool must be used to its fullest, or that different people will only utilize certain tools, depending on a game's core themes and objectives.
@CosmoNoBones
9 ай бұрын
I definitely understand difficulty options, I just prefer the Fromsoft approach, there are different gameplay options but the challenge is measured and set.
@the_mastermage
10 ай бұрын
As someone that plays games for relaxation I am a great fan of playing in easier difficulties. As such it annoys me when there is no difficulty settings, its not like i have no frustration tollerance. But as someone who studies Physics my Frustration tolerance is used up in other places over the day already. Thus I think noone should be shamed for liking to play in easy mode you never know what the person does or has been through. Edit: I was writing this comment in the middle of the Dark Souls part. And thank you so much for saying that there is more to love a game about than being good at the combat. And that its to easy to say these games are not for those people. Thank you so much its a major pain point I have been having whenever I look at the Soulslike stuff and people are just like well if you dont like difficulty then the game is not for you. Even tho I belive games are so much more than just the difficulty.
@lankyGigantic
11 ай бұрын
One reason I love difficulty options in games is for accessibility. I have dyspraxia, so a lot of the time, playing on easy is equivalent to a neurotypical person playing on normal, simply because my hands don't always do what my brain tells them to do.
@JohnDoe-hj9fh
11 ай бұрын
I feel like not enough people take this into consideration when talking about difficulty options. The souls games aren't much of a challenge for me but I have neurodivergent friends that literally can't play them and no amount of telling them to get good is going to change their physical limitations
@sarathepirate
10 ай бұрын
This!! Absolutely this.
@sarathepirate
10 ай бұрын
My brain can't always react fast enough to what I see. So extremely aggressive enemies are going to wipe the floor with me because I'm trying to parse what I'm even seeing... as the sword is coming down. I have a similar issue with games that ask you to move and aim and shoot, all at once. With the camera moving, I'll often struggle to recognize what I need to be aiming at. That makes most action games impossible for me if it's based on reactive combat, lacks auto aim features, or even just incorporates a camera bob when the character moves.
@rosiescott1531
10 ай бұрын
To me this is kind of the only argument that matters. Easy mode is necessary for some people not just to enjoy a game but to play it at all. Games not having an easy mode (like the souls games) is indefensible for this exact reason and people who say otherwise are deliberately excluding certain people from certain games because of a disability or a neurodifference and that's not ok. Especially when the level of difficulty someone plays at is nobody's business but their own and it has no impact on people who choose to play on diamond bastard hard that story mode exists.
@angmori172
10 ай бұрын
@@rosiescott1531it's perfectly fine to exclude anyone you want from anything for any reason :)
@Upsedriss
11 ай бұрын
Personal note on difficulty settings, specifically easy mode: for me wether or not a game has an easy mode is a big factor in most cases. I'm not great at doing multiple things either at once or in quick succession, like trying to time a dodge while also having to move and attack, or having to move my finger to several different buttons in a row while moving in a platformer. My reaction times are not the quickest unless i mainly focus on one thing, and even then it's more quick than precise. Spamming I can do, timing less so. it's like there's a delay where my brain has to register what im supposed to do and what i am doing, and i get overwhelmed. An easy mode makes me feel more secure that I'll actually be able to play and enjoy a game, and less at risk of wasting my money on a game i get stuck in. It has allowed me to play and enjoy games like Dishonored and Witcher 3, I really need that room for error. I can get people wanting challenge and overcoming great obstacles, but for me constant deaths can get infuriating quickly, because it feels like I'm supposed to do more than I'm actually capable of, and games then become these stressful trials to get past one section instead of getting immersed and enjoying the world. Easy modes have allowed me to enjoy some of my favorite games ever, so I'm certainly happy when they're there. sometimes I can go higher, sometimes I can't, sometimes easy mode is a challenge for me, other times it allows me to not feel stressed and have fun. So I guess, personally, id prefer for simple difficulty settings to be there, as without an easy mode I would never have been able to play some of my favorite games that I now have 100+ hours in. That's the take of someone who really needs room for error and sucks at timing responses, especially quickly.
@Ghorda9
11 ай бұрын
Don't underestimate yourself, it always takes time to get better at something. This sounds like the main cause of your problems is that you're unwilling to build up muscle memory and want instant gratification instead of taking your time.
@YungRamo
11 ай бұрын
i disagree seeing that he has 100+ hours on certain games, some people just dont have a knack for games.@@Ghorda9
@British_Rogue
11 ай бұрын
Ghorda9 has a point. It'd be intriguing to see how you fare on a higher difficulty on the same game you've spent 100+ hours in. Might be worth considering. Unless, of course, the problem is motor neuron-based.
@maxsoundandmusic
11 ай бұрын
@@Ghorda9 Not everyone wants a challenge when playing video games...
@Sammysapphira
11 ай бұрын
@@maxsoundandmusicThen they should watch a movie or read a book.
@poppyfrancis7338
10 ай бұрын
One thing I love is when games tell you their intended difficulty, but something that would make me like games with toggleable difficulty even more is if they tell me how difficult the game is intended to be. Some games have a normal mode that I could feasibly breeze through and others are hard enough that I will just inevitably get stuck at a certain point and need to lower the difficulty to progress in a reasonable amount of time, and the "intended gameplay experience" only tells me that this is the setting that the game was playtested with in mind
@Gloppieg
11 ай бұрын
One of my favorite implementations of difficulty is in God Hand. Difficulty dynamically adjusts as you defeat enemies without taking damage, but you will most likely spend your entire first playthrough on the easiest level due to the high upfront difficulty. As you get better at the game, the difficulty increases and enemies become more aggressive/less exploitable. It forces you to learn all of the game's systems and gradually incorporate them into your gameplay if you want to maintain that higher difficulty. And unlike Resident Evil, the difficulty is shown as a gauge at all times; this removes the sense that the game is handholding you from behind the scenes with impenetrable algorithms.
@hugofontes5708
11 ай бұрын
I think outsidexbox covered this system in one of their videos, mentioned some tricky think that can end up happening if you combo too hard
@tyrant-thanatos
11 ай бұрын
As good as God Hand is, this approach has plenty of problems as well. Enemy damage scales far to harshly with the dynamic difficulty, and it often feels like the game is punishing you for doing well. It's to the extent that many players strategically choose to sandbag their performance in order to keep the difficulty in check. I know I basically felt as though I had to, as I dropped the game multiple times due to sitting in the exact skill window in which I would reach the highest level and immediately get killed for it. The number of times I had to repeat segments because I was good enough to reach the highest difficulty, but not good enough to beat the highest difficulty, was such that I just gave up entirely. The fact that I had to make the strategic choice to eat hits at certain points in order to succeed felt artificial, cheap, and unintuitive on a level that was just blatantly unfun. I think the game is great, but my first playthrough was anything but.
@Gloppieg
11 ай бұрын
@@tyrant-thanatos These are all honestly great points that I just never ran into. I was so terrible during my first playthrough that I basically never got out of level 1. After that, chasing higher levels became the name of the game so I never really ran into that frustration. I can totally see how it could ruin a first playthrough if you grasp the mechanics more quickly than I did lol.
@luckygozer
11 ай бұрын
On a similarish vein I really enjoyed Furi. It doesn't have a dynamic difficulty but the default choice is appropriately challenging. Yet the entire game feels like it's training you to get better. One of the bosses is focused solely on a specific part of the combat. While that's a cool boss fight it also forces you to engage with a system you might've been largely avoiding. But that also means it's making you better and more confident at using it on every other boss fight in the game. By the time you have beaten the game it feels like the entire game has been preparing you for the harder difficulty option (that I think only unlocks after playing through it?) It also has one of my favorite boss fights in any game I have ever played. And that is Bernard an untextured dummy they used to test boss mechanics on. A 9 stage boss fight that has some of the best elements from every other boss combined into one single challenge. It was thrown in as a bonus alongside the one more fight dlc alongside a boss fight that i belief was an xbox exclusive at first? Which is a little unfortunate but apparently it's now included with the base game.
@yagoaraujo5945
11 ай бұрын
OMG I just wrote about GOD HAND the best forgotten PS2 fighting game that is basically resident evil 4 but with punches instead of guns and that leans even more on its combat system resulting the in most chad and stylish fighting game EVER ( not even kidding its that GOOD) and with EPIC soundtack IT ROCKS DUDE.
@michaelshepherd8545
11 ай бұрын
The Celeste method is interesting. It made it clear what the expected version is, but it does provide assistance methods. Although, I never went with those methods. I wonder if people felt discouraged because of that separation.
@SnoFitzroy
11 ай бұрын
the assist tools in celeste were intended as an accessibility tool, but it's good that it ALSO functions as a difficulty slider. You can make the game a bit more forgiving if you cannot physically move fast enough for certain segments , have a hard time seeing certain things, or just don't wanna bang your head against a wall when you're playing a highly emotional game about defeating depression and finding yourself.
@Zectifin
11 ай бұрын
I loved it. i couldn't beat the ending of the final part of farewell and was frustrated and was about to look it up on youtube and I heard someone say the assisstance options so I just turned them on and cheesed the final room so I could finally see the ending. I don't think games without a story need assistance options, but if you put such a meaningful story behind an extreme difficulty wall people are going to never see the ending and maybe even resent the story because it made them frustrated.
@skeetsmcgrew3282
11 ай бұрын
@@Zectifin I was the same, I gave up on the very last B-Side and the last part of farewell. But see for me, if I feel like I cheesed it, I think, why am I wasting my time on this? I love how the achievement for getting every strawberry was literally a sarcastic "impress your friends." I honestly found the strawberries really rewarding, but choosing between another 3000 deaths or turning on a cheese mode? I picked neither, just didn't finish the game
@RobinClower
11 ай бұрын
@@Zectifinditto. I grided the last room for a few hours before turning on invincibility, but have subsequently beat farewell over a dozen times without it. Instead of dropping it and never coming back which is close to where I was, assist mode let me get closure, and then later git gud
@jemolk8945
11 ай бұрын
@@SnoFitzroy I'm in the "physically cannot move fast enough for certain segments" camp, to where it's actually random whether I nailed the timing for even a single input in one of the more demanding sections, even after I learned the rhythm. I only ever had to slow down the game speed by a max of 30% (so 70% speed) to get to a point where it felt -- and was -- doable for me, though. Could still be really hard, but there's a colossal difference between 'hard' and 'beyond my ability to even control whether I succeed.'
@tyler403
10 ай бұрын
the thing with dark souls is that you could just grind/farm to get stronger and its hard to tell if you are underleveled or playing it how it is meant to be
@rankoliang
11 ай бұрын
Two examples of difficulty systems i enjoy are slay the spire and a lot of the supergiant games. Both of them feel like integrate the difficulty more closely with the gameplay than most games which i think is important. For the the spire, the fact that difficulty is tied with progression, gives you a reason to finish runs on the highest difficulty you can. It's also really gradual so you never feel that you're way out of your league; you've worked to unlock the difficulty multiple times beating runs at slightly easier difficulties. A lot of supergiant games have another mechanic where you pick a curse which improve the rewards that you get, which i think solves the problem of games with multiple aspects of difficulty you can adjust if balanced right. There's a base level of difficulty and you can adjust based off of the risk and reward which makes it a more interesting decision and makes the decision more extrinsically motivatee than intrinsic. These aren't perfect systems but are a good step over traditional approaches to difficulty. I do think difficulty balancing is possibly the most important thing to get right in most games since it really determines what systems the player will find themselves needing to engage with. The way I've enjoyed difficulty handled that is a bit less obvious is just difficulty in the form of optional content. The base game should be fairly approachable but those who are up for challenge have extra levels to look forward to. Kind of like the b sides in celeste Another thing I think would have liked to hear you touch upon is difficulty scaling as well. Some games can feel so different from the beginning to the end of the game as you gain more gear or as enemies get harder. Its frustrating when i play a game where the difficulty is enjoyable, then i either get overleveled/geared or there's a difficulty spike that makes the game harder than i would enjoy
@mgb360
11 ай бұрын
Your last point is exactly how I felt with the Witcher 3. At the beginning, the game looked like it was going to give me a real challenge and by the end I was having such an easy time I fought the final boss bare-fisted for a while because they just weren't a threat.
@stacey738
11 ай бұрын
Another advantage of the difficulty setting is to allow disabled or young players to be able to enjoy the story without being limited by the gameplay. I really like how tunic does this. The difficulty is not presented as an option at the start, but it is in the options if you look for it. There's even an invincible option which was great for my 5yo. She wanted to play the "fox game" as her first game, without having the reflexes you need to be able to survive the enemies.
@lluisg.8578
11 ай бұрын
The drawback is that they will have no challenge so they will not learn how to face higuer difficulties. Every approach has its downsides: more accessible then less improvement
@stacey738
10 ай бұрын
@@lluisg.8578 invincible mode doesn't necessarily imply 'no challenge'. For my daughter (and I'm sure for other kids or disabled people), the movement and gameplay itself without enemies may be challenging enough. My daughter struggles with any games that require timing of button presses (mario, pong, etc) nevermind the enemies. Naturally when she gets older and this mode no longer poses a challenge to her, I can change it.
@joeyharrington1863
10 ай бұрын
Great comment! People can enjoy games for very different things. When I was little I loved playing games like Kirby Air Ride and Sonic Adventure 2, not for the story or any of the main quests, but just because I loved interacting with the world. I also liked games with invincibility options (GoldenEye & Guitar Hero come to mind) but these options were always locked behind "cheat" menus. It's nice to see more accessibility options being implemented as part of the base game experience.
5 ай бұрын
After watching the video, I've come to realize the solution to the difficulty problem in games is to not play games anymore. Thank you.
@slayerchick9196
11 ай бұрын
As someone that didn't grow up with video games and has very little inherent video game skill, I really appreciated Resident Evil's adaptive gameplay. As it is, there aren't a lot of games that interest me (as I like stories and puzzles but have little ability to deal with action or platforming) so I really appreciate it when I can play a game and not get so frustrated that I just give up because I just can't enjoy it.
@cattysplat
10 ай бұрын
The main downside is you are playing a game in which the rules are constantly changing, which can be unsatisfying to someone who feels they have mastered their current difficulty, only for it to suddenly change and they are now failing, or for deaths to be required before the game starts easy enough for lower skilled. The game is learning and changing the difficulty dynamically every time you succeed or fail, but a series of failures will still always lead to death and constantly changing combat rules can make understanding that combat harder. Also making a horror game dynamically easier does take away some of the fear factor and the whole overcoming your fear aspect to horror.
@slayerchick9196
10 ай бұрын
@@cattysplat as he said in the video, there's not a great way to make a game work for everyone. Though maybe it would be good to have the difficulty settings and adaptive difficulty (such as with RE) but with an option to turn ad off. I guess I don't really see RE as a game that's really meant to scare you or make you face fears so not being as scary wasn't even a consideration, but again, everyone is different. I'm sure a lot of people don't think fatal fame is scary, but that creeped me out more than dead space or resident evil. As far as adaptive difficulty goes, I don't see how it really changes combat at all. You don't have to adapt to playing differently, the enemies just die easier and there are more ammo drops and stuff like that. You aren't having to adjust to a different combat style...granted I'm a noob so maybe I just don't see it.
@chronicallychic
11 ай бұрын
As someone with a dynamic physical and cognitive disability, I consider difficulty options to be part of the accessibility options. If you don't want to adjust them, you don't have to, just like all the other accessibility options. But their existence does not actually detract from the game's experience because you can always experience the game as intended or as you personally want to.
@beep3242
11 ай бұрын
I absolutely agree, but I do think that there should be some sort of comment saying something like "this is the intended difficulty for a regular player." In that case it is very easy to tell what will be the best balanced for players that want a healthy challenge and don't need accessibility options. Otherwise the, as you put, "intended experience" is extremely unclear. You could also have games with equippable items that customize difficulty. I think Sea of Stars does this pretty well. There is a specific menu in the inventory that lets you choose specific things that make the game easier or harder. It gives you time to see how you enjoy the game's difficulty and mechanics, running you through some quite easy sections before giving you the items for options. I've played games that are super hard on normal and reasonable on easy, and ones that are unenjoyably easy on normal. I've played games that are still hard to me on easy despite me being more experienced in gaming. Having that level of muddled explanation makes everyone frustrated I think, making it so that nobody knows what difficulty is right for them at all unless they trial and error it. And the trial and error of difficulty settings genuinely *does* taint the experience.
@Sabeximus
11 ай бұрын
I think this is the best option. It's a kind of mix of having no difficulty setting and still having difficulty settings. Like, there is the intended difficulty, but you can adjust them if you want the game to be harder or easier. The key thing is not actually calling them difficulty settings. This leads players to leave those settings alone in the beginning, but if they start to struggle or find the game too easy, they could be directed to those accessibility options.
@velemamba260
11 ай бұрын
This was a really interesting video. I loved the crpg rep with the pathfinder games and solasta. I also appreciate that you took time to point out that some people like their games to trend easy in terms of difficulty. I'm certainly that way. I play games for the story and I absolutely hate dying because all it means is that I'm being delayed to get to the story that's my main motivation for playing in the first place.
@GarrulousHerald
11 ай бұрын
I mean if you want to play the game like a slightly interactive movie that's your decision. I do know a lot of people who get personally insulted when dying in single player games, and I go "okay, well, so running in the middle of the enemies with guns clearly didn't work the first 5 times, maybe try a somewhat different strategy?" More often than not, they just need to turn their brains on. They need to enter in the mindset that this is not a movie, this is an interactive medium that will challenge them and their problem solving skills. This isn't a movie where you get to move the invincible protagonist and press x to shoot enemies only if and when you want to, and then get to the next cutscene. This isn't solely background noise or pretty colors. Don't be fooled by the animated environments and pretty graphics. Treat it a bit more like a board game or a sport, or something that requires input to be fun and engaging. The ball doesn't move itself. The board doesn't play itself. Usually these are chronic movie and TV watchers that expect drama and excitement, but are confused when it isn't served up on an effortless platter. They go in expecting a movie or TV show, and find it cool they can control the character and interact with the environment, but as soon as there is a challenge, anger ensues. "Why can't I beat it right away? I don't understand why I am dying!" But they haven't even begun to think why. They just expect to walk in and win. Maybe that partially speaks to how mind-numbing modern TV and shows are today. Or how TV today doesn't really provide enough mental stimulation to engage critical thinking skills.
@notyaunzzz
11 ай бұрын
@@GarrulousHerald i think you're just looking too much into something that just isnt there, and i highly doubt you really know THAT many people who are like that, like be serious. all you're doing is being elitist by connecting dots that arent there and claiming that people who don't like having to repeatedly die in game are people who don't have critical thinking skills. i actually have 3 friends who play games on the easiest modes made available to them, and they're nothing remotely like how youre describing people who get frustrated when dying in games, and theyre not chronic movie or tv watchers, either. they're just average people who dont spend every day playing video games but still like them! rather than people needing to "turn their brains on" the truth is that they just need to have a history of playing games and have developed the gaming sense that those kind of games require, and many people will enjoy videos but NOT have the time or the interest to dedicate their lives to gaming, and THATS OKAY. they should still be able to play video games, and video games should continue to make efforts to be playable by as many people as possible! you have gotta get off your high horse of making it seem like playing video games makes you a better, more critical thinker than people with other interests, because it doesnt. i see the way other gamers are often completely lacking media literacy, some of the dumbest most mind bendingly stupid people ive ever had the displeasure of talking with have been avid gamers, and that's because, believe it or not, your interests alone actually dont make you a more intelligent and balanced person. like what games are you playing that makes you think like that? and to begin with it's already clear that your literacy skills aren't that great anyway because you're conflating the skills of people who by your own admission aren't gamers to the skills gamers would naturally develop. perhaps you should watch another razbuten video "What Elden Ring is Like For Someone Who Doesn't Play Games" to hear about how it's actually GAMES faults that you apparently know a lot of people who clearly dont play certain kinds of video games yet youre expecting them to play like someone who does.
@GarrulousHerald
11 ай бұрын
@@notyaunzzz Well uh, I'm the one who has had said experiences I claimed to have so I guess I ought to know. But maybe you're right. Maybe it was all a figment of my imagination. When I said chronic TV watchers, I meant that most of all of their leisure time is spent watching TV or KZitem. That's not entirely uncommon today. I've seen them play. Playing on the easiest difficulty of games. "Story mode" of God of War 2016. You want to know what happens? The light attack button is good enough to carry them through THE ENTIRE GAME. They NEVER use weapon combos or powers. Because they forget, there's no reason to. Horizon Forbidden West? Well that's partially because of a lack of teaching on the game's part, but people completely forget weapon skills or valor surges are even a thing. Because the mindset is "well I'm not a super duper amazing lifelong gamer... So super easy seems like it would be for me." And then they play the entire game using the basic attack and maybe a few other mechanics, but completely ignore like 90% of the game's features. And they don't tend to enjoy it. At least not as much as they could. They might enjoy the graphics and the cutscenes, but you can tell they just play the game wanting to get from point A to point B because the game fails to grab their attention. Because of how mind-numbingly simple it is. One of these people I reference I am actually quite close to. He is middle aged, and it took him a while to develop the muscle memory required to play various popular titles. After he was playing games adequately, I asked him if he thought it was time to bump up the difficulty. The response? "I'm not very good at games. I don't want to die a bunch." We are talking about bumping the difficulty from story mode, to super easy. Small increments. But modern titles had already drilled into his brain that he wasn't a gamer, he probably never would be, so no use to try. And after reaching this state of good cognitive control of the controller, I saw how much he lost interest in the game. He still played it, but... It wasn't as fun anymore. There was nothing to learn. No challenge. And humans in general love learning and they love overcoming challenges. Over time I did sly underhanded tactics like changing the difficulty without him noticing, and he performed perfectly well. When I revealed the news, he was surprised. Over time, I tutored him and helped him explore everything from games settings to general UI. I taught him to be perceptive, put thought into the skill tree. Look at these skills you can unlock. There's more to the game than you realize. He learned surprisingly quickly, he just needed a little push. SOMETHING to motivate him and show faith in him. Soon enough, instead of choosing the easiest difficulty on every single game, he has enough confidence to actually put thought into what difficulties he is actually capable of pulling off. And he's had more fun with games than ever. He went from playing the easiest difficulty all the time, to trying normal or higher difficulties just to test the waters. And he is more engaged in the games, he uses his head more. He even solves non-difficulty related puzzles better because he is more attentive and doesn't expect it to just be handed to him. Now he only looks up walkthroughs for puzzles if it's either repetitive (like the catalysts in H:FW) or if he already gives it a try. He still sometimes gets mad if he dies a bit too often, but he's much more willing to take some responsibility and adapt his strategies. Changing difficulty at hard spots is now a last resort, he usually gives it a couple tries first and a lot of the time he comes out on top, feeling accomplished by overcoming the challenge. And most importantly, he has more fun. He's more confident in himself and his capabilities, and I'm proud of him. Humans of all ages and skill sets are capable of learning if you just give them the chance. Yes, a lot of the time, it is the game's fault. For trying to appeal to more mainstream audiences while not putting in the effort to engage them and inspire confidence. Not pushing them to try to be their best in a supportive manner. Instead, there are poorly cobbled together difficulty changes meant to allow anyone to beat the game with zero effort involved. Having trouble with a boss? Give him 0.1x health. Having a small hiccup understanding this integral mechanic to the core gameplay loop? Well just disable it! Players will often take the path of least resistance. That does not mean they will have fun doing so. And more and more modern titles are refusing to acknowledge this integral aspect of game design. They say it's to be more accessible, but the same games that introduced super duper easy mode press one button to win... Many of them DON'T EVEN HAVE SCALABLE UI OR SUBTITLES (H:FW, looking at you.) How can you claim to be accessible if you don't even attempt to tackle one of the most common disabilities, which is imperfect vision? If it's to become 'more accessible' for 'game journalists,' I think we are better off gatekeeping those kinds of people from the product. They either need to get better at the game so they can get by on easy difficulty, or they shouldn't focus their careers off of writing about games they barely even play. I think everyone should be able to enjoy games. Keyword, ENJOY. Not just play, ENJOY. This isn't some rite of passage to show how modern you are. This is for you to have a good and fun time, and all these claims of accessibility are just that, claims. I want non-gamers to have fun. And the unfortunate reality is... If you give people an option of an easier time which they don't need at the cost of fun... They'll tend to pick it. It's why options in difficulty and gaming aren't so clear cut of an implementation. It's more complicated than that. Not every game needs to cater to an audience that expects an effortless joyride. In fact, including such options, when the game isn't optimized or play-tested for such, it negatively impacts the experience of many casual gamers. Because how does the casual gamer even perceive "easy" mode vs "story" mode? It's subjective. It's not often conveyed well. "Well I think I like stories..." You have to hold the hand of casual gamers. They don't have the experience or knowledge of the medium to make educated decisions. And modern gaming has become so patronizing to casual gamers and newcomers. More options does not mean better. You need to actually look at it from the perspective of a non-gamer, and see the flaws in this supposed rise of "accessibility." Some of the results have been good, don't get me wrong. I like some of the accessibility options. But if you aren't careful, "accessibility" and "appealing to everyone" has the potential of simply making things convoluted and confusing, rather than actually widening the audience. Because if your product becomes TOO accessible, TOO mainstream, TOO "for everyone," more often than not, without a target audience, your game ends up becoming for no one instead. The veteran gamers are the ones who roughly know which difficulty to choose. It's the casual ones and newcomers who suffer.
@GarrulousHerald
10 ай бұрын
@@notyaunzzz So I'm returning to this comment to analyze it a bit more based on what it actually presents instead of just justifying myself... And wow... I kind of overlooked how uh... Hostile and aggressive it is. It starts out attempting to gaslight. Not a great start. +There is a difference between dying twice or three times to a major boss or encounter, and dying 28 times to basic enemies. It then sets up a strawman. I didn't say they didn't have critical thinking skills, I implied they weren't used to exercising them within their entertainment. I mean I'm not pulling this out of nowhere I know what TV is like lol. And I know plenty of people who do almost nothing in their free time other than watch TV. Don't read books, don't play games, board games, physical, digital... And unfortunately I would have to say that it does describe the average person. Particularly older aged individuals more than newer. People we would consider to be middle aged or older. I don't know what "those games" are, but uh, no really I don't know what you are talking about. Game sense? I mean sure it can take a day or two to get used to the controls, they might not have the reaction time or experience with certain genres to pull off hard or super hard difficulty, but I believe they are typically more capable than modern games and their "ultra accessible easy easy extra easy" modes give them credit for. You then... Talk about... dedicate lives to gaming? I'm not preparing them to enter E-Sports "or else they aren't real gamers." I myself don't care for ultra competitiveness or super duper hardcore. I tend to play on hard or one or two difficulties below the hardest difficulty. I care more about the quality of the experience than the challenge, though challenges are an integral part of the experience sometimes, it's just some harder difficulties aren't geared towards newcomers and prefer you play the game through at least once, while others are labeled hard for those experiences with the genre or quick to learn on this medium or have existing skills. Sometimes difficulty can certainly overshadow the quality of the experience if it is too frustrating or poorly constructed. "Playable by as many people as possible." I agree. Which is why it is strange why modern games tend to offer these... Challenge-less difficulties that a goldfish hooked up to the controller could beat, while they tend to neglect things like scalable UI or a variety of accessibility or QoL options. They're newcomers or casuals, not idiots. And I don't find it particularly preferable to treat them like they can't do anything right. I don't know where you got the idea I thought I was better than anyone else. I thought I was quite clear in my original post that I was considering the experience of others, not myself. Then there's this strange rant about gamers and media literacy? Like it's as if you strawmanned what I was saying just to build up to this moment to complain about something completely unrelated so it wouldn't be completely out of place? It also just seems to be an attempt to try and roast me out of nowhere. There's then uh... Another strawman. I never... Conflated the skills of gamers vs non gamers. "Skills gamers would naturally develop." Like what? Being open to trial and error, learning, challenges, and exploring your capabilities is not solely a gamer skill. My point was that games are not TV and many get caught up trying to conflate two very different mediums. Which ends up causing trouble for everyone involved. Games are interactive mediums which naturally mean they will have different priorities than TV which is primarily only a visual medium. Most modern games that include super duper easy modes, the interactive medium sucks under these poorly thrown together difficulties because they are clearly not designed for them, and the casual, or less than casual gamer misses way more than you may realize. And I don't want them to miss out. Did you even read my comment? Or did you read someone else's, read part of mine, and then just assume you knew everything I said based on some faulty correlation skills? This is quite bizarre.
@MrSchnorkel
6 ай бұрын
@@GarrulousHerald "More options does not mean better." is something quite uncomfortable that doesn't just apply to video games, but sometimes to real life as well.
@butterskutz
10 ай бұрын
This was a really interesting video especially considering how I rarely think about difficulty in games I play, and what sort of games I play generally. Like, I remember my first time playing a Souls game and being so frustrated that I didn't want to touch it again. Subsequently, this was also due to the fact that the game had spiders and it wasn't mine in thenfirst place. At the same time, looking over the games I do frequently play most of them are story focused first, or I play just to learn more of the story and world and not play to beat the game. It's a fascinating topic that also got me interested in your Gaming for Non-Gamers series, as well as subbing to your channel. I'd love a continuation of this topic if possible because it feels so vast.
@Aonubis
11 ай бұрын
Also an absolute fantastic video and a great take on this rather difficult topic. In recent years I usually start the game at one above the "normal" difficulty, except when the game clarifies, as you mentioned, that the intended experience is on normal.
@cattysplat
10 ай бұрын
Should really be noted that Normal difficulties are easier today than in the past. Dying to learn was absolutely a part of older games. Now that is seen as negative experience.
@weeeeelaaaaaah
11 ай бұрын
I'm glad you showed Sea of Stars, if only for a moment. But I liked that the difficulty options were at least somewhat integrated in the game, as things you need to find or buy. It makes them feel more earned, and spreads the decisions out so you can evaluate each in turn, and only after having some real experience.
@Red_Duc
11 ай бұрын
I think Will you Snail did a really good job with adaptive difficulty as it changes mid game based on how well you do. And it actually feels very integrated to the game because of how its set up
@jozimastar95
10 ай бұрын
It decrease the difficult but I still die at the same spike , I think king of thief's does it better by removing the spikes if you die to it for 3 times in a row
@marcushenry6020
8 ай бұрын
Armored Core 6 has been probably my favorite experience with difficulty. The opening mission and boss encourages you to utilize most of the core elements of combat and the chapter 1 boss builds on that by encouraging experimentation with playstyle and parts. Those 2 moments set you up for the rest how the game will play.
@frost9681
11 ай бұрын
"I like to play without choosing the difficulty" is exactly why I i will ALWAYS select the second hardest difficulty for my first playthrough. I feel confident that I can handle most challenges a game throws at me, but I'm extremely aware that the hardest difficulty available for a game is typically not designed for your first playthrough. So the second hardest is generally good enough, and then I dont change the difficulty from then on: this is how hard the game is, so if I'm struggling then I've got to get better until I can beat it
@Phoenix.Sparkles
10 ай бұрын
I've seen people with this mentality on reddit, except they ignore the fact that the hardest difficulty isn't meant for beginners. So they retry like 30 times and then have to give up because they played the entire day away instead of just inviting an experienced player who can teach them and carry the noob.
@AlkisGD
10 ай бұрын
@@Phoenix.Sparkles- I started going for the max difficulty years ago to avoid multiple playthroughs when going for platinum trophies, but later I discovered it enhances the immersion of games like the Witcher (all 3 of them) or The Last of Us or even Horizon (Zero Dawn/Forbidden West). Hell, I even started Dragon's Dogma on Hard, a clearly NG+ difficulty, but it was _so_ immersive for my glass canon assassin character! Same for Horizon on Ultra Hard: in the beginning it makes you _feel_ like a human fighting huge killer robots. Sure, by the end you can easily kill scores of them without breaking a sweat, but if you don't mind the switch to power fantasy, then _that_ effect is heightened even more by three sheer difference in power level, going from 11 dmg with your starter bow to 3500+ with a triple Powershot on a frozen enemy's weak spot!
@ascendedentity2162
10 ай бұрын
I've also adopted that mentality, and honestly, it works.
@nicolashugli9661
10 ай бұрын
Back in the day the hardest difficulty setting had to be unlocked by completing the game
@jarlwhiterun7478
11 ай бұрын
Survival horror games usually do some really cool stuff with their harder difficulties. The AI of the Xenomorph in Isolation is optimal at the harder difficulties.
@daughterofluthien
10 ай бұрын
This was a really nuanced breakdown, nice job! Personally, I don’t mind adaptive difficulty when it’s successfully unnoticeable, because I like to be fully immersed in a game-both easily wiping through enemies and dying all the time can break the immersion for me, so if the game can successfully tweak that behind the curtain, I definitely find it to be a more fulfilling experience. But I know that just has to do with my playstyle preferences, and there’s as many of those as there are gamers
@stackflow343
10 ай бұрын
*I like when a game lies to me about my skill at the game"
@daughterofluthien
10 ай бұрын
@@stackflow343 yeah sure, as long as I’m having fun 😂 what is any curated experience but a detailed, intricate lie
@blackout3187
3 ай бұрын
Great video! Just like to say i´m surprised you didn´t mention difficulty by equipment. For example, in my first playthrough of dark souls 1 I struggled immensely, and just as I was about to drop the game entirely a friend mentioned something about a certain glaive I picked up by chance and that Harvel armour set. I ended up powering through the game with 3-5 tries per boss, sometimes first trying them. While my skill did increase with experience, I would never have finished it had I not learned about Glaive/Harvel easy mode. Now, after several playthroughs with different playstyles, it is my favorite game ever
@marchmelloow
11 ай бұрын
As Thomas Sowell says, "There are no solutions. Only trade offs". Difficulty options might solve one problem, but it might makes existing ones worse or introduce new ones. At the end of the day, as obvious as this may sound, the answer is simply, "Make games good".
@razbuten
11 ай бұрын
Don’t know Thomas Sowell, but yes, I agree. Correct take.
@pakxenon
11 ай бұрын
@@razbuten Sowell is an African-American economics pundit. He can explain basic economic concepts well, but has a history of being a talking head for rich white conservatives.
@Orange_Swirl
11 ай бұрын
But there IS a solution. It just may not be the one all players are gonna love. The developers need to ask themselves, "What is the intended experience of my (or our) video game, and how should we handle difficulty in a way that best reflects that?"
@marchmelloow
11 ай бұрын
@@Orange_Swirl Yeah, that's what I meant by "make games good." Whatever experience developers want players to have for their game should dictate how they develop their game.
@Orange_Swirl
11 ай бұрын
@@marchmelloow The problem I had with your statement "make games good" is that it was too subjective, so I wanted to come up with something more specific. You may have meant that, but I didn't like how vague it was imo.
@felipearrais5415
11 ай бұрын
Thank you so, so much for addressing the wide variety of details regarding videogames difficulty. WAY too many people just default to "Erm game hard == good because rewarding and if you dont like it dont play it" but reality is so much more than that. Personally I still think Celeste should be the golden standard: no one ever says that difficulty in Celeste is a problem because of how transparent the game is about it and the options you have to modify it.
@HazhMcMoor
10 ай бұрын
Yeah he hits both hard == good and easy == good equally and exposes problem with them.
@polygon.fiction6514
9 ай бұрын
I love when a game gives certain bonuses or adds layers to the gameplay (risk reward) on a higher difficulty - like getting hit means you take more damage, but hitting an enemy's weakpoint does even more damage than before. Or the hardest mode is unlocked after beating the game, and there's more incentive to replay.
@rebelion160
11 ай бұрын
People with handicaps, I think, have the most benefit from difficulty settings. If you're afflicted by stress related problems for instance, lowering certain settings allow you to surpass points you otherwise couldn't cross. For these people, it'd be like torturing themselves. You can enjoy the story. Certain mechanics, like crafting in the witcher (I mean similar in its mechanics) can be fun but it can be frustrating to gather the required materials or go to a specific place to craft... especially if you don't have a boatload of time to constantly repeat something.
@anny8720
11 ай бұрын
Yeah they're the ones accessibility settings were made for, but then some people complain about them even existing and letting 'casuals' enjoy their game 😐
@SanguinaryLily
10 ай бұрын
Honestly those ghouls are unironically the second hardest fight on death march. With the hardest one being making sure that one merchants brother survives looting a battlefield so you can get a crossing ticket.
@kentknightofcaelin4537
10 ай бұрын
The Djinn is also really hard if you turn level scaling on.
@barebuttspankin
10 ай бұрын
The worst is when bosses and such aren’t hard just annoying. Like they could not think of a hard boss so they add two or three or have them send in minions
@ThePseudologist
10 ай бұрын
Ah, most bosses in DS2
@FarolGG
10 ай бұрын
some bosses in god of war
@a.w_.
9 ай бұрын
My least favorite boss trope is a fairly standard move set but an unreasonable amount of status affect affliction on most attacks
@Awesomeflame16
9 ай бұрын
Sending in minions during a boss fight can ruin its flow imo.
@onecrispylad1512
9 ай бұрын
Twin gargoyles 💀
@Damon_Blue
10 ай бұрын
Bit late here but I wanted to say that one thing I hate about games is when a "true" ending or whatever is locked behind the hardest difficulty.
@boshwa20
11 ай бұрын
Normal - Introducing myself to the mechanics and other systems Higher difficulties - Testing my knowledge on what I know and my skill in more difficult situations
@gramfero
11 ай бұрын
Reality: Normal - normal numbers Higher difficulty - higher numbers
@maynardburger
11 ай бұрын
The thing for me, and the reason I'll usually opt to play most games on at least one-higher-than-normal difficulty is that it tends to force me to engage with the game's mechanics and systems more meaningfully. Normal difficulty has a habit of letting you skate by with only minimal engagement and you can sometimes miss out on a lot of what the game is offering. Even something The Last of Us, on harder difficulties, the game plays more like a survival horror game which is great, and you need to scrounge for supplies, making exploration more rewarding, and forces you to make smarter and greater use of the tools available to you in encounters and all. On Normal, you can mostly just shoot your way through most of the game. It's definitely a lot more than just 'higher numbers'.
@joe_the_zombie
11 ай бұрын
I personally really like the assist mode option. I was playing through a small indie game called going under, a very challenging rogue-like with a lot of cool story elements. After making it around halfway through the game, it got too hard for me, even though I am usually good at very difficult games, and so I just bumped up the assist mode settings until I started having fun again. I would still absolutely recommend the game if anyone seeing this hasn't played it.
@hellothere6038
11 ай бұрын
razbuten vids are the kind that I deliberate avoid until I'm in the perfect mood to absorb everything
@mariobartolini2158
10 ай бұрын
i like pathfinder: kingmaker's difficulty adjustment system: they have like 6 defoult difficulties to choose from, but also extreamely customizable options if you want to fin-tune, and options of both numerical and meccanical influence. you have an hp, damage and critical hit damag multiplier or you can turn on things like party members being able to die permanently, rest removing otherwise permanent debuffs etc... also library of ruina is a turn based card game with set difficulty (i guess you can choose to use weaker floors instead of the OP braindead ones as a difficulty scale) were you are always given all the info you need to understand the meccanics of every enemy and beat it so the real final boss becomes reading comprehention
@battlecarrier
11 ай бұрын
Love the points made in the video, there's just one I wonder about: You mentioned that someone running the COD4 tutorial until they are recommended Veteran would be setting themselves up for failure, however the type of player who wants to keep trying until they get it right is exactly the type of player who would enjoy the challenge a harder difficulty provides. In that regard a tutorial like that is potentially slightly more effective than credited.
@b-mo272
11 ай бұрын
i love how you analyze videos, you put my 15+ years playing, experiencing and learning video games and their little quirks into a clear voice that makes me finally understand the nuance that ive been a part of all this time.
@arcturus4853
11 ай бұрын
I really like the structure of this video. Every approach to difficulty is worth discussing but all have their flaws, and that's okay. Just something to be aware of rather than a problem requiring a simple fix.
@dugget8990
Ай бұрын
I feel like the difficulty settings in terraria have not been mentioned enough here. Game modes such as mediumcore and expert mode as well as challenge worlds like for the worthy make for such fundamentally different game experiences that sometimes it feels worth getting better at the game to not miss out the features of these more difficult settings
@scottster8858
11 ай бұрын
As I've gotten older, I've almost completely lost interest in difficult games. I used to seek out the hardest difficulty in games, now I just leave it on normal, and even drop it it to easy sometimes, which is something I never used to do. Turns out adult life is hard enough on it's own. I don't want to spend my days struggling to keep my business profitable, managing relationships, bills and responsibility, just to go home and struggle against a tough boss. I'm interested in enthralling stories and immersive environments now. I do still do competitive sim racing, which is in a way, about as hard as "gaming" gets.
@Irisverse
11 ай бұрын
Yeah, I really don't understand the desire for challenge for challenge's sake when the challenge is so artificial. If I wanted to overcome something difficult I could run a marathon or climb a mountain or go to work and deal with my coworkers. With games I just want a good story and environments, and maybe I want to mash some buttons to kill enemies along the way if it feels good to do so.
@MakeGamesGreatAgain
10 ай бұрын
That’s why I love the dark souls series and counterparts to them. It tests your patience and how greedy you can get when fighting enemies or bosses. There’s easy enemies and easy areas but then there’s an area where it’s a pain with the different type of enemies. It also forces you to learn more of the game and learn the game mechanics imo
@SJ-di5zu
9 ай бұрын
One thing I appreciate is that besides Elden Ring, none of the games really have a particularly “easy” mode. No matter what weapon you use, you will have to learn the core mechanics of the game if you want to beat the bosses. There’s no way to get pampered through it. If anything, there are extra hard modes, like under leveling, using a trash weapon, or in Sekiro’s case, Kuro’s Charm+Demon Bell. If you don’t use these features, you will still have to learn how to engage with the game mechanics, and it won’t be easy at all. But these features are there for expert players or repeat runs to add difficulty for replay value. Elden Ring’s summons undoubtedly jeopardize this system to an extent, but I’m also fine with it. The summons make bosses so easy to the point where it’s boring, so many hardcore players would forego using these because they want the full experience.
@tsirakura1684
10 ай бұрын
Great video as always, As someone invested in an accessible world, I love how you pointed out the difference between difficulty and accessability
@hankboog462
10 ай бұрын
One thing i feel often goes ignored in this discussion is disabled players. Obviously its not reasonable to expect every game to have detailed difficulty options for players with motor issues and the like, and theyre not ableist for lacking it, but i feel that centering the discussion of difficulty options exclusively around player skill level can leave a lot of people out and ignore the more important things
@mxmissy
6 ай бұрын
Yeah, I often find when people assume that if you want difficulty levels, you need to get good. It's just so frustrating, when more often than not, the people who do need difficulty levels are going to be disabled people. No matter how disabled they are. I more often times will go for an easier mode, while I don't currently have motor issues, I'm still disabled and can find harder and sometimes even normal difficulties ... well ... difficult. But a lot of my issues with that are similar to abled-bodied/non-disabled folks! That is, no one testing to see if difficulty levels are balanced enough. There are times where easy is just, too easy for me. But normal could be like pulling teeth. But like I said, it's frustrating when disabled people want to talk about difficulty levels, and then get told to get good. Like, buddy, you may as well have just told me to stop being disabled, if that's how you really feel.
@JohnOren64
3 ай бұрын
There's a big difference between difficulty settings and accessibility settings.
@mxmissy
3 ай бұрын
@@JohnOren64 There is. But sometimes and more often then not, they can go hand in hand. Take games like Celeste for example. It's a platformer by design, sure there are some platformers that are piss easy, and some that are hard. The thing with platformers is that it's about timing. You have to time your jump, so you either land on the platform or fall. Some people might not have the motor functions to be able to press a button, or some might not have the mental functions to be able to know how to make the jump. It's why the assist mode is perfect, and it's not like it's just a base "easy mode", but people can customise the level of accessibility they need. So yes, most of the time it's not about accessibility. Some people like playing "easy" games because they work long hours and don't have the time or energy to dedicate it towards a harder game or difficulty. For others, they might find it challenging to play the game due to a disability they have, because most of the time, if a game is in easy mode, it can still be challenging for that person! I played BG3 in the easy difficulty, and I still found it to be difficult in some areas (most of the time it was due to being underlevelled or I screwed up).
@JohnOren64
3 ай бұрын
@@mxmissy That's what I'm saying. Accessibility settings include specific options for people who struggle in certain areas, while difficulty settings make the game generally easier for people to progress through.
@JohnOren64
3 ай бұрын
@mxmissy I guess I probably shouldn't have said 'big' difference but I still feel like many people don't differentiate the two. Also, using Celeste as an example, the assist settings kinda show which options are made for accessibility and the ones there to ease the general difficulty of the game. (Sorry I kinda did a lot of yapping in both of my replies)
@ryangale3757
11 ай бұрын
I remember reading somewhere that S.T.A.L.K.E.R was specifically designed to be balanced for the hardest difficulty setting, but the developers were told they had to include easier difficulty levels, so strictly speaking, if you want to get an authentic experience playing the game, you NEED to play it on hard. Might be misremembering the details for why exactly they included other options, but I distinctly remember the devs mentioning that, I think in an interview or something.
@PizzawurmV1
10 ай бұрын
I remember trying to kill gigants in skyrim right after the tutorial for hours, it was one of the best experiences i had in any videogame
@markm5927
10 ай бұрын
Great video, nice to see someone cover difficulty in all its facets rather than just regurgitating the 'easy mode' discourse. It's fascinating to me how difficulty connects with the experience of a game, and trying to simplify it to 'options good' or 'options bad' has never sat well.
@seanplace2471
11 ай бұрын
I can’t speak to TLOU1, but having played 2 on Grounded, it’s one of my favorite things ever. The brutality of the world, intelligence of the enemies, and the scarcity of supplies perfectly suit the story and themes.
@mike20170
11 ай бұрын
TLOU1 is exactly the same. The games are masterpieces on grounded.
@Weighty68
11 ай бұрын
Yeah Grounded is arguably Naughty Dog’s best approach to the “hardest difficulty” they’ve ever done in any of their games. Uncharted is pure masochism in comparison though it’s clear anything above Hard in those games is kinda missing the point. I think it also helps that TLOU’s scariest enemies are still scary across all difficulties like Clickers being able to insta-kill regardless of which setting you’re on. This makes it so the skills you carry from dealing with them on lower difficulties is readily applicable to the higher ones where the major difference comes down in your handling of that encounter. Even on Grounded, a headshot is a headshot and it’s extremely rewarding to know and master these set rules of the game’s world.
@sololeveling7390
11 ай бұрын
This is so me. I always look up for recommendations on what difficulty to play every game i play. It feels like such a huge decision
@elizabethcabbage9817
11 ай бұрын
It really can be, especially if you're someone like me who feels obligated to stick with said choice they've committed to previously, and EVEN MORE so when a game tells you you straight up CANNOT change the difficulty (typically only if you pick the hardest one) after you start the game.
@_piranha
11 ай бұрын
I seriously don't regret my decision of looking it up for FE Three Houses in particular. It was my first FE game and i wanted to play on permadeath, so i was about to pick Normal, and then i looked it up and saw that "Normal" was just Easy. I absolutely hate when games brand it that way. Hard is very balanced and a way better difficulty for the first playthrough, but because of the bad wording, players will end up choosing Normal and cruise through the game.
@yutubeog
2 ай бұрын
This is the best video essay I've seen in the last 12months. It describes exactly how i feel about difficulty options in games. Sometimes i just have a moment of clarity/frustration and think to myself "I'm just going to play every game on Normal. If i don't have fun, then the game was balanced poorly = the game is badly designed and i dont care how fun it is on Hard". But at the same time i do just want to fill myself with amazing experiences. Even though clearly game developers cannot decide what Hard mode even means - ive just started playing every game on the hardest. At least i KNOW that i will engage with all of the games systems becuase i NEED to to survive. Money and Skills actually matter becuase i NEED them to survive. Planning and engaging with the world is NECCESSRY to progress. These days when i play a game on Normal - i forget to even select new skills when i level up, i dont bother crafting/reading/cooking because i dont need to. I don't take my time to survey the area, plan my attack and think about the engagement - becuase all i have to do is press " Attack, Attack, Attack" and i win. Which absolutely kills engagement and even the enjoyment of the world. Witcher 3 is an amazing example. Personally i prefer a game has no difficult options. Then i KNOW i am playing the intended experience. If i dont have fun, then i can just say "game bad" and move on with my life.
@FractalShoggoth
11 ай бұрын
Love this discussion, and this video is a phenomenal contribution. I see difficulty as part of the dialogue between player and designer. The way difficulty is framed is important, and that process is continuous. If there are difficulty options, they need to be thoroughly described. If the intended experience is constant death, then that needs to be communicated early (see: the Supposed-To-Die first bosses of FromSoft games). I am also a big fan of Celeste's approach, with one "difficulty", but accessibility options. Side note on FromSoft bosses: What I would love to see is for bosses to tweak, not their stats, but their moveset in response to what the player brings to the fight. Maybe a multi-phase boss reaches the next phases sooner, or maybe they account for multiple opponents with more wide swings of their weapons.
@josephmorales1687
11 ай бұрын
Just got off playing Chapter 2 of Alan Wake 2 and this video rings so true. Initially started the game at hard, thinking hey I played survival horrors before, this should be fine. But during that first boss fight I found myself hitting a ceiling. It wasn’t until I turned the difficulty down to normal that I was able to beat it, with no ammo and a sliver of health. It was satisfying as hell but it took a few beatings to learn the right difficulty for me. Great video, Raz! Keep em coming!
@nathandts3401
11 ай бұрын
No difficulty trophies so I'm just playing on easy. That same boss fight wasn't difficult on easy, but was still tense because it's designed well. Tight, maze-like areas, bass heavy music, the blurry, darkness effects. If you're comfortable playing at normal then keep at it, but I would say the game design and direction nails horror, regardless of whether or not the difficulty is making you manage your inventory.
@criminalcuteness3952
11 ай бұрын
I started playing through the dark souls trilogy last year and it made me realize that I have a serious item hoarding problem. My first playthrough for all 3 games had me hoarding all consumable items because my mentality was, "if I use this now then I might really regret it later if I am ever in a pinch." So that's how I ended up beating ds1, ds2 and ds3 with like 50 humanities/effigies/embers. Nothing but my estus flask and the greatsword in my hand.
@sgtpastry
11 ай бұрын
Someone needs to attend the Firebomb Academy. But, FromSoft games do have a problem with their consumables. Once you use it that's it. Even if you die before the next checkpoint it's gone forever. This is a lousy system as when I'm struggling against a boss that buff might help. But I'm hesitant to use it as I'm likely to die anyway, and I don't want to interrupt my gameplay to play From's version of Stardew Valley.
@Skallva
11 ай бұрын
@@sgtpastry Stuff like this is why I can't stand these games. So much of their difficulty feels like padding rather than an actual challenge. Using items is needlessly committal because restocking them takes way too much effort, largely due to the soul retrieval mechanic, meaning that every time you want to get your consumables back, you have to grind because that mechanic is needlessly committal as well, owing to the awful checkpoints and annoyingly high enemy damage, which will force you to play slow and careful just to get back where you left off. And that's even without going into the boss fights, which have no checkpoints next to them, lock you in, meaning you can't actually use your currency if you die there and are huge damage sponges that will kill you in 3 hits while you're wrestling with the camera. So have fun if you reach the boss door, die there, fail to retrieve your souls, and are out of your consumables. Back to the grind you go. And make sure that also doesn't happen when dealing with mobs, especially when you're a bit short from a levelup. Why must these games pop up in every difficulty discussion again?
@leithaziz2716
11 ай бұрын
@@Skallva Some games are better than others in terms of handling pointless grind. The start of Bloodborne and Sekiro unfortunately have the problem of grinding blood vials or spirit emblems if you die too much.
@dtsatanfu8673
5 ай бұрын
I dont comment often and found this video by chance but i hope to start a discussion around an idea have. Great video btw! These types of videos engage my mind and critical thinking process and thats what i enjoy most, almost like a challenge in of itself! The Idea is why not let players choose what they are seeking from the game? If they want a story experience but they want an adustable diffculty that is an option. Or if players like a challenge, how about one that developers made specifically in mind for these players and you cant change it part way through. While the 1st option you could still have difficulty changes like easy, normal, or hard. You could still have a "difficulty" that makes you challenge yourself to beat it. Instead of thinking of this as the later option being a 4th difficutly thinking of it as a lateral option to the 1st. The problem i see with this even making a game with all this in mind as this would take an extreme amount of resources and thought process around making the game.
@Bulbassador
11 ай бұрын
So excited! This video filled me with the same excitement as the gaming for a non gamer vid did when it first came out. Awesome idea, awesome video. I love hearing you describe cool thoughts like this!
@gamesareartGA
11 ай бұрын
There's also situation where difficulty options just break the immersion of a game. Like when you play the highest difficulty in Skyrim and you have to swing your sword at a bear for like... half an hour. It really brings you back to the fact that they are ennemies with HP bars and not living breathing things in the world.
@dj_koen1265
11 ай бұрын
On top of that skyrim had adaptive difficulty as well Where all enemies would scale with the player level Which made for some really wonky situation when for example i skipped out on the main quest until i was like lvl80+ or something and couldn’t beat alduin because he was way overleveled compared to what i could do
@ruukinen
11 ай бұрын
@@dj_koen1265 Not all enemies scale, and most that do only do it to a certain point. Skyrim had it a lot closer to good than oblivion where your fall of bruma experience could be vildy different based on if you meet with a bunch of imps or high level daedra.
@gamesareartGA
11 ай бұрын
@@dj_koen1265 Absolutely! I miss the good old Oblivion's bandits that were covered from head to toe with the best armor possible while trying to bully you out of 100 gold. Those were the days.
@SarahSnow99
11 ай бұрын
When i first played Baldur's Gate 3, i was really glad they let me change difficulty whenever i wanted. Generally i played on Normal, but some battles required me to drop down to Easy, while other times i bumped up ro Tactician because i found it too easy. Really just depended on what stats i have my characters that run, and on replays, which battles i found difficult changed
@nathanscott3339
7 ай бұрын
That comment about someone loving a game but not having the skill to really explore it? Right here. Me and Hollow Knight. I eventually rebought the game on PC and used a trainer program, which does have a LOT of options, including two different forms of invulnerability. One basically removed your hit box. Run on spikes, run through enemies, whatever. You are safe. This was boring. The other method kept your hit box, you still got hit with the sound effects, if it was a hazard, you still got teleported back to where you last had safe ground....but you just didn't lose health. I loved this. It let me still get the feeling of how the game is intended on a moment to moment aspect without the frustration of needing to trek back to my shade to get my geo back and have full soul capacity (which, btw, bad move in games like some of the Soulsborne stuff that literally reduces max health or robs you of your upgrade materials that actually only makes the challenge harder). I enjoy some challenge. I do not enjoy bashing my face into the wall. And I ESPECIALLY do not like having long and/or difficult corpse runs so I can attempt a boss again. Check pointing should enable you to return to the challenge more quickly so you can keep learning and trying instead of having to take 2-5 mins fighting random trash mobs again just so you can get back to attempting the boss that is what is actually a road block at the moment.
@jamesbales7504
11 ай бұрын
I prefer optional content as a difficulty or by limiting myself by rules that I set for the game. Optional bosses new game plus are great ways to let players who want more challenge to get it. If you look at nuzlocks in pokemon nobody makes it harder you chose to make it more difficult for yourself. Often when I play I'll run into something unbalanced or broken and I'll just choose not to use it because it takes the fun out of it and then later I may find something a bit too hard and I'll pull out the nonsense. I think choosing difficulty is the same as choosing to cheat in a game it's up to you and what you find fun. Personally I like a lot of difficulty but I know plenty of others who don't.
@andreaskrlev4376
11 ай бұрын
I think its interesting how you reached many of the same conclusions as VideoGameDunkey in his videos about difficulty. Harder difficulties force players to look into different strategies on how to beat things they are unable to, and sometimes the games just cracks, as can be seen in your Demon Souls gameplay. I think having a game with high difficulty requires extreme polish to pull off, because one mistake in the system and the whole thing falls apart. It's why nobody ever talks about difficulty in Skyrim
@skeetsmcgrew3282
11 ай бұрын
Ah yes, Skyrim. The game with the worst idea for a difficulty setting ever that somehow got a free pass by fans
@santi_super_stunts2573
11 ай бұрын
I’ve been playing Skyrim on the hardest difficulty, at first it was unfairly hard so I used any and all cheese tactics that are part of the game to level the playing field , such as leveling up my sneak on the grey beards and general power leveling , then around lvl 40 the combat was good I could actually not immediately get kill cammed but had to dodge certain hits or use certain potions , but now at lvl 80 and beyond it’s too easy.
@Guyonabench
11 ай бұрын
I definitely prefer a fixed difficulty or that developers communicate more descriptively what to expect from each difficulty setting. However I think it’s good that not every games tries to do the same thing with difficulty. Variety is good. And having goofy experiences where the challenge was a bit off in one way or the other can be special or reflective moments. I also think self imposed challenges to make games harder is a neat way to get the challenge you maybe missed in a play through or have grown out of from getting better. I’m mostly thinking about my experiences with shovel knight writing this. Amazing video as per the usual. I really appreciate your reflective nature. Cheers^^
@Leonkennedy19992
10 ай бұрын
My favorite experience with difficult was ghost of tsushima. I always put difficulty on the highest setting but with tsushima it was crushing. I had progress with stealth around my first few hours because i couldnt continue but little by little as i grew stronger i felt comfortable attacking enemies head on. Until eventually towards the last hours the game became really easy
@benzymatic
11 ай бұрын
Love this video. I was hoping accessibility would come up because (as you mention) it's kind of inextricably tied to difficulty. And then your discussion of Celeste's approach to difficulty and accessibility really tied together everything I hoped you would touch upon in that discussion. I think you're conclusion is right: difficulty (and therefore also accessibility) is messy and there's no perfect solution to suit every game and gamer. Talking as someone who gets quickly frustrated with things I find too diffiult in games, even if Elden Ring had taken the Celeste approach, I probably would have changed those accessibility settings a bit; but also, beating ER is one of my most satisfying gaming experiences ever and I don't think I would have felt that way with difficulty or potentially exploitable (for me) accessibility options. As always, I appreciate the thoughtful commentary you bring to your videos.
@ryanwillingham
11 ай бұрын
my favorite type of difficulty is the type of difficulty you get from, say, speedrunning, and my favorite example of this is the original ghostrunner. you can totally finish the game normally, with a little challenge here or there. however, the mode i came back to gave you medals for finishing a course within a specific time window. i went through them once, getting only bronze or silver at best, and immediately i wanted more (if only because there was a fancy sword as a reward). so i got to grinding, figuring out the best path, and when i got those damn gold medals, it felt, so, so good. even better, there was a VISUAL difference, and that's what i want to emphasize most. there's a special kind of pride in getting through a level sloppily and getting through a level like you were born to slay every single enemy set before you. i don't like stealth games, but i imagine that's what hitman players feel when they achieve silent assassin. best part is that it's completely up to the player what they're happy with, so if you're a stubborn guy like razbuten, you don't have to rest feeling like you never "got gud" (as much as i hate that saying) honorable mention to assist modes, like in celeste. i was getting frustrated with the outer wilds dlc at one point and went to turn off the scares, but the message that it wasn't the intended way to play the game was what motivated me to keep going it and finish it in a way that felt good. but if you're at your breaking point, it offers a little step up that you can turn off as soon as you past this one level you're struggling with. they're great tools (lol, i hadn't finished the video. glad assist modes got mentioned!)
@BMVfilms
11 ай бұрын
That was how I felt playing Neon White!
@skeetsmcgrew3282
11 ай бұрын
Had that experience with the campaign for Levelhead. Some of the speedrun times required borderline perfection and I found that sometimes if I just moved on and came back I would develop skills to go faster. A very very satisfying feeling of progression
@IbbyTaz
8 ай бұрын
I'm not joking, you actually helped me fall asleep last night. Your style of video is so relaxing
@HazhMcMoor
10 ай бұрын
Damn this video really hits every point about difficulty so perfectly im very surprised coming to this channel. Usually there are things that i disagree or even despise like in other videos but here all the pain points is described magnificently. Keep it up!
@lordducky929
11 ай бұрын
The Zelda Totk system is a great difficulty approach aswell. there is no difficulty option, instead defeating certain enemies gives you 'xp', defeating them 'skillfully.' even more. the xp system is completely hidden from the player but slowly rises resulting in most enemies around the map becoming bulkier tougher variants. the weapons breaking also means players will lose access to their strong weapons if they stop fighting stronger enemies because their drops are what you use to 'fuse' create the stronger weapons, but they will never run out of good weapons long as they keep engaging with challenging opponents.
@elizabethcabbage9817
11 ай бұрын
No fuck that because now I have an inventory full of strong equipment I don't want to waste on the red or blue bokoblins I encounter LMAO
@Nepgdamn
11 ай бұрын
This was exactly my experience with the witched 3. I usually start with max difficulty and tune it down if I see that it's too much difficult. I lowered it since the tutorial fight was too much difficult for me and for the rest of the game I felt like everything was so easy on normal
@cloudburst27
8 ай бұрын
In general, I always stick to the easiest difficulty and focus on the story, but I totally get the point you're making. I think I ran into things becoming mindless in Bioshock: Infinite, but other than that easy mode usually never disappoints me. I still think the best approach to this challenge is the single difficulty paired with the Assist Mode in Celeste that you mentioned.
@NelsonMandelski
11 ай бұрын
I kind of see the choice in difficulty as a choice of how willing I am to fail and have to try certain parts of a game multiple times in order to master it. Most games will just have certain sections or spikes in difficulty that on the hardest settings would have me retrying it over and over like how you explained you would do the beginning section in cod 4 to get it perfect. I think some people don't care about failing a huge a amount of times because the reward of finally beating the challenge is worth the effort, where as other just like to enjoy the general experience of a game without feeling like they're losing too many times.
@sicnarfghost
11 ай бұрын
Exactly, enjoy the general experience of a game. Not enjoying redoing the same thing too many times. We complain job is boring because of that...
@chattw6885
10 ай бұрын
I have the experience that I always remember the games in which is struggled and had challenges to overcome because I played them on hard difficulty. Sometimes I play games on "easy" difficulty if I just want to relax and not think much, but that always makes me forget those games soon after finishing. So I kinda came to the conclusion that if I am gonna start playing a game I think I want to remember, I pretty much always try and play on hardest difficulty just so I know the memories and experiences with the game will stay
@knight_lautrec_of_carim
11 ай бұрын
I hate games getting harder if you perform well. It punishes you for being good and diminishes your skill gain. It's like level scaling in RPGs: If a goblin in the starter area always takes exactly 4 attacks to die no matter if I'm level 1 or 50, then there's no growth.
@afriendlyfox
10 ай бұрын
I think that having any choice of difficulty and it being clearly communicated is still better than having none or not telling it to the player, and having them miss out the entire experience. I abandoned Dark Souls at the point when I spent a couple of hours dying on the way to the Taurus demon. The game did not even tell me that some weapon options were easier and I did not see them on the main way, and all I felt was just disappointment of wasting so much time and not being able to refund the game. I did not get to enjoy anything other people were talking about, and all I saw of the game is just grinding the same location for hours.
@spyrotikus
11 ай бұрын
Ive never thought about random health and ammo drops being difficulty modifiers, but yeah I guess they are.
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