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[JerryinSoCal]

it is because it affects game design. also somehow the most beloved games ever and some of the best selling games ever have no difficulty options whatsoever

Which games would those be? other than the souls games? There are plenty of franchises that sell far better than souls games. Difficulty also has no real impact on game design, they tend to only reduce damage done by enemies and increase damage done by the player or opening up the timing windows for time sensitive options that's hardly a huge issue to overcome.

 

[Punished Miku]

it is because it affects game design.

Only if they actually put effort into it like Team Ninja. Ninja Gaiden difficulty levels had different tiers of enemies, new content, new enemy AI routines, new bosses, new boss AI routines and moves added.

If you just want to put in a lazy difficulty option you can make Elden Ring exactly as is and put it out. Then add easy mode where damage is reduced by 30%, and one hit kill moves have damage reduced further. Add an extra estus flask or something. Easy mode settings disabled when playing online.

There, done. Would take 60 seconds of coding.

 

[Knightime_X]

As someone who enjoys a hard game JUST AS MUCH AS chilling and playing something on easy because I fucking want to, that "hot take" article is gaming cancer.
What is this? North Korea? Fuck you, I'll play however I want.

 

[Wildebeest]

Which games would those be? other than the souls games? There are plenty of franchises that sell far better than souls games. Difficulty also has no real impact on game design, they tend to only reduce damage done by enemies and increase damage done by the player or opening up the timing windows for time sensitive options that's hardly a huge issue to overcome.

Mario, no difficulty setting. (see also games like Zelda and Metoid)
Tetris, level select
Poketmans, no difficulty setting
GTA, no difficulty setting
OG Tomb Raider, no difficulty setting

It is almost like a lot of the biggest games of all time have one hidden common feature.

 

[Spukc]

elden ring was piss easy go play some real hard games
that game ruined souls games for me as a genre now it became so much easier

 

[The_Mike]

Oh looks an soulsborne OP virgin.

Common quality.

 

[Laptop1991]

go on youtube, type in "[name of game] Longplay"...

Or maybe they can play a game the way they like to, they bought it, you didn't.

 

[SteadyEvo]

Yeah, cause we all want sweating palms, stress and anxiety with our games.

Fuck outta here!!!

 

[Fredrik]

Why?

I loved Returnal, then ended up hating it - Because of the difficulty and lack of save points and harsh/broken progression.

So now a game I could’ve had on my all time top 10 isn’t even on my top 100 list if I would ever bother making such a list.

How is that a good thing? What positives do I get from that? What does Housemarque gain from that?

All it does is making me less likely to buy their next game and it has also made me cautious on the whole roguelike genre and also other games people mention when talking about hard games, like Sekiro,

So, no. How about focusing on making sure people can have fun with the games instead. How about making sure the completion percentage isn’t getting lower for every boss battle. Are devs proud if only 10% of their customers see the conclusion of the story and will bother with a potential sequel?

Easy mode, save points, even rewind mechanics. Everything is fine as far as I’m concerned.

Just make it all optional! So people can choose how much challenge they want, and use trophies/achievements to reward those who play without any help, make a git gud trophy or something.

My son finished Super Mario Odyssey as a 4 year old. Because of a brilliant easy mode which replenished the health whenever he stod still for a few seconds. Still challenging to find the right spot for health regen when enemies attacked, but he finished it and was super happy and proud. Would never have happened with only one difficulty supposed to be perfect for everyone.

 

[Ultra Donny]

No movie should be enjoyed without an solid analysis no music should be listed to without a proper understanding of the context it repersent the recording history.

 

[Dust-by-Monday]

Just what I want after a hard day of work. A hard video game that frustrates me!

/s

I usually choose easy because I just want an interactive story, not rage inducing frustration.

 

[rkofan87]

But Elden Ring has easy mode. Summons, lock-on, shields, etc...

and over leveling

 

[pleaseinsertdisctwo]

In Elden Ring is much easier to over level and just destroy most bosses.

Also you have the option of summoning people help you out, I mean what else do people want?

It up to devs themselves if want to put difficulty option or not and FROM made it perfectly clear time to time again that they are not interested putting difficulty option in their games.

How long are people going to have same bland conversation?

I don't agree with this. In both DS3 and Elden Ring, enemies give pitiful amounts of EXP. The only way I managed to overlevel in this game was by using that glitch where you jump off a cliff. Otherwise, I wouldn't have had the patience to deal with the final bosses or Malenia

 

[TintoConCasera]

Just as you have the right to play your games on easy, I have my right of thinking your are a pussy for doing so.

Because, come on, what's the point of a game if it has no challenge at all?

 

[BadBurger]

The realest thing you'll read all week: easy mode was made for attractive people

 

[Surf Ninja]

When the Romans forced Simon of Cyrene to share the burden of Jesus' cross on the march toward his crucifixion and death on Golgotha, was that the Messianic version of "easy mode?" I think it was, and as such, easy mode is now the Gamers' cross to bear.

 

[Fahdis]

Lmao, these games are piss easy when you overlevel and have the time to put in. The hardest game in all honesty that I have ever played is Killzone 2 on Hardcore.

 

[Flash Junkins]

A whole generation of gamers have been mentally damaged by this series.

100% To determine the level a fella or girl or them or whatever puts into a game for enjoyment is subjective and a sure sign of lack of social interaction.

 

[Fredrik]

Just as you have the right to play your games on easy, I have my right of thinking your are a pussy for doing so.

Because, come on, what's the point of a game if it has no challenge at all?

Nobody here is talking about having no challenge, people are talking about having the choice to choose the challenge they prefer.

What’s the point of having a story if people never reach the end? Or making a cool ending boss? Or an awesome late game area with no returning enemies and all new content? Or even having ending credit?

No wonder many games are samey and feel like they have a lower budget by the end, no point wasting more money at that point, devs know only a fraction of their customers are left by the end anyway.

Should have the coolest stuff at the start and have starting credits instead, an awesome starter boss, and end the story half way through, and just make an infinite game with exponential level of difficulty impossible to complete.

That way more people see the coolest stuff and see who made the game and see all the great story bits and acting, and the 10% or whatever who always think everything is too easy get a game even they can’t finish.

Or, add difficulty options.

 

[StateofMajora]

I actually agree. Easy modes are dumb.

If a game is too hard for you, play something else.

 

[marjo]

Yeah, and stero systems shouldn't have bass and treble knobs, the musical artists know how they want things to sound. In fact, why do they even have volume knobs? I'm sure there's an intended listening level. Just who the hell do these so called consumers think they are! And don't get me started on having salt and pepper (or any type of condiments) at the table. Talk about ignoring the chef's vision.
.

 

[A Most Virtuous Cat]

100% agreed; there should be single difficulty level around which the game (level design, items, quests etc.) is tailor made.

 

[Allandor]

Just as you have the right to play your games on easy, I have my right of thinking your are a pussy for doing so.

Because, come on, what's the point of a game if it has no challenge at all?

Live can already be challenging enough. Some people just want to chill while playing a game and like the atmosphere and storyline.
Everybody is different and have different preferences. Gaming communities should really try to accept this.

Also the problem is, if a game is to challenging at least the next entry might loose some potential buyers and the game goes back into it's niche (with lower budgets for future games).

E.g. I like how Diablo 2&3 made this. They have a hardcore mode along with several difficulty settings. So you can play the game how you prefer it.
- Don't like permadeath -> use normal mode.
- The game is to hard -> use a lower difficulty setting (but you get less EXP and worse loot)

 

[Kenpachii]

If you die in elder ring, does it delete your save file? if not, its already easy mode.

 

[begotten]

The problem is "hard" can mean a lot of things in video games.

There's people who think Soulsborne games are hard, when we all know DMC is it's mechanically intensive big brother.
There's achievement / trophy whores who deliberately avoid hard games because of difficulty.
How many people accustomed to modern games can go back and beat a Mega Man or Castelvania game normally?
There's competitive games like fighters and MOBAs where one person can take 500 hours to get to a high level and another can be average after 5000 hours.

Just keep all difficulty modifiers in. No one really cares and people will play what they want, like they always have.

 

[Deerock71]

 

[killatopak]

Easy fix.

Just name the easy mode normal and add additional difficulty modes.

This satisfies the hard mode fuckers and easy mode pansies.

 

[Woggleman]

Yeah, and stero systems shouldn't have bass and treble knobs, the musical artists know how they want things to sound. In fact, why do they even have volume knobs? I'm sure there's an intended listening level. Just who the hell do these so called consumers think they are! And don't get me started on having salt and pepper (or any type of condiments) at the table. Talk about ignoring the chef's vision.
.

Phil Spector actually thought like that. He preferred mono because stereo gave the listener too much control over the sound. He was also a murderer and lunatic so maybe we shouldn't listen to people who don't want the consumer to be able to customize their experience.

 

[Knightime_X]

Mario, no difficulty setting. (see also games like Zelda and Metoid)
Tetris, level select
Poketmans, no difficulty setting
GTA, no difficulty setting
OG Tomb Raider, no difficulty setting

It is almost like a lot of the biggest games of all time have one hidden common feature.

Compare the difficulty of the first boss in literally any mario, zelda or metroid game to any souls game
Those games don't have difficulty settings because the developers are not on crack and understand the AVERAGE gamer is not some sweaty MLG champion but an actual casual player who lowkey kinda sucks at gaming.

 

[RPSleon]

http://[URL][URL]https://metro.co.u...d-have-an-easy-mode-readers-feature-16972834/

[/URL][/URL]

Elden Ring's success proves Gamers want a challenge, and that every game could be designed with the same experience as everyone else.

Man. I blocked these awful Metro clickbait reader feature articles on my browsers new feed and now they show up here.

All these Metro articles are scuffed.

 

[Tiamat2san]

No.
If you need a game to be hard to enjoy it, good for you.
Some prefer the opposite , good for them.

Options? Good for everyone.

 

[64bitmodels]

I play games to relax and enjoy a good story

there's a little thing called movies that let you do this but with 0 interaction

 

[64bitmodels]

Phil Spector actually thought like that. He preferred mono because stereo gave the listener too much control over the sound. He was also a murderer and lunatic so maybe we shouldn't listen to people who don't want the consumer to be able to customize their experience.

this dude's name is dangerously close to another phil we know

 

[nominedomine]

The irony is that From Software games had an easy mode all along, it's called using spells and other cheese strats.

 

[Kamina]

Easy modes are fine
Everyone should playing on easy is a noob though

 

[InfiniteCombo]

A whole generation of gamers have been mentally damaged by this series.

This.

The Souls games might be well regarded, but the FROM cultists/zealots are starting to become insufferable.

 

[Arcadialane]

There should be an easy mode, in fact there should be an infinite health mode because dying in a video game is mostly pointless.

 

[nani17]

Old man time: Come back to me when you beat Ghosts 'n Goblins or Battletoads.

 

[derrickchase]

Shields are not easy mode just a distraction. Go dual wielding swords that have inmate bleeding and add frozen attributes on it and see everything explode on a jump attack

Shields are sort of easy mode until Maleina.

 

[Shifty]

Monkey's Paw: All Easy modes are removed, and the industry rebalances Normal to be the new Easy.

Everybody loses.

 

[TheInfamousKira]

I think difficulty settings are something that really need to revolutionized. A game that is hard shouldn't be utterly inaccessible and a game that's easy shouldn't be boring. But I'm a dreamer.

 

[derrickchase]

Even though I'm not going to click on the link because I don't care about what that person thinks, from an artistic perspective, difficulty modes are pretty hacky and lacking in artistic integrity.

You either have a game design intent or you don't. Having different difficulties is just a lame way of copping out of the fact that you don't want to commit to a single authorial intent or even more cynically are trying to stretch out a game's content by forcing people through multiple asinine difficulty modes before they can really complete the game. It's lame. So I would go even farther and say games shouldn't have difficulties at all. Have some gumption and integrity. Settle on a design, make a decision, and deal with it.

 

[Danjin44]

So I would go even farther and say games shouldn't have difficulties at all. Have some gumption and integrity. Settle on a design, make a decision, and deal with it.

To me it’s up to devs themselves, if they want put difficulty option then they should if not they shouldn’t be force to just because others think it’s “standard”.

 

[FStubbs]

Sometimes I want to relax and I don't have time for BS difficulty. I'll play a game on easy mode because it's there.

Like Yuji Horii said once, in video games it's not like someone loses if I win.