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Top Ten Harshest Difficulty Curves in Video Games

Rusty Bucket Bay's difficulty is overrated. It is more daunting than it is hard, and I would say the gear room shouldn't even factor since the water is the biggest roadblock. If anything Canary Mary would be the series' (awful) difficulty spike.

Also those chests in Rayman Origins were the shit, wish every platformer both 2D and 3D had levels like those where you have a daredevil run through several hazards.  
 
Gartooth said:
Rusty Bucket Bay's difficulty is overrated. It is more daunting than it is hard, and I would say the gear room shouldn't even factor since the water is the biggest roadblock. If anything Canary Mary would be the series' (awful) difficulty spike.

 
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Yeeeep.

Never understood peoples issues with RBB. As long as you manage your breath bar properly the level is just as easy as any other stage in the game.
 
Andrew. said:
Surprised the Dam level in NES Ninja Turtles wasn't listed.
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Haha. How did I forget that? To be fair one person can't play everything. This is one hell of a difficulty spike.

feint_ruled said:
Yeah, thats makes sense. But just about everyone in this thread is talking about difficulty walls, where a previously playable game suddenly gets bullshit. E.g. the Radec bit in KZ2.

I think some of the earlier Mario games meet the topic as described in the subject. Fairly easy early levels, which quickly ramp up to tearing your hair out.
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I agree with that last statement. I mentioned Mario 1 having a very steep curve but Mario 2 isn't that far behind. The first few Megaman games done in the wrong order can be extremely taxing.
 
Pfft Whitney isn't hard at all, as it largely depends on your team but. Hell when I first fought Whitney I just abuse smokescreen, tail whip and growl thus making her Miltank no longer a threat.

pa22word said:
Yeeeep.

Never understood peoples issues with RBB. As long as you manage your breath bar properly the level is just as easy as any other stage in the game.
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It's hard because when you died you have to collect all the notes again.
 
Man, fuck that. Turbo Tunnel is nowhere near as difficult as EVERYONE ON THE INTERNET says it is.

But I guess this is about difficulty curves (spikes?) and it's definitely a lot harder than the two levels before it...
 
It's totally weird, but I never remember having a huge problem with Death Mountain in Zelda II. Like, at all. And it's not like I consider myself good at the game or anything, most Temples totally kicked my ass.

Great Temple is more of the game's difficulty spike, imo, if you can count final dungeons as difficulty spikes.

Also curious as to why GX Chapter 6 over Chapter 7 and... um... why Whitney is there at all.
 
Coxy said:
most of these are difficulty spikes, not curves, OP already mentioned it but yeah it's annoying
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Maybe we should have a gaf thread in the future to go over actual difficulty curves. It's a topic we don't talk much about for a dedicated gaming forum.

The Bankslammer said:
Also curious as to why GX Chapter 6 over Chapter 7 and... um... why Whitney is there at all.
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His explanation is that Whitney throws normal types at you and has Millitank. You can prepare for her to a degree but she is the one character that will ultimately force you to grind hard in Pokemon Gold.
 
Cidd said:
List missing

Dark Souls
Super meat boy
Rayman 1
Devil May Cry 3 OG US release
Ninja Gaiden

most of the games you listed wasn't that hard...
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Watch the video. He explicitly states that he wasn't aiming for the most difficult games, but games where the difficulty spike was abrupt, unexpected, or didn't adequately prepare the player for the challenge.
 
pa22word said:
374.jpg


NinjaGaiden-5.jpg
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Oh yeah... I removed them from my memory lol. And that dude was way harder in the last stage... oh the climbing... ::shudder::
 
Rusty Bucket Bay has no business being on that list.

I do, however, agree with the chest chases in Rayman Origins. You had to have pixel-perfect jumps.
 
maniac-kun said:
List is invalid because Dwarf Fortress exists.

dorflearningcurvep5u19.gif
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I never understood why the WoW curve end up over pretty high. WoW, even in 40 mens raids, was still really easy. Do your regular gig, just remember the events during the boss fight. Jump at the right moment and bam, done.
 
Gartooth said:
Rusty Bucket Bay's difficulty is overrated. It is more daunting than it is hard, and I would say the gear room shouldn't even factor since the water is the biggest roadblock. If anything Canary Mary would be the series' (awful) difficulty spike.
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Canary Mary is only hard if you don't realise that the computer is just rubber banding. If you go relatively slowly until the end, it's ridiculously easy.
 
Mr-Joker said:
It's hard because when you died you have to collect all the notes again.
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The XBLA port made the game far easier in that regard. Note scores were more tedious than difficult, especially Click Clock Wood were you had to go through the level 4 times.

As far as Canary Mary, yeah I've beaten her many times by abusing her rubber banding but before learning about it, it was hellish.
 
100% agree on Whitney. There really weren't a lot of fighting type options before gym 3 and those you had access to were weak as hell against one Stomp from Miltank. She's very easily beatable when prepared but going into that battle blind, especially considering the trainers in her gym, Miltank throws a huge wtf am I fighting against at you.
 
McLovin said:
Oh yeah... I removed them from my memory lol. And that dude was way harder in the last stage... oh the climbing... ::shudder::
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Really? Most people tend to think shadow murai is pretty much a complete joke and a really anticlimactic final boss.

If you can remember: what gave you trouble with him? Not trying to undermine what you're saying or anything, it's just such an outlier opinion and Ninja Gaiden is probably my favorite game, thus my curiosity is piqued, lol :p
 
wildfire said:
His explanation is that Whitney throws normal types at you and has Millitank. You can prepare for her to a degree but she is the one character that will ultimately force you to grind hard in Pokemon Gold.
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Hm... I guess that's fair. Miltank is the first heavily defensive Pokemon you encounter in the game and can pretty easily throw newer players for a loop, I suppose. It's not so much explicit difficulty as much as it just requires a reevaluation of strategy.

I guess it's just another one of those things where I've never personally heard of anyone having much trouble with it, so I'm always a bit taken back when people mention its supposed difficulty.
 
Honestly, I didn't think Death Mountain in Zelda 2 was that bad. The last dungeon is god awful, and nothing can really prepare you for it. So many dead ends, the enemies are incredibly difficult to deal with, and its a gauntlet to even get to the first boss. Then there's another boss.

I'm never beating this game and will have nightmares about the last dungeon until the day that I die. Death Mountain is a piece of cake comparatively speaking, and I was way more prepared for that.
 
Many Treasure games had almost extreme learning curve; in particular, in Alien Soldier you must play close to perfection since the beginning, truly a merciless challenge.

Also Sin e Punishment requires you to master game system pretty early on.
 
McLovin said:
No Killzone 2?

Pretty sure these games are just harsh all the time. No real curve IMO.
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For me personally all these games I listed started out easy until I got to the midgame when things ramped up in difficulty to almost unplayable hard.
 
Shamrock7r said:
actually nvm, link might be too offensive, but if you remember the famous F-Zero GX rant from SA, yea, lol.
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That was a legendary rant. It helps that he goes into detail what's unfair then goes on a tangent about what the game gets out of winning over the player winning.
 
I remember there were some spikes in prototype that I absolutely hated. Maybe not the hardest ever but they still frustrated me a lot
 
Lezard's Tower in Valkyrie Profile. You're especially screwed if your Dragon Buster breaks before or during it.
 
Dr. Feel Good said:
100% agree on Whitney. There really weren't a lot of fighting type options before gym 3 and those you had access to were weak as hell against one Stomp from Miltank. She's very easily beatable when prepared but going into that battle blind, especially considering the trainers in her gym, Miltank throws a huge wtf am I fighting against at you.
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Just played through GBC Silver, and really I didnt have that much problems. Mostly because I was able to get a Machop via trade from some girl in the same town. Sure Milktank killed the rest of my party while I was trying to keep Machop alive, but it was okay ish.

One of game I had a lot of problem with is Elite Beat Agent. That last song man. I suck at Rhythm games.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvLCnKqYWzA
 
pa22word said:
Really? Most people tend to think shadow murai is pretty much a complete joke and a really anticlimactic final boss.

If you can remember: what gave you trouble with him? Not trying to undermine what you're saying or anything, it's just such an outlier opinion and Ninja Gaiden is probably my favorite game, thus my curiosity is piqued, lol :p
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Every time he killed me I had to reclimb that stupid volcano. I think I even died climbing that thing a few times too.
The first time I fought him in game wasn't that hard because I played the demo to death, I even went to the highest difficulty. He's actually really easy to cheese once you memorize his ticks.
 
Rubius said:
I never understood why the WoW curve end up over pretty high. WoW, even in 40 mens raids, was still really easy. Do your regular gig, just remember the events during the boss fight. Jump at the right moment and bam, done.
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The challenge was typically not in the role of a single player, but trying to get yourself and the other 39 of them to mesh completely - with zero mistakes - for an extended period of time. That's never easy.
 
Rubius said:
One of game I had a lot of problem with is Elite Beat Agent. That last song man. I suck at Rhythm games.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvLCnKqYWzA
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Jumpin Jack Flash is hard, but the levels that precede it are pretty hard too. If the game had a difficulty spike, I'd probably say that it's Canned Heat, if anything. Pretty much all the songs prior had you going along to the rhythm of the melody, but Canned Heat has you following this totally weird, almost arbitrary beat.
 
djtiesto said:
Lezard's Tower in Valkyrie Profile. You're especially screwed if your Dragon Buster breaks before or during it.
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I would agree with this.


If we are just talking about difficulty spikes, there are a few battles in Final Fantasy Tactics that ramp up quickly if you are new to the game and did not properly plan out your character progression. Of course, it's not a curve since the game is on easy mode after you get Cid.
 
The Bankslammer said:
Jumpin Jack Flash is hard, but the levels that precede it are pretty hard too. If the game had a difficulty spike, I'd probably say that it's Canned Heat, if anything. Pretty much all the songs prior had you going along to the rhythm of the melody, but Canned Heat has you following this totally weird, almost arbitrary beat.
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I agree that Canned Heat was pretty awful.
Wasnt Ouendan last song said to be easier than EBA last song ? Man I should try to import Ouendan one day.
 
Trial of Archmedes in God of War Ascension was absurdly hard compared to the rest of the game (the easiest GoW by far...).
 
Trials HD was particularly brutal. Beginner, Easy, Medium levels are pretty much a cakewalk. Faultless runs are attainable fairly quickly from the off. Then you hit the hard levels, and you think... hmm... this is... hard.

Then there are four extreme levels, two of which I couldn't complete whatsoever for weeks. (30 minutes/500 fault limit)
 
Yoshi's Island DS. Had like 100 extra lives going into the later levels, then lost nearly all in 2 levels near the end.
 
Rubius said:
Wasnt Ouendan last song said to be easier than EBA last song ? Man I should try to import Ouendan one day.
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uhhhh not really sure how it compares in difficulty, because I had already played so much EBA by the time I purchased Ouendan. I guess it's probably a bit easier, but every time you fail you have to sit through the 30 second intro again, because it's unskippable. (you should get both ouendan games though)

ANYWAYS i feel like this needs to be addressed:

"Even so, F-Zero GX wasn't that difficult a game..."
what
 
Glad Dark Souls isn't on the list.
I love the game, but damn if its alleged "incredible difficulty" isn't overstated way beyond reality.
 
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