Thread 722962917

I really have no idea who hard games are for. Back in the 90s, sure, hard games gave you a bit more value out of a game which could probably be beaten in one sitting if it wasn't so hard. That would suck, since we only got new games for our birthday and Christmas. Also useful for developers, since making the player replay the same part over and over, meant you needed less assets and could use smaller, cheaper EPROMs.
But why are they still around today? We have more games than we could ever hope to finish thanks to Steam. There's no need to artificially extend the runtime of a game with difficulty, you can just start a new game if you finish it. So who are they for? The only people I can think of, are people who are looking to have some kind of accomplishment to make up for the fact they feel like they don't have anything like this in their real lives.

The difficulty debate will not end until game developers and publishers stop feeding and creating a specific category of "hardcore" gamers. People vary wildly in past experiences with games, ability and time available yet "hardcore" games and communities around them buy into two ideas:"difficulty" as an objective thing that can be separated from the concrete insidividual actually playing the game. And the second idea of challenge and overcoming it being a morally good thing which is true to an extent, but ultimately this is all happening in the context of games, these are entertainment products so any cool stories of "overcoming hardship" sound a little odd because in the end it's all people having fun, real world is full of challenges that are not as entertaining and would be much more suitable for the whole "difficulty for it's own sake" talk. So evwry time we end up with a group of people who think that lowering the "objective" difgiculty level is actually a morally bad thing because now there is less "overcoming hardship" in their videogame.

>>722962917 (OP)
What gaming publication do you write for? Just curious.

>>722962917 (OP)
At a semantic level I think game designers should move away from calling it difficulty settings and instead call it Experience Controls. This de-emphasises the challenge aspect that promotes the toxic "git gud" mentality while being open that players can customise the experience to suit their desired experience. It would also allow gameplay related accessibility options to be combined into experience controls.

There is no difficulty in single player video games, but you aren't ready for that conversation. Difficulty implies the possibility of failure, but dying isn't failure, it's just an expected part of the process. Memorize, die, memorize some more, die some more, train the system 1 and boom, the boss is dead with very little skill involved. These supposed "difficult" single player games are just extending the process often via underhanded methods, such as purposefully baiting impatience. Never mistake boring game design for difficulty.

Sorry to say this, but no matter how informative this vid is all games should never be punishing or too challenging. Easy games equally need to exist. Getting a "sense of accomplishment" or "overcoming hardship" are, imo, silly terms used in a space meant to be fun. Videogames aren't real life. They're literally just forms of entertainment. People who apply difficult games to real life are on another planet, but if that's how they see difficult games then have at it. Should HK: Silksong have been nerfed? No. Should these loud-mouthed fanatics that over-hyped and over-praised the game been more clear on it's difficulty before newcomers jump in? Yes. This is also the fault of the newcomers as well for outright buying the game before even looking into it or not playing the original Hollow Knight first.

90% of the time the reason for adding artifical difficulty is to pad out playtime, nothing else. It was as true for '80s NES platformers as it is for today's soulslikes. Nothing has changed.

>But why are they still around today?
You need to understand that all entertainment media exists and is created under the cultural context of social media these days. This consciously or otherwise impacts the design decisions of the media that gets created. The explosion of hard games occurring simultaneously with the proliferation of social media is not a coincidence. People live virtual social lives now with huge communities of other people doing the same. Opportunities for bragging rights and distinction are far more frequent than they ever were back in the days of CRTs and old school gaming, where the only people you'd brag to were your friends or siblings or maybe one or two guys on an ancient forum. Hard games largely exist now because the internet allows communities to form around them and allows every person to roleplay as master passing on teachings when you beat them. It serves the ego.

I grew up just before Arcades became a thing. Side scrollers don't interest me no matter how many times I've tried. Silksong looks like every other modern game recently by adding all kinds of theatrical presentations, cut-scenes, etc. Still, it's never going to convince me to enjoy this style once the pretty scenes end.

I was gonna make a joke about casuals not being human and not having souls but this thread is literally being supported by bot posts lmao

We've moved far enough from the arcade era and BS hard NES games that i feel like game designers (on average) may have forgotten the difference between fair hard and BS hard. For context, I haven't played Silksong so this is more of a general commentary of hard games over the years. Like I said, arcade games were originally so hard so that people would be forced to pay more just to keep playing. The tricks they often employed were unfair or impossible to catch the first time around. Potentially misremembering, but when mainstream games started adding challenge back when the first Dark Souls came out, it was more tough but fair type challenge. The memory of unfair BS was still strong enough in people's memory. So when a hard game was made, it felt like it was your fault and you needed to practice and get better.

However, as we have moved further from that, I think we've forgotten what makes for BS fake difficulty. Because at the end of the day, what games we like are down to our irrational subjective preferences, and some people like difficulty for the sake of difficulty. In other words, I think there's plenty of people who play stuff like Kaizo Mario ROM hacks for fun. I think what is happening is that the "difficulty at all costs" attitude has been bleeding into these (so called) tough but fair games over the years. Now we have games were it seems impossible to properly criticize since they're supposed to be hard, so what do you mean it's "too hard?" Some people like some brands of hard while others like all types of hard.

I really feel like we have this conversation about difficulty every few years a new challenging game comes along. I know some people may be tired of the Dark Souls comparison, but it was a real forerunner and watershed series. There have always been hard games even before the DS series came along. Arcade games were especially hard to kick you off the machine and insert more quarters for continues. I played Gradius recently with a buddy and had a hell of a time making progress. I haven't gotten a chance to play Silksong yet since I wanted to go back and finish Hollow Knight first. I'm glad to hear that you no longer have to fight your shade ( it wouldn't make sense for Hornet to have one) and there are better ways of banking your money. Those were two of my biggest criticisms with HK. Ultimately I do think these kinds of games want you to succeed and give you options to do something else if you're stuck like Mark said.

After playing so many "difficult" games, I've sadly come to a single conclusion : continuous mechanical difficulty is the most interesting (gameplay management, resources etc). But bosses ? It's always the bosses that destroys all the fun. They simply suck. Bosses in games are a relicate of the past anyway.

>>722962917 (OP)
Most "hardcore" gamers are either lowkey suicidal people who thinks overcoming challenges in a video game give them self-worth because they can't get their actual life together, or unemployed losers who streams to get income. This ragebait type of game is perfect for this audience.

I have no idea if this thread is bots or just some anon copypasting leddit comments.

>>722964754
I'm not a bot.
The comments are from youtube.

>>722963156
>There is no difficulty in single player video games
>very little skill involved

So what one is it

"If I have to try something more than three times the game should give me a free pass and let me continue. I don't want to engage with the game's various systems. I want to be rewarded with the time I have already put in!"

>>722965664
What's wrong with that? I pay $20 for a videogame, why can't I demand the game let me win if I am the one actually paying MY money for it?

>>722962917 (OP)
Not every game needs to be made for you, faggot.

>>722965723
Because 20 bucks is not nearly enough to commission your personally tailored experience.

>>722965763
That's why you're not millionaires like team cherry are, because you are fucking stupid.

>>722965846
But TC made a game that is too hard for 99% of people and they're still millionaires???

>>722965948
Why don't you go ask the millionaires for $20 then if you don't think my $20 is important

>>722966041
I don't care about your 20$

ai generated discussion thread

>>722966083
That's a shame because you'd have gotten $200 if you did.

>>722965745
OP has a point. Team Cherry has. One out and said the heal mechanic should be like a metronome, and it’s obvious to literally everybody that played the game that hornet’s moveset is supposed to make the fights and platforming be a dance instead of the blocky, “traditional” movement of ghost in hk. However, this means some players will appreciate the fast paced dancing metronome healthbar combat and praise the increased difficulty that is needed to balance it. Others will instead see the game as an obstacle course, a game where every boss fight, every arena and every platforming section is a chore to git gud at since the same combat and healing systems aren’t entertaining but instead aggravating and stressful. It doesn’t help that the game never lets up; there are no areas like resting grounds, fog canyon or ancient basin where there’s only passive/no enemies outside of one or two secret areas, and the players can just walk through. Silksong has an almost allergic reaction to letting the player walk through an area or even a room: every room must have enemies or platforming or both, and I can count on one hand the number of rooms that don’t have both that aren’t towns.

>>722966083
I hope your babies are both with cancer and you kill yourself

>>722962917 (OP)
The game is not even that hard. Stop falling for the "you didnt beat the game" memes. If tools exist in the game they are meant to be used. Most of the difficult stuff takes people on average maybe ten or so attempts. People's expectations of wanting to press an "I win" button have warped their senses of what difficulty is

>>722966406
>>722966114
Fine. Paypal me your 20 or 200 bucks then.

>>722964457
You do know soulslikes are the hottest shit around, don't you? And it's 100% about banging your head against tough as nails bosses.

>>722962917 (OP)
I grew up on NES games and I like the SNES game level of challenge. It's not about accomplishment, it's that games easier than that struggle to not be boring. Like, think about that Mario game where if you die on a level a few times, you get a super suit that makes you invincible and lets you fly over the whole level. If the whole game feels like that, it takes a LOT of quality in the story or whatever for it to be engaging. I don't think they're hard, and I don't go bragging online (I don't even play games on steam in part because I find "achievements" or the like an annoying distraction).
It's like reading books, I'm not interested in berenstain bears.

>>722966584
Are you being stupid on purpose?

>>722965948
???

60% of people who bought the game on steam beat the last judge
20% beat lost lace

test

benny frank

>>722962917 (OP)
Overcoming challenges causes satisfaction and drives motivation to play.

Old games weren't hard to make them last longer btw. They were hard because the programmers were the ones testing them.
New games are all focus tested on women.

>>722967019
They used mods.

>>722962917 (OP)
Just admit you're bad at video games OP. Your entire generation is proud of that so there's no point in trying to pretend otherwise.

>>722962917 (OP)
>But why are they still around today?
Because people enjoy testing their skills against them. Difficulty feels good to overcome. It doesn't have to be a substitute for real world accomplishment, it just has to be FUN, which is the point of a game.

to cultivate strength.

test

>>722970539
Most popular easy mode mod only has 200k downloads