Frustrated at games that are too hard, and those that are too easy, a reader complains that developers have lost the knack of creating a smooth difficulty curve.
I’m always surprised to remember that Dark Souls was an Xbox 360 game and is now 14 years old. That’s a long time ago now and while I appreciate how the game bucked the trend of the time, by being purposefully difficult, I’m really beginning to resent its influence on other games.
That’s been going on for a long time now, but it’s created a weird situation where almost all games are either too difficult or too easy. Perhaps that’s a reflection of the times we live in, where everything is at one extreme or the other, but I’m really sick of it.
Just to use some random examples this year, why are games like Donkey Kong Bananza, Death Stranding 2, and Assassin’s Creed Shadows so pointlessly easy on normal? And those are just the ones I played this year. Donkey Kong doesn’t even have a hard mode, so it’s not even a choice – just like Dark Souls and most similar games don’t have an easy mode. Why?!
The reviews of Metroid Prime 4 were very disappointing this week but I was still considering getting it, until I read that while it has an easy mode, normal has almost no challenge, and yet you have to play through that to unlock hard mode… which is stupidly hard with lots of restrictions. Again, why?
I feel like a lot of game design skills we used to take for granted are being lost, but the idea of a difficultly level and clever signposting and puzzles are the most serious losses for me.
Normal difficulty should be challenging enough that you die but not constantly. Easy should mean most people can beat the game and hard should mean you really have to know what you’re doing – it does not mean kneecapping you with contrived limitations just to add some challenge.
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Which brings me to the game that finally broke me, Hollow Knight: Silksong. I know plenty of people like it but to me the difficulty ruins the whole experience. Having to repeat the same section again and again because you made a mistake 30 minutes ahead of where you restart is not challenging, it’s irritating and it has absolutely no respect for the amount of spare time people have nowadays.
And yes, I know it was made clear the game is hard and I knew what I was getting into, but the game was very heavily praised, so I wanted to give it a go. But it ended up frustrating me so much that I just decided then and there it would be me last artificially difficult game.
It’s a shame because it’s well designed and very pretty, but I just didn’t enjoy any part of it, and isn’t that what we’re looking for from video games? I also want to make it clear I’m not complaining at games being too difficult I’m complaining that too many don’t have any real option.
Easy games never have a hard mode and hard games never have an easy mode. Again, why? To me it seems that, ironically, it’s just become too difficult for developers to properly balance their games. Like I said, it’s a lost art. Especially the idea of a game starting off easy, getting harder, and then being really tricky at the end.
Surely it’s not just me that thinks that’s the normal way things should work but I can’t think of the last game that was like that. There’s also far too much in the way of options now, which I think is stopping developers from actually fine-tuning things themselves. They figure if you can toggle enough things on and off they can leave it to you. But that’s not my job, that’s theirs! I don’t want to be constantly reprogramming the game myself because they can’t be bothered.
I’m just frustrated with it all. I don’t want to restart a game after 10 hours because it’s not providing a challenge, when I thought it should be slowly stepping things up. And I don’t want to give up after 10 hours when things get perversely difficult.
Can we please have a sensible middle ground that pleases most people, and then then just a simple easy or hard mode (both available from the start) for those that want it.
By reader Korey
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