Difficulty and you

[Whiplash]

I did something today in a game that I can honestly that I've never done before. I started a new game and selected maximum difficulty (150cc on Mario Kart or level 9 in Smash doesn't really count for me). It never even crossed my mind that I had never done that before. I felt like it was a "separates the men from the boys" kind of things.

Babbling aside, do you feel that the game becomes more enjoyable the more difficult it is, or annoying (some games just give the foes more health)? Do you like the extra challenge or do you just want to make it through that single player experience? Or do you like the games that just have that 1 difficulty, Mario, Zelda, and whatnot.

[Stark]

I almost always play on hard; not because it makes it more enjoyable or that it's 'pure' or I'm some elite hardcore gam0rzzz, but because the damn thing cost a pile of money and games these days are short and often easy.

For instance, it took me MONTHS to finish Condemned, because a combination of excellent tension and absurd difficulty made every sequence challenging. I found out later it was on hard (the Xbox defaults to hard for my profile) and on medium you can finish the game in one sitting, and the atmosphere is nowhere near as effective because one hobo can't kill you in two hits.

However, I'm not the sort of person who plays games for fluff or to watch cutscenes. I recommend many people I know play on lower difficulties because they don't have 25 years of gaming behind them, but I think it makes sense to play on the highest difficulty that doesn't make you throw the controller out the window.

[Oskuro]

I play on hardest too, partly for the same rationale as Stark, and partly because I want to complete the toughest challenge the game can offer, and not have that lingering feeling of needing to play through it again (which I hate unless the game has decent replay value). Also, some games won't offer the "full" ending until you beat them in hardest mode.

I make exceptions, though. One is for bullshit difficulties that are extremely unfair (Doom's nightmare mode would be the grand-daddy of this concept) or that somehow ruin the experience (Doom3's nightmare mode giving you the Soulcube from the start would be an example of this, because a supposedly atmospheric game really benefits from having the game's talking mcGuffin on hand from the start).
The other exception is for unlockable difficulties that artificially force you to make several playthroughs. If I can't cheat to unlock them, I'll probably not bother (which is why it took years for me to realize there's an special ending to Max Payne 2 )

And I'm with Stark in the notion that sometimes gameplay improves with increased difficulty, either because you really feel threatened, or because whatever they cut out of the game enhances the experience (In Hitman, for example, you don't get to see the position of enemies on the minimap on hard mode, thus forcing you to be more aware of the environment and, consequently, greatly increasing immersion).


But I'm also of the opinion that for people that struggle through a game, an easier difficulty is better. I in fact second a notion that Yatzhee once talked about in his column: Difficulty should be adjustable mid-game. If a certain scene or boss or whatever is too hard, it'd be nice to be able to lower the difficulty, or raise it if things are not too challenging. In single player games there really is no reason to force the player to start over with a new difficulty setting, specially if the problem is just a small part of the game (for example, my first and only playthrough of Halo was on Legendary, and was enjoying it, until I reached a scene where sword-wielding Elites kept spawning at point-blank range and thus raped me. I eventually quit the game because I was unable to get past that scene, and unwilling to start the game again)


Woah, rant mode!

[Techno_Union]

I usually start games off on a lower difficulty level just to get a "feel" for the mechanics, but I always up the difficulty to Hard or Expert after a few go arounds. I'm currently addicted to Age of Empires 3: Asian Dynasties. I've found that it's much more enjoyable on a higher difficulty setting; this is mainly because of the added strategy involved in choosing your Deck and Home City.

I don't personally find a game as enjoyable if I know there's no chance for me not to lose.

[Stark]

Yeah, games that let you change difficulty during a 'campaign' are great. It's stupid to force someone to either restart or slog through when they find out they're over their head. Once you get stuck and a sequence is too frustrating, letting the player drop diffiuclty is better than have them just return the game.

[weemadando]

I'm of the opinion that a game should be hard enough that I feel challenged playing it, but not frustrated. Sometimes this is normal, sometimes it's hard, sometimes it's easy (Red Faction Guerilla is a great example here, I was angry with this game until I put it on easy after hearing that a lot of others had done this after similar experiences and suddenly the infinitely spawning enemies and shit became less of an aggravation and more of an entertainign diversion)

I always start on Normal, because that's clearly what they intend to be the average experience and adjust from there.

To give an example - if I die in game, I want it to be because I fucked up somehow say I made a bad choice or let myself get into a bad position. I don't want it to be "you died because you have to die a hundred times to learn this level by repetition". Condemned on hard is a really good example - you feel fucking terrified because every encounter is potentially lethal, but you also know that you have the skills as a player and the character has the capacity to win every encounter. Hence, if you die it's on you.

The Call of Duty games are also worth discussing here - I play on Normal because there'll always be a section in there that is keyboard smashingly aggravating, even on normal. And even on the Normal difficulty there's still every chance of dying if you make a poor life choice.

The one time that I absolutely refuse to play on higher difficulties is where the difficulty is raised by the AI cheating. See some of the strategy games where the AI gets magical resource bonuses despite your strategic strangleholds etc.

[Stark]

Fuck yeah, I played RF:G on normal or easy too. Endless waves of psychic spawning cops of cheese? Fuck off.

That's a good explanation of Condemned too - I made really slow progress (especially through the abandoned shops) but I never felt like I was being 'cheated' or anything. You die because you lose track of hobos or you run out of health packs or you panic fire at nothing too much, not because ROFFLE HEADSHOT AI or whatever. By contrast many shooters on hard are just set game to : cheat, which is quite frustating. I also play strategy games like Galciv on middling levels.

[Ghost Rider]

Usually I start on normal or easy for the examples listed by Ando. If it's by ability I die, I'll up the difficulty. Most games? They just spam the screen with bullets and determine if you have the reflexes of caffenine addicted rodent, you'll see the pixel by pixel hole you're supposed to fit into to avoid death, wash-rinse-repeat *10000, or they will have accuracy out the roof, health that puts tanks to shame in foot soldiers or out and out cheat. So fuck that, and back to whatever allows me to enjoy they game and not wonder what sniper from 200 KM killed me by sneezing.

RPGs though? Fuck upping difficulty. Usually you either have to cheat your ass off abusing the system by either some inability to recognize pathing or spamming the supreme attack.

[CaptHawkeye]

Some RTS games are absolutely notorious for unplayable difficulty. S:HOWW2 had levels which were impossible even on easy. The entire concept of "3 guys vs whole armoured division" never really made sense though. It's also a frequent staple of shitty RTS "forced stealth" sections. Their is NEVER an excuse for that design choice.

It's really too bad that most developers view difficulty progression in a game as "give bots +20HP and player -20". That kind of simplistic, linear scaling ruins lots of games. Take Call of Duty's infamous "Veteran" mode.

[Dave]

It depends on what kind of mood I'm in. Often I just want to just kick ass and take names, at which point I'll have the game on weemadando's "you die because you did something kinda dumb" setting, or just easy if I'm not familiar with the game, (or it's an RTS).

Sometimes I want to kick ass with friends. The name of the game for that is Halo (any version, because everyone has at least one copy of Halo), and then we usually crank it up to Heroic (for the versions that reset to checkpoint if anyone dies) or Legendary (for those versions that don't care) and a couple of skulls and still feel like we're taking it easy.

Vary rarely will I feel the urge to conquer the game and play it on maximum difficulty. (Bad Company 2 comes to mind).

[weemadando]

Some RTS games are absolutely notorious for unplayable difficulty. S:HOWW2 had levels which were impossible even on easy. The entire concept of "3 guys vs whole armoured division" never really made sense though. It's also a frequent staple of shitty RTS "forced stealth" sections. Their is NEVER an excuse for that design choice.

Oh god, don't remind me. I love those games, but I would often just stop dead and never look at certain campaigns again because of shit like this.

"We're launching a major offensive comrade! The town ahead is held by a German Panzergrenadier Regiment with support from a SS Panzer Corps, an assault gun company and two artillery battalions. We've managed to scrounge up two conscripts, an armoured car and an anti-tank rifle. But there's no ammo or fuel. To victory and beyond!"

I think there has to be a split made somewhere here between difficulty in terms of difficulty level and difficulty in terms of scenario.

If we were to plot a graph with one on each axis, SHOWW2 would occupy the very top right hand corner.

[adam_grif]

I play on "Normal" and then adjust the difficulty as I go to maximize the fun I'm having. If it's too easy I crank it. In theory, I would also lower it if it was too hard but in practice most games are easy as shit these days. Exceptions are Gears because it only had Easy/Hard before you unlocked exterme, and playing a difficulty called "Casual" felt like the game was mocking me.

RTS / TBS games I start on easy then work my way up, unless I'm already familiar with the gameplay in which case I start on Normal.

Stealth games I play on hard to start with. Even if I just end up quicksave abusing all the time, I still have way more fun than the lower difficulties where you get a minor slap on the wrist for getting into a huge firefight. Finishing Splinter Cell 3 on the highest difficulty, 100%ing every mission (except one) and killing two people (The guy you "have" to kill near the end and this other guard who I got so sick of sneaking past, that when I finally did it successfully I turned around and shot him in the head for his trouble anyway) in the game was some of the best fun I've had in my time as a gamer.

[General Zod]

I normally don't bother playing with hardcore, because fuck it. I don't feel like spending that much time dying and the vast majority of the time it usually feels like you're getting cheated. Arkham Asylum is probably one of the few games I've played through completely on Hard, though. I loved the stealth aspects and wanted to see what the differences were (turns out it was mostly combat and health, lol). I had to change up tactics a bit thanks to that but not significantly.

[Stark]

The highest difficulty on Gears is like that; it's just 'double enemy hp and they dodge like a bastard'. It's just an endurance run, it's not fun.

[adam_grif]

The highest difficulty on Gears is like that; it's just 'double enemy hp and they dodge like a bastard'. It's just an endurance run, it's not fun.

Even on hardcore the RAAM fight in the first game was an exercise in controller smashing frustration. The only fight off the top of my head that I've had more trouble with in a game was Ares in God of War.

[Stark]

I liked RAAM, but on Hardcore and Insane it was complete bullshit. Good idea for a bossfight (running from end to end, blasting big guy, etc) but when he can gib you in a brief bit of fire and he needs 27 headshots to kill, well...

[Dooey Jo]

I feel even games like Zelda could benefit from difficulty settings. And not in terms of how often you die (and dying in Zelda isn't usually that bad because you don't have to repeat a whole section of the game when you restart, nor do you have to pause and save all the time to prevent this), but in terms of how easy the puzzles and shit are. Take that fairy in the N64 games, for instance. On Easy, it could give blatant hints on how to solve most puzzles, and where you need to go next (well it already does that). On Hard, it won't give any hints at all. You could also influence all the time-based puzzles to be more or less forgiving, and so on. The adventure games with "surreal" puzzles could also use this. I know people who take months and years to finish games because they can't figure out what to do. That doesn't sound very fun to me.

[Zac Naloen]

I'll play on Hard on anything that isn't a shooter now, playing on normal usually means I can finish the game in a weekend, and i've just wasted 40quid. In the case of a game like Enslaved with piss easy puzzles it means that there is a challenge in working out how to get through the combat sections which extends the amount of time I spent playing the game.

I just get frustrated on anything above normal on shooters so my controller goes through the TV screen when I miss the 5 head shots in a row required to beat that section.

[Sarevok]

Most games are broken on hard difficulties. The AI cheats even worse than it already does and game mechanics is slanted against the player in an absurd way. I.E on legendary a Covenant Grunt has more hitpoints than the Master Chief.

[Zac Naloen]

Well Legendary is designed to be nigh on impossible and to require a large amount of knowledge of the game to complete. It's a dick waving exercise.

[Vendetta]

Most games are broken on hard difficulties. The AI cheats even worse than it already does and game mechanics is slanted against the player in an absurd way. I.E on legendary a Covenant Grunt has more hitpoints than the Master Chief.

They still go down with a single headshot though, as does anything in Halo. Legendary is really just a case of following a few simple strategies. Headshot grunts/skirmishers/jackal snipers, shoot jackals in the hand to make them flinch then headshot them, charged plasma pistol to take an elite's shields off then headshot him, supercombine brutes with a needler/nerfle or headshot them repeatedly, or on H3/ODST plasma then headshot them. And hunters just circle strafe and punch them in the back repeatedly.

Halo is one of the games that I'll generally play on harder difficulties off the bat because there are strategies to deal with the enemies quickly. Even the flood drop to shotgun fire in games they don't care about headshots. Same with Call of Duty, because in that even on Veteran the enemies die just as easily as you do. It's not hard to kill them, the "hard bits" are just a cross between pattern memorisation and reflexes, and testing those reflexes is one of the reasons I also play bullet hell shooters (poorly, I'll admit, I've got that achievement for continuing 30 times in one game of EspGaluda 2).

Most games though I play on the local equivalent of normal. Flight combat games like Ace Combat and HAWX I turn up to the highest because, again, I'm pretty good at them.

[open_sketchbook]

I usually play games for the experience rather than the challenge; I have to really like a game to play it on it's hardest settings and "master" it. I usually end up on the second hardest difficulty avaliable these days, though; that's sort of the sweet spot. It's not so easy as to lack the "game" element entirely, but it's not difficult for it's own sake.

[Edi]

I tend to play on harder difficulties because the easy ones are usually far too easy. I like a bit of a challenge. I like the possibility to change difficulty in the middle of a campaign, because with some games it's almost required.

Currently I'm actually playing Freespace Open, the Silent Threat: Reborn campaign and holy fuck some of the missions are absolutely goddamn ridiculous on hard difficulty, bad enough that you can barely scrape through them on medium.

I've run into the same thing on some other games as well. The various AI cheats work in some games and don't in others, so it varies widely. Mostly I start out at harder difficulties.

[TheFeniX]

It's completely situational. On Normal, Force Unleashed, Prototype, CoD, and others are fairly enjoyable and actually have difficult moments in them. But on higher difficulties, it's not really "harder," it's just a lot more one-shot bullshit or AI that knows it's tougher than you. One instance that comes to mind in CoD:WaW was one brave German solider who ran through 2 lines of a Russian assault to round a blind corner and empty an entire magazine in my face. The other was Alex Mercer being ruthlessly violated by 5 hunters once one got a lucky hit and knocked me into a corner. I traded the game in after that.

Anyways, if the game offers 4 levels of difficulty, I always choose one above Normal. But some games are just too broken to be played enjoyably on hard when given the 3 standard difficulties (Easy, Normal, Hard). And some games are just weird with the difficulty ramping. The 4 man team we had going in L4Dead played the original on Advanced like it was normal. We could beat No Mercy with little difficulty on Expert (maybe a wipe or two on the finale). But L4Dead2 can't decide what difficulty you're on most the time. We've had easier runs on advanced than Easy, as sometimes the director will spawn a tank, then a wave of zombies, then two other special infected all within 30 seconds, all near a choke-point.

The only game I've seen lately justified in the whole "unlock a difficulty" area would be Resident Evil 5 with Professional. You just cannot beat that game on Pro without a large number of unlocks (or the infinite ammo RL). Plus, in the DLC, they actually throw different shit at you on Pro (with hilarious consequences).

Oh and the RAAM fight on Insane was awesome. It's one of the few cheap bullshit fights I really enjoyed. I ended up beating it with some random guy on XBLive after about 8 tries (He worked the TB, I worked the Sniper, aaaaaand RUN NOW!). GoW2 I started on Hardcore only because Chris was too chicken-shit to play it on Insane the first time through. Really though, the only thing you have to worry about is fucking Torque Bows. GoW is one of the few games I enjoy on smash your controller/keyboard difficulty. The only other game in recent memory like that was Star Trek online with elite difficulty, because it made hard missions actually hard where "guns blazing" didn't cut it. But the games other issues made it too little too late.

[Guardsman Bass]

I'm not really a big fan of the whole "death-repetition leads to victory!" exercise in terms of "twitch" skills, so I'll usually play games on normal. It helps that most of the games I play are single-player, whether in terms of RTS stuff or RPGs. I like to "indulge" in the game, rather than playing it in a hyper-alert, super-nervous state of mind.