New hard game comes out. Idiot press wants easy mode.

[CritialGaming]

I'm pretty sure that anyone who feels annoyed playing a Souls ends up not playing them, and anyone who does play them and likes them does feel challenged rather than annoyed.

I don't know, I like these games and the challenge undoubtedly adds to that enjoyment, but I feel a lot of the challenge stems from wrestling with the game's clunkiness. It's this part of the challenge that annoys me, and I don't understand why six games in Fromsoft can't invest in a decent camera and lock-on.

A game like Hollow Knight is equally tough, yet I never felt that same strain as I do with Fromsoft games, because Hollow Knight's controls are super solid. I don't feel like I need to split my attention between focussing on the actual fight and focussing on managing the camera and lock-on.

I reckon it?s because the former is a 3D action/RPG with animation systems tied to physics, and the latter is a simple 2D action adventure title with an equally simple animation system tied to the artstyle.

I?ve had the lock-on cause problems in FROM games too, but most of the time it can be corrected just by not locking on until you?re ready to face off against x enemy. Boss fights were usually the most difficult due to their size and the fact the lock-on only focuses on one or two areas with a limited viewing field.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

I think you underestimate the the impact of adding an easy mode. I think it would diminish the feeling of accomplishment for those who climbed the mountain to beat the games by making them feel less special. And I think it would ruin the gaming experience for those who would give in to the temptation to take the easy path. It would also destroy the entire Souls-like sub-genre and make those games just like everything else out there, and I think that would be a real shame. Variety in gaming is a good thing. I don't understand why some people want everything to be the same. How boring.

This is the exact attitude I just completely laugh at. You already don't know how someone beat a Souls game. You can beat Souls games by "climbing the mountain" yourself or just being that rich asshole that has sherpas do all the work (via the probably 10s of cheese methods in these games or literally having someone else do it for you). It's no great accomplishment to just beat a Souls game much like it's no great accomplishment to beat say Uncharted. However, mastering any game is an accomplishment. Beating the just Super Mario Bros. 1 is more of an accomplishment than how some people beat a Souls game. Thus, just beating a Souls game means nothing more than beating any other game. Souls is not some "right of passage" or whatever bullshit Souls fans think it is, it's just like any other game only disguised as something different (mainly by the player base), even stealing "git gud" from an actual hard game. If variety is a good thing, why does From use the same Souls mechanics in brand new IPs when they don't make much sense?

 

[Neurotic Void Melody]

I don't understand why people enjoy the frustration genre. Souls-like games aren't made to entertain, they are designed to frustrate. They aren't there to challenge, there are there to annoy. And I confess I don't understand how after a day at work people can want to come home and play something like that.

Also I don't understand why you would create so detailed a world, rich with lore and history, and then want to limit it to people who can 'git gud'.

If video games are meant to be art then they are meant to expand people's understanding and appreciation, not lock themselves off because they are on;y for an elite.

Under the assumption that games are art then not only are you are grossly distorting the truth, you're confusing "art" and "entertainment". Art is meant to challenge your perceptions and beliefs, not pander to people who want everything to be easy and accessible. Call me elitist if you want, but the fact remains that the primary distinction between art and entertainment is that one is made by the artist to share, the other is made for the people to consume.

The alternative is that videogames are meant to be entertainment. In which case, an easy difficulty mode is perfectly acceptable. That does, rather unfortunately, undermine the argument about Souls lore having artistic value since, you know, games aren't art anymore. Also it prevents you from calling games "art".

And to end your confusion: we play it because we enjoy it.

what kind of fresh bollocks is this? art and entertainment overlap extraordinarily so; they're not polar opposites. wtf.

 

[Erttheking]

BTW, if you don't take video games seriously

Get that strawman that out of my face. This may blow your mind but the world isn't divided into people who think Dark Souls losses all sense of identity if it's made slightly less hard and people who don't care about video games. For fuck's sake, I said this in the post you replied to. "The games are special to me too. But I don't lose my shit over a suggested addition that I would never touch anyway. It's not hard." So I'd like you know where the hell you got that strawman of me from. Because I'm sitting here, thinking hard about it, and the only thing I can think of is either you being deliberately dishonest or just not bothering to read what I wrote and just arguing past me. You tell me which one happened.

Also if you "give in to temptation" to switch to an easy mode, you weren't having fun, you were turning your game into a chore and pretending it was anything more than that is dressing up a mundane switching of settings to a moral crisis. You really do have no respect for the people who play Souls games if you apparently think they were all flagellating themselves and that they would stop and switch to an easier mode the second they were given the chance.

All of this stems from the fact that game reviewers can't beat the game in time for their review. They're asking for their job to be easier. This isn't some noble cause, but they sure can make it look like one. It always goes like "I don't like X, something something wider audience."

Well the guy in the article says he loves the Souls games so I think I'll take "people who clearly didn't read the article" for 400 Alex.

 

[Casual Shinji]

FromSoft creates games with a specific feel in mind. Difficulty is such a deep part of the game that it is fundamental to the actual story of the games! Sekiro is about trying to sever the ties of immortality that brings the player back to life over and over again and spreads a terrible disease over the people caught in a war. If the game was easy and the player could beat it without too much trouble, then the story of the game itself loses all impact. Dark Souls also had it's world and story tied to the player's constant death and persistence through the misery. Death and difficulty is core to these games.

Then what of the people who are eventually able to speedrun this game, or get so good that they hardly ever die? Does the game become meaningless the better you get at it? And with Dark Souls you could get a couple of buddies together online to kick some ass. This could pretty much be decribed as an Easy mode. Does this option to nulify a great portion of the game's difficulty defeat the whole point of the game?

And the desease in Sekiro seems to have no real point in even being there since you can just cure everyone with one little item that only costs 180 gold. The only thing stopping this is not running into that one merchant.

 

[CritialGaming]

Then what of the people who are eventually able to speedrun this game, or get so good that they hardly ever die? Does the game become meaningless the better you get at it? And with Dark Souls you could get a couple of buddies together online to kick some ass. This could pretty much be decribed as an Easy mode. Does this option to nulify a great portion of the game's difficulty defeat the whole point of the game?

And the desease in Sekiro seems to have no real point in even being there since you can just cure everyone with one little item that only costs 180 gold. The only thing stopping this is not running into that one merchant.

They don't start out speedrun good. They play the game enough to master it and get so good that the mechanics and story doesn't matter, however they've gotten that experience the first time through. There was a reason they got so good at the game, because they loved the game, and they loved the challenge, and they wanted to become masters of it.

Dark Souls has always been contentious with difficulty. Some wanted an outright easy mode and others felt the easy mode was already baked into the mechanics. Either by summoning help, or using certain weapon set ups. But the difference between Dark Souls "easy mode" and easy modes in any other game is simple. Dark Souls' difficulty is entirely dependent on how YOU play it. The game doesn't change for anyone, it simply gives you a toolbox and lets the player decide how they approach it. For some, casting spells is the easiest way, for others hiding behind a big fucking shield is the easy way. It's all subjective. But the game itself doesn't change, it remains the same for everyone and thus everyone can share that same experience and all the hardships that come with the game.

Sekiro is the same, but to a lesser degree. There are skills and approaches in SEkiro that do make most of the journey easier. However you can't fall back on someone else to beat a fight for you because there is no multiplayer. The game expects more out of you, but it DOES offer tools that can help you along the way that can help adapt to your playstyle.

Sekiro is by far the hardest of the Fromsoft games. But it doesn't require 100 hours of failure, it doesn't require you to quit your job, it doesn't require all that much except maybe a bit of perseverance and determination. My playthrough took 23 hours and I am not a very skilled player imo, and play time depends on level of exploration as well.

And frankly in hindsight, there is a lot of game to be had with Sekiro that doesn't require ball busting boss fights. The stealth is fantastic, the mobility and the platforming is great, the exploration is awesome, and stealth killing bad guys is sooo fun. So perhaps there is a bit of a trade off there. I don't know. It's personal taste and not every game can fit every player.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

Dark Souls has always been contentious with difficulty. Some wanted an outright easy mode and others felt the easy mode was already baked into the mechanics. Either by summoning help, or using certain weapon set ups. But the difference between Dark Souls "easy mode" and easy modes in any other game is simple. Dark Souls' difficulty is entirely dependent on how YOU play it. The game doesn't change for anyone, it simply gives you a toolbox and lets the player decide how they approach it. For some, casting spells is the easiest way, for others hiding behind a big fucking shield is the easy way. It's all subjective. But the game itself doesn't change, it remains the same for everyone and thus everyone can share that same experience and all the hardships that come with the game.

That's like true for so many other games that all have multiple difficulty settings. Souls is not is not some unicorn. I guess people literally can't share their experiences and hardships when fighting robodinos in Horizon with the game's toolbox because the game has several difficulty settings.

 

[CritialGaming]

Dark Souls has always been contentious with difficulty. Some wanted an outright easy mode and others felt the easy mode was already baked into the mechanics. Either by summoning help, or using certain weapon set ups. But the difference between Dark Souls "easy mode" and easy modes in any other game is simple. Dark Souls' difficulty is entirely dependent on how YOU play it. The game doesn't change for anyone, it simply gives you a toolbox and lets the player decide how they approach it. For some, casting spells is the easiest way, for others hiding behind a big fucking shield is the easy way. It's all subjective. But the game itself doesn't change, it remains the same for everyone and thus everyone can share that same experience and all the hardships that come with the game.

That's like true for so many other games that all have multiple difficulty settings. Souls is not is not some unicorn. I guess people literally can't share their experiences and hardships when fighting robodinos in Horizon with the game's toolbox because the game has several difficulty settings.

By selecting a "mode" for difficulty, the game literally changes itself to adjust to that.

Name another game that has exclusively player adaptive difficulty. Not a mode, not a setting, but a difficulty that changes only when the player plays the game differently? And I don't mean playing into mechanics or without mechanics either, a run and gun approach in a stealth game doesn't count because that's the player ignoring gameplay for the sake of a gameplay change.

I don't think any game other than DS has it's difficultly baked right into it's core rules.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

By selecting a "mode" for difficulty, the game literally changes itself to adjust to that.

Name another game that has exclusively player adaptive difficulty. Not a mode, not a setting, but a difficulty that changes only when the player plays the game differently? And I don't mean playing into mechanics or without mechanics either, a run and gun approach in a stealth game doesn't count because that's the player ignoring gameplay for the sake of a gameplay change.

I don't think any game other than DS has it's difficultly baked right into it's core rules.

I don't get the inherent flaw in games adjusting themselves for different players. A game isn't going to offer the exact same experience for anyone because everyone is different. If anything, games adjusting to players helps create a more similar experience among players than being 100% rigid. What if someone wants to play Souls playing like a ninja dodging around but isn't good enough? Must they play another way that they find boring then?

Does the game having difficulty settings exclude it from your list of having only exclusive player adaptive difficulty? If it doesn't, Horizon fits that criteria because some tools/weapons are easier to use than others, you can get robodinos to fight each other, etc. Dishonored is much easier/harder depending on how creative you are with the abilities/powers. If those don't fit, then just about any online competitive game fits that criteria since there's no difficulty settings there and each playstyle is requires different skillsets. Tons of older games (prior to difficulty settings becoming a norm) would fit as well, a game like SMB3 fits that with feathers, fire flowers, P-wings, etc.

Just because a game has difficulty settings doesn't preclude it from having difficulty baked into the core game design and mechanics either.

 

[CritialGaming]

By selecting a "mode" for difficulty, the game literally changes itself to adjust to that.

Name another game that has exclusively player adaptive difficulty. Not a mode, not a setting, but a difficulty that changes only when the player plays the game differently? And I don't mean playing into mechanics or without mechanics either, a run and gun approach in a stealth game doesn't count because that's the player ignoring gameplay for the sake of a gameplay change.

I don't think any game other than DS has it's difficultly baked right into it's core rules.

I don't get the inherent flaw in games adjusting themselves for different players. A game isn't going to offer the exact same experience for anyone because everyone is different. If anything, games adjusting to players helps create a more similar experience among players than being 100% rigid. What if someone wants to play Souls playing like a ninja dodging around but isn't good enough? Must they play another way that they find boring then?

Does the game having difficulty settings exclude it from your list of having only exclusive player adaptive difficulty? If it doesn't, Horizon fits that criteria because some tools/weapons are easier to use than others, you can get robodinos to fight each other, etc. Dishonored is much easier/harder depending on how creative you are with the abilities/powers. If those don't fit, then just about any online competitive game fits that criteria since there's no difficulty settings there and each playstyle is requires different skillsets. Tons of older games (prior to difficulty settings becoming a norm) would fit as well, a game like SMB3 fits that with feathers, fire flowers, P-wings, etc.

Just because a game has difficulty settings doesn't preclude it from having difficulty baked into the core game design and mechanics either.

I think the overall point I'm trying to make is the lack of a NEED for said difficulty options in FromSoft games because those options are baked into the experience. It might still not be enough for some, but that doesn't mean the option isn't there. Just because there isn't a big button that says "easy" on it, doesn't mean that difficulty options aren't there.

Which is why I rail on the press for article like this, because it always lacks a bigger picture. They always lack the scope of the game. What if Fromsoft put in an easy mode that was still hard for the Journalist in question? Would we then get another article that said, "Sekiro's easy mode isn't 'easy' enough"? And if so, then where does it stop?

You point it out yourself, you can't adjust difficulty in an online game. So if the players are too hard for you, you either play a game you can never win or you don't play that game. So what's the problem with that? It isn't your cup of tea, and that's okay.

Jim Sterling post a video about Sekiro https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-_ll1wdf1E and he loves hard games. He loved Bloodborne and Dark Souls and Nioh, but he doesn't like this game because it just doesn't work for him. He doesn't have the ability the game demands form him, but he is also okay with that. He understands that FromSoft designs for a specific audience and that audience can never and will never be everybody.

 

[Kerg3927]

Get that strawman that out of my face. This may blow your mind but the world isn't divided into people who think Dark Souls losses all sense of identity if it's made slightly less hard and people who don't care about video games. For fuck's sake, I said this in the post you replied to. "The games are special to me too. But I don't lose my shit over a suggested addition that I would never touch anyway. It's not hard." So I'd like you know where the hell you got that strawman of me from. Because I'm sitting here, thinking hard about it, and the only thing I can think of is either you being deliberately dishonest or just not bothering to read what I wrote and just arguing past me. You tell me which one happened.

You accused me of taking games too seriously, logically implying that you don't take them so seriously.

And on that note, you say you don't lose your shit over an easy mode being added. Well, how about also not losing your shit if it's not added? Why not just leave these games alone? I don't get it. It makes me wonder why you're even in this thread arguing this topic. Is it really because you don't like the fact that the Souls games don't have an easy mode? Or is it because you just don't like (other) Souls fans, period, and you're just using this topic as an excuse to spit in their face? I think it's probably the latter. I mean, you already said you don't associate with other Souls fans because you can't stand them.

Also if you "give in to temptation" to switch to an easy mode, you weren't having fun, you were turning your game into a chore and pretending it was anything more than that is dressing up a mundane switching of settings to a moral crisis.

I wouldn't say they weren't having any fun. I'd say they weren't having fun yet, and if they'd have just stuck it out a little longer, they'd have figured it out, overcome the challenge, and reaped the rewards of that. But instead, unfortunately for them, they quit before they got to that point, and missed out on the fun.

You really do have no respect for the people who play Souls games if you apparently think they were all flagellating themselves and that they would stop and switch to an easier mode the second they were given the chance.

Not all of them. But I think some would, especially people new to the genre who don't yet understand that the reward comes from the self-satisfaction of overcoming the challenge, and if you remove the challenge, you remove the corresponding reward, which = game ruined. So I think From is doing a very good thing by not making that temptation available.

 

[Kerg3927]

This is the exact attitude I just completely laugh at. You already don't know how someone beat a Souls game. You can beat Souls games by "climbing the mountain" yourself or just being that rich asshole that has sherpas do all the work (via the probably 10s of cheese methods in these games or literally having someone else do it for you). It's no great accomplishment to just beat a Souls game much like it's no great accomplishment to beat say Uncharted. However, mastering any game is an accomplishment. Beating the just Super Mario Bros. 1 is more of an accomplishment than how some people beat a Souls game. Thus, just beating a Souls game means nothing more than beating any other game. Souls is not some "right of passage" or whatever bullshit Souls fans think it is, it's just like any other game only disguised as something different (mainly by the player base), even stealing "git gud" from an actual hard game. If variety is a good thing, why does From use the same Souls mechanics in brand new IPs when they don't make much sense?

Well, if it's so easy, like you say, then why would it need an easy mode?

 

[CaitSeith]

I don't blame people for wanting a hard game to be easy, but I also don't blame a game for wanting to be hard.

But also From Software games being hard IS the point of them. Its a niche game for a niche audience.

The thing about From Software games is that being hard isn't their sole point. Thousands of people play them because the games are well crafted in general (visuals, characters and lore). Even though they play those games regularly to the end, they wouldn't mind an easy mode, because, for them, the challenge is secondary.

At the end of the day, From Software game's difficulty is a mere artistic decision like any other.

 

[Casual Shinji]

They don't start out speedrun good. They play the game enough to master it and get so good that the mechanics and story doesn't matter, however they've gotten that experience the first time through. There was a reason they got so good at the game, because they loved the game, and they loved the challenge, and they wanted to become masters of it.

Dark Souls has always been contentious with difficulty. Some wanted an outright easy mode and others felt the easy mode was already baked into the mechanics. Either by summoning help, or using certain weapon set ups. But the difference between Dark Souls "easy mode" and easy modes in any other game is simple. Dark Souls' difficulty is entirely dependent on how YOU play it. The game doesn't change for anyone, it simply gives you a toolbox and lets the player decide how they approach it. For some, casting spells is the easiest way, for others hiding behind a big fucking shield is the easy way. It's all subjective. But the game itself doesn't change, it remains the same for everyone and thus everyone can share that same experience and all the hardships that come with the game.

Sekiro is the same, but to a lesser degree. There are skills and approaches in SEkiro that do make most of the journey easier. However you can't fall back on someone else to beat a fight for you because there is no multiplayer. The game expects more out of you, but it DOES offer tools that can help you along the way that can help adapt to your playstyle.

Sekiro is by far the hardest of the Fromsoft games. But it doesn't require 100 hours of failure, it doesn't require you to quit your job, it doesn't require all that much except maybe a bit of perseverance and determination. My playthrough took 23 hours and I am not a very skilled player imo, and play time depends on level of exploration as well.

And frankly in hindsight, there is a lot of game to be had with Sekiro that doesn't require ball busting boss fights. The stealth is fantastic, the mobility and the platforming is great, the exploration is awesome, and stealth killing bad guys is sooo fun. So perhaps there is a bit of a trade off there. I don't know. It's personal taste and not every game can fit every player.

My point is that if death and hardship is so essential to enjoying these games and their stories, actually getting better would then make the games worse, calling in for online buddies makes the games worse, looking up tips on farming and grinding makes the games worse.

This is what I don't get when fans talk about the difficulty in these games like it's this unbending thing, when the games themselves have plenty of exploits that allow you to circumvent it, and it's even highly encouraged by the fanbase to look up tips online. I mean, do the dozens of YouTube videos giving combat tips for Sekiro get people mad because this is taking away some of the challenge and therefor ruining the game?

An Easy mode in Sekiro could just as easily be baked into the game's mechanic and lore like it was in Dark Souls. Have the undying guy be summonable for Boss fights, but make it so that using this feature will have negative impact on other characters/the story/the ending. Only allow the player to get the worst possible ending by going Easy as a trade off.

These games don't have a difficulty that is impossible to bend, there's plenty of ways the games allow you to do so. So the idea of an option that gives players an easier time really shouldn't be so unacceptable to fans.

 

[Phoenixmgs_v1legacy]

I think the overall point I'm trying to make is the lack of a NEED for said difficulty options in FromSoft games because those options are baked into the experience. It might still not be enough for some, but that doesn't mean the option isn't there. Just because there isn't a big button that says "easy" on it, doesn't mean that difficulty options aren't there.

Which is why I rail on the press for article like this, because it always lacks a bigger picture. They always lack the scope of the game. What if Fromsoft put in an easy mode that was still hard for the Journalist in question? Would we then get another article that said, "Sekiro's easy mode isn't 'easy' enough"? And if so, then where does it stop?

You point it out yourself, you can't adjust difficulty in an online game. So if the players are too hard for you, you either play a game you can never win or you don't play that game. So what's the problem with that? It isn't your cup of tea, and that's okay.

Jim Sterling post a video about Sekiro https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-_ll1wdf1E and he loves hard games. He loved Bloodborne and Dark Souls and Nioh, but he doesn't like this game because it just doesn't work for him. He doesn't have the ability the game demands form him, but he is also okay with that. He understands that FromSoft designs for a specific audience and that audience can never and will never be everybody.

I already said why difficulty options are good even though difficulty can be baked in with the following "What if someone wants to play Souls playing like a ninja dodging around but isn't good enough (or don't care to waste time grinding)? Must they play another way that they find boring then?" Any kind of options to the player are good because they're optional. A sports game with tons of sliders or Dishonored where you can change a shit-ton of stuff, I love being able to tailor games to my preferences.

In an online game, you're supposed play against players of your skill level.

Jim Sterling isn't not playing Sekiro because it's too hard, he's not playing because he doesn't like defensive/parry type combat. So I don't see how that has anything do with adding difficulty modes.

This is the exact attitude I just completely laugh at. You already don't know how someone beat a Souls game. You can beat Souls games by "climbing the mountain" yourself or just being that rich asshole that has sherpas do all the work (via the probably 10s of cheese methods in these games or literally having someone else do it for you). It's no great accomplishment to just beat a Souls game much like it's no great accomplishment to beat say Uncharted. However, mastering any game is an accomplishment. Beating the just Super Mario Bros. 1 is more of an accomplishment than how some people beat a Souls game. Thus, just beating a Souls game means nothing more than beating any other game. Souls is not some "right of passage" or whatever bullshit Souls fans think it is, it's just like any other game only disguised as something different (mainly by the player base), even stealing "git gud" from an actual hard game. If variety is a good thing, why does From use the same Souls mechanics in brand new IPs when they don't make much sense?

Well, if it's so easy, like you say, then why would it need an easy mode?

Because different people are differently skilled at games...

I noticed how you completely ignored my point that Souls in its current form isn't actually anymore of an accomplishment to beat than any other game so how is adding an Easy mode ruining that? And also why would you or anyone care about how someone else beat a game? All it matters is how you played and beat the game.

 

[Kerg3927]

I noticed how you completely ignored my point that Souls in its current form isn't actually anymore of an accomplishment to beat than any other game so how is adding an Easy mode ruining that? And also why would you or anyone care about how someone else beat a game? All it matters is how you played and beat the game.

From Software cares because it's their customers, and they want the best experience for them, because satisfied customers come back and buy DLC and future games. So they designed the game with that in mind, which includes offering only one difficulty mode, and it has been a huge success. Changing that formula now would be like Coke changing their flavor formula in the 80's... very, very ill-advised.

And I also care, because I'm a huge fan of the design, and I want others to experience it in the same way that I did, which includes one difficulty, forcing players to overcome the obstacles in the only way they are presented, because I know it leads to a rewarding feeling of accomplishment.

As for addressing your comment that the Souls games are no more difficult than any other game, I didn't address that directly because I flat out think you are lying. I think you're just saying that to get a rise out of people. I'm not saying they are the most difficult games ever made, and I'm well aware that summoning help can make some parts of the game much easier, but overall they are certainly more difficult than the average game for the average human. I think you'd be hard pressed to find people who could say that they are as easy as any other game while passing a lie detector test, including you.

And I think that's what most of this argument boils down to. Some people simply don't like the majority of Souls fans because they are proud, and for some reason that burns some people up. So they love to take a piss in their cheerios. They know that adding an easy mode is something the vast majority of them don't want, so they'd love to see it happen just to spite them. It has little to do with the game itself, and it's mostly about spitting in the face of its fans. It's really just base level shittiness, IMO.

 

[CritialGaming]

This is inspirational [https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=tso8u4OJLuI], and goes to show that an easy mode is a bit of a moot point.

 

[I can't enter my old name]

Which game reviewer? Find literally any example.

To answer that question you have to ask, who even gets bothered by Cuphead to write an article? It's because they struggled to reach the end of easy mode, and realized they were bamboozled by the devs.

Game journalists are not going to say "I'm going to give a game known for being hard a bad score because it's too hard" First of all, that's embarrassing, and secondly, they are going to get tons of harassment. Remember they have Takahashi in the back of their mind after the internet unfairly mocked him for what was supposed to be a self-deprecating joke.

What's more convincing, writing "This game is too difficult for me, please make it easier so I can reach the end faster" or "This game is exclusionary for players who might not be able to experience the game due to it's difficulty" and then throwing in something about elitists to get people riled up?

Yep, just hitting the wrong games journalist audience who're giving it solid 8-9.5/10 scores and will likely put it on every "Best of 2019" list in the industry.

I was talking about Cuphead. Souls games are so popular nowadays not covering it would be wasted money. It's not that hard to find someone who can beat most of a Souls game.

By the way review scores are meaningless and arbitrary, where a game with good graphics can get a higher score because it increases the feeling of quality and value of ownership of the game. Most of the time it's an expectation of what a game ought to get due to the amount of perceived effort put into it, which is why pretty console exclusives with heavy attention to detail always get 90+, and 10 years later it becomes the black sheep of the series.

The novelty and craftmanship of a game is enough to make Cuphead 80 minimum. You and I might not like it, but it is a work of art mostly because it has previous art to draw from, and we already know how labor intensive and prestigious it is. It would be insulting to give it anything lower than 80.

 

[Dalisclock]

They don't start out speedrun good. They play the game enough to master it and get so good that the mechanics and story doesn't matter, however they've gotten that experience the first time through. There was a reason they got so good at the game, because they loved the game, and they loved the challenge, and they wanted to become masters of it.

Dark Souls has always been contentious with difficulty. Some wanted an outright easy mode and others felt the easy mode was already baked into the mechanics. Either by summoning help, or using certain weapon set ups. But the difference between Dark Souls "easy mode" and easy modes in any other game is simple. Dark Souls' difficulty is entirely dependent on how YOU play it. The game doesn't change for anyone, it simply gives you a toolbox and lets the player decide how they approach it. For some, casting spells is the easiest way, for others hiding behind a big fucking shield is the easy way. It's all subjective. But the game itself doesn't change, it remains the same for everyone and thus everyone can share that same experience and all the hardships that come with the game.

Sekiro is the same, but to a lesser degree. There are skills and approaches in SEkiro that do make most of the journey easier. However you can't fall back on someone else to beat a fight for you because there is no multiplayer. The game expects more out of you, but it DOES offer tools that can help you along the way that can help adapt to your playstyle.

Sekiro is by far the hardest of the Fromsoft games. But it doesn't require 100 hours of failure, it doesn't require you to quit your job, it doesn't require all that much except maybe a bit of perseverance and determination. My playthrough took 23 hours and I am not a very skilled player imo, and play time depends on level of exploration as well.

And frankly in hindsight, there is a lot of game to be had with Sekiro that doesn't require ball busting boss fights. The stealth is fantastic, the mobility and the platforming is great, the exploration is awesome, and stealth killing bad guys is sooo fun. So perhaps there is a bit of a trade off there. I don't know. It's personal taste and not every game can fit every player.

My point is that if death and hardship is so essential to enjoying these games and their stories, actually getting better would then make the games worse, calling in for online buddies makes the games worse, looking up tips on farming and grinding makes the games worse.

This is what I don't get when fans talk about the difficulty in these games like it's this unbending thing, when the games themselves have plenty of exploits that allow you to circumvent it, and it's even highly encouraged by the fanbase to look up tips online. I mean, do the dozens of YouTube videos giving combat tips for Sekiro get people mad because this is taking away some of the challenge and therefor ruining the game?

An Easy mode in Sekiro could just as easily be baked into the game's mechanic and lore like it was in Dark Souls. Have the undying guy be summonable for Boss fights, but make it so that using this feature will have negative impact on other characters/the story/the ending. Only allow the player to get the worst possible ending by going Easy as a trade off.

These games don't have a difficulty that is impossible to bend, there's plenty of ways the games allow you to do so. So the idea of an option that gives players an easier time really shouldn't be so unacceptable to fans.

Let's not forget that both DS2 and Sekiro have a hard mode option triggerable from inside the game, which nobody seems to care about in these discussions. It's just the idea of having an easy mode that seems to rankle some people(like the idea of using Giantdad in DS1, which apparently is akin to cheating).

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

Which game reviewer? Find literally any example.

To answer that question you have to ask, who even gets bothered by Cuphead to write an article? It's because they struggled to reach the end of easy mode, and realized they were bamboozled by the devs.

I don't know, we seem to be making sweeping generalizations about an entire profession and supposed line of argument based on a single Forbes article that's got a rebuttal also on Forbes. Like, if you could link to an article, we could talk about it

Game journalists are not going to say "I'm going to give a game known for being hard a bad score because it's too hard" First of all, that's embarrassing, and secondly, they are going to get tons of harassment. Remember they have Takahashi in the back of their mind after the internet unfairly mocked him for what was supposed to be a self-deprecating joke.

What's more convincing, writing "This game is too difficult for me, please make it easier so I can reach the end faster" or "This game is exclusionary for players who might not be able to experience the game due to it's difficulty" and then throwing in something about elitists to get people riled up?

THE WHOLE "GAMES JOURNALISTS ARE BAD AT GAMES SO THEY COMPLAIN ABOUT THEM BEING TOO HARD FOR OTHER PEOPLE AS COVER" LIE WAS BORN OUT OF THE TAKAHASHI THING! It's one and the same! It's the same outrage manufactured by outrage merchants who rail about walking simulators!

Yep, just hitting the wrong games journalist audience who're giving it solid 8-9.5/10 scores and will likely put it on every "Best of 2019" list in the industry.

I was talking about Cuphead.

You shouldn't have been: it's Critic scores are also higher than the User scores, and Cuphead was on damn near every "Best of" list too.

One more time for the back of the class: GAMES JOURNALISTS AND REVIEWERS DO NOT HATE DIFFICULT GAMES! There's literally no evidence about that being a default position.

Accessibility is a thing people talk about because some people don't think people should be locked out of entire games they would otherwise like because of arbitrary bullshit. "Easy mode" is the 101 level of that discussion.

This is what I don't get when fans talk about the difficulty in these games like it's this unbending thing, when the games themselves have plenty of exploits that allow you to circumvent it, and it's even highly encouraged by the fanbase to look up tips online. I mean, do the dozens of YouTube videos giving combat tips for Sekiro get people mad because this is taking away some of the challenge and therefor ruining the game?

An Easy mode in Sekiro could just as easily be baked into the game's mechanic and lore like it was in Dark Souls. Have the undying guy be summonable for Boss fights, but make it so that using this feature will have negative impact on other characters/the story/the ending. Only allow the player to get the worst possible ending by going Easy as a trade off.

These games don't have a difficulty that is impossible to bend, there's plenty of ways the games allow you to do so. So the idea of an option that gives players an easier time really shouldn't be so unacceptable to fans.

Let's not forget that both DS2 and Sekiro have a hard mode option triggerable from inside the game, which nobody seems to care about in these discussions. It's just the idea of having an easy mode that seems to rankle some people(like the idea of using Giantdad in DS1, which apparently is akin to cheating).

I feel like 99% of this argument just wouldn't exist if it was "Normal vs Difficult" instead of "Easy vs Normal"