Poll: Easy, Medium, or Insane?

[BloodyThoughts]

Difficulties. They are the literal game changer of ones gaming experience. Gaming difficulties is like Goldielocks to some gamers. Not too hard, not too easy, but just in the middle.

Then, there are the people that like to go all out and go all or nothing in the insane(or any high difficulty) difficulty. Sometimes, it is actually fun for these people. Maybe because of the combination of the challenge and the sweet sweet taste of overcoming that challenge. Either way, these people like to play their asses off...
unless they are playing a game in which insane is just easy all over again...we've all played that type of game.

Then, the people that just like to relax and have fun with what they are doing. These people prefer the easy way of the gaming experience. Especially in sandbox games.

Oh yeah and the other people who I cannot talk about for reasons unknown....

Basically what I am asking my fellow Escapians, is what type of difficulty do you prefer? Easy, Medium, or Insane?

Me? You ask me what I like? Personally I am part of the "other" spectrum of the poll. If I feel angsty, ill go for the big reward and choose insane mode. If I want a challenge, but also want to have fun, ill go to medium. If I just want to relax from a hard day of work or something, I play easy mode all day long.

 

[Marter]

For the first playthrough, medium is usually good. After that, hard is the difficulty I like to play on.

 

[delet]

I always play Medium or Normal the first time, then if I like the game I ramp it up to the higher difficulty on a second playthrough, then at the end I have fun screwing around on easy difficulty.

 

[Dragon_of_red]

Although I do like Rhubarb Pie, I usually go with the medium difficulty, since I'm not that great at games, so I tend to get setroyed on the Insane difficulty, and it takes away the fun, exact opposite with easy, you win without a challenge, making it to easy and not fun...

 

[Sir Kemper]

First playthrough is generally medium, unless it's an older game.

Afterwards, if I revisit it, I play on a harder difficultie.

 

[Lizardon]

Always play on medium difficulty on my first playthrough. If I liked them then I move up to the harder difficulties.

 

[Slash12]

I usually try to start on medium if the game has is really story driven, just so I can experience the story, then on the second playthrough I'll go to hard. Of course, if there is an achievement or something for beating the game on Hard then I will probably play on hard the first time through.

 

[Autumnflame]

medium to judge the game. don't like a lot of the insane levels becasue its not about a challenge its about frustration and luck. i prefer to still have fun.

 

[Tattaglia]

Usually on the medium/normal setting. Although a lot of the time with modern FPSes I play on easy, if only to decrease the amount of time spent cowering behind crates waiting for my health to regenerate. Sometimes I'll play with the harder difficulties on games that I really like and don't find too frustrating - short after-death loading times are a must.

 

[onewheeled]

I start on Normal most of the time, unless it's a game that's notorious for a steep difficulty. Then, I would start on easy then ramp it up, because I suck at games.

The only game I played on the hardest difficulty during my first playthrough, technically, was The World Ends With You, as I tried to keep the difficulty on Extreme for as long as I could. Some of those bosses, though... damn, I had to put it on easy for the first one.

 

[CoverYourHead]

Always medium the first playthrough (or, if there's a slight step up after medium, I often choose that) and then the hard difficulty on my next playthrough.

Or, sometimes I mess around on the easier difficulties.

 

[Weaver]

I always do medium, but based on 99% of the new games out there I feel like I should be picking hard all the time. I also hate when difficulties are locked, go to hell developers.

I like when MEDIUM makes me struggle. King's Bounty: The Legend I recently started playing, it's a good example of this. Medium is very challenging.

 

[Uber Waddles]

My option was Rhubarb Pie. Because you can NEVER go wrong with pie... EVAR!

But seriously; it varies between games. Most games, I like the medium difficulty. For certain games, series of games, what have you, I like to boost the games difficulty up.

If its a game series I enjoy, Ill usually do a second playthrough on the harder difficulties. I understand that generally people learn better by having their ass kicked over and over again, but I dont feel inclined for said ass-kickage if it will hinder my over-all game experience

 

[Shjade]

Usually average/medium/normal difficulty. In most games turning it up to hard just means that everything gets more health and does more damage to you, so it's the same game except you can be insta-gibbed if you walk around the wrong corner. I like having some room for error in my recreation.

That is of course unless the game is just too easy on normal. In L4D and L4D2, for instance, I play on advanced by default as normal isn't really a challenge (with the exception of finales with all bot support...bleh, sad AI helpers). Likewise the Dynasty/Samurai Warriors series of games tend to be cake on anything below hard difficulty, though the expert/chaos difficulty on those games is just stupidly over the top where getting hit twice by just about anything can kill you. Given that in those games you will often get hit by things you can't even see because they're off-screen and/or behind you that's a difficulty level reserved for masochists and psychics.

 

[Kimarous]

I generally favour easy, although I've started playing medium a bit more. I generally only ramp up the difficulty if things are getting a bit TOO easy.

 

[Fragrance of Mtn Dew]

First time through, I generally start on medium. If I've beaten the game and I feel it's worth a second playthrough I might bump it up to hard if I feel that I've mastered the gameplay enough.

 

[Silver Patriot]

It depends on a few things. Is it my first time though? What type of game is it? Are the mechanics similar? What is my reward?

What difficulty I play on is directly tied to those responses. For example when Halo 3 came out I played it on Heroic at first because I had played the previous games and knew what to expect. I also knew what to expect from MGS4. However you get rewards (equipment for later games) for beating that game on higher difficulties, so I immediately bumped it up to the highest possible level.

Eventually though I will beat the game on it's hardest difficulty. I like challenges.

 

[Fallen-Angel Risen-Demon]

medium. Feels more fun and is less chalenging then insane.

 

[Zhukov]

Depends on the game.

With something really easy, like Bioshock or Mass Effect 2, I skip straight to the hard settings. Other games like, say, Red Faction are no fun on hard, so I stick with medium.

 

[xvbones]

If I am enjoying the game or know that I will enjoy the game, I will bump the difficulty up to get as much fun out of it as I can.

If I am not enjoying the game, I will kill the difficulty so I can just finish the goddamned game and have done with it.