Weird difficulty curves in videogames
- Thread starter mortalsatsuma
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Borderlands has it for sure... you're blowing through enemies in one quest, the next quest in the same area they're made of titanium and wiping you out with bursts of SMG or shotgun from ranges where you need a sniper scope to aim.
Demon's Souls cranks damage and enemy HP up a notch in each consecutive area of a world, despite the fact that it's like the exact same enemies. It's pretty mean when basic goons go from being a minor threat to half-killing you in a hit, or the bigger guys go from killing you on an unprotected hit to WTFWHEREAREMYHP right through your shield.
My current grind is Wipeout Fury. Elite-level difficulty on certain events seems somewhere beyond "race a perfect line around this track and you're good" and it takes me a whole night just to get one gold medal... meanwhile I can get Gold in the middle difficulty on my first go.
Demon's Souls cranks damage and enemy HP up a notch in each consecutive area of a world, despite the fact that it's like the exact same enemies. It's pretty mean when basic goons go from being a minor threat to half-killing you in a hit, or the bigger guys go from killing you on an unprotected hit to WTFWHEREAREMYHP right through your shield.
My current grind is Wipeout Fury. Elite-level difficulty on certain events seems somewhere beyond "race a perfect line around this track and you're good" and it takes me a whole night just to get one gold medal... meanwhile I can get Gold in the middle difficulty on my first go.
Surprised no one mentioned the Devil May Cry series.
DMC 1 - First half dozen missions were pretty easy, including the bosses. Soon as you meet Nelo Angelo, he rapes you in the ass, then slaps you around the field. Mundus is not much better.. the third person shooter stage of his fight is actually pretty easy, but once your on foot again, he rains Hell upon you.
DMC 2 - Same story, different people.
DMC 3 - DO NOT ever play on Heaven or Hell mode; you will never make it past the first stage. Dante Must Die isn't too bad... just be prepared for a lot of Demon Hunter ranks. Cerberus is a pain in the ass, but killable. I'd have to say the second and third fights with Vergil.. maybe Arkham are the nastiest.
DMC 1 - First half dozen missions were pretty easy, including the bosses. Soon as you meet Nelo Angelo, he rapes you in the ass, then slaps you around the field. Mundus is not much better.. the third person shooter stage of his fight is actually pretty easy, but once your on foot again, he rains Hell upon you.
DMC 2 - Same story, different people.
DMC 3 - DO NOT ever play on Heaven or Hell mode; you will never make it past the first stage. Dante Must Die isn't too bad... just be prepared for a lot of Demon Hunter ranks. Cerberus is a pain in the ass, but killable. I'd have to say the second and third fights with Vergil.. maybe Arkham are the nastiest.
I think Kingdom Under Fire (Crusaders at least) qualifies - first campaign? Pretty striaghtforward. Second? A few hiccups, still stable. The third and fourth (which are unlocked at the same time)? SOLID. The difficulty suddenly spikes up to eleven like you've just noticed a Tarantula nesting in your crotch! And with one of them, it's so insanely difficult that if you spend your EXP wrongly, you will be absolutely unable to move past a few of the missions.
hmmm, I didn't find heaven or hell mode in DMC3 that bad. I mean, it was hella difficult but in the way it was supposed to be. Besides After Cerberus the difficulty curve plummets faster than America's economy during G.W's presidency. yeah i went there...maverickhunter said:
2 things in demon souls I found hard. Army of dead babies and Old King Dorian. The rest wasn't to bad, and the final boss fight made me cry it was ridiculously easy. I felt kinda bad killing it.Kanlic said:
Exactly this. I was cruising through songs and getting 4-5 stars on most of them and then hit 'Raining Blood', which is a song I know and like and expected to be tough, but holy hell. I've beaten it once on Expert, my difficulty level of choice, and that is it. Then I get to Lou and "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" and lose because the Battle mode is utterly retarded.Chapper said:
I think no one mentioned them because we are talking about weird difficulty curves, not games that start out hard and can be made harder by ratcheting up the difficulty setting.maverickhunter said:
I've noticed this in a lot of games. In so many games, the first level or two is fairly easy (especially the tutorial levels which are almost impossible to lose in many games), then the difficulty ramps up very quickly. It's hard to list all the games that do this since so many of them do.
However, I can think of a few that have a more gradual difficulty curve: Star Wars Dark Forces, Battle for Middle Earth, Star Wars Republic Commando, Disciples, Tetris, Boom Blox, Asteroids etc. It seems like more of the older games had a somewhat more gradual difficulty curve.
Seems like the more recent "sandbox" or "open gaming world" games suffer more from inconsistant difficulty. That's probably because there isn't as much restriction by the game over where you can go and what you can do. Those games let you wander off into really difficult areas sometimes before your character is ready for it. Fallout 3 was notorious for this. You are killing monsters and finding stuff fairly easily in one area but if you wander too far from where the storyline wants you to go next, you can run into some pretty nasty baddies you aren't ready for yet. That's why being able to adjust the difficulty during the game is so nice in that game.
One of my favorite games in terms of difficulty settings is Battle for Middle Earth II. You can play the offline skirmish mode which lets you choose the difficulty of the AI you fight against (even how able they are to advance in the tech tree and how many resources they get); add AI allies, add or remove extra AI enemies, pick the maps you want to play etc. You can make that game as hard or as easy as you want.
Star Wars TIE Fighter was that way too as I recall. You could go into a window before you started the game and customize just about every aspect of that game including the difficulty of several different things in the game.
A few of the newer games are starting to give some customizability back to the player, but for a while there, we were lucky if we got to pick between two or three different difficulty levels that applied to the whole game.
However, I can think of a few that have a more gradual difficulty curve: Star Wars Dark Forces, Battle for Middle Earth, Star Wars Republic Commando, Disciples, Tetris, Boom Blox, Asteroids etc. It seems like more of the older games had a somewhat more gradual difficulty curve.
Seems like the more recent "sandbox" or "open gaming world" games suffer more from inconsistant difficulty. That's probably because there isn't as much restriction by the game over where you can go and what you can do. Those games let you wander off into really difficult areas sometimes before your character is ready for it. Fallout 3 was notorious for this. You are killing monsters and finding stuff fairly easily in one area but if you wander too far from where the storyline wants you to go next, you can run into some pretty nasty baddies you aren't ready for yet. That's why being able to adjust the difficulty during the game is so nice in that game.
One of my favorite games in terms of difficulty settings is Battle for Middle Earth II. You can play the offline skirmish mode which lets you choose the difficulty of the AI you fight against (even how able they are to advance in the tech tree and how many resources they get); add AI allies, add or remove extra AI enemies, pick the maps you want to play etc. You can make that game as hard or as easy as you want.
Star Wars TIE Fighter was that way too as I recall. You could go into a window before you started the game and customize just about every aspect of that game including the difficulty of several different things in the game.
A few of the newer games are starting to give some customizability back to the player, but for a while there, we were lucky if we got to pick between two or three different difficulty levels that applied to the whole game.
Not a Spy said:
I found with Mass effect and to some extent a lot of RPGs are actually harder in the beginning until you get your characters all powered up and then they become a joke. Dragon age difficulty is directly influenced by the number of enemy spell casters on the field of battle.
I gather that the difficulty in Mario Basketball goes like this:
easy - easy - easy - easy - SHITBRICKWALL
However, I nominate Lego Racers. You play the first two circuits. No real problems. Then the third circuit comes up and it is far harder because the Circuit Leader's strategy is gay. Then you beat it, probably by chance. Then the next two circuits are the same as the first two (literally, except the tracks are mirrored and there's a different Circuit Leader) and the sixth one is hard again. Then you race the final boss, who has an even more gay but slightly easier to beat strategy.
Weird.
easy - easy - easy - easy - SHITBRICKWALL
However, I nominate Lego Racers. You play the first two circuits. No real problems. Then the third circuit comes up and it is far harder because the Circuit Leader's strategy is gay. Then you beat it, probably by chance. Then the next two circuits are the same as the first two (literally, except the tracks are mirrored and there's a different Circuit Leader) and the sixth one is hard again. Then you race the final boss, who has an even more gay but slightly easier to beat strategy.
Weird.
The first Assassin's Creed comes to mind. I cruised to the first city quite easily, the combat system being as easy at it is, then all of a sudden I had to fight a group of guards (as in couldn't avoid them for some reason I forgot) along the road which I just could not kill. They kept blocking/countering my counters, they just wouldn't go down. I still wonder why the difficulty of the guards suddenly went up like that, especially completely unannounced.
Very true, sadly boss fights are B:AA's weakest point. That and the Bat himself being more stoic than Keanu Reeves.Jharry5 said:
Ohhhh let me guess, the mission in which you have to repair the car rental place? Makes sense, you usually get that mission too quickly, as in your level is usually lower than the recommended level. Plus your arsenal is still horribly standard, thus crappy. Only part of the game, so far after 14 hours of playtime I had any trouble with. Mordecai is seriously over-powered.Julianking93 said:
Kanlic said:
I'm pretty sure that's one of Atlus' mission statements, it's a common occurrence in at least the Persona games as well.
Speaking of Persona, P3 was pretty constant in difficulty till you hit the Tarturus bosses or got a enemy advantage.Then there were the bosses themselves ,one boss would be mopping the floor with your blood and the next guy would fall over from a weak sneeze.
P4 did this sometimes too but it was more consistent in boss ass-kickery
<url=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.151706>Lightning Warrior Raidy. That is all.
Heaven or Hell still counts for the thread, but that's only because the difficulty curve spikes sharply upward in Mission 14, with the introduction of the hard-to-dodge environmental hazards (and then in 15, with that sextet of dullahans...).
For that matter, there's also an in-mission spike out of nowhere in the higher difficulties. The Arkham fight wouldn't be that bad if not for the second half. Yes, having <color=white>Vergil fight alongside you is farkin' awesome, but taking away your devil trigger and style moves for the rest of the fight is a massive hit.
Nelo Angelo? He's not that bad until the third time. It's Nightmare that shows up out of nowhere as the "omigod how the hell do I hurt it?!" boss.maverickhunter said:
All you had to do in DMC2 was stand back and shoot things. It's the only game where that strategy is both viable and effective enough to work in less than fifteen minutes per boss.
Everything dies in a single hit in Heaven or Hell. Once you know that they'll try to trick you with that Hell Wrath, you have no excuse to lose in the first stage. Ever.
Heaven or Hell still counts for the thread, but that's only because the difficulty curve spikes sharply upward in Mission 14, with the introduction of the hard-to-dodge environmental hazards (and then in 15, with that sextet of dullahans...).
For that matter, there's also an in-mission spike out of nowhere in the higher difficulties. The Arkham fight wouldn't be that bad if not for the second half. Yes, having <color=white>Vergil fight alongside you is farkin' awesome, but taking away your devil trigger and style moves for the rest of the fight is a massive hit.
I agree with the Borderlands thing and the rescue Liara mission in Mass Effect.
However after getting a 12 round Jakob's shotgun in Borderlands playing as Lillith, the difficulty curve dropped to the floor for the rest of the game.
However after getting a 12 round Jakob's shotgun in Borderlands playing as Lillith, the difficulty curve dropped to the floor for the rest of the game.
well, its starts off fairly easy, then as soon as youve done a few beggining quests BAM your in "skag gully" or somewhere and before you can even move, youve had your balls ripped off by a baby skag.weker said: