Video games being too easy?

[Rosenakahara]

Yes im bringing this age-long topic back up but i wasnt even thinking about it until i saw this:

SPOILER: Show

[url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njzAyjAFCMI[/url]

like what the actual fuck, the nes has two buttons, all megaman can do is jump and shoot, how the hell do you mess that up? look i know they should have gone cutman first but seriously.

And some of these kids (i say that yet they are only a little younger than me) have actual modern gaming experience so this isnt a case of them all just being non-gamers, my point is videogames these days just dont seem to make you THINK, i can turn a lot of games i play on hard and i will still breeze through them without thinking about what i am doing and that is just bad.

Now im not saying all games have to be amazingly hard, that doesn't fit every kind of game however a lot of games (Mostly just AAA ones) in general now have just become.........mindless, formulaic........you get the idea.

[Ornette]

The old games with 2 buttons and 8-bit computing had an entirely different gameplay with different sets of accomplishments. Things were heavily dependent on timing and memorization, all of which aren't as important these days because you can make the games so much more immersive.

In the same way, compare those 8-bit 2 buttom games to text adventures. Text adventures must seem crazy hard compared to something like those Sierra games with 8bit graphics, Hitchiker's Guide excluded.

There's still legitimate "too easy" gripes, but I think you'll find a lot of that isn't because the game play was good, but that it was just dumb or broken.

[Rosenakahara]

^ Dude, megaman isn't exactly a broken or hard game, you jump, you shoot, a lot of these kids couldnt even figure out how to shoot, hell one walked right into spikes and then complained about it then they said this game was "hard".

Honestly megaman 1 is one of (emphasis on one of, 10 is much harder but mostly cause 10 can be bullshit at times) the easiest of the series, thier brains would explode if they played megaman x, you have to jump, shoot AND dash.

[NemZ]

It's pretty sad just how slow to adapt to enemy patterns they were. Almost no consideration of timing or positioning at all, just spam attack or tank hits and run through it. I didn't even know it was possible to get Sniper Joe (the green shield guy) to follow you that far into the stage. Are they playing with the sound off or something? how is it possible to completely miss the different hit/block sounds of your shots?

That said, megaman 2 is a far better starting place for people new to the series, while mm1 is arguably the hardest of the classic line. Not for anything these kids actually encountered though... bombman is an utter cakewalk compared to elec, ice and fire (unless you break the ai pattern). I agree that cutman is probably the better starting stage for someone who doesn't know what they're doing though, and there's a reason the cursor is there by default.

Also text/adventure games ARE ridiculously hard, but in a 'fake difficulty' sort of sense because they almost universally rely on the player to make intuitive connections between things they can't possibly have had any reason to think about at the time or that simply don't make any sense whatsoever. There's no potential for mastery here, just brute forcing your way through the stupid by trial and error, and even that is frustrated by how common it is to be able to enter a fail state but keep playing for a while and never realize what minor thing that you did hours ago sealed your doom.

[EvangelionGodMode]

Yes im bringing this age-long topic back up but i wasnt even thinking about it until i saw this:

SPOILER: Show

[url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njzAyjAFCMI[/url]

like what the actual fuck, the nes has two buttons, all megaman can do is jump and shoot, how the hell do you mess that up? look i know they should have gone cutman first but seriously.

I believe the AVGN has become famous ranting on these games that have in fact screwed this up

[IronEvangelion]

I will say that the amount of hand-holding in modern games is getting ridiculous, but these days I actually prefer somewhat easy games over extremely hard ones.

Years ago I was a hardcore gamer, and I always played on the highest difficulty level that was unlocked in whatever game I was playing. But over the years I realized three things. One: Nobody cared whether or not I could beat Ninja Gaiden on Very Hard mode. Two: It wasn't fun anymore. Three: I just didn't have time to waste on retries anymore.

These days, after working full time, I just want to sit down and have fun playing a game instead of repeatedly dieing and restarting in order to beat a damn boss on extreme mode for bragging rights that won't do me any good in the real world. So nowadays I almost exclusively play on easy mode (or whatever the lowest difficulty in a given game is), and I'm having a lot more fun this way, which is really the whole point of a video game to begin with.

[Lorkhan]

I myself never gave a toss as to how easy or hard a game was. If I had a good time, I had a good time.

Look, for all intents and purposes, the Nintendo Hard era of games is effectively over, and the only time you see a game near that level is because it was designed to be particularly obtuse for the sake of it, or at the very least requires a slightly different mindset to deal with. There is a point where "streamlining" something gets grating, but the truth of the matter is, things like that just don't sell on the whole anymore. Indie's might be trying to make something of it, but that's about it.

^I can't say I ever actually choose easy mode on games in general. Even for my (First) Wasteland 2 run, I went with Ranger Difficulty (Which is equivalent to hard I suppose) since surviving the wastes is sort of a thing. I have a feeling Supreme Jerk difficulty would have chewed me up and spat me out, but there's a point where I just flat out not like dying repeatedly or hauling ass across the wastes for something stupid I may or may not need. Nooooooot that it didn't happen and I accidentally went somewhere I was underleveled for, and a single machine gun wielding jerk wiped out my squad in a few turns.

[Monk Ed]

I just started Electronic Super Joy: Groove City last night. It's a perfectly modern game with a pleasing hard difficulty. I could also name the Souls series e.g. Dark Souls. I enjoy both hard games and easy games, and I rarely have trouble finding either. And I should add that "easy fun" is an entirely valid taste to have.

I suppose the real question here is whether the absolute amount of readily available hard games has diminished. Hard games are certainly a smaller proportion of modern games but that really doesn't matter -- the industry itself has grown hugely since the days when hard was normal. It's entirely possible that the selection of new hard (good) games might have actually grown since the old days, but only appears smaller because the number of not-so-hard games grew to dwarf it.

[Oz]

Just like others have already mentioned, NES games required a different mindset and a different set of skills, both of which are no longer needed as a gamer. However, that doesn't mean the modern gamers are hopeless - it's just a matter of what they are used to and what they grew up with. Trying to learn a new system takes more time and motivation after a certain age. At one point I played a lot of NES games with an emulator, but thinking about it afterwards I wouldn't play most of them again. I prefer immersion to the sort of grinding that games like Megaman require.

It should also be mentioned that the makers of the video posted in the OP intentionally choose the sort of people that bring them more views. The video is hardly a valid representation of modern gamers - it is just polarizing entertainment.

[Sorrow]

^ Dude, megaman isn't exactly a broken or hard game, you jump, you shoot,

It's still harder than Call of Duty. Take the original Castlevania and Castlevania 3 and compare it to The Lords of Shadow series. The amount of buttons available or that require your attention isn't an indicator of required skill. In the original Sonic the Hedgehog the only thing you could do with the buttons was jump, and it's still vastly harder than any Sonic after Sonic the Hedgehog 2.

Every year I would get Call of Duty (after World at War I stopped buying them but my friends would buy it for me so that I would play with them), and complete the story on Veteran then play online for a while, the same night I got it. I didn't even bother unwrapping Black Ops 2 and played Modern Warfare 3 for literally that one night.

Dark Souls was a disappointment. Admittedly I farmed[s]---[/s]as someone insisted I do "at least for my first play through"[s]---[/s]but the very fact it's an option means the game isn't very hard, only time consuming at best. I understand the intent behind making it possible for everyone to accomplish the task, because they did pay for it, but even the hardest difficulty is a matter of persistence on occasional moments with no risk of being set back. The absolute worst thing is when a game has a higher difficulty that you need to unlock; so you've had tons of practice and know exactly what's coming up, eliminating challenge and making it essentially no harder than the first time - it's like playing twice through on normal when most (modern) games aren't even good enough to play over again.

[Giji Shinka]

Dark Souls was a disappointment. Admittedly I farmed[s]---[/s]as someone insisted I do "at least for my first play through"[s]---[/s]but the very fact it's an option means the game isn't very hard, only time consuming at best.

Well, you probably will like Dark Souls II then, the games difficulty isn't crushing at the beginning like in the original and farming is pretty much nonexistent. You gain enough souls to beat enemies and bosses while you progress the game normally + enemies despawn in the game after you've killed them all multiple times (10 times I think) so that even players who aren't that good in the game can progress somehow.

And I do admit that Dark 1 requires a lot of farming at the beginning, which can be a turn off for some.

OT: What others said above.

[Sorrow]

I've heard that, but I can only imagine the difficulty was curved in other ways to compensate for the lack of farming. Not saying I know that to be the case, but I'd like to bet it is. I've even heard Bloodborne is trying to appeal to more "mainstream gamers" - id est incapable.

I thought about getting it when it's really cheap, but I just can't be bothered with games anymore and haven't played anything, old or new, in over a year now. They only ever disappoint, and Third Strike became a chore to get into a lobby - or I'd still be playing it. I'm still interested, in a way, and was planning to get Metal Gear Solid V when it comes out, but it seems unlikely.

[Giji Shinka]

I've heard that, but I can only imagine the difficulty was curved in other ways to compensate for the lack of farming.

Not really, not only do enemies despawn, but checkpoints (Bonfires) are closer to each other than in the original, the game gets really hard only after you've managed to beat over 70-80% of the game.

I've even heard Bloodborne is trying to appeal to more "mainstream gamers" - id est incapable.

Many people in Souls community who have played the beta have said that it's even harder than it's predecessors, so....

DS2 is the most accessible souls game right now and it is the game I would recommend to any new player.

[Sorrow]

Not really, not only do enemies despawn, but checkpoints (Bonfires) are closer to each other than in the original, the game gets really hard only after you've managed to beat over 70-80% of the game.

DS2 is the most accessible souls game right now and it is the game I would recommend to any new player.

I'm a bit confused. I said they probably made the game easier to compensate for the fact that you can't farm (so much) to get stronger, then you said "not really" but explained that: bonfires are closer together (easier), 70-80% of it isn't really hard (easier) and it's the most accessible (easier).

Unless you also meant less bonfires, that last 20-30% is harder than Dark Souls altogether, and I don't know what else you could have meant by more accessible.

As for Bloodborne, I'm glad to hear that.

[Rosenakahara]

Sorrow the journalists and dudebro gamers may have mislead you a little, souls series was never about difficulty, the difficulty is just a result of the mechanics, i love ds2 but a major gripe is they focused too much on the well received difficulty and the story+lore suffered because of it so now they have to remake the whole thing, dark souls is a game that you will get the most out of on a second play-through most likely and what you find most appealing tends to change from person to person, some people love the mechanics, others the bosses, me the lore ect. i think the only reason the difficulty got infamous is because this game actually forced players to THINK and be patient with their actions+try to learn enemy attack patterns and for some people that was too much so the media grabbed onto that and acted like it was the most difficult game ever.

Basically: ignore hype and enjoy games for what they are, you will have a lot more fun like that.

Honestly imo dark souls balances a line between hard and easy very well.

[Giji Shinka]

I think the only reason the difficulty got infamous is because this game actually forced players to THINK and be patient with their actions+try to learn enemy attack patterns and for some people that was too much so the media grabbed onto that and acted like it was the most difficult game ever.

This.
The game is pretty easy when compared to some older games.

[Sorrow]

I thoroughly liked the lore, but it's not good enough to sell the game on it's own, and not something I imagine the second game to even be on par with. Yes, I did go into the game thinking "this is meant to be the hardest thing since the 16-bit era". I played it through three times; once on my own, second time to collect all the items and spells and get the other ending, and a third time to help someone who was on their fifth play-through (and they gave me Quelaag's soul because it can make three items).

No, the game wasn't bad, but it was far too overhyped[s:3os3jzwa]---[/s:3os3jzwa]especially the difficulty[s:3os3jzwa]---[/s:3os3jzwa]and not really worth repeating with the second game. You can make any game harder by creating your own rules, avoiding certain things, and overall limiting yourself, for some people who say things like "don't do X and Y if it's too easy then", but that doesn't make the game itself hard.

If I did ever play the second I won't bother going out of my way to get any extra souls, I know that for sure.

[Giji Shinka]

As for Bloodborne, I'm glad to hear that.

I forgot to answer this....


No, it might not be a good thing.

The reason why I love Souls is because it handles the difficulty so well. It's challenging but fair and I fear that BB might become hard for the sake of being hard.

[Sorrow]

And I forgot to address this:

souls series was never about difficulty, the difficulty is just a result of the mechanics

Surely that could be said of every game that we moan about for being too easy - difficulty isn't the focus. It seems not only is the Souls series wrongly considered a really challenging game, it also gets off when called not nearly hard enough because "it's not really about that".

Metal Gear Solid V isn't about difficulty, but I still felt disappointed when I saw the "slow-time, free enemy kill when spotted to avoid being 'spotted'" mechanic.

The reason why I love Souls is because it handles the difficulty so well. It's challenging but fair and I fear that BB might become hard for the sake of being hard.

I understand that, and appreciate it. But I think it would be nice if someone concentrated on making a game challenging for the sake of challenge[s]---[/s]not broken, mind you[s]---[/s]and if FromSoftware are willing to be the ones to do it off the back of their reputation, I'm personally glad to see as such. One day when the Playstation 4 is £80, I'll pick it up.

[Rosenakahara]

While i would like to continue this:
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