Video Game Difficulty

[Mercen-X]

Hardest game I ever played was Alundra not because the gameplay was immensely difficult simply I couldn't bloody figure out where the hell I was supposed to go or what supposed to do half the time.

Paradise for PC

[Hollycat]

The hardest game I ever played was Freelancer with resistance set to 7. I didn't think I was going to win, took me over a hundred hours on a 10 hour story.

[Elite Lord Sigma]

I agree that design philosophies have deviated away from the often cheap and unfair mechanics of older games, whether they be accidental or intentional, in an attempt to cater to an older and admittedly more casual audience with less free time on their hands. However, I believe there is a right way to go about making games challenging without being cheap or saddling you with blatantly bad design.

Two games that go about this the right way are Dark Souls and Batman: Arkham Asylum. You will die over and over again in the first game, but this creates a huge sense of reward when you succeed. The game also encourages smart equipping and tactics, the latter of which it has in common with Arkham Asylum. I recently beat that game on Hard mode, and I can say that not one of my deaths, barring a strange glitch where I fell through the floor into a void, were due to anything other than my own mistake. To overcome both the main story and the extra challenges, a player needs to be both efficient and intelligent; button mashing will get you nowhere fast.

Now, two examples of poorly done extremes are Call of Duty: World at War and Prince of Persia (2008). In the latter, the game is insultingly easy because you are bailed out every time you are about to die with no real penalty other than possibly missing an achievement/trophy. Because of that, there's no real sense of accomplishment or any real reason to get involved with the game. The former, on the other hand, is notorious for being probably the hardest game in the series for all of the wrong reasons. The AI cheats frequently, the grenade spam is insane, and many levels require you to navigate chaotic situations when nearly every enemy is focusing on you and not your AI companions without being put down, leading to frustration and cheap death after cheap death.

[ReloadPsi]

Gaming is directed to a different audience today. The player doesn't have hours every day to devote to memorizing gameplay and level segments.

For me it's just that I don't give enough of a toss any more. Can't be bothered and all that.

[Wolf Kanno]

It largely depends on the genre nowadays. Vivi22 explained why they were brutal back in the day but nowadays, I feel the question of difficulty depends on the genre of games. Oddly enough I think making challenging games is probably one of the few strengths Japan has over Western developers. Companies like Capcom, Atlus and From Software are still not afraid to release games that can be completed with a simply rental, it takes dedication.

RPGs are not difficult because the audience expectations has changed, in Western RPGs it's exploration and world building and in Japan, it's all about telling the story. Now WRPG's get away with it cause the exploration and craftmenship of the world make up for the simplistic gameplay and general ease. JRPGs have suffered because telling a good story is no longer an exclusive niche for them. It's hard to promote being the story game when you can get just as good or nowadays, better writing from other genres. Games like MGS, Uncharted, Assassin's Creed, and even a few FPS titles can offer both a well told story with a fleshed out cast of characters and offer deep and fun gameplay. Course, these series may suffer the same fate of JRPGs if they follow in their footsteps of making their titles more about the story than the gameplay.