Quote Originally Posted by JKTrix View Post
Finally, someone mentions Ninja Gaiden.

I think the main reasons that games seem to be easier now is that we're older, more experienced, and more skilled than we were when we first started playing games. Another reason some games seemed too hard (back then and right now) is because of just plain bad game mechanics.

Ninja Gaiden was incredibly difficult. The first boss in that game is harder than final bosses in most other action games, and it's a very simple battle in essense. You have a sword, he has nunchuks, just hit each other till one of you dies. No other gimmicks like some enormous monster about to take destroy the world, or some crazy magic wielding villain. Just a guy who is really good at using nunchuks.

The challenge comes when you realize that you can't just attack him blindly. He will block most of the things you just throw at him, and will punish you painfully for it. You have to dodge, run on walls or whatever you can to avoid his attacks, then use your skills to strike at the right time. It's a game of pattern recognition and skill, and you won't be able to progress far if you suck. The game is rated M for mature, so they expect you to be '17+' when you play it, which should be old enough to have fairly good digital dexterity honed from years of gaming.
See, I still dont know why people had such difficulty with Ninja Gaiden. It was harder than most games but it never got so hard that I stopped playing it. After getting used to everything, I was skimming through the game, dying on the odd occasion.

The same goes for DMC3, more so in fact.