Letting the player choose difficulty settings is fundamentally bad game design

[Halfling Rodeo]

It's worse for who?

It's worse for the people who would have enjoyed the game the most. You're flattening the curve. Instead of a game where people either give it a 10 or a 5, you're getting a game where everyone gives it a 7 or 8.

Do I enjoy an otherwise easy game more than I might have if it has a higher difficulty setting that fits me better? Sure. I'm willing to give that up so someone more suited to an easy game can have a better experience. In exchange, I want a better experience in a different game suited to what I like. It's better to play one game perfect for me than five different ones that kind of tried but half assed whatever mode fits me best. I've got hundreds of games in my library. Maybe 20 are really great for me. I wish I had 25 in my library and they were all great and I didn't even look at the rest because they were obviously not for me.

You're acting like someone is forcing you to play and buy games not suited for you. This isn't the case. This is, at worst, a problem for children who get games as presents, but even then smart parents generally just ask the kid what to buy. Play a demo. Watch a review. Pay attention to which developers make what sorts of games and how reviewers rate games you've played before. Don't day one purchase shit out of hype and then bitch that it's not what you expected.

Last reply because you are seriously autistic.

You aren't flattening the curve and making everyone playing it give it a 7/8. You're making an experience many people will give a 0 and not want to play at all by making something too specific to one audience. It's the problems many games have, especially RPGs where the developers know so much about the game they build stupid systems and have difficulty balanced to them and not the average player.

A game with a difficulty slider maybe a game I would enjoy playing easier or harder than the default. If I find enemies aren't challenging but have too much HP to run through I may want it on easy to lower health or harder to make them more challenging. You're acting like Goldilocks was always right and she will never be right for the 3 bears with their own preferences. I want the option to adapt the game to how I want to play it so I buy less games I don't enjoy and waste less money on them.

 

[ind33d]

Games don't need difficulty settings: they need better stat tracking. Someone could suck cock at online poker and still have fun as long as he can view his own metrics and visually see "My VPIP is too high" or "I fold the turn too much," then make adjustments. You can only improve what you measure. What most people think is difficulty is really just poor HUDs and menu design. Halo Infinite almost did this well with the AIs, but they make dumb jokes instead of actually giving you useful combat tips like "Rush the power weapons, you queer"

 

[Halfling Rodeo]

Halo Infinite almost did this well with the AIs, but they make dumb jokes instead of actually giving you useful combat tips like "Rush the power weapons, you queer"

They tell you when power weapons are spawning which what you're asking for.

 

[Late Bloomer]

Sony patents ability for games to adjust difficulty levels on the fly

https://www.eurogamer.net/sony-patents-ability-for-games-to-adjust-difficulty-levels-on-the-fly

"When the user gaming performance level does not correspond to an expected level of performance, parameters that change the difficultly of the game may be changed automatically. Parameters that relate to movement speed, delay or hesitation, character strengths, numbers of competitors, or other metrics may be changed incrementally until a current user performance level corresponds to an expectation level of a particular user currently playing the game.

 

[ind33d]

Halo Infinite almost did this well with the AIs, but they make dumb jokes instead of actually giving you useful combat tips like "Rush the power weapons, you queer"

They tell you when power weapons are spawning which what you're asking for.

I mean the AI should be detecting things that are wrong with your play so you can correct them. Like if a player kept firing the Disruptor semi-auto or was rushing into engagements in which he was outnumbered, it should trigger a voiceline that works like a tooltip. "Power weapons incoming" is just a description of what's happening. "Push B with your squad" is a command.

 

[luj1]

On the first playthrough, if a game asks me what difficulty setting I want to choose, it's automatically a negative for me. For a couple of reasons:

1. Difficulty settings make the game predictable

Most difficulty settings boil down to easy, medium and hard. If you choose whichever one, you already have a strong idea about how the game is going to play out. In some cases, you EXACLY know how the game is going to play out, because the difficulty curve in the games of the same genre and same generation are exactly the same. Just pick any FPS from 2007-2013 era. This is how the game is going to play out depending on the difficulty you have chosen:

Easy: you have to actively try to get killed.
Medium: just don't walk into enemy bullets and you're fine
Hard: you have to shoot and then take cover

A good game makes thing easier or harder based on narrative/pacing reasons, not a metric the player chooses at the beginning.

2. The player doesn't have enough information to choose a difficulty setting

If it's your first playthrough, choosing the difficulty setting that is right for you is a pain in the ass, because you don't know how hard/easy the game is on a basic level. You just have to take a wild guess and that choice can ruin your game and make the game easier or harder than you intended.

3. Difficulty settings result in lazy balancing
On easy, the enemy dies in 1 hit. On hard, it dies on 5 hits. Wow, how creative.

This is a cop-out, because balancing in itself is an art form. By putting difficulty settings in the game, the developers make things easier for themselves, because if the game is unbalanced on hard, you chose that. If it's basically an interactive movie on easy, again, you chose that.

4. Difficulty settings don't allow players to have a shared experience
They ruin the joy of defeating a really hard boss that you might get stuck on for hours or enjoying the moments of absolute power after you have done the hard work to become strong (think Gothic games), the moments that you are eager to share with other players. With difficulty settings, moments like that are ruined and cheapened and do not become memorable enough to be worth sharing


So what are the alternatives?

1. Adding secret easy mode withing the confines of the game-play itself: like the sorcerer class in Dark Souls or certain weapons/aspects in Hades

2. Dividing the game-world into different difficulty settings, kinda like what Gothic games did. You are technically free to go wherever you want, but certain areas are hard to get through if you are still weak (this one works for open-world and semi open-world games

3. Making the main campaign easy and managable, but adding side content that is hard (kinda like GTA games or Mario games)

4. Designing the game in a way that rewards the player for showing skill, but doesn't punish the player for lack thereof (like the combo grading system in DMC and assassination grading system in Hitman games)

5. Adding dynamic difficulty (like Resident Evil 4)

Anyways, you can think of a lot of alternatives. The point is that difficulty settings suck and trivialize any challenge the game might provide. They are the result of lack of confidence and trust by the developers in their own ability to design a neat experience that deserve the player's attention and mastery.

Brilliant post

and yes you are right

There is only ONE way the game is meant to be played...


ever notice when you hover over difficulty setting, you sometimes read "this is the way the game is meant to be played"

so other difficulties are just bloat to appease the "git gud" masses

 

[luj1]

Sony patents ability for games to adjust difficulty levels on the fly

https://www.eurogamer.net/sony-patents-ability-for-games-to-adjust-difficulty-levels-on-the-fly

"When the user gaming performance level does not correspond to an expected level of performance, parameters that change the difficultly of the game may be changed automatically. Parameters that relate to movement speed, delay or hesitation, character strengths, numbers of competitors, or other metrics may be changed incrementally until a current user performance level corresponds to an expectation level of a particular user currently playing the game.

the ultimate dumbed down game

Todd Howard must cry when reading this because this tech came out after skyrim

 

[Halfling Rodeo]

Halo Infinite almost did this well with the AIs, but they make dumb jokes instead of actually giving you useful combat tips like "Rush the power weapons, you queer"

They tell you when power weapons are spawning which what you're asking for.

I mean the AI should be detecting things that are wrong with your play so you can correct them. Like if a player kept losing engagements because he was firing the Disruptor semi-auto or was rushing into engagements in which he was outnumbered, it should trigger a voiceline that works like a tooltip. "Power weapons incoming" is just a description of what's happening. "Push B with your squad" is a command.

That would be terrible. The AI isn't smart enough to understand the complexity of a multiplayer game in that way. Voice chat is supposed to serve that purpose but no one uses it any more.

Sony might want to invent time travel because RE4 had adaptable difficulty https://www.cbr.com/resident-evil-4-dynamic-difficulty-capcom/

 

[Ezekiel]

Voice chat is supposed to serve that purpose but no one uses it any more.

Largely because of government regulation, the CVAA bill. They said deaf people needed to be able to understand online communications and devs didn't want to put in speech to text software. This is also why text chat is gone. Devs didn't want to make communication options for the blind, but government now requires it.

As of January 2019:

(1) Input, control, and mechanical functions shall be locatable, identifiable, and operable in accordance with each of the following, assessed independently:
(i) Operable without vision. Provide at least one mode that does not require user vision.
(ii) Operable with low vision and limited or no hearing. Provide at least one mode that permits operation by users with visual acuity between 20/70 and 20/200, without relying on audio output.
(iii) Operable with little or no color perception. Provide at least one mode that does not require user color perception.
(iv) Operable without hearing. Provide at least one mode that does not require user auditory perception.
(v) Operable with limited manual dexterity. Provide at least one mode that does not require user fine motor control or simultaneous actions.
(vi) Operable with limited reach and strength. Provide at least one mode that is operable with user limited reach and strength.
(vii) Operable with a Prosthetic Device. Controls shall be operable without requiring body contact or close body proximity.
(viii) Operable without time dependent controls. Provide at least one mode that does not require a response time or allows response time to be by passed or adjusted by the user over a wide range.
(ix) Operable without speech. Provide at least one mode that does not require user speech.
(x) Operable with limited cognitive skills. Provide at least one mode that minimizes the cognitive, memory, language, and learning skills required of the user.
(2) All information necessary to operate and use the product, including but not limited to, text, static or dynamic images, icons, labels, sounds, or incidental operating cues, [shall] comply with each of the following, assessed independently:
(i) Availability of visual information. Provide visual information through at least one mode in auditory form.
(ii) Availability of visual information for low vision users. Provide visual information through at least one mode to users with visual acuity between 20/70 and 20/200 without relying on audio.
(iii) Access to moving text. Provide moving text in at least one static presentation mode at the option of the user.
(iv) Availability of auditory information. Provide auditory information through at least one mode in visual form and, where appropriate, in tactile form.
(v) Availability of auditory information for people who are hard of hearing. Provide audio or acoustic information, including any auditory feedback tones that are important for the use of the product, through at least one mode in enhanced auditory fashion (i.e., increased amplification, increased signal to noise ratio, or combination).
(vi) Prevention of visually induced seizures. Visual displays and indicators shall minimize visual flicker that might induce seizures in people with photosensitive epilepsy.
(vii) Availability of audio cutoff. Where a product delivers audio output through an external speaker, provide an industry standard connector for headphones or personal listening devices (e.g., phone like handset or earcup) which cuts off the speaker(s) when used.
(viii) Non interference with hearing technologies. Reduce interference to hearing technologies (including hearing aids, cochlear implants, and assistive listening devices) to the lowest possible level that allows a user to utilize the product.
(ix) Hearing aid coupling. Where a product delivers output by an audio transducer which is normally held up to the ear, provide a means for effective wireless coupling to hearing aids.

Failure to comply can result in customer complaints to the FCC, which the FCC will then mediate, taking into account what efforts have been made and how feasible the issue is to fix. The customer has the right to extend the initial mediation period if they choose. If not, substantial fines may be issued at the FCC's discretion.

The people who wrote that bill had no idea how difficult it is to make games or did know and wanted to see them degraded.

 

[Lyric Suite]

FromSoft does it best. You chose how easy or hard you want to make things as you go along, opting to ease the difficulty or increase the challence moment to moment.

 

[Halfling Rodeo]

FromSoft does it best. You chose how easy or hard you want to make things as you go along, opting to ease the difficulty or increase the challence moment to moment.

Until you run into a boss with resistance to your play style and suddenly your difficulty sky rockets through no fault of your own. Pyromancers can get fucked by some bosses in Dark souls 1 and it goes from the easiest playing style to one of the hardest without the player making a single choice after selecting your opening class.

 

[Vlajdermen]

Difficulty modes work well as an extra. You beat Serious Sam on Serious, now beat Serious Sam on Mental.

 

[Morenatsu.]

FromSoft does it best. You chose how easy or hard you want to make things as you go along, opting to ease the difficulty or increase the challence moment to moment.

Until you run into a boss with resistance to your play style and suddenly your difficulty sky rockets through no fault of your own. Pyromancers can get fucked by some bosses in Dark souls 1 and it goes from the easiest playing style to one of the hardest without the player making a single choice after selecting your opening class.

oh no the game doesnt let me braindead my way through it, it actually wants me to figure different shit out bruuuuuuuuuuh fuck this game lmao

 

[Borelli]

I don't disagree with the OP points, but i would like to add that difficulty settings can make for good replayability value. That is, if the game is good in the first place hah.
Repeating the same game but on higher difficulties can be great fun but only if the higher difficulty adds something new (DMC series is the best in this)

 

[Nifft Batuff]

I don't care much if there are difficulty settings or not, but at least I wish that, once chosen, the difficulty is consistent. The worst thing is dynamic difficulty. It is even worse than level scaling. It is the ultimate spoon-feeding.

 

[Vlajdermen]

I don't care much if there are difficulty settings or not, but at least I wish that, once chosen, the difficulty is consistent. The worst thing is dynamic difficulty. It is even worse than level scaling. It is the ultimate spoon-feeding.

"We see you died on this level x times so we'll make it easier without telling you."
FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU

 

[Halfling Rodeo]

FromSoft does it best. You chose how easy or hard you want to make things as you go along, opting to ease the difficulty or increase the challence moment to moment.

Until you run into a boss with resistance to your play style and suddenly your difficulty sky rockets through no fault of your own. Pyromancers can get fucked by some bosses in Dark souls 1 and it goes from the easiest playing style to one of the hardest without the player making a single choice after selecting your opening class.

oh no the game doesnt let me braindead my way through it, it actually wants me to figure different shit out bruuuuuuuuuuh fuck this game lmao

If you pick braindead easy difficulty with your weapon choices why should the game suddenly put you on impossible to beat mode? Some bosses are totally immune to some types of damage. How is that you selecting your difficulty through equipment? And it would be fine if weapons didn't need to be upgraded. Having your +14 fire sword become useless against an enemy when you used all your chunks upgrading it and have no way to find more is not an acceptable difficulty shift. It's bullshit.

 

[Lyric Suite]

FromSoft does it best. You chose how easy or hard you want to make things as you go along, opting to ease the difficulty or increase the challence moment to moment.

Until you run into a boss with resistance to your play style and suddenly your difficulty sky rockets through no fault of your own. Pyromancers can get fucked by some bosses in Dark souls 1 and it goes from the easiest playing style to one of the hardest without the player making a single choice after selecting your opening class.

oh no the game doesnt let me braindead my way through it, it actually wants me to figure different shit out bruuuuuuuuuuh fuck this game lmao

If you pick braindead easy difficulty with your weapon choices why should the game suddenly put you on impossible to beat mode?

Because it's not written anywhere that "magic" is easy mode specifically. It can be, sometimes, but the dangers of split damage were always meant to be the drawback.

None of this has anything to do with what i said. Making the game easier or harder in Souls has nothing to do with anything as simplistic as picking a particular "style" and expect it to trivialize everything until the very end. It's obviously more complicated than that, and it has more to do with taking advantage of weaknesses and loopholes that were intentionally coded in the game to ease things up for the player if he so chooses.

 

[Humanophage]

No way, we'll just be getting trivial games with the approach in the OP. Not inserting harder difficulties actually obstructs shared experience as people have to resort to mods, and these are all too different and niche unless the game is very popular such that some consensus emerges (e.g. Long War for nuXCom). Build-based difficulty discourages creativity. Constant self-imposed limitation is annoying, not to mention it's impossible to know which builds would make it harder without knowing the meta. Which is much more intrusive than Point 2 in the OP. It is also psychologically unrewarding as you are forced to deliberately ignore your knowledge.

Maybe the OP is thinking about some action games as there are constant mentions of Dark Souls, GTA, Resident Evil, Mario, and so on. But difficulty is absolutely essential for any of the more strategic games. If they only have genuinely high difficulty, then they won't sell. If they don't have high difficulty and try to pander to everyone with a single easy approach, then they are boring.

 

[Hace El Oso]

Letting the diner choose how they want their steak done is fundamentally bad cooking.

When ordering a steak, if a waiter asks me how I want it done, it's automatically a negative for me. For a couple of reasons:

1. Doneness options make the steak predictable
Most options boil down to rare, medium rare, and medium. If you choose whichever one, you already have a strong idea about how the steak will turn out. In some cases, you EXACTLY know how the steak is going to turn out, because the standards in restaurants of the same type are exactly the same.

2. The diner doesn't have enough information to choose an option
If it's your first steak, choosing how well you want your steak cooked is a pain in the ass, because you don't know how rare/well done the steak is on a basic level. You just have to take a wild guess and that choice can ruin your steak and make the steak more or less cooked than you intended.

3. Doneness options result in lazy cooking
5-10 minutes for rare, 7-12 for medium rare. Wow, how creative.

4. Doneness options don't allow diners to have a shared experience
Too silly a point for me to mock.

Perhaps this comparison has some merit. No high-end restaurant is going to allow menu alterations, usually including picking 'doneness'.

 

[NecroLord]

Game journalist difficulty.

 

[Falksi]

On the first playthrough, if a game asks me what difficulty setting I want to choose, it's automatically a negative for me. For a couple of reasons:

1. Difficulty settings make the game predictable

Most difficulty settings boil down to easy, medium and hard. If you choose whichever one, you already have a strong idea about how the game is going to play out. In some cases, you EXACLY know how the game is going to play out, because the difficulty curve in the games of the same genre and same generation are exactly the same. Just pick any FPS from 2007-2013 era. This is how the game is going to play out depending on the difficulty you have chosen:

Easy: you have to actively try to get killed.
Medium: just don't walk into enemy bullets and you're fine
Hard: you have to shoot and then take cover

A good game makes thing easier or harder based on narrative/pacing reasons, not a metric the player chooses at the beginning.

2. The player doesn't have enough information to choose a difficulty setting

If it's your first playthrough, choosing the difficulty setting that is right for you is a pain in the ass, because you don't know how hard/easy the game is on a basic level. You just have to take a wild guess and that choice can ruin your game and make the game easier or harder than you intended.

3. Difficulty settings result in lazy balancing
On easy, the enemy dies in 1 hit. On hard, it dies on 5 hits. Wow, how creative.

This is a cop-out, because balancing in itself is an art form. By putting difficulty settings in the game, the developers make things easier for themselves, because if the game is unbalanced on hard, you chose that. If it's basically an interactive movie on easy, again, you chose that.

4. Difficulty settings don't allow players to have a shared experience
They ruin the joy of defeating a really hard boss that you might get stuck on for hours or enjoying the moments of absolute power after you have done the hard work to become strong (think Gothic games), the moments that you are eager to share with other players. With difficulty settings, moments like that are ruined and cheapened and do not become memorable enough to be worth sharing


So what are the alternatives?

1. Adding secret easy mode withing the confines of the game-play itself: like the sorcerer class in Dark Souls or certain weapons/aspects in Hades

2. Dividing the game-world into different difficulty settings, kinda like what Gothic games did. You are technically free to go wherever you want, but certain areas are hard to get through if you are still weak (this one works for open-world and semi open-world games

3. Making the main campaign easy and managable, but adding side content that is hard (kinda like GTA games or Mario games)

4. Designing the game in a way that rewards the player for showing skill, but doesn't punish the player for lack thereof (like the combo grading system in DMC and assassination grading system in Hitman games)

5. Adding dynamic difficulty (like Resident Evil 4)

Anyways, you can think of a lot of alternatives. The point is that difficulty settings suck and trivialize any challenge the game might provide. They are the result of lack of confidence and trust by the developers in their own ability to design a neat experience that deserve the player's attention and mastery.

Brilliant post

and yes you are right

There is only ONE way the game is meant to be played...


ever notice when you hover over difficulty setting, you sometimes read "this is the way the game is meant to be played"

so other difficulties are just bloat to appease the "git gud" masses

That's just not true though. Some devs make games intended to be played on multiple difficulties.

Thunderforce 3 is a great example of a game which incrementally tweaks enemy patterns, environmental hazards and game foundation rules to offer different experiences requiring different approaches on different settings. Games testers (mostly of old granted) often spent as much time playing games on harder settings.

 

[Halfling Rodeo]

It's obviously more complicated than that, and it has more to do with taking advantage of weaknesses and loopholes that were intentionally coded in the game to ease things up for the player if he so chooses.

If only souls games let you do that rather than have severely limited upgrade material and force you to stick with 1 weapon for the majority of your play through or end up underpowered for the challenges you face.

 

[Morenatsu.]

nothing is underpowered in souls games

you just need to git gud

 

[Lyric Suite]

I don't care much if there are difficulty settings or not, but at least I wish that, once chosen, the difficulty is consistent. The worst thing is dynamic difficulty. It is even worse than level scaling. It is the ultimate spoon-feeding.

"We see you died on this level x times so we'll make it easier without telling you."
FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU

Which games do this? Asking so i can avoid them.

I know Battle Garegga has this system but it's a different matter there.