Games with brutal 'skill' based difficulty.

[DragoFireheart]

What games are extremely difficult not due to the computer having a "programmed" edge (example, in a fighting game, the computer performs moves that the character they control couldn't normally do) nor due to the RNG God? Ninja Gaiden on the Xbox for example.

 

[Konjad]

oblivion

 

[anus_pounder]

Demon's Souls, I guess ? Though to be honest, its more 'hard' (maybe not even that) than 'brutal'.

 

[Menckenstein]

I recall the first AVP being pretty hard.

 

[Xor]

Solomon's Key
Ninja Gaiden (NES)
Life Force
Battletoads
Kid Icarus
Gauntlet
Mega Man 1

Also there's I Wanna Be The Guy

 

[Hobo Elf]

Demon's Souls, I guess ? Though to be honest, its more 'hard' (maybe not even that) than 'brutal'.

This, but the game is as brutal as you are stupid.

 

[Zed]

Call of Duty: Black Ops

 

[Stabwound]

Some roguelikes, I would say. There is, of course, some randomness involved, but games like Nethack are highly player-skill based to the point where a good player could win 99% of games, while a new player has a near-zero chance of winning.

 

[felipepepe]

Yeah, Demon's Souls is the best example nowadays.

Shinobi for PS2 was punishing as well, some really hardcore level-design and a sword that keeps draining your health. Ninja Gaiden for Xbawks was tough too, but Ninja Gaiden 2 turned up easy and boring.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

I posted one today, but then again the series its part of it all about this thing (Contra). The remake of the NES Bionic Commando, Bionic Commando: ReArmed also has this to a degree, as does its sequel (though the sequel isn't as good as the first ReArmed).

 

[Palikka]

Shoot'em ups?

 

[I.C. Wiener]

God Hand (disregarding the item drops), the first DMC, Bayonetta. Any multiplayer game against sufficiently dedicated nerds (if it's a shooter, something closer to Quake than Cod).

Shoot'em ups?

I don't really play that kind of game, but I always thought there was a large amount of cheap difficulty in the difference between the size of the player sprite and their hitbox.

 

[anus_pounder]

Demon's Souls, I guess ? Though to be honest, its more 'hard' (maybe not even that) than 'brutal'.

This, but the game is as brutal as you are stupid.

This.

Its possible to finish the game without improving your stats (or equipment, apparently) if you're smart enough.

 

[Spark Mandriller]

I don't really play that kind of game, but I always thought there was a large amount of cheap difficulty in the difference between the size of the player sprite and their hitbox.

But hitboxes are always smaller than your sprite is, so if anything that's cheap in the player's favour.

You can get difficult ones with full size hitboxes, anyway. Gradius III's like that, and it's insanely hard, to the extent that Konami pulled it from the arcades for being impossible. I've one lifed Gradius I/II/Gaiden plenty of times, so it's not like I'm bad or anything, but I've never gotten past stage 3 in GIII, and half the time I play I die on the first level. Everyone says those bullet hell shooters are hard, but they're always talking about the last bosses or second loops or whatever, and even in those you get bombs and extra lives. Gradius III doesn't have any bombs, has checkpoint respawns so if you die you have to play the level again (and with no powerups so it's impossible half the time), and it's ridiculous for the entire game, shit's crazy. It's not even good at eating money, either, since it doesn't let you continue, and nobody would want to play it again after losing all their lives on the first stage. Stupid fucking game.

So yeah I nominate Gradius III.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

Ninja Gaiden for Xbawks was tough too, but Ninja Gaiden 2 turned up easy and boring.

Ninja Gaiden 2 easy? I can understand boring in some parts (like the blood fish or any of the flying fireball drake sections for example; or a more general complaint about how the de-limbing system leads to less variation in approaching different enemies), but easy? That game was *brutal* on Master Ninja, moreso than just about any other game I've played. Even Sigma 2, from what little I played of it on Master Ninja, had its own way of kicking the player down (enemies soaking immense amounts of damage, grabs are all one-shot kills), though it felt kinda cheap there.

Devil May Cry 3 has some skill in it. The first playthrough should be sufficiently challenging, as will the first one on Dante Must Die mode, though I'd second the recommendation for the first DMC game; it's sort of better in terms of balancing and difficulty, especially on the higher difficulties. Well...at least on the enemy side of things; a lot of DMC1 Dante's weapons/moves break the game in half if you know what you're doing. DMC3 doesn't really have anything like that, even Spiral canceling.

 

[Dirk Diggler]

I was going to bring up Ninja Gaiden and Demon's Souls but...

...yeah I was pretty much beat to it.

Thief 1&2 might not ever be 'brutal' on any difficulty setting but I think that they are a wonderful model for how difficulty adjustment should be handled in video games.

 

[felipepepe]

Ninja Gaiden for Xbawks was tough too, but Ninja Gaiden 2 turned up easy and boring.

Ninja Gaiden 2 easy? I can understand boring in some parts (like the blood fish or any of the flying fireball drake sections for example; or a more general complaint about how the de-limbing system leads to less variation in approaching different enemies), but easy? That game was *brutal* on Master Ninja, moreso than just about any other game I've played. Even Sigma 2, from what little I played of it on Master Ninja, had its own way of kicking the player down (enemies soaking immense amounts of damage, grabs are all one-shot kills), though it felt kinda cheap there.

On Master Ninja yes, but Ninja 1 was chalenging even on normal mode. You had to learn to play, read the enemies movements. I've seen people raging on the tutorial level. Ninja 2 on normal is a faceroll fest, you can just keep jumping and decapitating, no skill involved. The staiway to the final boss with hundreds of ninjas feels like Dynasty Warriors.

 

[I.C. Wiener]

I don't really play that kind of game, but I always thought there was a large amount of cheap difficulty in the difference between the size of the player sprite and their hitbox.

But hitboxes are always smaller than your sprite is, so if anything that's cheap in the player's favour.

Except in games like this you have to let bullets overlap with your character sprite to squeeze through. Some I've played there's no real logic to where hitbox ends and cosmetic bits of spaceship/flying loli begin so it feels really cheap.

I'm sure once you figure out the size of your sprite's weak point, the challenge of holding down the fire button and squirming through a maze of slowly moving jelly beans is perfectly skill-based. I remember playing a japanese freeware shooter where your the player character/object was just a orange dot with some transparent rods rotating around it and I found it very entertaining without that contrived difficulty curve.

 

[sser]

Ninja Gaiden 2 for the Xbox 360 is probably the most difficult game this generation. Possibly the biggest reason for this is that it jettisons the friendly enemy concept of opponents not attacking if you are not looking at them. Oh, and the bastards throw AOE-exploding shurikens almost non-stop. It's like an Ikaruga or R-Type scenario put into a fighting game sometimes.

 

[Metro]

The Impossible Game

Kid Icarus
Mega Man 1

I beat those games when I was 12. I wouldn't call them skill based/brutally difficult.

 

[BLOBERT]

BRO SO TRUE ABOUT KID ICARUS AND MEGAMAN EASY EVEN FOR ME AS A KID

NOW FUCKING MIKE TYSON HAD ME STUMPED FOR A LONG TIME I STILL SOMETIMES NEED A FEW TRIES TO GET IN THE GROOVE THOUGH I THINK IT IS THE SHIT GAMEPADS I BY

I PLAY IKARUGA EVERY NOW AND THEN AND THAT MOTHERFUCKER ALWAYS THRASHES ME

 

[racofer]

Contra III.

 

[BLOBERT]

BRO I HAVE PLAYED THE SHIT OUT OF CONTRA 3 IN RECENT MONTHS

I CAN FINISH IT WITHOUT THE CHEAT ON NORMAL BUT NOT HARD

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

On Master Ninja yes, but Ninja 1 was chalenging even on normal mode. You had to learn to play, read the enemies movements. I've seen people raging on the tutorial level. Ninja 2 on normal is a faceroll fest, you can just keep jumping and decapitating, no skill involved. The staiway to the final boss with hundreds of ninjas feels like Dynasty Warriors.

I can certainly understand where that sentiment comes from, because the low tier ninja that populate Acolyte and Warrior modes (easy and normal for those not IN DA KNOW) are pretty much pushovers with little aggression built in, but a lot of the bosses and enemies do demand skill from the player. Greater fiends were certainly no pushovers, and most of the other enemies (fiends/higher tier ninja/robots) punished mindless button mashing. While it certainly didn't throw roadblocks like Murai or Alma at the player, I don't think it was that much easier than the first; I think a lot comes from having played Ninja Gaiden 1/Black/Sigma beforehand.

Ninja Gaiden 2 for the Xbox 360 is probably the most difficult game this generation. Possibly the biggest reason for this is that it jettisons the friendly enemy concept of opponents not attacking if you are not looking at them.

It's not so much that as much as the team decided to be a little lazy, and forgo programming the complex AI routines of NG2's predecessor in favor of extreme amounts of aggression, where enemies are hellbent on Ryu's death, emphasized even more by the design decisions to make kamikaze attacks on a lot of enemies. It worked out okay enough, making for an intense play experience, but one that can certainly be frustrating to some. It can be a real kick in the head to go from solidly dominating an encounter to turning into a ninja fireworks display and seeing the game over screen...all in the space of five seconds.

 

[deuxhero]

God Hand.


Every attack can be dodged, luck only factors in on crate drops.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

I PLAY IKARUGA EVERY NOW AND THEN AND THAT MOTHERFUCKER ALWAYS THRASHES ME

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_dy9a8ElAQ#t=1m19s (edit: time thingie doesn't seem to work, but anyway, action starts at 1m19s)

bonus: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hs2nNcJTqmE