Introdeker
Novice
- Joined
- Apr 8, 2009
- Messages
- 9
Is Difficulty just a myth?
Dedicated gamers are frequently heard complaining about how easy games are nowadays. In this case, “nowadays” seems to mean “since forever”, or at least since the mid 90’s, when I got into contact with some representatives of that honorable group. According to the fair laws of the entertainment market, such long lasting complaint ought to have made its way into some niche developer’s ears, and the world would have been graced with its first truly hard videogame. Alas, notice of such a blessing hasn’t reached us, so we thought an analysis of the problem of difficulty in videogames might prove rewarding. Why, oh why, aren’t there difficult games? The first step in our harrowing quest was to dissipate the mists and remove the masks which for ages had covered the vile monsters that disguised themselves as Difficulty. Naked and exposed to the unmerciful light of reason, these abominations proved to be nothing but:
1) Randomness
Games with a heavy reliance on luck often appear to be hard. Equally often they also appear to be easy. Most videogame adaptations of D&D serve as examples. Say, you have to roll a 12 in a d20 to hit the enemy. In your first attempt you critically miss and drop your weapon, dying a few turns later. Second time around you get a critical hit and the enemy dies – very easy fight. These aren’t difficult games, just boring techniques to enforce save-and-reload cheating. Other examples are random loot and random stat growth, where the statistical beast allies itself with the long term one (see below).
2) Disguised puzzle
Games which aren’t supposed to have puzzles in their core element (in RPGs, this is battles), often catch players unawares. Our own experience with the original Final Fantasy Tactics, one of the hardest games we ever finished, will clarify the scenario. There was one encounter in the game in which a distant and protected enemy had a very powerful lightning attack which killed any character it targeted. Since he was very distant, we couldn’t reach the enemy before he attacked us multiple times and couldn’t kill him with the majority of our party gone. After a few tries we gave up. This seemed like a dead end, until we found on the internet that one of the previous shops had started selling accessory items which offered complete protection against electrical damage. Up to that point in the game we had never used or needed that kind of protection, weren’t even aware of its existence. But out of a sudden it was mandatory to progress in the game. This isn’t difficulty. They only took a RPG battle, which usually is an open ended puzzle with multiple improvised solutions, and turned it into a traditional puzzle with one right answer. After buying the required protections the encounter posed no difficulty. (Incidentally FFT had some other extremely distressing encounters, which could not be so easily solved.)
3) Long term imbalance
This devious monster misleads players into a sense of security and ease, only to attack them when they least expect it. To illustrate we again call upon our personal experience, this time with System Shock 2. We were playing a psychic and there had been some dire straits but we were managing fine with the aid of consumable items. Until about a third of the game in we suddenly had some very pressing encounters and found ourselves with a very limited supply of said items and no way to acquire more. Loading even our earliest save from an hour or so back didn’t help any. Despair and curses were our last resource, before again turning to the internet for help in understanding what we had done wrong. As it transpired, our mistake was in character creation, by choosing the worst class. We couldn’t have known that and the game had created a legitimate expectation that we would be able to finish it after progressing for hours with that play style. Instead we found ourselves for the first and last time locked in a game. Restarting with a marine, which the almighty internet reported as the best class, gave us a much easier time and allowed us to finish the game without serious problems. This isn’t difficulty, it’s just bad design.
Diluted versions of this problem are very common. There are, for instance, games which induce you to develop mages focused on hexes only to inform you at the end that all high level creatures are practically immune to such effects. The player couldn’t know this and will have to wade through the more challenging areas with an inapt kitchen knife wilder. Tough luck, says the designer. The wronged pup responds with torrents of insults.
4) Short term imbalance
This is usually just the game telling you to grind some more and come back later. A hypothetical example: you have 10 magic missiles but they only hit one enemy at a time. With no crowd controlling abilities, you are forced to fight twenty goblins. With 5 missiles you kill 5 goblins before they reach you. You kill 5 more in close range, but lose a third of your health. Now you’re out of special abilities and will inexorably die to the onslaught of the remaining 10 goblins. What to do? Well, nothing. Either the game allows you to gain an upper hand and return or you’ll really find yourself in the clutches of one of the preceding chimeras.
Conclusion
Crestfallen, we had to abandon our quest and return empty handed. There were no hard games and there would never be hard games as long as these remained classified as entertainment. But, intrepid reader, if on your own wanderings you have met and slain the fabled beast Difficulty (in the narrow context of RPGs, please) do step up and earn the rightful praise of the world.
P.S. There might be yet another sense for difficulty, analogous to what we mean when we say that Stephen King is a truly horrifying author. In this sense a game is deemed difficult not for its challenge, but for its badness. It was not unusual for a gamer to curse his fate for having saddled himself with the endless drudgery of Vampire: Bloodlines, and be heard complaining “why, oh why, is this game so hard to play?” Similarly, an unsympathetic reader might term this piece a very difficult read. In this usage, I’m afraid, difficulty is all too real.
Dedicated gamers are frequently heard complaining about how easy games are nowadays. In this case, “nowadays” seems to mean “since forever”, or at least since the mid 90’s, when I got into contact with some representatives of that honorable group. According to the fair laws of the entertainment market, such long lasting complaint ought to have made its way into some niche developer’s ears, and the world would have been graced with its first truly hard videogame. Alas, notice of such a blessing hasn’t reached us, so we thought an analysis of the problem of difficulty in videogames might prove rewarding. Why, oh why, aren’t there difficult games? The first step in our harrowing quest was to dissipate the mists and remove the masks which for ages had covered the vile monsters that disguised themselves as Difficulty. Naked and exposed to the unmerciful light of reason, these abominations proved to be nothing but:
1) Randomness
Games with a heavy reliance on luck often appear to be hard. Equally often they also appear to be easy. Most videogame adaptations of D&D serve as examples. Say, you have to roll a 12 in a d20 to hit the enemy. In your first attempt you critically miss and drop your weapon, dying a few turns later. Second time around you get a critical hit and the enemy dies – very easy fight. These aren’t difficult games, just boring techniques to enforce save-and-reload cheating. Other examples are random loot and random stat growth, where the statistical beast allies itself with the long term one (see below).
2) Disguised puzzle
Games which aren’t supposed to have puzzles in their core element (in RPGs, this is battles), often catch players unawares. Our own experience with the original Final Fantasy Tactics, one of the hardest games we ever finished, will clarify the scenario. There was one encounter in the game in which a distant and protected enemy had a very powerful lightning attack which killed any character it targeted. Since he was very distant, we couldn’t reach the enemy before he attacked us multiple times and couldn’t kill him with the majority of our party gone. After a few tries we gave up. This seemed like a dead end, until we found on the internet that one of the previous shops had started selling accessory items which offered complete protection against electrical damage. Up to that point in the game we had never used or needed that kind of protection, weren’t even aware of its existence. But out of a sudden it was mandatory to progress in the game. This isn’t difficulty. They only took a RPG battle, which usually is an open ended puzzle with multiple improvised solutions, and turned it into a traditional puzzle with one right answer. After buying the required protections the encounter posed no difficulty. (Incidentally FFT had some other extremely distressing encounters, which could not be so easily solved.)
3) Long term imbalance
This devious monster misleads players into a sense of security and ease, only to attack them when they least expect it. To illustrate we again call upon our personal experience, this time with System Shock 2. We were playing a psychic and there had been some dire straits but we were managing fine with the aid of consumable items. Until about a third of the game in we suddenly had some very pressing encounters and found ourselves with a very limited supply of said items and no way to acquire more. Loading even our earliest save from an hour or so back didn’t help any. Despair and curses were our last resource, before again turning to the internet for help in understanding what we had done wrong. As it transpired, our mistake was in character creation, by choosing the worst class. We couldn’t have known that and the game had created a legitimate expectation that we would be able to finish it after progressing for hours with that play style. Instead we found ourselves for the first and last time locked in a game. Restarting with a marine, which the almighty internet reported as the best class, gave us a much easier time and allowed us to finish the game without serious problems. This isn’t difficulty, it’s just bad design.
Diluted versions of this problem are very common. There are, for instance, games which induce you to develop mages focused on hexes only to inform you at the end that all high level creatures are practically immune to such effects. The player couldn’t know this and will have to wade through the more challenging areas with an inapt kitchen knife wilder. Tough luck, says the designer. The wronged pup responds with torrents of insults.
4) Short term imbalance
This is usually just the game telling you to grind some more and come back later. A hypothetical example: you have 10 magic missiles but they only hit one enemy at a time. With no crowd controlling abilities, you are forced to fight twenty goblins. With 5 missiles you kill 5 goblins before they reach you. You kill 5 more in close range, but lose a third of your health. Now you’re out of special abilities and will inexorably die to the onslaught of the remaining 10 goblins. What to do? Well, nothing. Either the game allows you to gain an upper hand and return or you’ll really find yourself in the clutches of one of the preceding chimeras.
Conclusion
Crestfallen, we had to abandon our quest and return empty handed. There were no hard games and there would never be hard games as long as these remained classified as entertainment. But, intrepid reader, if on your own wanderings you have met and slain the fabled beast Difficulty (in the narrow context of RPGs, please) do step up and earn the rightful praise of the world.
P.S. There might be yet another sense for difficulty, analogous to what we mean when we say that Stephen King is a truly horrifying author. In this sense a game is deemed difficult not for its challenge, but for its badness. It was not unusual for a gamer to curse his fate for having saddled himself with the endless drudgery of Vampire: Bloodlines, and be heard complaining “why, oh why, is this game so hard to play?” Similarly, an unsympathetic reader might term this piece a very difficult read. In this usage, I’m afraid, difficulty is all too real.
