Every game should have difficulty settings, the more, the better.
That goes for indi darlings too.
Hollow Knight: Silksong Sparks Debate About Difficulty and Boss Runbacks
Submitted 1 day ago by simple@piefed.social to games@lemmy.world
Comments
mavu@discuss.tchncs.de 1 day ago
davad@lemmy.world 1 day ago
And all music should be under three minutes long. Every book should have page numbers. Photographers should have familiar subjects. Paintings should have a full explanation by the artist telling you exactly what they meant to communicate. /s
If the have isn’t for you, just move along. There are tons of games out there.
BananaIsABerry@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
Silksong sparks debate about git gud and scrub
Hadriscus@jlai.lu 1 day ago
yea, that’s entirely valid. I love these games (Metroidvanias) because of the exploration and worldbuilding. The combat is a way to advance further into that world, but it’s just a means to an end. Make it too tough and you’re preventing me from enjoying the parts I like.
I played a good 4 or 5 hours of Silksong so far and loving it. It’s a little tough though, and I think it could use a nerf.
ExtraMedicated@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I haven’t played this yet, so I don’t know anything about what difficulty settings it may or may not have But in general, I see difficulty settings as an accessibility feature.
I liked the way that Ender Magnolia did it, where, at a save point, you could adjust several settings to customize the difficulty. I was able to temporarily make it slightly easier just for a few bosses that I lost my patience for.
Coelacanth@feddit.nu 1 day ago
Mandragora had the exact same difficulty system, you could adjust enemy HP, Damage and even Stamina cost at every bonfire. Great accessibility feature.
BenevolentOne@infosec.pub 1 day ago
So glad they fixed the slow/boring difficulty curve the first game had. I shouldn’t need to slog through 20 hours of gameplay before I feel challenged.
Binged it all weekend, it’s a great game, but folks whining about some of the game’s earlier challenges are unlikely to finish it.
KhanLee@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
A tale as old as time, the more things change the more they stay the same.
missingno@fedia.io 1 day ago
I haven't played Silksong yet, in part because truthfully, Hollow Knight was alright but not my favorite Metroidvania. The one thing I really disliked about the original was the runbacks. I remember getting stuck on one platforming section, and I could easily get to the halfway point where I kept dying to retrieve my money, but then drop it again because there was no turning back from this halfway point, had to keep trying to finish it. I wanted to just explore a different part of the map and come back to this section later, but sunk cost fallacy forced me to keep bashing my skull against it.
Which then felt like this mechanic conflicted with the exploration I expect from a Metroidvania. That's the real problem IMO.
subignition@fedia.io 1 day ago
You yourself admit it's a fallacy! This isn't exactly a "skill issue" situation, but in future efforts on these kind of games you might try being more thoughtful about when to take a break and spend accumulated currency.
Although as others have pointed out elsewhere in the thread, learning to accept not retrieving your stuff is sometimes necessary too. I lost around 1500 at a certain boss by getting too cocky trying to fight enemies on the runback instead of skipping them, and it took me a while to make peace with it lol.
If you do end up playing Silksong you should know that there is a mechanic specifically addressing this, where you can convert your currency into consumable items at a bit of a loss to keep them across deaths.
missingno@fedia.io 1 day ago
I do not like the idea of a mechanic that punishes me if I do choose to explore somewhere else in a genre that is supposed to be about exploration.
ModernRisk@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 day ago
People have nothing better to do than complain, I suppose. Don’t like the game? Don’t play it. The game is good, imo.
ampersandrew@lemmy.world 1 day ago
What about people who like the game but have criticisms? This is the time to discuss it.
ModernRisk@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 day ago
That’s alright too but every time there’s a hard game, it’s always the same old complaining. It’s tiresome.
Hollow Knight, the first game was hard too with some bosses.
cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 day ago
I don’t mind difficult games. I recognise that they exist as a kind of pushback against mobile games and casual games that have risen in popularity. I don’t mind that they exist. Likewise, I strongly believe that gaming is for everybody, but not every game has to be for everybody.
I think it’s perfectly fine, though, to ask the question: if the game — any hard game, to include the Dark Souls game and its spinoffs (e.g. Elden Ring) and knockoffs (e.g. Breath of the Wild) — had an easy mode, where virtually anyone could win it eventually, would that truly make the game less fun for people who like hard games? What if the game were hard by default, and easy mode cost $5 extra? That way, you would never be presented with the option, but those who want it can get it for a slight upcharge. (Maybe less on a $20 game, I’m thinking the $5 would be for a $70 game.) Case in point: Final Fantasy XV was never hard. But for 49¢, you could buy a “DLC”/“mod” that made gas cost half — 5 gil instead of 10 for any fill-up — and also made hotels (which give a big XP buff) half price. So one early-game strategy was equipping a ring that would not pay out experience when you camp, and saving your XP (which is normally paid out every time you sleep) until you could afford a room at the XP-doubling Galden Quay resort hotel, gaining you several levels by then. With the DLC/mod, you could afford it much sooner, and you could actually do it a few times, setting you up for later parts of the game. It wasn’t an easy mode, but it did soften the grind a bit, and it wasn’t presented as an option in the game. You kinda had to know about it and go look for it.
I actually think there’s something to that. Making a game and selling parts of it never really goes down well with players. But most players can’t beat hard games. So what if instead of new games being $70 or $80, they were $50 or $60 still, but people who want help can buy things that will make the game easier. Let those players subsidize the ones who are good enough to beat it without them, incentivising them to get better. Ideally, to get better at that game so they uninstall the helpers, beat it without them, then when the next one comes out, they’re ready.
I don’t hate hard games. But I’m not going to pay for them. If they make their money off people who have that much time on their hands, that’s fine. It’s a sound business decision. But I also think a game can’t say “we wish we made more money” while intentionally excluding players who maybe have full-time jobs, families, or other valid reasons to not learn the perfect button combinations and ultra-precise timing some of these games require. I think if they could find a way to include those players while not putting off their base, they’d have a winning solution on their hands. And no, we’re not gonna quit our jobs or neglect our families to “git gud” like we live with our parents and are half our age.
slimerancher@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I agree with most of it, except I think it’s fine for developers to make a hard (or very hard game) if that’s their vision. Not every games is for everyone. And if developers are fine with targeting just a niche, there is no issue with it.
That being said, I do have issue with players / gamers saying there should be no easy mode. Adding an easy mode doesn’t take away anything for anyone who isn’t playing easy mode. All it takes away is their ability to brag that they finished a game half the people can’t finish. There are ways for developers to handle even that. Give some special achievement or something for those who finish on non-easy mode, but that’s again up to developers, and I am fine if there isn’t one.
cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 hours ago
Rockband was a good example of achievement-gating the higher difficulties. You got an achievement for beating the game on Medium, Hard, or Expert. And doing it on one of the two higher ones would unlock the ones below if you didn’t already do it on those difficulties. So if you were good enough to beat it on Expert, you got three or four achievements. Now I know you’re probably thinking “wait how do you beat Rockband”? By completing the Endless Setlist, which is unlocked when you beat the story mode. The story mode just unlocked the higher tiers of difficulty. The Endless Setlist was all the songs. Six hours and 20 minutes minimum. Oh, and when I said “three or four achievements”? The fourth one is if you do it without pausing or failing (at any difficulty Medium or higher). That one was called the “Bladder of Steel Award.” Yes, I own it. You food prep in advance, you do it on vocals, and you time your bathroom breaks very carefully (and drop a deuce in advance as well). But those three achievements for beating it at difficulty? Those are per instrument. I only have the gold (expert) vocals award. I may have the bronze (medium) bass award, but I never got any for guitar or drums.
That’s just one example of difficulty and incentives. I like how Deus Ex 1 did it, too. On Easy, you did more damage and took less. On Hard, you did less and took more. On Medium, it was balanced. On Realistic… everyone takes more. That was how I played. I wasn’t getting hit. I played a sniper. Even on Easy it was hard to one-shot enemies with a good gun and a headshot. For some reason that didn’t kill them. On Realistic, a shot to center mass with my .30-06 will drop any human enemy. A shot to the head will drop the augmented ones. So that’s how I play… played. It’s not on Xbox and it’s not on the Mac. My Mac can run it through Whisky, but I haven’t played much more than parts of the first level, so I’m not sure what the compatibility looks like later.
mohab@piefed.social 1 day ago
I don't mind difficult games. I recognise that they exist as a kind of pushback against mobile games and casual games that have risen in popularity
You got that backwards: difficult games are as old as arcades. If anything, casual games exist as pushback against difficult games, not the other way around.
cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 16 hours ago
I grew up with Atari and the NES. I think it’s actually both ways. I don’t think casual games were ever really a pushback against difficult games though, I think they were just trying to reach a wider audience. Take Subway Surfers for example, it’s probably the best example of the casual (phone) game. Anyone can pick up and play it, and if you fail, you just start over. IIRC you had to watch an ad first though? I dunno, I got hooked on it and I bought the coin doubler for $5 which also removed the mandatory ads (not the ones you can opt to watch to double some prizes or open ad-gated prize boxes though). That’s all I ever paid for it — far less than any paid game. Of course you can’t “win” at it either, it just goes on forever. On consoles, you also have Animal Crossing and the like. Games that never end but you can’t lose, either. Like you can get stung by wasps or scorpions or bit by tarantulas (though the latter two encounters are rare), but you just pass out and wake up in front of your house with nothing lost. But no, I don’t think casual (e.g. Animal Crossing) or accessible (e.g. Subway Surfers) was an active “push back” against the “NES Hard” trend of hard gaming.
Of course, arcade games weren’t just hard to be hard — like Subway Surfers and other phone games, they exist to get you to spend money. An arcade game that isn’t generating revenue isn’t desirable to people who operate arcades.
Coelacanth@feddit.nu 1 day ago
Yes indeed, when arcade games were the norm devs specifically designed for absurd difficulty ramp ups and cheap deaths to finagle another quarter out of you.
Treczoks@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Kids crying because a game is not a walkthrough? Maybe they should play something more suitable for their age group.
LettyWhiterock@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Why people resort to insulting anyone who criticizes things they like
Treczoks@lemmy.world 1 day ago
It’s not about me liking it or not. I don’t even have that game. The point is that one should play games fitting ones abilities. There are people who will master this game, like I mastered Elite about forty years ago. Complaining about a game being difficult is either they overestimated their abilities, or they lack perseverance.
For the rest, there is always tictactoe or animal crossing.
SeriousMite@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Seems to me it’s usually “kids” that don’t mind difficult games. I’m in my 40s and I don’t have the time or inclination anymore to replay a boss for hours on end, but when I was younger I loved a challenge like that and would usually set difficulty to hard.
Vanilla_PuddinFudge@infosec.pub 1 day ago
Once you
Tap for spoiler
Get the run/dash ability
, none of this is even a problem. You can jump and glide over any normal enemy in the game back to a boss room.
Poopfeast420@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
I think the game is difficult, probably a bit more difficult than the first game (which I haven’t played in over 5 years, so I might be wildly off), but I don’t find it unreasonable.
I know a lot of the time it’s my fault that I died, because I’m someone who likes to trade damage with enemies, which just isn’t really possible in this game, but I can’t stop doing it.
As for runbacks, I think there are a few weird ones, that can be terrible, depending on if you found/unlocked the nearest bench, but otherwise I don’t remember anything truly awful.
Kolanaki@pawb.social 1 day ago
Difficulty is subjective. Creating multiple levels of difficulty either takes tremendous effort to do well or, as is the case with most games, an adjustment to some numbers that is less an increase/decrease in difficulty and more an increase/decrease to the tediousness of combat.
Puzzle games with difficulty settings alter the complexity of the puzzles. Action games can alter the encounters themselves (how many, of what kind of enemies and their placement in the arena), or even changing the enemy behavior to be more/less complex. Yet this kind of difficulty adjustment isn’t common at all anymore.
Renacles@lemmy.world 1 day ago
The game was designed for people to have played the first one first. I think the difficulty curve works best if you consider Silksong as a direct continuation of the first game, picking off where the main story left off rather than the extra challenges they added through updates like godhome.
desmosthenes@lemmy.world 1 day ago
glad poe 2 added sprinting
BananaIsABerry@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
Tangentially related but I agree. It makes the long run through sections of the campaign more bearable.
On a more related note, POE2 has checkpoints practically on top of the bosses during the story so you can bash your head against it as much as you want. The only time you’re punished for dying is endgame bosses.
desmosthenes@lemmy.world 1 day ago
yea agreed. in general though our attitudes with gaming have changed due to how many titles are available (over abundance) and the history of gaming, etc. we’ve become spoiled in ways. there needs to be a ‘penalty’ of sorts to encourage trial and error growth. get some true dopamine overcoming a trial.
there’s a place for all types of games and difficulties though. let the artists create their vision.
Vanilla_PuddinFudge@infosec.pub 1 day ago
git gud
But_my_mom_says_im_cool@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Why are these side scrollers premium price?? Seems like such a cash grab. That’s why franchises are going backwards into side scrollers, easy money, i avoid them
TimbukTuscan@reddthat.com 1 day ago
The game is 20 bucks. How the hell is that a premium price?
NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
So far I have only found two or so runbacks that really bothered me. One is THAT BOSS (TLJ…) which isn’t actually too bad (once you figure out the safe path) but a single missed jump or tag by an enemy is 2 masks of damage. So just spend all your souls ahead of time and if you flub, end it all and respawn.
The other is a much earlier boss in Widow (?). The runback is actually zero danger and just a matter of holding R2 and running. My big issue is that there is an elevator right next to the bench. So you start the sprint back because you want to get it right this time and slam into a cage and have to wait for it to reach the top then hop back in to get back down and it just feels horrible.
But yeah. I actually like a good runback as a way to reset your brain and avoid getting on tilt against a boss. Elden Ring very much spoiled people by putting the bonfire right outside the fogwall for effectively every single boss and it just leads to making the same mistake over and over again until you warp away to do something else. But Silksong’s balance is definitely rough.
Quazatron@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Regarding difficulty: I’ve lived through the 80’s, where difficulty was ramped up to make the game last longer, as you only had precious few kilobytes to fill with content. I’ve grown to hate difficult games.
It is your right as creator to go that way if you wish, but it is my right as player to hate your guts if I buy your game and it kills me over and over again in the first minutes.
Anarch157a@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 day ago
Another 80s child here. The difficulty of ganes of that era was to extend tge game duration and made them seem longer. They were designed that way to eat quarters at the arcade, the original “games as a service”. What happened with home computer and console games at the time was that developers used the same paradigms for “buy to own” games that they used for arcade, thus the idea of limited lives, game over screens, high dificulty, etc.
qweertz@programming.dev 1 day ago
If you dislike impressionist art, would you still go to a museum exhibition on that topic and then get angry at the curators?
Quazatron@lemmy.world 1 day ago
If it is clear that the topic is Impressionist art, I would not go. If I buy the ticket to see Expressionism and get Impressionism instead, I would fell upset.
(Actually, I’d go either way, I love art)