Games with no difficulty settings

[StaceyPowers]

How do you feel about games that have a single difficulty setting with no way to adjust it up or down?

[killamch89]

I think it's a somewhat bizarre choice by certain developers but if you can cope with the difficulty scaling (Dark Souls), It's pretty challenging but entertaining at the same time because you don't know how difficult the next fight is going to be.

[Akun]

Depends on how difficult the game is. I don't generally like challenging games. I know that's an opinion that's frowned upon by most gamers, but my slow reflexes and anxiety attacks means that I can't really handle the stress that difficult games come with. I would just suck at those games and no amount of "git gud" would matter. 😆

But if the difficulty doesn't make me want to punch my monitor, I don't see the problem with it. I usually play my games at the default Normal setting anyway, unless it's a roguelike dungeon crawler meant to punish you or something.

[Shagger]

Long term members will likely know how I feel about this already, but for the rest, games with no difficulty options are stupid.

 

People have the right to get want they want out off the games they buy. If someone is more interested in story and exploration over combat and challenge, they should be able to tailor that experience. Likewise if somebody finds a game to be too easy and less engaging as a result, the are within thier rights to make it more challenging and satisfying to play. Contrary to what the "Git Gut" pricks say, having difficulty options creates challenging experiences in games, not deny them it. Having these options available also puts developers in a place where they actually have to put the effort onto all these aspects of the game, so the game itself is just generally better for it. Better stories, more interesting game worlds, better gameplay, only good thigs for everyone can come out of games having difficulty options. However, focusing only on difficulty for a game with no difficulty options usually makes a game worse. When making a game as hard as possible in this mantra, the game becomes cheap and unempowering to play. When trying to hard to make it easy, the player engagement suffers and the game becomes boring and and you care less about what's going on.

 

In some types of games like platformers, some bullet hell games, puzzle games, multiplayer, interactive narratives or games made for young children, it does make sense to not have difficulty options, but otherwise the only reasons developers don't include difficulty options is laziness, sheer arrogance or both. Fuck games that do this for no good reason. They are worse than other, similar games just for doing this and also worse as a result of doing this as they are made by people who do not have thier priorities straight from minute one.

 

It's not like I don't enjoy a challenge, for example I can't play Horizon Zero Dawn on any difficulty other that Ultra Hard anymore, but because that game can be made playable for people only interested in the story and exploring the open world, it's a better game than anything from From Software (Even thier name is annoying, do they seriously think that's funny?). I would be more forgiving of thier games if difficulty was genuine instead of the cheap and cryptic "trial and error" approach they use instead. They are sluggish, crippling and limiting in terms of control, something that is again done on purpose create a false challenge, with enemy combat strengths and weaknesses and aspects of the the environment that serve as beginners traps. Whereas in Horizon ZD, you are given all the info you could want about the enemies as soon as you scan them, offered a wide variety of weapons and combat strategies and the game is empowering in the way it controls with swift, purposeful movement and instant, connected reactions. They do that and still mange to make a challenging game. The benfit of that is that every triumph and every mistake you own complexly, unlike when I played Demon Souls and Bloodbourne where I either felt robbed or "got lucky" that time after every fight. I hated it.

Edited September 2, 2022 by Shagger

[Empire]

Control has no difficulty levels. I found it pretty challenging at points, particularly the bosses. However, I have to admit I've never played a souls game for comparison. I've not yet tried the new expedition missions, which I believe get pretty challenging. I really enjoyed the game, except for frustrations occasionally as it was pretty difficult (I prefer difficulty levels!)

[Yaramaki]

Don't mind it to be honest, If this is how the devs intended anybody should play their games go for because  i'm all fine for it. The only problem is finding the right balance of difficulty take rockstar their last 2 games  gta 5 and rdr2 don't have a difficulty setting, i feel like they did a great job with them. I wouldn't call them easy but they are not that hard at all and they are designed so anybody can beat, fail to many times on a mission you can skip it, no idea why anybody would do that but it's there. 

Mad max also didn't have a difficulty option and is imo one of the best games from the past 10 years, from what i remember you just can't go into a camp and start knocking everybody until you get some upgrades, encouraging the player to go off the beaten path and do some exploration for upgrades. Offcourse if you tend to do everithing you pretty much are max level by half of the game, which is the same with all assasins creed games up until origins, overall they were fairly easy games even when you diden't upgrade i'm fairly sure you could just beat those games without upgrading any of your gear. 

Another one that diden't have a difficulty at launch that i really like is Kingdom come deliverance and you know they added a harder difficulty later on, but the base game especially in the beginning was really hard. A bow is barely useable unless you start training, same with a sword you have to properly train before you can use it, go against a couple of bandits it's going to be mostlikely game over for you. Offcourse later on the game once you get proper gear  becomes easier and easier eventough you still can't defeat an army of bandits by yourself. Alchemy while confusing at first, makes for a unique experience on it's own, especially since you have to use snapps to save the game. Man wish i had another 200 hours spare for another playtrough.

I tend to agree with @Shagger on games from From software, i feel like they should atleast contain a lower difficulty setting especially a much hyped game like elden ring, i know purist will scream bloody murder but i'm sure it can only benefit sales in the end. i managed to get my way trough the first darks souls but other then that i never bothered with any of their other games. I just don't have the time anymore to be stuck at a boss for a couple of hours until you finally get lucky to beat it, sure the feeling is great but the cursing and frustration not so much because i play games to relax not to get frustrated. Don't get me wrong i will pick and play elden ring one of these days just not for full price because i'm not sure i have it in me anymore to experience 60+hours of constant frustration.

This leads us to the next question should games have a so called story mode? I feel like devs should stick to just easy mode instead where there is something atleast worthy of a challenge, if you play something like the witcher 3 on the easiest mode, alchemy becomes completly unnecessary and thus meaning you can skip on of the most important parts when doing a monster contract and that is preparation. I've seen this in many modern western rpg's  where on the easiest difficulty you can skip many parts of the game because so you are so overpowered. Again i'm going a little off topic and this would be better for another topic but you know.

Oh yeah the thread was about games with no difficulty option, like i said i don't mind them at all. The problem is that we have gotten so spoiled over the years that their needs to be a difficulty setting for everybody no matter what skill a gamer is. But you know if they don't have a difficulty option many games tend to cather towards a more casual audience making them easy in the process, well unless you are from software they don't seem to care.

[Akun]

18 minutes ago, Yaramaki said:

i feel like they should atleast contain a lower difficulty setting especially a much hyped game like elden ring, i know purist will scream bloody murder but i'm sure it can only benefit sales in the end. i managed to get my way trough the first darks souls but other then that i never bothered with any of their other games. I just don't have the time anymore to be stuck at a boss for a couple of hours until you finally get lucky to beat it, sure the feeling is great but the cursing and frustration not so much because i play games to relax not to get frustrated. Don't get me wrong i will pick and play elden ring one of these days just not for full price because i'm not sure i have it in me anymore to experience 60+hours of constant frustration.

Yeah, reading these posts kinda make me change my mind about it. Imagine putting so many hours into the game, only to find that the game proved too difficult for your preference, and you can't change the difficulty so you're stuck between abandoning the game, wasting $60, or forcing yourself through 60+ more hours of frustration.

That's also why I like games that allow you to change difficulty mid-game too, instead of realizing how difficult "Normal" is down the line and not wanting to restart all over again (looking at you, Devil Survivor: Overclocked).

Edited September 2, 2022 by Akun

[Heatman]

Personally,  I don't really fancy playing such games that are designed with no way to adjust the difficulty setting. It's a silly and clumsy way to develop a game. It's share laziness in my opinion because that shouldn't fly at all in games. 

[Justin11]

This was initially among the reasons why I wasn't interested in soul games for some they came with difficulty settings but it is quite nevliha because the game is still tough at whichever level you might choose to play it.

[Shortie]

I often question why game developers will choose to not have a difficulty setting on their games, especially when some of them make the default setting difficult. That often leads me to just lose interest in the game if I am honest. I prefer to go on the normal difficulty of a game and then play through the game, get used to it, get to know the game before going up a level of difficulty. When the difficulty is just set for me and I can't change it, if I struggle, I just leave it and don't bother going back. It's a very odd choice to have no difficulty settings and I am glad it's not a normal thing for all games.

[Justin11]

17 hours ago, Shortie said:

I often question why game developers will choose to not have a difficulty setting on their games, especially when some of them make the default setting difficult. That often leads me to just lose interest in the game if I am honest. I prefer to go on the normal difficulty of a game and then play through the game, get used to it, get to know the game before going up a level of difficulty. When the difficulty is just set for me and I can't change it, if I struggle, I just leave it and don't bother going back. It's a very odd choice to have no difficulty settings and I am glad it's not a normal thing for all games.

The More reasons I enjoy straight play videogames , the difficulty could be set to whichever mode you want.

Some games are just difficult to play and you are not too interested in it to even bother about trying to understand it.

[Scorpion]

I appreciate single difficulty settings for their challenge, but they can alienate casual players. Flexibility would enhance accessibility and enjoyment for everyone.