What makes difficulty feel good?

[b1tchcelcracra]

Even though I'm still an absolute pleb in games, I've recently gotten into the "difficulty is content" discourse that's been going on with Mark from the Electric Underground and Boghog; their assessments on the importance of difficulty in keeping players engaged and motivated to improve instead of motivated to be coddled, etc. I feel kind of inclined to this; but at the same time I feel like there is an element that separates difficult games from making the player feel motivated and still feel that they're having fun even though they're not winning, and making them feel continuously frustrated.

For example, in God Hand, a game that famously will beat your ass relentlessly by the first level and up the ante as you get better, I felt compelled to keep going back even though I'd been stuck at the first checkpoint of the first level for 3 hours. Meanwhile, those fucking carryarm enemies that tick your health off from just bumping into you on the train level in Mega Man Zero 2 enrage me to no end. I'm getting gored in Ninja Gaiden 2 continuously and wanting more, but a few attempts in the Cerberus boss in DMC 3 and I turned the game off.

Has anyone also encountered something like this? For you, what is it about a game that makes you want to keep coming back to a game that keeps beating your ass?

 

[jon2]

Learning Curve

As one grows experienced, the "difficulty" (but more accurately the game design itself) should not feel like a chore but rather a stimuli to master and overcome

The challenge (difficulty) is relatively commensurate with one's proficiency AKA if you are a "master" it feels like "musou" (play the old Dynasty Warriors or Samurai Warriors or OROCHI or Gundam Musou pre-2010 to find out) but lose focus for a sec then the game pwns you

Keeping the players on their toes and "in the zone" is what makes difficulty enjoyable; anything lesser than that is just a "breezable" game while anything more is basically kaizo and a kick in the nuts

 

[b1tchcelcracra]

Learning Curve

As one grows experienced, the "difficulty" (but more accurately the game design itself) should not feel like a chore but rather a stimuli to master and overcome

The challenge (difficulty) is relatively commensurate with one's proficiency AKA if you are a "master" it feels like "musou" (play the old Dynasty Warriors or Samurai Warriors or OROCHI or Gundam Musou pre-2010 to find out) but lose focus for a sec then the game pwns you

Keeping the players on their toes and "in the zone" is what makes difficulty enjoyable; anything lesser than that is just a "breezable" game while anything more is basically kaizo and a kick in the nuts

i agree! i got a psvita recently and have always wanted to play dragon crown (for the pretty ladies) and while it is hard playing on your own without a party, the skill tree really makes it very easy to just mash your way out; i later found out vanillaware's other game, odin sphere, also got a port to the vita, playing classic mode on it was genuinely intense every step of the way, i was getting my ass whooped by a cute little bear that ate honey and took naps in the middle of our fight but being able to progress on it without losing health and needing to waste more resources was a good puzzle.

for even more high skill based games like shmups or fighting games, i feel like theyre basically a new skill that you have to master like a piano; like what full extent of the jam mentions. learning how to stop mashing and fully understand the rock paper scissors core mechanic in virtua fighter 4 evo's quest mode really reminded me of practising a song back in high school, for that my motivation was the feeling of doing something actually productive. of course, then i get reminded that my house doesnt have ethernet and cant install it, so i wont be able to actually play against real people :(

at the same time, now that i think about it, i think this is where character design and even graphics contribute to enjoyment of difficulty; even if enemies keep dodging my attacks, landing a izuna drop in ng2 and watching skull and brain fragments splash out is really satisfying, while gene from God Hand being portrayed in the story as an underdog/slightly goofball shonen type mc makes it easier on myself to lose fights.

 

[Not_Red]

Learning Curve

Not just this, the rewards for doing good in a game also have to be good enough for the players to keep on going or else they will realize there is nothing to the game beyond just the difficulty.

Think about the Megaman games for example, you always face a boss at the end that has a specific weakness that you don't have access to. The first time it will be tough getting the first victory but the moment you do and get just a single power up you truly feel like you can take on the rest of the game.

 

[FrootyLoopsSamurai]

I think for difficulty to feel good there needs to be a learning aspect to drive engagement. Implementing new techniques and strategies to overcome challenges feels good. Sometimes it's a matter of building the muscle memory to pull off certain techniques consistently. As the player continues to improve, a sense of accomplishment is felt. Frustration is usually felt when there is a lack of progress or understanding of mechanics.

When thinking about what games hit the tension and release sweet spot of difficulty for me, Souls/like games tend to be the ones I gravitate to. Sekiro, in particular, probably had the most satisfying difficulty curve. There are a lot of mechanics you have to learn in that game in comparison to any Souls games released before then. It felt really good to beat some of the fights in that game. Hollow Knight and its sequel also had some pretty engaging difficult fights.

 

[TamagotchiTamaHero24's icon TamagotchiTamaHero24 TamagotchiTamaHero24]

Decent pace!

Difficulty can be a struggle, but a spike really stinks. If you get a hard challenge, then a less hard challenge, then a slightly harder challenge… you can keep going. Just make it consistent, and give them to you in quick succession. It’s always clear, especially with retro games, which titles got played from front to back at the end of their development and which ones didn’t.

 

[b1tchcelcracra]

I think for difficulty to feel good there needs to be a learning aspect to drive engagement. Implementing new techniques and strategies to overcome challenges feels good. Sometimes it's a matter of building the muscle memory to pull off certain techniques consistently. As the player continues to improve, a sense of accomplishment is felt. Frustration is usually felt when there is a lack of progress or understanding of mechanics.

When thinking about what games hit the tension and release sweet spot of difficulty for me, Souls/like games tend to be the ones I gravitate to. Sekiro, in particular, probably had the most satisfying difficulty curve. There are a lot of mechanics you have to learn in that game in comparison to any Souls games released before then. It felt really good to beat some of the fights in that game. Hollow Knight and its sequel also had some pretty engaging difficult fights.

i think that makes a lot of sense! i recently started playing resident evil 6 and got really pissed off, but then i looked at tutorials on steam and youtube and it started flowing a lot better for me. sometimes how much effort a game puts into actually teaching you its techniques matter a lot as well! a lot of my enjoyment with virtua fighter 4 evo came from how dedicated it was to wanting you to get good, i think virtua fighter is one of the only games ive come across where a lot of the terms used in the meta come from the games, and not the fans/pros that have painstakingly studied and dissected it so we didnt have to haha

Decent pace!

Difficulty can be a struggle, but a spike really stinks. If you get a hard challenge, then a less hard challenge, then a slightly harder challenge… you can keep going. Just make it consistent, and give them to you in quick succession. It’s always clear, especially with retro games, which titles got played from front to back at the end of their development and which ones didn’t.

i never thought of that, that reminds me of how frustrated i got from the cerberus boss in dmc3, each time i died i would have to start again fighting a bunch of low-level enemies that i just had to plow through before i could actually attempt the boss, not very fun.

 

[Goshikk]

masochism

 

[Bakuma1997]

The fun of solving a puzzle

I mean i enjoy easy games, but when i get ahold of a game that requires me to solve a challenge (A true one) i get a great deal of joy in the best "I...i did that?" way, don't get me wrong, some games are too BS with difficulty, especially retro ones, but those where the difficulty feels like a puzzle to solve fills me with joy

 

[Adachi_08]

Depends. There are serveral difficulties in games. Wether it be combat, platforming or puzzles.

For combat it feels rewarding when you master the tools provided to you by the game, and being able to use these tools in ways you never thought you could (like various techniques and chaining them together), but combat can also suck if the tools you have are very limited/clunky or the combat is just unfair (like in older games you usually had the hard difficlty being the bullet sponge course, but this still happens even today). What i find enjoyable in fps is even field, where you can one shot and enemy, BUT they can do the same to you. Deus Ex 2000 had "realistic" difficulty, which essentially tweaked the already exsiting difficulty settings for an extra difficulty. Honestly i think in deus ex "realistic" is the difficulty to go. Yes it's hard, but you also can hit hard with headshots or having a GEP gun for tough units.

As for the puzzles, sometimes they can be easy like "why bother with adding it" to the point "This shit is cryptic af, how did they even figure this one out". For puzzles i like "The Witness" with it's many puzzles, which are just "drag a line from point A to point B" but in every area you get new conditions that should be accounted for while you are dealing with puzzles, like having a specific shape, or splitting start by color or by collecting all the dots. But even then there are instances where the enviroment also becomes a challenge for completing a puzzle which is also cool.

And for platformers its the movement of the character i think? Cause if the character you control is very responsive and have moves that can help navigate tough spots, then it can be enjoyable. What isn't though is lack of things like a shadow under the character, which kinda makes it hard to predict where are you gonna land, or the absolute dogshit controls/movement, which just make stuff frustraiting to play.

 

[GundamJehutyKai]

I'd say the 2 biggest things about what makes difficulty feel good are presenting the player with a problem or game point which seems out of reach but not so far that you think its insurmountable. Soulborne games are the closest match to following this. You reach a boss and it kicks your ass handily but when you get back there, you always have the feeling of "this time, I'll get it!" and you try again.

Adding on to that, Difficulty also feels good when you tangibly feel like you are getting better at the game. This is more difficult to quantify but when you are able to look at how you played at the start of a game compared to the end and you see your own improvement as you played, then that can feel really cathartic.

 

[Pandaprewmaster325]

I play sudden strike which i nicknamed "the dark souls of RTS" why? Sudden strike punishes mistakes like no other!

You see when you commit to an assault you are risking the attack force entirely , you will need to do proper reconnaissance and artillery barrage before going onto the attack and even then there is a chance of failure!

Sudden strike is hardcore to the max and i mean absolute max that even i said "ok OK maybe you need to be a little less hardcore" now what makes sudden strike hard is you can't replace troops this means save scumming is one way to play or not saving at all means you need to be very cautious.

I personally plan attacks and organize troops then attack , and i take the consequences well (most of the time) , SS is one of the games that had me pretty frustrated at times too.

Another example of difficulty i like is call of duty 1/2 veteran , the only difference between you and the enemy is your controls and that means you and him can take 2 rifle bullets max before dying , you need to be careful and skillful in aiming because running around like Rambo will get you killed.....now cod 1 has the blessing of manual saving which makes it a little easier to get to the "point" where you keep failing unlike COD 2 which auto saves making you repeat easier sections over and over.....if you played cod 2 you know of the infamous silo mission.

A game that's pretty challenging but rewarding is WarCraft 3 , lots of mechanics to learn but very satisfying once you play properly , one of the most important things for me when it comes to difficulty is not having a handicap on the enemy like damage is doubled and armor too that's the way Red alert 1 does high difficulty and it's crap.

I like stats to be equal in RTS in all difficulty levels , for shooters i like if the enemy is as vulnerable yet as dangerous as I'm which is something counter strike excels at.

Survival horror is usually difficult as you need to manage resources well , and most importantly know when to run and when to fight a lesson that was very valuable thanks to silent hill 1.

All in all difficulty should offer a challenge to keep the player engaged not too easy as it becomes stale if you can overcome everything easily and not too hard it becomes anger/frustration inducing session (also known as playing sudden strike) instead of gaming session , chrono trigger/cross manage difficulty well , Diablo games manage difficulty well as Diablo is an action RPG meaning you meet groups of enemies but you will quickly learn to isolate enemies or fight 3-4 enemies max , only time where fighting overwhelming odds works in Diablo is Diablo 2 act 1.

 

[Mopeybloke]

People like winning and feeling it was hard fought. In general there is a sweet spot for progress that they expect to see that is rewarding. If goes over that, it begins being frustrating.