Playing games on easy difficulty- how do you feel about it?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I have absolutely no problem playing on the lowest difficulty if I don't find the higher difficulties - or the actual combat - fun to play.

[trapmaster]

Everyone has their own personal taste when it comes to difficulty. I am still fan of hardest mode but still having second thoughts if it’s worth my time. Halo 2 legendary solo. Fuck...never again.

[Jastall]

Everyone has their own personal taste when it comes to difficulty. I am still fan of hardest mode but still having second thoughts if it’s worth my time. Halo 2 legendary solo. Fuck...never again.

Halo 2 is probably the most unfair shooter I've ever played on Legendary. What the fuck are those one-shotting snipers and pinpoint accurate Drones that slaughter you in seconds flat, among other things. It's straight up not fun at all, and Halo 1 wasn't that much better. I remember playing both games on Heroic and leaving it there.

[trapmaster]

Halo 2 is probably the most unfair shooter I've ever played on Legendary. What the fuck are those one-shotting snipers and pinpoint accurate Drones that slaughter you in seconds flat, among other things. It's straight up not fun at all, and Halo 1 wasn't that much better. I remember playing both games on Heroic and leaving it there.

yeah i beat in regular xbox but when MCC is a thing for xbox one. I do not.. I repeat.. I do not wanna endure legendary halo 2 ever again. Those days HAUNTED me of broken controller and middle fingering to tv. Nah, i'm good. Heroic will do.

[Darthias]

I usually play on normal for story-driven games (Uncharted, Horizon, etc). I use easy ONLY if it gives me an advantage while grinding for specific items, and only for that particular scenario, then I switch back to normal. This was the case with Niflheim/Muspelheim farming in God of War since those were an absolute chore with no challenge, just time consuming. For meaningful content, like the Sigrun secret fight, I ofc switched back to normal.

I use hard difficulty if there are particular achievements involved after I am done with the game once (Death March on Witcher 3 for example), or if I am playing a strategy game where I want to be challenged to tears (Starcraft 2, Warcraft Reforged).

It is true that videogames have to be a relaxing experience, but to me, easy difficulties might as well be a cinematic mode with no input required, since there are no risks or stakes at all

- - - Updated - - -



Slightly off-topic, but the outcry about Dark Souls never made sense to me. The game is as easy as you want it to be, if you put in the effort; you are never locked to a place with no hope of getting back to a grindable place. It gets frustrating, sure, but if you are not prepared to take on a boss and you keep throwing yourself at it with no different strategies, it's gonna suck big time.

Every Souls game has at least one spot that allows for massive exp gains. I remember I was struggling immensely against the Fume Knight in DS2 because he was the counter to my build and I couldn't hold my concentration up for 20 minutes while battling him. I just went to the Giant Lord, got to level 200 or something, and murdered him pretty soon after. Those were the days

There was a lot of (in my opinion) quite legitimate concern that if FROMSoftware did add 'easy' mode to Dark Souls, that it wasn't because it would ruin their accomplishments (though to deny that particular argument would be an obvious lie), a lot of it was stemming from the fact that it would kind of take away from Dark Souls as it doesn't really fit the setting or the aesthetic of Dark Souls.

Dark Souls is a series that has always been about perseverance through survival and I honestly think that if there were an easy mode it would somewhat de-emphasise the aesthetic both in-world and out-of-game (I can't remember the term used for something that feels like it belongs as part of the world [it is often used to describe the RIG UI and game options in Dead Space]).

I am not opposed to multiple difficulty modes, so long as:

a.) It makes sense for the game, it's world, the genre of game.

b.) Doesn't sacrifice the developer's intention or the integrity of what they were setting out to do, merely because of publisher pressure.

c.) Make harder or easier difficulties...HARDER or EASIER not MORE BULLET-SPONGE or LESS BULLET sponge. Make AI smarter or dumber. Look to the "Metro" series 'Ranger Hardcore' difficulty as a good example of this. You might go down in fewer shots than other difficulties BUT the enemy ALSO goes down in fewer shots. (arguably it is actually easier than 'hard' difficulty because of this fact despite the fact that 'Ranger Hardcore' is the hardest difficulty)

d) Like mentioned above, the Metro series is quite good about difficulty because it says OUTRIGHT that even though 'Ranger Hardcore' is the way that 4A Games intended the game to be played, they STATE OUTRIGHT that it is NOT recommended for a first-time playthrough.

e) Instead of having an arbitrary option at the start of the game before you even get into gameplay, depending on genre, have your performance in the tutorial allow the game to suggest a difficulty setting to you (i.e. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare's "Killing House" tutorial)