imagine dark souls was so easy you get bored. Wouldn’t you ask for a difficulty slider? Let people ask their needs to be fulfilled. And definitely, avoid being contrary to them only because their need is alien to you. They are not even asking anything from you.
imagine dark souls was so easy you get bored. Wouldn’t you ask for a difficulty slider?
No? What? I’d play something else.
I’m not out here like “stardew needs to add permadeath and player invasions”. I don’t find stardew very fun so I don’t play it.
Adding more options is usually fine but I don’t accept the premise that every game needs to be fun and completable by every player.
If someone made Calculus Souls, I know I wouldn’t do well at it. I wouldn’t demand that they change it to be Arithmetic Mode just so my bad-at-math brain can finish it. if they add that, fine, maybe even good, but I don’t feel entitled to that.
FURTHERMORE: Difficulty options can be changed in ways other than a meta game slider. You need basically zero reflexes to finish elden ring with a tower shield and spirit ashes. Is that good enough? Or do people want it so everyone can finish the game in naked parrying dagger mode.
It’s also different games for different occasions.
Sometimes I just want background static for my thoughts → Stardew Valley
Sometimes I want to casually explore a whimsical world → BotW
Sometimes I need a constant flood of adrenaline to drown out the pain → Dota2
Dark Souls is amazing, and it would suck if it was easy. Everything about it is punishing and that’s part of what makes it such a standout experience. Same with Silksong.
My issue with this way of thinking is that difficulty is not always a gradient thing, it can be about what you have learned and are able to apply. If a game is very focused around the player developing specific skills, and repeated practice until they are able to figure it out, an easier version where you can get through it without learning the prerequisites would not be the same game at all, and requesting that could amount to the same thing as asking for its erasure.
I’ve never watched a different cut of a movie made specifically because people didn’t like the original
Personally I’ve been meaning to watch Terminator 3: The Coming Storm for precisely that reason. I’ve also enjoyed plenty of modded games that change the original because the developer’s vision wasn’t all that great in many people’s opinion.
I’ve only seen director cuts that more closely align with their vision. Which is what fromsoft essentially does
Project 4K77 is Star Wars as it was originally released but the director doesn’t want that version to be available anymore.
I totally think people should mod their games to their liking. But here the people who want to change the game are mad the developers didn’t make it to their liking in the first place.
Just mod it, especially when the developers have specifically said they make these games for an exact experience.
Star Wars despecialized is very cool but we had to accept Lucas didn’t care for the original like we did and it was up for someone to independently go and create the modified work. Fan work and mods are fine and great and they exist to fill this exact need because the original creator has vision and preferences too.
They’re falsely framing advocates asking FromSoft for an easy mode as people calling FromSoft ableist and demanding that Dark Souls be canceled. They listened to a few too many Gamer Bros™ and don’t have an actual thought-out opinion here.
My complaint is that people take issue with these specific games being too difficult and not having accessibility features when it’s essentially designed by one guy who holds himself to be an artist that specifically wants to make these games exactly how he makes them.
It’s just the wrong games over which to make it an accessibility issue because they’re inherently mechanical/physical and it necessarily butts up against the simple right of a guy to make his own games like that
“Altering the game” is unhelpfully broad. Changing the gamma level is altering the game, allowing subtitles is altering the game, swapping the enemies for teletubbies is altering the game.
We’re getting into ship of Theseus territory, coupled with authorial intent, death of the author, and stuff like that.
Plenty of people would like an easy mode. It’s up to the developers of they get one. I think it would be a better product with more options for difficulty but you seem to feel it would be bad…?
Perhaps more helpfully I draw the distinction between game modes that alter the mechanics in some ways but not others. As in, some games have difficulty levels that change not just the damage mechanics but also the numbers of enemies, the objectives the player is required to complete, the available routes through the world, and any number of other things.
Other games just adjust things like damage mechanics and timing windows, without touching other stuff. The latter I feel falls under accessibility.
Conflating the two to me seems strange. Can’t play the game for as long as someone else? No game for you!
So his vision for the experience is that only some people are worthy to play? I mean, it’s allowed but it’s not an opinion I’d personally go to bat for.
Worthy as in “having the time and capability to play it in the way he feels is correct”. So if my carpal tunnel is acting up then I guess no game for me because I wouldn’t be playing it the way he feels it should be played.
As I said, it’s certainly an opinion one is allowed to hold. I don’t have anything more positive than that to say about it.
And i think that criticism is a fundamental part of interaction with art. I’ve been playing Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn lately (wife got on an fe kick and I decided to try out the series) and the entire time I’ve been discussing what I like and dislike about the decisions they made. I shouldn’t get to force their hand, but from what I hear a lot of my complaints were addressed in future (and past) games, while unfortunately many of the kudos I have for it didn’t roll forward.
To engage with games (or movies/tv) without asking what was done well or poorly is fine, but I’d really encourage doing it. The internet can be very loud about their opinions, but artists do well to learn which opinions to consider or reject.
No that’s part of interacting with products, not art.
Some games are just art and not a product, they’re not there to be negotiated with only presented as the artist made it. Some games are both and the developers care about what people want, movies also sometimes use focus groups. The best movies don’t.
But people don’t actually know what they want and that’s part of what makes actual art like film or fashion exciting…and what makes it art.
I find it troubling that you’ve described a consumer feedback cycle as having something to do with art
And yet to ask questions about what was done well or poorly and what resonated or didn’t and what made something easier to get into or didn’t is part of analyzing it, just like trying to determine themes. In an art gallery I often have an initial like/dislike reaction, from there I ask why.
The best movies don’t care what the masses think, but they do care what the critics who they respect think. The best movies are often made by people who saw a movie and were inspired by what they liked or didn’t like about it to do their own thing that they thought they could do better or their own way.
And I agree that it’s good and exciting when artists do their own thing and create something unique and cool. And when it works it’s fucking amazing, and it’s really easy to only remember the things that did work. I have a lot of respect for the music of Yoko Ono, she said “fuck you” to the critics and everyone else and did her own thing, but I also wouldn’t call myself a fan of her music.
Miyazaki does his own thing, he acts as an artist who feels that the difficulty of his games is a fundamental piece of the experience. I can respect that. And I can also respect the people who hear these games are very good, are interested in them, and acknowledge they don’t have it in them to “git gud” enough to truly enjoy them and are saddened by that. I see the people wanting an easy mode in difficult games as similar to my wife who complains about the lack of a hard mode in most Nintendo games.
Adjusting the difficultly is not changing the text size.
It is altering the game. You might think that’s ok or worth it for accessibility but it is still altering the game.
Plenty of games have difficulty sliders and plenty don’t. Both are 100% ok
imagine dark souls was so easy you get bored. Wouldn’t you ask for a difficulty slider? Let people ask their needs to be fulfilled. And definitely, avoid being contrary to them only because their need is alien to you. They are not even asking anything from you.
No? What? I’d play something else.
I’m not out here like “stardew needs to add permadeath and player invasions”. I don’t find stardew very fun so I don’t play it.
Adding more options is usually fine but I don’t accept the premise that every game needs to be fun and completable by every player.
If someone made Calculus Souls, I know I wouldn’t do well at it. I wouldn’t demand that they change it to be Arithmetic Mode just so my bad-at-math brain can finish it. if they add that, fine, maybe even good, but I don’t feel entitled to that.
FURTHERMORE: Difficulty options can be changed in ways other than a meta game slider. You need basically zero reflexes to finish elden ring with a tower shield and spirit ashes. Is that good enough? Or do people want it so everyone can finish the game in naked parrying dagger mode.
It’s also different games for different occasions.
Sometimes I just want background static for my thoughts → Stardew Valley
Sometimes I want to casually explore a whimsical world → BotW
Sometimes I need a constant flood of adrenaline to drown out the pain → Dota2
Dark Souls is amazing, and it would suck if it was easy. Everything about it is punishing and that’s part of what makes it such a standout experience. Same with Silksong.
My issue with this way of thinking is that difficulty is not always a gradient thing, it can be about what you have learned and are able to apply. If a game is very focused around the player developing specific skills, and repeated practice until they are able to figure it out, an easier version where you can get through it without learning the prerequisites would not be the same game at all, and requesting that could amount to the same thing as asking for its erasure.
Make your own game then 🤷♀️
If I see a movie and it was boring I don’t ask for a more exciting version
You’ve never watched a different cut of a movie?
I’ve never watched a different cut of a movie made specifically because people didn’t like the original
I’ve only seen director cuts that more closely align with their vision. Which is what fromsoft essentially does
Personally I’ve been meaning to watch Terminator 3: The Coming Storm for precisely that reason. I’ve also enjoyed plenty of modded games that change the original because the developer’s vision wasn’t all that great in many people’s opinion.
Project 4K77 is Star Wars as it was originally released but the director doesn’t want that version to be available anymore.
Just throwing that out there.
I totally think people should mod their games to their liking. But here the people who want to change the game are mad the developers didn’t make it to their liking in the first place.
Just mod it, especially when the developers have specifically said they make these games for an exact experience.
Star Wars despecialized is very cool but we had to accept Lucas didn’t care for the original like we did and it was up for someone to independently go and create the modified work. Fan work and mods are fine and great and they exist to fill this exact need because the original creator has vision and preferences too.
Is your complaint that people have a different opinion of the games as delivered? I’m afraid you’ve lost me.
They’re falsely framing advocates asking FromSoft for an easy mode as people calling FromSoft ableist and demanding that Dark Souls be canceled. They listened to a few too many Gamer Bros™ and don’t have an actual thought-out opinion here.
My complaint is that people take issue with these specific games being too difficult and not having accessibility features when it’s essentially designed by one guy who holds himself to be an artist that specifically wants to make these games exactly how he makes them.
It’s just the wrong games over which to make it an accessibility issue because they’re inherently mechanical/physical and it necessarily butts up against the simple right of a guy to make his own games like that
“Altering the game” is unhelpfully broad. Changing the gamma level is altering the game, allowing subtitles is altering the game, swapping the enemies for teletubbies is altering the game.
We’re getting into ship of Theseus territory, coupled with authorial intent, death of the author, and stuff like that.
Plenty of people would like an easy mode. It’s up to the developers of they get one. I think it would be a better product with more options for difficulty but you seem to feel it would be bad…?
Perhaps more helpfully I draw the distinction between game modes that alter the mechanics in some ways but not others. As in, some games have difficulty levels that change not just the damage mechanics but also the numbers of enemies, the objectives the player is required to complete, the available routes through the world, and any number of other things.
Other games just adjust things like damage mechanics and timing windows, without touching other stuff. The latter I feel falls under accessibility.
Conflating the two to me seems strange. Can’t play the game for as long as someone else? No game for you!
I feel the developers should release games as they see fit, that’s it.
Your opinion is that your opinion doesn’t matter because you’re not the developer? 😆
Miyazaki personally designs the levels according to his specific vision of the experience.
So his vision for the experience is that only some people are worthy to play? I mean, it’s allowed but it’s not an opinion I’d personally go to bat for.
Worthy to play? He’s making something he finds fun. It’s not a statement on someone’s worth if they can’t also play it.
Worthy as in “having the time and capability to play it in the way he feels is correct”. So if my carpal tunnel is acting up then I guess no game for me because I wouldn’t be playing it the way he feels it should be played.
As I said, it’s certainly an opinion one is allowed to hold. I don’t have anything more positive than that to say about it.
And i think that criticism is a fundamental part of interaction with art. I’ve been playing Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn lately (wife got on an fe kick and I decided to try out the series) and the entire time I’ve been discussing what I like and dislike about the decisions they made. I shouldn’t get to force their hand, but from what I hear a lot of my complaints were addressed in future (and past) games, while unfortunately many of the kudos I have for it didn’t roll forward.
To engage with games (or movies/tv) without asking what was done well or poorly is fine, but I’d really encourage doing it. The internet can be very loud about their opinions, but artists do well to learn which opinions to consider or reject.
No that’s part of interacting with products, not art.
Some games are just art and not a product, they’re not there to be negotiated with only presented as the artist made it. Some games are both and the developers care about what people want, movies also sometimes use focus groups. The best movies don’t.
But people don’t actually know what they want and that’s part of what makes actual art like film or fashion exciting…and what makes it art.
I find it troubling that you’ve described a consumer feedback cycle as having something to do with art
And yet to ask questions about what was done well or poorly and what resonated or didn’t and what made something easier to get into or didn’t is part of analyzing it, just like trying to determine themes. In an art gallery I often have an initial like/dislike reaction, from there I ask why.
The best movies don’t care what the masses think, but they do care what the critics who they respect think. The best movies are often made by people who saw a movie and were inspired by what they liked or didn’t like about it to do their own thing that they thought they could do better or their own way.
And I agree that it’s good and exciting when artists do their own thing and create something unique and cool. And when it works it’s fucking amazing, and it’s really easy to only remember the things that did work. I have a lot of respect for the music of Yoko Ono, she said “fuck you” to the critics and everyone else and did her own thing, but I also wouldn’t call myself a fan of her music.
Miyazaki does his own thing, he acts as an artist who feels that the difficulty of his games is a fundamental piece of the experience. I can respect that. And I can also respect the people who hear these games are very good, are interested in them, and acknowledge they don’t have it in them to “git gud” enough to truly enjoy them and are saddened by that. I see the people wanting an easy mode in difficult games as similar to my wife who complains about the lack of a hard mode in most Nintendo games.