Comments on: When did games become hard?

By: Chris2

Chris2 — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 23:06:11 +0000

I think the key is the balance between risk and reward. If the level is long, the rewards need to be frequent; and if the level is tough, the rewards need to be satisfying. I doubt this is the sole factor in entertaining game design but it’s something designers are not immune from forgetting.

By: Chris

Chris — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:51:01 +0000

I don’t think general difficulty is the main problem, it’s poor game design. Challenging games can be enjoyable for all types of player – it’s down to the game design to slowly ramp up difficulty and give you a sense of accomplishment, but not make things impossible, and certainly not introduce these unexpected “learning cliffs” to pad things out.

The problem is that single player or cooperative games require some level of challenge to be set by the game designer: No challenge at all, throughout the course of the game, then things are very boring (even arty games like fl0w and flower have an element of challenge). Too difficult and you put people off. Setting that level to please everyone is very difficult.

Multiplayer (competitive) and social games are different; the difficulty is dynamic and is determined by who you’re playing against and how seriously you take the game. Also a lot of the fun and appeal is from the social aspect, not the challenge presented by the game itself; people will happily carry out even the most mundane repetitive tasks if there’s a social element (consider a good section of the Wii catalogue!)

By: matt

matt — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:30:14 +0000

I totally agree Marc.

There is a very hard middle ground that developers need to find where the game is challenging and fun but not impossible. You would of hoped a developer like Sega with its experience would be able to hit this middle ground easier!