marketing strategy. if they can get a bunch of fans of the Metro franchise to actually buy their hard mode, they'll get a ton of cash for that. if this latches on, more studios will do so, and thus it will become "natural" to strip their games off of Hard Mode and have players purchase it.
I have to agree on one thing with I think it was Machinima. You can take A LOT more hits then in 2033. The game isn't that much of a challenge as 2033. Maybe in hard mode it is a bit harder so I can't say for sure. And I don't have Ranger mode, so......
