gaming Is it me, or did video games get easy?

[lomk 20,663]

Back in "ye olden days" games could only be a couple of kilobytes big, but people wouldn't want to buy something that only lasted a few hours, 

 

What about The Adventure of Link. I've never made it too far in that one, but I've read in certain places that Hyrule was enormous in that game, considering the number of towns and different environments. Again, this is only what I've heard from friends who have played it and read in various places--not that I've actually gone too in-depth with it. 

[Starstream 182]

What about The Adventure of Link.

Exactly 257 kilobytes, my point still stands, but I will acknowledge that that game had a significant world to it, the only problem being that it did a really terrible job explaining what you could/had to do. (if I remember it correctly.)

 

Villagers had misinforming text boxes (some times because of character limits, other times because of mistranslation), and a lot of sprites were recycled to conserve space on the cartridge, so a lot of places looked alike. (Again, if my memory is accurate.)

Edited February 11, 2013 by Zhinzo

[Poppy Bros. Jr. 9]

I would say games are only a little easier nowadays.Chemical Plant Zone is extremely difficult at first but it just takes some getting used to. Now Wing Fortress Zone, that is a completely different story. I have the same problem as you in MK2 I had to play as Sub Zero on very easy and even then I was lucky to get past Shao Kahn. I really don't mind optional tutorials because you might come across a game with really complicated controls where you might actually need a tutorial. But much like Egoraptor I just hate it when you are playing a game that you've played before and the game stops you dead in your tracks to tell you crap you already know (I'm looking at YOU Skyward Sword). Despite this abundance of tutorials there are still a lot of good games that are hard like Super Meat Boy or Dark Souls. These games are hard but they are designed well so they don't feel impossible or unfair like a lot of 8 bit and 16 bit games.

[Retro*Derpy 3,118]

Really depends on the video game at hand. Assassin's creed has defiantly gotten easier, but both because I've played them all, and the 3rd one just seems as if you always have the upper hand. Though games like SSX, Command and Conquer, and Fate I still find quite difficult to beat.

[Key Master 25]

I think games have gotten way easier over time. I mean, I beat LoZ: Skyward Sword in two days. I beat Majora's Mask in about a week and a half, but it took me a whopping two months to finally beat the original Legend of Zelda. Coincidence? I think not.

[Crispy 5,563]

Now I got past the Emerald Forest Zone just fine. I got to Chemical Plant Zone and the first act was a little tough but I made it through without losing any lives...Everything changed when the Fire Nation--I mean when I got to act 2. 

 

That level is the bane of my existence.

 

 

I don't see how Chemical Plant is hard.  Keep trying and you'll get it.

 

I think it's less "Video games are becoming easier" and more "I'm not choosing hard video games to play".

 

Play Megaman 9.  Play Super Meat Boy.  Play I Wanna Be The Guy.  Hell, have you tried Halo 4 alone on Legendary?  They've really beefed it up this time around.

[Scootalove 10,685]

Well, I do say video games are getting easier. Back in probably the breakout year of the 90s, video games started to develop and become harder as time goes by. Like, I never even finished Spider-Man the Movie The Video Game. I kept jumping off a building, killing myself.

[Megas 27,218]

Making a game more accessible and having the game hold your hand throughout are two entirely different things. I'll just get that out now.

 

I do think that games are getting a lot easier these days, but I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing as long as they, again, don't have the game baby you during it's duration.

 

But there are some other contributing factors to consider:

 

1) Us as gamer are probably getting better at games, so in time they become easier

 

2) Games are becoming more mainstream, so in turn developers have to make their games more accessible(this could be good or bad depending on how they do it)

 

3) Games are too similar. This is just a personal opinion on certain genres, but I feel like a lot of games are getting too similar to each other with the current explosion of the shooter genre. While one could argue with the popularity of platformers during the SNES/Genesis era, or the JRPG explosion during the PS1/PS2, to me at least, most of the games I've played around those had different mechanics that I couldn't apply what I learned from one game into another(Example: I couldn't play Mario like it was Castlevania, or Sonic like Megaman). On the other hand I can play most shooters easily because a lot of them are too damn alike. The only way to learn from the game is if I get really technical on how the online gameplay is like

Edited February 12, 2013 by Megas75

[Flare Fire 15]

I only have 1 example

Pokemon Yellow was the hardest pokemon game

Now the games are getting wayyyyyyy too easy I can beat the new ones in 12 hours

[Harmonic Revelations 8,833]

Video games did get a lot easier over time. It has something to do with the newer generations lacking patience and expecting immediate reward for their actions, I suppose.

[Fluttering Shy 12]

There are just so much more casual gamers today and they want it to appeal  to them since well there are so much more! Its is all about money the companies want their games to appeal to everyone so everyone plays it and it is popular.

[~TheStealthyPony~ 166]

It kinda depends on which games you used the play and which games you play now i mean everybody plays different games before and different games now

Also you gain past experience rrom past games which makes you a better gamer

Edited February 12, 2013 by ~TheStealthyPony~

[Celtore 2,769]

I never beat ocarina of time when I was a kid. A decade later, I ran through it in a few days wondering why the hay I couldn't figure out the deku tree. I also found super mario world extremely difficult as a kid and now, I can proudly say I beat kaizo and kaizo 2. I can actually still speed run the first 3 kaizo mario 1 levels in three minutes without save states for the most part.

 

As for games today compared to what they used to be, they are a lot easier for the most part. There are indie games and certain series that definitely rank up the difficulty though even when compared to the older days of gaming, such as touhou and pretty much every "i wanna be the guy" style clone. This is probably because of companies trying to reach out to the casual gaming demographic and I really don't think there is anything wrong with that. Just leave in difficult difficulty options for those who want a challenge.

Edited February 12, 2013 by Celtore

[TheBronyHeart 2,640]

Well lets put it this way, super mario brothers 1,2,3 and super mario world VS. New super Mario brothers wii (and every other terrible new mario game except galaxy.)

 

 

The difference is plain to see. Hopefully...

[Loona 287]

It seems so. Playing games that were made a while back as to games created recently, I can say that recent games are far more easier.

[decoherence 183]

I've been playing FarCry 3 on the medium difficulty setting and found it to be a fair challenge, at least if you want to try and be stealthy. If you just wanna go in and blast the crap out of everyone then I guess it'd be pretty easy.

 

On the other hoof, my friend and I have been playing through FF6 and we're finding it unbelievably easy -- certainly way easier than either of us remember. That might be because we've both played through it a dozen times, though.

[Grimm Darkness 7]

They have mad games much much easier to appeal to both an older and very young audience. Making the games easier makes it that people with full time jobs can find the time to have fun and beat them. Also they give younger, 4+ audiences a chance to play and enjoy video games. Also making their games much easier to beat, allows the game developers to sell more games and ultimately make more money. The game developers make the games easy so once you beat them and get bored of that story line, they already have another game of interest to you that you'll buy or another addition to that series. It's only natural that as our society is filled with greed and money hungry companies, that games would stay the same price but be shorter, easier games.

[Kamil 315]

I remember watching a video where someone explained a few legitimate reasons why games are actually becoming easier, but I only remember this one:

An increasing number of games have online multiplayer, almost always with the exact same interface and mechanics as single player or local multiplayer options. The problem with that is, the two largest markets for video games are Europe and America, and both of those markets haven't drastically improved the average consumer's internet connection for quite some time. Basically, in online games the user experience will be terrible due to high latency and dropped packets unless they dumb everything down to the point where another player's poor connection doesn't ruin everything for you. Unfortunately, the offline modes use the same mechanics so a lot of the stuff is really easy even when it's not online.

 

Don't know exactly how much of that is fact, but it seemed reasonable. On the other hand, I have a challenge for everyone: go back and actually play those old games again. What seemed hard back then may be rendered almost trivial by years of experience.

[hawkflame 3,310]

I don't think games are getting easier, you're just getting much better. I try to play everything on the hardest difficulty possible. It's way more fun and satisfying that way.

I'll believe that games aren't easier when I see a game today that has only three lives, no continues, no saves, and one hit deaths. Yep, you get hit three times, it's game over, and you have to restart from level 1. That was not unheard of back in the day.

 

Seriously, try playing games like the original Ninja Gaiden or Ghosts and Goblins today. A couple of years ago I played Mega Man I again on the Mega Man Legends collection for the PS3 and that game just kicked my ass.

[khaine21x3 789]

@@Kamil,

 

That's why we old gamers want newer games that gets even more complex and harder instead of the dumbed downed games that are so prevalent these days.There are indie devs making such games and that;s good enough for me, not gonna touch the dumbed down big corporation games.

[Bucky McGillyCuddy 956]

I think it's quite the opposite they aren't getting easier, you / we are simply growing as gamers and getting better. I remember playing though Halo: Combat Evolved at the age of 10 or so and found playing on Legendary very difficult even after completing it more than 5 times. I play it now and it's just so easy.

 

Play Halo 4 on legendary and then play Halo on legendary and i dare you to tell me that the original was more difficult. I personally think it's just me getting better and being able to work out how to do solve a problem or kill a certain bad guy better every time.

[Circadian 1,273]

I'll believe that games aren't easier when I see a game today that has only three lives, no continues, no saves, and one hit deaths. Yep, you get hit three times, it's game over, and you have to restart from level 1. That was not unheard of back in the day.

 

Seriously, try playing games like the original Ninja Gaiden or Ghosts and Goblins today. A couple of years ago I played Mega Man I again on the Mega Man Legends collection for the PS3 and that game just kicked my ass.

 

Hardcore mode for Dead Space 2 is pretty tough! You get three saves, no checkpoints and you revert back to the last save upon death. DS3's hardcore mode is even better. You get one life to last for the entire game. I'm doing that right now, actually.

[hakaru-x 13]

Much agreed with that point. I've played Skyrim on Master. I started on Apprentice but as I learned how to play with a keyboard and mouse (it was the first time I tried PC gaming), I turned the difficulty up and I have to agree it get brutal sometimes. Really, I think all games should give you the option of how hard you want the game to be before you even get started. Whether or not you can change it in-game is up to the devs. 

To be honest i think Fallout New Vegas is waaay harder than Skyrim, specially in hardcore mode, you can die from almost anything XD.

[Prismatic 49]

One of the things I would attribute is that most of the older games had no save system (some like Tails' Adventure, Metroid and a few others relied on passwords to save progress; etc.) in which after the number of lives was exhausted the player had to start over from scratch.  Needless to say they would get better at the starting areas and get better going through the whole game.  Although in the mini-discussion of Sonic 2 I never had any issue clearing the Chemical Plant as a kid; I just forgot the side platforms fold down when Robotnik is rushed.  I found certain parts of Sonic Adventure 2 to be more gruelling than Sonic 2 simply because of how insane SEGA made the space stages (notably Final Rush).  Then again once a stage is cleared in the newer games a player can still just slowly edge per stage rather than per game.

 

Admittedly some games have become a bit easier than I remember (R-Type is a great example.  The original and its sequel are coin wasters.  Super R-Type was toned down for the SNES and R-Type III wasn't too terribly bad.  Delta went back to being hard and Final is more or less easier...Then again Irem figured that a player unlocking all ships would need a motive to doing so (and that some ships like the Ragarok and Leo are overpowered).  Let's see).

 

Doom 3's difficulty is a bit of an inverse than that of its predecessors.  Nightmare on the originals had double ammo but infinite enemy respawns while if I remember on Doom 3 the player starts with the artifact but continually loses HP from the start (down to 25).  I don't remember how RoE's difficulty played out.

 

Let's see how far I can get back on topic.  I think the overall difficulty in some games have been decreased in favor of also having the gameplay being more immersive or complicated.  Providing it's not an FPS more and more games can get away with adding a bit more depth to the gameplay rather than raw difficulty.

[hawkflame 3,310]

Hardcore mode for Dead Space 2 is pretty tough! You get three saves, no checkpoints and you revert back to the last save upon death. DS3's hardcore mode is even better. You get one life to last for the entire game. I'm doing that right now, actually.

 

Do you have a health bar, or is it one hit and you're dead no matter what? 

 

By the way, there was no adjustable difficulty for most 8 bit NES games.  This was the standard difficulty.  True, most of them did have continues and a life bar, but some of the shit that the game would throw at you was relentless and insane.  And you generally had to beat the whole thing in one sitting. 

 

Just take a look: