Frame Trap - Episode 152 "Forbidden Horizons"

[@___IG]

Huber brought the first ACTUAL Hottake in Frame Trap's history this episode

[@josemanuel_rocha]

I'm on the side of giving players the most options possible: difficulty, graphics, accessibility, etc., especially in a paid product. But the devs should always say what the intent vision is, for example, "the hard difficulty performance mode (60fps) is the way the game is meant to be played".

[@jkylebroyles]

This is Vince McMahon meme tier: -New Frame Trap -Horizon reference in the title the day before it drops -Almost 3 hours long -It's Ben, Brad, and Huber

[@elnopalero4691]

I need a weekly frame trap 😭 maybe not cuz it’s so jam packed content. I would love if they alternated weeks one with classic frame trap and another with every other media they consumed (books tv music etc )

[@sak9626]

Whenever difficulty and accessibility come up, I always point to Celeste. Climbing that mountain is hard as hell. But I feel that that game is paced perfectly, and I wouldn't change a thing. But I also have two fully functioning hands and fine eyesight. This is where Celeste's Assist Mode is incredible. It lets the player bend the rules of the game to accommodate someone that doesn't have those things or can't react to or process some game info as quickly as more seasoned players. It's something I wished every single game had. I wish Sifu had a mode like this to help people like this, not to just let people breeze through a game they don't want a challenge from. Developers can stick to their creative direction to make a hard game while simultaneously letting *everyone* be able to play. To boil it down to one sentence: I would rather a game let more less-capable players be able to overcome a game's challenge with the help of assists than for a game to not have any assists out of fear of letting some chumps cheat themselves.

[@gaztheman7879]

As someone who has trained in martial arts for years Sifu is a love letter to training . Learning patterns forms or katas is what your doing in the game same movements but keep improving them. Also teaching you to keep the person your fighting in front of the other fighter so they can’t attack love it.

[@citizen3000]

@@sugs0377 It's funny that these people end up looping back round to "hmmm what we need to do is to have the cultures separated". It's just mad. Sorry culture does not work that way, you can't keep it locked up in a box and you can't stop it spreading and being appreciated and reproduced by anyone.

[@robardian3697]

@@sugs0377 I always find it funny because if you look at the complainers its 99 percent white people. Reminds of those people complaining about Mario wearing a Sombrero in Mario Odyssey and Mexicans were all for it. Its so stupid

[@Gricuit]

I got rid of my Reddit and Twitter account and I like it. I get news through Google News and the Easy Allies Podcast. It's enough for me I realized. I don't need to know all the emotions that surrounds a game.

[@sachoslks]

Having only one difficulty is a great equalizer, everyone starts from the same place. When you beat a boss you know everyone had to go through the same thing as you did to beat it. When talking about the game its really cool because you know everyone is on the same place mentally, you do not need to do any disclaimer like "i only beat it on easy" or stuff like that. Plus im pretty sure having one difficulty really helps the devs tune the experience to perfection.

[@julian_whiteway]

Totally with Huber on the difficulty argument, specifically when he mentioned players wanting instant gratification and being ready to bail after a small handful of attempts. I think it's a product of the times in a lot of ways, because there are just so, so, so many ways to get those little dopamine hits elsewhere with the oversaturation you get today, from all angles: there's always someone else to message; some other notification to read; some other show to watch; some other game to play. Sifu and other difficult games like it aren't just competing to see if the player will stick around for another bout anymore, they're competing with just about everything else the player could be doing in that moment, which oftentimes is just so much less resistant than toughing a difficult game out.

[@zhontigue]

38:16 Thanks for this Ben and Huber, glad to know I'm not alone in feeling ill about sitting down putting the time into writing. It's the most satisfying thing when it's over, and I get a brief reprieve during the process, but it is something to overcome for sure. I'm going to bust my ass writing tomorrow.

[@miguelpiresramos1280]

I'm really on the side of accessibility. Call it easy mode, cheat codes, whatever you want. Why would your enjoyment of the game change because someone else enjoyed it differently? What if Sifu had a cheat code that let you do double damage? God Mode? Why would that affect you in any way, if you don't want to use it?

[@TheCanipaEffect]

I think Ben did a good job of kind of moderating Huber's rant. I think it's totally fine to want easier difficulties. Not everyone has the time or ability to complete some of the hardest games. Honestly, I wish some games just had a no clip mode so I could spend more time in those well crafted environments. I don't think Huber was being fair by painting everyone who wants difficulty options as having "demands" or "playing the victim", especially when he's had complaints about games not offering harder difficulty options. I think it's great that more people will be picking up Sifu because of the difficulty options. Those developers worked insanely hard on crafting a gorgeous experience that they clearly wanted more people to play. Your accomplishment shouldn't be threatened by other people's enjoyment.

[@citizen3000]

They "clearly" wanted it to be played a certain way. Then they got harassed online.

[@felixenigma4335]

wholeheartedly disagree. Some games are meant to be difficult. Rising above their challenge is what is appealing to the game. Unfortunately especially in America ''gamers'' have reached a point were accessibility has become detrimental to some game, especially in terms of game design. Making Sifu playable for people with disability if wholly different than making it easy for ''people who dont the time. Sometimes in life if you not willing to invest the time and the struggle you do not deserve the reward.

[@leontartovsky8949]

I’m sorry, but this is one of the most asinine comments I’ve seen. It’s akin to if I took 5 years of my life, sweat and tears to write a novel and was forced to tell you that you don’t have to read the whole thing but just a page with 150 words that summarizes it. How the hell am I happy about that. Or if a filmmaker told you that all you needed to see was a one minute trailer to appreciate all the hard work spent into shot design and cinematography as well as the VFX, sound track and etc. The devs obviously spent a lot of hard work into designing, fine tuning and balancing the combat and now Easy Mode basically diminishes all that hard work and makes it basically not important and trivial. I can’t see them being happy that people are playing a butchered version of their vision of the game. All that tension and adrenaline is lost resulting a much weaker game.

[@superbadisfunmy]

@@citizen3000 that's exactly what happened. Some games are just difficult. I love souls game but I never beat them cause I'm just not good. I'm not going to harass the developers cause of that

[@AlexMoscow9mmpr]

Gliders definitely revolutionized the open-world game. Not just perfect for traversal but also gave us a new, beautiful way to view the game world. To my mind, Arkham City was the first game to really demonstrate its effectiveness. Not a glider in the literal sense but Batman's cape, for me, is the first real use of the mechanic.

[@baircade]

OMG you are so right! I thought all this time Zelda started that but it was indeed one of the most fun things to do in the Arkham games especially City and Knight. Slightly different of course but gives that same feel. Also experiencing it now gliding with Hisuian Braviary in Legends Arceus. Seeing that glider in Jones' review of the new Horizon made me wants the game even more.

[@ishrov2303]

Infamous and Prototype had open world gliding back in 2009.

[@joshuavarghese7166]

Was super fun to glide in Assassin's Creed Brotherhood when you unlock parachutes later in the game. Infamous 1 and 2s gliding is also fantastic

[@cloudrider9142]

@@baircade I mean, Zelda BotW certainly pushed it even more into the foreground of the industry, that’s for sure. (Like, if Horizon had been inspired by Arkham, Infamous or something else than BotW, they probably would’ve already added it in Zero Dawn…) But yes, the Arkham games were probably the first really big openworld games to make gliding the best/most effective way of traveling. Depending on if you wanna count sandbox games or semi-open worlds though, quite a few other 3D games had gliders, parachutes or other forms of gliding before Arkham did! Off the top of my head: - Wing Cap in Mario 64 (Literally the same duck and rise motion to gain altitude or distance as in Arkham) - Ocarina had the Cuccoos to use, Majora had the Deku Mask and the Wind Waker had the Deku leaf - iirc Banjo also had gliding, no? - Just Cause games have their kites/parachutes - Infamous and Prototype had superpowerered gliding - AC Brotherhood had the da Vinci parachutes as a usable item

[@reed1645]

That's a good point. Arkham city really has phenomenal open world traversal. It's also a great example of taking a great game like arkham asylum and building on it to create something which feels really distinct.

[@miendude]

There were complaints about Sifu not giving you tools in the beginning to deal with mobs of enemies... But LEARNING to deal with the mobs make you feel like a total BADASS once you get it down! It makes it so much more satisfying when you're destroying situations you would get wrecked in, and look damn good in the game doing it

[@robardian3697]

Feeling like Old Boy in that scene haha

[@citizen3000]

The idea that it is satisfying to be forced to rise to a challenge if you wish to overcome it and that, in fact, that challenge might be last essential element to making a bunch of mechanics gel together to make something singular and remarkable, that in fact it might be what makes the game a game - well that's lost nowadays.

[@Liam-hp1qw]

That Sifu talk honestly sold me on the game. Well done boys

[@DDSlawson]

This accessibility conversation has upset quite a lot of people. I'm glad you all acknowledged how you don't know all sides of the discussion and I can appreciate some of the discussion points, but I think it's quite important that the allies pick up this conversation again and DEFINITELY reach out to people in the accessibility space and bring them into the conversation, because difficulty and accessibility are not mutually exclusive. I think this is a perfect example for why Easy Allies need to start bringing in more guests.

[@christrengrove]

2022 please just do a weekly The Boys stream or cast. The chemistry is unmatched

[@samuelsolberg7329]

Thanks for the difficulty discussion. Genuinely cathartic to listen to. "How does it affect you" is always thrown out. Games are experiences and feelings. I hate selecting difficulty up front and feel less accomplished when I know I could just toggle something up or down, even in cases like Celeste. For me personally difficulty options make the challenge feel more artificial and less immersive. Delegitimizes victory in the back of my head by feeling more like self-imposed challenge than a world or task that must be tackled and overcome... But that's just me. Devs have to consider all angles. I'm just tired of hearing that options "literally don't affect anyone's experience." This is art and it's subjective. Anyone can feel anyway experiencing it and saying every piece of this artform has to conform in any way makes the entire medium less bold and exciting.

[@dmtgallardo]

Great discussion on SIFU guys. Agree with Huber and Ben on the diversity point : let us have some Hard games from time to time. Not every game should be like SIFU. If you don’t like it, move on, there’s PLENTY of other stuff to play. Easy games simply fail to provide that level of satisfaction of overcoming seemingly impossible hardships. A key lesson not just for games, but for life.

[@RandyVie86]

Dark Knight Rises does not have an end Huber.... we get the Joseph Gordon-Levitt/Nightwing tease

[@liaml2035]

I want to sit down, sip a Sapporo and talk video games with Huber. L&R

[@mattlandry]

Certain games are just significantly better without difficulty options. If I could have played the souls series on easy mode I would have finished them without appreciating the mechanics. I gave up on dark souls 4 times and last year I finally figured it out and it felt so amazing to overcome. It's a feeling I have never gotten from any other game. Now I have beat dark souls 1,2,3 and bloodborne and it's just been orgasmic overcoming those bosses because they force me to either overcome or fail. Not to mention death makes you spend more time in the world where you eventually notice fantastic secrets you missed for so long and really get to know an environment over a period of time. Long term payoffs dude.

[@KeyT3ch]

And you know what, then I am NEVER going to enjoy any Soulsborne games then. They COULD have reached a FAR wider audience, but they choose not to, sure fine then. We are NOT asking them to make it easier, but adding an OPTION in the Settings, that is turned OFF by DEFAULT for you hardcore players, but still allowing the general audience to ENABLE it, would be SO MUCH better

[@mattlandry]

@@KeyT3ch I'm a pretty average gamer so the fact that there was no option actually pushed me to have the most rewarding experience in gaming. I would have turned down the difficulty and missed out completely. I suppose on pc you can download a trainer if you find that enjoyable. On console you are stuck with creators intent.

[@charoleawood]

I'm the exact opposite. I wasn't able to get into Souls until I looked up the item duplication exploit for PS3 Demon's Souls. People use hacks in games all of the time anyhow and they become better at a game quicker for it. When you can use save states to circumvent "developer's intent" and practice a boss without having to reload a stage and travel back to a fog gate you are going to have more aptitude with that boss. Souls fans became "good" at Dark Souls because they learned it with their buddies and NOT because that game is particularly well balanced or fair. They riot when a non-Miyazaki game is too hard for them, it's that pride factor Ben brought up, and they complain about "hit boxes" and everything else under the sun. So Miyazaki From games can get away with being challenging, but it's best for people making Souls-likes to have difficulty options, because From fans aren't actually better gamers and they won't appreciate your game more for being difficult.

[@citizen3000]

@@KeyT3ch By definition that would enable making the game easier. If their vision of the game is that it only works in the way they want at a certain difficulty level then they have every right to do that as creators. People are allowed to write books I don't understand at all. I don't have the right to have them dumb them down for me. Grow and accept that not everything is for everyone.

[@paulsmith9192]

@ArtifiShuL Instinct at the end of day,their is no right or wrong answer on difficulty options. For me u pay 60 dollars or whatever for a game, you should be allowed to play how you want. Give players the option

[@wayofthedead2648]

Huber completely correct. I don't think difficulty options are bad. I think the games that are balanced very tightly around one inflexible difficulty creates an experience that can add real value to a game, and it is diminished in multiple ways when there are difficulty options or sliders. And not every game needs to appeal to everyone. Let some things be special, niche, whatever. Also gatekeeping is saying "this game is too hard for you. Don't play it." Not gatekeeping is saying "this game is hard but worth it. You should play it so you understand what I mean." And all of the games that engender this sort of discourse tend to fall in the latter camp.

[@wwoouutt1]

For me, the problem with difficult games is that I'm simply not 16 years old anymore. I have a full time job and time is literally limited (it always was, but you know what I mean). I haven't played Sifu yet, but I have had some time with Returnal and I think my personal issues with these game are going to be similar. I would love to get to the end of the game, see all the areas and enemy types and have a satisfying conclusion to the story, but if I play Returnal for two hours straight, die and literally have nothing to show for it, I sometimes feel like I wasted my entire evening. Yes, I played the game and it was fun playing, but by now, what I did was something I've done a dozen times before. I'm actually interested in Easy Mode for Sifu. I'm not going to start with it, but if I reach a point where I'm getting frustrated with the normal difficulty, I'm definitely going to lower it. It just makes the decisions to buy and play the game a little easier. Also, I know he doesn't mean it that way and I'm not mad or anything, but even though Huber says he isn't gatekeeping, the way he talks about it sometimes does kinda make it sound like it.

[@burntbacon718]

Its fine that you like games with an easy mode and dont have time for hard games. I think the crux of Hubers argument is that a lot of people on the internet are like you and DEMAND games have an easy mode and that if you dont agree you have a wrong opinion. I think its fine for games to be hard when so many modern games now are incredibly easy. And if the developer wants there to be multiple difficulties thats fine, but for people to demand and pressure Devs to add multiple difficulties after the fact is not ok. Not every piece of media out there needs to be consumed by you.

[@mwmrhdm]

A couple years back I distinctly remember Huber downplaying DMC5's replayability and how he doesn't have time to replay games because he's not in high school anymore. Other times he'll tell you how much he loves replaying something like RE Village or rewatching the same movies/shows. Its an opinion thing, they can change over time with a person's mindset.

[@rinaldus4512]

Huge agreement with Huber on being unable to connect to Horizons characters with the first game. I have tried so many times to push through and complete the first game. Like SO MANY times. And I just can't get invested because of the characters. It's really disappointing because the gameplay is solid and 2 looks SO GOOD.

[@dmtgallardo]

Aloy is a bland character.

[@trulydeadly]

I think introducing an easy mode is fine for the dev to do, as long as they don't feel impelled to do it against their will. For some people the easy mode may elicit a similar feeling of difficulty and progression as the regular mode did for Huber. I agree that anyone who is complaining before actually putting some decent amount of time in should not be listened to. I'm on my first run, just beat the third boss at age 69! I am not beating this game in one run, and that's fine. I'm used to that, I seek games like that out. For instance, I never finished Galak-Z even though I love the game. Mainly because each run is more randomised and there's some more luck involved in getting a viable run to completion. I didn't petition for any changes to be made. I just enjoyed my time with it and moved on at a certain point.

[@Davey_Cakes]

I agree with Huber about the reward factor of games. It’s okay for something to take multiple tries. A game having senses of adversity and payoff is good. It’s not “disrespecting the player’s time” in all cases. And, not all games should follow the same philosophy, but some games should be respected for their deliberate design. Accessibility options are a separate conversation, more about making a game playable for as many people as possible while maintaining the vision of the developer.

[@Kango234]

I think the hyperbole is what drives me insane the most about this. I don't fully agree with Huber about options being a compromise and I see the frustration of people who payed full price for something they can't finish. But I just hate the idea of devs "disrespecting" you just cause they made something for a certain audience. I'm more aligned with Ben in that people are allowed to air out their criticisms and I've seen a few rational takes, but I'm just so tired of the way social media and supposed journalist talk about it. That's who I'm really annoyed by at the end of the day.

[@Davey_Cakes]

@@Kango234 People being on hair triggers about everything doesn’t help, that’s for sure.

[@Hazz3r]

Difficulty is the OG accessibility setting. The more difficult something is, the less accessible it is because you require less restrictions to access it. In the case of difficulty in games, this is often a restriction of cognitive ability, fine motor-skills, and/or time. Like wheelchair ramps in the real world, it was introduced first because it was something that could benefit people who are generally able-bodied at times, as well as those who need it in order to access a service at all. I had a decent length chat on Era with Ben about difficulty settings when Sekiro came out, and I'm largely going to repeat the same points. I really do appreciate though that Ben appears to have come around on a few things since that conversation, judging by this episode. For the record, I haven't played Sifu, and don't plan on playing it soon, Dark Souls is one of my favourite games of all time, I've beaten all the From Software games of note, and I've carved out a solid 3 days of my life, including a day of PTO from work, to play Elden Ring at launch. I personally do not require easier difficulties for these kinds of games. I think all game developers should (not must) make their game as accessible as possible, including adding difficulty settings. So, what do I think?
 We can't demand that developers must introduce a difficulty setting into their game. We must acknowledge that, as an interactive medium, the way that you interact is part of the game itself. The art is not just the environments, the stories, the characters, but the experience that is carefully crafted between you and the game. Sometimes that's an after thought but sometimes it's an integral part of the game. It's easier to introduce difficulty if your game falls on the former. However, developers must acknowledge that they are making their game less accessible to the audience as a whole if they choose not to provide those difficulty settings, and that's okay. Everyone can't do everything, and that's the same whether you consider yourself disabled or not. If your reaction to the Sifu Easy Mode announcement is some form of annoyance along the lines of, they're ruining the integrity of the game, or proclaiming that people just want participation trophies, you're gatekeeping and you're part of the problem. I enjoyed Hubers statements when he mentioned things like, "just give it time", "play it in short bursts", "it's a game you need to practice at to get better", because he's focussing on the creators intent. He's saying that, this is the creators intent and here are all these ways you can try to keep experiencing it without compromise. But, accessibility is often a compromised experience. Take The Last of Us Part 2 as an example. That game won awards for its accessibility. One of the things that stuck out to me was the high contrast mode and the undetectable mode. Both modes made it so that people could easily play and experience the game, even with sight difficulties, even with issues with co-ordination. As an able bodied player, I can point to that experience and we can all agree that that's not how the game is supposed to be played. You're meant to feel the fear of getting spotted when surrounded by enemies. You're supposed to take in the wide array of colours or lack thereof in the environments. Yet, these people got to play the game, and they got to enjoy it, despite those compromises. Because we acknowledge that there is still great game to be experienced here. I can't imagine playing the game with that High Contrast filter yet some people are more than happy to because it allows them to experience what they were previously unable to experience.

So if we can say with confidence, games like Sifu, Sekiro etc, have aspects of the game to enjoy outside of its difficulty, then we can say with certainty that even if those games had an easy mode, there is something there to enjoy, just like The Last of Us Part 2. And so, we can agree that adding difficulty for all games is fine because more people get to play it right?

Well no, because, as Huber points out, he feels differently about games with multiple difficulty settings. In some ways I think this is a poor outlook. If you feel like your accomplishment is lesser simply because someone could have experienced it with an easier time, I think there's a small nugget of elitism there, especially when you acknowledge the previous point that there's something to be enjoyed here outside of the difficulty. It comes off a little like "Only I get to enjoy this other part of the game".

That said, especially with From Software games where messages between players and co-operation are built into the fabric of those games, there is something to be said about the shared adversity of playing a difficult game. By working your way through a game like Sekiro or Sifu, you build intimate bonds with people you will probably never meet. It's like a less overt version of finding someone's ladder that they left behind in Death Stranding. You can instantly relate to each others experience and that bond feels special, despite never meeting them. And I think that bond can feel soured if suddenly everyone can get to the final boss of Sekiro, if suddenly everyone can get to Gwyn, without having to go through the same hardships you did. I think this closely relates to the elitism comment I made in the previous paragraph, and I can't decide whether it's also elitist. Maybe it is but at this moment in time, I think it's at least righteous.

Two final things I want to get across, first, and happens an awful lot, I don't think it's fair to present a KZbin Let's Play as an alternative for playing a game. If we acknowledge what we did right back at the start that the interactivity of interactive mediums is what makes them special, then obviously watching a video isn't the same. Hell, if it were a drop-in replacement, then that KZbin Let's Play should cost $60 to watch. Last, is that I want developers to innovate when it comes to difficulty. At least when I talk about easy modes, I'm not talking about throwing in some damage sliders, or an invincibility cheat, or a skip boss button. Just like The Last of Us Part 2, I want developers to rethink how difficulty affects the ability for people to play their game and adjust it in ways that make sense for their game. If you can make the next From Software game easier for some people, while still retaining that euphoric feeling that we all so greatly appreciate, then that's a win for everyone. Just look at when Twitch Chat beat Dark Souls, that was achieved by modding the game so that it paused every second to read in the next command from Twitch Chat. Imagine someone with motor skill issues being able to use that build of the game. They have to still learn enemy attack patterns and strategy, but suddenly they don't need to be able to move their thumbs and fingers as fast, and suddenly they're getting to experience an albeit compromised version of Dark Souls, but still a lot of the heart of Dark Souls remains. It's not wrong to value difficult games. Difficulty is part of the medium. But I think we should push our developers to come up with solutions that retain the core experience and make it more accessible for everyone.

[@MrWizardvoice]

I played Bloodborne and enjoyed my time up until Rom. I knew it was time to move on after the 20th time with that piece of shit spider. I'm not mad about it. I just realized I can either keep getting pissed off at Bloodborne for hours, or just move on to a different game. I played Sekiro until the first main boss that was on the horse and then hard quit realizing this ain't happening. For every From Software game I've quit I've also finished a game like Hollow Knight to completion. You win some, you lose some. It's ok for a game to be too hard. Don't be too proud to admit it. From Software games are rad.....and not for me.

[@BoknoyBuhisan]

@@SleeplessSpecter i know people who are gods at 2d games but ass at 3d. some people are more comfortable with 3d games and some are comfortable with 2d games.

[@BoknoyBuhisan]

@@SleeplessSpecter i know. gyobu is relatively easy but he is also quite annoying when you first encounter him. i died a good 10 times before i figured him out and from then he can barely hit me but he was a real pain. some people don't have the patience.

[@BoknoyBuhisan]

@@SleeplessSpecter when you are used to 2d games, you know the spacing of hits very well. it's like playing fighting games. but gyobu has a very long reach and sometimes i can't quite measure it correctly. but know that older people who are used to playing 2d games will breeze through hollow knight.

[@terencecaron2922]

@@SleeplessSpecter I got a friend who beat every Dark Soul game. He never finished Cuphead, and Im the exact opposite. People have different skills, especially between 2D/3D

[@BoknoyBuhisan]

@@SleeplessSpecter and here you are actually going with what the op is saying, can't beat it, move on and let people like what they like. it's not just patience, i'm sure he tried but we all don't have the TIME to learn how to properly win the fight when we have other things to attend to. and games for that matter.

[@godribbon]

I generally agree with Huber about difficulty, but it's totally valid for people to not try a game coz they think it'll be too hard is totally valid, especially since they don't get review codes. I think games should be accessible for everyone but it's totally fine for games to be hard otherwise

[@Ayoul]

I don't think his main point was that people shouldn't avoid games they know they won't enjoy. It's just that we've seen it where people will trash a game because they didn't put in the effort to learn it. In those instances, it's on the player and not the game.

[@pancakeburglar9361]

I’m totally with Huber regarding difficulty in games. I haven’t played Sifu yet (not enough time right now) but as a big souls fan I’m familiar with difficult games enough to accept that not every game is for everyone. I’m sure the difficulty argument will come up again once Eldin Ring comes out too.

[@hododod246]

I 100% agree with Huber's take on difficulty. Yes, difficulty and accessibility are different things. In my opinion, good accessibility settings should allow people who have disabilities to play the games they love even in the hardest difficulty. What if someone who has mobility issues wants to play last of us in grounded mode. It is a completely difficult experience than story mode. By reducing accessibility to difficulty, people just give developers and publishers an escape from prison card in my opinion. In addition to that, I would word one statement differently. Games are for everyone. But they are not for everyone's personal taste. Game developers don't have to and cannot make games geared towards everyone's personal taste. They have a vision. I am fine with difficulty options, it won't change my enjoyment of the game. But developers should not be bullied because of their vision.

[@BogeyZero]

Huber I have never agreed with someone more in my entire life. I’m absolutely loving Sifu and I’m trying to get the platinum before the easy mode update hits. I know that’s weird, but it’s my own little goal I’m setting for myself. Got to last stage at age 20 and I can’t beat last boss without aging past 25. I’m kinda at my wits end. But your rant has given me the push to keep trying.

[@mundanemorselsmundanemorse7028]

I absolutely loved the Star Wars conversation. Different views, disagreements, passion, investment. And my favorite moment of the show is Brad telling Huber to GTFO if he cant handle it lol. Love the chemistry.

[@Walkerofpaths]

Yahh

[@rustyshackleford3401]

Ben Brad and Huber, the holy trinity

[@MoDeep1212]

I agree with like 75-80% of Huber’s take on difficulty however I have to hard disagree on the idea that the devs adding an easy difficulty to any game can take away from your personal enjoyment. Not only does that mindset not make any sense to me, but I believe it’s that level of thinking that causes the narrative to be that people who like hard games to be viewed as the “bullies”. It’s one thing to prefer hard games, but it’s another to say that someone who wants an easy mode is ruining the game is a completely different thing and that’s where the gatekeeping narrative comes from. I love challenging games as much as anyone else, but if every game I’ve played had an easy mode, I just wouldn’t play that mode, while being happy that more people will enjoy it. Like don’t you want more people to play a game you love? Who cares how they experience it as long as it doesn’t directly negatively effect anyone else play-through

[@creese16]

I finished Sifu over the weekend, both endings, and it took me about 8 attempts before beating the final boss. But when I finally did it was so gratifying. Now I can get to level 3 at age 20, and the third boss still gives me trouble in her first phase so I’ll die usually 2 times. But man, it’s such an incredibly rewarding game.

[@ComicsLamar]

The Tower is very tough to get through without at least dying once lol. Even with shortcuts. The game likes to throw the heavy basher and spin kick girl at you at the same time.

[@abxy2257]

I struggled with 3rd boss first phase alot too, until I realised you can just keep your distance and not dodge a single thing! When she finishes her string of moves you can run in and hit her. I also take in a fresh bat to help me get it over quicker!

[@already_in_use_]

Great episode Allies, thanks! Interesting discussion about difficulty. It's an important topic that deserves to be talked about. I understand the players that want easier difficulty options. But for some games I tend to agree it could take away from the experience. Like Huber said, I think gamers give up too quickly these days. If every game had an easy option, I'm afraid most gamers would immediately switch to that the moment a game pushes back even just a little. For me Returnal probably was the hardest game I ever played. Mostly because I'm not great at shooting gameplay. But I stuck with it and went from thinking the game is impossible to beating it several times comfortably. I will always remember the immense satisfaction I felt beating it and I'm glad the game didn't offer me an easy way out.

[@GlitchDeity]

My take on difficulty in games: More accessibility for absolutely anyone, regardless of reason or necessity, is fantastic and should always be strived for. I played Dark Souls for the first time a couple months ago and it was FANTASTIC. However, I fully believe and stand by the idea that someone could get immense joy from exploring that world EVEN if all combat was removed. It wouldn't be the most ideal version of Dark Souls by quite a lot, but someone that as of now hasn't been able to see beyond the first tiny fragment of that world, might be able to enjoy something beautiful if they could choose to remove one element from their time with the game. However, with that being said! Great game worlds, mechanics, pacing, and everything else should be designed together, with the balance and flow of all elements in mind, which... creates problems when difficulty options are involved in general. I think Souls games are so great because all their elements are designed tightly together, so pacing and difficulty affect everything else very well. Because of those previous thoughts, I believe just having a difficulty option makes any game worse UNLESS the game very clearly presents which setting the whole game was designed for. Bumping a game up too high could ruin it in the same way that dropping it too low could. So I believe the solution to every and all difficulty discussions is simple: Do what Celeste did. Celeset does exactly what I previously described, it blended all elements, including difficulty and story telling together. Celeste has a very clear intended difficulty that leaves us with a beautiful game, and at the same time, Celeste allows us to dramatically change that experience in any way needed to allow absolutely everyone to enjoy whichever aspect of the game they most want to, in whichever way they want to. Between the two, it doesn't matter if all games get difficulty adjustments like Celeste, or simply make it clear which setting the game was designed for (without shaming ANYONE for choosing something else), the solution to the difficulty debate comes down to two very simple things: options and clarity. Those are my thoughts on all this anyway! The important thing is that people are just nice to each other about all of this. There's no reason to be overly defensive or aggressive when all anyone wants is to enjoy something fun.

[@legsweep4268]

One thing I like about a single difficulty is how it makes the game relatable. When you discuss a difficult boss in a from game with people. You can all relate to that moment and the ways you went about overcoming it. But when a game has multiple difficulties, it's not universally relatable. Some people will have put it on easy, others will have gone hardest, the experience they have will be too different and you lose that relatibility.

[@franciscogallardo7011]

I am one hundred percent with Michael Huber on the SIFU conversation

[@mydudepencilvesteriii7144]

Huber, I agree with you 100% on your accessibility and difficulty discussion; but, more importantly I respect how you expressed your thoughts in a clear, concise, and fair way. Well done.

[@ziyingc]

Horizon earned it from people (not small number) enjoyed the stories/lore/characters last time. I am glad guerrilla games is making the game for people that are hungry for more of that. What Huber and Brad talked about that scares people is like music to my ears. This is one of the greatest sci-fi world in the last 2 decades or so. It deserves to get more story.

[@joaofreitas2899]

Agreed, I was surprised how captivating the world and lore were in the first game, so I'm glad they're doubling down in Forbidden West. Cheers

[@jyoung188]

Great difficulty discussion even though I 100% disagree with you guys. I used to hate the “you don’t understand until you have kids” guy but I’m now that my guy haha. Time is my the most valuable currency and gaming is my favorite hobby. I just want to experience as many games as possible, drop that shit to baby mode as soon as I hit a wall, I just want to see the game through. I want to see everything the developers created, not beat my head against a roadblock that, pre kids, I would’ve overcome (beat demons, dark souls etc pre kids) but that costs time and time is the ultimate currency and I have such limited time. Again all respect to Huber for bringing an actual hot take to the show.

[@tccschreiner]

As a self-described generation of gamers, I agree wholeheartedly with Huber. Give us Skies of Arcadia, Sega. :(

[@VinceOmega]

I'm surprised it's not on Steam already.

[@MrLindenluke]

Re: difficulty, Ben seems to be suggesting that the real problem is about niche vs broader games, and that brings a whole new light to the subject. Niche communities exist and are served by niche games, and the gaming landscape would be far less interesting without those. As a lover of Shin Megami Tensei I feel if those games were made “for everybody” they’d lose everything that makes them great. Anyone can enjoy SMT or Dark Souls, but by design, not everyone will.

[@deathrowslag78]

I dunno what if someone really struggles and is not getting any enjoyment out of the game. Along comes an easier setting and this setting clicks with said person game becomes one of there favourite games. Why deny anyone a chance of falling in love with a game on there own terms. Especially when you still have your difficulty option right there

[@charoleawood]

And very often what will happen is those players will go on to challenge themselves on the harder difficulties. Knowledge, as they say, is half the battle.

[@deathrowslag78]

@@charoleawood exactly dude treat easy mode as a practice mode.

[@CuriousCorduroy]

I don't really see an issue with developers adding additional difficulty settings. People should be able to play as they want to. Someone playing through the developer intended difficulty shouldn't feel their playthrough is now diminished by someone playing on an easier difficulty or just because a new one is available.

[@silk3sm00th]

I'll catch you in the hard games Huber - on your wave for sure

[@elborrador333]

As a player who buys a video game to have a good time and not necessarily to cultivate my character at the kiln of a difficulty gimmick, I'd appreciate difficulty options.

[@BHCha-]

Thank you for the great discussion on Sifu. You literally can't discuss the difficulty /accessibility issue on Twitter and say you like the game having one difficulty without being mobbed by a group of people that will not have any other view point put forward. It's pretty sad.

[@robardian3697]

Twitter is a cesspool and I find myself lately not even wanting to go on it because it's hard to even have an opinion.

[@happyfundave]

When a developer comes out saying they want to make other difficulties and was working on that since before release I kinda find it disrespectful to say the game shouldn't have other difficulties. Let the developers decide how their games can work.

[@felixenigma4335]

It a weird sign of America life. The bullied have become the bullies. You would think that people preaching for inclusivity would welcome different points a view but alas. Also says a lot about how Shizophrenic part of game culture has become,especially large swaths of the so called videogame press, on the one hand they complain about games lacking challenges and being samey but on the other hand there not really willing the challenge themselves at all anymore. Its getting increasing silly.

[@___IG]

@@felixenigma4335 read the anti-christ by Nietzsche. It's literally that

[@happyfundave]

@@marcushankins8171 in the case of Sifu it's developers wanting to make those modes.

[@treebush]

I think fighting games are cool but I suck at them and don't have the time to practice. Never would I want the game to be dumb down to fit me, because then it would lose what made those games so special and why I am impressed with people who play them. A person who plays a modified version would never understand what type of experience the people who've played the game on its intended design would and would then have a completely different view of the game.

[@charoleawood]

Most fighting games have difficulty options. Ben Moore praised Guilty Gear Strive as much for its accessibility as for its graphics and gameplay.

[@otterdonnelly9959]

@@charoleawood Pretty sure he is mostly talking about Vs mode

[@charoleawood]

​@@otterdonnelly9959 Well, a robust community engaged in the fighting game scene will welcome newcomers. Good matchmaking will pair skillful players with each other and unskillful players with each other. In such a way people learn to "get gud" through appropriate difficulty and the application of time. You may never be at the level of the top players in a franchise, it may not be in your ability no matter how many hours you put in. However, even though you aren't ever going to experience the game in the same way as top players, if you are involved in the game competing with similarly skilled opponents, you are still said to have experienced the game. I've played several hundred hours of Age of Empires 2 over the years, I can see that top competing players are playing a different game than myself, but I still get to say I've played AoE2. Even though I've never done a match against a human opponent I've immersed myself in the game's mechanics and I can follow along well enough when I watch a match. Players who beat a game on easy get to say that they payed that game on easy. They don't get to say they beat it on Normal, but maybe they were as challenged on Easy as others were on Normal. Still others didn't find Normal so difficult and had to play on Hard in order to experience the "developer's intent" for the appropriate difficulty.

[@reed1645]

I don't see the point in making sifu easier. The visuals are really nice but the story seems pretty simple so.. the challenge and the loop seem very much like the point of the game.

[@charoleawood]

@@reed1645 Is there any point to having an option to make it harder? Replayability perhaps? Perhaps for the pro gamer sort that finds Normal too easy?

[@christoffersjostrom4555]

Difficulty is such an interesting topic. I'm completely with Brad about having one difficulty feels much better. It also gives me as a player the confident that I probably can do it, as I'm playing the creators vision, I don't have the choice to affect this. If it's too hard, then I will know that and can let it go if I don't feel like it's worth my time. With multiple choices on difficulties it's so easy to start doubt yourself, or you can even getting anxiety when starting the game, wishing you've chosen the right one for you. I'm playing God of War 2018 new game+ at the moment and I believe I had these issues the first time as well tbh. But I'm always questioning the difficulty, and the differences between the two difficulties are huge, it's either a breeze or I'll get wrecked by two hits AND the enemies are suddenly "bulletsponges". I also believe that with one difficulty it's probably way easier for the developer to balance the game.

[@citizen3000]

Yeah, you can have multiple difficulty levels but that doesn't actually mean they've been properly balanced. If Devs make a game with one difficulty in mind and they only add others because they feel obligated to by market forces than you both easily miss out on how they really wanted you to play AND you could find yourself unsatisfied with a game that is too easy with mechanics that seem pointless (because they don't come alive until a higher difficulty) or frustrated by something that feels unbalanced because the Devs heart wasn't really in it and they just maxed out the HP sliders on the enemies or whatever. There's something reassuring about having one difficulty. This is what they intended, this is what they balanced for, this is the challenge level at which they feel all the mechanics become essential.

[@DARKDEATHKILLER]

I 100% agree with Huber on the difficulty part. Some of the magic of the Souls games is that everyone played the exact same game and everyone who beat it did so with the same set of tools. You would not have discussions around how difficult Ornstien and Smough are if there was an easy mode which made it into "mash R1 to win". I don't think all games should be for everyone at all. If you can't beat a game, there's always KZbin if you want to "experience" it. Having no difficulties pushes people who actually want to beat a game to TRY instead of giving up and bumping the difficulty down, and the game will be balanced better for this one difficulty. Also, I'm all for accessibility in games that allow for a more diverse experience, but not all games should be for everyone, gatekeeping or not. Some games are just more challenge oriented than others.

[@Hazz3r]

A video isn’t a substitute for playing a game.

[@DARKDEATHKILLER]

@@Hazz3r So play the game on its own terms then, or don't. Both approaches are fine. There are way more excellent games out there than one person can play. Pick one more suited to you.

[@chocobo92]

and people bitched about using certain tools in dark souls to make dark souls mash R1 to win, so make easy modes because the same people are going to complain that you trivialized their "real" video game anyway.

[@alexandredoiron2124]

I've never been mad at Game of Thrones. I still like it to this day. Characters were great

[@wesleylang172]

On sifu, I think there is nothing wrong with being difficult. But get the ramping up right. Have that second boss come later on the game. Problem solved.

[@trulydeadly]

Who's the second boss? The guy with the flaming staff?

[@Walkerofpaths]

The second boss was soo easy

[@mwmrhdm]

I don't agree with Huber's statements about the MCU not standing on their own. I'm hyped to the high heavens for Multiverse of Madness and it has nothing to do with how it'll setup the next 5 movies. WandaVision and Loki were extremely unique shows that really dig into the character's psyches, to dismiss them as generic MCU stuff is not something I can agree with.

[@TeeKetch]

I agree and disagree with Huber's point on difficulty. I am loving Sifu, have completed it twice and am now working to get through the game 25 or under. But the thought that them adding difficulty settings somehow demeans the game is wild. Why would it be a problem if this allows more people to experience this game we love? The devs have already said they adjusted some bosses fo being too difficult before the difficulty level announcement. They can only QA so much internally. Lastly I will say you are viewing the game's difficulty through your own lens. To you playing a game on Hard is the norm but for other folks "normal" may be their hard. All I'll say in the end is these settings take absolutely nothing away from your experience and any narrative of folks who like the difficulty being seen as villains may be more a reflection of the folks you're following/reading opinions of than the broader community at large.

[@thepuppetmaster9284]

That discussion about difficulty is interesting. First, definitely agreed about “accessibility” and “difficulty” are two different things. Second. As a guy who born in the 80’s and grown up around challenging games like Battletoads, Ninja Gaiden, Mega Man, Contra, Ghost n’ Ghoblins, etc, i’m just sad and also angry to see there’s less and less challenging single player games that test our skill and reaction time to the limit because pubs / devs don’t want backlash from mainstream casuals audiences who thinks every games needs to cater to their taste 🙄

[@HalfpennyTerwilliger]

I'm very disapointed by the discussion on Sifu and difficulty. I think it's an interesting subject and I was curious about your opinions. But I felt like I just watched you built a strawman with an "entitled whiner painting itself as a victim ruining our game with its easy mode" sign and punched it for half an hour instead of discussing the issue.

[@citizen3000]

That's not a straw man, every single of those arguments is made repeatedly by that side of the debate. If you think it's a strawman please give yourself a dose of reality by visiting Twitter or a game forum.

[@HalfpennyTerwilliger]

@@citizen3000 I'm not saying there's no one saying what Huber said (people dropping the game after a few tries and complaining, I agree, that's a thing), my issue is that it's the only viewpoint they adressed.

[@citizen3000]

@@HalfpennyTerwilliger I don't think any of them think complaining is a problem. It's demanding that games can only be made one way that's the problem.

[@HalfpennyTerwilliger]

@@citizen3000 That's an argument that circles on itself. You can't say "you can't demand games can only be made one way (with various difficulty modes)" while arguing it's perfectly fine for games to be made only one way (with one unique difficulty mode). There's a real discussion to have about how games are made and how difficulty modes, options and accessibility can be implemented. Unfortunately nearly every discussions on the topic these days end up completely polarized and end up in 0/1 arguments and that's too bad.

[@citizen3000]

@@HalfpennyTerwilliger I can argue that actually because those two things are entirely different. I don't go round demanding that devs make their game with only one difficulty mode, so your analogy doesn't work. I have never attacked a game for having difficulty modes. I'm also not saying that all games should have one single (high) difficulty; I'm defending the right of individual games to do that whereas the other side want to stamp out the existence of single difficulty hard games. These people demand that ZERO games be made with a fixed high difficulty. You can have all the complex, nuanced discussion you want but it's pointless because it always ends in the same place: game X MUST include difficulty options. It is considered unacceptable to do otherwise or argue otherwise.

[@InnerRise]

Concerning the combat in Horizon Forbidden West. It's not much different until you UNLOCK those moves. So you're forced to go down an upgrade tree for something that should already be accessible when you could be going down an upgrade tree you actually want to do. Edit: Also. I think the difficulty conversation was very focused on The Gamers that like easy options vs gamers who dont and their perceptions of one another. But the people who dont think there should be options for other people. I think that's the conversation. Regardless of victims and villains and bullies. Just why does it matter to them at all. And why should it matter. I think Ben walked the line and spoke on behalf of both sides. But kinda felt like Huber was villainizing people who want options. In doing so, he kind of fulfilled the role he was projecting onto the other side.

[@JimsGameRoom]

Huber loves that Peacemaker is relatively disconnected from baggage, 5 seconds later says the finale should be a Suicide Squad movie sequel hahaha. Love you man

[@darkraider7]

Huber telling everyone to Git Gud is my favorite gaming moment of the year 😅

[@mustakarhu95]

I usually play games on normal or hard. But my take is if games have easy mode (or some helpful settings) it does not take away anything from me. my playthrough would still be the same regardless, if souls games had an easy mode it would not change anything from how i play them now. So i cant understand being against adding an easy mode to games, that just feels elitist and not all people play games to be challenged, or can play hard games because of disabilities.

[@Syktris]

Correction: dying light 1 had parkour and combat skill trees, although in the first game they were named agility and power , but it was the same system of leveling them up, and there was also a survivor skill tree.

[@thewhitewolf4968]

I may be the few people that think this but I love Dying Light 2. I dont think it's a perfect game nor do I think it's 9 game but I love it for what it is. The parkour, the co-op, the world itself. I wish there were more variety and unique human enemies with different attack patterns ( personal gripe ) The side missions are surprisingly good. Not Witcher 3 level but it's pretty good! All in all good I'd say don't miss out on this. More pros than cons

[@thewhitewolf4968]

@@jayjayson9613 they do choose a little. I'm playing primarily pk and my friend is playing primarily survivors. I've played in his game and little things do change. I think the execution could be better ( I assume from Ben's response )

[@CRedd9830]

Huber is taking this difficulty thing way too serious. I understand he has made a career out of video games but for most people it's just a hobby (even if your passionate about it), if people want to play on easy who cares.

[@cbt1138]

I think their arguments are definitely from the perspective of people who play video games for a living. They spent half an hour throwing out their judgments on the views of people who don’t have the luxury of playing video games for eight hours at a time, like they do, because they feel like they’re above it. They get to breathe rarified air that most of us will never know.

[@citizen3000]

@@cbt1138 There will be films and books you find totally impenetrable too, but nobody would pretend that authors or directors need to rush to make sure their works are entirely approachable by literally everyone. Not everything is for everyone. I'm not a professional critic and I entirely agree with them. It's not because they have masses of time to play games, it's because they respect the sanctity of the medium and how important artistic vision is. This medium comes down to gameplay. There's nothing wrong with insisting upon a certain type of gameplay.

[@cbt1138]

Agree to disagree.

[@citizen3000]

@@cbt1138 What an impressive counter argument.

[@DonLionheart]

Just so you guys are aware, not that I expect acknowledgment so many days after this went live, but Genshin is like 90% singleplayer. You can co-op, but the entire story is required to be played solo.

[@TheXDownpour]

I gotta say this conversation about Sifu difficulty get's off to a bad start with everyone blindly agreeing to the "accessibility != difficulty" argument. Pay attention to any accessibility advocate in the gaming space and almost every one of them will say that difficulty is a form of accessibility. Obviously accessibility can take many other forms and difficulty options don't solve every accessibility need, at the end of the day no studio no many how many resources they pour into accessibility efforts can cover for every possible disability out there. Difficulty options can help cover the difference. And the thing is we've seen games show how they can deliver a crafted difficult experience, much like Sifu does, while still delivering accessibility options through difficulty. Look at Hades "God Mode" or Celeste "Assist Mode". Hade's God Mode being just a simple reduction of damage you receive which means you can make more mistakes while Celeste assist mode lets you tweak individual components of the game's difficulty. I think most people would agree that those games are still hard, but satisfying at their base level and that those options took nothing away from the experience.

[@chocobo92]

personally i separate the two because I want accessibility to specifically refer to people who are not able bodied or have other detriments that need specialization in design to address, rather than just people that are impatient or too used to instant gratification and want things to be accessible to them - which i think is who Huber is talking about. I agree it can cover the bases and not hurt anyone. I'm not hurt that I can't beat ninja gaiden on master ninja.

[@Not_Liquid]

Loved the Sifu discussion.

[@martymcintosh5026]

Brad "Fashionborne" Ellis

[@jamesm.gemino664]

Yo! Always a delight yo have my question selected. Makes my day! Enjoy yourselves!

[@charoleawood]

You should play Folklore and Ni No Kuni

[@pheria]

I'm one of the people that always goes for easy and probably won't play a game if it's too hard. If I know it's hard and will frustrate me and I can avoid it, then it's no big deal there are plenty of things to play. But if I bought something with the intention of relaxing with it, and then discover it is more challenging (or more relevant: more frustrating) than I expected now I also feel like I made a mistake/wasted money on top of it. I lean more toward the opinion that an easy mode doesn't take away from someone's hard mode victory. You beat it on hard, I beat it on easy- I, personally speaking, don't see a problem. It's difficult for me to see the why having that hard difficulty be the only difficulty makes it more satisfying for you, and easy to (falsely?) assume that you just like being able to say you did something other people couldn't. I feel like you can accomplish the same thing by saying "I beat it on hard" (but I think there's more to it than my assumption). The point I do agree more with is that whomever makes the game can do whatever they want. It doesn't free them from criticism, people will always be critical and voice opinions, but if they want to stand by one, hard difficulty then so be it. There are plenty of other things for me to play. I think about old games a lot with this too, it would almost be nice if we just had cheat codes again. I beat the difficult game, but I'm a cheater and didn't do it 'legit'. I'm okay with this. :D Trophies/achievements help here too, you get a trophy for hard, I don't. Fine by me. I will add on to this that there are some games I really enjoy putting the time into and getting good at. (8 Button Mode in DJMAX Respect for example, getting the platinum trophy for DJMAX Technika Tune) I've sat down for hours for days in a row failing something just because *I* wanted to accomplish it. It was frustrating at times, and felt good to achieve. I'm not willing to put that into most games, and this game even had different modes. Other people can play the easier modes, enjoy the game and the songs.I take satisfaction knowing I play a mode many people struggle with because I invested the effort, but the easier modes don't rob me of my satisfaction. I struggle to see why they would or should. There are good ways to offer criticism though, too, I do agree with that. I can criticize a game without condescendingly trying to say the creator needs to change it to suit me. I can give them that feedback without pretending "I'm right, how dare you make such a mistake". If they don't want to listen, that's also fine - they don't have to. I like to draw analogies with other types of content that not everyone likes. Sexualization/fanservice, graphic violence etc. Some people are there for that, some are indifferent, some are hard out because of it. That's all fine, and voicing that is fine too but it's also fine if they decide not to listen to you. It is for someone, and it doesn't have to be for you. Would an option to turn these things down take away from my enjoyment of leaving it on? No, but I also don't think the developer *has* to give you options. It's nice if they do, but if they didn't, they didn't.

[@kingofthesharks]

I unintentionally Platinum'd Zero Dawn because I got engrossed in the lore and how the rewards for exploration fulfilled that quality. The present-day characters were okay but the backstory was a lot more interesting and became 1 of my favorite surprises of HZD, along with the Tearblast arrows. Luckily, I played it before BotW so it didn't feel "backwards" as an open world. Yet I totally get why some people thought the game was "vanilla" especially if they've played 50 open world games thru the 2010s. I am totally down for HFW taking its time narratively and I'm glad to hear the PS4 version doesn't pull a Cyberpunk haha

[@kylelussier7323]

I completely agree with Huber's Sifu take but for Souls games. Always painted as the villain defending Fromsoft and any game with one hard difficulty. For me, one thing I love about having a single difficulty setting, especially one with a strong fanbase, is sharing that comradery with the rest of the community, knowing we went through similar perils and tribulations. Not many games are better without fewer difficulty options, but IMO these intentionally difficult and potentially demoralizing, but ultimately rewarding games like Sifu and Souls that are built around the difficulty of the game should stick with their guns and keep to the original vision. Sifu gave in, and that's fine; Sloclap certainly deserves those sales, but I'd wish gamers would just go and pick one of the other billion games to play than continually rag on devs like Fromsoft hoping they eventually cave.

[@somebody4298]

Really hoping we're getting something on KOFXV, especially because Ben was excited for it, game's getting good press and is pretty tight, as far as my short experience with it on PC goes.

[@297fihsy]

Loved Huber’s difficulty rant. Totally agree. Git gud is a meme but it has merit! Learn the mechanics. Have some patience. That said, some games need to be good enough to earn your patience. Souls games are difficult sure, but the act of playing them and experiencing those worlds is so rewarding that it’s worth investing the time.

[@brianstrike2781]

Sifu developers + Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles = 10/10 please universe/Huber’s dreams

[@toval6255]

The bully image is coming from you wanting to take away the option for a easy mode. Because when difficulty options are taken away in games, it's always the hard mode experience that is taken as the "Intended Experience" and never the easy mode experience. So it really hard not to see you as 'bullies' when you want to take my difficulty option and only keep yours when we could have both. PS: I'm having difficulty writing this in the 3rd person perspective. So I'm just gonna leave this in 1st person perspective.

[@citizen3000]

You can't have both if the devs vision is a particular level of challenge and that that challenge is key to having the mechanics gel. Just accept that not everything is for you, because you're not in fact the protagonist of reality. You're not the most important person in the world.

[@toval6255]

@@citizen3000 I'm so tired of the sentiment that if I'm not playing the game in it hard difficulty as the dev vision it then there no point in me playing it. It's such a self assuming stance that since you won't enjoy the game in easy mode then I won't enjoy it too. Everyone different. I prefer my singeplayer games to be chill experiences of me going through the game world & its story. Which easy mode gives me the ability to do just in hard games. I find them to be just as rewarding for me the same way as you winning against a hard encounter. So stop forcing everybody else who prefer playing game a different way to the way you prefer to play especially in a singleplayer game. Let people play how they want to play.

[@citizen3000]

@@toval6255 I don't care what you enjoy. I care what the dev wants the game to be. No-one is forcing you to play hard games; no-one is making you play Sifu. Play something else. Let devs make games how they want to make them.

[@toval6255]

@@citizen3000 Yeah the devs vision in the game is left untouch & fully intact in its current iteration and also maybe improved in the upcoming harder mode. But the addition of a easy mode doesn't affect those 2 other modes especially the experiences of those who have played the game already. Let the dev chose what options a game will have and let other players choose which given option they want to take. Don't make those 2 decision for yourself for them both.

[@citizen3000]

@@toval6255 "Let the dev choose what options a game will have" This is where we started off. Me and others like me argue precisely this: let the Devs decide how hard their game is. That obviously includes them choosing to make it a very hard, single difficulty game. Either they get to decide what they want, or they don't. Make your mind up.

[@Ceriden]

Holy Hell do I find Huber's entire argument infuriating.

[@Hailu_316]

When it's these three, you know it's gonna be a good time.

[@Ronaconda973]

Sifu's difficulty feels just about right, save for the bosses and certain levels having weird spikes but it seems designed well for that. also, stay off twitter, no good grounded discussion happens there

[@MilesWilliams88]

I agree. I beat the game last night. I'm working on 100% completing it now. The difficulty felt challenging but fair for the most part. Sometimes the low sweeps can be a little hard to react to in time, but once you figure out the rhythm for them, they're not too bad.

[@LiquidVelocity9]

Honestly, Huber complains about toxic culture around difficulty discussions, but his arguments totally add to the toxicity in this case in my opinion. He doesn't allow the notion that people don't want to play games the way he does. He takes personal offense to people wishing for an easy mode. The fact that an easier mode devalues his experience of the base game is his issue entirely. People really overestimate the mystique around creator's intent. Developers want people to enjoy their games. Developers can make games too hard. Developers could have anticipated that people won't struggle at a point people struggle heavily at. Games are a dialogue and what works for one person doesn't work for many others and letting go of letting outside factors influence your experience and this self-assigned mystified notion of creator's intent will make for a way healthier discourse.

[@charoleawood]

Developers also make games "too easy" depending on perspective. If Sifu had only added Hard mode based on player feedback (and they are adding Hard mode) then there wouldn't be this conversation about "creator's intent" and the devs being "bullied" into adding a more difficult option. This conversation only exists because of a gatekeeping attitude toward Easy difficulty options. If having a game add "Hard" mode doesn't "take away" form a person's experience then the addition of "Easy" shouldn't either.

[@LiquidVelocity9]

@@charoleawood Totally! Games are a super volatile thing to develop and the idea that the way a game comes out is totally intended and untouchable is weird. I can agree with the need to be really careful when adjusting difficulty for all players across the board, but options? Yeah, sure. I like my games to push back, but what is push back for me might be an insurmountable wall to someone else and vice versa.

[@johnny8183]

I don’t see how adding easier difficulty ruins the game for people who aren’t going to play on easy. It’s a bit of a weird take. I’m going to finish Sifu on the difficulty it came with btw, but still a weird one.

[@baircade]

I think some people just have no self control. Scared the option of going easier will be too tempting.

[@TheLastDaysOfSorrow]

I think there'd also be the mental damage of the option to switch to easy difficulty constantly scratching at the back of your mind. It's something the souls-games already bypass by giving you the option to call in other players. At worst the game would constantly ask if you want to lower the difficulty. There'd also potentially be the additional workload to build a game for let's say three different difficulties opposed to just one, which could lead to an unbalanced experience overall and longer development. But heck, I'm not a developer so take that with a grain of salt.

[@charoleawood]

​@@TheLastDaysOfSorrow I've felt dissatisfied in games where I'm able to switch the difficulty around on the fly. I think if I was developing a game I'd lock you into your difficulty choice at the start. Or perhaps I'd enable you to bump your difficulty up on the fly but if you want to bump it down you have to restart the story though you'd get to keep your character progress. Difficulty options don't slow down development. Nobody looks at a game that doesn't have easy mode but does have hard and very hard and says, "Ugh! Hard and very hard shouldn't be there! That took away from development time!" The development time argument was used back in the day when Ubisoft tried to defend not having female characters playable in Assassin's Creed multiplayer. It's nonsense. Anyway, with Sifu difficulty options, including Hard, are being added after the fact, dev time was not impacted in the slightest. FromSoft has gotten away with murder by releasing games that require quick reaction times but have piss poor frame pacing and 30fps performance. All the reviews back in the day said "It's completely fair, whenever I died it was completely my fault," like a bunch of dumb parrots. Well, if that was true about Dark Souls with its enemies who can attack through walls and an auto camera (set to on by default) which knocked players off ledges then no game ever has been unfair. And I say this as somebody who loves the Souls games.

[@JorinEvers288]

I think something just went wrong with the messaging with Sifu in regards to gamers' expectations. I think people, myself included, saw the combat and figured: 'that looks like a cool kung fu game that's like Batman Arkham in terms of combat. Cool, I'll play!' And those games are relatively easy. People spend their money and then find out the game's actually way harder than what they were expecting and that's where that dissonance comes in. It doesn't align with people's expectations and they get upset because they feel like that wasn't communicated to them clearly. When in reality they saw the gameplay footage and figured it'd be like batman' s combat. I was going to buy the game, but then I heard about the difficulty and I decided not to get it. But I have to admit that I don't feel like I ever heard about the game being difficult before its release. Could just be me though.

[@charoleawood]

But when Easy does get added you can check Sifu out at that less punishing difficulty

[@citizen3000]

@@charoleawood Yes, and fail to see the developers actual vision.

[@superbadisfunmy]

...wait for reviewers lol

[@InnerRise]

@@citizen3000 If the developers put it in, it is their vision And these developers ALWAYS intended to add them later so you have no argument here.

[@samisalamii]

Huber’s arguments were very gatekeepy ironically with his thoughts that adding an easy mode reduced his experience playing the game. That is just ridiculous. I understand feeling it, but I think you should take a step back, cool off, and try to dissociate the experience of others from your personal enjoyment of a game. No one will take away your successes, it is just an option. Play how you wanna play.

[@thedurtylemur2282]

I think you failed to truly understand the conversation.

[@samisalamii]

@@thedurtylemur2282 I agree with many of the points in the discussion besides his last one that adding an easy mode affected him.

[@licka]

I'm with Huber on the difficulty thing. I love games that only have the one setting and are very challenging. To me playing those feels a lot more satisfying than playing a game on hard mode because I know the difficulty wasn't an afterthought and everything was meticulously designed to be just right. I also enjoy knowing everyone is on a level playing field when they pick it up. When presented with different difficulty settings I usually go for 'Normal', because I assume that's how the game was designed to be played and the risk of encountering a poorly designed hard mode is not worth it.

[@borgs101]

I agree with Huber on difficulty, in my view there is no shame walking away from a game if it's not for you. Some games are about trying multiple times and triumphing over them, that's what they're about. In the same way that games have content that isn't for everyone violence, swearing, sexual content etc games being interactive will have some games that aren't for everyone because of the difficulty.

[@robardian3697]

I think for people in my age group and older for the most we grew up on single difficulty games like Sonic, Contra and so many others. We have triumphed over some of the toughest games we had to. We grew up in an age where thousands of games were not at our fingertips and practiced on the same game for hours.

[@borgs101]

@@robardian3697 for sure I am 36 and grew up with those sorts of games

[@r.f.switch5847]

35:25 Ok, I have a major problem with what Huber said, but it comes from WHY so many people want an easier mode in these games. Accessibility. And I mean that as in the people who want to enjoy the game, but can't because the game is so hard that their hands/brain cannot process how to get through it (like, disabilities that cause a person's motor functions to not be good enough for those games). I am obviously on the side of an easy mode in Dark Souls because I am disabled (Autism, among other much more frightening mental conditions), and I have a lot of friends with disabilities (ranging from crohn's disease to paraplegia, autism to down syndrome.) I'm not saying this to knock Huber, obviously I know he is a decent person and is sensitive to this kind of criticism. I'm just saying that the contention isn't just because people 'give up to easily' but because it's an actual impassable wall for some people who want to enjoy these games, but their personal circumstances won't allow them to.

[@r.f.switch5847]

And to the people who are going to argue with me on this... Yeah, you absolutely are gatekeeping. You are telling those people who wish to enjoy the games and worlds within that they can't, and must 'get over (their disabilities)' in order to enjoy it. That is the definition of gatekeeping. Obviously, I am saying all of this out of love, I love the Allies enough to be willing to check them when they say something that can be hurtful...

[@r.f.switch5847]

Also, if you need to ask what my limit is.... I play Bass fairly well, and I CAN'T play past medium on Guitar Hero/Rockband.

[@chocobo92]

i think it's pretty clear that the people most vocal about this stuff want the numbers to be tweaked and wouldn't even be able to come up with ways to address disabilities. Designing a game for disabilities is a different design task than making you not lose as much HP or even making enemy AI not as aggressive. I don't think adjusting the numbers would help someone that has some of the things you've mentioned, it requires a separate approach through options an able-bodied person would not necessarily benefit from. It should be pretty agreeable that designing unique options/playstyles for people with disabilities that are universal should be in basically every video game. The barrier of putting it behind a menu that says "accessibility" instead of "difficulty" would likely deter a lot of this controversy anyway, people with too huge egos wouldn't feel like they're adjusting how "hard" the game is, and would ideally understand that it's options that don't pertain to them and are for the benefit of other people to just..interact with the game on a basic level. That doesn't mean that the game necessarily becomes easier with certain accessibility options enabled either. It becomes USABLE, that's more the point. If a game's design is really so special, then accessibility options shouldn't interfere with "the vision" ...right? or maybe the game can't actually stand on its own if you lean a bit more in the player's favor and is suddenly boring as shit.

[@ShadyHitchhiker]

I haven't even finished this episode yet and Huber's swinging fists in all directions Play games on hard, Let him spoil media, do not besmirch the phantom menace! I nearly started involuntarily ducking while listen to avoid all the blows

[@MilesWilliams88]

I beat Sifu last night. That game is so fucking rad!

[@kif1983]

I would refer Huber to a comment discussion I had with someone where I calmly explained the audiences an easier difficulty would be helpful for, and how it could be engineered in FS games to be unimpactful. In the face of calm rational points they straight up swore at me and said people who aren't hardcore shouldn't be allowed to play FS games... It is gatekeeping. On the other hand Hades was incredible, didn't feel like a waste of time to die over and over, and also included a mechanic similar to what I think FS games could have for people who need it.

[@citizen3000]

Some comment from some idiot doesn't mean that FS have an obligation to make their games easy.

[@kif1983]

@@citizen3000 never said it did, just highlighting that there is absolutely a gate keeping mentality amongst at least some people

[@zhaf]

I love every member of Easy Allies. But when Ben, Brad and Huber are in the room together..... it's one giant solid 24k pure gold bar. PS. can't wait for teh SF6 disscusions next episode.

[@IronHeadBison]

I'm waiting for Sifu's physical release in May and I'm sure it'll be updated by then, but I plan on trying it on its default difficulty before I feel like changing it.

[@MilesWilliams88]

I beat it last night. It's challenging, but it's no where near as difficult as a lot of people are making it out to be. I'm not some God at games by any means. If I can get through it then I'm sure most people can. The combat is super fun.

[@geoafe66]

Thank you Huber! on the difficulty/accessibility Sifu stuff it’s ridiculous that people aren’t willing to learn the mechanics or attempt to get good at them and immediately call for an easy difficulty. Sifu is fun because its tough! surely introducing an easy difficulty will completely change the design of the game?

[@citizen3000]

A lot of gamers nowadays want 'experiences', not anything that challenges them. So with Sifu they want a kung-Fu master flavoured 'experience'. Aesthetics, stories, graphics and 'vibes' over gameplay, and certainly they don't want their experience tainted by fail states.

[@ThePughski]

Huber with the facts!

[@CRedd9830]

Ben play Panzer Dragoon Saga!!!!! You own it man!!

[@GodIsSatan]

I appreciate the accessibility conversation, but I disagree with a lot of what Huber has to say here. I think for a nuanced topic like this, you may have to invite some guests to help dive a little deeper into the different perspectives on the conversation. I'd love to see y'all invite some accessibility specialists on to discuss this more in-depth. Maybe talk to some devs too because you'll probably get some interesting insights.

[@philbarton2832]

Really selfish take from huber regarding his 72 hour till spoilers statement, expected better from him honestly. Here's a suggestion huber, how about not spoiling at all and not robbing someone's surprise and joy.

[@KamenRiderBlackSun]

i love big sprites and i cannot lie

[@andrewr6048]

Huber, you’re spot on about difficulty. One unappreciated aspect of having a standard difficulty is that it creates a common ground for discussion, and this can be essential to the fun. Take the recent phenomenon of Wordle. The fun of Wordle is that each day everyone is asked to guess the same word. Everyone compares scores with their friends and family because they know they’re playing the same game. Wordle does have a “hard mode,” but it’s barely different, so it doesn’t put a wall between people who play with it enabled and people who don’t. However, imagine if Wordle offered three difficulties with significant differences between them. The party would be over. By fragmenting players and complicating score comparison, putting an easy mode into Wordle would in fact ruin the fun for others. It would diminish the social aspect. It is the knowledge that everyone is playing the same game you are that makes it fun and easy to compare Wordle scores. In fact, recently, when people were accidentally given different words to guess, there was outrage; articles were written. That’s because the fun of Wordle goes beyond the game. Offering everyone the same task is what makes Wordle fun and social, and the same is true of games like Dark Souls and Sekiro.