Sadly, that sort of difficulty level is an absolute and total necessity nowadays. There's no way the game could get away without having that. AAA games in particular have taught alot of players to just expect wins to be handed to them, so when they run into REAL difficulty, they're put off by it badly. Thus.... the easy modes. Yes, I hate them too. Heck, I did not even once test them; this is the reason for the original set of bugs the Warden had. I hadnt spotted the issue that caused him to work just fine in normal, but to get all weird in easy/very easy.
Or maybe they're a difficulty level for people who have never played a game like this before, young children, older people who don't have the reaction speeds they used to, people who actually just want to experience a game's story without having to stress over the difficulty, or people who are just REAL BAD at video games. Video games becoming more popular amongst people who previously wouldn't have played them is something to be celebrated, not derided.
I know. But this isnt a casual game in any respect; being labelled "bullet hell" *and* "roguelike / roguelite" immediately connects it with two of the hardest genres that exist. By default, this type of game is difficult. And that's their normal/easy difficulty.
Particularly for a bullet-hell type thing, Normal on it's own is *very* tame in most places. The Warden is where it starts to heat up a bit, and Terminus is the one that really pushes it, at least as far as that goes. Not to mention the fact that you can take a great many hits before going down; all you have to do is spend some time exploring each floor and gaining items and EXP.
Besides, I didn't mean it just in reference to THIS game. It's more a blanket statement about the current state of the industry, and it's my genuine opinion. Alot of games like this truly arent all that hard. Alot of games, way back when, that really were designed for everyone (as in, they werent specifically made to be hard) were about as difficult as this is. But the AAA side of things hadnt exploded yet, and hadnt lowered the bar yet; so players werent constantly trained to just EXPECT victory. They would play the games, get a bit of practice, and after a time, beat them. With many games, it really didn't take all that long even just for a more casual player. And many of those are either as tough as this one on it's base or slightly lower difficulty, or they can be a little tougher (Hard mode in this game though IS quite a spike).
But major games in particular have just been handing out victories and such left and right that even those that consider themselves "hardcore" nowadays just cant deal with something like this anymore (and this, to me, is where the problem is). Give them an older game on the NES or SNES, and it'll tear their faces off and beat them over the head with it. The "major" games have lowered the bar SO much that you have to actually SEARCH for games that have something resembling actual challenge in them. The closest that that side of the industry gets to this is probably the Souls games. Aside from that? Infinite continues, regenerating health, very slow enemies, easy bosses that jump up and down (slowly) and scream "HEY LOOK RIGHT HERE THIS IS MY WEAK SPOT!!! Okay I'm gonna stand still for 10 full seconds so you can shoot it for a bit", and so on. AAA developers in particular dont ACTUALLY want the player to be able to lose; they might not complete the all-important story (ugh), might not feel like winners, and might not buy the next 20 sequels!
And that's just with single-player stuff.... I'm not even going to go into what happens when a player trained to expect victory goes into COMPETITVE gaming. I'll just say.... I dont play games against friends much anymore. It gives them ragequit moments, and gives me boredom.
I'm not saying that there shouldnt be easier games and such for different people. But right now, on that side of the industry? They're *all* easy. Usually REALLY easy. With, again, the Souls games being pretty much the only exception.
But that's all just me. I know many dont agree with that... which is too bad, but fine. But that's why I stick to indie games these days (because I aint getting anything worthwhile out of the big ones), and also why I tend to keep to myself most of the time; my friends are all into gaming, but I pretty much *never* discuss gaming with them. Talk about a cure for insomnia... This one forum is pretty much about as much gaming discussion as I get. This isnt likely to change anytime remotely soon.
