I think there's added enjoyment in knowing that you can only see or experience a thing if you've reached a certain level of mastery.
Knowing that you could've just knocked the difficulty down a few notches and strolled right in saps much of the satisfaction from the accomplishment.
There's something to knowing that you've done something or progressed somewhere that others couldn't.
enjoyment derived explicitly because youve experienced something other people cannot is something I dont think we should endorse
thats fundamentally a bad concept
I think knowing that you've accomplished what many others could not is a potent source of pride. I don't see it as a bad concept.
There are some things that it is important for everyone to have easy access to regardless of skill or ability - the next stage in Dark Souls is not among them.
This discussion is interesting to me when it comes to competitive multiplayer games because a lot of the discussion I've seen around the ones I play boils down (from my perspective) to "this design decision is bad because other people are better at this game than me."
People will complain about a weapon, or ability, or the way the netcode works, or whatever, when they consistently perform worse against the thing, but sometimes the deciding factor is player skill and not what the game's doing.
I don't know how to answer the questions of how much responsibility developers have to balance the game or matchmake effectively; if you only play against players of your own skill, how will you get better? But maybe not everyone wants to get better? But should getting better be part of the obligation of playing the game in the first place, is there an inherent responsibility on the player's part to get better as they play more? But what about people with genuine limitations who can't "git gud" no matter how hard they try?
And that's not getting into large scale cooperative experiences. The majority of players never complete the raids in Destiny (going by the achievement numbers) but they're the best, most rewarding content in the game. People have been shrieking about raid matchmaking for years but it just wouldn't work, you have to communicate with the people on your team to be successful, but does Bungie have a responsibility to the solo player? I don't know!
A very dumb part of my brain does feel a tinge of disappointment at the idea of telling someone "Oh, I beat <hard boss from Sekiro>" and having to clarify if it was on normal or not, and I don't think there's anything wrong with being proud you beat a hard thing in a game and wanting to share with your friends! but also who gives a shit, that's just me being an irrational baby.
It seems a little bizarre to me for people to rant about not being able to play a game because it's too hard.
I mean if it's too hard, then it's not enjoyable. If it's not enjoyable then why would you want to play it?
because there are things about a game that can be enjoyed and experienced beyond the gameplay
dark souls has a killer aesthetic, lore, and a type of atmospheric storytelling that exists almost nowhere else
tons of people have watched videos to experience that second hand because they lack the ability to clear the games challenges
This ties into the shit I was wondering about - is that experience, indeed, lesser-than? If so, why?
because actually navigating the game world is different than watching someone else do it
lets use a less enigmatic example
say you cant handle the gunplay in mass effect
you can watch someone paly through it, sure
you can even watch all the diffwrent branching paths
but its not "your" shepherds story
you havent gotten the experience of creating a character out of living through the series of choices theyve made
its a hard to pin down experience, but I had so much more of an immersive time playing through dark souls than i did just watching someone play through bloodbourne because I couldnt deal with that game
i felt much less connected to the world when it was third hand
But is "less connected" inherently bad/invalid?
I'm colorblind - there are movies that are never gonna resonate with me "right." My experience of, like, anything by Terrence Malick, or Baz Luhrman, or Wong Kar Wai, is inherently gonna be "impure." But I can read essays, I can watch analysis, I can participate in the discourse. I am removed from it, but I can see what other people get out of it, and build a bridge towards understanding.
For there to be a level playing-field for me on film enjoyment, everything would have to be black and white. And I don't want to take away color from the people that resonate with it, I just wanna see where they're coming from and feel like I can come closer to "getting it." My secondhand experiences aren't "pure," but I don't think they're invalid. I've still learned something new, experienced something new, just on different terms.
Also, could you run me through how you're defining "third hand?" I'm not sure where the extra degree of remove comes in - wanna make sure I'm not misinterpreting.
but you can still experience those things
people who cant play souls cant
i think playing it os fundamentally different than watching someone do it
its like reading the cliffs notes. you still get things from it, but youre not reading the work
watching something in the wrong color set is a actually decent metaphor for this
sure youre playing it on an easier setting than designed, but you still experience it and thats not less valid
"third hand" was me trying to say youre watching another person control a character in 3rd person
so its a character that theyre controlling that youre watching
I dont know if thats the right term but it made sense in my head
But reading Cliff Notes is experiencing the work, yeah? There aren't difficulty sliders on Moby Dick, but you can still read summaries, essays, discussions. You can get what it's going for, interact with the themes, see how it fits into culture as a whole and other works in specific. There are means of absorbing what Moby Dick does without wading through a hundred pages of tedious and inaccessible whale biology text, if wading through a hundred pages of tedious and inaccessible whale biology text isn't something you are capable of/interested in doing.
I think that limiting the definition of "experiencing" a work to "actively, personally moving through it" does a disservice to the many other functions of art - the way art intersects with other works, the way it comments on or interacts with the world, the capital-D Discourse that springs up.
To stick with the color palate thing, if I watch a black and white movie when everybody else watched color, I'm still gonna need the supplemental/peripheral material to connect with people who watched it "right." The bridge to their context is built by outside works, since I am physically incapable of having their context. And if I'm dependent on that context anyway, I don't... Really see what I lose by focusing on that?
If the gameplay of something sucks for you, but it does other stuff well, I don't see the harm in removing the sucky part entirely and consuming a thing in other ways.
(Just to reiterate, since we're a few replies deep: I am not trying to argue you into thinking differently, I'm just asking you the questions I'm asking myself as the discussion around all this swirls. I think it's all interesting, and I ain't trying to, like, "win" or anything)
part of it, i think, is that adjustable difficulty has been baked into video games from pretty much their inception. not every video game does it, and the ones that do don't always do a great job, but especially nowadays most games let you bump things down to "Very Easy" if you just wanna soak in the atmosphere of the game. Sure, you could watch a no commentary let's play, or read critical essays, but when the norm is for games to at least make an effort toward letting everyone experience them, it's a little frustrating when something deviates from the norm in a way that pushes some players out, especially since a lot of disabled players rely on easier difficulties and can play plenty of other games.
What makes it more frustrating in the case of From Soft games is that they do have multiple ways of adjusting difficulty, they just only work in one direction. Sekiro has the Demon Bell and New Game Plus if you want a harder experience, but nothing at all if you want an easier one. This is actually a step back from most From games, where the online co-op worked as a de facto easy mode. Making Sekiro single player removes that option.
It seems a little bizarre to me for people to rant about not being able to play a game because it's too hard.
I mean if it's too hard, then it's not enjoyable. If it's not enjoyable then why would you want to play it?
because there are things about a game that can be enjoyed and experienced beyond the gameplay
dark souls has a killer aesthetic, lore, and a type of atmospheric storytelling that exists almost nowhere else
tons of people have watched videos to experience that second hand because they lack the ability to clear the games challenges
This ties into the shit I was wondering about - is that experience, indeed, lesser-than? If so, why?
because actually navigating the game world is different than watching someone else do it
lets use a less enigmatic example
say you cant handle the gunplay in mass effect
you can watch someone paly through it, sure
you can even watch all the diffwrent branching paths
but its not "your" shepherds story
you havent gotten the experience of creating a character out of living through the series of choices theyve made
its a hard to pin down experience, but I had so much more of an immersive time playing through dark souls than i did just watching someone play through bloodbourne because I couldnt deal with that game
i felt much less connected to the world when it was third hand
But is "less connected" inherently bad/invalid?
I'm colorblind - there are movies that are never gonna resonate with me "right." My experience of, like, anything by Terrence Malick, or Baz Luhrman, or Wong Kar Wai, is inherently gonna be "impure." But I can read essays, I can watch analysis, I can participate in the discourse. I am removed from it, but I can see what other people get out of it, and build a bridge towards understanding.
For there to be a level playing-field for me on film enjoyment, everything would have to be black and white. And I don't want to take away color from the people that resonate with it, I just wanna see where they're coming from and feel like I can come closer to "getting it." My secondhand experiences aren't "pure," but I don't think they're invalid. I've still learned something new, experienced something new, just on different terms.
Also, could you run me through how you're defining "third hand?" I'm not sure where the extra degree of remove comes in - wanna make sure I'm not misinterpreting.
but you can still experience those things
people who cant play souls cant
i think playing it os fundamentally different than watching someone do it
its like reading the cliffs notes. you still get things from it, but youre not reading the work
watching something in the wrong color set is a actually decent metaphor for this
sure youre playing it on an easier setting than designed, but you still experience it and thats not less valid
"third hand" was me trying to say youre watching another person control a character in 3rd person
so its a character that theyre controlling that youre watching
I dont know if thats the right term but it made sense in my head
But reading Cliff Notes is experiencing the work, yeah? There aren't difficulty sliders on Moby Dick, but you can still read summaries, essays, discussions. You can get what it's going for, interact with the themes, see how it fits into culture as a whole and other works in specific. There are means of absorbing what Moby Dick does without wading through a hundred pages of tedious and inaccessible whale biology text, if wading through a hundred pages of tedious and inaccessible whale biology text isn't something you are capable of/interested in doing.
I think that limiting the definition of "experiencing" a work to "actively, personally moving through it" does a disservice to the many other functions of art - the way art intersects with other works, the way it comments on or interacts with the world, the capital-D Discourse that springs up.
To stick with the color palate thing, if I watch a black and white movie when everybody else watched color, I'm still gonna need the supplemental/peripheral material to connect with people who watched it "right." The bridge to their context is built by outside works, since I am physically incapable of having their context. And if I'm dependent on that context anyway, I don't... Really see what I lose by focusing on that?
If the gameplay of something sucks for you, but it does other stuff well, I don't see the harm in removing the sucky part entirely and consuming a thing in other ways.
(Just to reiterate, since we're a few replies deep: I am not trying to argue you into thinking differently, I'm just asking you the questions I'm asking myself as the discussion around all this swirls. I think it's all interesting, and I ain't trying to, like, "win" or anything)
so i cant speak for everyone
but for me, personally, I get almost nothing out of lets plays
in most cases, id rather not experience it at all
thats not to delegitimize them, but they dont work for me
so i need other options in order to experience them
there shouldnt be one alternate way to experience something when there could be multiple that help different people
But there isn't just one alternate way?
I am godawful at Crusader Kings. Bounce off it every time I'm foolhardy enough to try. There's too much for me to keep track of, and I can make neither heads nor tails of the UI. But I can listen to podcast discussions of it, I can watch LPs, I can read after-action reports, I can read essays, I can read reviews, I can read posts on these here forums. I can see how it slots into the greater sphere of strategy games, I can see how it comments on power and politics. I can see how funny it is to see a horse emperor crowned. I've gotten a shit-ton out of a game I've never played for more than half an hour, and I don't think any of my experiences were invalid, and I don't think the game is lesser for not being accessible to me.
+1
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Lord_AsmodeusgoeticSobriquet:Here is your magical cryptic riddle-tumour: I AM A TIME MACHINERegistered Userregular
To what extent do things like Let's Plays and streaming mitigate the way difficulty can keep some people from enjoying something? I know that I have enjoyed and experienced far more video games (admittedly second hand) that I probably never would have for a variety of reasons by watching other people play them.
Of course personally, I agree generally that I don't think adding an easy mode would detract from the game experience at all. I agree with Sterling that nobody is forcing anybody to use the easy mode, and for the kind of person who wants an easy mode the game is probably going to still be hard so if difficulty is supposed to be part of the experience I don't even think an easy mode detracts from a game in that way either.
Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. - Lincoln
I think there's added enjoyment in knowing that you can only see or experience a thing if you've reached a certain level of mastery.
Knowing that you could've just knocked the difficulty down a few notches and strolled right in saps much of the satisfaction from the accomplishment.
There's something to knowing that you've done something or progressed somewhere that others couldn't.
enjoyment derived explicitly because youve experienced something other people cannot is something I dont think we should endorse
thats fundamentally a bad concept
I think knowing that you've accomplished what many others could not is a potent source of pride. I don't see it as a bad concept.
There are some things that it is important for everyone to have easy access to, regardless of skill - the next stage in Dark Souls is not among them.
having enjoyment that is specifically derived from the fact that other people cannot experience that sensation is fundamentally against my moral worldview
It goes against essentially everything I believe about how the world should work and how humans should treat each other in a society
it feels deeply, deeply wrong to me
so Ill always argue against design or rule sets that encourage that
It seems a little bizarre to me for people to rant about not being able to play a game because it's too hard.
I mean if it's too hard, then it's not enjoyable. If it's not enjoyable then why would you want to play it?
because there are things about a game that can be enjoyed and experienced beyond the gameplay
dark souls has a killer aesthetic, lore, and a type of atmospheric storytelling that exists almost nowhere else
tons of people have watched videos to experience that second hand because they lack the ability to clear the games challenges
This ties into the shit I was wondering about - is that experience, indeed, lesser-than? If so, why?
because actually navigating the game world is different than watching someone else do it
lets use a less enigmatic example
say you cant handle the gunplay in mass effect
you can watch someone paly through it, sure
you can even watch all the diffwrent branching paths
but its not "your" shepherds story
you havent gotten the experience of creating a character out of living through the series of choices theyve made
its a hard to pin down experience, but I had so much more of an immersive time playing through dark souls than i did just watching someone play through bloodbourne because I couldnt deal with that game
i felt much less connected to the world when it was third hand
But is "less connected" inherently bad/invalid?
I'm colorblind - there are movies that are never gonna resonate with me "right." My experience of, like, anything by Terrence Malick, or Baz Luhrman, or Wong Kar Wai, is inherently gonna be "impure." But I can read essays, I can watch analysis, I can participate in the discourse. I am removed from it, but I can see what other people get out of it, and build a bridge towards understanding.
For there to be a level playing-field for me on film enjoyment, everything would have to be black and white. And I don't want to take away color from the people that resonate with it, I just wanna see where they're coming from and feel like I can come closer to "getting it." My secondhand experiences aren't "pure," but I don't think they're invalid. I've still learned something new, experienced something new, just on different terms.
Also, could you run me through how you're defining "third hand?" I'm not sure where the extra degree of remove comes in - wanna make sure I'm not misinterpreting.
but you can still experience those things
people who cant play souls cant
i think playing it os fundamentally different than watching someone do it
its like reading the cliffs notes. you still get things from it, but youre not reading the work
watching something in the wrong color set is a actually decent metaphor for this
sure youre playing it on an easier setting than designed, but you still experience it and thats not less valid
"third hand" was me trying to say youre watching another person control a character in 3rd person
so its a character that theyre controlling that youre watching
I dont know if thats the right term but it made sense in my head
But reading Cliff Notes is experiencing the work, yeah? There aren't difficulty sliders on Moby Dick, but you can still read summaries, essays, discussions. You can get what it's going for, interact with the themes, see how it fits into culture as a whole and other works in specific. There are means of absorbing what Moby Dick does without wading through a hundred pages of tedious and inaccessible whale biology text, if wading through a hundred pages of tedious and inaccessible whale biology text isn't something you are capable of/interested in doing.
I think that limiting the definition of "experiencing" a work to "actively, personally moving through it" does a disservice to the many other functions of art - the way art intersects with other works, the way it comments on or interacts with the world, the capital-D Discourse that springs up.
To stick with the color palate thing, if I watch a black and white movie when everybody else watched color, I'm still gonna need the supplemental/peripheral material to connect with people who watched it "right." The bridge to their context is built by outside works, since I am physically incapable of having their context. And if I'm dependent on that context anyway, I don't... Really see what I lose by focusing on that?
If the gameplay of something sucks for you, but it does other stuff well, I don't see the harm in removing the sucky part entirely and consuming a thing in other ways.
(Just to reiterate, since we're a few replies deep: I am not trying to argue you into thinking differently, I'm just asking you the questions I'm asking myself as the discussion around all this swirls. I think it's all interesting, and I ain't trying to, like, "win" or anything)
so i cant speak for everyone
but for me, personally, I get almost nothing out of lets plays
in most cases, id rather not experience it at all
thats not to delegitimize them, but they dont work for me
so i need other options in order to experience them
there shouldnt be one alternate way to experience something when there could be multiple that help different people
But there isn't just one alternate way?
I am godawful at Crusader Kings. Bounce off it every time I'm foolhardy enough to try. There's too much for me to keep track of, and I can make neither heads nor tails of the UI. But I can listen to podcast discussions of it, I can watch LPs, I can read after-action reports, I can read essays, I can read reviews, I can read posts on these here forums. I can see how it slots into the greater sphere of strategy games, I can see how it comments on power and politics. I can see how funny it is to see a horse emperor crowned. I've gotten a shit-ton out of a game I've never played for more than half an hour, and I don't think any of my experiences were invalid, and I don't think the game is lesser for not being accessible to me.
i understand that
but Im saying that for me those things dont replace or compare to playing the game
they arent equivalents or even substitutes
i need to actually play the game myself to get anything out of it
Im glad that those things exist! I think theyre a good part of a suite of accessibility options
but i think the games themselves also need to be more open to people who want to play them
I think there's added enjoyment in knowing that you can only see or experience a thing if you've reached a certain level of mastery.
Knowing that you could've just knocked the difficulty down a few notches and strolled right in saps much of the satisfaction from the accomplishment.
There's something to knowing that you've done something or progressed somewhere that others couldn't.
enjoyment derived explicitly because youve experienced something other people cannot is something I dont think we should endorse
thats fundamentally a bad concept
I think knowing that you've accomplished what many others could not is a potent source of pride. I don't see it as a bad concept.
There are some things that it is important for everyone to have easy access to, regardless of skill - the next stage in Dark Souls is not among them.
having enjoyment that is specifically derived from the fact that other people cannot experience that sensation is fundamentally against my moral worldview
It goes against essentially everything I believe about how the world should work and how humans should treat each other in a society
it feels deeply, deeply wrong to me
so Ill always argue against design or rule sets that encourage that
But how does this extend to e.g. sports or games where you're directly instead of indirectly in competition with other players
I think there's added enjoyment in knowing that you can only see or experience a thing if you've reached a certain level of mastery.
Knowing that you could've just knocked the difficulty down a few notches and strolled right in saps much of the satisfaction from the accomplishment.
There's something to knowing that you've done something or progressed somewhere that others couldn't.
enjoyment derived explicitly because youve experienced something other people cannot is something I dont think we should endorse
thats fundamentally a bad concept
I think knowing that you've accomplished what many others could not is a potent source of pride. I don't see it as a bad concept.
There are some things that it is important for everyone to have easy access to, regardless of skill - the next stage in Dark Souls is not among them.
having enjoyment that is specifically derived from the fact that other people cannot experience that sensation is fundamentally against my moral worldview
It goes against essentially everything I believe about how the world should work and how humans should treat each other in a society
it feels deeply, deeply wrong to me
so Ill always argue against design or rule sets that encourage that
This feels like a disagreement on the definition of "cannot," honestly
Like, part of the pride inherent in finishing a marathon or climbing a mountain is "A lot of people can't do this."
But that's a poor expression of the actual feeling of, "A lot of people wouldn't do this." It isn't pride over having strong legs or good lungs, it's pride over having willpower and commitment. But language is clumsy and imprecise, and "cannot" is often mistaken for "would not."
+8
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masterofmetroidHave you ever looked at a worldand seen it as a kind of challenge?Registered Userregular
I don't think designating experiences as lesser or greater is a very fruitful line of discussion because there isn't going to be an objective consensus on that
People are asking for the option and that should be enough
I think that being confronted with failure and learning when to give up is a valuable skill in some contexts. If a game wants to teach or explore that, I feel like that's ok.
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
I think there's added enjoyment in knowing that you can only see or experience a thing if you've reached a certain level of mastery.
Knowing that you could've just knocked the difficulty down a few notches and strolled right in saps much of the satisfaction from the accomplishment.
There's something to knowing that you've done something or progressed somewhere that others couldn't.
enjoyment derived explicitly because youve experienced something other people cannot is something I dont think we should endorse
thats fundamentally a bad concept
I think knowing that you've accomplished what many others could not is a potent source of pride. I don't see it as a bad concept.
There are some things that it is important for everyone to have easy access to, regardless of skill - the next stage in Dark Souls is not among them.
having enjoyment that is specifically derived from the fact that other people cannot experience that sensation is fundamentally against my moral worldview
It goes against essentially everything I believe about how the world should work and how humans should treat each other in a society
it feels deeply, deeply wrong to me
so Ill always argue against design or rule sets that encourage that
What about directly competitive games where there is a loser, or many losers? If I win then I feel good about it and enjoy it, I expressed my skill and mastery of the game the best, but my having those feelings means someone else can't because they lost.
I think there's added enjoyment in knowing that you can only see or experience a thing if you've reached a certain level of mastery.
Knowing that you could've just knocked the difficulty down a few notches and strolled right in saps much of the satisfaction from the accomplishment.
There's something to knowing that you've done something or progressed somewhere that others couldn't.
enjoyment derived explicitly because youve experienced something other people cannot is something I dont think we should endorse
thats fundamentally a bad concept
I think knowing that you've accomplished what many others could not is a potent source of pride. I don't see it as a bad concept.
There are some things that it is important for everyone to have easy access to, regardless of skill - the next stage in Dark Souls is not among them.
having enjoyment that is specifically derived from the fact that other people cannot experience that sensation is fundamentally against my moral worldview
It goes against essentially everything I believe about how the world should work and how humans should treat each other in a society
it feels deeply, deeply wrong to me
so Ill always argue against design or rule sets that encourage that
This feels like a disagreement on the definition of "cannot," honestly
Like, part of the pride inherent in finishing a marathon or climbing a mountain is "A lot of people can't do this."
But that's a poor expression of the actual feeling of, "A lot of people wouldn't do this." It isn't pride over having strong legs or good lungs, it's pride over having willpower and commitment. But language is clumsy and imprecise, and "cannot" is often mistaken for "would not."
I want to clear this up
I dont mean that its not okay to enjoy doing something because it was difficult
Im saying Im against the idea of enjoying something specifically because others cannot
theres a big difference
because one means hey i beat dark souls on hard!
it was really hard for me but i overcame it and i feel great
the other is hey i beat dark souls and that feels awesome because other people cant do it!
one of those sensations can still be experienced if easy modes are added: I chose to play on hard, I won, and I feel great
the other cant: I beat dark souls but I cant enjoy it any more because they added easy modes and now my accomplishment means nothing
Thats the mentality Im arguing against and its one that you see way more than youd think in discussions about this stuff
yeah even standard easy difficulty things like lower HP or being able to take a lot of hits go a long way when you have say, arthritis that makes it so that you can't operate two analog sticks at once.
I think there's added enjoyment in knowing that you can only see or experience a thing if you've reached a certain level of mastery.
Knowing that you could've just knocked the difficulty down a few notches and strolled right in saps much of the satisfaction from the accomplishment.
There's something to knowing that you've done something or progressed somewhere that others couldn't.
enjoyment derived explicitly because youve experienced something other people cannot is something I dont think we should endorse
thats fundamentally a bad concept
I think knowing that you've accomplished what many others could not is a potent source of pride. I don't see it as a bad concept.
There are some things that it is important for everyone to have easy access to, regardless of skill - the next stage in Dark Souls is not among them.
having enjoyment that is specifically derived from the fact that other people cannot experience that sensation is fundamentally against my moral worldview
It goes against essentially everything I believe about how the world should work and how humans should treat each other in a society
it feels deeply, deeply wrong to me
so Ill always argue against design or rule sets that encourage that
What about directly competitive games where there is a loser, or many losers? If I win then I feel good about it and enjoy it, I expressed my skill and mastery of the game the best, but my having those feelings means someone else can't because they lost.
theoretically this is why matchmaking exists: you want each person playing to have as close to an equal chance to win as possible
But youre right that this is kind of a grey area for me
I tend to think of it as that I enjoyed the match and test of skill
I dont really gain joy explicitly from winning and making the other person lose
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
the thing is, they have a lot of overlap
lots of people with disabilities can beat games on lower difficulties that would be physically impossible on higher ones
But this views "beating" as the only viable consumption of/interaction with a video game
Story as adversary, art as opponent, tone as nemesis, sound as other word for "bad guy"
i mean
yes, because the way to complete the narrative attempting to be told is by finishing the game
Again, there are a myriad of ways to "complete" (a very ambiguous/fluid term, that) a narrative that don't involve directly and personally moving through it.
context about myself- my brother is disabled and when I was younger and up until now, my mum would always ask me 'do you think bro would be able to play this game?' and I would have to figure out if I thought the game was 'accessible' enough for him.
reposting my thoughts on this from the g&t thread- looking at it from more of a market perspective-
the part that is overlooked in the games-journalism struggle session about Sekiro's easy mode is that nothing in a game just exists, everything is a trade off between efforts.
Take the genichiro fight. How many hours do you think went into tuning the experience of that fight, making it more or less difficult until Fromsoft had it at exactly the experience that they wanted?
I don't know, but I'm going to hazard a guess that it's a lot. A very large lot.
If Fromsoft adds an easy mode, you've got to assume that ~50% of the players will select that. How then, do you justify the insane amount of work that goes into the 'real' genichiro fight when half of the players won't experience it in a way that justifies the very precise tuning that you put into it?
And I'm not even saying I think Sekiro shouldn't have an easy mode, I don't know whether it should or not. I think the game is too hard. I'm just saying that a simplistic 'every game should have an easy mode because accessibility' doesn't reflect a good understanding of how making games works.
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
This tho! I feel like difficulty and accessibility should be treated very distinctly, even though I think people conflating the two are well intentioned
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
the thing is, they have a lot of overlap
lots of people with disabilities can beat games on lower difficulties that would be physically impossible on higher ones
Then you look the developer straight in the eye and ask "is it more important that everybody beat your game or that everybody has a difficult time?"
That's the endpoint of this dilemma
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
the thing is, they have a lot of overlap
lots of people with disabilities can beat games on lower difficulties that would be physically impossible on higher ones
But this views "beating" as the only viable consumption of/interaction with a video game
Story as adversary, art as opponent, tone as nemesis, sound as other word for "bad guy"
i mean
yes, because the way to complete the narrative attempting to be told is by finishing the game
Again, there are a myriad of ways to "complete" (a very ambiguous/fluid term, that) a narrative that don't involve directly and personally moving through it.
I think this is a point I just dissagree with you on fundamentally
if i fall asleep halfway through anmovie, I didnt complete the narrative
if I cant finish a game, I havent experienced what the game has to offer
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
I'm probably not going to contribute anymore after this but I would like to sum up my experiences again
I have defects which would make it difficult to play games like Sekiro if they were only about timing specific inputs and motor control - and not also about patience, learning, mental perseverance and so on. I got prescribed medication for those defects only very recently and they made my life difficult in various ways, together with other things. Having something available on the market which was both aesthetically pleasing to me and mentally stimulating helped me survive.
I think that being confronted with failure and learning when to give up is a valuable skill in some contexts. If a game wants to teach or explore that, I feel like that's ok.
People with disabilities are already well experienced at being confronted with failure due to systems being built in ways that exclude them. They are, perhaps, the last people on god's green earth who need lessons in that.
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
the thing is, they have a lot of overlap
lots of people with disabilities can beat games on lower difficulties that would be physically impossible on higher ones
But this views "beating" as the only viable consumption of/interaction with a video game
Story as adversary, art as opponent, tone as nemesis, sound as other word for "bad guy"
i mean
yes, because the way to complete the narrative attempting to be told is by finishing the game
Again, there are a myriad of ways to "complete" (a very ambiguous/fluid term, that) a narrative that don't involve directly and personally moving through it.
I think this is a point I just dissagree with you on fundamentally
if i fall asleep halfway through anmovie, I didnt complete the narrative
if I cant finish a game, I havent experienced what the game has to offer
Some games have no ending. All movies end.
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
the thing is, they have a lot of overlap
lots of people with disabilities can beat games on lower difficulties that would be physically impossible on higher ones
But this views "beating" as the only viable consumption of/interaction with a video game
Story as adversary, art as opponent, tone as nemesis, sound as other word for "bad guy"
i mean
yes, because the way to complete the narrative attempting to be told is by finishing the game
Again, there are a myriad of ways to "complete" (a very ambiguous/fluid term, that) a narrative that don't involve directly and personally moving through it.
I think this is a point I just dissagree with you on fundamentally
if i fall asleep halfway through anmovie, I didnt complete the narrative
if I cant finish a game, I havent experienced what the game has to offer
i think the closest analogy here would be reading scripts/screenplays
you can get something valuable out of that, but you're missing out entirely on the performance and visual design aspects of the story
"gameplay" is the thing that video games have. it's what distinguishes them from other forms of media. It's analogous to like, editing in movies. It doesn't seem unreasonable to say that as many people ought to be able to experience that as possible.
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
the thing is, they have a lot of overlap
lots of people with disabilities can beat games on lower difficulties that would be physically impossible on higher ones
But this views "beating" as the only viable consumption of/interaction with a video game
Story as adversary, art as opponent, tone as nemesis, sound as other word for "bad guy"
i mean
yes, because the way to complete the narrative attempting to be told is by finishing the game
Again, there are a myriad of ways to "complete" (a very ambiguous/fluid term, that) a narrative that don't involve directly and personally moving through it.
This is a fine of way of engaging with media on a personal level (I've done it plenty) but it does not work for everyone and it should not be used as a pat answer that puts the blame on a person for not being satisfied with a no-commentary let's play or other such option
My biggest problem with these discussions is that difficulty and accessibility tend to get conflated.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
the thing is, they have a lot of overlap
lots of people with disabilities can beat games on lower difficulties that would be physically impossible on higher ones
Then you look the developer straight in the eye and ask "is it more important that everybody beat your game or that everybody has a difficult time?"
That's the endpoint of this dilemma
yeah but no
Fromsoft didn't just go 'haha lets make these bossfights super hard because we're dicks'
they spent thousands of hours creating a very specific experience that is super refined
A very specific, super refined experience that is designed so that everyone that plays will eventually see the end, or that everyone that plays will be challenged?
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
i guess to me the question is 'why does Sekiro not have difficulty settings when most games do?'
and the clear answer is 'because Sekiro is a work of extreme design precision that operates at completely different level to most works in the interactive space, and creating a work at that extremely high level of precision at two different difficulty settings is not feasible'
to which people will say 'that's fine, I don't need the easy experience to be as tightly tuned as the hard experience'
but that clearly isn't what FromSoft is setting out to do. If they were going to make an easy game they would want it to be as emotionally rich and evocative as their hard game, and doing both at the same time simply isn't possible
i guess to me the question is 'why does Sekiro not have difficulty settings when most games do?'
and the clear answer is 'because Sekiro is a work of extreme design precision that operates at completely different level to most works in the interactive space, and creating a work at that extremely high level of precision at two different difficulty settings is not feasible'
to which people will say 'that's fine, I don't need the easy experience to be as tightly tuned as the hard experience'
but that clearly isn't what FromSoft is setting out to do. If they were going to make an easy game they would want it to be as emotionally rich and evocative as their hard game, and doing both at the same time simply isn't possible
I don't think From is in the position to dictate to people that they would enjoy the game less or find it less rich if it were easier
i guess to me the question is 'why does Sekiro not have difficulty settings when most games do?'
and the clear answer is 'because Sekiro is a work of extreme design precision that operates at completely different level to most works in the interactive space, and creating a work at that extremely high level of precision at two different difficulty settings is not feasible'
to which people will say 'that's fine, I don't need the easy experience to be as tightly tuned as the hard experience'
but that clearly isn't what FromSoft is setting out to do. If they were going to make an easy game they would want it to be as emotionally rich and evocative as their hard game, and doing both at the same time simply isn't possible
they already have the demon bell and multiple tiers of new game+. The people that made Sekiro DON'T believe that there is only one difficulty to play the game at to experience their vision.
Posts
I think knowing that you've accomplished what many others could not is a potent source of pride. I don't see it as a bad concept.
There are some things that it is important for everyone to have easy access to regardless of skill or ability - the next stage in Dark Souls is not among them.
People will complain about a weapon, or ability, or the way the netcode works, or whatever, when they consistently perform worse against the thing, but sometimes the deciding factor is player skill and not what the game's doing.
I don't know how to answer the questions of how much responsibility developers have to balance the game or matchmake effectively; if you only play against players of your own skill, how will you get better? But maybe not everyone wants to get better? But should getting better be part of the obligation of playing the game in the first place, is there an inherent responsibility on the player's part to get better as they play more? But what about people with genuine limitations who can't "git gud" no matter how hard they try?
And that's not getting into large scale cooperative experiences. The majority of players never complete the raids in Destiny (going by the achievement numbers) but they're the best, most rewarding content in the game. People have been shrieking about raid matchmaking for years but it just wouldn't work, you have to communicate with the people on your team to be successful, but does Bungie have a responsibility to the solo player? I don't know!
part of it, i think, is that adjustable difficulty has been baked into video games from pretty much their inception. not every video game does it, and the ones that do don't always do a great job, but especially nowadays most games let you bump things down to "Very Easy" if you just wanna soak in the atmosphere of the game. Sure, you could watch a no commentary let's play, or read critical essays, but when the norm is for games to at least make an effort toward letting everyone experience them, it's a little frustrating when something deviates from the norm in a way that pushes some players out, especially since a lot of disabled players rely on easier difficulties and can play plenty of other games.
What makes it more frustrating in the case of From Soft games is that they do have multiple ways of adjusting difficulty, they just only work in one direction. Sekiro has the Demon Bell and New Game Plus if you want a harder experience, but nothing at all if you want an easier one. This is actually a step back from most From games, where the online co-op worked as a de facto easy mode. Making Sekiro single player removes that option.
http://www.audioentropy.com/
But there isn't just one alternate way?
I am godawful at Crusader Kings. Bounce off it every time I'm foolhardy enough to try. There's too much for me to keep track of, and I can make neither heads nor tails of the UI. But I can listen to podcast discussions of it, I can watch LPs, I can read after-action reports, I can read essays, I can read reviews, I can read posts on these here forums. I can see how it slots into the greater sphere of strategy games, I can see how it comments on power and politics. I can see how funny it is to see a horse emperor crowned. I've gotten a shit-ton out of a game I've never played for more than half an hour, and I don't think any of my experiences were invalid, and I don't think the game is lesser for not being accessible to me.
Of course personally, I agree generally that I don't think adding an easy mode would detract from the game experience at all. I agree with Sterling that nobody is forcing anybody to use the easy mode, and for the kind of person who wants an easy mode the game is probably going to still be hard so if difficulty is supposed to be part of the experience I don't even think an easy mode detracts from a game in that way either.
having enjoyment that is specifically derived from the fact that other people cannot experience that sensation is fundamentally against my moral worldview
It goes against essentially everything I believe about how the world should work and how humans should treat each other in a society
it feels deeply, deeply wrong to me
so Ill always argue against design or rule sets that encourage that
i understand that
but Im saying that for me those things dont replace or compare to playing the game
they arent equivalents or even substitutes
i need to actually play the game myself to get anything out of it
Im glad that those things exist! I think theyre a good part of a suite of accessibility options
but i think the games themselves also need to be more open to people who want to play them
But how does this extend to e.g. sports or games where you're directly instead of indirectly in competition with other players
This feels like a disagreement on the definition of "cannot," honestly
Like, part of the pride inherent in finishing a marathon or climbing a mountain is "A lot of people can't do this."
But that's a poor expression of the actual feeling of, "A lot of people wouldn't do this." It isn't pride over having strong legs or good lungs, it's pride over having willpower and commitment. But language is clumsy and imprecise, and "cannot" is often mistaken for "would not."
People are asking for the option and that should be enough
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
To me those feel like they should be very distinct concepts.
What about directly competitive games where there is a loser, or many losers? If I win then I feel good about it and enjoy it, I expressed my skill and mastery of the game the best, but my having those feelings means someone else can't because they lost.
But I do object to the idea that it's somehow an affront if a game declines to have one.
I want to clear this up
I dont mean that its not okay to enjoy doing something because it was difficult
Im saying Im against the idea of enjoying something specifically because others cannot
theres a big difference
because one means hey i beat dark souls on hard!
it was really hard for me but i overcame it and i feel great
the other is hey i beat dark souls and that feels awesome because other people cant do it!
one of those sensations can still be experienced if easy modes are added: I chose to play on hard, I won, and I feel great
the other cant: I beat dark souls but I cant enjoy it any more because they added easy modes and now my accomplishment means nothing
Thats the mentality Im arguing against and its one that you see way more than youd think in discussions about this stuff
But it's also true that if we are having difficulty clearing even that low bar it's going to be pretty hard to go any further
the thing is, they have a lot of overlap
lots of people with disabilities can beat games on lower difficulties that would be physically impossible on higher ones
http://www.audioentropy.com/
theoretically this is why matchmaking exists: you want each person playing to have as close to an equal chance to win as possible
But youre right that this is kind of a grey area for me
I tend to think of it as that I enjoyed the match and test of skill
I dont really gain joy explicitly from winning and making the other person lose
But this views "beating" as the only viable consumption of/interaction with a video game
Story as adversary, art as opponent, tone as nemesis, sound as other word for "bad guy"
i mean
yes, because the way to complete the narrative attempting to be told is by finishing the game
Again, there are a myriad of ways to "complete" (a very ambiguous/fluid term, that) a narrative that don't involve directly and personally moving through it.
context about myself- my brother is disabled and when I was younger and up until now, my mum would always ask me 'do you think bro would be able to play this game?' and I would have to figure out if I thought the game was 'accessible' enough for him.
reposting my thoughts on this from the g&t thread- looking at it from more of a market perspective-
This tho! I feel like difficulty and accessibility should be treated very distinctly, even though I think people conflating the two are well intentioned
https://medium.com/@alascii
Then you look the developer straight in the eye and ask "is it more important that everybody beat your game or that everybody has a difficult time?"
That's the endpoint of this dilemma
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
I think this is a point I just dissagree with you on fundamentally
if i fall asleep halfway through anmovie, I didnt complete the narrative
if I cant finish a game, I havent experienced what the game has to offer
I'm probably not going to contribute anymore after this but I would like to sum up my experiences again
I have defects which would make it difficult to play games like Sekiro if they were only about timing specific inputs and motor control - and not also about patience, learning, mental perseverance and so on. I got prescribed medication for those defects only very recently and they made my life difficult in various ways, together with other things. Having something available on the market which was both aesthetically pleasing to me and mentally stimulating helped me survive.
People with disabilities are already well experienced at being confronted with failure due to systems being built in ways that exclude them. They are, perhaps, the last people on god's green earth who need lessons in that.
yeah but no
Fromsoft didn't just go 'haha lets make these bossfights super hard because we're dicks'
they spent thousands of hours creating a very specific experience that is super refined
https://medium.com/@alascii
sure, but that's how the kinds of video games we're talking about are structured
you don't get to play through the story unless you can perform at a certain level
you can watch it, and you can read about it, but you can not play through it
not every game is like that, but the ones germane to this conversation are
http://www.audioentropy.com/
Some games have no ending. All movies end.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
i think the closest analogy here would be reading scripts/screenplays
you can get something valuable out of that, but you're missing out entirely on the performance and visual design aspects of the story
"gameplay" is the thing that video games have. it's what distinguishes them from other forms of media. It's analogous to like, editing in movies. It doesn't seem unreasonable to say that as many people ought to be able to experience that as possible.
http://www.audioentropy.com/
A very specific, super refined experience that is designed so that everyone that plays will eventually see the end, or that everyone that plays will be challenged?
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
tell that to everyone that says that Dark Souls doesn't REALLY start until New Game +3.
http://www.audioentropy.com/
and the clear answer is 'because Sekiro is a work of extreme design precision that operates at completely different level to most works in the interactive space, and creating a work at that extremely high level of precision at two different difficulty settings is not feasible'
to which people will say 'that's fine, I don't need the easy experience to be as tightly tuned as the hard experience'
but that clearly isn't what FromSoft is setting out to do. If they were going to make an easy game they would want it to be as emotionally rich and evocative as their hard game, and doing both at the same time simply isn't possible
https://medium.com/@alascii
I don't think From is in the position to dictate to people that they would enjoy the game less or find it less rich if it were easier
they already have the demon bell and multiple tiers of new game+. The people that made Sekiro DON'T believe that there is only one difficulty to play the game at to experience their vision.
http://www.audioentropy.com/
if someone WANTS to play through a game and experience in that fashion
I genuinely dont think there is any artistic reason that should override that persons desire to do so
I think thats the heart of the arument
I dont think theres any reason that is more powerful than letting someone do that of they have the desire to