19 réponses à ce sujet

[Maria Caliban]

I, and I think the majority of gamers, play games on the default difficulty.

After the game has started, I usually forget that I can change difficulty on the fly and will only do so if I find an encounter frustrating. Moreover, I only play the game once so I'm going to judge a game on my experience of that difficulty.

I'm steadily coming to the conclusion that default difficulty is made so anyone who isn't highly inebriated can get through 90% of the fights. The lower difficulties aren't so much so people can have an easier experience (though they provide this as well) but so the majority of people can see that there are difficulty levels below what they're playing on. It allows the illusion of a moderate challenge without much in the way of challenge.

This had interesting consequences for ME 3 MP when the majority of people hopped right into Silver because it was the middle difficulty, and got their lvl 1 Soldiers rocking lvl 1 Avengers got their asses stomped. Though according to BioWare, the MP is quite popular, so that apparently isn't off-putting to many.

Anyways, what do you want the default difficulty ('normal') to be like?

[cJohnOne]

I expect normal to be pretty easy. That's fine because there is still Hard and Nightmare. It would be nice if normal were a little harder than DA2 but it isn't a big deal to me.

I want easy to be a story mode type of thing where I just get through everything and see the story. I always start on Casual and work up because I play multiple playthrough usually.

[syllogi]

All I ask is that if they're going to restrict friendly fire to certain levels of difficulty, please don't make it Hardcore/Insanity/Really Long and Tedious Mode or nothing. I actually loved playing mages while friendly fire was active on Normal in DA:O, because it meant I had to be strategic and plan fights without the ability to spam AOE spells.

I generally play through once on Normal, and ease my way up, if I'm so inclined, on subsequent playthroughs, if I enjoy the combat. If a game is easy on Normal, but I don't enjoy the combat, it's not going to kill my enjoyment of the game completely, but it will affect replayability for me.

[Wulfram]

They'll keep the default easy, because people are too stubborn to move the difficulty to something actually called "Easy". It's psychologically nicer to start with a too easy normal and move up.

[Iosev]

I'm probably in the minority that thinks that the default setting should be difficult enough that it requires the player to understand all of the ins and outs of combat (resistances, positioning, friendly fire, etc.), but easy enough that most players can get the hang of it after enough practice. However, I think finding the balance is probably much easier said than done.

I personally would like to see a simplification towards only three difficulty settings: Casual, Default, and Nightmare. Default would be for experienced RPG players that are accustomed to learning RPG combat systems and utilizing them at least in a basic capacity. Casual would be for the players who are more interested in story rather than combat, or for the uninitiated. And Nightmare would be for the people who enjoy being challenged, with success dependent on mastering the gameplay elements.

Modifié par arcelonious, 12 décembre 2012 - 07:26 .

[AngryFrozenWater]

Most of all I get annoyed by temporary invulnerable foes or ones that have silly health. Another: Disabling a party member to make a level more difficult (often used in ME3) defeats the idea of a party based game. I also do not see the fun if a higher difficulty just means "deal less player damage and increase the health of foes". That kind of survival is grinding to me. I rather see that foes get smarter on higher difficulties than those "solutions".

Modifié par AngryFrozenWater, 12 décembre 2012 - 07:33 .

[Navasha]

Seeing as this is a game made after the year 2000, I can pretty much guarantee "normal" difficulty will be rather easy.

I am not trying to sound 'elitist' or anything, but honestly, for the last decade, I have found I generally have to start a game at the highest available difficulty and then drop it back if I find it is something I can't handle.

Only a few games have I ever had to dial it back to just "hard", and thats usually because the highest level has something like Perma-death like in Witcher 2.

[Tigerman123]

No idea, there are many people who have no interest in 'hard' games and others who will give upon on games that aren't sufficiently challenging through boredom

I do remember that only about 2% of players actually played on nightmare though, seems as if that's the difficulty cap, regardless of the fact that many people would like more adversity

[Nefla]

Most gamers know how to change the difficulty, problem solved. Also if you only play a BW game through once you're missing out on a lot.

[hexaligned]

I think gamers familiar with party based RPG's, playing on the default difficulty, should still see the "game over" screen fairly often. I think the player should have to have a good understanding of how the foundation of all the game mechanics work, in order to actually progress through the game. Even with that understanding, they should still come up against mechanics that force them to re-access their strategies/tactics, and come up with new ones.

I think of all the Bioware games I have played, BG1 was the closest to getting it right. I played that game at the age of like 8, and it was my first introduction both to DnD mechanics, and Western RPG's in general. I got absolutely destroyed on the default setting, repeatedly. Through trial and error I eventually figured out the basics of what I needed to do, and how i needed to build characters. Which is as it should be. The harder difficulty settings built on that foundation and required a deeper understanding of the spell systems, as well as requiring characters that were WELL built, rather than just competently built, at least to get through the game without "exploiting".

This is the area I think the DA series "needs" the most work on. The games base mechanics require almost no overarching strategic planning. The in combat tactical execution is a little better, but i see those mechanics as what the "casual" difficulty setting should require a player to understand. The "normal" setting should require an eventual mastery of at least those basic mechanics to get through the game. The hardest difficulty setting should pick up from there, and build upon the base mechanics, while adding a few more consequence heavy ones to the mix.

[In Exile]

relhart wrote...
I got absolutely destroyed on the default setting, repeatedly. Through trial and error I eventually figured out the basics of what I needed to do, and how i needed to build characters. Which is as it should be.

A big part of that is that it's D&D. Trial and error in all of those games is what they're based on. You often just need to know what encounters you're having a head of time.

And a game based on trial and error is terrible, because it punishes anyone who doesn't want to invest terrible amounts of time in learning how to play that one game. It's why you get conceptually easy to play games - like FPSs - building fan-bases and running away with the industry, because they're easy to get into to and teach a very translateable skillset.

This is the area I think the DA series "needs" the most work on. The games base mechanics require almost no overarching strategic planning. The in combat tactical execution is a little better, but i see those mechanics as what the "casual" difficulty setting should require a player to understand. The "normal" setting should require an eventual mastery of at least those basic mechanics to get through the game. The hardest difficulty setting should pick up from there, and build upon the base mechanics, while adding a few more consequence heavy ones to the mix.

DA:O/DA2 are easy games on nightmare, so that isn't saying much for the setting. And I don't see how a return to D&D fake difficulty would make thi sbetter.

[Anomaly-]

syllogi wrote...

All I ask is that if they're going to restrict friendly fire to certain levels of difficulty, please don't make it Hardcore/Insanity/Really Long and Tedious Mode or nothing. I actually loved playing mages while friendly fire was active on Normal in DA:O, because it meant I had to be strategic and plan fights without the ability to spam AOE spells.

I agree with this. I enjoy having friendly fire, but I do not enjoy the ridiculously inflated enemy stats on higher difficulty settings.

For normal, I would expect some thought and strategy to be required, while still allowing for a lot of different playstyles and sub-optimal builds (something I hope is minimized as much as possible). Friendly fire included, or at least optional.

In regards to difficulty in general, I believe DA has done it all wrong, especially DA2. I've had no interest in playing on the harder difficulties due to how they are handled. Instead of scaling enemy stats to ridiculous levels, the scaling should be on enemy numbers and relative intelligence. I just get no satisfaction out of playing on a difficulty where the common mook is vastly superior to my characters, and the only reason we win is because we mug them 4 on 1. Doesn't make me feel very heroic.

However, if instead enemy numbers and AI are scaled up, suddenly every encounter becomes more epic and you feel more heroic and satisfied. That's what I would expect from higher difficulty levels.

[Arppis]

I don't really know. I play DA-games on casual difficulty, because I don't enjoy how the combat works in these games. Wait, I did play trough DA2 as "Normal". But still, combat isn't my cup of tea for these games.

I much pefere the Mass Effect style, where I focus on playing as MY character and command the other characters around.

[Sylvius the Mad]

The default difficulty should be fair. Symmetrical combat mechanics, friendly fire.

[Maria Caliban]

Nefla wrote...

Most gamers know how to change the difficulty, problem solved. Also if you only play a BW game through once you're missing out on a lot.

If I play a BioWare game through twice, I'm missing out on the other games I could be playing.

relhart wrote...

I think gamers familiar with party based RPG's, playing on the default difficulty, should still see the "game over" screen fairly often.

How often is 'fairly often?'

Modifié par Maria Caliban, 12 décembre 2012 - 11:27 .

[cJohnOne]

I use to like 50% friendly fire on normal now I'm use to not having friendly fire on normal.

[MichaelStuart]

I believe there should only be three difficultly levels.

I believe Easy should be for beginners.
I believe Normal should be a challenge for the average player.
I believe Hard should be nigh impossible to beat.

Friendly Fire should be its own option.

[Rawgrim]

I am pretty sure anything but the highest difficulty will be very very easy. Its been that way so far with the latest bioware games, I don`t see that changing since "streamlined" is a word that comes up more and more.