Difficulty Must Die

 Stylin' on fools!

I have been very vocal in the past about my feelings on difficult games and difficulty levels. I like the idea of differing difficulty levels, but few games go out of their way to implement them in clever and interesting ways which is why I tend to err towards games with universal difficulty. Does this mean that some titles will be harder for novice players to get into, absolutely- but some of the best and most memorable genre games I've played are those that cater to the highest skill ceiling of those that know what they're doing to some degree going in. There always needs to be a place for beginner games, and those rare few that can do both I absolutely take my hat off to, but I wouldn't have had experiences like 'Pathfinder: Kingmaker' if those makers played things safe in order to cater to the fresh new comers. And I wouldn't like to persist in such a dour and dull existence.

As I've moved on from reviewing the Devil May Cry series, I've erred towards the unfailing punishment of higher tier DMC play and in doing so have started to tap into some of the allure of Devil May Cry replayability, what makes these games classics despite their somewhat short length over the years. (They're all really short, I thought MGR was an outlier in that regard!) As any veteran will tell you, Devil May Cry really starts to shine when the player becomes more familiar with the moveset of their chosen hero and starts stringing together high difficulty moves and switches and juggles and finishers with the deft of someone who knows everything that they're doing, rather than a button masher who wants to see how badly they can mess up their target. Although the beauty of DMC is that button mashing still looks incredible and feels fun- can you ask for anything more?

Devil May Cry games throughout their history have all maintained a very similar path of difficulty modes which scale in challenge and prospect to really push players to the knees, but unlike higher difficulty modes in a lot of games out there- these are designed to a precision accuracy. I believe the belief is that because replaying is as much part of the central experience as the first go-around, DMC directors believed the core development route wouldn't be complete without focusing on these higher modes as well- which leads to the high quality ceiling. Returning players to higher difficulties will be surprised to discover not only your standard increased enemy damage output and player damage input, or the slightly rarer switched up enemy consignments- they'll find themselves happy to spot totally new enemy attacks, and even super powerful rage states which totally change up how a player will react and take them down.

When I think about the way in which Devil May Cry changes itself up going into Son of Sparta and Dante Must Die difficulty levels, I can't help but draw comparison to a another action title which boasted a high 'skill' ceiling which I found utterly repellent to joy or fun- Yakuza 3. Yakuza 3 is unique as one of the most detested games in an otherwise niche, but beloved, franchise. Key reason being because the highest difficulty mode available comes with the inability to engage with the game's most enjoyable element: the free-flowing combat system. That's right; back in the time of Yakuza 3 the developer figured that the best way to infer the concept of 'difficulty' upon their players was to put up as many roadblocks to enjoy the combat as humanely possible, which lead to one of the most unbearable experiences in the franchise. (I hear that 1 and 2's original versions can get pretty bad in that regard too, but thankfully we have modern day replacements now.)

When fighting an enemy in Yakuza 3's harder difficulties there are three big issues you need to contend with. Firstly, every enemy blocks an obnoxious amount made even more painful by the fact that you start with absolutely no guard-breaks whatsoever, and the counter move is an optional unlock for those somehow willing to stand the rest of the game to get that far. Secondly, every enemy grabs an obnoxious amount which makes any opportunity to build heat a nightmare. (Heat drains rapidly during a grab) And finally, every enemy is given an insane and, yes, obnoxious amount of health and damage resistance to such a point that your typical boss brawl can scratch up to the ten minute mark of just steady whittling. Which essentially means that the Yakuza 3 team made their combat slow, clunky and prone to interruptions- everything you don't want.

Now Son of Sparta difficulty for DMC games does also increase enemy health as I mentioned, and Dante Must Die does have the honour of pushing those enemy health margins to, yes, obnoxious degrees; but in Devil May Cry there's quite a different relationship between the player and tough enemies. You see, ever since Devil May Cry 3 the flow of combat in these games has been decided by the whim of the responsive 'style' system which ranks every fight based on how often you string together consecutive attacks and manage to not get hit. (People like to pretend the style system is smarter and more particular than that-but it really isn't.) Higher style ranks means more drops and just a cool buzzing feeling when the S turns gold and you hear a little announcer voice that gets lost in the action declare it. As such, tougher enemies are actually something of a godsend.

Juggling enemies with outrageous and drawn out combos that span weapon switches, style switches, direction switches and even parry switches is made all the more fun when every enemy requires a full juggle combo in order to whittle down and anyone you leave free can deliver a 300% boosted attack if you let them. As you get more fluid with chaining and dodging, your gameplay starts to reflect that mastery and soon the visual feedback of your performance is stimulation enough to keep honing those skills and pushing those limits. In Yakuza 3 'high level' play involves starting every fight with a parry and then hit stunning an enemy into a wall bouncing animation that lets you glitch them to death. I'm not kidding, that is what Yakuza 3 defenders think skilful and interesting play looks like. To be frank, that feels as boring as it sounds to pull off.

What I'm trying to instil here is the sense that difficulty modes in games can be so much more than just stat fiddling, and in the modern age they all really should be. Turning around and committing to a harder difficulty should mark something of a renewal in the gameplay experience, I genuinely think you should see things in hard mode that you've never seen before on normal- even if that does end up just being another annoying move for the world's most annoying enemy- the DMC 5 Fury. Baldur's Gate's Tactican mode reprimes certain battlefields to add new factors or enemies to the mix, Oblivion just unbalances the entire game and makes it unfun to play. You see the difference in effort versus outcome, so maybe that's the kind of topic to take into account the next time you demand an easy mode from a high quality developer who absolutely wouldn't just cobble such a thing out of pre-fabs the way some people clearly expect them too.