Fake Difficulty

[TaboriHK]

Infinitely respawning enemies are the cheapest way to drum up the difficulty known to man.

As I like to call it, the Call of Duty method. When the enemy has unfettered access to spawn closets, the terrorists have won.

 

[TaboriHK]

Bad controls.

Yeah I'm look at you resident evil franchise.

This whole bad controls make the game scarier is bullshit.

do you know how innaccurate it is to run and shoot?

Do you know how inaccurate it is to have people move like SUVs?

 

[David Bray]

Escort missions.

Arbitrary health jump.

I would much rather work against a more intelligent AI than just have to use twice the amount of bullets.

 

[Altorin]

DAMN YOU TVTROPES! MY HOURS ARE ALL GONE!

 

[DiMono]

I didn't see it in the page, but "Moon Logic" has always been my most hated type of fake difficulty. I played an escape game recently that had several puzzles which were totally unrelated to any hints presented in the room, with no way to intuit them. For instance, break a specific brick in a wall to find the key, but there's 400 bricks and not even a clue that says breaking bricks is what you're supposed to do. The game I'm talking about is the only one I've ever left a scathing review for.

Edit: Also, 1) Bad technical aspects. There's a game on Newgrounds called I Wanna Be The Flash Game where double jumping just kind of ...fails... every so often. Like it simply doesn't register the keystroke. And when I contacted the game creator about it, he told me (direct quote coming up) "i'm not pretending. double jump is 1/50, we did this to increase annoyance." Seriously.

 

[Netrigan]

I didn't see it in the page, but "Moon Logic" has always been my most hated type of fake difficulty. I played an escape game recently that had several puzzles which were totally unrelated to any hints presented in the room, with no way to intuit them. For instance, break a specific brick in a wall to find the key, but there's 400 bricks and not even a clue that says breaking bricks is what you're supposed to do. The game I'm talking about is the only one I've ever left a scathing review for.

I think that falls under "Solve The Soup Cans".

 

[Sephychu]

Metroid Prime 3 on Hypermode is one of the few games I've ever quit.

On the final boss.

That thing is a health TANK. Most of my losses were from a) getting tired or b) leaving it on and family turning the Wii off.

Doesn't help that it's a really boring boss.

Edit: And I will not forgive you for linking me to TV Tropes.

Dear LORD yes. Man that's horrible.

Similarly, some of the more recent Final Fantasy games seem to think that a boss is made more difficult by forcing you to win by having a very complex sequence of tasks over and over and over again, sometimes literally for hours on end.
If you mess up even one move in this sequence at any point, fuck you, mate.

 

[Viewtiful Dan]

MW2 is a perfect example with the juggernat. An extremely fast moving enemy, with a stupid amount of healt, and eagle eyes that rapes you almost as soon as they spawn on the map. Sweet jesus I'm having flashbacks of my first encounter with a juggernat and it was not good. Also spawning a billion enemies and not giving you time to breath. Something L4D2 has been guilty of recently. Especially in the mutations.

 

[Lullabye]

You know, Im going wiht a new one.
Getting players to make other players games harder.
That not "the game" being difficult. Thats fucking multiplayer.
*stares daggers at Demon's Souls"

My most hated is the "super speed boost" cars get in racing games in order to catch up with you.

 

[pretentiousname01]

Bad controls.

Yeah I'm look at you resident evil franchise.

This whole bad controls make the game scarier is bullshit.

Oh pish, in resident evil 5 the chainsaw guy wouldn't be nearly as scary if i could jog back while shooting.

Yet dead space managed to provide some thrills while not using the crutch of bad controls

Bad controls.

Yeah I'm look at you resident evil franchise.

This whole bad controls make the game scarier is bullshit.

do you know how innaccurate it is to run and shoot?

But yet it is possible?

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

"Hardest" difficulty is only "Hard" because you have less health. i.e. Modern Warfare 2. I still beat it on Veteran, too. Was fucking easy but really frustrating.

Also, damn you, OP! I spent an hour and a half perusing tvtropes because of you!

Actually, the difficulty was increased by a number of things. The player had (relatively) less health (this could be accomplished by giving them less health or making all enemy weapons do more damage). The enemies react more quickly to the player (for the record, AI can always act on the same frame that something occurs but most games add a delay precisely because such reaction time is inhuman). They enemies are more accurate (really just adds to the first point). The enemies are significantly more likely to throw grenades (which forces the player to move compounding the problem of the previous points).

 

[Mesca]

Bad controls.


This whole bad controls make the game scarier is bullshit.

do you know how innaccurate it is to run and shoot?

But yet it is possible?

Hell, that's not a bad idea. Make me take an accuracy penalty if I move and shoot. Survival Horror characters always control like a 3 wheeled shopping cart. Fairly sure they recycled the engine for Onimusha also, which ends up ridiculous, because it's a blasted action game. I shouldn't have a Samurai toting all the powers of Hell, who can't move and turn at the same time.

Also, definitely Solve the Soup Cans. Silent Hill 2, you know what you did. Use the fruit juice to dislodge the coin from the laundry chute? SERIOUSLY?

 

[LtFerret]

Stun-locking

Crackdown 2 is one of the worst offenders recently. The game is not fun if i can't move because i keep getting knocked down by those fucking large freaks and his two buddies.

 

[JohnnyDelRay]

Bad controls.

Yeah I'm look at you resident evil franchise.

This whole bad controls make the game scarier is bullshit.

do you know how innaccurate it is to run and shoot?

Actually if it was only being able to walk and strafe would make a world of difference, and be a lot closer to other games/real life. It is damn near impossible to hit squat while sprinting and shooting like in other games, but you can actually be fairly accurate while walking and shooting, (provided you bend your knees a lil, walk heel-toe to stop from falling over, and point your feet in the direction you are walking to avoid gun bob).

Having said that, it did feel a cheap way to make the game difficult, and even more so in the later, more action-oriented versions in the series. Despite all this, I have sunk too many hours into the franchise, including unlocking everything in mercenary mode in the last 3 to complain really.

 

[dogenzakaminion]

life or death Quick Time Events, sometimes this is added well, aka Dead Space with the Wall Grabbers, or added just to make the game annoying aka Resident Evil 4 i think...(i forget which one but the one on Game Cube was just a damn chain of QTEs...)

Well in Resident Evil 4 it was an integral part of gameplay. It happened when you expected them too, so they work. Like the Krauser fight. Find any other better example of how to make quick time events work properly in a game.

OT: For me it's the respawning enemies until I take two steps forward and then they're all gone. Or how I have limited ammo, and the opponents have unlmited ammo, grenades, rockets, mines, tanks, planes, aircraft carriers, socks, pinaples...

 

[jumjalalabash]

Boss battles of FF13. Hey lets just give you a random party with no set orders to give your team. They all just kill you at least once because of that bullshit.