Discussing difficulty in video games is a hard topic since the release of Dark Souls. For some unknown reason, there is this backlash towards including a difficulty slider for players in some games; mostly anything released after 2011. Not for a reason that is plain to see, but one that is rather ambiguous yet trite in the end. The reason seems to be, as always with fandoms and especially internet fandoms, gatekeeping. “We don’t want THOSE filthy casuals!” as Jim Sterling tends to put it, is the reason many, myself included, have been put off of this otherwise enjoyable series. Which is a shame all things considered. I myself have been licking the leather boots of that dominatrix; Dark Souls. Which is a fact I tell everyone and their dog.

However, the conversation is always one side sniping at the other for things they themselves have misunderstood. There is never anyone in the center denoting where both sides are wrong and right, or even in agreement but are too angry to notice. If I said both were gutter sniping at each other, I’m sure the Dark Souls/Souls-like elitists would be pleased because that would mean they start deprived, and thus they start from nothing. This ignores the fact that I’m calling the other side of the argument the same, and here we see the issue with the snobbish Souls fans: it is always about one’s self. This is something both side exhibit, however, one more than another.

Often the discourse when discussing difficulty is the idea that it doesn’t affect anyone else other than the person playing on easy or normal. However, I’d like to make a point I don’t see – as I’ve already called them – the snobs of Dark Souls make too often or at all: The psychological aspect. When playing something on a harder difficulty, I have thought, “Maybe I could drop the difficulty to get past this one mission?” To which I yell at myself for thinking that because my self confidence when out for a smoke. I know I can beat this horrific beast or stupid design flaw, “You are amazing,” as Dark Souls tells me afterward.

It is this idea that one could simply drop the difficulty and reset it once again while playing, which drives the small group of Dark Souls and Souls-like fans into hysteria. At least one hopes this is the case. However, this is easily given a counterpoint: Lock the difficulty. Some games do this considerably well, some don’t allow for a change in the setting outside the main menu, and some have one choice about the difficulty at the beginning of the game, and never again. There are ways of curbing the question of difficulty for both sides in that sense.

Though there is one culprit of this lack of a difficulty slider, and it is strange that no one speaks about it. Rockstar never has a difficulty setting, no one speaks of this, and no one is too vocal about their difficulty options. Instead, we give 2K and Rockstar one billion dollars in three days. However, I think there is a reason for this. You see, Rockstar is the master of the open-world game; there was an entire period of gaming which people tried to start the terms: “Grand Theft Auto clone,” “GTA-like,” and “Criminal sandbox.” The point being, Rockstar spent several years perfectly constructing every pubic louse of their games so there is often a nice balance.

This doesn’t dispute the fact some still find the games difficult– I hadn’t completed Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas until a few years ago, because of difficulty and a lack of interest in doing so. As I have stated, I love Rockstar’s games like no other; As one tends to enjoy an Obsidian game they are an alien in the industry. Though, as I said before, the conversation never speaks about Grand Theft Auto, Bully, or Red Dead. In fact, there is a nice joke by Dara Ó Briain about games and difficulty: “Video games do a thing that no other industry does, you cannot be bad at watching a movie; you cannot be bad at listening to an album, but you can be bad at playing a video game. The video game will punish you, and deny you access to the rest of the video game.”

This joke continues to go into the idea of difficulty, and I suggest you see the full R-rated piece, but it is very true. You cannot watch several scenes of a movie and not understand who is the villain and protagonist are, but you can play several missions in quick succession to be halted by a forced stealth section. One-hit kills are soul(s) destroying when played several times over. You cannot have this same issue while listening to Led Zeppelin or watching a Marvel movie. This is truly unique to video games, and to ask that every game defaults to unlocking all the content off the bat almost defeats the purpose.

This is the point of something such as Guitar Hero, Rock Band, or hit this plastic piece of tat off your brother’s head for wanting to play Wonderwall the boring sod. The reason some trite band you’ve never heard of has a song next to Led Zeppelin is your own desire. You want to play Immigrant Song, but first, as a challenge, you have to play some dull Disney pop balled with no guitar in it, but who cares? In a minute you’ll be playing some rock royalty and all the groupies in your mind will thrive off sex and sausage sandwiches. This is a natural challenge, don’t blow your brains out and you can play a Nirvana track.

To continue on the thought that I was making in the accessibility piece, Dark Souls, Bloodborne, and Sekiro could do several things to improve themselves. Though the difficulty isn’t based on health or several other metrics that could be quantified and sold off in loot boxes. It is a natural difficulty that is embedded in the design of the game: A design that depending on how you know the Dark Souls and Souls-like games, it is either something that shouldn’t be changed, or it should be changed to fit your own specific desires for the game. Neither of which is the correct way of looking at it.

The reason I have fallen for Dark Souls is that I’ve spent so much time trying to like it. This is literal Stockholm Syndrome, and it is part of the design that causes this response in several players: “Dark Souls isn’t for the noob. Don’t go changing my game!” However, speaking as someone who can see the flaws and see why I like the games, I can tell you why I like them and what is a good example of them: Physics. When playing something, such as Surgeon Simulator, you laugh when things go wrong, and it all goes wrong because of the “whacky” physics. With Dark Souls you have to think the game is working against you, then you have to figure out how to work against the game; this is your: “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.”

Admittedly, some don’t want to fight a game to play it. Personally, I think the games of the 80s and 90s that are half made aren’t enjoyable for this reason. Those games didn’t have natural difficulty: They were short, fairly boring in comparison, and random death was there because of rentals. Before Blockbuster went the way of the Dodo, and Netflix became the online streaming monolith rentals were common; and games have since become easier, but also much longer. A majority of triple-A western games have balanced out their difficulty, and Japanese games are often three or four things: a Nintendo (family) game, a Square Enix RPG, pornographic visual novels, and then something like Dark Souls.

To many gamers, the difficulty seems like an easy thing to change and tweak. However, the difficulty of Dark Souls isn’t based on the usual metrics; it is based on the design which is naturally incongruous to what we know from the rules of several other games. This is what Dark Souls wants out of you, for you to assume of it the same as other games so it can laugh at you. It is your own knowledge of video games of the last several years that will often be your downfall in a game like this. You need to have knowledge of the game to enjoy it, though the Dark Souls series won’t tell you the rules it is playing by.

To enjoy something like Dark Souls or “Super serious hard games for hardcore gamers,” it takes that fighting against the game I spoke about. So how does one fix this for those with slower motor functions, give some a chance to enjoy it, and ultimately not hate it and the create this divide between elitists and people who just want to enjoy a game? Instantly I’d suggest cheat codes, something that has been replaced by microtransactions. An invincibility mode so one could soak up the lore in peace would be a simple addition. There are ways of fixing these issues, and I’m sure a proper game designer could think of better ways to fix the problems.

Should this have to be the case? No, but this is the only way to move forward without breaking the design of something such as Dark Souls for the majority of players. With something so poorly yet expertly designed as Dark Souls, “normal” difficulty settings would do very little to the overall experience other than some deaths. Though these options should be included; they should also be accepted as long as they don’t affect you as a player.

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