Insanely difficult games..?

[topper]

Weirdly, most games that are now considered "retro" seem to be extremely difficult when I fire them up now. Yet, back in the day, when I was 10, I had no issues. Perhaps I'm soft now, or perhaps games have become easier to provide a less frustrating experience for those not prepared to put in a lot of time and get knocked back. *deletes rest of post as it was veering towards a "casual" discussion and it's not as if I don't enjoy non-retro games*

Put it this way, I won't be firing up Manic Miner any time soon.

[NemesiS]

Ghouls N Ghosts is definetly one. I never did finish it myself, don't you have to complete it twice to get the true ending?

No. It all depends on whether you get the ring on your first playthrough and wear it against the final boss if i remember rightly. If you don't, you beat the final boss then have start again from the beginning. ARSE

[EvilBoris]

Ghouls and Ghosts
I never had the patiences as a child to even do the first level
Shinobi
same

Sonic the Hedgehog 360/Ps3
So broken, there were sections I swear were impossible

All the Battletoads games and those friggin uber speed hover bike sections

[SuperBeatBoy]

I remember playing Revenge of Shinobi alot. It was a really difficult game, tough but fair. Did finish it though. Last boss use to make me laugh with the hair.

[Darwock]

Weirdly, most games that are now considered "retro" seem to be extremely difficult when I fire them up now. Yet, back in the day, when I was 10, I had no issues. Perhaps I'm soft now, or perhaps games have become easier to provide a less frustrating experience for those not prepared to put in a lot of time and get knocked back. *deletes rest of post as it was veering towards a "casual" discussion and it's not as if I don't enjoy non-retro games*

Put it this way, I won't be firing up Manic Miner any time soon.

It wasn't like that for me, when I was a kid on my spectrum I basically went into a game with no aspirations of completing it whatsoever.. starting with games like Manic Miner put me in the mindset that completing a game was cloud cuckoo land type stuff. I think the first one I ever finished was Strider. Probably next was either Midnight Resistance or Batman the Movie.. whichever came first. This corresponds to me starting to grow up and get good of course, but also games becoming easier.

Oh yeah, someone mentioned DMC3&4 - they absolutely don't belong in this thread unless you're only talking about DMD mode. The easier modes of DMC are a piece of cake... as long as you bother to learn the game!

[Dazzyman]

Battle garraga can be impossible if you dont rank down (you have to learn to suicide). Pretty much any manic shmup for us mere mortals with one credit.

[Pilotwings]

I would say most games on the Amstrad/Commodore/Spectrum were ok for quick blasts, thats it. Maybe a few games got completed but thats probably cause they were designed better. Plus you had to play with hideous joysticks with suckers on the bottom.

[Silvergun X]

Battle garraga can be impossible if you dont rank down (you have to learn to suicide).

Same goes for Ibara also.

[kernow]

in my opinion any game that you have to purposefully die to get the internal rank to drop down .. is horribly broken

[BaudAttitude]

Weirdly, most games that are now considered "retro" seem to be extremely difficult when I fire them up now. Yet, back in the day, when I was 10, I had no issues. Perhaps I'm soft now, or perhaps games have become easier to provide a less frustrating experience for those not prepared to put in a lot of time and get knocked back. *deletes rest of post as it was veering towards a "casual" discussion and it's not as if I don't enjoy non-retro games*

Put it this way, I won't be firing up Manic Miner any time soon.

I've noticed that I do a lot better now at any arcade game from, oh, 1983 or before, then there's this spike of difficulty starting in 1983-1984 and continuing until 1991-ish, then game difficulty starts to come down a bit and starts declining very quickly with the Saturn/PS generation. You still get the odd holdout like Ninja Gaiden, but by and large games these days are designed to be beaten.

I think there's at least a tenuous correlation with the point where arcade games shifted over from "pay a quarter and play until you die, then start from zero" to "pay a quarter and play until you die, but then you can put in another quarter to keep going", and then another correlation with the point where gaming at home became the norm. Not that I have anything to back that up, mind you.

[Darwock]

I reckon you're right though, it must be the case. Arcade games were designed for a reason, and that was to make money. They weren't made just for the love of it... and the best way to make money in an arcade is to get people to keep pumping in the continues.

At home people just want to be satisfied with their purchase, so enabling them to complete it becomes much more important.

[Kubrick]

Gradius III is ridiculously hard compared to the rest of the series.

[boxhead]

ninja gaiden 2 was horrificly difficult for me. I couldnt get past the second boss after about 10 tries so i've not played it since. A real shame because I thoroughly enjoyed and beat the first one.

also, advance wars days of ruin comprehensively kicked my ass after about the 14th stage.

[Phar]

The only one that stands recently for me is Last Hope, absolutely no learning curve whatsoever, starts off insanely hard and gets f*cking harder. Still can't get off the 3rd level 2yrs on.

[Daragon]

Ninja Gaiden 2 - it's a shame that Team Ninja took a step backwards after Sigma. With Sigma it wasn't too difficult or too easy. With sigma, you could return to earlier levels and rooms within those levels in order to train or earn money orbs. None of that stuff with 2 tho

Games that are too difficult just put people off playing them and hurt review scores. Can't imagine publicity like that is what producers want.