The history of difficulty in

Video GamesBy: Kevin Lenyo

Explaining DifficultyDifficulty in Video Games is often associated with the term difficulty curve and how this curve looks has changed somewhat drastically over time.

Difficulty is the challenge to “complete” the game as if there is no uncertainty of victory or defeat the game becomes defunct.

Games with the primary focus on multiplayer have a different set of rules, so for this presentation I will be focusing on Single Player Games.

The Arcade Era

Games created around the time of the emergence of arcades had a primary purpose - to collect as many coins from children as possible.

With this in mind the difficulty curve for these games was extremely linear.

The idea behind this is that the game becomes continually more difficult requiring players to insert more coins to master or continue playing the game.

Arcade Game Examples

1-3rd Gen Consoles

The rise of the home consoleWith the success of the arcade in making money companies decided this industry was big enough to be brought into the home.

With the draw of high-score becoming negligible companies had to find a new curve.

The amount of time it took players to master games was no longer profitable.

The response to this was to just make games difficult to complete and in many cases the games were long.

1-3rd Gen Examples

4-5th Gen Consoles

Blockbuster Blockbuster and other rental stores actually had a much greater effect than one might think. Games were now popular enough to be offered in these stores and because of that companies had to find ways to push rental sales.

Developers created choke points to prevent players to pass that certain spot in the game without spending a large amount of time.

Blockbuster Era Example

6th Gen and Beyond

Triple A GamingTriple A gaming brought upon several different curves and ideals as now the industry had become larger than expected. With this the draw for an increase in narrative.

Bigger budgets were being supplied along with the improvements of equipment allowed for less limitations in games.

Puzzle / Casual GamesGood puzzle games reward players for figuring out the puzzles presented.

The goal for puzzle games is to introduce a new piece, have the players figure them out and then use their knowledge to continue solving puzzles.

Puzzle Game Example

Designer Hideo Kojima has gone on to say that players should never die in video games, that the idea of Game Over is archaic.

Dying in a narrative game naturally drops immersion as there is nothing that separates you more from the game than when your character dies and you are left with the Try Again screen.

Narrative Games

Narrative Example

Since Triple A gaming came out there have always been a few games that have come out that have just been deemed hard.

The point here in these games is very retro in a way that the player should always be struggling never dropping the difficulty curve.

Hard Games

Hard Games Examples

This is the end of the slideshow.