Are Games Getting Easier?

A question that some gamers might say. Some gamers from 80s and 90s believe that games are getting way too easy now compared to the 80s and 90s standards. It's no doubt that games like Battletoads, Ninja Gaiden, and Contra was hard and challenging and it would make any kid want to break his/her controller. Nowadays, games are relying on checkpoints or save/load system to ease things up. Some gamers think it's dumbing the difficulty of the game. I would say yes and no. I think in the 80s and 90s there might be a bit more harder games compared today's standards. That's why I say yes. The no part is that game's might not be as hard as Contra or Ninja Gaiden, but it's still a challenge. However, with the option to load and save + checkpoints, it's making it less frustrating. I for one believe that frustration does make a game difficult, it's basically a design flaw that the earlier games had. Now as technology advances, we're fixing those flaws with save/load system and checkpoints. Also games like Halo: Combat Evolved and Gears of War's technology is much more advanced than Battletoads since they sometimes change the challenge a bit with their advanced AI-making the player to use different strategy or changing his/her playing style a bit. Both of Halo and Gears game do give options to player to somewhat adjust difficulty a bit. You can throw a grenade in the E-Hole to not fight a group of Locust or you can wait for them to come out and fight them. With the Halo games, Halo fans say the easist way to play the campaign is using the infamous Noob Combo (BR/PP) to ease things for new players on Legendary. However, if you're using different weapon combos, it's basically a test on how well you can use the other weapons and it gives you a much different experience if you're gonna use other weapon combos like the AR/Needle. How do I know this? Well guess what gamers, I actually REPLAY my games when I beat them. See technology is so advanced nowadays, it's giving you some more options to come back and replay your games and sometimes you can have a different experience you had before. Also the newer games where you try to beat the whole game without dying once is almost up or it is to the same level with the older games too. The advanced AI can sometimes spice things up a bit and you'll probably died where you didn't expect to. It seems like all these "tough gamers" go on forums and whine about new gen games being easy today is that because they probably just play it one time and never even touch it again. Do you want games to be like I Wanna Be The Guy? I sure don't.

Post your thoughts, these are my thoughts.

Oh yeah and some people are different than others in terms of playing their games. My friend is really good at the Castlevania games and he can master them pretty quickly since he's a huge fan. Some of the Castlevania games he can play without dying once. However, he can't see himself playing the COD games on Veteran without dying once. He also beated both MW and MW 2 on Veteran. I asked him if he would ever try to play MW on Veteran without dying once and he said he'll never do it because he said he always find a spot where he can die quickly.

Nah it's just that they seemed harder because when you failed a level you had to restart the entire thing and spend like 20 tedious minutes getting to the exact same spot and dieing again and then doing it all over again and beat it on your fourth try or so. In games now you would just get a checkpoint before that point or something so it wasn't bullshit.

As for your "advanced AI" thing you have going on I bet you're super hyped for Crysis 2.

Errm I see what you mean. I don't think they're getting easier though...they're just getting more convenient sort of.
Having checkpoints doesn't make it easier, it just makes it more convenient. Because if you've already got past a hard bit, then die on the bit after that, if you have to do the hard bit again, it's not any harder, it's the same thing you already did. Newer games with checkpoints just sort that out, after doing the hard bit you can focus on the next part and not even bother going back.