With Hollow Knight: Silksong’s huge launch in full swing, community debate about its qualities and flaws has gone back and forth, with some players insisting their criticisms about things like the game's difficulty are valid and shouldn’t be instantly dismissed as "hate."
Hard to say. We have many examples of games with only one difficulty that are glorified for their challenging combat. We have an example of God of War with cool and challenging combat on max difficulty that for some reason did not receive such status like Souls games. I think Elden Ring can be an example of a challenging game with “difficulty setting” that was did receive other Souls treatment. So I think “difficulty settings” can work if done not as an option at the start of the game but by adding game mechanics or strategies that make it easier. Technically that’s what Silksong does for the most bits with a crest for easier platforming, usable tools for combat and boss specific weaknesses(Moorwing fight is trivial at the right corner of the arena, Widow can only hit you with one attack if you stand at the corner, and so on).
all of the things you say are completely, 100%, unaffected by a difficulty setting.
The only thing a difficulty setting changes is that some people can say “I am better than you, I beat [game X] and you didn’t”
that’s it.
and even that is a complete illusion, see the prominent worst business man in the world, paying someone to make PoE ranks for him.
Also there are mods, cheats and plain lying.
This whole thing is excluding people, and for what? Literally worthless bragging rights.
yes, i HATED that, and don’t think I ever finished any of those games.
that was not a good thing.
To you. It was for players who liked it that way. There are even popular rogue likes today.
would they still like it if there was a difficulty setting?
Hard to say. We have many examples of games with only one difficulty that are glorified for their challenging combat. We have an example of God of War with cool and challenging combat on max difficulty that for some reason did not receive such status like Souls games. I think Elden Ring can be an example of a challenging game with “difficulty setting” that was did receive other Souls treatment. So I think “difficulty settings” can work if done not as an option at the start of the game but by adding game mechanics or strategies that make it easier. Technically that’s what Silksong does for the most bits with a crest for easier platforming, usable tools for combat and boss specific weaknesses(Moorwing fight is trivial at the right corner of the arena, Widow can only hit you with one attack if you stand at the corner, and so on).
all of the things you say are completely, 100%, unaffected by a difficulty setting.
The only thing a difficulty setting changes is that some people can say “I am better than you, I beat [game X] and you didn’t”
that’s it.
and even that is a complete illusion, see the prominent worst business man in the world, paying someone to make PoE ranks for him. Also there are mods, cheats and plain lying.
This whole thing is excluding people, and for what? Literally worthless bragging rights.