Difficulty in video games is actually a pretty cyclical thing. Back in the days of arcade rats and joysticks,games were ridiculously hard, and high scoreswere like badgesof honor. Slowly, however, over time, players began to crave moremanageable, relaxing endeavorswhere the content wasn’t skill-gated.
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Then, due to gameslike FromSoft’s Soulsborne titles, players began to despise the yellow paint on cliff ledges and endless tutorials, craving a more punishing experience.
But even when players are bracing themselves for a punishing game, it can sometimes be so hard that it becomes unfair, frustrating, and unenjoyable. This is usually when the developer steps in.
Through patches and updates, these games have balanced their core experience, retaining their ‘hard game’ status, but ultimately making the experience easier. So, if you fancy seeking out even more punishing V1.0 runs, these games without patches were an absolute nightmare.
10The Callisto Protocol
Breaching Protocol
The Callisto Protocol
While I would be hard-pressed to drum up any convincing argument that The Callisto Protocolis an amazing horror game, it’s not a half-bad recreation of what Dead Space has to offer horror fanatics. It’s not anywhere near as polished, but it scratches the same itch.
That said, it’s a much more palatable experience these days because, at launch, this game was deeply irritating to struggle through.
The game’s combat required pinpoint parrying, had enemies hit hard as hell, featured a wealth of cheap ways to take damage, and had very harsh checkpoints that would make you endure these terrible sections until something snapped in you, and you quit the game for good.
Thankfully, the game is now a much more balanced survival horror endeavor and warrants checking out. Just don’t expect Dead Space levels of brilliance, and you should still have a good time.
Dead Cells
Dead Cells has been a rather balanced experience for as long as many fans can remember, even with regular updates, DLC, and new features being added to keep the game fresh and exciting. But, in the very early days of Dead Cells' existence, there were definitely some teething issues.
Bosses used to be a lot harder, with higher damage output and less margin for error. Not to mention that the game didn’t offer anywhere near as many healing opportunities or useful drops as it does today.
Fair warning, though. The game is still one of the toughest indies out there, and the DLC only cements that reputation with a wealth of huge obstacles to overcome. But, it’s indie royalty for a reason, and one well worth struggling through.
8Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order
A Disturbance In The Force
Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order
Despite the fact that Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order sets its stall out as a Soulslike,and a Metroidvania, it’s nowhere near the toughest game in either of these genres by a long shot.
That said, when it was first released, this game was definitely a lot closer to rivaling the hardest in each respective field, but for all the wrong reasons.
Jedi Fallen Order was rife with difficulty spikes, even on the lower difficulty settings, that made portions of the game feel needlessly tough and frustrating. It wasn’t a player skill issue; it was a design issue.
But, a few updates later, each difficulty setting felt a lot more palatable and appropriate, with AI that wasn’t quite as hellbent on slicing and dicing you. Unless you chose hard mode, in which case, you asked for it, so you may’t be mad.
Bullet Hell With Breaks
This one may feel like a bit of a wildcard, as Housemarque never made any big changes to the core gameplay experience and the overall difficulty of their bullet-hell roguelike. However, they added one simple function that made the game infinitely more approachable and less stressful.
The devs added a save game feature post-launch, allowing players to save the game at regular intervals rather than committing to hours-long sessions just to hit a hard checkpoint in their run.
The runs are still just as hard, and the save file won’t allow you to undo any deaths that occur throughout, but it does mean that you can play Returnal in shorter bursts and on your own terms. It’s a small change, but it will feel like a revelation to anyone who played the game in its original state.
A Smoother Experience
With the success of the recent Souls-like,The First Berserker: Khaszan, it’s all the more important that we remember the trailblazing series that first married together Diablo-style looting and Souls-like combat, Nioh.
The second in the series is superior to the original in almost every single way, but initially some of the bosses were rather unbalanced, making for a few portions of the game that weren’t quite in keeping with the game’s steady difficulty curve.
Various mob enemies were made a lot less dangerous in patch updates, alongside boss encounters such as Saika Magoichi, Shibata Katsuie, and a handful more.
Some may argue that harder is always better, but in my humble opinion, it makes the experience a lot fairer and enjoyable. So, in this case, kudos to the devs for polishing up an already stunning Souls-like experience.
5Blasphemous
2D Souls Suffering
Blasphemous
I always inform anyone who wants to get into Blasphemous as a series that it’s almost better to play them in reverse order, as Blasphemous 2 plays more like a traditional Metroidvania Souls-lite. Whereas the original is a much morepunishing out-and-out 2D Souls-like.
That still holds true to this day, but it was even more true when the original was first released, as the game was even tougher than it is now.
As it exists today, the game has far less aggressive knockbacks, a lot more I-frames to play around with, and more opportunities to save making losing your resources less of a recurring issue also.
It’s still brutal, the bosses are still tough as nails and spikes still kill you instantly, but by comparison, today’s version is a relative cakewalk.
Looks Can Be Deceiving
From the outside looking in, you would think Tunic is a wholesome, cute Zelda clone. Which, cards on the table, it is. But, under the hood, this game doubles as a very punishing and challenging Souls-lite.
This was a huge shock to the system for most fans looking for a cozy adventure, and, as a result, a lot of players either bounced off the game or struggled to get through the most basic boss fights the game had to offer.
Thankfully, though, the developer didn’t go down the FromSoft route and keep the one difficulty for all approach. Instead, introducing robust accessibility features that allowed players to effectively turn on God Mode if they wished, making a grueling game into an easy-breezy puzzle-driven affair.
No matter what you choose, Tunic is still a blast, but if it weren’t for those accessibility features, this game would be revered as one of themost deceptively difficult games in history.
3Elden Ring
Put Those Foolish Ambitions To Rest
Elden Ring
Elden Ring, being part of the FromSoft family, is naturally an unapologetically hard game, but when the game first arrived to much acclaim, there were significant portions of the game that seemed hard for the sake of it, and over time, the developers seem to have come to the same conclusion, as these features have been patched.
Brutal boss encounters like Margit the Fell Omen, Starscourge Radahn, Malenia, Blade of Miquella, and more were nerfed significantly to make for a fairer fight.
Plus, thanks to the new build options provided by the DLC, Shadow of the Erdtree, there are even more tools to take down the biggest and baddest bosses in The Lands Between.
It’s still no walk in the park, but thanks to these changes, Elden Ring is in my book the most accessible Soulsborne game of all, and a great place to start for curious gamers.
Black Belt Difficulty
Outside of the Soulsborne titles, very few games are keen to commit to a ‘one difficulty fits all’ approach. However, before the updates that would later change this, Sifu was a game that embraced this design choice.
This meant that the game was intensely punishing, required near mastery just to get through the initial stages of the game, and due to the roguelike nature of the game, many players seemed to run out of steam well before the finish line as the skill ceiling was just too high.
An easier difficulty setting was later added, along with custom sliders for various aspects of the game. Plus, the game added training rooms and permanent unlocks to negate the need to grind every single run. Generally speaking, the game actually has more of a rogue-like feel, where death makes you stronger than it did before.
It still requires a lot of practice, kung-fu mastery, and a deep understanding of your opponents, as every encounter could be your last. However, Sifu is a much more approachable game to newbies than it was many moons ago.
1Lies of P
The ‘P’ Stands For Punishing
Lastly, we have a game that I had the pleasure (and pain) of playing before launch. Lies of P was an absolutely deadly experience in the initial weeks of its release, as bosses hit like trucks, your weapon degraded like crazy, and the game was particularly grind-heavy, even for a Soulslike.
However, these issues were resolved with much-needed balancing issues, with emphasis on particular bosses like Romeo and Simon Manus. Alongside more resources being added for weapon upgrades and buffs being added to summons and P-Organ abilities.
It essentially turned an unbearable slog where you would constantly slam your head against a wall into a fair fight, and while I will probably never go back to this one, I know from how many times I let out a wail in frustration how much this game likely benefited from these updates.
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