I just avoid those games. If the devs want to keep them hard that's their call. I'm 37 with a kid, sorry but there are tons of other games my money, not my limited time, can go toward.

Because People love to complain and believe opinion matters as long every one agree with them.

Any sane person knows level shaming is absurd. Unfortunately, fan shorthands fanatic and since most video games have a skill element, there will always be competitive elitism when applicable.

Difficulty levels give a choice to the player. That is never bad.

Telling people how they have to have fun is totally nonsensical.

I'm an older gamer and I must say they seem to get easier. Many games I want a harder mode and some just level the difficulty too poorly. Like from hard to nightmare is 4 times harder. Some some games with a fixed story mode I wish were harder. Assassin's Creed learned and made some adjustments over the years.

Because most often those games don't get an extra "easy mode" they just make them easier in general. So I think they should stay loyal to their current fanbase instead of trying to please new people

agreed, but try to say that to the Elder Ring community.

Feeling of superiority. Lots of people tend to grasp at any straw to feel superior than their fellow man, no matter how meaningless their achievement is.

exacly and that should apply to both sides.

I never avoid hard games but I've avoided easy games in the past, depending on how the gameplay is structured - a game like Telltale's Walking Dead will obviously be easy due to the nature of the game itself (so no big deal) but if a JRPG like Yakuza Like a Dragon presents me a deep combat system and then never capitalizes on it due to being braindead, then that's a major flaw I can associate with it (still beat it but it was disappointing).

In general, Hard games tend to be like that because they often capitalize on the gameplay of that specific game. Easy games are either adequate to the light gameplay/story elements or completely unbalanced to the point of undermining what would have been a deep, enriching experience

EDIT: if you're referring to Elden Ring, yeah, the game is easy to a fault - and I can support that with arguments about why that clashes with other gameplay elements in the game. Already had that discussion multiple times though. Game is good but quite flawed.

I find that the less you communicate with the souls community, the better your experience will be xD

i know, it's so pathetic.

But isn't that what's fun? Learning, adapting and overcoming the difficulty of the game. Btw 44 here and with 4 kids and I like my games hard.

I do enjoy creative easy modes like in dmc 3 with it's auto mated combat but my personal favorite to play a video game is onimusha 3 on easy cause it let's you do the beautiful looking counter slashes with more forgiving windows.

Difficult in a game can become a right of passage, the fact that everyone is expected to clear the same bar is important with gatekeeping. If it's a low bar then whats the point?

The best thing i can compare it to is mountain climbing, their is an inate prestige to climbing certain mountains be it the 48 high peaks of the Adirondacks (relatively short) or the Matterhorn or Everest. And if we built an escalator to the top of every mountain it would cheapen the accomplishment of climbing them, atleast to some.

In a way games with just 1 difficulty are like mountains, Portal doesn't have an easy mode but its also a small hill. Pokemon doesn't have a difficulty mode and it can ba all over the place. But souls likes take pride in being true mountains that take skill and experience to beat, and their are no stairs or escalators so only those truly able to climb it can enjoy the prestige of saying "I did it, i beat darksouls".

And semi related is a valid non-gatekeeping reason. Darksouls difficulty isn't from things you can put on a slider, so much if the difficulty is from very custom tailored elements that you can't simply change the boss's HP and Damage and have difficulty modes that feel right. (Put fallout 4 on hard, it just make enemies bullet sponges which isn't fun. They don't become any smarter, they just waste more time to kill.) So for this reason i understand not wanting difficulty modes if the balance is mainly from factors that don't lend themselves to sliders.

I believe a game is meant to teach the mechanics and allow the player to master them and display their skills in a series of increasingly difficult challenges. That’s what I find to be the most rewarding part of video games. I think depending on the type of game, difficulty options may work, however seeing 5 different difficulty options straight off the bat is also pretty overwhelming. I think if the game is great at introducing and developing its gameplay concepts at a good pace, then the player should naturally be able to see their abilities improve to conquer any challenges the game poses. Obviously it’s not going to be applicable to everyone which is unfortunate. Personally a game’s challenge to me doesn’t feel as rewarding knowing that someone who could have played it with little to no challenge got the same experience as me so that’s really what kills it. I guess different rewards for a more challenging difficulty like achievements or secret cutscenes are nice. Maybe even a super hard boss in a game with no difficulty options could be a solution. ¯_(＾ω＾)_/¯ Hard to say obviously because each game itself is a case to case basis.