How Nintendo Can Make New and Old Gamers Happy at the Same Time...

I know this doesn't apply to everyone, and that's fine, but I have a problem with Mario Galaxy and I know I'm not alone.

Before you call flame bait, hear me out. I love Mario Galaxy. I have nothing against the game itself. My problem lies with the difficulty level. It's simply too easy for me.

I know there are others here like me, people who have played Mario games since the NES days. So it's no surprise that, after 11 years of 3D Mario gameplay, the game is just a brisk walk through the park when it should be an actual challenge. It feels as though I'm just going from point A to point B, with not much inbetween. I'm just glad that the gameplay itself is pure, unadulterated fun, or I would have to call shenanigans.

Galaxy's gameplay is a lot of fun, and I had a great time doing stupid things like long-jumping the circumference of a planet. The problem was that the only levels that challenged me were the Daredevel comet levels, and a few of the Purple Coin challenges. So I thought of a way that Nintendo could make a Mario game that would keep the game easy enough for novice players, while catering to the seasoned veterans as well.

It's a simple process, and it's been done thousands of times in the past: a difficulty setting. The great thing is, with my idea, they wouldn't even need to change any of the actual gameplay in any way.

Here's an example of how it might look:

Easy: You start the game with five 1-ups, 4 pieces of health (6 for the bosses), 50 coins for a 1-up, 50 star bits for a 1-up, when you die you start at the last automatic save-point.

Medium: Start the game with four 1-ups, 3 pieces of health (5 for the bosses), 50 coins for a 1-up, 60 star bits for a 1-up, when you die you start at the last automatic save-point.

Hard: Three 1-ups, 2 pieces of health (4 for the bosses), coins only replenish health (no 1-ups), 75 star bits for a 1-up, when you die you start at the beginning of the level.

Impossible: Two 1-ups, 2 pieces of health (2 for bosses as well), coins only replenish health (no 1-ups), 100 star bits for a 1-up, when you die you start at the beginning of the level. "Game Over" means GAME OVER in this mode, like it used to. Be warned.

So there you go, my idea. It makes it possible for new players to succeed, and for the daring, it's Contra-style difficulty for your punk-***.

And don't think that people wouldn't try Impossible. You know you'd be seeing speed-runs on Youtube in no time.

Is this a good idea, or what would you do differently? How about other Nintendo games? You got any ideas for the Legend of Zelda to make it more challenging? Feel free to share.

Impossible: Two 1-ups, 2 pieces of health (2 for bosses as well), coins only replenish health (no 1-ups), 100 star bits for a 1-up, when you die you start at the beginning of the level. "Game Over" means GAME OVER in this mode, like it used to. Be warned.

bob_newman

A problem I see with Impossible mode is that, assuming that by Game Over, you mean start from the very beginning of the game and your save file gets deleted is that it can be simply worked around by having saving onto something else then copying it when the game is over.

[QUOTE="bob_newman"]

Impossible: Two 1-ups, 2 pieces of health (2 for bosses as well), coins only replenish health (no 1-ups), 100 star bits for a 1-up, when you die you start at the beginning of the level. "Game Over" means GAME OVER in this mode, like it used to. Be warned.

Technoweirdo

A problem I see with Impossible mode is that, assuming that by Game Over, you mean start from the very beginning of the game and your save file gets deleted is that it can be simply worked around by having saving onto something else then copying it when the game is over.

I guess you could shut your system off right before you die...well, anyone who does that is a cheater! Step up and accept when you lose, that's what I say to that.

Ill share my opinion. But first lemme say that your ideas are great. A fun way to get more into the game but I think my version will be have the SMB2 feel to it.

Its a basic idea and I don't know why they implemented this. But those comets they used Purple Coins, DareDevil, Cosmic race etc. They shoul have used them for each level. I mean all 120 stars, well most them. Now that would add some serious replayibility for the game. And it will certainly chanlenge(soory for spelling) the old and new

Bob, I'm going to freak you out here so you and everyone watch out.

Nintendo makes the games so forgiving because of the gamers, not in spite of them.

Gamers would freak if the games were harder and they were unable to complete them. There is a gradual step process that hardcore gamers have lived if they've been a part of Nintendo from the 8 or 16 bit consoles.

I say some of the filthiest words in the history of human language when I play old school Nintendo games because nothing made sense. Want to finish Zelda? Then you better be prepared to bomb, set afire, and kick everything on the map. Nothing told you how to finish. These days stuff needs to make sense and you need to be lead just because storytelling has become what it is.

If people couldn't finish the games when they're explained to you then wow, you suck.

Also it's not the difficulty in the Mario games it's the ride and how you decide to take it. The hardcore gamers go back and try to do better. The less hardcore are just happy they're done with a level.

On the other side of the coin everyone would miss out on the story if the games were too hard. That means lowering the difficulty level and then you're back to "Wow, you suck"

Bob, I'm going to freak you out here so you and everyone watch out.

Nintendo makes the games so forgiving because of the gamers, not in spite of them.

Gamers would freak if the games were harder and they were unable to complete them. There is a gradual step process that hardcore gamers have lived if they've been a part of Nintendo from the 8 or 16 bit consoles.

I say some of the filthiest words in the history of human language when I play old school Nintendo games because nothing made sense. Want to finish Zelda? Then you better be prepared to bomb, set afire, and kick everything on the map. Nothing told you how to finish. These days stuff needs to make sense and you need to be lead just because storytelling has become what it is.

If people couldn't finish the games when they're explained to you then wow, you suck.

Also it's not the difficulty in the Mario games it's the ride and how you decide to take it. The hardcore gamers go back and try to do better. The less hardcore are just happy they're done with a level.

On the other side of the coin everyone would miss out on the story if the games were too hard. That means lowering the difficulty level and then you're back to "Wow, you suck"

Jaysonguy

I agree when you say that it's fun for "hardcore gamers (to) go back and try to do better." I love the replayability of Mario games, I think it's one of the things that I enjoy the most. I'm just thinking of the idea of taking the formula and turning it into something new.

What I'm talking about is really just for fun here. I know that taking Mario in a different direction like this is probably not going to happen.

But I doubt that many people will think that they suck if it says "impossible" in the setting. Maybe it could have a warning, saying "don't attempt to play on this setting if you throw Wiimotes at the screen out of frustration. You will get a game over and have to start over if you die" or something along those lines.

I don't think that I suck at Contra, I just know that it's really, really hard to do.

Bob, I'm going to freak you out here so you and everyone watch out.

Nintendo makes the games so forgiving because of the gamers, not in spite of them.

Gamers would freak if the games were harder and they were unable to complete them. There is a gradual step process that hardcore gamers have lived if they've been a part of Nintendo from the 8 or 16 bit consoles.

I say some of the filthiest words in the history of human language when I play old school Nintendo games because nothing made sense. Want to finish Zelda? Then you better be prepared to bomb, set afire, and kick everything on the map. Nothing told you how to finish. These days stuff needs to make sense and you need to be lead just because storytelling has become what it is.

If people couldn't finish the games when they're explained to you then wow, you suck.

Also it's not the difficulty in the Mario games it's the ride and how you decide to take it. The hardcore gamers go back and try to do better. The less hardcore are just happy they're done with a level.

On the other side of the coin everyone would miss out on the story if the games were too hard. That means lowering the difficulty level and then you're back to "Wow, you suck"

Jaysonguy

I agree. My biggest complaint with Galaxy was the lack of any real difficulty or feeling of accomplishment. The only part that was semi-challenging was the last 10 or 20 stars.

This is why I love the Metroid series so much. The bosses and challenges are actually tough and you feel like you've truly accomplished something. You didn't really get this in Galaxy until the final 20 stars.

I know it could be alot of work but i think they should consider adventure games like Metroid Prime and Zelda with

different difficulty settings that dont just affect enemies but enviroment and at least puzzles. I had a big problem with metroid

prime 3 because the puzzles were easy and not well thought out like in the 1st 2 games. And people were telling me play

hypermode its more challenging but all hypermode does is boost the enemies. In games like Contra 4 for the DS each setting

really changes the game. Easy every weapon is at full power and the enemies are not that frequent and easy to kill. The mid

setting puts all weapons at a low power and u have to power them up enemies are harder and theres more of them and bosses

have addtion moves. Hard the enviorments are different and have traps and the enemies are insane. Games that had great

changes between easy mid and hard when have greater playablity.

So this game is really easy and theres no way to make it harder? Great, I'm having second thoughts on whether to pick it up or notKenny789

Its worth the buy it might be a kind of easy game but its still refreshing and original without loosing its roots at all

Is this a good idea, or what would you do differently?

bob_newman

I'm sorry if I seem like an *** for saying this, but what I would do differently, is play a different game. Most games these days are not meant to frustrate the crap out of you. Most games these days are there to provide a fun gaming experience to a broad audience, generally with a reasonable difficulty level.

However, I do see where you're coming from and I agree that SMG (and other games) should have at least one more difficulty setting to please the people who want more of a challenge. Example of what they could do to remedy this problem would be something like Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland. A relatively easy game, but for the enthusiasts if you beat the game 100% you could unlock the "Extra" mode, which halves your total vitality, making the game twice as hard.

So, actually yes, I do agree with you for the most part, and I believe that every game should have an added difficulty level for the gaming enthusiast.

Trying to get Jordan's 'Best Wii Forum Week 5" ehhh?
In any case, you state some good ideas.

However I do not believe that lowering the life makes the game any harder, just more challenging. There IS a difference.
Just like playing the game faster makes it more challenging rather than hard.

In my opinion challenging would mean you have to do more tasks, and more fights that involve more and critical thinking.

When I figure that in order to kill a boss all I have to do is dodge him till he dances then jump on his head. Thats not hard, maybe if I have to dodge him longer then it is more of a challenge but not harder. To make it harder then I need to think more critically how to defeat him as no obvious reason will come to my mind. You see where I am going?

In my mind challenging is lengthening some attribute of something that is already there in someway.

Harder is taking tha matter off the game and putting into the mind and the body. Where you have to think harder, work hard, and break afew sweats to figureout what to do to overcome the situation.

Trying to get Jordan's 'Best Wii Forum Week 5" ehhh?
In any case, you state some good ideas.

However I do not believe that lowering the life makes the game any harder, just more challenging. There IS a difference.
Just like playing the game faster makes it more challenging rather than hard.

In my opinion challenging would mean you have to do more tasks, and more fights that involve more and critical thinking.

When I figure that in order to kill a boss all I have to do is dodge him till he dances then jump on his head. Thats not hard, maybe if I have to dodge him longer then it is more of a challenge but not harder. To make it harder then I need to think more critically how to defeat him as no obvious reason will come to my mind. You see where I am going?

In my mind challenging is lengthening some attribute of something that is already there in someway.

Harder is taking tha matter off the game and putting into the mind and the body. Where you have to think harder, work hard, and break afew sweats to figureout what to do to overcome the situation.

WolfWatch

So basically something like modifying the A.I to make the player adapt More often ?

[QUOTE="WolfWatch"]

Trying to get Jordan's 'Best Wii Forum Week 5" ehhh?
In any case, you state some good ideas.

However I do not believe that lowering the life makes the game any harder, just more challenging. There IS a difference.
Just like playing the game faster makes it more challenging rather than hard.

In my opinion challenging would mean you have to do more tasks, and more fights that involve more and critical thinking.

When I figure that in order to kill a boss all I have to do is dodge him till he dances then jump on his head. Thats not hard, maybe if I have to dodge him longer then it is more of a challenge but not harder. To make it harder then I need to think more critically how to defeat him as no obvious reason will come to my mind. You see where I am going?

In my mind challenging is lengthening some attribute of something that is already there in someway.

Harder is taking tha matter off the game and putting into the mind and the body. Where you have to think harder, work hard, and break afew sweats to figureout what to do to overcome the situation.

mojothebaboon

So basically something like modifying the A.I to make the player adapt More often ?

basically. i am sure i am not the only one that see's a boss and within afew minutes know how to beat him and you just repeat the steps. for instance the battle with bowser, you just made his feet hot with lava, spun him around afew times, and he's gone. if that only worked once, and you had to figure out some other way to defeat him rather than repeating one thing.

[QUOTE="mojothebaboon"][QUOTE="WolfWatch"]

Trying to get Jordan's 'Best Wii Forum Week 5" ehhh?
In any case, you state some good ideas.

However I do not believe that lowering the life makes the game any harder, just more challenging. There IS a difference.
Just like playing the game faster makes it more challenging rather than hard.

In my opinion challenging would mean you have to do more tasks, and more fights that involve more and critical thinking.

When I figure that in order to kill a boss all I have to do is dodge him till he dances then jump on his head. Thats not hard, maybe if I have to dodge him longer then it is more of a challenge but not harder. To make it harder then I need to think more critically how to defeat him as no obvious reason will come to my mind. You see where I am going?

In my mind challenging is lengthening some attribute of something that is already there in someway.

Harder is taking tha matter off the game and putting into the mind and the body. Where you have to think harder, work hard, and break afew sweats to figureout what to do to overcome the situation.

WolfWatch

So basically something like modifying the A.I to make the player adapt More often ?

basically. i am sure i am not the only one that see's a boss and within afew minutes know how to beat him and you just repeat the steps. for instance the battle with bowser, you just made his feet hot with lava, spun him around afew times, and he's gone. if that only worked once, and you had to figure out some other way to defeat him rather than repeating one thing.

You are not the only one, but we have to think about the majority of the gamer, which are not the hardcore gamer, and that would make the game more challenging for everyone. Therefore a lot of people would not be able to complete the game and would then stop buying the sequel. Then again implementing "difficulty" would also hurt the producers as some people will complain about not being able to enjoy the "full" experience.

Trying to get Jordan's 'Best Wii Forum Week 5" ehhh?
In any case, you state some good ideas.

However I do not believe that lowering the life makes the game any harder, just more challenging. There IS a difference.
Just like playing the game faster makes it more challenging rather than hard.

In my opinion challenging would mean you have to do more tasks, and more fights that involve more and critical thinking.

When I figure that in order to kill a boss all I have to do is dodge him till he dances then jump on his head. Thats not hard, maybe if I have to dodge him longer then it is more of a challenge but not harder. To make it harder then I need to think more critically how to defeat him as no obvious reason will come to my mind. You see where I am going?

In my mind challenging is lengthening some attribute of something that is already there in someway.

Harder is taking tha matter off the game and putting into the mind and the body. Where you have to think harder, work hard, and break afew sweats to figureout what to do to overcome the situation.

WolfWatch

First of all, I'm not trying to get into his best of the Wii forum ;), but as he mentioned on his blog, the lack of interesting things to talk about around here has dropped a little lately. I'm just putting some ideas up that I've thought about for a while, but didn't bother because there was lots of other things to talk about. I doubt he'll put me in it for a 2nd straight week, but who knows?

Anyway, to get back on-topic, I completely agree with your belief that challenging doesn't equal harder. I know there is a big difference, and as I mentioned in my first post, I said that my idea would be a good way for them to create difficulty levels without having to change the gameplay itself. I don't know, but I think that when you start changing the level design, the boss battles, and the difficulty of the enemies, you start to create a new game altogether, and I doubt that Nintendo would want to go that route.

I'm not saying that they would go with mine, either, but I appreciate that you pointed that out.

It's the easiest way to give life to games without having to program a whole different game for a harder mode. raahsnavj

Exactly my point. That sentence sums it all up, really.

Implementing a capcom difficulty (capcom are known to use this a lot correct me if im wrong) type to every game would satisfy a lot of gamer. But would also gives a lot more longevity to all games, which is one thing Producers do not want, they want to keep selling games making you complete a game blazing fast is not a bad marketing strategy since it force the hand of gamers that want new harder/different content.

yea good post btw bob, i was abit joking about making on the blog :D
i still remember the nes days (and VC helps that), those old mario games were hard, but anybody could play them.
uhh i forgot completely what i was gonna say, lights keep flickering so, yea... *whistles*

Implementing a capcom difficulty (capcom are known to use this a lot correct me if im wrong) type to every game would satisfy a lot of gamer. But would also gives a lot more longevity to all games, which is one thing Producers do not want, they want to keep selling games making you complete a game blazing fast is not a bad marketing strategy since it force the hand of gamers that want new harder/different content.

mojothebaboon

true but if all games were like that people would stop playing altogether

[QUOTE="mojothebaboon"]

Implementing a capcom difficulty (capcom are known to use this a lot correct me if im wrong) type to every game would satisfy a lot of gamer. But would also gives a lot more longevity to all games, which is one thing Producers do not want, they want to keep selling games making you complete a game blazing fast is not a bad marketing strategy since it force the hand of gamers that want new harder/different content.

motti2thesecond

true but if all games were like that people would stop playing altogether

Why would people stop playing if they only have more content to a game? Putting difficulty only gives replay value, its not like its taking anything away from the game itself.

It's a simple process, and it's been done thousands of times in the past: a difficulty setting. The great thing is, with my idea, they wouldn't even need to change any of the actual gameplay in any way.

Here's an example of how it might look:bob_newman

This post pisses me off.

Not because it's stupid. Not because it's a critique of Galaxy. Not because it's written by some guy named bob who thinks he knows everything. :P

It pisses me off because Galaxy wasn't made like this. I would love to play through the game on the impossible difficulty. "Game over" used to mean something, now it's hardly a slap on the wrist for failing.

What really gets me going is how ridiculously easy it would've been for Nintendo to pull this off. Minor coding adjustments, that's it, and I'd probably still be playing Galaxy, two months later.

Maybe we'll see the return of difficulty settings, maybe even the return of high scores, to most games. Developers are starting to go back to their roots, since gamers who grew up with the NES are becoming the programmers of today. We've already seen this trend begin, now let's hope it continues.

[QUOTE="bob_newman"]It's a simple process, and it's been done thousands of times in the past: a difficulty setting. The great thing is, with my idea, they wouldn't even need to change any of the actual gameplay in any way.

Here's an example of how it might look:JordanElek

This post pisses me off.

Not because it's stupid. Not because it's a critique of Galaxy. Not because it's written by some guy named bob who thinks he knows everything. :P

It pisses me off because Galaxy wasn't made like this. I would love to play through the game on the impossible difficulty. "Game over" used to mean something, now it's hardly a slap on the wrist for failing.

What really gets me going is how ridiculously easy it would've been for Nintendo to pull this off. Minor coding adjustments, that's it, and I'd probably still be playing Galaxy, two months later.

Maybe we'll see the return of difficulty settings, maybe even the return of high scores, to most games. Developers are starting to go back to their roots, since gamers who grew up with the NES are becoming the programmers of today. We've already seen this trend begin, now let's hope it continues.

You scared the crap out of me just then. I thought you were going to ban me or something...

Anyway, I don't think I know everything! God!

Just most things.

Anyway, I'm glad you like the idea. It really makes me wonder, because Nintendo said that they want to appeal to all gamers this gen, so naturally you'd think they'd give us a little sumin'-sumin', know what I'm sayin'?

I read about an interview with Miyamoto, and he said...

well, you know what, that sounds like it's a different topic altogether. Maybe I'll post that now...