Well, chances are it was all of those things combined, but the whole easy-mode thing probably stuck out the most. There’s a mass of games falling prey to this idea, theory, and concept that games need to be far more accessible to help penetrate the market more. Developers around the world are doing research groups in order to meet the demands of people who will never play their games anyway.

What spurned this sudden desire? Well, truth be told, it’s not that sudden. There’ve been varying difficulties in games since the very beginning, it’s only now–since the launch of the Wii–that Nintendo’s enforced upon the industry this concept of accessibility.

Is this good? For the Wii, it is. With the demographic consisting entirely of people who’ve never played games before and a lack of any games at all, any titles they do release have to be playable by quadriplegics.

What about the other systems, though? Are there games out there for people who’ve played video games since they were four? If they were the people buying the majority of titles, then perhaps there would be, but the market seems to suggest that it would like to exclude this “loyal” fanbase. This hasn’t stopped them from clamoring for more, though. At every instance possible, those of the hardcore demographic raid message and image boards and pollute the HTML code with cries of injustice. In this digital age, the developers are apparently listening.

Their solution, however, is not the most sound. For developers who want to attract all audiences, they’re incorporating this idea of “easy to pick up, tough to master,” which is perhaps only self-serving. When this new design philosophy is implemented, it often degenerates into half of the game being way to easy, and the other half either being not hard enough or simply too hard because the player just wasn’t prepared for it.

Do you remember when Super Mario Galaxy really picked up the pace? Me neither. I remember near the end of the game, some purple coin collecting taking me a fourth try, but that’s it. That was the most exciting part of the game, and the part most people take home with them. We all remember Luigi’s Purple coins.

Fighting games are probably the only genre that comes close to achieving this lofty goal of “anyone can play.” Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe did have a somewhat simple and satisfying battle system, and some brutally timing-specific “pro moves” that only dedicated players would be able to work into combos. Street Fighter IV is also touting an ease of accessibility with the inclusion of a “challenge mode” that’s supposed to let you learn the most basic attacks up to the best and most complicated combos in the game. The problem with both of these games is that if a person has never played a fighting game before, they’re going to be totally lost regardless. It takes some time and a little bit of skill to learn how to do “shoryuken” and super combo motions, and for some people those may not be things they’re willing to dedicate to a game where there are already thousands of players online just waiting to obliterate them twenty times over.

The problem is, nobody knows how to make these games fun for everybody anymore. Why can’t they just realize the answer’s been right in front of them the whole time:

Difficulty Settings

My God, it’s so simple! Change certain things about the game depending on a selection made at the beginning, or make difficulty options  interchangeable during the game that alter how hard the game plays and make it accessible to everyone! Brilliant!

I don’t understand why this is such a hard concept to understand. Metal Gear Solid 4 got it just right, and nobody noticed. “Professional” reviewers don’t even get it. The majority of those who reviewed the game knocked it for being far too easy. “What is the point of stealth when you can just shoot everybody?” How can you get paid big dollars to review things, without having played the whole game? Unless it’s a joke review, I see no reason for it. Anyone who’s played the game on anything but the first three settings knows the game considerably ramps up the difficulty, making it very difficult to simply shoot one’s way out of situations. The game is not perfect by any means, but to knock it for freedom of choice is just ridiculous. Hell, it even rewards you for playing the game without killing anyone. The whole review process has always been bizarre to me.

What spurned this angry discourse? One of my favorite developers has betrayed me: Criterion just announced what the details are for their free content update.

Click to watch.

Essentially, they make the cars at the beginning of the game much slower and harder to crash, give you more time to do a stunt run, and make every billboard, smash, and jump fluorescent and colorful. Why? I’d be fine with this if they’d included all of this as an optional selection on the menu. If they didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, they could have called this new stuff “normal” and the old stuff “advanced.” Why hurt everyone?

Perhaps I’m overreacting, and I need to wait for the release, but I’m just really sick of having to deal with this. There are some games that are still pretty brutal: Dead Space and Super Street Fighter II Turbo: HD Remix, but they’re few and far between. I’m not asking to get maniacally raped in every game I play; that’s just frustrating. I just want the option to choose whether or not I get raped.

Is that so much to ask?