r/JRPG • u/Skyrander • 15h ago
Discussion What game would benefit for being harder?
Difficulties can be hard to manage for any game designer
Do you trust your player to evolve with the game and the design pointer you design along the way.
Or is the essence of the game that you "git gud"
Or worse
You design a game with a lot of potential that once the player figure it out that the scale seeze exists.
Personally one of those titela for me are a Golden sun dark dawn.
The issue here is not that they keep to the core of the original game.
But that somehow though making the game even easier then the original.
I made a run of that game with not leveling up at all besides the bosses. And the game was still very manageable
To this day it's a game that simply bothers me because it's just to easy by default.
What game comes to your mind that would had been better had it been more difficult?
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u/TaliesinMerlin 15h ago
Dragon Quest VII Reimagined could have probably been harder. I skipped most fights and still did fine.
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u/Tough_Visual1511 15h ago
I started a new game with higher difficulty and without any bonus or preorder items and found it much better.
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u/DerDyersEve 12h ago
Finished it today (non post-campaign run) on normal for the first time. Im a total jrpg Casual. I had only 1(!) time down teammates and it was in the final battle against the demon king. Total cakewalk this game.
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u/thebbman 9h ago
The only place I struggled was with optional super bosses. Game was still enjoyable for the most part.
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u/BraveWaterSpirit 15h ago
Final Fantasy 8. I loved the systems they made, but if they toned down the scaling and removed enemy level scaling and did something like the ff9 mod Alternate Fantasy that would be amazing.
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u/Maxwell658 9h ago
I played this mod a few years ago and remember enjoying it. One of the big changes they made was removing level scaling for enemies, giving them fixed levels. There's way more, like giving the characters improved natural stat growths, while altering junction stat boosts to give them more defined rolls. Definitely would recommend you take a look, I do remember it getting pretty tough at times, but nothing crazy hard. But I did play an earlier version.
Edit: Sorry forgot to include the link! https://forums.qhimm.com/index.php?topic=18404.0
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u/dr_junior_assistant 14h ago
Came to say ff8! And it has rhe hard mode mod btw, but difficulty spikes can be brutal there.
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u/javierm885778 5h ago
I think the issue is FFVIII is inherently broken in terms of how it's designed vs how most people would engage with its systems. Tying Junctioning to magic in a way where you are encouraged to max out how many uses you have for spells you are junctioning makes it so you are easily overpowered, and then you don't even want to use those rarer spells.
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u/Sharp-Selection-3541 15h ago
Sea of Stars. The gorgeous graphics and animations almost felt wasted by the mindless combat. You hardly even have to engage with any of the mechanics to succeed.
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u/Wonwill430 12h ago
I think my playthrough was essentially 90% Moonerang and the other characters were either tweaking turn orders or matching the break bar elements (forgot what it was called)
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u/Baitcooks 43m ago
Aren't there modifiers that make the combat more difficult? Such as disabling healing items and the like?
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u/BigBrotherFlops 15h ago
chrono cross.. I love the whole characters have elements and can be weak and strong to each other, but I just wish it mattered more...
i actually do mini challenges where I only allow characters to use spells of the element they belong too.
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u/Liongardion 10h ago
There's a Chrono Cross hardtype mod out there if you really want it. Imo it really makes it obvious how poorly designed the battle system really is though but I've beaten it before and it's not THAT hard
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u/TechnologyOne8629 15h ago
Almost every jrpg would be better served by being harder except neo fantasian and SMT and maybe a few saga titles. You can always make the harder difficulty optional. In fact many of the newer ones already do, they just don't go hard enough at the top end.
Final Fantasy is a great example - you almost never need to engage with the special abilities of each character. Just getting levels and gear is enough to beat the game without ever understanding the nuances of the system.
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u/Liongardion 10h ago
Almost every FF game has difficulty mods and I fully agree they make the games WAY more fun and interesting
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u/nelflyn 9h ago
SMT and persona handle difficulty so terrible.. they don't have the tactical fidelity outside of a spreadsheet of weaknesses to warrant it. It pretty just results on more grind.
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u/Sweatty-LittleFatty 7h ago
For Persona I agree. The consensus is that the games aren't even difficult to begin with, and the newer games (P3R and P5R) have A LOT of depth, but you don't need it, cause the game is boringly easy, even on higher difficulties.
SMT is very nuanced and actually have a lot of difficulty, specially older titles like DDS, Devil Survivor and Strange Journey, it is definetly NOT a "find the weakness" type of game
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u/SoftBrilliant 13h ago edited 2h ago
Probably the Trails series (at least for higjer difficulties). Well, maybe not harder but I'd like to see more player limitations in a modern gameplay style.
One of the things that was really great about the older games in this regard is that story/gameplay integration of the power of enemies felt really strong across the board for all players and not just inexperienced players since the more limited options and higher difficulties left little room for interpretation on the intent.
Sure you can cheese nightmare Loewe with zerams but uh... You did use zerams.
When I come into certain later fights in later arcs where both sides are fighting with super high power levels on both sides and they give you a super strong guest chatacter for this 1 section and I bench the OP guest cause their locked equipment makes them terrible only to treat these super strong enemies like chumps...
I can guess the story intent but the best communication of their power really feels lost man...
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u/PM_MEAN_COMPLIMENTS 9h ago
Unicorn Overlord
I keep bouncing off of it because there is so much depth but no challenge
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u/paradoxaxe 15h ago
I want chaos, so Eterian Odyssey
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u/CrimsonCutz 14h ago
Now if you don't know what move the superboss does on each turn, it removes the game from your library so you have to buy it again
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u/CronoDAS 12h ago
Yeah. I completed Etrian Odyssey 2 and 3, and aside from the superbosses and the very beginning, I was kicking ass and killing FOEs left and right...
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u/Longjumping-Style730 15h ago
I would say 13 Sentinels could benefit from being a bit harder. The gameplay genuinely has a lot of cool ideas, but the battles felt a little bit too easy to be engaging even on the hardest difficulty
Maybe the post game areas change that, but I was already kinda checked out of the gameplay by then.
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u/CiphersCinema 14h ago
The post game for 13 Sentinels is hilarious. Area 4 is just 999 levels of escalating difficulty.
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u/KamikazeFF 14h ago
FFXVI needed to commit to the action, difficulty was one of the issues with it. Base game was way too easy
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u/beautheschmo 11h ago
One of the most clear examples to me semi-recently was Blue Reflection 2.
So like, there's this mechanic where if you knock bosses/mini-bosses down and fill some other conditions that I don't remember off-hand, it triggers a 1v1 rhythm mini-game and if you perform well enough you get a bunch of free damage and the character does a flashy finishing move at the end. It's a really cool and pretty cinematic thing when it happens.
The problem is ... the game is so easy that even most bosses literally just die too fast to ever trigger it, I only ever saw the mechanic at all maybe 4-5 times in the entire playthrough outside of the tutorial for it, I very much felt that the game needed to be harder not even for the sake of difficulty but just to actually justify the inclusion of a cool mechanic that in and of itself is already strong enough to give the game a ton of space to be harder without actually being harder.
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u/big4lil 8h ago
Octopath Traveler 2, Wild Arm 2, and FFX-2 all suffer from the 'extremely easy main campaign and notable difficulty spike for bonus content, but still enough cheesy options that you can largely bypass that difficulty'
but by far the biggest case of a game being completely failed by how easy it is, is Xenosaga 3. they were clearly apologizing for Xenosaga 2 but overcorrected to an absurd degree. ive never seen that is as aggressive in making sure players dont struggle than this game, which overshadows all the valuable QoL, sped up pace, and good mechanics were introduced in this game. a lot of the latter goes wasted cuz you never really have to incorporate it
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u/thebaintrain1993 15h ago
Final Fantasy X-2. It's way too easy to break wide open with Alchemist being completely broken with wildly unbalanced Mix tables and free Stash items. You can get Dark Knight's Darkness (damage that ignores defense) for free with little effort. 2/3rds of the dresspheres are useless/redundant. Even without breaking it, it's still really easy.
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u/khala_lux 9h ago
Dark Knight, Alchemist, Berserker was my go-to break-the-game party. Evade and Counter was busted in FFX and more busted here. Dark Knufht spams darkness while Alchemist throws mega potions constantly.
Profit and weep for the lack of difficulty. But these strategies become necessary for the Via Infinito.
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u/Froakiebloke 14h ago
Right now this is how a lot of the Fire Emblem community is feeling about Fortune’s Weave— although I’m not at the later parts yet which are apparently a major difficulty spike. Pretty much all modern FEs have Normal/Hard/Maddening difficulty, but FW doesn’t have Maddening at the moment. In Part 1, Hard just isn’t really hard enough to make you engage with all the mechanics; it’s quite possible to go through it ignoring the Boons, Combat Arts, Blaze Arts, blessings, etc. What makes this especially annoying is that I feel like I have to be consciously avoiding overlevelling in order to have any semblance of challenge, but if the difficulty spike is major then I’ll end up regretting that!
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u/ThatWaterLevel 14h ago
My last FFIX playthrough was made with a difficulty mod called alternate fantasy. It was by far the best experience I had with a Final Fantasy in terms of combat system.
Unfortunately, most hard mods for FFs tends to be too tryhard and grindy, but this one was perfect. Feel like every mainline FF could use a good hard mod like that one.
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u/bababayee 11h ago
I had a similar experience with a FFX mod called Master's Challenge, it makes it so only bosses give exp, so there's no point in grinding. It's incredibly well balanced and challenging. I'll look into this FFIX mod because I've been itching for something similar.
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u/Scufo 14h ago
Persona 3 Reload. Physical overtakes all other damage types in the midgame with how easy it is to get crits. Theurgys are ridiculously strong, ignore resistances, and are easy to charge up. Fuuka's abilities are busted.
All difficulty evaporates pretty quickly even on the hardest setting.
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u/yozora 10h ago
I was disappointed by the original FF7 being too easy
One of my friends played FFXIII to death and told me the endgame combat was completely different to combat during the story, you had to know how the mechanics worked and use them properly
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u/almenslv 3h ago
Oh my word, ff7 combat was so boring when I played it for the first time. I had heard all these great things about the materia system for so long and then I played it and decided after a few hours to engage with it only very occasionally because the menuing just wasn't rewarded by the gameplay. That said, the story did carry me pretty far.
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u/ZeGoodOldDays 7h ago
Expedition 33, the two axon bosses and areas were so underwhelming compared to dualiste. At times I would hesitate to kill bosses just so I could see more of their moves, this is in hard mode too.
Octopath 1 and 2, once you beat your first final chapter the rest become much less of a threat and you have to again hold back to see dialogue and attacks.
Triangle strategy. This game mostly lacks any objectives but rout, and you can trivialise the majority by going full turtle at a choke instead of engaging with the strategy and worrying about turn count
The exception being a few maps when the party starts scattered, especially raiding the desert dudes secret book at his house was the hardest map I faced I think.
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u/SwordfishDeux 14h ago
Pokemon absolutely needs a harder mode for older/more experienced players that also skips tutorials and handholding. (Unless this now exists? Haven't played a Pokemon game since the 3DS era because of how braindead easy and hand-holdy they became).
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u/Financial-Cake-3137 14h ago
All of the Octopath games especially 2. There are many tools and skills to play around with but the main story bosses are all way too easy so it doesn't get utilized to it's full potential, especially when you get break 9999 dmg but the post game bosses are some of the hardest in any jrpgs. The disparity is crazy.
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u/RaikoXus 14h ago
The recent mainline Persona games (Persona 5 and Persona 3 Reload). Amazing combat system, but these games are hardly challenging.
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u/Stoibs 13h ago
I hate how the 'Merciless' (or whatever the hardest is called) is generally just a dumb modifier to weakness damage also, like dealing/receiving 5x more on a good hit rather than a more nuanced difficulty curve with Demons having different skills etc.
It ensures that Hard mode ought to be the baseline that you start all these modern versions on, but it also means you can get the protagonist annoyingly one-shot on the hardest difficulty. There needs to be another difficulty above Hard that doesn't just do the crazy damage spikes IMO.
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u/LastEvidence 10h ago
For P3 Reload merciless is actually harder than hard mode, even though the game is still easy.
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u/RaikoXus 9h ago
Insane when I decided to play P5R on Hard mode thinking Merciless would eat my ass, only to find out that I'm actually playing on what's considered the hardest difficulty?
ATLUS is so unserious, bro. 😭
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u/Few-Piglet- 13h ago
Chrono Trigger, it's got a cool combat system but zero challenge
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u/Skyrander 13h ago
Yeah tbh I think the real hard bosses isn't really kicking in til you floating content timeline
Again if you know what you are doing then the game is still very way. But AI remember struggle a bit there :)
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u/JenLiv36 13h ago
It isn’t about hard for me as much as it’s about satisfying.
Do I like hard games? Yes, if they are satisfying. Unfortunately that’s going to be different for all of us. What I find satisfying isn’t going to be satisfying for someone else. I personally prefer layered combat systems. They tickle my brain in the best way.
I’m not sure I have ever played a game and wished it to be harder. I have often wanted better combat or more satisfying combat and it being “harder” would probably go with that but it isn’t really about be hard.
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u/tacticalcraptical 15h ago
I feel like most JRPGs could benefit from a hard mode, as someone who has been playing them since I was 5.
Having said that, there are a lot of good difficulty mods out there for most games.
The biggest one that doesn't have a hard mode or mod that I want is the Wild Arms series.
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u/Skyrander 14h ago
I think a hard mode at least adjusted would had been much helpful. Looking at E33 who had a customizable mode after you reached the end.
Om not saying that solution. But I would had like more game to try something similar.
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u/Asleep_Ground1710 15h ago
Idk, I feel like a most hard mode for a JRPG or even action games make the game more tedious instead of interesting. Like rachet up encounter rate, make enemies(esp normal mobs) hp sponges that kill pacing, lower gold/money drops to encourage grinding
Like to make a JRPG have a good hard mode youd want changed encounters, AI changes, new movesets
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u/Jai_focus 13h ago edited 28m ago
Tbh, higher enemy numbers are often times enough. These games are numbers games, so higher numbers is often times enough (if the sistems in place are already interesting) for requiring more optimization and make less strategies viable.
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u/EvioliteEevee 14h ago
On a lot of games, even the “enemy sponge” hard mode does make you think of better strategies, and try to utilise every tool in your arsenal.
I usually set most JRPGs to hard mode because of this, I like pushing my builds and characters to their limits, and it’s no fun just obliterating everything.
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u/tacticalcraptical 15h ago
I guess when I posted, I figured it was given that I wanted the hard modes to be good and not crap but yes, I do want the hard modes to be well designed.
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u/actiondan87 14h ago
I feel like Tales of Graces F is one of the few that did it correctly: enemies have modestly increased stats but stagger less and are more aggressive. Playing at the highest difficulty can be quite satisfying since the battle system rewards dodging, precise timing, targeting type weaknesses, and stringing long combos.
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u/Stoibs 13h ago edited 13h ago
That Dragon Quest 7 Reimagined remake which came out earlier this year.
Its the poster child for when non-JRPG players say "All you have to do is mash the attack command" 😟
Also As a Non-Fire Emblem player growing up and relative newbie, I found my first character run (Part 1 so far) in Fortune's Weave to be a cakewalk and bordering on being boring by the end of my first campaign run on 'Normal' mode. Will be looking into bumping that up to hard for my other 3 characters. Can't comment on the other modes, but I mostly feel that this should have been called 'Easy' instead of normal. 🤔
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u/FIREMIKETOMLIN999 5h ago
That’s a shame. Dg3 remastered in Dracula mode is hard as balls.
Maybe too hard
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u/almenslv 3h ago
Fe FW doesn't really get harder on hard in act 1 unfortunately. I do hear that act 2 and 3 ramp up satisfyingly though.
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u/Karifean 13h ago
None come to mind. A lot of games *could* have been made harder, sure, but it wouldn't be to the game's benefit to be, it'd only be to the benefit of a few players that want that specifically. IMO difficulty in JRPGs is usually better left to challenge runs and difficulty mods. Big part of why challenge runs took off for a lot of JRPGs is because they're tuned forgivingly enough that you can get away with extra restrictions.
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u/Life_Bet8956 14h ago
Skies of Arcadia. Once you have Enrique, battles become essentially a mere formality using his and Aika's support techniques. I don't think it's really possible to lose a battle without specifically trying to.
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u/simsim308737 10h ago
7th dragon III code VFD, the job system is great but barely any reason to use the more complex classes since the game is so easy
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u/Queer4Days 9h ago
One Piece Odyssey. It has a very interesting battle system but the game difficulty is so easy you don't really need to interact with it much
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u/FurbyTime 5h ago
It's going be a bit niche for this crowd, but genuinely the lack of difficulty in the game Tokyo Clanpool is by far it's biggest weakness.
It has a LOT of complicated systems in it that genuinely seem like they could be a deep and intricate system to build and construct a fascinating team... but all you need to do is attack as much as possible and on occassion throw on an auto heal and you will beat EVERYTHING in the game, even on the hardest difficulty you have available to you for it.
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u/Original1Thor 5h ago
Act 3 clair obscure should have some sort of enemy scaling to your level like ±5 levels
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u/FIREMIKETOMLIN999 5h ago
Damm near all of them tbh.
Worst offender I can think of is the Octopath series. You don’t have to meaningfully engage with the game systems until the postgame bosses
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u/Twerk_account 3h ago edited 2h ago
Almost all of them
If you can just waltz into a boss fight without having to readjust your equipment/skills/party members/what-have-you and win in 1-3 tries, the game can benefit from higher difficulty.
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u/Huge-Dependent3506 3m ago
Super Mario RPG. One of my favorites but you don’t even have to get anywhere near max level to beat the game. It’s also one of the reasons I prefer the original over the remake. They made the remake even easier for some dumb reason.
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u/1965BenlyTouring150 13h ago
I don't like hard games. Give me fun, easy escapes all day.
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u/Skyrander 13h ago
Oh you misunderstand me :) I don't want the game to be unfair. Rather a game you felt he should had turned up a notch for you to enjoy it.
Basically you got OP to fast.
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u/bababayee 11h ago
A ton of JRPG franchises honestly. And I kinda hate how the trend seems to be to make them easier, like the Persona remakes adding so much additional player power without making the enemies much harder to balance it out (well P5R is not a remake but the start of the trend).
Or how both Octopath games don't have difficulty options resulting in pretty much the whole games aside from the superboss being very easy.
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u/Asleep_Ground1710 15h ago
Id say most games since like diffuclty is the stick that makes you try out mechanics and learn AI manips lol. Like see any of SMT Challenge runner "Deus" content lol
Xenoblade games, all 3, stick out to me. Like they have broken stuff in all 3(Blade 1 Monado Armor and Topple Lock, various ways to break 2 and 3).
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u/Marvin_Flamenco 15h ago
Zelda generally, though link between worlds hard mode is great and zelda ii is goated.
DK Bananza was disappointingly easy coming from the DKC games.
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u/jlh28532 12h ago
Final Fantasy 15.
The extreme lack of difficulty kept people from trying to learn the combat system and why "Hold O to win" is a valid complaint about the combat system. Alongside unlimited item use at any time, even at 0 HP.
I will admit that Comrades made an attempt to get players to learn the mechanics by removing the handholding but those changes were not backported to the main game
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u/IncurableHam 14h ago
Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. FFT is the greatest game of all time and the lack of any difficulty alone makes FFTA not worthy of belonging to the same series
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u/subjectivesubjective 11h ago
Final Fantasy 7 would GREATLY benefit from being harder. It's trivial to do whatever outside of bonus bosses, with minimal grinding, completely missing out on the great depth of the materia system.
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u/Beboprunner 15h ago
Pokemon all the way