作者：Josh Bycer

在游戏设计中使用难度设置经常在各种不同的时候被我们拿出来讨论。有些人觉得每一款游戏都应该拥有难度设置作为扩展用户基础的一种方式，也有些人认为这会破坏游戏平衡并导致游戏变得越来越糟糕。作为玩了许多像《Souls》系列的硬核游戏的玩家，我考虑了这一问题很长时间并希望在此和你们进行讨论。

Dark-Souls（from gamasutra）

广泛的用户

使用“简单，中等和困难”的设置已经成为许多游戏类型和设计实现游戏平衡的一部分。就像城市建造，RPG，行动游戏等等都让玩家能够决定自己想要的游戏难度。这种机制的执行非常简单：这是在不用惩罚任何人的前提下让玩家享用多种技能设定的方式。

许多RPG和基于故事的游戏甚至说：“简单是针对于那些只关心游戏故事的人。”在最近几年里我们发现有些开发者在发现游戏内容变得太过复杂的时候会让玩家略过某些关卡或内容。或许这么做会冒犯到硬核玩家，但是让玩家可以基于不同难度设置去玩游戏却能够有效地扩宽游戏用户。

因为优秀的故事，游戏变得越来越戏剧化，并也因此吸引了许多想要感受精彩绝伦的故事的非游戏玩家，但是这些玩家却不具有中等或复杂游戏的技能。

更别提许多RPG的难度设计是基于抽象规则和系统，这也是新玩家门根本不了解的内容，而他们也可能因为不能有效使用这些内容遭受惩罚。

如果游戏拥有不同的难度测试，新玩家便不会因为不能理解一些疯狂的规则和机制而遭遇惩罚了。
这时候一些批评家便会跳出来说难度设置并不适合许多游戏，并且可能创造出比益处更多的坏处。

不同看法

在大多数游戏中难度设置所存在的问题为，它们很难呈现出真正平衡的挑战。有时候你会发现开发者根本未去考虑平衡而在创造更加困难的设置；他们会只考虑到硬核玩家而去创造一些惩罚机制。

有时候你会发现游戏根本不打算拥有不同的难度设置，我们可以通过两种情况来看待这一问题。首先游戏是围绕着多人游戏或竞争游戏机制进行创造。如果游戏将面向多人游戏关卡重新平衡每场对抗的话开发者的工作负担便会大大加重，服务器的负担也会变得更大。除此之外你还需要应对基于不同技能的玩家在面对不同关卡/难度时所遇到的问题。

第二种情况是当游戏是围绕着玩家的基本性能进行创造。这些游戏通常都是基于技能且致力于推动玩家不断成长或不断失败；就像行动游戏那样。如果设计师将游戏设置得过于简单，玩家也就没有理由去提高自己的技能并更深入地理解游戏。

如果玩家并不愿意/不能掌握更出色的游戏玩法，设计师又该如何从中去提升自己的设计呢？

能够弥补资深玩家的一种方式便是设定体验或技能基准，然后使用可选择的更加困难的挑战去测试玩家。例如《黑暗之魂3》中的Champion Gundyr或Nameless King。

如果你不能有效地测试玩家，这便会导致整体设计让玩家感到受挫。在最初的《暗黑破坏神3》中，跳向最终难度关卡便极端困难，甚至连设计师在当时也不能完成这一挑战，而将其用于拍卖屋系统中是一种极让人受挫的糟糕设计。

过去的我非常反对在游戏中添加难度设置，即认为不应该每一款游戏都围绕着这样的设置进行设计，但也存在一些情况是难度设置成就了更出色的游戏。

难度设计

如果难度设计能够真正整合到设计中，而不只是作为一个可变更的数值，它便能够真正有效地作用于游戏中，不过这要解释起来可不简单。

我想列举的第一个例子是当难度既是游戏的衡量系统也是奖励系统的时候。有些游戏系统会基于不同难度提供给玩家额外的奖励或内容。例如在《Kid Icarus Uprising》中，更高的难度级别便意味着玩家能够获得更厉害的奖励并将面对全新的敌人和境况。在《美妙世界》中也是如此，即更高的难度级别能够让玩家找到更高质量的装置。

在这些例子中，玩家可以选择待在较简单的设置中，而游戏会引诱他们走向更厉害的奖励。例如《暗黑破坏神3》便拥有不同的难度设置。还有《Gemcraft》系列，让玩家能够选择不同难度元素，然后根据他们的选择去调整游戏奖励。

另一个例子便是难度将逐渐改变游戏并成为不同技能级别间的门阀。在这种情况下，更高的难度级别将影响者玩家经历并使用机制的方式。《XCOM：未知敌人》和《XCOM：内部敌人》以及《XCOM 2》便都是非常典型的例子。

而玩家会选择较低难度级别便是因为他们将因此遭受到比使用高级机制和规则更少的惩罚。

这样的设置的最大优点便是，不管玩家的选择是怎样都不会因为自己的游戏方式遭遇惩罚；资深玩家不一定要开启更高级别的设置，而新玩家也可以只是享受最基本的游戏体验。

这里的要点在于难度会改变玩家的游戏方式并对他们作出不同要求。我最喜欢的行动游戏《Ninja Gaiden Black》便做到了这点；每个难度设置不仅拥有不同的敌人和道具，同时也会呈现出全新的对抗条件。对于那些选择正常难度的人来说，他们将拥有与基于Master Ninja完全不同的游戏体验。

从这些列子中我们可以发现，开发者可以不需要调整难度设置间的不同数值，只需要将难度选择整合到游戏设计中便可，如此将能够提供给玩家更加有趣且更具奖励性的游戏内容。

并不是面向所有人

每次只要全新的《Souls》游戏一问世，便会有人开始讨论为什么他们要添加难度设置到游戏中。就像我们所讨论的那样，并不是每一款游戏都能/应该添加难度设置；有时候一款游戏的设计并不打算让所有人都能击败它。

所以游戏设计必须明确怎样的基础体验更合适。一旦你清楚别人为了打败你的游戏需要掌握什么时，你便可以将其带进游戏的所有内容中并确保难度曲线保持一致，且玩家能够为挑战更难的内容做好充足的准备。

如果你能够有效做好这点，你便不需要难度设置了，除非你真的想要将其整合到游戏机制和进程模式中。不管怎样，关于游戏始终不存在一种最有效的选择，而只有设计师能够决定游戏真正适合怎样的设置。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转发，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Debating Difficulty Settings in Game Design

by Josh Bycer

The use of difficulty settings in game design has always been argued at different points. Some feel that every game should have them as a means of expanding the user base, while others feel that it messes with the balance of the game and leads to titles that are worse off. It’s a topic that I’ve thought about a lot as someone who plays a lot of hardcore games like the Souls series, and I wanted to talk more about this given the latest crop of games.

A Wide Audience:

The use of “easy, normal and difficult” settings has been a part of game balance for a lot of genres and designs. We’ve seen everything from city builders, RPGs, action games and more, have settings for the player to decide how hard they want the game to be. The implementation of this mechanic is simple: It’s a way for multiple skill sets to enjoy a game without punishing one or the other.

Many RPGs and story-focused titles even say something along the lines of, “Easy is for people who just want to follow the story.” In recent years, we’ve seen some developers go as far as have level or content skips for when things get too difficult. While this may seem sacrilegious for hardcore fans, the option to let people play games at different settings has been a major point in widening the audience of games.

As games have become more cinematic with greater stories, they have attracted a lot of non-gamers who want to play/follow an amazing story, but may not have the skill set for normal or hard play.

Not to mention the fact that many RPG’s difficulty design is based on abstracted rules and systems, something a new player may not understand fully, but would be punished for not using properly.

By having the different settings, someone is not going to get punished because they didn’t understand some crazy rule/mechanic that they wouldn’t know about.

Where critics come in is the fact that difficulty settings don’t work for a lot of titles, and can cause more harm than good in some cases.

Split:

The problem with difficulty settings in most games is the fact that they are very hard to get right in terms of a balanced challenge. You sometimes see developers make the harder settings without any thought in terms of balance; making the game punishing to play, because they think that’s what the hardcore want.

Other times, you have cases where the game is not meant to have different difficulty settings, and there are two examples of this. First are games built around multiplayer or competitive play. The amount of work would be increased dramatically if the game had to re-balance every encounter for multiplayer levels, and the increased server load of having different difficulty shards of their game. Not only that, but you then have to deal with the headache of what happens when players of different skill levels/difficulties meet.

Second is when the game was explicitly designed around a baseline of performance on the player’s part. These are games that are normally skill-based and challenge the player to grow or fail; see the action genre as examples of this. If the designers make the game too easy, then there is no reason for the player to improve their skills and understanding of the game, which is the point of playing.

If the player is not willing/unable to learn the finer points of play, how is the designer supposed to compensate their design around that?

One way to compensate for expert players is to have the baseline experience or skill required, and then test the player with optional harder challenges; see Champion Gundyr or Nameless King in Dark Souls 3 as examples.

In regards to not properly testing them, this can lead to situations when the design as a whole becomes frustrating to play. In the original form of Diablo 3, the jump to the final difficulty level was so extreme that not only were the designers not able to beat it at the time, but it was frustrating and poorly designed to be used in conjunction with the auction house system.

In the past, I’ve been against having difficulty settings in games and feel that not every game should be designed around them, but there are some cases where it can make the game better as a whole in my opinion.

Difficulty Design:

Difficulty in game design works best when it’s used as a fully integrated part of the design and not just simply altering stat values, and I know that can be confusing to explain.

The first example is when difficulty acts as both a measurement and reward system for playing the game. Some games like to give the player additional rewards or unlock content based on the difficulty that the player is at. For instance, in Kid Icarus Uprising, the higher the difficulty meant getting better rewards and fighting new types of enemies and situations. You can also see that in the amazing The World Ends With You, where the higher difficulty made it possible to find higher quality gear.

In these cases, the player can stay on the easy settings if they want and get through the game just fine, but there is that temptation and allure to bump things up for greater reward. See also Diablo 3 as an example of this with the different settings. Another good one is the Gemcraft series that literally lets the player pick and choose what difficulty factors to have on, and then adjusts the rewards accordingly.

The next example is when the difficulty literally changes the game and becomes a gate between skill levels. In these cases, playing on the higher settings will affect how someone goes through and makes use of the mechanics. XCOM EU and EW along with XCOM 2 are great examples of this one.

The reason is that playing on the lower difficulty, the player is not punished as much for using advanced mechanics and rules, but the option is there for higher skilled players to really fight the enemy.

The best part is that neither group is punished for playing the game their way; expert players don’t have to unlock the higher settings and newcomers can enjoy the base experience.

The point is that the difficulty changes how you play the game and asks different things from the player. My all-time favorite action game Ninja Gaiden Black did just that; every difficulty shuffled up the enemies and items while introducing new situations to fight. For someone playing on normal, they would have a completely different experience compared to someone on Master Ninja.

The key takeaway from these examples is that the developers didn’t simply adjust stats between difficulty settings, but integrated the act of difficulty selection into the game’s design, making it a lot more interesting and rewarding for players.

Not for Everyone:

Every time a new Souls game is released, there will most often be someone talking about why they should add difficulty settings to a game. As we’ve talked about, not every game can/should do difficulty settings; sometimes a game is just not meant to be designed around everyone being able to beat it .

This is where the idea of figuring out the baseline experience comes into play. Once you have an idea of what someone needs to know in order to beat your game, you can then extrapolate that out to all the content in your game, making sure that the difficulty curve is consistent and players are being adequately prepared for harder content.

If you do this just right, then you don’t need difficulty settings, unless you want to build them into the mechanics and progression model itself. Either way, there is no one best option for a game, and it’s going to be up to the designer to determine how the game is going to go.（source：gamasutra）