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Good. I am so bored of the whole power trip trope which is pervading most video games. At this point, ennemies would have to trip on my sword in order to make some games easier. Arcade games tend to be 'artificially unfair' in order to make sure that the player will die and have to pay to continue. Many modern mainstream games take the opposite approach and make sure that the average game will feel like a demigod. It is not without merits, especially with a hero battling against oversized ennemies. For example, it is very gratifying to fight enemies 10 times as big as the protagonist of Darksiders. I feel like it is reaching a dead end though. Parkour / scaling in Assassin Creed is a one button affair. You just look at your hero do these feats. Platforming is equally easy in that game series, you just have to find the designed path thought up by the developers and press the right button, which is even conveniently displayed on the screen. Ezio is able to take on dozen of guards and I usually flee only because I am bored of the easy kills. Skyrim goes out of its way to make you feel like 'yet another chosen one', and judging from the game quest, you are litteraly the only person able to get anything done in that world. Not to mention that very soon you become a walking demigod able to kill anything from liches to dragons. I can't shake the feeling that these games are very condescending to the player. They avoid giving the player a real challenge in order to make sure that everybody can feel powerful with minimal effort.

I don't think that games have to be as brutal as Dark Souls or even unfair like Banished. Avoiding the 'suddenly all powerful chosen one' trope would be a good start. Please let me play a random schmuck that is not going to defeat all the demons of Hell and save the world all by himself.



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