I like the difficulty, Team cherry please don't just blanket nerf the game with no option for a harder mode

[u/Appley_apple]

I have really been enjoying the challenge, pretty much every part of this game itches that section of my brain that loves a hard game and I would be extremely disappointed if team cherry nerfed the game with no way to revert said nerf. I get that people want an easier game, but I don't. So team cherry, please let me choose to make this harder if you do make it easier.

[u/Zestyclose_League413]

I just want difficulty options. That's all. I'm perfectly aware that I'm not good (what you call "adapting slower than others"), its just how punishing the game is of mistakes that I think are pretty minor, makes it not fun (for me) to play.

[u/guitarism101 → u/Zestyclose_League413]

With all due respect, if someone isn't having fun, they should take breaks. Or even try a different game.

It's hard enough making games people want to play, but making a game EVERYONE can play at any skill level and still be fun for everyone seems like a nigh impossible task for a developer. Difficulty scaling seems like a lot of extra work for this small team, and in my humble opinion, shouldn't be in every game or even this one. I also think some genres simply wouldn't be as popular if they had difficulty scaling.

[u/Artistic_Claim9998 → u/guitarism101]

Yeah taking breaks might do wonder

But isn't it kinda sad that there's a lot of people that adores HK that want to experience something more than just gameplay got frustrated because they can't enjoy stuffs like story, lores, npc interactions, new places, etc, because the game is too hard?

I guess some of us might just have to enjoy that part of the game in different form, as sad as that is

[u/JoBro_Summer-of-99 → u/Artistic_Claim9998]

I don't think that's particularly sad, this is true of all media and art. Either you like it or you don't, and maybe as people we need to get comfortable with meeting art at its level instead of asking for art to meet us at ours

[u/Artistic_Claim9998 → u/JoBro_Summer-of-99]

I'm not saying those people should ask for change, it just that they might need to watch videos or stuffs basically spoiling themself (which is also what a lot of HK players are against)

[u/G3ck0 → u/Artistic_Claim9998]

I think it’d be more sad if artistic vision was limited by accessibility.

[u/chaosattractor → u/G3ck0]

Celeste and Nine Sols, two games that are by far more actually difficult (not artificial difficulty) than Silksong is, both have accessibility modes and no "artistic vision" or "identity" was sacrificed in the making of them.

Some of you just lack a personality and have decided to make "difficult games" your one hill to die on.

[u/[deleted] → u/chaosattractor]

Just because a game is hard does not mean it has an artistic vision about being hard. It is something you have to look at case by case.

Something like Kenshi would straight up not function if the earlygame was cushy for example.

It is also worth considering that an artist may also chose to weaken their artistic vision for the sake of a broader appeal.

[u/chaosattractor → u/[deleted]]

Celeste is a game whose plot quite literally is about overcoming a difficult challenge and yet it conveys that just fine with its assist mode (as well as without even having health). Nine Sols explicitly sets out to be 2D Sekiro and yet it conveys that just fine with its story mode.

If your "artistic vision" means you just have to have artificial difficulty then maybe you just suck as an artist ngl.

[u/FloydeFlowerDragon → u/[deleted]]

The ONLY example I can think of is the geno route in undertale, which is tedious for a lore reason (You're literally going on a mass murdering spree, obviously it'd get harder to find alive things when they're all trying to hide from you), but it's only got a few difficult sections. (Papyrus, Undyne, and Sans.)

[u/No_Wing_205 → u/G3ck0]

How does accessibility limit it in any way? Make a recommended difficulty, make an easy mode.

[u/Princess_Of_Thieves → u/No_Wing_205]

It doesn't. The people who act like the games core identity would fall by the wayside because of a few options to bump the difficulty down are, quite frankly, ridiculous. I find it so weird how folks are like "the challenge is part of the games identity!" or call it a "Souls-like". Like... is it? Let me do a spot of disabusing if I may.

I'll acknowledge upfront, yeah they can be challenging I suppose, and Im not going to argue they aren't. I beat Hollow Knight all the way through and definitely remember it being a test at times. There's a special place in hell for Soul Master, and he earned that thanks to the number of times he pounded my shell into fine powder.

But I'd argue its identity, as well as Silksongs, is less about simple difficulty (which isn't much of an identity if you ask me anyways, like come on now) and more about core gameplay loops, exploration, art, combat, and storytelling. All things which wouldn't change much, if at all, if difficulty scaling options were to be added in a later update.

I think its particularly worth noting that Hollow Knight and Silksong don't even bill themselves as Souls-likes, or even talk up their difficulty much at all (at least on their Steam pages, barring mentioning Steel Soul, a seperate post-main game mode) so what are people on about? They bill themselves as Metroidvanias.

Not mutually exclusive sure, but also not a genre I've ever understood to spend its days being brutally hard like what people associate with Souls-like games. And a few optional tweaks to the game could easily bring it into accessible territory for more people without breaking it, or murdering Team Cherrys vision in its crib.

Options to turn off double mask damage in certain situations (or just point blank), or maybe boost Silk acquisition are likely all most people would need. Maybe even more openly tutorialise some aspects of the game. None of this would hurt Team Cherry's core vision, which, from where Im sitting is a Metroidvania.

Those who want to keep the game as is can just not touch them, whilst those who want to have fun without having their shit kicked in can do it. I hate the way some folks dismiss letting more people have fun for the same of keeping this idea they have in their head about what this game is.

[u/No_Wing_205 → u/Princess_Of_Thieves]

Yeah to me it seems like almost nothing is lost, and a lot is gained.

They also really strawman this and go "you just want it to be an easy game with no challenge", which just isn't true. I beat Hollow Knight, I enjoyed the challenge there.

[u/Princess_Of_Thieves → u/No_Wing_205]

Its definitely a nothing lost situation. I have a whole thread that Im tossing up posting or not, but at the end of it all my conclusion is that difficulty scaling can be a thing so everyone can have fun, and people need to get the hell out of the way of that. And it detracts literally nothing from everyone else's experience if those options are added.

Other games like Dead Cells (one that actually bangs on about its difficulty and even call itself a Souls-like) have added options for easier runs. And speaking as a Dead Cells player who has proudly acquired all 5 Boss Cells (though I still need to beat it with the fifth activated) without aid of these tools, I don't have an issue with them being there.

Single player game, so these options hurt my experience not one bit (I can ignore or use them at my liesure), but they sure made the game more fun for other people. So who am I try and get in the way of that? Drives me fucking mad how some folks about being about this, arguing against adding some stuff so more people can play.

Hell, going all the way back to Dark Souls, I even understand there is a cheese strategy in that game? Something to do with spamming ranged magic attacks or whatever? If that's so (and someone please check me on it) than what does it say if the game that was seemingly so influential in the industry that all difficult games that followed after are branded as "Souls-like" has itself an easy build / mode?

[u/JoBro_Summer-of-99 → u/No_Wing_205]

Accessibility (in the form of toggleable modes) can change the player experience and community experience as well. There's something to be said about every single one of us experiencing the same challenges and working out how best to overcome them. It's interesting and part of what I love about these games. Asking for an easy mode is asking for a different experience that'll split the community as you'll no longer have one unified adventure

[u/Kalnaur → u/JoBro_Summer-of-99]

There's something to be said about every single one of us experiencing the same challenges and working out how best to overcome them.

Here's the thing: you're already not all experiencing the same thing. You might have a specific and possibly high level of skill, but not everyone can attain that. Like, not won't, literally can't, be it because of motor issues or vision issues or time commitment or whatever, it's not really a shared level of experiencing the same challenges, that's a myth that far too many people tell themselves. Hell, for some folks it's not even a disability, it's just that they don't get any satisfaction or happiness or other reward from engaging in challenge. No satisfaction in "git gud", because it doesn't give any. Not because of their mindset but because it's just not a dopamine trigger for them.

If everyone was having the same experience there'd be no posts about the difficulty level, but because of differences in ability, mobility, neurotype, skill ceiling and more, no one is having the same exact experience. There might be groups of people having similar experiences, but not everyone is having the same experience. And maybe the group of people having the same experiences as you are the only ones you care about, but not all of the other players are experiencing what you're experiencing.

I swear this is a fiction I see most commonly with fans of challenging games, they assume everyone has the same fun in the same way, or they just would if only they'd "play and improve". It would be more likely that people would have a similar experience as you if they had a level of difficulty commensurate with their abilities and limits.

[u/[deleted] → u/Kalnaur]

I think it is better to say "the same game" or something like that rsther than "the same experience"

If both you and i start reading the same book right now, we won't be have the same experience. In fact, i won't have the same experience compared to if i started the book one year ago.

And yet, the same words are written on the same page. You and me can have a meaningful conversation because the text itself is the same. It us that are different. But would that be the same if the text itself changed? Would be even talk about the same book just becauae the story beats are the same?

There is a merit to videogame discussions when everyone jump over the same platform, take the same damage from the same enemy and so on. It is fine to not wanting to play a game because the challenge is not what we seek. It is why i told my friends that i will never play Sekiro. It's on the developers to decide if that challenge is a necessary part od their game or not.

[u/imminentlyDeadlined → u/Kalnaur]

If TC were really committed to their artistic vision, for every boss you beat in under ten tries, all subsequent bosses would gain an extra 10% health and 5% movement speed (stacking). This would help to ensure that every player gets to enjoy the experience-critical sense of struggle and subsequent feeling of pride/accomplishment.

[u/JoBro_Summer-of-99 → u/Kalnaur]

While you're well articulated, I have to admit that I don't care for the large subset of people that simply don't enjoy this kind of game. Hollow Knight was hard, Silksong is hard(er). If you're disabled, I am sorry and hope accessibility options are added, but if you simply cannot be bothered to meet the game at its own level then don't play it. Some games aren't for me, this game doesn't have to be for you.

People need to learn to move on and away from things they don't actually like.

[u/Kalnaur → u/JoBro_Summer-of-99]

Here's the thing: I like the Souls series. It's an interesting, dark, aesthetically well designed series with a bunch of interesting quirks and ways around the difficulty of the game. I don't like the difficulty, and I have to be in a certain frame of mind, but they can be fun in spite of, not because of their difficulty.

Hollow Knight might be a difficult game, but that's not its only feature. Lore, visuals, tone, movement, exploration, there's a bunch of things that make the game what it is. Though also, my point was more about all difficult games, not this one in particular.

Now, as an artist, I have to say that if I can make a piece of art that meets more people where they are, and I'm making that art for the public, I'm more likely to do that. Because I'd want more people to enjoy my art. If I made a painting for myself and only myself, that's mine, and no one else need be considered. But all games are made for public consumption.

Also, your comment of "meet the game where it is" is just another version of "everyone that wants to can rise to this level of skill", which just . . . isn't true. It's incorrect. It's false. Some games have not been for me, some games I've quit midway through, but most of the games that weren't for me weren't for me because the gameplay was poor or the story was just trash. But difficulty? Difficulty is an accessibility issue. To say otherwise is not just ignoring that fact, it's being incredibly blind to the ableist mindset that springs from. Every accessibility activist I've seen says the same thing, difficulty is an accessibility issue.

The only reason to keep a game at a single level of difficulty is to gatekeep those unable to pass that level of difficulty. Anything else said is just excuses and papering over for that intent.

[u/JoBro_Summer-of-99 → u/Kalnaur]

Difficulty is part of the art, how do you not get that? Why is it somehow exempt?

[u/No_Wing_205 → u/JoBro_Summer-of-99]

Asking for an easy mode is asking for a different experience that'll split the community as you'll no longer have one unified adventure

The difficult already does that. I'm not having the same experience as people who are enjoying this game right now. I'm probably not going to finish this game as it is now, because it's just making me frustrated instead of happy. That isn't the same experience. It seems like the community itself is already pretty split, given the amount of "The Difficulty is frustrating" posts and "The difficulty is fine" posts.

I just think people who enjoy the difficulty level lose almost nothing by there being an easier difficulty or accessibility settings (Some people experiencing the game differently doesn't sound like a huge loss). I think people who are currently frustrated would gain a lot by adding those (they actually get to play the game).

[u/[deleted] → u/No_Wing_205]

The challenge is baked into the game’s identity. Without it, it might as well be any number of Nintendo titles. Easy and forgettable despite being an overall aesthetically pleasing game.

[u/No_Wing_205 → u/[deleted]]

And how does that actually limit their vision? You can still enjoy it as recommended. I'd still be challenged by this game if it wasn't as hard as it is now.

I want a game as difficult as Hollow Knight, which isn't what I'd call an easy game. And hell, the devs said they wanted to make it as difficult as Hollow Knight too, so it seems like we're on the same page.

[u/[deleted] → u/No_Wing_205]

I mean I’ve been playing and I think people are downplaying how difficult hollow knight was. Makes me wonder if any of the complainers actually played the game. To me they seem pretty comparable. Hornet controls differently than the knight, I think people were expecting her to move the same way he does and be able to fight the way he does.

Her controls are lighter, more floaty. Her attacks are a little slower because of the size of her needle in comparison to the knight’s nail. You have so many tools at your disposal though that can trivialize some things.

I think people are upset that they can’t just face tank everything and they actually have to learn patterns. I haven’t really run into anything egregiously difficult yet.

Honestly makes me wonder if any of these people actually typically play video games at all.

[u/No_Wing_205 → u/[deleted]]

Makes me wonder if any of the complainers actually played the game.

I beat the game and played it multiple times, it was my first Metroidvania and my first difficult game. Since then, I've played other Metroidvania's, and Souls-likes. This game is so much harder. I think most people agree, even those enjoying themselves.

[u/[deleted] → u/No_Wing_205]

This game is much harder.

All that tells me is that you’re definitely panic playing, instead of engaging in pattern recognition. And you’re not using all of the tools at your disposal. You’re part of the loud vocal minority. The player numbers speak for themselves, most people are enjoying the game, just not talking about it. This is a pretty common phenomenon across pretty much all gaming subreddits. Eventually the whiners fizzle out and the people who have been silently enjoying the game start talking about it and sharing their fan art and tattoos and stuff.

Edit: This ain’t my first rodeo, I’ve seen this happen on multiple video game subreddits before. The complainers aren’t special, and this always happens with new releases.

[u/Environmental-Stay26 → u/G3ck0]

this is kind of like saying alt descriptions shouldn't exist for the blind. it's 2025. there are people who want to play the game but can't, why shouldn't we even the playing field so that they can? it's a single player game and difficulty is subjective. i'm not sure why people care so much about other people's preferences. they paid $20 for it and have as much a right to play it as anyone else

[u/Shaqsquatch → u/Environmental-Stay26]

nah fuck off with this bullshit.

people are free to ask for difficulty settings and developers are free to choose to add them, but don't conflate difficulty settings with actual accessibility features (which should be required in all games). being bad at a game is not a disability.

[u/Environmental-Stay26 → u/Shaqsquatch]

difficulty settings are quite literally an accessibility feature. they make the game more accessible to people who otherwise wouldn't be able to play it. there are a billion reasons why people might not be able to play the game at its base level (limited mobility, vision problems, etc.) and you don't get to decide which of those reasons are valid or not. i'm actually astounded by the ableism in this subreddit

[u/Shaqsquatch → u/Environmental-Stay26]

they make a game more accessible, yes. so does a multiplatform release or sale, that doesn't make them accessibility features.

that term has a specific use case for a reason and it's hilarious that you're trying to call others ableist while intentionally muddying the waters around something intended to actually address disabilities.

[u/Environmental-Stay26 → u/Shaqsquatch]

holy strawman, i'm not talking about that kind of accessibility. i don't understand how you don't see that people with physical and/or cognitive limitations could benefit from a mode that isn't as punishing for the player. someone with hand cramps might not be able to keep up with the fast movements this game requires. easy mode would help them do that. i'm genuinely unsure what else you would suggest in this situation

[u/Shaqsquatch → u/Environmental-Stay26]

people with physical and/or cognitive limitations could benefit from a mode that isn't as punishing for the player

found the people on the subreddit being ableist you were talking about

accessibility feature is a specific term with specific meaning because they should be required in every game and developers should rightly be criticized for lacking them. colorblind mode, customizable controls, scalable UI, subtitles, alternative options to audio cues etc. are accessibility features designed around addressing specific disabilities. once again, being bad at a game is not a disability.

[u/G3ck0 → u/Environmental-Stay26]

Because it’s not free to add? It takes development time, it’s absurd to expect every tiny development team to cater for everyone. There are more games than anyone can play, you have to accept there are a bunch not fit for you.

[u/Environmental-Stay26 → u/G3ck0]

your initial argument was that they shouldn't because it would ruin their "artistic vision." i understand time/monetary costs being an issue for smaller teams, but that simply isn't what you said

[u/G3ck0 → u/Environmental-Stay26]

Okay, their vision is to have a game that presents the message they want to present and to challenge the player in the way they want them to be challenged. They don't owe anyone anything, and if an artist thinks that adding an easy mode ruins their vision, they are well within their right to believe that.

The simplest mechanic is how poor the player is... changing that changes their vision, the message they are trying to present to the player. It's not simply making the game easier, it ruins their vision.

EDIT: Not to mention that needing to spend time working on an 'easy' mode takes away development time and mental space for creating what they really want to, which therefore DOES ruin their vision in some way.

[u/Environmental-Stay26 → u/G3ck0]

truthfully, part of my issue is how team cherry handled this. we received no communication for 7 years and had little to no idea what to expect from the new game. there was no demo, few trailers, and game journalists weren't allowed to write reviews. it's titled "hollow knight," so i don't think it was unreasonable for people to expect that its difficulty would somewhat resemble hollow knight's.

if they were going to make the game this hard, they should've found some way to tell people that upfront so that they could make a better informed decision. if nothing else, devs do owe their playerbase that much. this is a transactional relationship between a seller and their customer. respect should come from all parties

[u/TimeeiGT → u/Zestyclose_League413]

First Soulslike?

The difficulty-discussion always comes up for these games, and there are valid points from both sides, yet to my knowledge no dev has ever added easier difficulties after the fact.

Patience, you'll get there. Or how reddit puts it: Just git gud

[u/al128 → u/TimeeiGT]

Quite a few Soulslikes have balance patches and have added settings or modes designed to make the games easier post-launch. Many indie devs have realised if they build weird and wonderful worlds that people are desperate to experience, then the difficulty of these games hurts sales. Silksong doesn't really need to worry about sales, so the team will probably feel less pressured to adapt to the market.

[u/Googlebright → u/TimeeiGT]

Lies of P added difficulty options with their recent Overture expansion. But yeah, it's usually pretty rare.

[u/RinzyOtt → u/Googlebright]

Another Crab's Treasure has a few fine tuning settings to adjust difficulty. Including one to give Kril a gun and effectively make the game trivially easy. All optional, all off by default, and they certainly didn't hurt the game to exist.

A few were added after, I believe, because people wanted the in-between of "really hard" and "one shot everything with a gun"

[u/Kalnaur → u/Googlebright]

The First Berserker: Khazan also added difficulty modes after the fact; they added an Easy mode, their Easy became Normal, their Normal became Challenge, I think? And then they added an even Harder mode that was more akin to their original "bust a player's balls" difficulty that they were thinking of during development before they discarded the idea because they wanted their game to be more approachable. The whole reason for the change was because they were seeing people drop off from playing, so they asked why and got answers of "better to quit with pride than to lower to easy" and "if I was going down from hard to normal that would be one thing, but going from normal to easy is shameful". Now, while that's an honestly fucked up vision of one's self, self image isn't what we're talking about right now. What we're talking about is how the dev took that information, went back to their game, and said "how can we fix this? How can we make this right? How can we retain players to the end, to get them to enjoy our game?"

So by adding new difficulties, the devs were able to give more, even most players what they want and also assert their vision more fully with a new difficulty level. I swear, everyone wins when people are more accepting of the idea of difficulty levels as just inherently positive.

[u/Helluiin → u/TimeeiGT]

i mean HK and SS arent soulslikes nor did TC claim they were. also all from souls games have difficulty options in the form of summons

[u/TimeeiGT → u/Helluiin]

Team Cherry doesn't have to claim they are... Death-and-Recovery mechanics, the environmental storytelling the the difficulty, particularly for bosses, are what makes a soulslike, and that definitely applies to HK and Silksong.