Yeah, a reasonable curve of difficulty is what pushes the player base to explore the options / the world. A recent famous example (which also saw the developer experimenting open world formula) is Elden Ring. The difficulty spikes are what encourage players to rethink and explore other options.
The difficulty spikes were in the older games the only issue is it meant you had to farm the same level again and again which gets tedious. Plus the saves being in annoying places makes progression more annoying. Like I love bloodborne but stopped when I got to the swamp because I was annoyed having to farm levels.
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u/zohar2310 Feb 25 '25
Yeah, a reasonable curve of difficulty is what pushes the player base to explore the options / the world. A recent famous example (which also saw the developer experimenting open world formula) is Elden Ring. The difficulty spikes are what encourage players to rethink and explore other options.