I can't help but agree. The trade-in market coupled with consumers' fear of buying a mediocre title (and in many cases, difficult games are considered mediocre or bad) has led to the dumbing down of difficulty levels. Very true.
Anyway, I would be afraid to admit just how many hours I spent trying to figure out Super Pitfall, a game that is probably a very bad one, but I basically played what my parents bought (we didn't really have any say back in the mid-80's with our NES because I have two other brothers, and so they made it really easy by just buying games for us...haha...without our input and thus without constant, childish fighting that every person with a sibling knows so well), and Super Pitfall was one of those titles. I'll always hate that game deep down, but mostly because my child-mind never could get its metaphorical hands around that deeply strange and very badly designed game. Any game where you have to randomly jump into the corner of a wall (obviously inspired by the access point to the secret water world in Super Mario Bros.) in one of the game's many tunnels to access some strange dark world is a little too crafty (or stupid) for me.
Anyway, we all hung with our games back then because even the bad ones had charms. Rygar, by today's standards, isn't really a "good" game, is it? I adore it, but it's realy butt-ugly, you know? I mean, even compared to other games of the time! It didn't have the stylish goodness of Castlevania's gothic world, nor the solid perfection of something so early as Super Mario Bros. The two things it had going for it were pretty good control (as with most Tecmo games) and some kind of inadvertantly depressing gameworld (the music is memorable, but I can't remember how positively). Hahaha...maybe that's harsh, but anyway. So many gems out there are missed because they get a 6 or 7 (not bad scores, one should remember, usually) in various mags.
It all goes back to an underlying truth that is growing more and more evident. We gamers are getting really sick of point systems. Too many people don't read the words of the review which inform you about the game far more than scores. And don't give me that bit about needing something quick to look at because life is short--life's also too short to miss out on all the good stuff everyone's missing out on already. Then again, just buying the 9's and 10's is sure to keep you pretty happy, and many people don't have much money (like me), but still, the point is valid.
Topic: when I attack ver. 1 (Read 2602 times)
