Difficulty vs Grind?

[chris2804698]

I was wondering...

 

my last two proper platinums (not counting easy 30 minute games) were assassins creed Valhalla and Devil May Cry (PS4). Currently they have a similar rarity on PSNprofiles although I’m sure assassins creed will get have a much lower rarity in the coming months. 
One of these games was brutal and tested me as a player to my limits, one was easy and enjoyable but the platinum took hours upon hours of grinding. This led me to wonder what are all of your preferences a difficult game that has the potential to be out of your skill range or a grind that may make you want to gouge your eyes out? 
let me know what you think! 

[Landertjuuh]

29 minutes ago, chris2804698 said:

I was wondering...

 

my last two proper platinums (not counting easy 30 minute games) were assassins creed Valhalla and Devil May Cry (PS4). Currently they have a similar rarity on PSNprofiles although I’m sure assassins creed will get have a much lower rarity in the coming months. 
One of these games was brutal and tested me as a player to my limits, one was easy and enjoyable but the platinum took hours upon hours of grinding. This led me to wonder what are all of your preferences a difficult game that has the potential to be out of your skill range or a grind that may make you want to gouge your eyes out? 
let me know what you think! 

Definitely difficulty. I did a major grind for a trophy once but never again, if the trophy takes way too long I dont even really bother going for it because i’m not having fun then. I still have AC Black Flag level 55 to do but I dont think i’m going to do it. At the end of the day trophies are just trophies so i’d rather get a challenging one than one that takes hours upon hours of tedious grinding.

[KenjiCBZ]

Both. I like being faced with tough challenges (As long as it doesn't have RNG factors), and even if I am not able to complete them I still enjoy them; on other hand, grinding every now and then is not a big deal to me, I hardly get bored and even if I have to do the same task for hours I just put on music to keep me company.

[MidnightMoonss]

Don’t have a preference. Grinding doesn’t bother me unless it’s ridiculous. 

[DiamondAN-94]

I really enjoy both but when it comes to grinding it has to be a game I really enjoy such as Friday the 13th or kingdom hearts. A challenge is always appreciated as long as it’s doable with practice and patients

[JohnCenaSong-]

I often like it hard and short. ?

 

But yeah, jokes aside, I enjoy games in which they'd be generally fairly short but only if you're perfect, any time it takes is dependent on your ability. Could be a 100hr plus if you suck, less than 5hrs if you're a god at the game, that kind of thing.

 

I love me a long relaxing game from time to time too, having to really comb over everything and sink hours and hours into it but I'd rather challenge myself over a variety of games in that time than commit so much of it to something that doesn't challenge me in any way.

[Evil_Joker88]

I prefer grinding over difficult because i know i can finish it even if it takes a long time and i'm not enjoying the game anymore along the way. But there's always progress towards my goal. There are a couple of games i played and know i'm not good enough to complete and that is more unpleasant a thought than to grind something mindlessly but for full completion.

Edited December 24, 2020 by Evil_Joker88

[SuperPatchZ7]

I would like to say both, but I have more grind trophies that difficult ones.

[flugurnarrr]

I'm very new to trophy hunting (started three months ago), but I prefer difficulty over grind any day. I enjoy mastering game systems, so challenge is something I crave in my games (and trophies). Grinding just bores me to death and always makes me wish I was playing something else.

[ladynadiad]

Difficult is fine by me, but I find that many games that claim to be difficult have a cheap sort of difficulty that relies more on luck than actual skill.  To me that sort of difficulty is no better than a lengthy grind and in many ways is worse because there's no idea when you'll actually get lucky enough to beat it.

[Whitelightnin683]

I guess I lean more towards grind, but honestly I don't really have a preference. Both have their equal share of pros and cons. Difficulty, if done right, can further develop your skills as gamer and fill you with a great sense of pride of overcoming a challenge. Moreso, if not many people have achieved such a feat. If not, if the game isn't designed well enough to accommodate difficult feats or challenges, it can lead to frustrating situations and one may indeed feel it is a matter of luck rather than skill. Whether or not overcoming bad game design/artificial difficulty is a "good" challenge could be an interesting debate on its own.

 

Grind gives more of a sense of progression that difficulty may not always provide depending on the person, yet is still be accomplishing with all the "hard work" chipped away at over a long period of time, even if the task isn't difficult. However, grinds can be boring and no different from completing chores, especially if grinding isn't baked into the actual game design and just feels needlessly tacked on.

 

 

Edited December 24, 2020 by Whitelightnin683

[AJ_Radio]

Difficulty, always.

 

Grinds for the most part bore me to sleep. Difficulty that is presented in a reasonable fashion in a not-so-long game is more encouraging for me. I’d rather have challenge that only lasts a short while, as opposed to a heartless grind that could take several days or weeks.

Edited December 25, 2020 by Spaz

[Copanele]

Unless it's a fun grind or I need a reason to listen to a podcast, I would always choose difficulty. 

At least I am improving my skills or something and I get satisfaction once I beat a challenge. Just mashing a button 200000 hours for a measly trophy? Nah that's no fun in my book.

EDIT : assuming it's reasonable difficulty and not some impossible crap done by the devs for shits and giggles (see those 0% completion games that are impossible to do) 

Edited December 25, 2020 by Copanele

[Redgrave]

I prefer a grind since while it might take a while I at least know I can get it done eventually. Difficulties tend to vary too much for me to really prefer them. Some games will have "hard" where it's not really that hard and you can just exploit things easily, and then other games will have """"hard"""" where it's just everything has a difficulty spike to where it feels more frustrating and annoying than actually difficult.

 

Granted, some grinds really suck and for the most part I at least prefer to do them when there's a big pay off in the end as opposed to one that doesn't really give you anything but the way I see it is I would rather chip away at a wall than bang my head against it.

[StraightVege]

I currently can't think of a single instance where grinding has ever been fun or desirable, so difficulty is preferable for me, if the challenge is fair. I'm actually not that into 9-10 difficulty platinums; 7-8 is the sweet spot, where it's not overly frustrating.

[AgentSmiz]

If they're done correctly, I don't mind either.

Generally, I find a grind easier to play through and deal with than difficulty. If I hit a grindy section or trophy on a game, I'll often thrown on my ipod or Youtube and just listen to something else whereas difficulty requires me to put more focus in. That can lead to frustration when I keep having to do the same bit over and over, leading me to not enjoy my time playing the game. I'd rather have a boring long time than a frustrating short one.

As I said though, done correctly, both are fine. If the difficulty is fair and mistakes are because of my skill(or lack thereof), I'm more likely to keep playing than if it's cheap, inflated difficulty. Likewise, if the grind is reasonable and the gameplay loop is fun, I'm more likely to stick at it.

 

[Shmeefly]

I enjoy hard trophies, ive never really quit on a trophy/platinum in over its difficulty, grinding is ok too, a bit boring most of the time but most games dont require more that a few dedicated nights of grind, just dependent on how much you want the platinum in both aspects really, and i always want it, what i dont like tho is when these two are ridiculous, like Grid grind, over 100h of doing oval laps for ONE trophy... After the 60h i put in doing everything else, or when difficulty isnt fair, il do hard games, n practice makes perfect but if difficulty is beyond skill n more based on luck or dumb AI its just unfair, restarting a checkpoint 50 times bc bad RNG or whatever, not enjoyable in those circumstances, but il still do them regardless

[Lava_Yuki]

I prefer in-between, as in not too short and easy like Life is Strange, but not too long and difficult like the Yakuza games or too hard like Crash Bandicoot. 

A perfect balance would be anything between a 4-7/10 difficulty, and 30-60 hours to platinum. I'm tired of 100+ hour plats now as an adult as I dont have time, although I often played those grindy games when I was in school and uni and did not have real life responsibilities. 

 

Good balanced games for plats imo were Tales of Graces F, Xillia, Hearts and Innocence, FF8, 10.2, 15 and 12 TZA, KH3.

Too difficult and hence frustrating that I just played for fun, did not other with the plats- Crash Bandicoot, Kingdom Hearts 1, BBS, CoM, FF9

Too grindy- Persona 5, FF10 and 13, Tales of Vesperia, Berseria and Xillia 2

Both difficult and grindy=a nightmare, like Yakuza games and Disgaea games. 

[Yukiko Miyamoto]

Difficult although grinding is easy, I don't want to get bored doing the same thing over and over.

Edited October 23, 2023 by Kimura Takahashi

[TheFalseDeity]

Depends on if i like the grind. Generally id prefer grinding as i do not like difficulty period, but some grinds just suck and to a big enough point to overtake my dislike of challenge.

[Gamer-Girl-Noire]

I like a middle ground. I don't want to be getting my ass kicked but being too easy makes things slog on because no fear of danger but grinding is if it's needed I want it to be something that actually amounts to something in gameplay more then just you now have 20000 thingys that mean nothing

[SlowQuorex]

I just like it long and hard. 😌