What Is Artificial Difficulty?

[Rudometkin]

There's a lot of discussion centered around the making of Vintage Story, and I keep seeing the term "artificial difficulty" being used. Can anyone clarify and justify the use of this term for me?

The VS character class system is said to introduce "artificial difficulty" by way of limiting certain abilities depending on the class you choose. But it also introduces buffs for balance. The entire package is wrapped in an intelligible class system. How is this not as 'natural as it gets' for difficulty? Enemies having extremely high levels of health is also said to be an example of artificial difficulty. But artificial according to what? The entire game is artificial. I suppose another synonym for the term is "forced difficulty". But the entire game is forced into motion by code. So surely the term is not being used in a metaphysical sense. So in what sense is it being used?

I see a lot of talk about artificial difficulty. But I don't see a lot of talk about natural difficulty. For those of us using this term, do we also have a framework that explains what natural difficulty is? or are we perhaps arbitrarily using the term 'artificial difficulty' as a weapon to undermine game design choices we simply don't like? perhaps as an artificial argument?

Perhaps 'Natural' is what Anego Studios makes. Perhaps it is as simple as that. 'Natural' and 'artificial' difficulty must be relative to something. If tomorrow Tyron decides to double the health of the standard Drifter, is that artificial difficulty? If so, why? What is making it artificial? Does difficulty need to be explained with a complex system that makes sense? We are doing that with the class system, and we're still calling that 'artificial'. Are we basing it off of what the game used to be compared to how it is now? But the game is in heavy development. Perhaps what we are calling 'artificial difficulty' is actually 'natural rebalance'.

Look forward to somebody maybe clearing this up for some of us. Thanks!

[ThatMaxGuy]

I feel like you're getting too hung up on the dichotomy between artificial and natural, but that's not what "artificial difficulty" is about. 

The term is somewhat nebulous, and can be applied nebulously too, but generally artificial difficulty means difficulty that does not care for your skill. If you quadruple an enemy's health or damage or whatever to compensate for bad AI, that is artificial difficulty. Racers rubber-banding (becoming more or less fast) to catch up to you if you're ahead, that is also artificial difficulty.

You could argue that making you unable to craft certain items if you don't pick the right class is also artificial difficulty, but personally I don't see it like that. Classes are a way to have access to different tools, and millions of other games do it: picking a melee class in an rpg that can't cast spells isn't artificial difficulty, it's how I've decided to approach fights. 

As far as I'm aware, natural difficulty is not a widely recognized concept. 

[Rudometkin]

49 minutes ago, ThatMaxGuy said:

I feel like you're getting too hung up on the dichotomy between artificial and natural, but that's not what "artificial difficulty" is about. 

The term is somewhat nebulous, and can be applied nebulously too,

If it is nebulous, then perhaps we ought to clear it up with a proposed dichotomy and come to a clear definition for better understanding.

Shouldn't those of us who use the term want to be understood?

49 minutes ago, ThatMaxGuy said:

but generally artificial difficulty means difficulty that does not care for your skill.

Ah! Well case closed for me, then! This game is designed to provide uncompromising challenge. It's generally designed to be 'artificially' difficult by this definition.

49 minutes ago, ThatMaxGuy said:

If you quadruple an enemy's health or damage or whatever to compensate for bad AI, that is artificial difficulty. Racers rubber-banding (becoming more or less fast) to catch up to you if you're ahead, that is also artificial difficulty.

I see, very interesting. If a game quadruples an enemy's health, who am I to determine whether it is to compensate for bad AI? but I can totally see a problem in rubberbanding. I mean at that point, the game rules are not even consistent! Unless the racers are explained to have some ability that gives them more speed power while they are losing the race, that seems like some cheap difficulty that isn't consistent. That is something I'm not inclined to appreciate.

49 minutes ago, ThatMaxGuy said:

You could argue that making you unable to craft certain items if you don't pick the right class is also artificial difficulty, but personally I don't see it like that. Classes are a way to have access to different tools, and millions of other games do it: picking a melee class in an rpg that can't cast spells isn't artificial difficulty, it's how I've decided to approach fights. 

I agree with this. For those who call that artificial difficulty, I ask them, then what is the antonym? Or what is natural difficulty?

49 minutes ago, ThatMaxGuy said:

As far as I'm aware, natural difficulty is not a widely recognized concept.

Yeah, I've probably never heard of it myself. It was an original thought that I formed when contemplating the artificial difficulty objections. "Well, if they consider this to be artificial difficulty and to be looked down upon, then what is good difficulty in their book?" Thus, natural difficulty was born. Hahaha

Thanks for your comment!!

[Koobze]

4 hours ago, ThatMaxGuy said:

generally artificial difficulty means difficulty that does not care for your skill

I think this is it, at least how I read it. If the game is difficult, but I as a player can learn and improve and the difficulty is reduced, this is the "natural" difficulty that tests a player's skills.

Difficulty that exists regardless of the player skill is what I'd call artificial. The rubberbanding in mario kart is a great example, the AI does not follow the rules in order to make the game more difficult for the player. I'd say "take down a bear" in Vintage Story is closer to skill-based difficulty - though "nerdpole + projectiles" isn't a very skillful solution - but then if you needed to collect 20 bear-tails to do something it would start to lean more towards artificial difficulty, since there isn't much skill difference between taking down 1 bear and taking down 20, it's just adding tedium (and luck/RNG) to the task. 

I think artificial difficulty can be useful, and doesn't need to actually be difficult, it can be an artificial lack of difficulty. I believe some games like Civilization were designed such that the opposing players aren't really trying to "win", since it can be very frustrating as a player to get beaten by the AI, so some of them just do their own thing and are more like roadblocks/speedbumps in the player's journey to win. But then, Civilization also gives huge bonuses to AI players depending on the skill level, which is also artificial difficulty.

I'd say making it have a strict definition is not necessary since it also really depends on the game. I mentioned that somewhere it shifts from skill to tedium and that's the line, but overcoming tedium through perseverance can also be considered a skill, and if "persevering through extended durations to overcome the challenge" is the point of the game then while it would (for me) qualify as artificial difficulty it might not be so to someone else who enjoys having their perseverance-skill tested. 

[Facethief]

Somewhere between a scripted loss and a tutorial sequence. While natural difficulty can exist, usually in the form of in-depth emergent gameplay, artificial ease exists wherever artificial difficulty does. Like ThatMaxGuy said, artificial difficulty doesn’t care how good you are, or more accurately, it allows the game to not care how good you are. Rubberbanding in a racing game is a good demonstration; if you’re playing “too well,” but the game wants you to be as challenged as anyone else, it makes the world around you more difficult. Consider also; if you’re playing Skyrim or a similar game, enemies become more powerful as you level on a global scale. Does this make sense in-world? Not really, or at least not to me; most people can’t train at the same rate a demigod can.

That’s my take, I guess.

[CastIronFabric]

Examples of what I would consider to be 'Artificial Difficulty' in games in general (I can not think of one that is part of VS core game play to be fair)

1. mini games like fishing in an RPG.

2. 'Perk' systems in which you plan to get a lot of XP by killing zombies so that you can increase your farming skill.

 

I really do not think those two examples really need to be boiled down into a lengthy essay, I think we all would get the idea.

 

 

 

Edited August 19, 2025 by CastIronFabric

[Sparticus247]

15 hours ago, Rudometkin said:

Enemies having extremely high levels of health is also said to be an example of artificial difficulty. But artificial according to what? The entire game is artificial. I suppose another synonym for the term is "forced difficulty". But the entire game is forced into motion by code. So surely the term is not being used in a metaphysical sense. So in what sense is it being used?

Since I replied on your last topic on bosses having planet sized health as forced/artificial difficulty in a specific Final Fantasy game, let me break this down for you.

Imagine playing a game about defending the planet from "Crab Monsters". Now imagine that there is a "Boss Crab" on each region of the planet you have to defeat. Each boss crab is the exact same in its attack style (other than some randomness on attack order) where it has 5 attacks that can be dodged if you memorize movement patters, and 1 splash damage attack that can't be dodged so you have to have high HP and heal during the battle. Every boss crab is the same mechanic, just with a different character model, and each "Boss Crab" has more HP and does more damage than the previous.

You level up your HP and healing by defeating lots of "Standard Crabs" during gameplay. That is the only way to increase your level.

Is the "Boss Crab" that killed you 4 times actually difficult to defeat? You memorized its attack patterns, but it kills you with the attack that can't be avoided eventually because it hurts too much, and you can't heal enough HP in time between. Now if you go kill 800 "Standard Crabs" you may level up and have enough HP to defeat it next time. Then the next boss needs another 900, then the next 1200, etc.

That to me is artificial difficulty. There is nothing you can do but slog through the game the way it was designed to add extra hours.

[Sparticus247]

7 hours ago, Rudometkin said:

If it is nebulous, then perhaps we ought to clear it up with a proposed dichotomy and come to a clear definition for better understanding.

Shouldn't those of us who use the term want to be understood?

It's hard to pinpoint things that much. When is something considered "awesome"? It's in the eye of the beholder, but we as a group generally know what awesome is. Awesome however can be a bit different from person to person.

[Steel General]

Not to deny the aforementioned takes on artificial difficulty, but mine took it as making a worse interface.

GTA is a good example: at the start of the game, when you have low skills, the difficulty comes from having a lousy interface - driving makes a good example. The vehicle's direction has some random walk and the player's input has some random adjustments, and between the two it's difficult to drive well. When the skill is high the random walks are eliminated - you have a functioning interface that lets you control your vehicle much as one would in a racing game. GTA started with a functioning interface, then gimped it to have a chance to earn functionality back.

In Vintage Story, an example might be the accuracy box on archery. It's trivial to point the view at a target; it's slightly less trivial, but still directly doable, to adjust that to account for a ballistic path to target - with practice, one need never miss. Hence, the inaccuracy box is imposed with the only effective compensation to be close enough to the target to moot the inaccuracy by having the box be smaller than the target. The ability to aim at a target, to track and lead a target, to adjust for distance and gravity, are all naturally difficult - and that wasn't good enough, so some artificial difficulty is added on to it.

I guess technically having any amount of HP more than one is artificial difficulty, as is randomized damage. 'Tag' is normal difficulty

[Bumber]

What is "pseudo-intellectualism"?

The prefix "pseudo" means "false", but clearly you can read these words on your screen, so they are real in a sense. It also implies the existence of a "true" intellectualism, but how does one determine which is which?

Some things are falsifiable, while others are simply indeterminable or matters of preference. If things do not fit neatly into true/false boxes, can pseudo-intellectualism really be said to exist? Isn't any discussion inherently valuable?

Should one be encouraged to look up or ask a definition for a term they don't understand, or is it not preferable to wax philosophical on what one thinks it means instead? I think a word salad can be a healthy appetizer to any discourse.

Edit: Turns out OP already got banned. Oh, well.
Edit II: My point is that OP made up his own strawman definition and rambled pointlessly about it.

Edited August 29, 2025 by Bumber