Should I start on Hard Mode?

[Wesk Alber]

Long time PM fan, been playing since 64. I've never done anything like Danger Mario strats but I love the game to death and got relatively good.

The thing with RPG Hard Modes is they tend to just be stat increases, though this one seems to have different AI too. But is it worth it? Is there a general comparison you can make to 64 or TTYD of where difficulty relatively lies? In general PM was never meant to be all that hard but there were definitely points it got hard.

[Aldelaro5]

Normal is just a TAD harder than pm64/ttyd, but hard is a significant bump and here's the key part here: it's REALLY GOOD hard mode in the sense it scales very well.

The changes it does is very specific depending on the enemy: sometime the atk increases, sometime it has more hp, sometime it has more def and sometime even AI or odds changes. It's specifically tuned and balanced so it scales very well. What I am saying is don't expect double dip (in this game, hard hits would be the KIND of double dip, but even then it's done much better).

My rule of thumb is if you though pm64/ttyd were too easy for you, try hard mode and since it's a toggle, you do not need to worry if you don't like it after a while, just turn it off.

[Wesk Alber]

You've basically convinced me to try Hard.

And I did read it's basically a badge. Only other question I have is, is it at a Point Cost?

[NBOX21]

Originally posted by LostSoldier20:

And I did read it's basically a badge. Only other question I have is, is it at a Point Cost?

Nope. It costs zero points to equip it and you even get achievements if you manage to beat the bosses on hard mode, so if you're up to the challenge, I'd say go for it.

[Wesk Alber]

Cool, thank you!

[Tystefy]

Every time you kill a boss on Hard Mode, you can get a reward from the guy who gave you the badge.

[Songbird]

I played the whole game with Hard Mode + Hard Hits equipped, and it was very fun. Really encourages you to use status effects and items to their maximum potential and aggressively use TP to eliminate the enemy's turns whenever possible.

[Yonin777]

I played through it on normal my first play through and had a hard enough time. I'm happy I'm saving Hard Mode for another play through where i understand more of the mechanics of the game.

[Wesk Alber]

I'm a PM vet so I knew the mechanics.

I'm part way into Chapter 3 and I am glad I went Hard Mode

[Archmage MC]

And when your done with your first playthrough, there is TUFFBUGS filename hard mode, or the HARDEST hard mode or whatever its called. HARDEST is perma hard mode with a few more tweaks to make it harder that can stack with hard hits, and TUFFBUGS adds all the extra difficulty filenames (including hardest) together to make a super hard mode that you can still stack hard hits on top of.

[Wesk Alber]

Yeah THAT... doesn't sound fun at all

[Aldelaro5]

Originally posted by LostSoldier20:

Yeah THAT... doesn't sound fun at all

It's actually very fun, but it's VERY brutal so you only do this if you played the game on hard already. The idea is it improves replayability like I only play on hardest because it's brutal enough that it remains challenging.

[JunkSniperJoe]

LTTP, but I enjoyed normal mode despite having played 64 and TTYD as a kid. If anything, playing on normal first will make you appreciate the changes in hard mode. I plan on doing a hard run after the new dlc.