Game is Too Easy Now

[cowboydan72]

I would like to start by saying this game feels amazing, it is super fun. But the recent patch ruined it for me. I had spent like 4 hours of attempts trying to do shard 7 while my upgrades were broken but I was still having fun with that difficulty. It was really hard but it was so satisfying to succeed.
Coming back after the patch I have yet to receive a grade lower than S rank anywhere because they massively decreased the difficulty to a point where shard 7 now feels as hard as shard 2 did with the exception of the boss. It's like a gentle stroll with no challenge for 20 minutes before a very difficult boss. I love how hard the boss is but I think it should still be just as much of a struggle to get there. Some people might feel like the new difficulty is better, more fair, whatever that is ok.
I just wish there was still an option for people like me who really wanted that challenge. Something like adding main difficulties that just increase obstacles. Or having difficulty scaling as a menu and the player being able to control how much they want more difficult obstacles to generate or regular obstacles in general, things like that.

[The Grand Mugwump]

The snow shards feel really really bad now without as many obstacles in them. It's already hard to get good dives onto downslopes there, and the obstacles with their boost rings were one of the ways to stay ahead of the collapse. Now there are almost no ways to boost.

It's not even easier. It's hard to stay ahead of the collapse in shard 9 now without the obstacles and their boost rings. It's just zzz as I can barely scrape B's out of snow levels without tracks on them until I get +boost items.

[NIBV]

Originally posted by cowboydan72:

I would like to start by saying this game feels amazing, it is super fun. But the recent patch ruined it for me. I had spent like 4 hours of attempts trying to do shard 7 while my upgrades were broken but I was still having fun with that difficulty. It was really hard but it was so satisfying to succeed.
Coming back after the patch I have yet to receive a grade lower than S rank anywhere because they massively decreased the difficulty to a point where shard 7 now feels as hard as shard 2 did with the exception of the boss. It's like a gentle stroll with no challenge for 20 minutes before a very difficult boss. I love how hard the boss is but I think it should still be just as much of a struggle to get there. Some people might feel like the new difficulty is better, more fair, whatever that is ok.
I just wish there was still an option for people like me who really wanted that challenge. Something like adding main difficulties that just increase obstacles. Or having difficulty scaling as a menu and the player being able to control how much they want more difficult obstacles to generate or regular obstacles in general, things like that.

i disagree, in my opinion the game feels a lot more fun, it's all about the power fantasy, Devs did say that they will add much more difficult options in the endless mode anyways, just keep in mind that people play video games to have fun and live out a fantasy with no stress, not to get frustrated ;)

it's all about that fun factor babyyy

[The Grand Mugwump]

Originally posted by NIBV:

Originally posted by cowboydan72:

I would like to start by saying this game feels amazing, it is super fun. But the recent patch ruined it for me. I had spent like 4 hours of attempts trying to do shard 7 while my upgrades were broken but I was still having fun with that difficulty. It was really hard but it was so satisfying to succeed.
Coming back after the patch I have yet to receive a grade lower than S rank anywhere because they massively decreased the difficulty to a point where shard 7 now feels as hard as shard 2 did with the exception of the boss. It's like a gentle stroll with no challenge for 20 minutes before a very difficult boss. I love how hard the boss is but I think it should still be just as much of a struggle to get there. Some people might feel like the new difficulty is better, more fair, whatever that is ok.
I just wish there was still an option for people like me who really wanted that challenge. Something like adding main difficulties that just increase obstacles. Or having difficulty scaling as a menu and the player being able to control how much they want more difficult obstacles to generate or regular obstacles in general, things like that.

i disagree, in my opinion the game feels a lot more fun, it's all about the power fantasy, Devs did say that they will add much more difficult options in the endless mode anyways, just keep in mind that people play video games to have fun and live out a fantasy with no stress, not to get frustrated ;)

it's all about that fun factor babyyy

If you wanted easy, then play on the lower shards until you have enough anti-sparks to survive higher shards. The last I checked, Haste's store tags are "fast-paced action," not story driven snuggler. I don't think it's unreasonable to assume an action game should have some engaging action in it.

I think this was a half baked change. There are some obstacles which made the game unfun when there were too many, like the vertical laser obstacles. Those things messed up the terrain and made it too jagged to get through easily. And then there are other obstacles with boost rings in them which made the maps easier and more exciting by having a lot of them.

Cutting down on all of the obstacles without reading player feedback on the bad ones (almost universally the vertical lasers and lots of clutter on the ground) has caused the game to be less fun because we also don't get as many boost rings now. Maybe if the developers put in a map gen rule which prevented back to back lasers, I'd applaud that. Funnily enough, this patch doesn't even solve that, as sometimes I'll still get a map from hell with mostly vertical lasers messing up the terrain, but now I don't have boost rings to recover from them with.

I feel neutral about the items. I think the way they're designed is bad. Some of the best items, like the constant 10% boost passive, are only available at low item rarities, which makes increasing our item rarity score actually work against us. Increasing the number of items we can get helps with the high rarity stuff that is mostly situational. I'd rather they examine their high rarity items so that they work more consistently all the time, but having a ton of high rarity items makes them more likely to work too I guess.

[Gary the Goat]

Agree - was up to the snow shard before the patch and was STRUGGLING to pass the first few levels.

Now it's an actual cake-walk. Even the blue levels, I used to FEAR them but love the risk of going in, it just feels like barely a challenge now.

I feel like the difficulty before was just right, I think the problems were the difficulty to get items early on to make the run more feasible.

I don't know the answer, but pre-patch I was just struggling too much with the early levels of the snow level.

EDIT: The end of Shard 4 was a little struggle, endless mode level 3+ got REAL hard
Shard 5 feels like a good level of hardness for the first few levels

[FlameHricane]

Yea I would've liked more time with the harder stages as well, but it's probably for the best for the time being. The possibility of absolute bs layouts were a little too high and should only get that crazy in endless or adjustable difficulty settings. The base difficulty may have been slightly overcorrected, but not by that much.

[Eternal Echo]

I think this could've been somewhat solved with difficulty levels. What the game was before could've been Hard and what the game is now could be Normal.

Although I do much prefer the Antispark drop rate as it is now; the old rate was just absurdly miserly.

[Xodroxx]

I agree, an "hard" mode as before could be good

[2001 Volkswagen Jetta]

Same as above. Although, maybe take into consideration that you've improved at the game as well.

[Middy]

Originally posted by NIBV:

Originally posted by cowboydan72:

I would like to start by saying this game feels amazing, it is super fun. But the recent patch ruined it for me. I had spent like 4 hours of attempts trying to do shard 7 while my upgrades were broken but I was still having fun with that difficulty. It was really hard but it was so satisfying to succeed.
Coming back after the patch I have yet to receive a grade lower than S rank anywhere because they massively decreased the difficulty to a point where shard 7 now feels as hard as shard 2 did with the exception of the boss. It's like a gentle stroll with no challenge for 20 minutes before a very difficult boss. I love how hard the boss is but I think it should still be just as much of a struggle to get there. Some people might feel like the new difficulty is better, more fair, whatever that is ok.
I just wish there was still an option for people like me who really wanted that challenge. Something like adding main difficulties that just increase obstacles. Or having difficulty scaling as a menu and the player being able to control how much they want more difficult obstacles to generate or regular obstacles in general, things like that.

i disagree, in my opinion the game feels a lot more fun, it's all about the power fantasy, Devs did say that they will add much more difficult options in the endless mode anyways, just keep in mind that people play video games to have fun and live out a fantasy with no stress, not to get frustrated ;)

it's all about that fun factor babyyy

I achieved that power fantasy by playing the game until I was good enough to destroy shards that previously felt like a challenge. I felt unstoppable and now there's nothing even attempting to stop me.

[StarFrost02]

Good news y'all there's a difficulty slider now in settings that lets you custom your experience! I also felt that the new patch was too easy so I changes the settings to what now feels like a solid challenge!

[Mister Marcus]

The patch was definitely required.
The "Dark Levels" would often create "Death Walls" where you had a solid wall on the left, solid wall on the right and one of those gravity orbs in the only place you could passs through. That was just a run killer - you couldn't do anything, cause getting hit would make the Shatter Point catch up to you.

Now the game is at least balanced enough that the Dark Worlds are difficult, but all you have to do is play well.
Whatever they did to the level generation fixed this issue.

"Haste" didn't market itself as some "super hardcore, Dark Souls of running games" title, so making the game EASIER for beginners is the most optimal move they could've done.
Adding higher difficulty levels that are OPTIONAL for people who enjoy them is the best course of action. That way people who enjoy the difficulty can flex how they beat the game on "Hard" while new players don't get frustrated from all the nonsense 1.0 had on the first day.

[cowboydan72]

I just wanted to come back in and say I appreciate the devs for following up with the community and making quick changes and fixes based on feedback. I can't wait to grind this.

[Mister Marcus]

Yeah, the Dev team is trying their best to cater to all of their players right now.
Not an easy task - but greatly Appreciated.

It's incredible to see them add options for this stuff within the first Week. This way everybody can have the experience they desire.
Cheers to the Dev team!

[TheDreamer]

If they want to cater it to everyone they should add difficulty selection.

But on the bright side, my 3 year old beat the game today so there's that

[Gaffer Gonz]

I completely agree that the game is too easy now. The basic levels are almost completely devoid of hazards now, to the point that I'm almost never taking damage on them anymore. Shard 7 was tough before, and I had to try my hardest to get to the boss. Now I can get to the boss every time even skipping every shop and event item.