Hard Kids' Games

[Kwing]

Most games made for little kids are fairly easy. Some, like LittleBigPlanet, have an easy difficulty but include very difficult challenges, such as "acing" a level without dying. This is NOT what I'm looking for. I'm trying to weed out games that are difficult just to complete. Of course, the target audience of a lot of games may be vast, but there are certain games that are specifically geared toward children, especially if the game is based on a franchise (like Barbie,) that typically hold little interest for someone much older.

I'm looking to compile a list of those games. Remember, this is not just a list of games that are appropriate for kids, rather a list of games AIMED at kids but somehow manage to be far than it should be, even by adult standards. Basically this would mean any game that looks like Dora the Explorer and plays like Dark Souls.

[PsychedelicSamurai]

I'm looking to compile a list of those games. Remember, this is not just a list of games that are appropriate for kids, rather a list of games AIMED at kids but somehow manage to be far than it should be, even by adult standards. Basically this would mean any game that looks like Dora the Explorer and plays like Dark Souls.

A whole lot of NES games were very difficult for children. There's a good amount of platformers that are all ages and tend to be very difficult. Not sure if that's what you're looking for.

[Kwing]

At 9/13/15 12:46 PM, PsychedelicSamurai wrote: A whole lot of NES games were very difficult for children. There's a good amount of platformers that are all ages and tend to be very difficult. Not sure if that's what you're looking for.

I know that. All ages games do not count, otherwise the list would already be flooded with, as you said, NES games - the game has to be specifically targeted toward younger audiences.

[Ragnarokia]

At 9/13/15 01:59 PM, Kwing wrote:

At 9/13/15 12:46 PM, PsychedelicSamurai wrote: A whole lot of NES games were very difficult for children. There's a good amount of platformers that are all ages and tend to be very difficult. Not sure if that's what you're looking for.

I know that. All ages games do not count, otherwise the list would already be flooded with, as you said, NES games - the game has to be specifically targeted toward younger audiences.

Actually you are both wrong. old games from the NES / Genesis / Snes were easier for children than they are for older players. The reactions and patience of any game regardless of quality that comes with youth made games we now consider "impossible" or stupidly hard at least to be perfectly doable.

The easiest example is Sonic the Hedgehog. Trying to play old 2D sonic games when older is surprisingly difficult despite finding them so easy when younger. The reaction times dull enough to make the fast paced game incredibly challenging to play. Another example is the Megadrive / Genesis Back to the Future 3 which may have been seen on the AVGN video and their subsequent attempts to play the game finding the first level "impossible". That level does look "impossible" now but when younger it was actually perfectly doable due to the reaction time. I am not good at games especially reaction based ones yet I could get past that level pretty much every time I played the game when I was younger, getting stuck on the second level instead.

People like to pretend their reactions haven't dulled much from childhood claiming they still have just as good reactions since they are still young. But everyone who claims that is a liar. Reaching the end of your teenager years and into early adulthood your reactions are noticeably dulled which everyday life doesn't show, but playing games you recall the difficulty of in the past does show.

By all means children had different problems, we lacked the intellect to plan and digest information which could help beat games, but when it comes to reaction based things like platformers that loss of reaction time and patience with shit games back when you didn't understand they were shit, that is stuff that children truly have the advantage of.

[PsychedelicSamurai]

I wouldn't say we're wrong. You're right, but I played a whole slew of SNES, Playstation, and arcade games when I was a kid. There were many that I thought were hard, and when I revisit them now a few of them are still difficult games. But yes, definitely doable. He's asking for games designed for kids that they find difficult. I wouldn't say either of us are wrong. There were difficult games everyone played as a kid, everyone has at least one.

[Painbringer]

Mario Is Missing!

[The-Great-One]

Barney's Hide and Seek for the Genesis. It is ruthless man. If you don't actually try, it just beats itself for you, because you weren't hardcore enough for it.

[Jercurpac]

At 9/13/15 10:21 PM, Ragnarokia wrote: The easiest example is Sonic the Hedgehog. Trying to play old 2D sonic games when older is surprisingly difficult despite finding them so easy when younger. The reaction times dull enough to make the fast paced game incredibly challenging to play.

What? I never beat any Sonic games as a kid until they started getting battery-backed saving. Same with pretty much the entirety of my family's NES collection. It wasn't until my mid-twenties when I started going back to my retro games that I actually beat any of them. I think you're highly overestimating how big of a deal reaction time plays. I think most people under 60 have the physical capacity to beat most fairly designed retro games. It has to do with perseverance. When I was young I didn't have the patience to play through Sonic the Hedgehog a second time if I didn't beat it my first go. Now I actually enjoy bashing away at tough games until I get them right. The only time loss in reaction due to age actually matters in gaming is if you're playing an e-sport at the highest level. Even then I think people generally overestimate how soon it becomes an issue, but that's another conversation altogether.

Personally I think it's modern game design (which I have no qualms with) that makes retro games seem harder by comparison. It dulls our perseverance because why play Super Mario Bros. over and over until we beat it when we have a giant backlog of games that we don't have to work to beat? I went the opposite route most people do and gained the patience to play hard games later on in life. When people are kids they have more free time to devote to games and since we didn't have any notion of games beyond the tough NES era games most people had no choice but to devote a lot of time to perfecting them, but once they get older they have more obligations that kept them from devoting chunks of time to tough games so they look back and it seems like, "wow I can't beat this game anymore" without realizing the perseverance it took to beat it in the first place.