This is a very subjective point of view, but I have been dealing with frustrating gameplay elements that increase the length of games, without necessarily feeling justified.
The most blatant problem I have with some shmups is that when losing upgrades make the experience excruciatingly painful.
When I play Super Star Soldier for example, some levels are either average if you have a weapon pushed to the maximum, like the awesome green beam, either extremely painful when you lose a life.
Using a continue or losing a life is often a synonym for going through additional difficulties that feel hard to swallow.In Gunhed, I used to feel frustrated with the final stage, where you can get stuck in a very bad situation because of the way checkpoints are placed, until i stocked enough blinking balls to avoid restarting the level from checkpoints.
I feel it is also harder because the culture that gave birth those games is somewhat different from modern culture, though not all shmups are this frustrating and there are accessible shmups even in the 80's or 90's.
shmups elements that artificially boost difficulty
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Re: shmups elements that artificially boost difficulty
To me it's autofire that jank up the rank so high. Twin Eagle for example will tell you to die already if you set autofire to 15hz or higher. Gun Frontier also falls with this issue too, given how many enemies they are.
I'm also not fan of big player sprite with large hitbox. Darius II is one of shmups I want to like, but that with slow moving ship means a no-no to me, and it doesn't give you full power-ups on Normal difficulty even at last boss.
I'm also not fan of big player sprite with large hitbox. Darius II is one of shmups I want to like, but that with slow moving ship means a no-no to me, and it doesn't give you full power-ups on Normal difficulty even at last boss.
Re: shmups elements that artificially boost difficulty
I know what you mean about certain games having aspects that can seem unfairly brutal. But on a side note, I really don't like the phrase artificial difficulty. So games that have a really strict game balance have a difficulty that is inherently artificial? Does that mean if you balance it to be easier by giving more health, lives etc. That's artificially easy? Is a crossword puzzle artificially difficult because they picked a bunch of words I don't know?
Its all just game balance. And some games do a better job of feeling tough but fair and some might feel overly strict or punishing. But how does that make anything artificial? If there's an opposite "true" difficulty how would that even be defined?
In the case of a game where certain parts are difficult or impossible due to very flawed unfair game design, glitches, excessive flicker and slowdown, bad controls etc. I'd just call that broken or unbalanced.
Say you were to call a broad swathe of NES games artificially difficult since they rely on having limited lives and continues to extend gameplay. Thats kind of tough to swallow because most of those games were probably designed and balanced around that level of difficulty from the beginning. The expectation is that the heart of the gameplay revolves around learning to overcome a tough challenge through repetition. It might be brutal, but its not inherently flawed or artificial.
If I could think of an example that I might consider artificial it would be when fighting game bosses read your inputs in order to react to everything. Or that moment in a racing game where suddenly another racer appears right behind you. Even then, while how the AI works might subvert your expectations it doesn't mean the games are unwinnable.
Its all just game balance. And some games do a better job of feeling tough but fair and some might feel overly strict or punishing. But how does that make anything artificial? If there's an opposite "true" difficulty how would that even be defined?
In the case of a game where certain parts are difficult or impossible due to very flawed unfair game design, glitches, excessive flicker and slowdown, bad controls etc. I'd just call that broken or unbalanced.
Say you were to call a broad swathe of NES games artificially difficult since they rely on having limited lives and continues to extend gameplay. Thats kind of tough to swallow because most of those games were probably designed and balanced around that level of difficulty from the beginning. The expectation is that the heart of the gameplay revolves around learning to overcome a tough challenge through repetition. It might be brutal, but its not inherently flawed or artificial.
If I could think of an example that I might consider artificial it would be when fighting game bosses read your inputs in order to react to everything. Or that moment in a racing game where suddenly another racer appears right behind you. Even then, while how the AI works might subvert your expectations it doesn't mean the games are unwinnable.