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Comment by ComputerPerson | Hacker News Reader

Difficulty settings, though. He mentions them only briefly (in this incredible article).

Normal varies so much.

As a "cozy" gamer, I want the standard setting to be something I can play without having to switch my context to to the internet for help or a guide. This was one of many triumps of Baldur's Gate 3: the difficulty settings make sense in how they translate to gameplay, and the default is fun.

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What is ‘normal’ is unfortunately subjective and can mean a lot of different things to different people. Also often what is listed as ’hard’ is often normal, because most people will see ‘normal’ and decide they’re better than that and have a miserable old time.

This reminds me of UX. Seems like it could be a subdomain.

I think I disagree with your basic point, though what you say about normal vs. hard is funny. I'm fortunate enough to work with a UI/UX pro, and these things have right answers; they're incredibly obvious after they've been explained to you.

Makes me think of a game like FTL, where “easy” was challenging for quite some time, and now I play normal if I want a challenge!

There's nothing wrong with opinionated design. The dev has set the bar this high and chosen this thing to represent difficulty levels, either you like it or you don't. Catering to everyone is impossible.

This is true, but you don’t want people to bounce off the game immediately, so they have a bad time and refund it before giving it a proper go.

This can happen if they feel it’s easier or harder then expected.

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