Game Difficulty Discussion

[SwordBreaker]

I've been meaning to write an article about this for quite sometime, and recently I read an article which addresses this so-called "situation". A nice discussion with you guys can perhaps inspire me with more ideas.

Take the Zelda series as an example. Now, I'm sure a lot of you have noticed, but the series seems to be getting easier over time. Games like The Wind Waker and The Minish Cap were total cakewalks, and I've been hearing that Phantom Hourglass somewhat falls into the "easy" category. Twilight Princess' difficulty fluctuates between easy and hard. As a fan, I feel a bit upset...yet in the same time I can't say that TP and The Wind Waker were bad experiences...I loved both games even though they weren't that hard to me, yet in the same time wish that Nintendo can put a "hard mode" in the series someday...

I'm sure that there are a lot of games or game series you can think of which seems to be easy now, but started difficult back in the old days. Difficulty was never an issue in the NES/SNES era. At first glance, NES games like Little Nemo, Duck Tales, and Chip and Dale didn't seem to be difficult to me, but lo and behold...I was surprised by how hard those games were. I lost count of how many times I died in Zelda II...and I still loved that installment in particular even though it gets frustratingly difficult at times. Now, I think most of us who started playing in the NES/SNES era currently thrive for games that have that "hard difficulty" we all love. There are currently a few game series which keep that type of difficulty alive like Ninja Gaiden and Mega Man, and I truly respect the developers for doing so. It's a shame that series like Zelda did not keep its classic difficulty.

On the other hand, there are a couple of recent games which really crossed the line in terms of difficulty in my opinion. Devil May Cry 3, for example...man, I couldn't get through the first freggin' boss. There was something REALLY off with the default normal difficulty of that game...then after reading a bit about the game it turns out that the US "normal" difficulty is actually placed as "hard mode" in Japan. Weird.

I personally love games which let you choose the difficulty you want. I'm not the type of guy who would play through those "impossible" difficulty settings (going through MGS without being seen...my ass), but at times I love the "hard" mode when it's all balanced out and just right. Odin Sphere, for example, has a really cool hard mode. Resistance for PS3 really got the balance right with its difficulty modes...adding more levels or segments in the hard mode while giving the player more cool weapons to compensate for the difficulty...hard mode feels like a different game at times in Resistance. It's a shame that Halo 3 didn't do the same...I've been hearing that the campaign mode on Legendary isn't that hard, especially if you have 4-player co-op...nothing to compensate for the number of players...

I'm currently worried about Super Mario Galaxy in particular. I've always found Mario's 2D and 3D games to have a couple of really nice challenges (Sunshine's waterpack-less segments come to mind). Yoshi's Island and Yoshi's Island DS in particular were extremely challenging to me since I go all the way to get perfect scores in each level (did that twice for the first YI for SNES and GBA, but I'm finding it very hard in YIDS). Despite New Super Mario Bros awesome level design, it didn't feel hard at all. I'm really hoping that Galaxy does not water down its difficulty in order to appeal to "mainstream" gamers. Nonetheless, I'm sure I'm going to enjoy Galaxy even if it's not that hard.

So...does difficulty matter to you in this day and age? Are you the type of person who picks "easy mode" just to experience the game's other highlights like innovative gameplay or awesome story? Do you like frustratingly hard games or game series like Maximo, Ninja Gaiden, and Devil May Cry? Discuss your opinions here!

[Gollgagh]

going through MGS without being seen...my ass

This is totally possible btw.

I did this in MGS3 on Hard in conjunction with the no kills achievement and also shot all the kerotan in one playthrough.

Why the hell didn't I get a screen cap of it.

I'm still working on this for the extreme difficulty.

[zircon]

I think games lately have been too easy. I mostly have been playing RPGs & SRPGs, and they are simply all cakewalks. I rarely if ever have to worry about dying. Even remakes/ports have been dumbed down for the kids. I can't remember the last time I was even frustrated with a game due to difficulty, and the majority of reviews I read for games I am interested in (eg. Eternal Sonata) say they are either easy or very easy. Same goes for PC games like Bioshock, from what I've heard.

Difficulty IS important. It's all well and good to make a deep battle system with dazzling graphics and a great story, but WTF is the point if I'm not *challenged*? It just feels like I'm wasting my time. I remember with older PC RPGs and console games I actually felt challenged. Hell, even playing those same games today, they're still just as hard - for example, Master of Orion II. I want more of those. If nothing else, I want a difficulty selection - easy, medium, hard. Maybe "impossible" too.

To further delve into the topic, I think difficulty should come from TACTICS, primarily. I hate that many RTS games - when played online - simply boil down to who can execute the most actions in a short period of time. Micro/Macro skills. This is no better than twitch action. That's why I usually prefer more thoughtful, turn-based games where my strategy is tested. Likewise, designing RPGs with monsters that have massive HP and max of every stat is an OK practice to increase challenge, but not ideal. After all, I can simply raise my levels and get more gear to win. That's just a timesink.

Frankly, for all the hate it gets, I think no game has challenged me more in recent years than World of Warcraft. There were so many cases playing that game where I had to think quickly and invent new tactics, and adapt to changing circumstances. People knock it all the time for just being 'another MMO' but it isn't, IMO. PVP in WoW, provided the teams have roughly equal skill, is an exhilarating thing.

[Bigfoot]

Legendary has been pretty damn hard for me in Halo 3, but I'm doing it alone. Snipers have been giving me hell. You actually have to know where they are, and as you run out try and shoot them ASAP because if you don't, you're one-shotted. It's not often that they miss.

I miss the days where games were hard as hell, and there was nothing you could do about it but to figure it out on your own. Website FAQS/Cheats? Ha! You had to buy a magazine to get that.

[tk]

I think the problem is that most games these days have difficulty settings whereas older games didn't. You can't really say that the Sonic games that appeared on the MegaDrive were particularly challenging for the most part, and games like Golden Axe/Streets of Rage are also the same unless put on the hardest difficulty.

The problem is that the gaming industry is pretty huge these days and if they make games difficult, then "non-gamers" will be put off and this will reduce sales.

[watkinzez]

Every time I see a game over screen, I'm taken out of the experience that little bit more, and I'm less inclined to continue playing. Easy games that still make me feel that make me feel like I'm accomplishing something cool plzkthx.

[Bahamut]

I think games lately have been too easy. I mostly have been playing RPGs & SRPGs, and they are simply all cakewalks. I rarely if ever have to worry about dying. Even remakes/ports have been dumbed down for the kids. I can't remember the last time I was even frustrated with a game due to difficulty, and the majority of reviews I read for games I am interested in (eg. Eternal Sonata) say they are either easy or very easy. Same goes for PC games like Bioshock, from what I've heard.

Difficulty IS important. It's all well and good to make a deep battle system with dazzling graphics and a great story, but WTF is the point if I'm not *challenged*? It just feels like I'm wasting my time. I remember with older PC RPGs and console games I actually felt challenged. Hell, even playing those same games today, they're still just as hard - for example, Master of Orion II. I want more of those. If nothing else, I want a difficulty selection - easy, medium, hard. Maybe "impossible" too.

To further delve into the topic, I think difficulty should come from TACTICS, primarily. I hate that many RTS games - when played online - simply boil down to who can execute the most actions in a short period of time. Micro/Macro skills. This is no better than twitch action. That's why I usually prefer more thoughtful, turn-based games where my strategy is tested. Likewise, designing RPGs with monsters that have massive HP and max of every stat is an OK practice to increase challenge, but not ideal. After all, I can simply raise my levels and get more gear to win. That's just a timesink.

Frankly, for all the hate it gets, I think no game has challenged me more in recent years than World of Warcraft. There were so many cases playing that game where I had to think quickly and invent new tactics, and adapt to changing circumstances. People knock it all the time for just being 'another MMO' but it isn't, IMO. PVP in WoW, provided the teams have roughly equal skill, is an exhilarating thing.

Well for RPGs...I don't like how the battle systems are structured usually. Usually any difficulty could be attributed to poor game design in them (excepting in a few spots in a few Tales games).

In general though, I do agree they are too easy. One game I have been absolutely addicted to lately is Super Stardust HD - the difficulty is as fair as it gets, and it is a damn hard game to beat from normal to elite difficulties (I haven't beaten it yet and I'm ranked 398 so far in high scores). More games need to come up with better designs, and this makes me suspect that some genres are a bit flawed with accepted elements, especially the RPG genre. Genres like that are better suited to be hybrid with other gameplay elements that are more interactive and that you have more direct control over your characters.

[Brushfire]

The difficulty is no big deal for me in games like Halo 3 and Gears of War because I was able to team up and work together with folks. Solo on the other hand, makes me cry. And throw controllers....

[Antipode]

I'd like to bring up this thread and the following in particular:

[You'd rate a game lower] for being hard?! You kids these days, you have no respect for difficulty. Difficulty is good.

Maybe, but at the same time, there's something to be said for having REASONABLE difficulty (tough but fair as DukeNukem007 said). When something is so hard that I die over and over again and have to retrace the path to said hard part over and over, I just get sick of the game. When I finish that area, I don't feel triumphant - I feel sick of the game and I feel weary from seeing and doing the same damn thing 20 times. For me weariness doesn't equal fun. When a game is REASONABLY difficult, especially for a boss, it's hard when you don't know what to do - and then after a couple times/deaths you figure out what you need to do and it ought to be relatively easy. Then I feel like I've accomplished something because I figured out the weakness - if I already know what to do and I STILL can't beat it, then it's entirely about using your reflexes, not your head, and I don't really care as much when I win. Modern games are relatively easier because now they understand a lot better about what makes a game fun.

I still agree with myself. I think that there's such a thing as a game that's challenging and rewarding without being needlessly difficult. I play games to have fun - I don't do it to be tortured into absolute perfect execution of a series of steps, only to have to repeat the process for the following level. Balance is incredibly important with any game that's going to have serious replay value.

[Bigfoot]

The difficulty is no big deal for me in games like Halo 3 and Gears of War because I was able to team up and work together with folks. Solo on the other hand, makes me cry. And throw controllers....

Good thing for wireless eh? You can throw it as far as you want.

[SwordBreaker]

@ zircon

I've been hearing the same about Eternal Sonata. It's a shame that an RPG THIS innovative is just too easy to go through. Tri-Crecsendo's last game, Baten Kaitos, at least offered some challenge with innovation. Not the same with Eternal Sonata, unfortunately. I think most developers nowadays have a mentality of "hard games drive people away". I'm not so sure that's right. Sometimes, however, I'm willing to overlook a game's easy difficulty as long as it's innovative and fun to play.

Speaking of SRPGs...you reminded me of Final Fantasy Tactics. Now that was one hell of a game. Gets very challenging at times. I'm really looking forward to buying the PSP port to relive the experience. I also that the recently-released GrimGrimoire for PS2 is a pretty challenging SRPG.

[suzumebachi]

A problem I see in difficulty for a lot of games is extreme varying degrees of difficulty from one part to the next.

For instance, Half-Life 2. Throughout most of Half-Life 2, I rarely died. And of the very few times I did die, it was usually a result of accidentally slipping up and falling off of something while going through one of those platforming segments. That is, until I reached the part of the game where you have to make your way into the combine building which is guarded by thousands of combines, a half dozen walkers, and a handful of airships. I must have died 50 times there. But once I made it inside, it was back to being a cakewalk again.

Half-Life 2 isn't the only game I see this happen in, either. Lots of role playing games do the same thing. You slaughter endless hordes of demons and monsters and badmen with little or no effort. Then you get to a boss and he kills two of your dudes on the first attack.

It's pretty annoying, really. To me, consistency is more important than overall difficulty. I don't mind games being easy, or hard, if they're easy or hard all the way through (with some exceptions for extremely difficult games, an easy slaughterfest for a small portion of the game is fun to break up the monotony). Or ideally, progressing in difficulty. Like the old NES/SNES Super Mario Bros games. None of this "OMG LETS CHANGE IT UP BY MAKING THE NEXT PART INSANELY FUCKING HARD" stuff.

[HalcyonSpirit]

I agree with the notion that games these days are, in general, too easy. I prefer games that challenge me in one way or another. Good example: Freespace 2. Been playing that lately. Now that's a game where, if you don't stay on top of things for each mission, you're going to fail. But if you do stay on top of things, you can still fail. Not only from your own little mistakes adding up, but also from not paying attention to a little thing that doesn't seem important at the time or ordering your wingmates to do something at the wrong time, or something else entirely. That game honestly feels like I'm in an actual firefight. Love the game, wish there were more games like it.

[Effector]

A problem I see in difficulty for a lot of games is extreme varying degrees of difficulty from one part to the next.

For instance, Half-Life 2. Throughout most of Half-Life 2, I rarely died. And of the very few times I did die, it was usually a result of accidentally slipping up and falling off of something while going through one of those platforming segments. That is, until I reached the part of the game where you have to make your way into the combine building which is guarded by thousands of combines, a half dozen walkers, and a handful of airships. I must have died 50 times there. But once I made it inside, it was back to being a cakewalk again.

Half-Life 2 isn't the only game I see this happen in, either. Lots of role playing games do the same thing. You slaughter endless hordes of demons and monsters and badmen with little or no effort. Then you get to a boss and he kills two of your dudes on the first attack.

It's pretty annoying, really. To me, consistency is more important than overall difficulty. I don't mind games being easy, or hard, if they're easy or hard all the way through (with some exceptions for extremely difficult games, an easy slaughterfest for a small portion of the game is fun to break up the monotony). Or ideally, progressing in difficulty. Like the old NES/SNES Super Mario Bros games. None of this "OMG LETS CHANGE IT UP BY MAKING THE NEXT PART INSANELY FUCKING HARD" stuff.

I actually enjoy this new trend towards the "roller coaster" philosophy concerning game design - HL2 and RE4 come to mind. Quick and deadly moments interspersed with times to catch your breath on. Most critics have lauded both these games for their extraordinary pacing, and I'm inclined to agree. I wouldn't enjoy a constantly-tough-as-nails-throughout game, but that doesn't mean I want a cakewalk right through. Consistency may mean you know what to expect, but when you don't know what's going to be right behind the next door, it fosters an atmosphere of deliberate action, and (for me), it gives a more complete feeling of accomplishment.

[Dhsu]

I think my opinion falls mostly in line with Antipode's. I don't really get much satisfaction from playing a game where you have to get everything absolutely perfect to pass...a lot of 2D platformers in particular tend to be guilty of this. Back then it was *necessary* for a game to be borderline impossible in order have any semblance of longevity, because otherwise one could beat it in a few hours. And considering that kids couldn't afford to buy games every week or so, they wanted their games to last. That's why JRPGs were so popular.

Nowadays not a lot of people have time to sit down with an 80-hour grindfest. Now the deciding factor for what games I get is how much bang I get for my hour, not my buck. In the case of JRPGs, most of the time I'm playing it is for the story, not the cookie-cutter battle system or pointless fetch quests. So I want to get through as much story as I can as quickly as possible, and easy battles make this a much more painless process.

So yeah, if a game is short but incredibly awesome, more power to it I say. That way I can go on to the next short and awesome game.

[Drack]

I'm a computer science major somewhat specialized in Game AI, and a longtime gamer.

I love hard games. I like it when the AI pulls every fair trick in the book to try to win. When the NPCs do things the PCs can't, I like to see AI that exploits this and forms good strategies. Even when AI does everything a player does, I like to see strategy and tactics that make my game very difficult, albeit without cheating, like knowing I'm right behind them, or knowing exactly where my bases are in an RTS. great example of well done, hard AI is Unreal Tournament, when set at a high bot skill level. They aren't hard because they cheat, they're just damn fine atwhat they can do, and have great strategy and teamwork, without resorting to cheap methods for hard AI like never missing a sniper shot.

It saddens me that my Game AI class tells me to design AI that "loses, but with virve." My class tells me that AI designed to win is no fun to play against. It seems that most gamers disagree with me that rising to a challenge is a positive experience. Any game I can beat without dying a single time (Twilight Princess, I'm staring at YOU as I gaze upon my 0 death completion first-time save) is too easy. Any boss I can beat the first time around without losing at least half my health is too easy.

Games nowadays are too easy. If you're going to make an easy game, give it a difficulty menu, and make hard mode hard.

Appeasing casual gamers is no excuse for poor AI or enemies not hitting hard enough. I want my AI to be smart and try its best to win without cheap tactics like omniscience.

[Dhsu]

Oh and btw, I <3 DMC3.

[Haganegiri]

To me it all about presentation

I enjoy the pacing in Half Life 2. It's about 50% easy going, with 40% hardness, and 10% ZOMGI"M PISSED kinda difficulty.

Now I also enjoy DMC3 and Godhand (which I contest if FAR more difficult than DMC3).

Half Life 2 is more of a Story really, than a FPS. They have some pretty awesome voice actors (some of the best I've EVER heard in a video game).

DMC3 and Godhand on the other hand, are more of a "go kill things" action game, so I WANT difficulty in those games.

[SwordBreaker]

@ Drack

You bring up an excellent point on enemy AI. Reminds me of a recent story, actually. Hear me out.

Recently, I read a 1UP interview with Mr. Itagaki, producer of the recent Ninja Gaiden games. Apparently from the interview, there's some very bad blood between Itagaki and Devil May Cry 4 producer Mr. Kobayashi, as each one disses the other game series, calling one another "not true action games". My friend tells me that Itagaki is very arrogant in nature, claiming Ninja Gaiden to be "the only true action game ever", which is what put off Mr. Kobayashi first this time by dissing NG: Dragon Sword. Itagaki surprisingly handled it very well in the interview, and he brought up an excellent point regarding the upcoming Devil May Cry 4. He played it, and noticed that the enemy just stands there, using one attack animation or two regardless of what your character does. The point of DMC is beating your enemies in the coolest way possible, and the difficulty mostly rises from multiple enemies and type/frequency of their attacks. No wonder Itagaki is a bit showy with Ninja Gaiden...I'm playing Sigma on the PS3, and I noticed how damn aggressive the enemies are. The difficulty of the game comes from that...the enemies react according to what you do...if you defend, they just wait until you lower your guard or come at you in another way...if you attack, they defend...they move around and have multiple ways of coming at you, etc.

I never really noticed what Itagaki pointed out because I'm usually focused on attacking and being on the offensive in DMC. But he's right. It's not a bad thing in DMC's case since the point of the game is being showy in your attacks. But it's something that should be taken note of in action games in general. Twilight Princess mostly falls into the same category, save for a couple of particular enemies and bosses. With the power of the next-gen consoles, enemy AI shouldn't be one-dimensional, using typical patterns of attacks and such. Ninja Gaiden Sigma is truly an example in which enemy AI shines.

[Drack]

@SwordBreaker: Good read. I especially enjoyed what little of Ninja Gaiden Black I played (a couple hours), and I firmly blieve that this is better AI than what we're seeing in almost all games nowadays.

In my eyes, it's a shame that the recent Ninja Gaiden games haven't sold well due to extreme difficulty. True, they're aimed at a different audience, but if you look back to most 2-D games from a decade or two ago, you'll see games just as hard, but for different reasons (cheap enemies, mostly). Game AI has gotten a lot better.

But good AI doesn't sell. The kind of AI that nearly always loses to the player while still providing a fun experience -- the kind of AI my class is making me code -- does.

And it's not just AI. Enemies do less damage and go down more easily too in most recent games. In order to pound this concept into a friend, I had him beat Twilight Princess, then play Link to the Past immediately after. The difficulty gap is enormous, but not because of any cool AI LttP offers (It really doesn't do anything cool with AI) - Just enemy strength.

Of course, this could be because I'm comparing a Wii title, and Nintendo's direction with the Wii is to expand the market. The fact of the matter is, easy sells.

[Gollgagh]

The fact of the matter is, easy sells.

All the more reason to have multiple difficulty levels in games.

[HalcyonSpirit]

Regarding the difficulty-consistency issue:

Personally, I like games that have some variety with the difficulty. It brings more atmosphere into the game; it seems more "realistic" that way. The enemy can't keep being equally difficult all the time, it don't work that way. Have the enemy focus on defending critical areas, have them make surprise strikes on you. There can't be enemies everywhere all the time.

I again point to Freespace 2 (mind you, this game is from 1999). The enemy AI isn't the greatest, but it was good for the time. And to be honest, the game's difficulty came from both being able to manage a space battle with other fighters and cruisers all battling each other at the same time, and also from not knowing what was going to happen next (on your first time through, anyhow). At some points, you could be taking on a relatively easy mission, beating them down without much difficulty... and then an enemy cruiser with 3 wings of fighters and bombers exits subspace only a few kilometers from where you are and begins to beat down on you. In that first minute when you're taken by surprise, whether you and the craft you are responsible for survive depends on whether you have the presence of mind to recognize and target the enemy's most important advantages first (just like in a real battle). If you don't, you may survive, but your wingmates and perhaps the cruiser or freighter you were protecting may not. And depending on the mission, that may or may not change the outcome of the battle. Some missions you can lose the ship and still move on, other times it's game over. I like that kind of gameplay and difficulty.

[Kusabi]

I do think today's games are too easy, but then again, it's better for the situation that I'm in.

I'm in college, and have the college grind of projects, projects, and more projects. I got a Wii last Christmas, but *shock*, I rarely play it! I can't even find 3 of the 6 games I own for it, having been lost in the packing, moving, unpacking, repacking, moving thing of living 700 miles away from my university.

Since I also don't get a lot of time to play, I like games that are actually not eternal time sinks. This semester, my goal is getting off probation, which means I'm rarely playing my Nintendo, maybe 1 hour a week, if even that. I don't like games that I can't sit down with, enjoy 30 minutes of playing, and then save and quit, and not worry about having to figure out where I was at the end of the last time I played.

So yes, easy sells for me.

That's not to say I don't appreciate a challenging game. I enjoy challenging games, but I despise hard games. The line I draw is when the difficulty is ramped up simply for the effect of ramping the difficulty (i.e. just making enemies harder and no new changes to puzzles), sometimes making the game so difficult that its unplayable for me. Those kinds of games have a tendency to go to the bottom of my pile of games to play.

I've played older games in a series back to back with a newer game (Twilight Princess and Link to the Past). I appreciate the difference in how the game does basic mechanics, which make the gameplay more challenging, and the puzzles are different. It makes it more challenging, and a challenge I enjoy.

But if a game is ludicrously difficult, which to me is defined as it takes away from the fun of the game, then I don't play it. I have better things to waste my energy on than a game that isn't fun to play.

[AarowSwift]

This is actually something I've been giving thought to lately. What's too hard, what's too easy, what's just right? There is a wide variety of preferences from gamer to gamer, or even for a single gamer from game to game. I, for example, like challenge. I also like accomplishment. I don't mind moving through an easy game if I'm having fun, I don't mind playing a hard game if the challenge is satisfying. I love DMC3 and F-Zero GX. Both are Hard games. I love playing Kirby games, most of which are really easy. On the other hand, I didn't have so much fun with the last few Zelda games because most of the enemies, bosses included, felt like trivial encounters.

I may be mis remembering this, but I think Shigeru Miyamoto was quoted saying he didn't believe in difficulty levels, that a good game was perfectly balanced (apologies if I've got that wrong). Assuming he did say that, I respectfully disagree. Some gamers have little time to game and want the challenge toned down so they can progress during the little amount of time they can devote to gaming. Other gamers want to be challenged and are let down when a game lets them sleep walk through it.

I feel difficulty levels are necessary, to allow all these different types of gamers to have some say in the type of experience they want. However, I also feel that blanket difficulty modes; Easy, Normal, Hard, etc; are inadequate. I'd like to see difficulty broken up along a set of traits. Here's an example.

Let's say that a new Metroid game comes out. It allows you to customize difficulty to your tastes but doesn't use the classic 'modes. Instead, it breaks difficulty up into the following categories: Enemy Attack Strength, Enemy Defense, Enemy Health, Enemy Intelligence. Each category has a 5 point slider bar with the defaults at 3 (average). You can now adjust the various attributes of enemy characters to give you the challenge you want. Set the Attack slider down to 1 and Enemies will cause low damage, set the Enemy Intelligence up to 5 and enemies will make smart moves and be at their most aggressive. I'd even separate Normal enemies from Boss enemies, so you could tweak the two groups separately. I usually like my normal encounters moderate while the bosses should really put up a fight.

I feel that offering greater customization of difficulty to gamers is the only way to address the widely varied wants of said gamers. Of course, this can only really address the challenge of dealing with adversarial characters. My personal favorite type of challenge is me VS the environment, and in that regard, intelligent level design is irreplaceable

The other aspect of challenge is Player Death. If you die, should you start from the same spot you died on, should you start from the last save point, should you be able to die at all? This one is a lot harder to tackle. First off, I feel that any game that places your character in harms way must have character death in it. Threatening situations and enemy characters lose their teeth if they can't seriously harm you. Failure needs to carry some sort of consequence, otherwise, what's the point?

Again, maybe customization can help with this issue too, like perhaps the ability to toggle on or off soft restarts. Off, and you restart at the last save point. On, and you resurrect on the spot or close to it.

Anyway, those are my thoughts in brief.

[Final Guard]

This is why I love the Touhou series. They seem to get harder and harder each game(Mountain of Faith just came out this August, and it's considered the most difficult), but they still are tons of fun. Even though you'll most likely lose a lot at first, you'll want to keep continuing and continuing.