I started on Hard and played through to the end. The only really challenging parts were the Bane type battles. I'd say that took at least 12 hours on the low-end. Plus I went back to find all the riddler challenges which probably added a few hours. This game wasn't short at all. Of course I had a RROD in the midst of my playthrough so an accurate gauge of my time isn't possible.

This discussion reminds me of Halo:ODST though where people would drop it on easy, play co-op and finish in 4 hours and proceed to complain. Put that sucker on Legendary and play through solo on the first playthrough and you'll eat up 12 hours in no time.

Yeah, I'm with you. I think I spent about 10 hours on Batman, maybe 12, but it felt just right. I have rarely played a game that is much longer that doesn't feel like it could have been shortened by dropping some unnecessary part, be it grinding of back tracking. There was back tracking in Batman, but it was the best kind - it was never tedious, and the environments were often changing to make them seem new again.

I think game length is really dependent on how you play games as well. Even when I really get into a game, I tend not to play for longer than an hour or two at a time, and hardly every back to back days. I think it took me maybe 3 weeks to beat AA. Same for other "short" games like Gears of War or Beyond Good and Evil. That's why I hardly ever bother with games like Dragon Age because I know I can never put in the time required to see a game like that through. Which is why I'm baffled when folks are able to play through those games multiple times.

Batman didnt feel short to me. First beat it on normal (found all riddler challenges on 1st playthrough), then hard, then completed all the challenge rooms.

I'd say I put somewhere around 20 hours in the game.

Only game I ever felt compelled to get 1000/1000.

x2

Keep in mind that trick doesn't work on all games. Some will actually downscale to 480p instead. For example, Fight Night Round 3 and darkSector.

Artificially padding game length by increasing difficulty isn't a solution, IMO. Doubling game time because you die twice as much is a shitty solution, since most of the time that just drives frustration. There should be a balance.

I disagree. Will you die twice as much? Sure, but the game is sure as hell more fun than plowing through everything on easy. Also playing a game like AA on easy renders actually learning the moves pointless when you can button mash to win. Hell, putting any game on easy takes away any strategy that may be involved otherwise. As Bungie puts it in Halo, Easy basically plays itself. There is also a much higher level of satisfaction in taking out a boss on a more difficult setting.

I wouldn't call it artificial padding at all.

Killzone 2's last level took me about 4 hours on hard. I like the challenge from time to time but man did I want to kill my partner "Get me back in the game motherfucker!" so damn stupid.

I'm gonna have to go ahead and disagree with every single one of your points.

No. Replaying a difficult section over and over, is frustrating and certainly not fun. When you get the sense of relief from passing a stage, you weren't having fun as you dread ever having to play it again.

Again, just, no. While playing on easy might lessen certain strategy elements, it's doesn't completely remove them. And I'm not talking about RTS games here - strategy is not a major component of these games anyways, it's usually memorizing patterns and execution to a point where it's second nature and hardly strategic.

That's not the sort of satisfaction I look for from a videogame, that's the sort of thing I look for in my life and work - fun in and of itself is enough out of a game, and tacked-on difficulty is rarely, if ever, fun.

I would - it's padding, pure and simple (or difficult), and it can keep most games from being fun.

You didn't address strategy or learning the game's move system. Both of which are moot on easy when you can run into any battle and button mash. That is equally not fun.

Basically, whatever the default setting is (unless it's easy) that's the mode I choose since more often than not, that is the difficulty the designers tailored the game. Achievements sometimes dictate otherwise, and I set it to hard depending on the game.

That's different from your example of putting Halo on Legendary so that it triples the play time.

Obviously the default setting should be the balance between being too easy that you can breeze through the game or being too hard where you die every 5 minutes. But I disagree completely if someone says Batman was too short and the solution is to put the difficulty on Hard.

Not at all. In the Halo games (and most other shooters) the difference between easy and hard is night and day in terms of strategy. It's not as simple as "you die more so the game is longer," as slop implied, although, I won't lie, that is one factor.

In Halo you can run into the middle of any battle and take care of business on easy barely taking any hits. You have to be much more methodical and strategic on how to approach battles on the harder levels or you will die. Even something as little as ammo becomes an issue on the harder difficulties which isn't an issue on easy. Finding the right gun with a decent amount of ammo to use on a certain enemy only to drop it and grab another to run with makes the game more interesting. This means a slower pace. Slower pace means a longer experience.

In regards to Batman, there was only one section with the standard thugs that I got hung up on hard and it was damn frustrating but man it was satisfying approaching the battle with more strategy than I initially was prepared to give it and because I didn't, the game punished me for it. I learned and changed the way I approached the battle, i.e. learned what the game wanted me to learn, and prevailed. It was not a sense of 'relief' but a sense of accomplishment.

And the reason it requires more strategy and time is because ramping up the difficulty in shooters is typically the result of the enemy units having more hit points, or your character taking more damage. It's no different then putting in a mode that results in one shot kills and saying that it just requires more strategy to live, enjoy.

Games generally are and should be designed around the default difficulty to balance strategy and game mechanics without frustrating the player, and designers are generally aware of that. Sure there are individuals that like the thrill of challenges and naturally good at a certain genre of game where they enjoy playing through multiple difficulty levels, but lets be honest, the average gamer probably doesn't do that and dropping the pace of a Halo game 3 times slower takes away a lot of the charm that a lot of people see in the game. For instance, I have no interest in playing Gears of War on Insane since taking three times as long taking cover and waiting for opportunities to shoot ruins the thrill of the gameplay. I don't play Halo, but I imagine throwing it on Legendary would do something similar.

I think if the common complaint was that Batman took 10 hours to beat without dying once, there's an issue (not that that's the case). Setting the game on Hard to alleviate that is a failure in game design.

Round and around it goes.

Still an over simplification. Harder difficulty brings about smarter AI. No longer will enemies stand by while a grenade blows up at their feet. Their accuracy is more on par with your own, and they are generally smarter to move behind cover and not pop up in the same spot until you get that perfect head shot.


But whatever. Hard = more hit points/less shield == padding.

Anyone else see this? A 3D GOTY version?

http://www.gamestop.com/Catalog/Prod...73&loc=360soon

I've been wanting to play this again, but the extra challenge maps probably aren't worth it to me and the 3D can't be that good I'm guessing.

Yeah, I'll play it again in 3D and get all the achievements again

Ugh, so it's a different game as far as XBL is concerned? But it has all the same achievements? That's hella lame.

I don't know for sure but other GOTY editions were treated as the same game for XBL. E.g., Fallout 3, Gears of War, Fable 2 Plat, etc...

Yes, I know, which is what makes this lame. If you want to upgrade, you have to start over. Sure, I get wanting more achievements for doing the game again, but since I haven't finished the first one all the way, there's no incentive* to upgrade and sell my old disc.

* For a raging completionist whore like myself.

I just got this for $20 and cant wait to play it! I planned on doing it on hard my first play throough (Im a batman whore and will get the platinum trophy) but it looks like you guys are saying its NOT fun on hard? I did Modern Warafare 1 on hard and though it was a bitch, I have no complaints and had fun. I also did COnan on hard and it was the worse experience ever because it was cheap as shit. Can you guys give me a comparison?

anyone see a review for this GotY edition? wondering how this 3D effect fairs in long stretches of play.

I only played it on Normal and found it to be both challenging and fun at that level (granted, I'm not as much of a gamer as most who play this probably). If you're going to start with Hard, I'd probably recommend cutting your teeth on challenge mode before going too far into story mode in order to pick up on the fighting controls and stealth tactics.

3D ruins everything - especially real life.

I played through on medium first and then on hard. The only real difference on hard is that there are no visual cues for when an enemy is going to attack so you can use the counter move. After playing through on medium, I was so used to the animations, that not having the visual prompt was not a big deal, so hard was not much more difficult than medium.

I'd at least play through the challenge rooms a bit to get used to how the enemies attack and then hard shouldnt be a problem.

Can't wait for the sequel, this is my favorite game of this generation.

Although they market with a different name that escapes me at the moment, this new edition uses anaglyph 3D.