“Firm, But Fair”
In the April 2011 issue of Edge magazine, From Software’s Hidetaka Miyazaki outlined the five key criteria by which his team is balancing the difficulty of Dark Souls:
1. Any player can clear any obstacle simply by learning from mistakes and paying close attention.
2. The reasons for failure must always be clear and understandable.
3. Every problem must have multiple solutions, so that the player can tackle it in whichever way they want.
4. The game’s controls can never be a factor from which difficulty is derived.
5. There must be the possibility for miracles to happen - those magical moments that spread stories outside of the confines of the game world.
“So long as an obstacle passes those five criteria, we are happy that we have achieved the maximum level of difficulty, while retaining the necessary element of fairness.”
