Classic Video Game "Screw You"s: Difference between revisions
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When a developer wants to up the difficulty level of his game, he has quite a few options.
This is a list of a few classic methods of making a game [[Nintendo Hard]]. We'll call them
Differs from [[Fake Difficulty]] in that these can be fair. By definition, [[Fake Difficulty]] is completely unfair in some way; [[Luck-Based Mission|it requires good luck]], [[Guide Dang It|it expects you to know things it didn't tell you]], etc.
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* The ability of an enemy to [[One-Hit Kill]] you when the game itself doesn't make you a [[One-Hit-Point Wonder]] is a well known FU.
* The [[Auto-Scrolling Level]] can easily be made into part of an FU, especially when mixed with Instant Death Areas, vanishing or moving platforms, [[Inconveniently-Placed Conveyor Belt|Inconveniently Placed Conveyor Belts]], and/or [[Goddamned Bats]]. (Forcing you to choose between two paths, one of which is a dead end, is more [[Fake Difficulty]] than a true FU.)
** Deliberate use of [[Ratchet Scrolling]] that limits you from going back, causing you to miss pickups and giving less room to avoid attacks. Worse yet is Ratchet, [[Rise to the Challenge|Auto,]] or [[Flip Screen Scrolling|Flip Screen]] scrolling on a climbing vertical level, which each have their own way of illogically killing you with bottomless pits.
* The [[Slippy-Slidey Ice World|Ice Level]] is another classic FU, where your character, and ''only'' your character, [[Frictionless Ice|skids like crazy]], causing the [[Spikes of Doom]] and [[Goddamned Bats]] to be much more difficult to avoid.
** Similarly, underwater areas that hamper your characters mobility but leave enemies and traps (including fire-based traps) unhindered. Better yet, an underwater ice world that ignores how cold such water would be in the interest of combining these FUs.
* [[Goddamned Bats]] and [[Demonic Spiders]] are among the most common FUs; the former is frequently used in conjunction with knockback and Instant Death areas to form an FU.
* [[Wall Master
* [[Invisible Monsters]].
* [[Timed Mission
* [[Escort Mission
* In games with power-ups (e.g. most space shooters), losing them all when you die is a nearly universal FU, and also an example of [[Unstable Equilibrium]]. AKA [[Continuing Is Painful|Gradius Syndrome]].
* [[Poison Mushroom|Power Ups that can kill you/harm you/cancel out good Power Ups if accidentally collected, in conjunction with looking like normal power ups or being in the same container as the normal power ups.]]
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** A popular ceiling bumper moment is a tunnel where the end of the ground and ceiling line up with each other, and the only way to progress is to jump out of the tunnel, turn around in mid-air, and land on top of the ceiling.
* [[Character Select Forcing]], including the [[Guide Dang It]] that comes from realizing that [[That One Level|one or two tough levels]] are oddly [[This Looks Like a Job For Aquaman|much easier]] with the resident [[Lethal Joke Character]].
* In some old [[Platform Game
* One of the most apparent in platform games - [[Knockback|flying backwards after getting hit]]. Sometimes this gets you away from danger, but other times, throws you into a [[Bottomless Pit]].
* Bottomless pits in places they don't belong. Like your backyard. No wonder that house was so cheap...
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* Invisible bombs that kill you so much that you have to restart the entire game.
{{examples|Some games include more unusual Video Game FUs, such as:}}
* ''[[Mega Man and Bass]]'' is notable for having nearly every one of the listed above. [[Unstable Equilibrium|Ammo does not regenerate on death]], enemies have massive amounts of [[Mercy Invincibility|Recovery Time]], two consecutive [[Marathon Level
* ''[[I Wanna Be the Guy]]'' has one almost every screen, and this is what actually makes it fun. For example, one screen has a falling ceiling of spikes, and one spot in the floor that is lower than the rest. Upon finally managing to reach that spot, you discover that the spike just grows longer to kill you. Other examples include the Delicious Fruit which can ''fall up'' and the evil save point which chases and kills you. And spring-loaded background couches underneath spiked ceilings. And clouds that spontaneously drop lightning bolts. And spike pits of doom that chase you. And that clusterchucking moon.
** And that's nothing compared to ''[[I Wanna Be the Fangame]]''. ''More'' spikes, ''more'' [[Invisible Block
* The ''[[Wizardry]]'' games at least up to V were more than happy to allow you to teleport into solid rock. This resulted in the '''[[Total Party Kill|total loss]]''' of your party, [[Final Death|no resurrection attempts allowed]]. Oh, and if you play the games the way they're intended, there's no "reload game" upon this happening. You can also emerge high above the city and crash to the ground, or drown in the castle moat, but these "merely" kill your party as opposed to your losing them forever; you have a shot at resurrecting them in the latter two instances. Basically, be '''''very''''' careful when teleporting in Wizardry.
** ''[[Might and Magic]]: World of Xeen'' similarly allowed you to accidentally teleport off the edge of the
* In ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]'', {{spoiler|if you [[Dug Too Deep]], you can release a Balrog}}. Thanks to the line "Losing is fun" in the in the instructions for the game, they are referred to as Hidden Fun Stuff, or just HFS.
** The "losing is fun" line means the Fun Units for DF suddenly stop being sarcastic.
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* When you die in ''[[Descent]]'', all of your equipment is scattered around the place. This wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for losing them all forever if you die between blowing the reactor and getting the hell out of Dodge. (Some levels, which involve things like ''invisible death mechs'' with insanely powerful cannons, are even more charming).
** Level 6 has a fairly memorable FU where [[Teleporting Keycard Squad|you pick up the red key and the walls open]] to reveal an ambush of ''six'' Class 1 Driller [[Demonic Spiders]] with instant-hit cannons. Most players, on their first try, will die before they even figure out what happened. In later levels [[It Gets Worse]].
*** Level 9 has a [[Monster Closet]] right at the start of the level that opens after you proceed forward a ways. Also bad are [[Teleporting Keycard Squad]] ambushes from multiple directions, spawning [[Demonic Spiders]] such as the aformentioned Drillers and Super Hulks. One level in ''Descent Maximum'' for the [[PlayStation]] has the yellow key placed between two Diamond Claw-generating [[Mook Maker
** The whole first game becomes a big Fun Unit on Insane difficulty after level 7. Between the random "roaming" of the enemies, the brutal AI, and your weakness vs their strength, it's for all practical purposes impossible.
* ''[[Tetris|Bastet]]'' has the piece generator designed so that the worst possible block for your situation is the one you get every time. However, this is the entire point of the game.
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Video Game Difficulty Tropes]]
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