Hardest game of the modern era.

Easily Sekiro. Could never get the timing right. Only souls game i never finished.... never even got close.

Of that list, NG black is the most fun game imo.

Sekiro is the hardest on that list and not in the slightest would I call it fun. It's a punishing not fun at all game. A game you play because it's ridiculous spikes in difficulty seems impossible but you push through anyway. It's not due to complex strategies, it's not like you get an "aha! moment on mechanics and then beat it. No you just suffer and repeat untill the game is imprinted into your DNA code after being butt****ed into oblivion for hours on in.

Sekiro is a hard game without fun.

NGB is a hard game that's also fun.

NGB never feels "cheap" imo when it comes to difficulty, can't say the same for most of the souls and souls likes listed.

Lol, you definitely have an argument. I do however think it's fun. You just have to be in the mood for EXTREME punishment. The most brilliant, and brutal, thing about the game is that it does not allow you to take shortcuts. You either learn the system, tattoo it to your brain, or you die. End of story.

This happened to a lot of people, lol. DS is one thing. You can find a ton of ways to push through. But Sekiro is just...something else. The game doesn't take any shit.

yeah i'll have to go with sekiro too. find soulsborne games a walk in the park in comparison. found nioh tough once through the early stages but eventually it all clicked. never had that moment with sekiro, the whole tone, setting, mechanics just didn't land with me. it's a game i feel i should like, i want to like, and i should be able to get to grips with, but it just didnt agree with me. got to hold my hands up and admit just wasn't very good at it

NG2 on PotMN is considerably more difficult than anything on that list. NGB MNM is an easy game by comparison. Even if we only counted the first couple of stages of NG2 PotMN, it would still take it. Game is brutal lol.

But of course we're talking "big" well known games here. Actual tough as nails games tend to remain obscure, rarely break through to mainstream audiences.

@sargentd: You sound like a scrub. Sekiro is the only game I have ever done a no death run on. (Technically I am on my way to doing that in FF16, unintentionally).

Its also the only From Software game where I literally feel immortal. in DS1, DS3, Elden Ring etc there are several bosses that take me 5-10+ tries (Sister Friede, Slave Knight Gael, Malenia, no summon, Manus etc) every playthrough

I did die a lot on my first playthrough though. Second one as well. After that it clicked and it was the most satisfying "aha" moment I have ever experienced in gaming. I literally felt dumb not knowing how to play the game properly the first two times.. Reading comments like yours is funny, because after that click I find the game ridiculously easy, like blindfolded easy.

Probably the ones with the steel cases.

@ConanTheStoner: The thing about NG is there's cheesy tactics, if you really look. I looked all over the place in Sekiro, couldn't find a scrap of cheese. Maybe it's there, and I just missed it though.

@nod_calypse:

There are a few cheese tactics in Sekiro (the bull and demon come to mind), but 90% of Sekiro is literally getting good, which is precisely what makes it so good.

@nod_calypse:

Cheese tactics in NG hold up with some enemies/encounters in normal mode, sure. But then there's multiple modes up from there with no freebies.

NG2 PotMN, cheese is a requirement in some encounters. As in it's the only possible out lol. Not something that makes the game easy.

Don't take my word for it, give it a go. These other games will feel like playing Kirby afterwards.

I don't even think it's a satisfying or fun challenge, I'll never do it again. Any time I revisit the game, just stick with Path of the Mentor.

60% voted for Sekiro lol. Easiest game on the list for me. I beat DMC5 11 times and I still feel like I suck. especially with Dante. Hell & Hell mode? Never going to happen. A thousand times more difficult than Sekiro ever was.

I beat God of War 3 times, but there is ZERO chance of me ever being able to beat Sigrun on GMG mode. if you think Isshin From Sekiro is hard you must never have tried GOW on GMG... I haven't got to her yet because I could only kill 3 of the 9 valkyries in GMG.

Same with God of War Ragnarok. 120 hours, just as many hours as Sekiro, and I feel like I mastered its combat, but I stuck with the second hardest difficulty and still took 100 tries.

If you beat King Hrolf or Queen Gna in the GMG mode Sekiro should be a cake walk.

After beating Sekiro twice I have become a literal god at the game.

1. Wolfenstein on Mein Leben difficulty
2. Doom on Ultra Nightmare difficulty
3. God of War on GMG difficulty
4. God of War Ragnarok on GMG difficulty
5. DMC5 on H&H difficulty
6. Hollow Knight
7. Returnal
8. Hades
9. Sekiro (only on your first playthrough)
10. Dark Souls 1 (especially) environments on NG+7. The bosses are super easy, except for Manus and a few others, but its more the actual mobs that are always dangerous.

That's my top 10 of most difficult games I have ever played. The first 8 I never finished.

Still I could add more games in the top 5 or so like Skyrim or Fallout 4.

Have you guys played them on the hardest? its literally 100x worse than anything FromSoft has made lol, the smallest enemies are bullet sponges that 1 shot you... a simple ghoul took what felt like 270 bullets to kill. In Sekiro you can finish off any regular mob with 1 single stealth attack or just a parry or two and a few ripostes/slashes. From Soft isn't hard or punishing. Its actually extremely fair and well made challenge. Unlike the garbage that Skyrim/Fallout gives you.

@ConanTheStoner: Come to think of it, different modes is a whole different discussion, lol. Should probably have just the poll a base level mode vote, no ng, etc.

Only played NG back when they were released a million years ago, and back then i don't even remember if anything over Normal mode was available from the beginning, so i've only played them on Normal.

From latest titles that i remember, gow2018 on gmgow cuz nobody at Santa Monica gave a shit to balance it lol, Perfect Dark Zero on Dark Agent and a decent amount of achievements were pretty darn hard in the original Dead Rising from what i remember.

Sekiro is the hardest Fromsoft title, but not on the level of the three titles above.

@nod_calypse:

Seems too muddy to me, defeats the purpose of the question. Should just go off the highest challenge a game offers.

Especially important with Japanese action games where the difficulty increases often lead to substantial changes rather than simple value tweaks. NGB for example introduces all new enemy types, mixes late game enemies earlier with new attacks/patterns. Flying Swallow changes from a freebie attack to something that is typically blocked or countered leading to your death lol. All kinds of changes like that.

It's pretty typical in these games for the initial run to essentially function as a long tutorial with the higher difficulties being the real game.

@ConanTheStoner: Yeah, mean i should've just clarified. but whatever.

Probably one of those indy rogue like dungeon crawler RPG simulator.

Personally Sekiro is easiest while Nioh 1 dlc is hardest. Fk nioh dlc its so imbalanced.

Rogue legacy 2

I had more trouble beating Cuphead than Sekiro. I think it's difficulty is exaggerated. I even accidentally beat some bosses with the demon bell activated. Still there were some pretty epic battles, no doubt.

I imagine Nioh or NG to be the hardest. Difficult for me to say because I don't like how those games feel, so I gave up after an hour or so, but that was my impression.

Can someone reply to Moze plz, the dude is desperately seeking attention.

@nod_calypse: I saw a guy beat the game literally blind folded

Well he's really, really good at video games, lol.

For me, it's gonna be R-Type: Final 2 as in most shmup games, I had a hard time trying to unlocked lots of stuff into R-Type Final 2.

Next is Returnal PC. Can't believe that game can give you a challenge if you aren't careful.

Finally, I will admit, Sekiro is indeed hard despite I love parrying mechanics and timing is a bitch, I wish that game would have Nvidia Reflex on-boost+ in the setting to make it much easier to play.

Voted: Sekiro.

Sekiro. That game can be brutal.

Nobody is going to believe me, but I am going to say it regardless. I beat Sekiro not by blocking and parrying, but by running like a freak hitting and running me way through most bosses and enemies 😂 .. like literally I just press the circle button to run in circles all the time

@ConanTheStoner: I actually downloaded the Ninja Gaiden "trilogy" remaster on Gamepass. Have to see if its as hard as everyone says. I think there was only two difficulties, I took the hardest. About 30 minutes in and no biggie so far.

Combat is nice but the lack of lock-on mechanism made it hard to enjoy. I hear people cry about the camera in Souls games "the hardest boss in the game is the camera" but cannot relate at all. the camera in From Soft games is unmatched imo.

The camera in NGS after just 30 minutes bugged me beyond belief.

But lock on wasn't that common in 2007 I guess.

It's not a particularly well defined question as games can get arbitrarily hard to the point of being essentially unplayable and it's been like that since forever. All the games listed in the poll are just generally quite good games with usually well balanced difficutly that is harder than average but by no means the hardest.

Other: Stranglehold on hard boiled difficulty, only game in the last 20yrs or so I haven't finished on the hardest difficulty.

@Life-is-a-Game: I believe you. That is a viable option. You just have to keep moving and be careful when you pick your moments to rush in. It's not very flashy, and is super tedious, but works if executed correctly.

Thing is, every time you increase the difficulty in NGB it turns into a different game, with enemy changes and multi opponent bosses and bosses attacking more often.

For example, frst time you fight Alma 1 or 2 on normal, she's rock hard. Then you play it over and over and you learn how to deal with her in one go. Then you up the difficulty and her attacks increase and now there's more enemies on the screen and it turns into a nightmare.

There's this guy on YouTube called JayTB123 and he'll show you walk throughs, speed runs or Karma runs. But when he shows you stuff on Master Ninja and he'll just toy with everyone onscreen, pretty much only getting hit on purpose when he's trying to demonstrate things. He makes it look so much easier than it actually is.

Sekiro closely followed by ninja gaiden black like both games but I'm terrible at them.

Not into hard games anymore, i can't be arsed.

playing on hard difficulty doesn't make me feel like i am good or bad at games, i really dont care about that. i'd rather just have fun and enjoyment whilst gaming than feeling like i have completed some ridiculously hard task.

its rarely satisfying when you do anyway, its just more a feeling of relief / thank god its over.

Only played the dark souls games out of that list and can't say i enjoyed them except for DS3.

Most frustrating i've played lately was Elden Ring and that was solely because of the Fire Giant, it seemed cheap.

Aliens dark descent is pretty hard at times.

@nod_calypse: exactly 🙏

Definitely the games with too many cutscenes. I just can't make it through 😎

Grounded being a prime example. Felt like hours of cutscenes, popping up all over the place.

I see that my comment struck a nerve.😎

@nod_calypse: Strange, you bit and you think you were fishing.😂

Feel the same way often. Then, out of nowhere, I'll get in this mood to torture myself, lol. That's when I know it's time to play a Souls game, or the like. When I scratch that itch, I go back to normal gaming.

@Mozelleple112:

You'll want to grab NGB and NG2. Sigma games have all kinds of issues and wack additions. NGS is easier than NGB and NGS2 is a cakewalk compared to NG2. The differences are especially drastic for the latter.

Don't know if you own any Xbox consoles, but those are the only way to access those games unfortunately.

And yes you'll have to unlock the higher difficulties by beating the highest available difficulty.

Though if NGS is all you have access to, beating Doku in the "unwinnable" fight at the beginning unlocks the next difficulty automatically.

Yeah it's unfortunate the master collection was the sigma versions.

Black and NG2 on series X is a beautiful thing with the higher fps. SSX3 as well.

@nod_calypse: yes I can understand that. I knew I had to play elden ring. But was relieved when it was finally over. Torture seems right

Should clarify single player. Competitive e-sports on PC are probably technically the "hardest".

Easily other. Games with player made content are ALWAYS the hardest. Games like Mario Maker 1 and 2 and Geometry Dash are at or near the top of the list. Don't believe me? I'll make you a list of levels to beat... lol. It will make games like Sekiro feel like a walk in the park.

If multiplayer or community levels are excluded then I'm not 100 percent sure, but a few of the ones listed are difficult. Problem is a large number of other games could be put in their place with certain conditions. A LOT of games are absolutely brutal at the hardest difficulty level.. like nearly unbeatable.

@ConanTheStoner: I was worried I'd have to play some relatively obscure original Xbox version to get the genuine experience.

I'm a little too much of a graphics hoe to bother with 480p gaming in 2023 unfortunately.

For now I might give the PC remasters on GamePass a try.

Lets check this as another remake we need for 2024+... fully remade with original challenge etc.

@WitIsWisdom: very true.

@WitIsWisdom: Oh for sure. There are Mario Maker levels that require fallen angel blood to beat. Another one is TRLE (tomb raider level editor), and it might be the worst. That community has produced some near impossible content to beat, and not just for the platforming.

@nod_calypse:

Someone actually thinks Ninja Gaiden Black is hard?? Then I must be a hack 'n slash master then!