I recieved a PM from Ischa reacting to my review of Jazz Planets 2. One thing really stood out in the PM to me. The first is in which I complained at how dull the crate breaking levels were and how the last few variants had far too many crates to even be considered fun. Ischa countered this with "DO YOU JUST LIKE EASY LEVELS".

This has gotten me thinking, in my 'career' of reviewing SP packs I know will be average or worse, whenever I mentioned that a certain element was highly dull or too frustrating to be fun the creator always countered with "I guess you don't like hard levels".

It could be the creators can't take crit and improve themselves, it could be I'm just a nitpicky whiny git, however I don't believe that I don't like hard levels. I have had my (-)(-)(-) handed to me in Deserto (JJ1, and Mike's pack) repeatedly, but I still go back to try again. I still feel entertained even when I see Jazz turn to ashes. I have had the same experience with Rayman 1 and other games. On the flip of the coin, I have played other games where I just got too bored or too frustrated at it's "difficulty" to continue onward.

And so, I'd like to see what you guys feel creates 'fun' difficulty, something that while hard and perhaps frustrating still brings the player back, and what is what I like to call 'newbie level designer' difficulty, something thats hard for hardness sake and isn't really compelling. Or other various theories of difficulty that don't fit into my black-and-white mold.

A good challenge is providing an obstacle the player wants to overcome, no matter how hard it may be, if the obstacle is of interest to the player it will keep him playing (You could also add some ploy to decive the player into thinking the obstacle is relatively easy and if he can't defeat it he sucks ;P). Even if the obstacle doesn't appeal to your tastes, it's common sense to tell what you simply don't like and what is just plain absurd.

Of course even boring obstacles will keep you playing if there's a story or some other motive keeping you. The 'newbie' levels you're describing probably didn't have a story or one that had your interest, so you focus more on the flaws and boring stuff. I also get the impression that some authors focus more on just trying to earn praise and ratings but wouldn't enjoy playing their own levels. The "DO YOU JUST LIKE EASY LEVELS" Quote sounded like he was trying to make the gameplay as hard as possible, since he probably read a bunch of reviews complaining about how certain other SP packs are too easy.

Level design is ultimately not about following any standards, you should make what you want to play in. Most of which you would want to play is probably what other people want to play as well.

My 2 cents.

I tried to write an essay on this subject but it didn't sound right, so have a paragraph which will probably be clearer to grok in general.

Difficulty, despite what a few certain level designers and Korean MMO developers believe, isn't measured in "how many monsters you kill/how many crates you have to open/how big the level is". You can't assign a number to something that is, in itself, an abstract value.

Anyone that n00b described in the original post, take note: you make things difficult by adding in different situations, not the same situation over and over. Tedious is not difficult, it's just annoying. Don't believe me? Play and professionally designed level for any game and tell me how many times a certain situation is exactly repeated.

In addition to what FS pointed out, I suppose it's safe to say that a level based mainly on original obstacles will be more appealing than the typical single player gameplay. The last two levels from Jazz Unleashed are a fine example, same as the Deserto Orbital Base from ep2.

You guys have all valid points. Also one annoying thing is if challenges are unfair. Like spike pits that you can't see and other stuff you can't know before it's too late and get hurt or die. Of course challenges should still be hard but make it fair for the player. If players can't overcome some obstacle it should be the players fault and not because the challenge is unfair.