Poll of the Day > Can you think of any games where the plot changes on different difficulties?

(+) Yeah! (+)

One mission is significantly affected in Perfect Dark, but all the plot beats are hit the same.

The plot is subtly affected in Rain World based on difficulty

obvious answer I guess is Star Fox. maybe not strictly plot.

there are other games like Buster Bunny SNES where there are additional levels on the higher difficulties.

there are some games like GoldenEye or Thief where the mission objectives change with difficulty, but that's definitely not plot. Star Fox is a lot closer to a plot change than those.

there's almost RE2 where you can choose which character takes which path at the start. not sure if counts as difficulty though.

you could think of any RPG with a branching storyline (if there is such a thing and that's not just a pipe-dream) as being close to this, but sort of the reverse. it's not the difficulty changing the plot, it's the plot changing the difficulty.

That awful Mortal Kombat Sub Zero game would lock you out of the last chapter of the game unless you were playing on the hardest difficulty

Kinda RE1?

Umm in the inFamous games I always did the "bad" playthrough on Hard mode?

I would almost say Undertale based on how the plot changes based on your actions in combat with pacifist, genocide and neutral endings.

Kessen II?

And yes, I played that horrible, horrible game.

System Shock 1 you can change how much of the plot you see, or even turn off the plot entirely and just play through the puzzles.

Sahuagin posted...

obvious answer I guess is Star Fox. maybe not strictly plot.

there are other games like Buster Bunny SNES where there are additional levels on the higher difficulties.

there are some games like GoldenEye or Thief where the mission objectives change with difficulty, but that's definitely not plot. Star Fox is a lot closer to a plot change than those.

there's almost RE2 where you can choose which character takes which path at the start. not sure if counts as difficulty though.

you could think of any RPG with a branching storyline (if there is such a thing and that's not just a pipe-dream) as being close to this, but sort of the reverse. it's not the difficulty changing the plot, it's the plot changing the difficulty.

i'm loose on this, I'll accept Starfox 64, particularly since the final boss changes and it affects the ending

The old Star Wars arcade game sort of did that. If you started on wave 1, you fought in space against TIE fighters, then dove into the trench to attack the exhaust port. At higher levels there was a section in between where you'd skim along the surface attacking gun towers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJv94FPRddA

VampireCoyote posted...

That awful Mortal Kombat Sub Zero game would lock you out of the last chapter of the game unless you were playing on the hardest difficulty

Damn I thought they stopped doing that shit around the early SNES days

Kero Blaster. The plot has some pretty significant changes on hard mode.

Although you do have to unlock hard mode by beating the game once so don't know if that counts.

While it doesn't change the plot (such as it is), some of the difficulty levels in Postal 2 change the types of weapons NPCs use in the game, or the way they behave around you. Liebermode removes all the NPC guns, replacing them with melee weapons like shovels, police batons, stun guns, and scissors. (It actually makes the game a lot harder because they don't drop gun ammo anymore). Hestonworld arms everyone with guns. (Which can actually make the game easier since there's not only more ammo drops, but civilians will return fire at anyone shooting, including factions and cops. Monster infighting FTW.) Insane-o arms the NPCs with heavy weapons like rocket launchers, napalm, and WMDs. (But their shooting AI remains the same, so they're really more of a danger to themselves and each other than to you.) And if you choose the difficulty level They Hate Me, every single NPC in the game will attack you on sight. (This makes many of the plot items impossible to accomplish the "normal" way, but everything in the game has more than one solution.)

Sahuagin posted...

you could think of any RPG with a branching storyline (if there is such a thing and that's not just a pipe-dream) as being close to this, but sort of the reverse. it's not the difficulty changing the plot, it's the plot changing the difficulty.

The alternate path in Symphonia was usually referred to as the Hard Path.

Nichtcrawler-X posted...

it's not the difficulty changing the plot, it's the plot changing the difficulty.

Close enough - True Crime: Streets of LA does something like that

Lokarin posted...

Close enough - True Crime: Streets of LA does something like that

True crimes was. Fail a mission you go down a certain path. Do it correctly you go another

or end up shooting dragons, zombies, and fist fighting twin concubine demons while james hong does his best shang tsung impersonation

Shadow the hedghog did this as well- neutral path was easy. Good and bad paths were a middle finger to the player

Valkyrie Profile had character availability dependent on difficulty mode, and a dungeon? iirc it's been awhile

edit:
https://valkyrieprofile.fandom.com/wiki/Einherjar

yeah some are listed as unavailable in easy mode, and only available in hard mode

Counting games that end early on lower difficulties? Because there are a bunch of them.