What are the worst difficulty spikes you have experienced in a video game?

In Europa Universalis IV after you win your first couple of wars. I tend to be greedy and the AI loves to dole out punishment after you get enough Aggressive Expansion. Early game it’s difficult to make money and your troops are usually terrible. You usually have to ruin your economy to fight off a large coalition and playing ironman (no reloading saves; only way to earn achievements) makes it extremely difficult.

In my Holland to Netherlands game, I took 3 provinces in the area and I got declared war on by most of the HRE and the Kalmar Union. Fortunately, daddy France (my only ally) was able to save me but it was a long climb back for both of us.
 
Those missions in Command and Conquer where you start off with a limited amount of units and need to search and destroy, or search and rescue. Those would take a few tries. The first Nod mission, although a similar deal, was easy enough.

Mission 6 for GDI could take a few tries as well, you had one commando ("Time to Rock'n'Roll") available to use, and needed to figure out what they wanted you to blow up. Plus you had to blow up some SAM sites, which could have a couple of infantrymen pop out during the explosion, trying to kill the commando. He had a quite random chance of surviving that, or so it seemed.

 
I agree with most of the ones posted already, especially NFS Underground, I never beat those last races as a kid and im pretty sure my brain has a special place full of supressed rage from back then.

I don't really consider the Dark Souls/Bloodborne games as having difficulty spikes, more like the occasional difficulty lull (looking at you, One Reborn).

I'd like to mention a game that I think uses difficulty spikes to great effect and that's Monster Hunter: World. The game hits you with a few along the way, first they hit you with the ultra aggressive Anjanath a few hunts in and he will really teach you to play the game. Then again as you get to Rathian/Rathalos/Diablos, usually one of those three will really test a new player (for me it was Diablos). Then when you reach High rank, some of the revamped monsters are going to push you once again, all becoming more aggressive and tougher.

Then the elder dragons roll along, and a lot of people have quit the game once they come face to face with Nergigante. He's ultra aggressive, quick as hell, will close range very quickly, and has a divebomb move that can one shot you very easily, but he too can be overcome; you learn to be brave and stand in his earhole, smashing at his giant horns with one ludicrously oversized weapon or other.

Now after Iceborne we're facing Savage Deviljhos, Zinogres, buffed versions of every monster (Thanks for poison AND paralysis, Viper Tobi-Kadachi) and of course, toughened, tempered elder dragons with extra moves.

The thing is, I think these spikes are perfectly executed. You get slapped around but you learn to play the game, you learn the way the monsters fight and hopefully think of some tactics and gear you can use to your advantage.

And always, in the end, you triumph if you stick with it, and you get to look back at the time Low Rank Anjanath slapped you around for a whole day and laugh.

Source: hunted Arch-Tempered Nergigante
 
wvmgmidget
In Europa Universalis IV after you win your first couple of wars. I tend to be greedy and the AI loves to dole out punishment after you get enough Aggressive Expansion. Early game it’s difficult to make money and your troops are usually terrible. You usually have to ruin your economy to fight off a large coalition and playing ironman (no reloading saves; only way to earn achievements) makes it extremely difficult.

In my Holland to Netherlands game, I took 3 provinces in the area and I got declared war on by most of the HRE and the Kalmar Union. Fortunately, daddy France (my only ally) was able to save me but it was a long climb back for both of us.
Click to expand...

Continuing on with the Paradox game theme, Crusader Kings 2 has a few:
  • first few years after an extremely early inheritance (like ~5 years old or less). Have fun watching your factions bubble up to the point where they could theoretically pop and cause untimely civil wars. Mitigated by the fact that you'll begin to accumilate the long reign opinion bonus by the time you come of age, which oddly enough makes it one of my prefered times to take the throne.
  • inheritance itself. E.X Run elective succession? Good luck getting enough votes to keep your top title in the family long enough to change out (unless playing as the ERE or HRE, fairly sure those are hardlocked into a form of elective in the final few patches.) There are, of course, ways to game the system.
  • Holy wars. Time them wrong and it's likely that everyone in the area following your targets religion will pile on, leading to unintended consequences and more wars from other sources.
  • Pressing weak non-inheritable* claims held by women when your target is a healthy man, mostly owing to the crapshoot of waiting for him to either die or be under a regency for whatever reason.
*-Most cases will be converted to inheritable if an attempt to press the claim is made.
 
I think I've played through John Woo's Stranglehold a few times on the PS3, but I kept getting to the restaurant level and getting stuck.
Stuntman on the PS2 also, IIRC there was a sequence I just couldn't get past. (edit: 'Head On' in the 'Live Twice for Tomorrow' filming).

These two stick out because they're both games I really enjoyed, but just stopped playing part way through because I just couldn't get any further.

And not so much a difficulty spike, but a tedium one... doing the 100 photographs in San Andreas just about killed me.
 
Last edited:
Darla Starch
Continuing on with the Paradox game theme, Crusader Kings 2 has a few:
  • first few years after an extremely early inheritance (like ~5 years old or less). Have fun watching your factions bubble up to the point where they could theoretically pop and cause untimely civil wars. Mitigated by the fact that you'll begin to accumilate the long reign opinion bonus by the time you come of age, which oddly enough makes it one of my prefered times to take the throne.
  • inheritance itself. E.X Run elective succession? Good luck getting enough votes to keep your top title in the family long enough to change out (unless playing as the ERE or HRE, fairly sure those are hardlocked into a form of elective in the final few patches.) There are, of course, ways to game the system.
  • Holy wars. Time them wrong and it's likely that everyone in the area following your targets religion will pile on, leading to unintended consequences and more wars from other sources.
  • Pressing weak non-inheritable* claims held by women when your target is a healthy man, mostly owing to the crapshoot of waiting for him to either die or be under a regency for whatever reason.
*-Most cases will be converted to inheritable if an attempt to press the claim is made.
Click to expand...
Inheritance is the worst. Especially gavelkind and having ungrateful vassals. Like EU4 I tend to get too greedy, which leads to a slew of problems. Overall, I think CK2 is a bit easier (less coalitions and rebellions, plus there’s not really an economy to deal with), but more tedious (keeping track of everyone) to maintain your realm.
 
I picked up Pokemon Crystal through the 3DS virtual console, I think I had to grind for XP against the Elite Four about 6-8 times to finally beat them as my team averaged around Lv 40ish when I cleared Victory Road.
 
The Death Star Mini-Game in Lego Star Wars The Force Awakens.

I think this is one of the most recent examples I have and one of the most infuriating I have had in a while too. While it doesn't look that bad, it's a lot harder when you actually play it. The controls are a bit too twitchy, the obstacles are large and hard to avoid, it goes too fast and it only gets harder and harder the longer it goes on. The mini-game is just ridiculously hard and annoying and it goes on a little too long for what it is. I have played through the entirety of Lego Star Wars The Force Awakens and it has a wide range of things you have to do to reach 100% and out all of them, this was easily the hardest thing in the entire game for me. Which is absolutely absurd because it's just a small mini-game on the 2nd level, yet it manages to be harder than anything else the game throws at you.
 
Honestly, the one driving mission in GT4 I just couldn't do was the Honda Odyssey one where it's all about slipstreaming. I don't think I have ever passed it. The Mercedes-Benz one at the Nordschleife is tough and I seem to recall having difficulty with a Skyline one too.
 
Mission 6 in Ace Combat 5. It was extremely difficult for me as a kid, and I stopped playing the game for years because of it. It actually pretty much traumatised me, to this day I've completed it at most 9 times (assuming I had to replay it to get an S-rank), even though I've put hundreds of hours in AC5 and I got 100% twice. It's also the reason I haven't played the remastered version of the game in PS4 much as I'll have to beat it a couple more times to get 100% again. I refuse to play it again.
 
I can think of many 8bit and 16bit games from the 80's and 90's that were genuinely impossible, but in recent years the hardest hardcore difficult games are danmaku shoot em ups. Despite the high difficulty there is something so addiciting about these games I can often do 2 or 3 levels without dying and its a real buzz... Cave produces some of the finest like the dodonpachi games and raizing with battle garegga / batrider check the video bullet hell indeed!

 
Grand Prix Series

The Ace difficulty.

So it goes Novice, Rookie, Semi-Pro, Professional and Ace and the only real difference between each is the speed of the AI. The availability of other noob driving aids is also a thing but you'll only ever use/have/need auto gearbox and throttle control once you know how to play the game.

Each car has real-life based performance so a Minardi is like a Minardi and a Ferrari is like a Ferrari. In Grands Prix 2, 3 and 4 the professional difficulty is a really tough challenge no matter what car you're driving. The ace difficulty? It's just impossible. I've played these games for over 20 years now and whilst I've always had fun with them, setting myself various challenges and stipulations, I have never managed to win the championship on ace difficulty. The AI is just programmed to be too fast, particularly in the rain. You won't even come close unless you're driving the fastest car in each particular game; Benetton in GP2, McLaren in GP3 and Ferrari in GP4.

GP4 is probably the worst offender for this. No matter what your setup is, Michael Schumacher will win.
 
Right out of the gate I can think of two, both of which I have yet to beat to this day:

Firstly, the Roadster boss race in the original Burnout; it just takes off immediately and is difficult to chase back; even if you can still keep track of it you also have traffic RNG to contend with which can be both a blessing or a curse. On the one hand if there's a big truck coming up and the AI crashes into it you effectively get a free pass into the lead. However, using a car with poor maneuverability (especially the legally-distinct not-Viper Muscle car) can equally screw you over, especially in the traffic-dense sections of the road.

And second, the Harrier battle in Counter-Strike: Condition Zero Deleted Scenes. You're on the top of the bridge of a large ship, so you have very little cover, when the terrorists take a Harrier jet they hijacked to capture the ship into the air to kill you. There's very little in the way of cover and healing items on the bridge rooftop and what's worse is there's another terrorist that'll attempt to pester you with grenades until you kill him. As for the Harrier itself, CZDS is no Metal Gear Solid 2 so you don't get a homing rocket launcher; instead, your only viable method of dealing damage to the Harrier is with your two sniper rifles; the AWP that you get just before the start of the fight, and the Scout-sniper that you obtained earlier in the mission.
 
Last edited:
The last level of both Splinter Cell 1 & 2. First one you are trying to protect hostages who are split up in 2 different areas whilst being over run by enemy soldiers who have multiple ways to get to both you and the hostages, it's very challenging to say the least, all it takes is a couple of shots or for just one soldier to get to the hostages and it's game over. And then you have to take out the boss who is very fast and taking pot shots at you when you already have virtually no health left. A horrible end to a brilliant game.

And then the last level of the 2nd game, trying to take out 3 enemies who are above you and can easily spot you whilst racing against time to kill them and disarm a bomb, you have something like 1.5 mins to get all this done, whilst again just a couple of shots kill you. Another horrible end compared to all the other levels.

Thankfully SC3 doesn't have anywhere this type of difficulty at the end.
 
Anyone play Puzzle & Dragons Z?

Every boss in that game after the first one was a difficulty spike but if I would be specific it be the Light Skydragon boss fight.

It focused on Paralyzing half your team every 3 turns if it doesn't attack (when your party member is paralyzed, they won't contribute to any attacks regardless of the colour matches you do) . The kicker is that he moves every 2 turns so he can use the Paralyze move twice in a row or 3 times in a row and if he targets an already Paralyzed team member, the Paralyze stacks.

You can just not do anything for a lot of turns. I only beat this boss when he didn't use the Paralyze move twice in a row.

And he comes back with the same move unchanged for the final boss fight with the other Skydragons
 
Last edited:
Ones that I would call annoying, but not impossible:
  • Unbeatable difficulty in Forza Horizon 3. It's pretty much obvious in the first few minutes of the game that the AI has different physics than you, but the AI takes it to a whole 'nother level on max difficulty. The lines and speed that the AI would carry through the corners were just insane. While it can be dealt with with the right cars and tunes, the fact that so much was required to do that was pretty silly.
  • This one has been mentioned a few times, but after recently doing a playthrough of NFSU1, the game really does take a dive in the last 3rd once you start to unlock Level 3 performance parts. It gets really sweaty real quick, and the AI ramps up its speed like you wouldn't believe. Of course the game is more than beatable, but the uptick in difficulty and rubberbanding is hard to ignore.
  • Mission 10 "Mayhem" in Ace Combat Zero, specifically on Mercenary Ace Style. For the boss battle, you fight a squadron of 8 MiG-31s (for reference, Solider style has 4 F-14s and an EA-6 Jammer, and Knight Style has 4 F-16Cs and an F-4) equipped with long-range missiles, as well as insane acceleration and increased turning ability. There's also several named Aces that'll give you a run for your money as well, even on repeated playthroughs. If it's your first playthrough and you're only partway through the game at this point, you likely don't have access to any high-end planes with good SP Weapons, and if you haven't bought the Su-37, Typhoon or F-15C, you're gonna have a tough time. I'd 100% call this the hardest mission and boss battle in the entire game.

Ones that I would call downright ridiculous:

  • IC-4 in GT2. I think this one is self-explanatory.
  • IB-7 in GT2. Getting gold here requires such perfect driving that it's imo impossible to get a consistent time. The game seems to want you to carry a drift through the first right-hander and then keep a fast-but-shallow drift through the long left-hander, which is just impossible to pull off consistently. I remember getting gold on this challenge and not really knowing how I got a good time, and I haven't been able to repeat that.
  • Mission 13 "Liberation of Gracemeria" in Ace Combat 6. The mission itself isn't impossible, but the boss fight at the end is a total PITA. Basically you're constantly getting swarmed by hyper-maneuverable UAVs that can out-turn your missiles at a moments notice, and will happily swarm you and pepper you to death with machine guns, while the CFA-44 that the boss pilot uses launches their own high-performance missiles at you, while also getting nerfed on occasion by the CFA-44's onboard jammer, which is also pretty much the only time that you can land good hits on the enemy. Allied support is pretty much useless, as your allies' missiles will miss the UAVs for the most part, and you have to shoot down 35 of the buggers if you want S-rank. The boss fight basically turns into a game of evading attacks and waiting for the game to jam your radar. Did I mention that the CFA-44 is a stealth aircraft, and it only appears on your radar either if you're looking right at it or when the jammer is being activated?
  • Mission 9 "Lit Fuse" in Ace Combat 5. The main aspect of this mission is that there are enemy bunkers that you have to attack so that your ground troops can move up, but if you don't attack them quickly enough the bunkers will pop back up later. From what I understand, it's possible to totally destroy each bunker on the first pass, but the window to destroy the bunker is super short, and the game basically gives you no indication of how long it'll be until the bunker comes back online, nor does it tell you how quickly they need to be destroyed. This imo is the most boring and un-fun mission in the game, and there's a mission where you just fly through a ravine and take photos.
  • CoD: World at War. The entire campaign on Veteran difficulty.
 
Does anyone recall the PlayStation 2 Futurama game? I was looking at it in my collection recently and my brain flooded with long buried trauma.

I won't look it up to confirm, but I remember the game had a serious, serious difficulty spike when you reached Leela's level on The Sun. It was certainly no hand holder of a game before that stage, I recall it's a tricky 3D platformer with some really headache inducing sequences.

But something about that Sun level is embedded in my mind as impossible. If I recall, there were long sections to clear between checkpoints with a bunch of really hard hitting enemies and difficult jumps to make too. I seem to remember some aspect of the level required not getting hit or getting hit as little as possible on your way through bit that this was next to impossible. I definitely never beat it.

Amazing that what seemed like an offhanded licensing tie in game was such a proto-Dark Souls in my memory.
 
Super License in Gran Turismo 3 A-Spec.
Decided to give this game a go recently since I never gave it much attention in my youth and upon doing this license, it quickly became another example of this. Upon playing it, it was many times harder than International A, so much so, it made me feel like I had skipped at least 3 or 4 licenses just to get there. I managed to get a little over half of them, but a few of them are ones I can honestly say I don't even know how I did and there were 5 I couldn't get at all. Maybe I am a bad driver, but I often missed the bronze by at least 3-4 seconds if not more. I get it's meant to be hard, but there is still such a thing as making it too hard and Super License in GT3 just goes a bit too far with this.

I should note, while I am sure it's worse in other GT games, I haven't played Super License in any other in a very long time so I cannot speak for them. GT3 is the only recent one I have done.
 
Last edited:
Boot up some arcade roms on MAME and you realise today games a fair and easy, pretty much every arcade game wanted to be fed coins every 3 minutes. I remember befriending an arcade tech guy and he would let me and my brother choose 1 game and he would set it to free play for us (top bloke). One night I chose Apache 3 a helicopter game with a moving cabinet having spent an hour, and a crazy amount of credits to get the final boss, we came to realise after another 30 mins that the final boss was an invincible bullet sponge, what a rip lol. Came back an hour later after handing the machine over to some other kids, and they were still trying to defeat this final boss... lol
 
Recently it would have to be Not A Hero's third chapter, it's not the easiest game up to that point but it made me feel like it was training me to stay with the difficulty curve... Then the first level of the third chapter absolutely wiped the floor with me, repeatedly.

Most disappointing has to be MGS 2, I had practically beat it on every difficulty and had almost all the dog tags, the only bit I couldn't do was the bit where you get strangled heading into the final boss on European Extreme. I remember struggling with Vamp (primarily because the controls were and still are terrible) for ages, finally got through it then failed hard at the penultimate hurdle. Most annoying of all is the fact that you can be as good as anyone at the actual game, but then because you can't mash the button fast enough for long enough it won't let you just finish the game.
 
Challenge 43 in the Challenge Series in Need for Speed Most Wanted (2005).
The Challenge Series in the game consists of 68 challenges, or more if you have the Black Edition. It starts off okay and gets progressively harder as you go, but then at challenge 43, it gets noticeably worse than expected and it's more of a learning curve than any of the previous ones. Apart from just driving cleanly, I think what makes or breaks it is what pathway you take when you cut through the trail, but I never have been able to figure out what it is. Some have been able to beat it without going through it, but I never have done this. No matter what I do, I always end up running out of time a long ways away from the finish line.
 
Last edited:
Now that I've played several more games since my original post, I think I will revise my list:
  • Galactic Commander Mars (Pokemon Diamond Version & Pokemon Pearl Version, DS): An under-levelled Purugly with a Speed stat belying its appearance, the no-miss Feint Attack that hits surprisingly hard if you haven't got a Pokemon who's decently bulky, and just enough bulk combined with Sitrus Berry and Mars' Potions to withstand a decent number of hits from anything short of a STAB Fighting move Machop or Monferno.

  • Early Post-Game (Pokemon Black Version & Pokemon White Version, DS): Right out of the gate, the first trainer battles of the Post-Game locations are 10 levels higher than the final boss of the main campaign (level 52-54 for Final Boss, 62-65 for early Post-game NPC battles). Generally, a gap of 10 levels or more is massive unless you're running a team with a high base stat total, so unless you have a Gen 4 save you can transfer from, Gen 5's post-game content can be quite an uphill battle.

  • Super License Test S5 (Gran Turismo 6, PS3): One lap of Ascari Race Resort with the Flying Walrus itself, the Bugatti Veyron. The 900+HP W16, near 2-tonne weight, trick suspension and low-drag low-downforce body make it a very unruly beast for circuit racing, and you have to get at least a 2:20.000 or better to even pass the test; a nightmare time to get if you haven't got a wheel. Even if you do get the bronze to unlock the final Super License races, you need to shave off 6 whole seconds to get the Gold time for the final License Test reward.

  • Thin Ice (Counter-Strike: Condition Zero Deleted Scenes, Steam): While most of the level itself isn't all that bad, the biggest sticking point is the end-level boss. You have to fight a Harrier Jump Jet with nought but an AWP, a Scout-Rifle and a limited number of healing items on the rooftop of the bridge of the ship that the terrorists had hijacked in this mission. The Harrier outranges, out-damages and can outmaneuver you, especially when it's in the fog in the distance, and what's worse is that there is very little cover available and a Terrorist grenadier tossing grenades onto the bridge rooftop that you need to deal with as soon as possible (ideally before the Harrier takes off)

  • Final Battle (Bioshock Infinite, PS3/360/PC/MacOSX/Linux): You have to defend the Airship you have hijacked from enemy attackers on all sides, including both ground troops and enemy gunships. If your airship takes too much damage it's game over. To help you hold them off, you have a summon you can use to attack groups of enemy ground-troops or airships at any time, but each time you use it it has a long cooldown which gets even longer when destroying the gunships. The most consistent way to hold the line is to stack a number of damage-absorbing shield-traps around the ship's core to prevent as much damage as possible from hitting the core itself in between summon attacks, but even that is not perfect as melee enemies can detonate the traps forcing you to reset them which you may not have the time or resources to do in the heat of the moment.

  • Cabaret Club Czar - Club Moon (Yakuza 0, PS3/PS4/Steam/XBOne/Luna): Majima's business side-mode requires you to run a hostess club as effectively as possible to prevent the five biggest club owners in the area. After you have a large enough patron base in a given area, the club owners challenge you who can rake in the most business on a single night. Each of the preceding clubs has an underhanded trick to cripple your earnings in the challenge (tiring your hostesses, attracting your customers out, etc.) the host of Club Moon however, performs the tricks of the other four preceding clubs all at the same time, putting you at a major disadvantage, meaning you'll have to grind as much as you can to get a large enough patron base that you won't be affected as badly when the hit comes in.

  • Emperor Fynalle (Streetpass Mii Plaza: Warrior's Way, 3DS): The Final Battle of Warrior's Way has far and away the largest army in the entire game. Not only that, but his battle works entirely differently to every prior battle. In every regular battle, you must divvy up your army into three different infantry types (Cavalry, Spearmen and Bowmen), then match up your army against the enemy leaders in a "rock-paper-scissors" game (Cavalry=R, Spearmen=P, Bowmen=S). Whoever has the advantageous class in each clash halves the disadvantaged force's strength, with equal infantry types remaining unchanged. The winner of the clash is the force with the higher strength after deductions, and the first army to take two victories wins the battle. For the Emperor however, your entire army fights as the infantry type you choose, and while clash wins do not matter, the infantry count does. After five clashes, you must have more surviving units in your army to win. If you lose, you lose half of the troops that you started the battle with, which can only be replenished from Streetpass hits (dependent on other players' Plaza sizes and whether or not they've played before) or from Play Coins (Warrior's Way has some of the steepest Play Coin costs of any 3DS title at up to 15 Play Coins for the highest tier; only Super Smash Bros. for the 3DS has steeper costs AFAIK, and even that's for optional reward items).

  • Tanks! - Level 12 (Wii Play, Wii): Throughout the game, there are a number of tanks that exhibit different behaviours in order to take you out. Green tanks are introduced in Stage 12, and though they are static, Greens fire tracer rounds which fly as fast as the rockets used by Teal tanks but can ricochet against walls twice before breaking. This combined with the fact that they will adjust their aim to find the optimum angle for a bank-shot that will take you out from your current position. In their debut stage of Level 12, there are two such tanks as well as two Pink tanks that are most similar to the player's tank in movement and attack power, meaning you have to not only fight two moving targets but also keep track of two ricocheting projectiles so that you aren't blindsided in the heat of battle.

  • Hollow Bastion - Demyx 2nd (Kingdom Hearts II, PS2/PS3/PS4/XBOne/PC/Switch): One of the most infamous difficulty spikes of the PS2 Era, the second Demyx encounter features his signature water-clone challenge from his first encounter at Olympus Coliseum Underworld uprated with more clones and on a relatively stricter time-limit. Between clone-summoning phases, Demyx will fight directly by summoning water-based attacks which have massive area denial in the small arena you fight him in, plus a powerful counter-hit if you get behind Demyx and fail the Reaction-Command QTE. Combine that with an obtuse elemental system (there is no Water magic in Kingdom Hearts so Demyx is actually Ice element and therefore weak to fire, contrary to most other RPGs where a water element is present), and the fact the penalty system to prevent Drive Form abuse makes it Four Times As Likely to trigger Anti-Form than normal, which means using Wisdom Form for magic spam isn't a safe option.

  • Basil the Batlord (LEGO Racers, PC/PSX/N64): Each of the seven champions in LEGO Racers has certain patterns to their AI behaviour, particularly in regards to their item usage. Captain Redbeard & Johnny Thunder (Bosses 1 & 4) both primarily favour Projectiles (Red), King Kahuka (Boss 2) prefers Shields (Blue), Baron von Barron (Boss 5) uses traps (Yellow) and Rocket Racer (the final boss) goes for boosters (Green). Basil the Batlord is Boss 3, and like Gypsy Moth (Boss 6), does not prioritize one brick type over another, meaning he can get an early Booster and speed away if you don't get a Boost-start, plus this lack of favouritism means it's less predictable how he'll behave when you're catching up, meaning he could block your projectile with a shield, sabotage you with a trap if you aren't prepared, or just boost away again. This isn't helped by the fact that the opening round; Knightmare-a-Thon, is the only track in the game without a shortcut. Meaning the only way you can catch Basil if he has a strong first lap is through your own driving skill and effective use of items.
 
Last edited:
Raymond_Racer
Basil the Batlord (LEGO Racers, PC/PSX/N64)
Click to expand...
Man I felt this one. I remember having to ask my father to beat him for me.

Although big part of the reason why I couldn't beat him as a child was that every tracks in his championship was just way too spooky. Hated the laughing witch that throws bomb, hated the UFO that pulls you back, and hated every single part of the Adventure Temple Trail.
 
Sonygamer455
Super License in Gran Turismo 3 A-Spec.
Decided to give this game a go recently since I never gave it much attention in my youth and upon doing this license, it quickly became another example of this. Upon playing it, it was many times harder than International A, so much so, it made me feel like I had skipped at least 3 or 4 licenses just to get there. I managed to get a little over half of them, but a few of them are ones I can honestly say I don't even know how I did and there were 5 I couldn't get at all. Maybe I am a bad driver, but I often missed the bronze by at least 3-4 seconds if not more. I get it's meant to be hard, but there is still such a thing as making it too hard and Super License in GT3 just goes a bit too far with this.

I should note, while I am sure it's worse in other GT games, I haven't played Super License in any other in a very long time so I cannot speak for them. GT3 is the only recent one I have done.
Click to expand...
So after beating it normally (surprisingly), I wanted to come back and expand upon this a bit. While the license itself is a difficulty spike alone, the very last one is a difficulty spike within it. It involves driving a Toyota GT-One Race Car around Cote D Azur at a time of 1:35:00 or better. With TCS disabled by default, the GT-One is extremely picky about throttle input and will spin if you so much as look at it wrong, like it can't even handle its own power. The fact you have to navigate it around a tight, narrow track full of blind corners makes this one easily the worst of them all. I get it's meant to be the hardest of the bunch since it's the last, but I think they went a bit too far with this one because it's just too a bit too large of a jump from the others in my opinion.

In fact, I honestly don't care to play this one ever again and will probably use cheat devices in future playthroughs because it just isn't worth the frustration for me.
Raymond_Racer
Super License Test S5 (Gran Turismo 6, PS3): One lap of Ascari Race Resort with the Flying Walrus itself, the Bugatti Veyron. The 900+HP W16, near 2-tonne weight, trick suspension and low-drag low-downforce body make it a very unruly beast for circuit racing, and you have to get at least a 2:20.000 or better to even pass the test; a nightmare time to get if you haven't got a wheel. Even if you do get the bronze to unlock the final Super License races, you need to shave off 6 whole seconds to get the Gold time for the final License Test reward.
Click to expand...
Never played that one, but as someone who drives a Veyron often, I have no doubt it's hard!
 
Sonygamer455
So after beating it normally (surprisingly), I wanted to come back and expand upon this a bit. While the license itself is a difficulty spike alone, the very last one is a difficulty spike within it. It involves driving a Toyota GT-One Race Car around Cote D Azur at a time of 1:35:00 or better. With TCS disabled by default, the GT-One is extremely picky about throttle input and will spin if you so much as look at it wrong, like it can't even handle its own power. The fact you have to navigate it around a tight, narrow track full of blind corners makes this one easily the worst of them all. I get it's meant to be the hardest of the bunch since it's the last, but I think they went a bit too far with this one because it's just too a bit too large of a jump from the others in my opinion.

In fact, I honestly don't care to play this one ever again and will probably use cheat devices in future playthroughs because it just isn't worth the frustration for me.
Click to expand...
You know what's funny? I recently got all golds in GT3s Super License for the first time ever (for reference I've owned GT3 in some capacity since Christmas 2002), and I honestly found the GT-One test to be relatively easy to gold. It turns out the trick to this test is to use manual shifting and be one gear higher than the game wants you to be on most corners (i.e, taking the first turn in 3rd instead of 2nd, staying in 2nd/3rd in the Hotel hairpin, staying in 3rd the whole way through the Swimming Pool Chicane). Basically, spend most of the lap in 3rd and 4th, and never shift down into 1st gear. You can also manage the wheelspin somewhat by quickly getting off and back on the throttle, and/or shifting up when the wheels start to spin. After some experimenting, it took me only 20-30 minutes to beat the gold time by roughly a second, and that was with a very bad lap. Some Youtube videos show players somehow beating the gold time by 5+ seconds. :crazy:

That being said, while I was able to beat S-8 in short order, S-6 (Viper GTS-R on Laguna Seca) straight-up took me ~2 days on-and-off to finally get gold, and I immediately saved my progress and didn't play GT3 for another 3 days after getting the gold time. S-3 (Miata at Trial Mountain) can also kindly go to hell. :lol:
 
Mission 34 in GT4 will always be #1 in my book.

Formula 1 Championship in GT5 pre pit-save update. This was the most stressful championship because at the time we had to do it all at once (or leave the console on between races). Ugh, super stressful, I believe there was rain added to the mix too IIRC(?)

The Water Temple in Ocarina Of Time....in-sanity the number of rooms and keys and add Dark Link to the mix? FFS that was a lot in '98. I do it for funsies now cause I love the game, but back then forget about it.

Honorable Mention goes to the hardest license tests in GT1-3. I have no idea how I golded them all back in the day with those physics :lol:


Jerome
 
NotThePrez
You know what's funny? I recently got all golds in GT3s Super License for the first time ever (for reference I've owned GT3 in some capacity since Christmas 2002), and I honestly found the GT-One test to be relatively easy to gold. It turns out the trick to this test is to use manual shifting and be one gear higher than the game wants you to be on most corners (i.e, taking the first turn in 3rd instead of 2nd, staying in 2nd/3rd in the Hotel hairpin, staying in 3rd the whole way through the Swimming Pool Chicane). Basically, spend most of the lap in 3rd and 4th, and never shift down into 1st gear. You can also manage the wheelspin somewhat by quickly getting off and back on the throttle, and/or shifting up when the wheels start to spin. After some experimenting, it took me only 20-30 minutes to beat the gold time by roughly a second, and that was with a very bad lap. Some Youtube videos show players somehow beating the gold time by 5+ seconds. :crazy:
Click to expand...
Well, I am glad you found a way to do it because I certainly couldn't, I'll keep it in mind if I ever do it again. I can believe the part about never shifting down to 1st gear because I noticed it's the low speeds where you have the most wheelspin.
NotThePrez
S-6 (Viper GTS-R on Laguna Seca) straight-up took me ~2 days on-and-off to finally get gold, and I immediately saved my progress and didn't play GT3 for another 3 days after getting the gold time. S-3 (Miata at Trial Mountain) can also kindly go to hell. :lol:
Click to expand...
Oddly, I had an easier time with those than I did the last one, but S-6 was still hard though.

Something I found is that if I do an endurance race and then go to the license tests, I tend to do a lot better I guess because I've gotten into the rhythm of the game. That's how I managed to beat those and the last one. (bronze that is)
 
Last edited:
The last mission in the Simpsons hit and run, I remember spending all weekend with my cousin trying to beat it I don't think we ever did.
 

Similar threads

Sonygamer455
Worst UI in video games?
Replies
24
Views
8K
Sonygamer455
Sonygamer455
Sonygamer455
Best UI in video games?
Replies
6
Views
1K
TypeRDC5
T
Sonygamer455
Best rewards/unlockables in a video game?
Replies
3
Views
2K
Sonygamer455
Sonygamer455
Sonygamer455
Mysterious Experiences You've Had In Video Games?
2
Replies
39
Views
7K
m355y
m355y
Sonygamer455
Hidden content you wish was in the final game
2
Replies
31
Views
7K
Animedeaf
Animedeaf

Latest Posts

Back