| S.T.A.G.E. said: Its so funny, You couldn't get me off of the damn floor when I was younger when I was playing Mario. Super Mario 3 and World and 64 were the best Marios to me filled variety in their levels and suspense, but relatively easy at its core. I guess its that easy to play but hard to master type of thing. I got Aladdin and Contra on my SNES and then we were rockin'. I lived in fear of contra on hard until I got into my teens. I dunno, you probably look deeper into than I do, but I just jumped on everything and ran past certain things to keep time with the stop watch in Mario, because again, another part of the game is to keep time and get to the end before time runs out. Hardcore games tend to have themes that and characters that compare to the die hard gamer, control schemes that are complex and ai that is incredibily smart and also less lives to live. Playing Gears, Halo and Uncharted on the hardest settings got me to realize this, but for instance, when you play Uncharted on the hardest difficulty when you shoot at characters they bob and weave to try and get out of your line of sight when you're firing and if they shoot you good they can kill you in two shots at times. Its amazing how smart the AI get in those games when you just crank up the difficulty. They will be in your quarters guns blazing and sometimes even in formation. |
Looking it from that perspective, Mario will be considered much less complex, because the AI is poor in comparison. I think the level design is what makes mario challenging, and not the enemies. For example, New Super Mario Bros. 2 has a very hard DLC from what I saw, and it takes real skill to complete it. Though the enemies are simple, their placement and the speed required, as well as the availability of platform make it challenging to the core.
It all depends on what is our yardstick. But in the end, if challenge is the aspect we're measuring, AI is only one metric by which we can evaluate it.
