When even Ys is adding easy mode and cheap win tactics, you know something is going on.

When Fire Emblem lets you turn off perma deaths you also know something is going on. Luckily that game is still hard as f*ck (from what I heard, haven't play it yet)

funnily enough I put the Soul's series in that category.  At least when I played Demon's Souls I found the levels to be extremely easy other than the ones in tunnels or small rooms where targeting an enemy would result in me being unable to see.  Then I would get to a boss and die before figuring out the pattern and have to start the whole level over.  It was easy to get through most of the levels if you took your time, but damn was the no checkpoint at a boss thing dumb.  I'm not asking for any advantage.  Give me the same health I had after going through the level and same items, just don't make me go though 50 soldiers and tediously do the same half hour level again just to get back to the only hard part.  Stupid design imo.

lol pretty much proof of bad level design or at least unclear objectives.

I also noticed much later that I was supposed to kick those barrels...

tell that to assassin's creed  

and there is a difference between diffeculty and bad gameplay/enemies. if something is unbalanced within the game causing you to do die so much when in about the whole game things were going smooth then its more of a flaw than an actuall challange and its not really uping the diffeculty, its just spamming you with enemies lol

Yes, that one.  I just remember it being really fiddly on veteran and having to know enemy placements otherwise you'd run through a door and get shotgunned in the face; or even just hit by an assault rifle which would cause your suit to crack and then you'd be living on borrowed time.

And it started off with that horrible tank section, which was made worse on veteran because you'd take fewer hits before you'd die.

AND the checkpointing was absolutely horrible.  From the start of the tank section - you'd go through the gas section, then the shootout outside the factory, then going inside the factory before there were any checkpoints.

All in all, a horrible horrible mission.

Yes way too easy. If a game includes the hardest difficulty from the start then I don't mind.

Kid Icarus:Uprising and The World Ends with You had the best difficulty settings out there.

I want to see more of THAT.

It encourages you to be better at the game. What's the fun of dying to some soldiers when you respawn at the spot? I died a lot of times in Demon Souls and had to repeat the same areas again, but I was getting better, by doing some areas again I start learning the game and be better at it, which help a lot in future areas. It's not frustrating because the enemies are not really cheap (like everything, there are some exceptions in the game imo, but overall most enemies are fine), you just have to learn their patterns and know how to block and attack.

 In this type of cases I think people confuses difficulty with perseverance. If you try a million times one part and never beat it or when you beat it you feel like you didn't learned anything, then that's a really bad design choice. When you try a part a couple of times and beat it and you feel you are getting better, that means the developers have done a good job. 

No one makes you turn off perma-death, though. It's just an option for those that prefer a more casual experience. FE: Awakening on Lunatic, even with perma-death off will give you fits.

Also, anyone looking for a challenging game should check out Etrian Odyssey 4. Like FE it now gives an option to set tthe game to casual but in standard mode it'll have you cursing out loud, yet enjoying it so much that you keep going back for more punishment.