10 Toughest Video Game Levels That Made You A Better Player
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00:00 The following developers created titles for a very specific demographic.
00:04 The people who'll put up with trial and error mentalities, awkward checkpoint placement
00:08 and brutal changes in difficulty, all in service of moulding them into better players on the
00:14 other side.
00:15 The results are some of the best games you'll ever play, provided you can overcome the challenge.
00:19 I'm Jess from WhatCulture and here are the 10 toughest video game levels that made you
00:23 a better player.
00:25 Number 10 - Bloodborne's Opening Slug
00:27 For all those who didn't know what to expect from those behind Dark Souls, Bloodborne opens
00:32 with a ridiculously arduous stretch of nothing but overwhelming odds, non-stop enemies and
00:38 a boss battle for good measure.
00:39 You've got to do the whole thing on one checkpoint, unless you actively seek out an additional
00:44 save point off the beaten path, another essential tactic for the game.
00:48 Finally coming up for air if you make it through.
00:50 Surviving this opening does one thing and one thing only, making you realise with utmost
00:55 sobriety whether you're dedicated to Bloodborne for the long haul.
00:59 If you'd thought to just check out what everyone's talking about, give it a go.
01:03 From software pull to Gandalf slamming a great big roadblock in the way, screaming "You
01:07 shall not pass!" unless you put the time into perfecting the basics.
01:12 On the other side of this though, you'll be dodging like a pro, having developed the
01:15 preternatural ability to read enemy attack animations before they've started in full.
01:20 You'll be steeled against the game's most comical level of trial and error and ready
01:25 to dig into the minutiae of combat from here on in.
01:28 9 - God of War's Fafnir Battle After a couple of hours of cleaving half
01:33 the undead Norse populace in three, you just knew at some point God of War's combat was
01:38 going to kick off in regards to difficulty spikes and enemy placement.
01:42 Cut to freeing the dragon Fafnir from his smoky shackles and things go from zero to
01:47 ten thousand.
01:48 What was once an accessible system of dodges, combos and finishes turns into memorising
01:53 every pattern and attack animation from an annoying as sin set of enemies.
01:58 With Fafnir himself hanging over the battlefield, you'll have to dodge a wall of flame covering
02:03 the arena, a revenant witch placing down proximity spells and launching tendrils through the
02:08 ground, and two lumbering enemies with wide swing arcs that'll catch you with unblockable
02:13 attacks.
02:14 It is agony.
02:15 Similar to honing your skills in Bloodborne, because this comes after the opening few sequences,
02:20 it's your first look into the elaborate combat chess approach to God of War's more
02:25 intense duels.
02:26 Optional challenge realms Muspelheim and Nilfheim need you to have mastered the art of juggling
02:31 multiple enemy types and dodging into increasingly tight spaces to create safe zones, all of
02:36 which you'll only get down if you can survive freeing Fafnir.
02:40 8 - Crypt of the Necrodancer's First Level An entirely unique dungeon crawler based around
02:46 rhythmic button presses to move your character and attack, unless you choose a much easier
02:51 difficulty setting, just playing Crypt of the Necrodancer means learning to tap directions
02:55 and face buttons in time with a pulsing soundtrack.
02:59 Right from the get-go, you'll be forced into scenarios that require pre-thought and
03:02 planning, as each enemy moves in specific patterns as well.
03:06 Want to offer Disco Dancing Dragon?
03:08 You'll have to move into the right place at the right time, lest you open yourself
03:12 up to every enemy descending into your next open space.
03:16 It's hella complex to understand and even comprehend at first, going against everything
03:21 you've learned in literally every other game ever.
03:23 That said, Crypt of the Necrodancer is easily one of the most fun, charming and constantly
03:28 rewarding roguelikes of them all.
03:30 You'll die copious times against pretty much every new enemy encountered, as they
03:34 all have different patterns to memorize and counter, but the result is a gaming experience
03:39 that, because it requires so much concentration, is addictive and engaging as hell.
03:44 7.Fury's The Line Battle
03:46 A top-down bullet hell shooter twinned with hack-and-slash combat, Fury is a stylish boss
03:51 runner that doesn't exactly ease you in slow.
03:54 But the opening duel is nothing compared to the third boss, The Line.
03:58 Sitting in a central spot and showering the screen with constantly moving projectiles
04:02 like they were coconut shavings, you need to navigate this mess and attempt to stay
04:06 alive.
04:07 Things only get worse when The Line enters the fray, zig-zagging around his own energy
04:11 bolts to stab you in the middle of the fray.
04:14 Perfect timing and maintaining your composure when it feels like the whole screen is baying
04:17 for blood is a must, anything less and you're back to the start.
04:21 This is Fury's big pivot, though, the moment where all the lessons learned from the previous
04:25 encounters get jacked up to 11 and beyond.
04:28 Though you should already have mastered the game's ability to leap between one-on-one
04:32 fighting to top-down bullet hell, the latter forces you to comprehend an entire screen
04:37 of movement or be overcome by it.
04:39 Every future fight falls back on this notion of playing against the screen, and especially
04:44 for the bonus ending boss, it's integral to not getting wiped out in seconds.
04:48 6.
04:49 Ninja Gaiden's Entire First Level
04:51 Not content with throwing a number of lightning-fast enemies at you as a way to encourage precise
04:56 dodges and timing, Ninja Gaiden's first level ends with what other games would've
05:01 saved for a final boss.
05:03 Named Murai and brandishing some vicious nunchucks, his cat-like animation set sees him adopt
05:08 a waiting stance, only to lash out and devour half of your health bar.
05:12 Lose, and you're back to the beginning.
05:14 No checkpoints.
05:15 Ninja Gaiden's unabashedly anti-player mentality likely wouldn't survive today - just look
05:21 at how widely beloved Volga the Viking isn't - but Ninja Gaiden was all about liking it
05:25 or lumping it.
05:26 Either you got good enough to manage crowds of enemies so you could carry that first health
05:30 allowance to the final jewel, or you didn't even see Murai again.
05:34 Credit to Team Ninja, it was a good few hours until the difficulty spikes came a-callin'
05:38 again.
05:39 Until that damn airport level.
05:41 5.
05:42 Any Contra Game
05:43 Coming straight out of the arcades and onto home consoles without any change in mentalities,
05:48 Contra's genuinely stupid difficulty was designed to get as much money out of each
05:52 player as possible.
05:54 In the hands of home console owners, though, it meant you'd barely get through the first
05:57 level - or set of levels - without memorising entire layouts of enemy attacks and projectile
06:03 placement.
06:04 Even the smallest bullets could lay you out flat, despite them sneaking across the bottom
06:08 of the screen, in amongst the smushed-up collections of pixels that make up the level itself.
06:13 As for why it was worth enduring, though, well, unlike the rest of the entries here,
06:17 this wasn't about expanding on a set of abilities or polishing them to a mirror sheen.
06:21 Either you learned to memorise enough of Contra to proceed without tearing your hair out,
06:26 or you didn't play.
06:27 Simple as that.
06:28 4.
06:29 Tomb Raider II - The Great Wall
06:31 Coming after the industry-shaking popularity of the original game, and how Lara's buxom-fuelled
06:37 image meant Tomb Raider as a brand started to be thought of as boobs-first, game-second,
06:42 Tomb Raider II set out to right that wrong immediately.
06:45 Opening with a devastatingly proficient level called The Great Wall, you'd be dodging
06:50 tigers, spike walls and other traps within moments.
06:53 Even gearing up and out of the cave you find yourself in was an exercise in scanning the
06:57 surrounding rockery to pick out handholds and ledges to grab.
07:00 In short, this cemented everything the fans loved about Tomb Raider outside of Lara herself,
07:05 but damn if it doesn't play like a slap in the face.
07:08 Fracturing the player base right down the middle, getting through The Great Wall brings
07:12 a brilliant sense of relief.
07:14 There's a palpable sense of peril to these older Tomb Raider games, thanks to their awkward
07:18 controls and vertical chambers comprising intricate climbable pathways, and focusing
07:23 on that entirely made for a sequel aimed at all the right people.
07:27 Corn knew it was imperative to remind the world that Tomb Raider was a pioneer of playable
07:32 3D spaces, before it was a headline grabber for gaming's most prominent sex symbol.
07:36 The Great Wall accomplished all of this in one level.
07:39 3.
07:40 The Witness's Swamp
07:41 Understanding how The Witness works, what it means, and what creator Jonathan Blow was
07:46 going for involves deprogramming the very way you think about language.
07:50 It involves, in much the same way Braid forced you to rethink the progression of time, approaching
07:56 various puzzle solutions from a number of abstract, unique points of view.
08:00 The entire game is teaching you to read the environment and factor simple shapes into
08:04 grander designs.
08:05 It's self a comment on the function and enlightenment at the heart of various religious
08:10 teachings or wider commentaries on life itself.
08:12 It's heavy stuff, but your first taste of how cognitively messy things can get comes
08:17 during the Swamp level, where one particular Tetronimo puzzle will likely break the majority
08:22 of players.
08:23 Again, the previous areas - and granted, you can go anywhere, but the Bright Swamp is a
08:28 notable draw - fell back on pretty easy ideas that are simple to process.
08:32 Mirror puzzles, ones involving separating colors.
08:35 Yet it's the Swamp where you'll be genuinely stumped for some considerable time, until
08:40 you learn to let go and re-approach from a completely new methodology.
08:44 2.
08:45 Swords of Ditto's Agonizing Progression
08:48 Going back to a top-down Zelda is something even Nintendo seldom do, yet developers won
08:53 bit beyond elected to design something that's just as much linked to the past and Majora's
08:58 Mask as it is Steven Universe.
09:00 The latter only applies to the gorgeous Cartoon Network graphics, but where Swords of Ditto
09:05 gut-punches these otherwise child-friendly assumptions into the sea is with a difficulty
09:10 curve as sharp as steel.
09:12 See Ditto operates on a cycle of five-day turnarounds, culminating in a boss battle
09:16 against a leveled-up lady named Mormo, who unless you did as much combat as possible
09:22 to XP up yourself, will flatten you.
09:24 The twist in the tale is you're supposed to die, over and over, and over, and if you're
09:29 me, over and over and over, until you finally unlock, across multiple character lifetimes,
09:35 the ability to hand down equipment across generations, or the knowledge of what lies
09:39 beneath the dojo.
09:40 Each time you die, you'll have to replay a slow prologue crawl back to your predecessor's
09:45 dropped gear, a slog that batters players with the realization that almost nothing they
09:50 accomplished meant anything in the short-term run.
09:52 Even if you defeat Mormo, 100 years pass and everything starts over again.
09:57 It's deflating, but pushes you to explore the world and find the key to breaking the
10:01 cycle.
10:02 Only then can you eventually, truly win.
10:05 1.
10:06 Driver's License Test
10:07 The creative decision that stopped Driver being 3D GTA two years before GTA 3 even dropped,
10:13 this opening license test genuinely put off a good 70% of all who tried it.
10:18 Simply starting the game threw you into this timed gauntlet of performing specific moves.
10:23 Annoyingly, the game's recognition of your actions wasn't the best, and the area you
10:28 were in was filled with pillars to bounce off, or otherwise interrupt, the last thing
10:32 on the list before the timer ran out.
10:35 I can't help think that if Driver didn't open so catastrophically, it would've fired
10:39 out the gates with enough momentum to rival GTA.
10:42 That 70% I mentioned who gave up?
10:44 They didn't know what they were missing.
10:46 For the rest of us, they discovered a game of 70s cop thriller drifts, blisteringly fun
10:50 destructible cars, and a physics model that only benefited a sizeable city to tear around
10:55 in.
10:56 Those who fell in love with Driver would enjoy two stellar games, until the monstrously naff
11:01 Driver - where the E is a 3 - tanked the franchise forever.
11:04 That is the end of our list, but do let me know down in the comments if you can think
11:08 of any other super tough video game levels that made you a better player.
11:13 As always, thank you so much for hanging out with me, I've been Jess from WhatCulture,
11:16 if you like you can come say hi to me on my twitter account where I'm @JessMcDonald,
11:21 but make sure you stay tuned to us here for plenty more great video game lists.