The Best of Video Game Challenges

Gamers always crave for a bigger challenge. When the game has nothing more to offer, however, some incorporate their own difficult challenges that push them to their gaming limits. The following are some of the most interesting and popular ones created.

Randomizers

Beating a game when you know it like the back of hand is not too difficult. It is a completely different challenge to have everything you thought you knew changed. The basic idea of randomizers is that everything in the game – items, collectables, levels – are shuffled around. It forces the player to think through how to progress in a completely different way. Some, like Nintendo’s Super Mario World, don’t just shuffle the order in which you play levels, but also the physics of how the level works. Randomizers essentially change the games into a rogue-like adventure in which no two people will experience the same thing.

Controller Changes

A console’s controller is usually perfectly designed to play the game. However, playing the game with a different apparatus is a whole different ball game. While one of the more difficult challenges, controller changes are endlessly entertaining. One man, for instance, beat Dark Souls, which is infamous for its unfair difficulty, with a guitar controller. Another person used electrical wires to play Overwatch, with bananas as button inputs.

Pokemon Nuzlocke

The Pokemon Nuzlocke challenge is one of the most famous gaming challenges. The rules are simple: catch the first pokemon you see on each route and release any pokemon that faint in battle. While simple on the surface, it has only been accomplished by collection of Pokemon experts. The inability to forge a team and account for type advantages makes every battle the chance to go disasterly wrong. There are also hundred of extended rules such as not using Pokemon centers, releasing the starter, and not being able to run from a wild encounter.

Speedrunning

Last but not least is speedrunning. Speedrunning is playing a game start to finish in as little time a possible using any means necessary. While not hard to accomplish, it constantly pushes a player to improve their best time. There are even gaming marathons held during the winter and summer where multiple runners play through hundreds of game in a single week. It makes the games endlessly replayable and extremely satisfying when completed.

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