You are quite right that there are indeed two variants of difficulty. I agree that one evolved with what is technically possible as you describe and yea, then there is that mental difficulty you mentioned about Morrowind.
I more or less basically gave up on these extremely complex games (mechanics and systems wise) because they (IMHO obviously) push you into spending too much time to do meta-research and studying. And I just don’t wanna spend more time outside of the game than I do in game + this also starts to feel like “a job” to some degree. Or obviously you can be intelligent and very into it and perhaps realize how these mechanics work yourself but as you mention - some games are just extremely complex IMHO (usually these are strategic games but also others like competitive games, etc.) and the collective knowledge of the internet is in my opinion taken into account while designing these systems.
But yea, then there is that mental difficulty. I’d say Tunic falls into this category. And there are many games like these even among modern AAA titles sometimes (not in that “full scope” like say the mentioned Morrowind). But I wonder if there are people who came to these conclusion by themselves. I mean obviously these things got solved but how? Was it a person by themself or was it a collaborative effort on a site/chat channel or w/e?
Because I am thinking about this a lot and unless I am lying to myself, when I was a kid, I almost 100% FF9 (the only thing I didn’t find/do looking back now is that I never did a speedrun (this concept was absolutely unimaginable to me until relatively recently even) so I didn’t get Excalibur II and I haven’t beaten Ozma - but I found it). And I wonder if that was just me spending a lot of time on the game, enjoying it and thinking about it and piecing stuff together eventually and now I am perhaps “unable” because my brain starts to react with “OMG this is impossible to do alone” quite fast. Or did also these mental difficulties ramp up over time? I am not sure to what end it’d serve but yea.
I mainly wonder if these “super secrets” were always meant to be solved collectively somehow or is it more of a modern take because internet/meta gaming or am I just intellectually lazy/dumb these days? For example let’s consider that Excalibur II in FF9. The only hint a “normal player” has is that a card of it exists in Tetra Master but then you had to speed run the game (12 hours to the very last dungeon) and there you had to look around for it. Was it found accidentally? Or did someone data mine then? Or did some devs talk about it with friends and it spread? And same goes for basically any and all of these “super secrets”.
My main point I guess is that I’d love to spend time with a game I love and try to find these things myself but I am quite unsure whether it’s even possible for some of this stuff.
Yea, what Tunic did was something that was not quite standard in the “days of yore” IMHO, but at least it was being done here and there. Now you open a case and you have one crappy list of plastic paper with either the basic controls or some “coupon” for extra credits valid only in some crap store. And we don’t even have to start about the part how you don’t even have the game on the disc most of the time.
But yes, I recommend Tunic to anyone who wants to catch this (and generally that “good ol’ times” vibe of gaming) feeling. It’s a lovely game and it has that positively tougher difficulty and the need to think about some stuff if you wanna solve all the secrets. Something which not many games do these days (obviously you have FromSoft games and indies but yea).
But this also has a “downside” IMHO. I will be frank, I feel stupid as heck when I think about, say, some of the endings for Sekiro or even stuff in Tunic. I am quite sure I’d be unable to solve most of the stuff by myself. Maybe my brain also got mushed, I dunno. I wonder if I am stupid or if these puzzles are now being made with internet/meta gaming in mind? But I’d rather prefer to not meta game but sometimes I feel almost “forced” (not really as usually this stuff only concerns optional content). I dunno. Anyway, rant over. If anyone wants this kinda vibe gaming used to provide, definitely try Tunic!
Speaking about the back of the case. Remember Metal Gear Solid? Yea, I 'memba.