What has been the biggest difficulty spike you've encountered in games? Ashen's Seat of the Matriarch dungeon still torments Community coordinator Alex. Let us know yours below!

The biggest difficulty spikes are just accidentally going the wrong way in a souls game

The Valkyrie in God of War. Not the queen but the one in Muspelheim (fire realm) - Gondul. All the Valkyries were a difficulty spike compared to the game but Gondul was the one I found the hardest. The others I defeated in maybe 2-3 tries but Gondul took ages. I wasn't expecting her to be so much stronger than the others. Sure the queen was harder but she used the moves of the others, so by the time I reached her I knew what to do or what to avoid. Gondul was a nightmare. Honorable mentions: The Dahaka from Prince of Persia Warrior Within and Lavenza from Persona 5 Royal.

Jak and Daxter to Jak 2 was a ridiculously big leap in difficulty

One that comes to mind is escaping from the slums in Jak 2. I was cruising along until that mission and almost turned the game off. Finally beat it and went on with the game. I forgot how hard Jak 2 and 3 could be.

When you've just started feeling confident in Final Fantasy XV, maybe even a little cocky, so you stay up past nightfall to see what monsters appear. Only takes one smacking around by an Iron Giant to realize you're nowhere near ready to go up against what lurks in the dark of night.

Biggest difficulty spike for me was in MGS1 as a ten year old. Meryl’s frequency code. “It’s on the back of the CD Case.” Took me a week to realise the code was on the back of the physical copy of the game.

Kena: Bridge of Spirits 1st boss messed me up for the longest time. I spent the first couple hours giving my Rots the perfect hats to only be slapped around by that first boss not 2 minutes later.

Hell house in Final Fantasy 7 Remake was a massive spike in difficulty, found most of the fights straight forward up until that point. It took me 8 hours straight to complete then another 5 straight on Hard mode. Though, finally after 160 hours of playtime I've got a grip of it & can defeat it in under 4 minutes

2 difficulty spikes in FFX. Gagazet Seymour and Yunalesca. Even now when I play, knowing how they attack, I can sometimes be overwhelmed

I remember this from years ago "YOU WANNA PLAY THIS GAME OR NOT, I SAID SLALOM!!" still love all the old Friday Features, classics :)

As a kid I completed driver, brother wiped my save (memory card days), then I tried again and it took a literal week of nights to get out the tutorial, mostly as it was my first touch of gamer rage hahaha

As a Trophy Hunter, I have to say that all Batman: Arkham Knight Trophies (including the many DLC ones) are pretty fair and doable, and then comes the Community Challenges DLC. It's one of the very few games I still don't have 100% for...

I remember playing Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine on Sega Genesis. Spent many hours playing it as a kid. :)

The original Monster Hunter has a bunch of difficulty spikes. Playing and discovering this game for the first time was amazing! To start with you're just running around the hills and forest picking up mushrooms and maybe dodging the occasional Bullfango. Then, your first level-up Proper Monster Hunt is to take on FIVE Velociprey at once! It was total chaos, they leap all over the place while screeching and trying to kill you, and I was screaming and running in and out of the area to get some hits in and recover. But I did it! Then, the next level-up difficulty spike is your first bird-like wyvern, the feared Yian Kut-Ku. This thing had me on the ropes, flying all over the jungle and smashing me into the ground with its massive beak. It took me a few tries, but I got it down! After that, you have learned the skills to take out a bunch of similar monsters. The Velocidrome. The Gypceros. The Cephadrome. You confidently sprint through Velocidrome packs on your way to the "real" challenge. And then you encounter the highest wall of all, the Rathalos. I observed that if you keep getting KO'd in a hunt, upgrade your armour. If you survive but the hunt times out, upgrade your weapon. I had to do both, plus learn the Rathalos' moves and behaviour, and utilise ALL of my hunter tools to take it down. After that, the rest of the game is pretty much a plateau. You casually dispatch Yian Kut-Ku in under 30 seconds, and look at a Rathalos/Rathian pair thinking "yeah I can take them". Only the elder dragon Fatalis adds an extra little bump at the end.

I am ashamed to say I could not get past the Driver tutorial. Straight back to Blockbuster it went!

I always recall the difficulty spike towards the end of God Of War Ascension - think it was a vertical lift or something that I beleive was patched a week or two after launch. I remember deliberately not downloading that patch in order to make sure I did it the OG way.

Yakuza Like a Dragon, where you go up against two characters from previous games simultaneously who are a much higher level than you, unless you grind.

Ah yes, the freaking Demons Gate, I still remember my first encounter with that thing even after 20+ years. I think I ended up defeating it by pure luck, with just one party member alive and summoning Bahamut as a last resource. Fun times.

When I fought the demon's gate I had Vincent on my party and his flipping limit brake HEALED demon's gate so I was properly stuck on the temple for a good while. :)))))

Get Seal Piece At Water Slums in Jak II was an absolute nightmare. Some playthroughs I can muscle my way out after a few attempts, but sometimes I get absolutely bogged down for hours. Unless you’re in the flow it’s bloody relentless.

Driver is actually the hardest game I've ever completed, and yeah - that tutorial is the second hardest mission in the game. If anybody remembers the last mission...it's completely bonkers insane. Don't remember how many goes it took me, but I don't think I'd have the patience for it today.

Digimon World 3. I didn't have trouble as a kid, since I overlevelled so hard I already had a full party of mega digimon when to got to the South Badlands and Mobius Desert back then. I would start a new save over five years later and barely scrape by each and every fight in the South Badlands when I had been trouncing everything in all the previous areas, because my level was low enough that I was pretty far from getting even a single Mega. Even the Coelamon in some of the underwater segments were hell with how strong they were, which makes me wonder exactly how much I had grinded for hours and days upon end as a kid and how I had that much patience. Oh and Ash, get a bow. It's very useful for pulling stuff one by one, even if you don't intend to use a bow often. The Misbegotten in Castle Morne for example will just let you lure them over and take them out one at a time from the entryway.

Final Fantasy Tactics. Two quest make or break you, Inside Riovanes Castle 1&2. There is a save opportunity before RC1, if you use it and can’t beat RC1 or RC2, you have to start the game over. RC1 is a 1v1 fight, and you can easily get 2 shot, if you’re not leveled a bit. The second fight is a traditional fight, but, it’s a narrow walkway you fight on, and range can destroy you while the boss wrecks havoc. Make an addition save file, so you can go back and not get locked.

I beat the tutorial in Driver for the first time 4-5 years ago and I felt like I had finally achieved balance in my life. It was an awesome moment for me. Felt like I had completed a full game.

Killzone 2 had a pretty tough last level and boss fight. Going for the platinum, I remember playing on the hardest difficulty (Veteran or Elite) and being stuck in the courtyard for about a month. After finally making my way past through sheer luck, I spent a further 3 months trying to take down Radec.

Eggmanland from Sonic Unleashed The game had been pretty fun up until that point. But then suddenly the difficulty ratchets up to ungodly levels. It took me a full day just to finish that one level.

I'm glad there's a lot of talk about the slums mission in Jak 2, that game had some obscenely difficult levels compared to the first game. That and the one where you're being chased by the tank from the perspective of the tank's camera.

I'm with Dave that the Driver tutorial was insanely difficult. I will even put my hand up and say that I am one of those people that never got past the tutorial, so I have never played any other part of the game.

First fight against Seymour in FFX, when he has two other guado buddies that heal him... I just couldn´t understand how that fight was sooo difficult.

Sen Armstrong in metal gear rising revengeance, the whole game is a bit of a difficulty spike but the final boss in particular is a bit mental, takes a while to get a grip on what's going on and what you have to do

Demon's Gate destroyed me too, and also taught me an important lesson- make multiple save files, because when I went to load my save again, I was presented with the words "Data is corrupted".

Final Fantasy Tactics for PS1. I used the Rob method of grinding over-levelling. Most battles are fine - they're set level, but this one specific fight you have to do scales upwards - you take on a number of chocobos - and if you're too high level, they are really nasty chocobos, especially for the characters you have at that point.

Goro and Saejima in Yakuza Like A Dragon. The game was fairly easy, then those two came in. I had more trouble with them than I did with Amon in the True Final Millennium Tower.

Oh dear, Rosie mentioning Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine made me think of that mini game in Trails of Cold Steel IV. There are some opponents which are easier and some which are quite difficult at first but can be beaten with some practice. But then there are those who just drop one thing after the other at maximum speed and each of them is a perfect fit. Forget thinking about where to best place my blocks - I can't even recognise colours as fast as those opponents drop them....

Turtles on NES, the water level. Also High Road in Crash bandicoot remake.

Blood Will Tell on PS2. It's a pretty difficult Hack n Slash but when you fight Dororo possessed by Dragon Brood in chapter 2, it's a big jump in difficulty. The final boss Behemoth is also a harsh jump with a 50 hit chain sequence required to finish it off (I never managed it). Honorable mentions are the first Eidolon fights in FFXIII, Hunters in the Resident Evil series, and when you first encounter a giant bird type enemy in The Last Remnant remastered.

Not sure I can pinpoint biggest difficulty spike but some bosses that I remember really giving me problems: 1) Wiegraf’s 2-phase battle where he transforms from Final Fantasy Tactics 2) Legend of Dragoon’s first battle with the water dragoon woman in castle 3) Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne’s Matador

Xcom 2- fighting rulers before the patch. My god. To this day I don't understand how I managed all that.

Rosie, I will give you the ONLY advice I have figured out for Stage 2. You can't only think about each chain at a time. You have to set up multiple small chains at time, that you can get rid of, ALL at the same time to beat him. And even then, for me it would cut close. Stage 3? I have made it there 5 times, and haven't even come close.....

One difficulty spike I wasn't ready for, and more likely never will, is The Witch Doctor boss battle in The Human Village level in Disney's The Jungle Book game from 1993. It was all fine and dandy, when those three monkeys were standing on each others shoulders. But when they split up... ARGH! I just can't handle them. I just can't shoot in one direction and dodge the shots from two or three directions at the same time. It might be needless to say I had never beated that boss. It's so difficult and it's not even the last boss. You get to fight it in somewhere half way through the game.

Just call it the Chooseday Checklist already!

Nail bat absolutely melts the demon wall

solaire sweatshirt? For From some big ones I can think of is owl in sekiro and malenia in elden ring as well as Old Hunters and Ringed City DLC obviously especially if NG+(playing for the first time). Although there's been many in a bunch of games. Kinda hard to explain exactly

In line with Robs entry. I always found the train heist in FF8 having a difficulty spike. Not the boss fight but the clunky controls of dropping down the side of the train and trying to input codes without being caught. But pressing up was like asking Lara crofts butler to hurry and squall would jankily make his way back up just in time to be caught. Every time. I was 9/10 but I hated it. Side not I didn’t have a memory card cap no saves. Failing this was a proper game over for me

"Does anything not make you furious Rob? Dont get mad at that one.." LOL Ash

The Driver tutorial was brutal the first couple of times I did it, but it remains my favourite bit of that game. The feeling when you eventually aced it was never matched in the rest of the game.

Rob... Rob... As much of a Sephiroth-super fan that I am. How can you make it as far as Temple of the Ancients and not use Areis(th)? What is wrong with you!? xD

Insane mode in castle crashers. I'll just say that the mode operates on the 10x rule. Most enemies in the game have 10x their health and do 10x their damage. This is ludicrous by the final levels.

I remember playing mgs2 and the fight against those metal gear rays was very difficult and tedious for me

The court house in Wolfenstein 2 is as close as I have come to throwing my controller at the TV.

I would say Caelid but the environmental cues were aggressively warning me away long before my clueless self was super murdered. There was a fight against Deathstroke in a Batman game from a few years back. It was one of the game's earliest boss fights, and it was by far the most challenging aspect of the whole game, which oddly enough never rose to that level of difficulty again for the rest of its run. It was a curious difficulty spike, in that it was more surprising as a design decision than time consuming or frustrating.

Poor Rosie. I got stuck on stage 6 for a while. Skwheel, a pig blob on wheels. Mind you, this was many moons ago on my actual Sega Megadrive/Genesis console. I eventually beat it, and the rest of the game.

As soon as Rob said FF7 I knew it was going to be Demons Gate 🤣

are we not even going to mention KENA? that game escalated quickly!

12:45 Funny quirk of Rosie: sometimes she will simply repeat a joke someone says

Does midgar zolom in early game considered as difficulty spike or beginner's trap? Tho you can skip it with chocobo

Great shout for Driver, Dave. I was 7 years of age when that game was released. We bought it and I had no idea what a Slalom was. Had no internet to find out either!! Never played it again xD

My 15 minutes of "fame" was when I was a freshman in college living in the dorms because I could beat the Driver tutorial and had a save on my memory card right at the beginning of the game after the tutorial, lol.

The "I can't wait to be king" level in the SNES Lion King.

Hades with his Extreme Measures pact of punishment on. Knew it was going to be tough but damn it's so much harder than I was expecting still haven't got it yet

Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine! I had it in a compilation cartridge back on the Sega Mega Drive about 10 years earlier!

Most recent one for me was Ni No Kuni 2 (played purely because of Rob) and I had finished the game, beaten all the side content only had 1 trophy left for the plat that was easy so decided to start up the DLC missions. I hadn't really seen or heard anything about the DLC but figured I beat Faraway Forest 12 levels under what I had seen most people online beat it at sonic was feeling confident and got to the point I had to fight Mausinger again and oh my god was he insane. Teleport combos that if you mistimed the dodge would one shot you, room filling fireball attacks, just pure chaos but I managed it after a few attempts and then it was on to the next boss. There was no way, she had more health than anything, summoned adds, AoE damage along her movement path, arena wide AoE, homing shots and all of it lethal. There ended my attempt at the DLC and now I am just going to get the plat and call it good enough. PS. Looked it up online afterwards and saw multiple people say they couldn't get past her with maxed out levels and gear and even more people who gave up at Mausinger.

Am I the only one that thought Dave was going to talk about Bloodborne when he started talking about stage 1? Central Yharnam scared off so many players

Haven't watched it yet, but I'll be disappointed if encountering Majima and Saejima for the first time in Yakuza like a Dragon isn't on this list.

I remember playing Arkham Knight on knightmare mode, and when you enter the blimp and have to fight all goons. Took me ages to get all those combos perfect

I always thought it was called Demon wall. I was getting up extra early before school for about 2 weeks to farm exp so that I could beat that god damn boss!

Ash: Look at me, I am Nathan now.

Mean Bean Machine 2P mode has one of the best music tracks put to game.

Aaahh.. Puyo puyo. That game still give me nightmares! To get the platinum in Judgement you had to play a lot of Puyo Puyo...

Bloodborne has a view ones I not so fondly remember: Unseen village Forbidden woods Upper cathedral ward And that damn fishing hamlet🤣🤣

"Maybe I'll give you a call when I need a ride to the grocery store..."

I actually make myself forget the demon wall and get that extremely unpleasant suprise every time I play FFVII 🤣.

I had little problem with driver, I actually done the garage part using the keyboard on pc. My brother couldn't do it though, so I had to do it for him.

Presidents run was definitely the hardest level on Driver... me and my friends found the test at the beginning challenging but not tough...

“It’s was before Ash was born.” “I’m Nath now, so I’ll take his mantle.”

I think I shared this with you before many year ago where you even read the comment on Access Granted. It was in Ratchet and Clank 2 the glider segment on planet Dobbo, that one bit kept me stuck for months! Every day I would give it a few tries and then just go grind weapon exp and bolts, by the time I finally beat it I had bought everything even the best weapon in the game which costs 1 mill. Bolts!

For me, it is a PS2 game called Mafia. Beginning of the game is pretty fun, and not too difficult until you get to... The Race. All Mafia players know about the race. It's a difficulty spike that is strictly based on how poorly the car handles and how precise you have to be with the driving. The Definitive Remake made it easier, but it's still not easy on the hardest difficulty.

It's been a while so my memory is a bit fuzzy, but I think i might have had more trouble with the demon wall in FF12 than in FF7.

I got the wretch in Elden Ring, because while you're just given a bad starting weapon, everything is at 10 from the start, it feels like the default class, but supposed to be "worse than that."

First playthrough of Diablo 2 The Act 2 boss Duriel is notoriously difficult and was an immense uptick in difficulty.

Will somebody please put together a Rosie game explanation compilation!!!

The frozen wastes in Returnal! The Frozen severed are no joke!

Memory unlocked with Mean Bean Machine...still have it on the Mega Drive

Poor Rosie - she never got to the end roll call to know that "Spark" is actually called "Frankly" :D

I loved Mean Bean Machine! One of my favorites growing up.

I would say yugioh forbidden memories. So in the beginning in ancient egypt you can manage to play eith your starting deck and upgrade it with some cards you win but the spike comes when you get to the present. In the present you enter the tournament where your opponents all use high lv monsters where your deck is still on a medium size. Only with luck you can get through it or you have to grind and pray you get some strong monsters.

Can the first level be a difficulty spike by definition? Doesn't the difficulty need to start somewhere and then jump up unexpectedly?

I was playing Ace Combat 7 last night. The 5th mission had me tearing my eyebrows out (I’m bald). Trying to stop bombers destroying your base when every 5 seconds you have a missile chasing you, so frustrating, dual shocks nearly went flying.

When I played the wetch I made sure to not do anything until I bought me some armor and I worked as fast as possible to replace my club with the longsword

Can't believe this feature hasn't been renamed to Ash Wednesdays yet

The first main boss Margit in Elden Ring, also the whole Caelid region 😂

Blighttown in Dark Souls 1. Haven‘t made it through up to this day.

7:14 "I've heard tales of people who couldn't get past the tutorial, and that was their experience of Driver." I feel personally attacked.

The seal piece at the Water Slums in Jak 2. *Vietnam Flashbacks*

Stuntman (PS2) is basically Driver: The Tutorial: The Game.

I never passed the tutorial in Driver and only got to experience the game once Driver 2 came out lol

Disc 3 in Legend of Dragoon you go to this area for the Wingly town and you can't leave the area until you beat it if you don't bring enough potions that's it game over. My last save before that area was 13 hours before getting there that difficulty spike is why I hold onto as many potions as I can now. lol

Ah yes, the "Driver Tutorial". Stuff of nightmares. I did pass it eventually though.

Yeah "Demons gate" was my first ever proper difficulty spike too 😩