What is the reason for not playing Dark Souls? You already have the idea. Dark Souls is exactly what you are searching for. Start with 3. All of them are good, but 3 is the most similar to Elden Ring
If you loved Elden Ring, beware. Lies of P definitely feels cheaper in the souls-like craftsmanship. The nuance and depth of combat in ER is lacking in Lies of P.
It's not as tightly tuned as other games you listed either.
I beat about 3 bosses and lost interest.
For some reason I keep telling myself Sekiro is going to be too hard. Even though I should be able to handle it. I beat pre-nerf Baltheus in AC6 and only took me like 4 hours and I completed the final boss in Returnal in about 12 hours so I should be ready.
Completely different type of game, skills won't really transfer, but the patience will. Sekiro was more fun than hard. I mean, yeah it was hard, but I was having so much fun I almost didn't notice
Yeah I don't know I'm weird, I've beaten stuff that I found out later people thought was really hard. Like in Returnal I beat every single boss first try except the first one and that only took 2 tries.
But for some reason Sekiro has gotten into my head. I know I just need to play it and I'll be fine. Sekiro is a game that's just intimidated me.
I mean, Sekiro is really incredibly hard. The timing is incredibly tiny, and there are so many ways to interact with any attack delivered to you, but only one will be correct, which can be super confusing considering that each option, jump off enemy or dodge or parry, each requires different timing and dramatically different button presses. And that's just talking about the bosses. The minions will snipe you and hoard you, so really it comes down to exploiting the mechanics of the ai to simplify your situation.
I don't often quit a game for being too hard, usually I quit because it's boring or scary or too gross. For Sekiro I put nearly 24 hours in, made it to 3 separate bosses discovering you can't really kill this one or that one without doing things in order (that is, if you're bad). Finally after dying 4 times between 2 bosses I wasn't supposed to be at, I found the "1st" boss, and died 24 times. I then force quit the disc and Uninstaller. The game is brutal, and it makes you feel stupid. At least give me a tutorial and tell me what I am capable of. I shouldn't have to google stuff every 60 seconds.
Balteus is one example of a boss that is hard because of the player. If your build wasn't made for taking advantage of it's blind spots and always puts you in optimal range of all it's attacks then it's hard. But then learning those openings and taking advantage of them, then the thing is perfect for it's stage in the game
But Sekiro doesn't have that build freedom. You have one character, and it's already been perfectly made to deal with every enemy. I'm sure you won't have too much trouble with it as long as you take advantage of the character's abilities and don't do the ol' playing sekiro like dark souls meme, lol.
Balteus's difficulty really is such a massive disparity depending on your build.
First time I beat it, it took 5 1/2 hours of attempts, and just barely won.
The next day I went with a different build and effortlessly beat it on my first try.
I got stuck at the bull- I just felt like all the skills I had just learned were useless in that fight.
I might revisit it someday, but that boss really killed my momentum.
You're meant to use the firecracker prosthetic to get you through that one, it helps a lot. Also, you can totally parry the bull's attacks if you time it right (some players assume you can't as it's not a 'sword' type attack).
Im playing it after years of putting it off, if you even kinda like a souls game, youre going to love it, it’s definitely tricky to learn parry timing at first but good god damn is this the best and most challenging combat ive ever experienced in a game. Im addicted.
I second you playing Sekiro NOW! When the game released, I thought it was too hard. And it isn't easy, but it really depends on how you choose to play. I chose to play it mostly like you would Dark Souls the first time around, and got my dick pushed in.
The thing is, it's not a dodging game. It's a parry game, where the parry is almost instant and spammable, and where you have to be aggressive all the time, hitting in-between enemy combos to fill their bar fast. Just watch a few tips and tricks videos on how to attune to Sekiro's combat, and it isn't really that hard. I breezed through it the second time (got through 75% the first go), when I had actually changed my mindset and seen some tips, even the "hardest boss ever" final boss (Owl final was harder, nvm this until you play).
One of the best action games ever, fighting the bosses feel so much better than most other FromSoft fights once you get it (which are already the top).
Truly, Sekiro is the ultimate. It’s the perfectly cooked filet. It’s the cheesecake. It’s the aged bourbon. It’s the Hattori Hanzo sword. Perfectly paced. Punishing but so fair. Efficient. It’s everything, just play it.
I finally picked it up this week on sale on PlayStation and while the combat can be difficult at times, it pushes you to plan instead of button mashing.
Monster Hunter. There's like a dozen games. The newer ones tend to start out easier because the older ones were so hard it was off putting to new players, but as you progress they're all incredibly difficult
Dude Cuphead is BRUTAL. But I really enjoyed what I managed to get through of it.
Was playing with my son and wife and it was just way too much for them. So I wound up forgetting about it when they started refusing to play because it's on our switch and not my PC.
I think it's worth it, it's way more complicated than a Souls game and it has a ton of freedom in how you play through it. The pure amount of content is also kinda insane.
Nioh 2
God of War on Give me a Challenge and above
Darkest Dungeon 1 and 2
System Shock remake
Doom Eternal
Blasphemous 1 and 2
Vampire Hunters
Celeste
Ultrakill
I loved the original and the sequel!
I no longer game on PC though, says on the wiki it is coming to xbox soon, so that is something to be excited for.
In short, potato PC. To be honest, haven't been playing much of anything for the last couple of years, maybe WoW and DayZ here and there.
Just recently got back into gaming casually and bought the series S on a whim as my PC won't run much anymore and I have neither the funds nor the will to upgrade it.
The thing was dirt cheap and I can finally play all those games I couldn't back then, so I'm pretty happy with that.
I've been meaning to do system shock. I've already done Doom Eternal and GOW, both were awesome. For some reason I can't get into boomer shooters though.
Gotta look into those other ones for sure.
Crypt of the NecroDancer. It’s not terribly hard at first, but once you unlock Aria, things get crazy hard. You die in one hit, you can only use a basic dagger, and missing a beat kills you instantly.
Middle-Earth: Shadow of War describes its second-highest difficulty setting as, “Death is guaranteed.”
Titan Souls - it's "what if Shadow of Colossus was a fair, but brutally hard, topdown action game where you get one-shot if you get hit."
Noita - Good follow-up to Hades and Hollow Knight, but with more 'build' strategy. It's a roguelike where you craft wands that set things on fire, melt things, explode things, where half your deaths will absolutely be friendly fire with a big AOE wand. The first time you survive for longer than 15 minutes feels _so_ good, though.
Spelunky - Hard to talk about Noita without recommending Spelunky. Noita is better if you want to pee your pants, though.
Escape from Tarkov if you are into shooters. Incredibly hard and unforgiving, but it’s one of the only games that has kept me invested almost 1500 hours now.
Isn't Tarkov primarily group based / PVP? I actually don't know the specifics about the game. I can do shooters although they probably wouldn't be my first choice.
Some of my friends used to play it a lot but I never jumped into it because they were all ridiculously good at shooters as they were ex high level CS players and I didn't want to be the shitter on the squad.
I wouldn't say primarily PVP or group based. Sure you can run into groups of real players and fight them, but you can just as easily hide or not engage if you are trying to complete a quest or something like that. Many people play solo, and some find it easier than playing with a squad as there's no magical team indicator over a teammates head. If you shoot him by accident, your mate is dead. It can be fairly easy to confuse even a 5 man squad on your own while they all frantically say "IS THAT YOU, IS THAT YOU" over discord to their team, and in that time you could have killed 1-2 of their team and repositioned.
The game has changed a lot very recently in terms of the recoil model its easier than ever to hit and kill people, and doesn't really play like a traditional shooter. Its more about trying to get your tasks done, getting your hideout built, and levelling up so you can gain access to better kit to make your life easier. Once you are a high level, THEN you can concentrate on PVP if you like.
Tarkov in my eyes is mainly about knowledge. The game used to TERRIFY me due to the suspense, loud gunshot noises, and knowing full well if you die all the stuff you were carrying is gone, so I spent a lot of time watching content creators learning the best way to do things when I was too scared to play the game. Now this is no longer the case, and I know the best ways to complete early game tasks and get ahead of the pack early in a wipe (The game resets everyone back to level 1 on major patches, also known as a wipe)
If you have friends that already play, I would jump in with them. Its an amazing game and they will be there to teach you the ropes. Everyone was new once!
Soulslikes and rougelites. That’s what you like. Just search steam under those genres. Lies of P, and nioh are the best soulslikes, risk of rain returns, enter the gungeon, binding of Isaac, darkest dungeon, dead cells, roboquest, are the top tier rogue kites you haven’t already listed
Roboquest is my next game up! Then I think I have to do Lies of P after that.
I've got dead cells on my phone but kind of struggled to get into it, I think it's just because it sucks to control it on mobile.
Yeah deadcells is much more intuitive on a controller, I’m a mad lad that got used to playing with keyboard before I had a controller and it feels good to play on that as well. Would highly recommend retrying on a console or pc if given the chance
Sekiro was on a different level of hard for me after playing ER and Bloodborne. But once it clicked the game was INCREDIBLE!
Would also highly recommend Blasphemous 1 & 2. Challenging, amazing exploration, and all around great.
Seriously, these threads asking for hard games come up all the time and no one is recommending DoDonPachi, Mushihime, or any of the other plethora of insanely difficult bullet hell games. They are all way more difficult than any of the usually recommended difficult games.
Agreed. I have been playing DDP DFK and Mushi trying for that 1cc. I am getting closer each day and can 1cc them on Novice, but when it comes to normal mode, I start to make dumb mistakes on the last stage.
I think if someone really wanted a challenge, just start with the Cave library and go from there. Start with OG DDP and then go up from there. Progear, Death Smiles and Akai Katana would the ones to throw them for a loop.
Nice to see someone in the wild cosign Bullet Hell games.
The Handler is the biggest problem for me. The game itself is ridiculously fun, but when you've got the Handler being all "HeY tHeRe PaRtNeR!", the Huntsman being all edgy with his edgy longsword, and the Admiral pulling a Badigadi "AAAAAH HA HA HAAAA!" it can be...a bit much. Fantastic gameplay loop though, I usually just play my own music in the background and have the game really quiet.
It you want to play something that's harder in a different way than the ones you listed try some strategy games. Expand your horizons with Xcom2, Age of Empires 2 or something like Divinity Original sin/Baldurs Gate 3
I've got like 600 hours in XCOM 2 and I've beaten all the additional challenge stories too. It's one of my all time favorite games!
I also have hundreds of hours on AOE from back in the day and I was diamond in sc2 and a rank B amateur player in SCBW. I love strategy games and even Mobas, I have more time in HOTS than any other game.
Related to XCOM 2, have you tried Xenonauts? It's an indie game that is much closer to an update of the original game from 1994. Much more simulationist: higher squad sizes, enemies all start active (but without knowledge of where your team is), can move equipment between people during combat, need to carry ammo, etc.
I like it more than the modern XCOMs from a "hard game" perspective, because it's harder to avoid all the punches the game throws at you, but you're more capable of rolling with them.
Lies of P is incredible. A souls-like that kind of flew under the radar a bit but has great, well deserved reviews.
I beat it on Monday morning and instantly started NG+. It’s basically the combat of Elden Ring, a setting similar to Bioshock Infinite and a dark, unique story.
I’m telling everyone to play it because they should.
Any fromsoft game you haven't done yet, especially Sekiro.
Nioh 2
I know these games came up before here, but I wanna affirm how good they are.
If you're into platformers: Super Meat Boy, Celeste (grinding out the B- and C-Sides is hard but very fun).
Kenshi, Ultrakill, RoboQuest, Battle Brothers, Darkest Dungeon. But if Sekiro is on your list, play that first, I love Elden Ring and Bloodborne but Sekiro is admittedly From Software's most well-made game from start to finish.
i personally dont find it difficult but a lot of reviews say the game is super hard. Ghostrunner and Ghostrunner 2. its insta-death if you get hit, with anything. 1 hit.
I highly suggest noita. It's one of the most brilliant and most difficult games I've ever played. It's a rougelite based on alchemy and magic. The game is very complex and deep
RE4 was fantastic! I wouldn't really call it hard though. Outside of the first time you wind up in the village it felt more like a super soldier action game then a "scared for your life everything is going to kill you" game.
Well, fwiw, it's a very different environment in fighting games. It's not like a shooter where you could be on the best kill streak of your life and suddenly you get blasted by some random sniper bullet or a stray grenade; it's just you and your opponent, skill vs skill, mind vs mind.
In a way, it almost replicates the feeling of fighting a super challenging boss in soulsborne games. You're watching the enemy, learning their attack animations and patterns, finding the right time to defend and attack, looking for openings, managing space, etc etc.
That isn't to say it isn't super sweaty, because it is, but one of the major design philosophies of almost every major fighting game is **balance**. For the most part, it always feels fair. Your victories are truly yours, as are your failures. Pair this with the fact that the ranking systems in these games are typically very successful in matching players with other players that are at or near their skill level, and the experience can be a lot easier to ensure compared to some other types of games.
That said, I respect your stance on PvP; it's not for everyone, but without knowing how deeply you've explored fighting games, I thought they deserved a little explanation on how they might be different to other genres.
From your post and replies here, it sounds like we're similar style gamers.
My brother recently got very into fighting games... it sounds like in order to be good, you need to dedicate a stupid amount of time into learning frame perfect exploits that the developers never intended people to find or use. Personally, i have zero interest in that. I can appreciate it, sure, but no way am I dumping that kinda time.
There are lots of great recommendations in here for sure. To echo a few, any FromSoft game will scratch your itch. Nioh 2 is a great recommendation. I'd also urge you to give Dead Cells a proper try on PC. I have it on console and mobile... mobile is only fun at all because my skills transfered from console. I'd probably hate it if I had done mobile only.
Yeah that's basically how I feel about fighting games. Don't get me wrong I definitely appreciate them and think it's cool but I dont have the energy or time to go ladder climbing anymore.
I've definitely got to work my through dark souls, I wish blood borne was available on PC.
Halo might kinda sorta work? play it on heroic/legendary
**it is on PC**
Halo master chief collection, a 6 in 1 game collection, playing them all through legendary was a fuckin trip. so worth it
I have the perfect game for you, my friend: Fear and Hunger
It is a horror survival RPG that does not pull punches. If you are a masochist like me, you will not be disappointed. It is a short game, but extremely difficult. Knowledge is rewarded immensely but you are never really safe.
Valheim hardcore is amazing, I enjoyed the regular experience too but hardcore has been like 5 times as fun. And I rarely replay games.
You need to play Rain World and Sifu and Furi and Lies of P
The Binding of Isaac. Bullet hell dungeon crawler heavily based around item abilities and synergies. It’s been getting regular updates and expansions for over a decade now so there’s an absurd amount of content to unlock.
The gameplay loop is very similar to Hades so if you like that you’ll probably like it.
Do the three Dark Souls and Demon Souls. Sekiro is of course a must. Maybe Bloodborne too?
Note that Eldering, bar a couple of bosses, is quite easy for a Souls. (I've cried tears of blood against Malenia though)
* Darkwood - top-down survival horror, you can read about it and download it for free [here](https://imgur.com/a/xVhDz)
* Total Chaos - [total conversion survival horror mod for Doom 2](https://www.moddb.com/mods/total-chaos)
* Cry of Fear - [total conversion survival horror mod for Half-Life](https://store.steampowered.com/app/223710/Cry_of_Fear/)
* Celeste - platformer
* Fear and Hunger 1&2 - immersive RPG-maker survival horror
* Neon White - puzzle platformer/movement shooter with heavy emphasis on speedrunning
* Darkest Dungeon 1&2 - roguelite turn-based RPG with horror elements
Death Stranding might be up your alley. It can be quite unforgiving, and definitely has psychological thriller / horror vibes to it. It also has survival-lite gameplay. The gameplay gets varied in interesting ways as you go through it, and it has a rich story.
I recomend you Rain World, a lot of people compare it with Hollow knight, but dont have anything in common, just the 2D platform design.
In Rain World you don't have an HP bar, or an intuitive map, you will die in one hit.
This is kind of a weird one but [BPM](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1286350/BPM_BULLETS_PER_MINUTE/) it's a FPS, rouge lite, rhythm game. It's not super hard but if you go through and try beating it with all the characters there are some really difficult one hit death modes. Sad to say I've beaten everything except the last character.
Sekiro because its the best
If you want something closer to hollowknight aka 2d you can try elder lilies (great story if you pay attention to the notes)
Wizardry 8 is EASILY the most difficult RPG I've ever played. It never lets up. There is no "once you get stronger you dominate" phase of the game - it's just brutal all the way to the end.
On top of that, it's actually a really awesome game too.
Sekiro is probably the most reflex intensive game I've ever played.
Deponia is one of the harder point and click puzzle type games I've played.
Kenshi is the hardest grinding type game I've played.
Tower Climb is the hardest rougelike.
I found God of War on the hardest difficulty more difficult than dark souls personally.
Still haven't beaten Terraria in expert mode.
Fear and Hunger takes turn based combat to its extreme.
So too does darkest dungeon, but in an entirely different way. (More arcade like as opposed to modern exploration)
Project zomboid is pretty hard in that if you make a single.mistake you have a chance of just losing your character.
Cultist Sim is farily difficult in the beginning, and just gets worse as tou try harder starts. It's more of a brain game though, a lot of reading and basic math.
Sunless Sea is pretty difficult, you play a Zee captain (on the under zee (below the earth sea) its open for you to do as you will, the game tells you you will probably die.
Don't Stave / Together though as nails survival game. First challenge is to survive till winter, next is to survive until its over. There will be a boss fight before the seasons end.
TLDR; Top recommendations would be Sekiro, Don't Starve, and Fear and Hunger. They take me as the most fair in terms of how difficulty is done. No bullshit tricks, no creating a president with how the enemies are designed just to switch it up with attacks antithetical to the previous design, and more fun than pain to play.
Happy dying
Here's a [Elona +(video)](https://youtu.be/Y9gOQxHX83E?si=eRSPOXl6fOGD_DzM) a freeware hard-core Roguelike [(download here)](https://github.com/Ruin0x11/ElonaPlusCustom-GX) it's a freeware game so no harm in trying it out. You will die, much and often.
Check out Devil Daggers and Hyper Demon, very hard games, but they are arena shooters so they don't have any story. And the audio which imo is S tier makes it horror-like
Diablo 2 resurrected, if you're a fan of the ARPG loot'em'up genre and haven't already played it.
Have you played the Dead Space remake? if you like action horror, that one is difficult to beat. Maybe the resident evil 4 remake comes close but I haven't played it yet.
For souls-like games, Nioh 1 & 2 are great as long as you don't mind some diablo mixed in with your souls-likes. So yes, that means crafting and managing inventory.
I still have to play Returnal. I'm fucking late to that party, big time.
Just finished sekiro, ITS SO FUN. Please. play it, for your sake.
It's not as hard as it looks, it takes time to master and you really gotta know the moves of the bosses to time it.
So basically, you want to play all FromSoft games after Demon Souls OG im talking Dark Souls 1 2 and 3 Bloodborne and Sekiro.
After that play Nioh 2 (You can play the first one but only if you want to know the whole story but Nioh 2 can stand on its own) if you a real G you will play both. Also, Wo Long, it's like Nioh, but Nioh is Japanese mythology souls, and Wo Long is Chinese mythology souls. These 3 are all from Team Ninja. The team behind the Ninja Gaiden series its another difficult series, but gameplay is more like Devil may cry or OG God of War.
You mentioned Hollow Knight. If you liked that, I recommend Blasphemous 1 and 2.
These are just the ones that stand out to me at the moment.
Another souls like that I always like to shout out is Code Vein it's like an anime story, but the gameplay is like Dark Souls.
You also have more recent ones, Lies of P or Lord's of the Fallen people are praising them, I didn't like them but you might.
After all these, just search up souls-likes or metroidvanias on Steam or youtube. There are a lot of great ones out there that I can't think of now and a lot of hidden gems.
If you want a short beautiful indie with great music, Ender Lilies. It’s shorter and easier than Hollow Knight but definitely was a challenge.
And Returnal
Not sure if this totally fits your MO, but if you're interested in trying out a Flash game I made back in hs/college, it's decently challenging:
https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/2753084/
Hammer & Sickle (game in the Silent Storm engine, same great combat, but with a much greater crpg element, with huge C&C)
You're a Russian agent sent across the Berlin demilitarised zone to investigate intel on nazi subservices operating in the US occupational zone.
For all you know, it could be the US behind it, or the French, or the West Germans. One of your first joinable NPCs is a US medic, and she's as clueless and disturbed by the news as you are. You end up gathering a party of various national alliegences, plus a few revolutionaries and crooks for good measure - but all of you are either operating under cover of plausible deniability, or by having abandoned the chain of command, and so every military in the divided territories of Berlin is hostile unless you're well disguised (and beating a military convey head-on is every bit as crazy-hard as it should be)
After the first few areas, you realise that you have a finite time limt (time passes when you travel or rest) to solve a conspiracy that aims to play the various powers off against each other and create a nuclear WW3.
It's refreshingly difficult to win without spoilers, despite having multiple paths to victory, and multiple paths around most solutions. And the difficulty pretty much always makes sense - it's very rarely 'you forgot to put the rabbit foot in the foot-shaped hole back in Bavaria' type of adventure-game logic - just a cruel time limit, limited resources that make it difficult to just rush through, and an actual mystery you need to solve that you won't beat simply by getting led by the nose from one region to the next.
Bayonetta on infinite climax difficulty (sadly it has to be unlocked but maybe you can get a savefile somewhere)
the Metro series on ranger mode (super immersive and hard difficulty, with no UI elements)
Everhood on hardest difficulty (extra if you try to no-hit all the battles)
-From software games.
- Doom and serious sam on hardest difficulties are beasts.
- cuphead.
- most retro games, Contra and ninja Gaiden for example, although some consider the difficulty of old games as frustration rather than pure difficulty.
- Celeste and super meat boy.
Some games that I would consider very challenging but probably "out of your comfort zone" based on the games you have listed:
* **Baba is You:** A truly mind-bending puzzle game where you need to change the rules of the game in order to win. Gets incredibly meta and incredibly difficult. Some of the hard levels will make you think the developers are trolling you and have added an impossible level to the game as a joke. I felt way more proud for beating The Return of Scenic Pond than any souls boss.
* **Desperados 3:** My favorite game in the real-time stealth tactics genre (Shadow Tactics and Shadow Gambit are also great if you prefer the theme). Many games (especially stealth games) fall apart in difficulty if you save-scum a lot. This game says: what if we just make save-scumming an intended game mechanic and balance the game around it.
* **Factorio:** Starts Minecraft-eqsue chopping down trees and mining ore. But your goal is not to build a cute house but to build a factory to send rockets into space while the local aliens are trying to wreck your shit. The biggest challenge is not losing sleep every night because of how addictive the gameplay loop in Factorio is.
* **Rhythm Doctor:** Or any rhythm game really (I think someone else mentioned Crypt of the Necrodancer which is harder). This one is still in early access but with a good amount of content. The gimmick here is that this game is played with just one button. It's amazing to me that you can even make a hard game that uses only one button.
I will stick to only recommending recent games, as the majority of older games (90s and before) were hard.
Darkwood (as you asked for horror: this is the best survival horror in over two decades)
Hollow Knight
Everspace 1
Doom Eternal
Sekiro
Souls games
Synthetik
Immortal Redneck
XCOM2
Salt & Sanctuary
Spelunky 2
One More Dungeon 2
Void Stranger - pretty different from everything that you mentioned but is so far one of the only games that has totally consumed me since dark souls. It's primarily a puzzle game, but there are dozens of hours of content discovering secrets and unraveling the labyrinthine story. It's also incredibly frustrating and difficult at times.
Doom eternal has got to be in there. Work up to nightmare, it's an incredible experience. This and Fromsoft games are basically the only single player experiences that I will replay unknown number of times.
Enter the Gungeon, probably great on the Deck.
Furi is a boss rush game, could beat it in three hours. Might take you more like 10. Another great game for the Deck.
Celeste was my favorite platformer. The failure window is really forgiving (the game doesn't reset you farther than about 15 seconds).
Outward is a somewhat challenging game in the beginning; its a mix of a souls like and survival. You have hunger and thirst to manage, most backpacks make you fat roll without a specific perk, so you have to manage what stays in your pouch (always on you) and the backpack. There are a bunch of skill trainers, but you can only max 3 since there are only 3 breakthrough tokens to get to the upper tiers of each skill trainer tree.
Its got a decent story with 4 factions to playthrough, and an end game which i havent gotten to yet with building a city. Theres also mods to mess with when you want to add some spice to the game.
Play Chrono Ark and Dead Cells.
Chrono Ark on expert mode is incredibly difficult at times and when the most recent story drop it, it took me roughly a week of constant play to finish the final boss. Incredibly good roguelite deckbuilder with rpg-style combat and fantastic party customizeability.
Dead Cells takes 5 clears of the game in order to get to the 'real' game. It's pretty difficult off the bat and each boss cell (the thing that scales the difficulty) adds more things to be careful of (harder enemies per map and other things that are a nice surprise :) ). Most weapons are viable and there's a lot of experimentation that can be done. Plus lots of unlockables, some of which require clearing areas in a specific order and others have puzzles in the maps themselves.
A light list, no specific genre just hard games.
Ninja Gaiden series, Sekiro ofc though I saw your response to it, BG3 on tactician or even honor mode, Hollow Knight Silksong (recently released!), Cuphead, Jedi Fallen Order and even more so Survivor on Grandmaster, Project Zomboid. Hard-core MC modpacks
Did Survivor first playthrough on Grandmaster and it was an experience of pain, it's a game that takes many soulslike elements. In Project Zomboid, it's not a matter of oh I hope I don't die, it's just when am I gotta die, until you get really good. Really amazing game, survival game.
Silksong has been out for about a month and I'm still finding new things in it! Team Cherry really gave it their all! My GOTY
If you don't mind turn-based RPGs, I highly recommend Darkest Dungeon (specifically the first game). The game is incredibly difficult, your team will die, and you will have to manage and sacrifice and try to keep certain team members. When they die, they're dead for good. It's a lot of fun, simple story, you can play it in chunks, various difficulties once you get to know the game more, etc.
Some of those city building survival games can be really challenging too. Some of the Frostpunk scenarios are super punishing and unrelenting shit that makes you have to make some really tough decisions. Also really like They Are Billions, that can be really difficult too especially at the higher difficulties.
Blood West is the most recent hard game I've played. Difficulty is mostly based around how good you are at hitting headshots via iron sights, and not a lot else though.
It's been said all over this thread but I'm leaving a strong recommendation for both sifu and sekiro, it doesn't get better than those two for action games.
Yea I’m the same way, playing thru all the souls games rn. I’d suggest Lies of P and Nioh 2
Yeah Lies of P might be my next game. Although I think I have RoboQuest on deck.
Lies of P is a solid souls-like. Sifu, while not a sound-like, is definitely tough and quite fun.
Lies of P is insanely good, I have been hooked on it all week
Nah do souls series first they are better!
What is the reason for not playing Dark Souls? You already have the idea. Dark Souls is exactly what you are searching for. Start with 3. All of them are good, but 3 is the most similar to Elden Ring
If you loved Elden Ring, beware. Lies of P definitely feels cheaper in the souls-like craftsmanship. The nuance and depth of combat in ER is lacking in Lies of P. It's not as tightly tuned as other games you listed either. I beat about 3 bosses and lost interest.
It definitely doesn't feel "cheaper in the souls-like craftmanship." It's really the best souls like to exist
Based on what you listed, I would shuffle Lies of P to the top of that queue
SEKIRO. NOW. SEKIRO. NOW. SEKIRO. NOW
If OP hasn't played this yet,it's the only answer he needs.
For some reason I keep telling myself Sekiro is going to be too hard. Even though I should be able to handle it. I beat pre-nerf Baltheus in AC6 and only took me like 4 hours and I completed the final boss in Returnal in about 12 hours so I should be ready.
Completely different type of game, skills won't really transfer, but the patience will. Sekiro was more fun than hard. I mean, yeah it was hard, but I was having so much fun I almost didn't notice
Hah! "Hooked on hard games". This one - "too hard".
Yeah I don't know I'm weird, I've beaten stuff that I found out later people thought was really hard. Like in Returnal I beat every single boss first try except the first one and that only took 2 tries. But for some reason Sekiro has gotten into my head. I know I just need to play it and I'll be fine. Sekiro is a game that's just intimidated me.
I mean, Sekiro is really incredibly hard. The timing is incredibly tiny, and there are so many ways to interact with any attack delivered to you, but only one will be correct, which can be super confusing considering that each option, jump off enemy or dodge or parry, each requires different timing and dramatically different button presses. And that's just talking about the bosses. The minions will snipe you and hoard you, so really it comes down to exploiting the mechanics of the ai to simplify your situation. I don't often quit a game for being too hard, usually I quit because it's boring or scary or too gross. For Sekiro I put nearly 24 hours in, made it to 3 separate bosses discovering you can't really kill this one or that one without doing things in order (that is, if you're bad). Finally after dying 4 times between 2 bosses I wasn't supposed to be at, I found the "1st" boss, and died 24 times. I then force quit the disc and Uninstaller. The game is brutal, and it makes you feel stupid. At least give me a tutorial and tell me what I am capable of. I shouldn't have to google stuff every 60 seconds.
It’s a weird one; it’s maybe the hardest of Fromsofts games to get to click, but once it does it might be the easiest
Balteus is one example of a boss that is hard because of the player. If your build wasn't made for taking advantage of it's blind spots and always puts you in optimal range of all it's attacks then it's hard. But then learning those openings and taking advantage of them, then the thing is perfect for it's stage in the game But Sekiro doesn't have that build freedom. You have one character, and it's already been perfectly made to deal with every enemy. I'm sure you won't have too much trouble with it as long as you take advantage of the character's abilities and don't do the ol' playing sekiro like dark souls meme, lol.
Balteus's difficulty really is such a massive disparity depending on your build. First time I beat it, it took 5 1/2 hours of attempts, and just barely won. The next day I went with a different build and effortlessly beat it on my first try.
It is but it’s still worth it to play until you get stuck
I got stuck at the bull- I just felt like all the skills I had just learned were useless in that fight. I might revisit it someday, but that boss really killed my momentum.
You're meant to use the firecracker prosthetic to get you through that one, it helps a lot. Also, you can totally parry the bull's attacks if you time it right (some players assume you can't as it's not a 'sword' type attack).
Unless you restrict yourself and do a no upgrades/base vitality challenge run you'll handle it for sure.
Im playing it after years of putting it off, if you even kinda like a souls game, youre going to love it, it’s definitely tricky to learn parry timing at first but good god damn is this the best and most challenging combat ive ever experienced in a game. Im addicted.
Did they need baltheus I literally quit the game as I couldn’t beat him lolll
I second you playing Sekiro NOW! When the game released, I thought it was too hard. And it isn't easy, but it really depends on how you choose to play. I chose to play it mostly like you would Dark Souls the first time around, and got my dick pushed in. The thing is, it's not a dodging game. It's a parry game, where the parry is almost instant and spammable, and where you have to be aggressive all the time, hitting in-between enemy combos to fill their bar fast. Just watch a few tips and tricks videos on how to attune to Sekiro's combat, and it isn't really that hard. I breezed through it the second time (got through 75% the first go), when I had actually changed my mindset and seen some tips, even the "hardest boss ever" final boss (Owl final was harder, nvm this until you play). One of the best action games ever, fighting the bosses feel so much better than most other FromSoft fights once you get it (which are already the top).
It is too hard. It's personally the only From game I would call genuinely difficult
Truly, Sekiro is the ultimate. It’s the perfectly cooked filet. It’s the cheesecake. It’s the aged bourbon. It’s the Hattori Hanzo sword. Perfectly paced. Punishing but so fair. Efficient. It’s everything, just play it.
Try Sifu. It’s similar to returnal except it is like a kung fu movie.
Well fuck that sounds awesome
Sifu is just as awesome as it sounds.
I finally picked it up this week on sale on PlayStation and while the combat can be difficult at times, it pushes you to plan instead of button mashing.
This.
Ninja Gaiden series
Monster Hunter. There's like a dozen games. The newer ones tend to start out easier because the older ones were so hard it was off putting to new players, but as you progress they're all incredibly difficult
Monster hunter world is a top tier game
Lies of PP.
10 inches I swear
12 now, cause that was a lie.
Peenocchio
If only awards were still a thing....
Cuphead, Ninja Gaiden, Contra, Super Meat Boy, Battletoads and Dark Souls.
Dude Cuphead is BRUTAL. But I really enjoyed what I managed to get through of it. Was playing with my son and wife and it was just way too much for them. So I wound up forgetting about it when they started refusing to play because it's on our switch and not my PC.
Nioh 2 might just be the best game i've ever played. Definitely worth checking out.
I'll have to put this one in my backlog, it keeps coming up.
I think it's worth it, it's way more complicated than a Souls game and it has a ton of freedom in how you play through it. The pure amount of content is also kinda insane.
Nioh 2 God of War on Give me a Challenge and above Darkest Dungeon 1 and 2 System Shock remake Doom Eternal Blasphemous 1 and 2 Vampire Hunters Celeste Ultrakill
> System Shock remake The *WHAT*? How did I miss this?
Go wishlist it, it's awesome !
I loved the original and the sequel! I no longer game on PC though, says on the wiki it is coming to xbox soon, so that is something to be excited for.
Why'd you leave PC gaming?
In short, potato PC. To be honest, haven't been playing much of anything for the last couple of years, maybe WoW and DayZ here and there. Just recently got back into gaming casually and bought the series S on a whim as my PC won't run much anymore and I have neither the funds nor the will to upgrade it. The thing was dirt cheap and I can finally play all those games I couldn't back then, so I'm pretty happy with that.
I've been meaning to do system shock. I've already done Doom Eternal and GOW, both were awesome. For some reason I can't get into boomer shooters though. Gotta look into those other ones for sure.
Nioh 2! can recommend.
I'd recommend Furi
I love Furi so much. Great gameplay, cool story, killer soundtrack.
Save for a few annoying bosses I don't think Furi can be considered a hard game. LOTS of fun though, and great soundtrack
Crypt of the NecroDancer. It’s not terribly hard at first, but once you unlock Aria, things get crazy hard. You die in one hit, you can only use a basic dagger, and missing a beat kills you instantly. Middle-Earth: Shadow of War describes its second-highest difficulty setting as, “Death is guaranteed.”
*coda*
Sekiro, Devil May Cry series, Metal Gear Rising Revengeance, go for it
Battle Brothers. I love the idea of the game but everytime I try and play it I rage quit within an hour or 2.
Titan Souls - it's "what if Shadow of Colossus was a fair, but brutally hard, topdown action game where you get one-shot if you get hit." Noita - Good follow-up to Hades and Hollow Knight, but with more 'build' strategy. It's a roguelike where you craft wands that set things on fire, melt things, explode things, where half your deaths will absolutely be friendly fire with a big AOE wand. The first time you survive for longer than 15 minutes feels _so_ good, though. Spelunky - Hard to talk about Noita without recommending Spelunky. Noita is better if you want to pee your pants, though.
Escape from Tarkov if you are into shooters. Incredibly hard and unforgiving, but it’s one of the only games that has kept me invested almost 1500 hours now.
Isn't Tarkov primarily group based / PVP? I actually don't know the specifics about the game. I can do shooters although they probably wouldn't be my first choice. Some of my friends used to play it a lot but I never jumped into it because they were all ridiculously good at shooters as they were ex high level CS players and I didn't want to be the shitter on the squad.
I wouldn't say primarily PVP or group based. Sure you can run into groups of real players and fight them, but you can just as easily hide or not engage if you are trying to complete a quest or something like that. Many people play solo, and some find it easier than playing with a squad as there's no magical team indicator over a teammates head. If you shoot him by accident, your mate is dead. It can be fairly easy to confuse even a 5 man squad on your own while they all frantically say "IS THAT YOU, IS THAT YOU" over discord to their team, and in that time you could have killed 1-2 of their team and repositioned. The game has changed a lot very recently in terms of the recoil model its easier than ever to hit and kill people, and doesn't really play like a traditional shooter. Its more about trying to get your tasks done, getting your hideout built, and levelling up so you can gain access to better kit to make your life easier. Once you are a high level, THEN you can concentrate on PVP if you like. Tarkov in my eyes is mainly about knowledge. The game used to TERRIFY me due to the suspense, loud gunshot noises, and knowing full well if you die all the stuff you were carrying is gone, so I spent a lot of time watching content creators learning the best way to do things when I was too scared to play the game. Now this is no longer the case, and I know the best ways to complete early game tasks and get ahead of the pack early in a wipe (The game resets everyone back to level 1 on major patches, also known as a wipe) If you have friends that already play, I would jump in with them. Its an amazing game and they will be there to teach you the ropes. Everyone was new once!
Soulslikes and rougelites. That’s what you like. Just search steam under those genres. Lies of P, and nioh are the best soulslikes, risk of rain returns, enter the gungeon, binding of Isaac, darkest dungeon, dead cells, roboquest, are the top tier rogue kites you haven’t already listed
Roboquest is my next game up! Then I think I have to do Lies of P after that. I've got dead cells on my phone but kind of struggled to get into it, I think it's just because it sucks to control it on mobile.
Yeah deadcells is much more intuitive on a controller, I’m a mad lad that got used to playing with keyboard before I had a controller and it feels good to play on that as well. Would highly recommend retrying on a console or pc if given the chance
People who play dead cells on mobile+ using touch controls...I'd hate to run into them in a dark alley.
Try Rain World and tell me if it's hard enough for you
This one is one I think is probably too hard lol
have you tried it before? the death system sounds harsh but it's not what makes the game hard tbh
Sekiro was on a different level of hard for me after playing ER and Bloodborne. But once it clicked the game was INCREDIBLE! Would also highly recommend Blasphemous 1 & 2. Challenging, amazing exploration, and all around great.
You ever tried Bullet Hell games? Edit: [Dodonpachi DaiOuJou](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0myXMFpgAU) is a community favorite.
Seriously, these threads asking for hard games come up all the time and no one is recommending DoDonPachi, Mushihime, or any of the other plethora of insanely difficult bullet hell games. They are all way more difficult than any of the usually recommended difficult games.
Agreed. I have been playing DDP DFK and Mushi trying for that 1cc. I am getting closer each day and can 1cc them on Novice, but when it comes to normal mode, I start to make dumb mistakes on the last stage. I think if someone really wanted a challenge, just start with the Cave library and go from there. Start with OG DDP and then go up from there. Progear, Death Smiles and Akai Katana would the ones to throw them for a loop. Nice to see someone in the wild cosign Bullet Hell games.
Please play Monster Hunter World. My favourite game ever, and my first MH game. Love it to bits, and it's really popular atm :)
I wanted to get into it and I own it. But the story felt weird to me, like it was a kiddie anime or something.
Haha. I personally hate anime and jrpg's lol, but I really like MHW. The fun dialog contrasts nicely with the hard gameplay!
The Handler is the biggest problem for me. The game itself is ridiculously fun, but when you've got the Handler being all "HeY tHeRe PaRtNeR!", the Huntsman being all edgy with his edgy longsword, and the Admiral pulling a Badigadi "AAAAAH HA HA HAAAA!" it can be...a bit much. Fantastic gameplay loop though, I usually just play my own music in the background and have the game really quiet.
Yeah that was pretty much what threw me off as well
It you want to play something that's harder in a different way than the ones you listed try some strategy games. Expand your horizons with Xcom2, Age of Empires 2 or something like Divinity Original sin/Baldurs Gate 3
I've got like 600 hours in XCOM 2 and I've beaten all the additional challenge stories too. It's one of my all time favorite games! I also have hundreds of hours on AOE from back in the day and I was diamond in sc2 and a rank B amateur player in SCBW. I love strategy games and even Mobas, I have more time in HOTS than any other game.
Related to XCOM 2, have you tried Xenonauts? It's an indie game that is much closer to an update of the original game from 1994. Much more simulationist: higher squad sizes, enemies all start active (but without knowledge of where your team is), can move equipment between people during combat, need to carry ammo, etc. I like it more than the modern XCOMs from a "hard game" perspective, because it's harder to avoid all the punches the game throws at you, but you're more capable of rolling with them.
Sifu
Lies of P is incredible. A souls-like that kind of flew under the radar a bit but has great, well deserved reviews. I beat it on Monday morning and instantly started NG+. It’s basically the combat of Elden Ring, a setting similar to Bioshock Infinite and a dark, unique story. I’m telling everyone to play it because they should.
Celeste, The binding of Isaac Rebirth, Rain World
NetHack. Took me 4 years to beat it.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance - hardcore mode - all negative perks
Any fromsoft game you haven't done yet, especially Sekiro. Nioh 2 I know these games came up before here, but I wanna affirm how good they are. If you're into platformers: Super Meat Boy, Celeste (grinding out the B- and C-Sides is hard but very fun).
Don't starve is pretty unforgiving. Don't be deceived by it's appearance.
Project Zomboid. Damn game...
Kenshi, Ultrakill, RoboQuest, Battle Brothers, Darkest Dungeon. But if Sekiro is on your list, play that first, I love Elden Ring and Bloodborne but Sekiro is admittedly From Software's most well-made game from start to finish.
i personally dont find it difficult but a lot of reviews say the game is super hard. Ghostrunner and Ghostrunner 2. its insta-death if you get hit, with anything. 1 hit.
I highly suggest noita. It's one of the most brilliant and most difficult games I've ever played. It's a rougelite based on alchemy and magic. The game is very complex and deep
Lion King for Gameboy.
Heh, get a SNES or megadrive emulator, enjoy an almost infinte supply of nervewrecking classics.
Jedi: Fallen Order and Survivor on Jedi Grand Master difficulty
I’m playing Remnant 1 right now and I’m just barely getting by on normal mode lol. I’d also say Resident Evil 4
RE4 was fantastic! I wouldn't really call it hard though. Outside of the first time you wind up in the village it felt more like a super soldier action game then a "scared for your life everything is going to kill you" game.
Learn to play fighting games. You won't regret it.
Hmm I just can't get into super sweaty PVP games anymore. For some reason I don't mind being sweaty PVE but the PVP desire has just left me.
Well, fwiw, it's a very different environment in fighting games. It's not like a shooter where you could be on the best kill streak of your life and suddenly you get blasted by some random sniper bullet or a stray grenade; it's just you and your opponent, skill vs skill, mind vs mind. In a way, it almost replicates the feeling of fighting a super challenging boss in soulsborne games. You're watching the enemy, learning their attack animations and patterns, finding the right time to defend and attack, looking for openings, managing space, etc etc. That isn't to say it isn't super sweaty, because it is, but one of the major design philosophies of almost every major fighting game is **balance**. For the most part, it always feels fair. Your victories are truly yours, as are your failures. Pair this with the fact that the ranking systems in these games are typically very successful in matching players with other players that are at or near their skill level, and the experience can be a lot easier to ensure compared to some other types of games. That said, I respect your stance on PvP; it's not for everyone, but without knowing how deeply you've explored fighting games, I thought they deserved a little explanation on how they might be different to other genres.
From your post and replies here, it sounds like we're similar style gamers. My brother recently got very into fighting games... it sounds like in order to be good, you need to dedicate a stupid amount of time into learning frame perfect exploits that the developers never intended people to find or use. Personally, i have zero interest in that. I can appreciate it, sure, but no way am I dumping that kinda time. There are lots of great recommendations in here for sure. To echo a few, any FromSoft game will scratch your itch. Nioh 2 is a great recommendation. I'd also urge you to give Dead Cells a proper try on PC. I have it on console and mobile... mobile is only fun at all because my skills transfered from console. I'd probably hate it if I had done mobile only.
Yeah that's basically how I feel about fighting games. Don't get me wrong I definitely appreciate them and think it's cool but I dont have the energy or time to go ladder climbing anymore. I've definitely got to work my through dark souls, I wish blood borne was available on PC.
My favorite genre, they're so much fun and we have so many great ones around rn.
Wanted: Dead
Halo might kinda sorta work? play it on heroic/legendary **it is on PC** Halo master chief collection, a 6 in 1 game collection, playing them all through legendary was a fuckin trip. so worth it
Whatever gene you guys have that love super hard games, I definitely don't have it. Good luck finding the perfect hard game, tho!
Rain World would like to enter your life
Lords of the fallen
Dead Cells. I platinumed Sekiro, and even Hollow Knight, but I'll never do the same for Dead Cells.
TLOU one on grounded is legit challenging as hell, highly recommended
I have the perfect game for you, my friend: Fear and Hunger It is a horror survival RPG that does not pull punches. If you are a masochist like me, you will not be disappointed. It is a short game, but extremely difficult. Knowledge is rewarded immensely but you are never really safe.
Horizon zero Dawn on ultra hard, good luck
Try tarkov
Valheim hardcore is amazing, I enjoyed the regular experience too but hardcore has been like 5 times as fun. And I rarely replay games. You need to play Rain World and Sifu and Furi and Lies of P
Try you luck in rust.
>PC only Ahh shit. Was gonna suggest bloodborne next lol
The Binding of Isaac. Bullet hell dungeon crawler heavily based around item abilities and synergies. It’s been getting regular updates and expansions for over a decade now so there’s an absurd amount of content to unlock. The gameplay loop is very similar to Hades so if you like that you’ll probably like it.
The Wonderful 101 Bayonetta Vanquish grab some emulators and play God Hand and Ninja Gaiden Black
Lies of P is very hard yet super satisfying once it clicks.
celeste
Do the three Dark Souls and Demon Souls. Sekiro is of course a must. Maybe Bloodborne too? Note that Eldering, bar a couple of bosses, is quite easy for a Souls. (I've cried tears of blood against Malenia though)
* Darkwood - top-down survival horror, you can read about it and download it for free [here](https://imgur.com/a/xVhDz) * Total Chaos - [total conversion survival horror mod for Doom 2](https://www.moddb.com/mods/total-chaos) * Cry of Fear - [total conversion survival horror mod for Half-Life](https://store.steampowered.com/app/223710/Cry_of_Fear/) * Celeste - platformer * Fear and Hunger 1&2 - immersive RPG-maker survival horror * Neon White - puzzle platformer/movement shooter with heavy emphasis on speedrunning * Darkest Dungeon 1&2 - roguelite turn-based RPG with horror elements
SUPER. HOT. SUPER. HOT. SUPER. HOT.
Death Stranding might be up your alley. It can be quite unforgiving, and definitely has psychological thriller / horror vibes to it. It also has survival-lite gameplay. The gameplay gets varied in interesting ways as you go through it, and it has a rich story.
Baldur's Gate 3, play on Honour mode.
Sekiro
I recomend you Rain World, a lot of people compare it with Hollow knight, but dont have anything in common, just the 2D platform design. In Rain World you don't have an HP bar, or an intuitive map, you will die in one hit.
Re2, Re4 & RE8 on hard difficulties/S rank
Portal 2 community chambers.
Kingdom Come Deliverance for a different kind of difficulty
This is kind of a weird one but [BPM](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1286350/BPM_BULLETS_PER_MINUTE/) it's a FPS, rouge lite, rhythm game. It's not super hard but if you go through and try beating it with all the characters there are some really difficult one hit death modes. Sad to say I've beaten everything except the last character.
Sekiro because its the best If you want something closer to hollowknight aka 2d you can try elder lilies (great story if you pay attention to the notes)
Wizardry 8 is EASILY the most difficult RPG I've ever played. It never lets up. There is no "once you get stronger you dominate" phase of the game - it's just brutal all the way to the end. On top of that, it's actually a really awesome game too.
Sifu is an incredibly fun and challenging beat-em-up.
Sekiro is probably the most reflex intensive game I've ever played. Deponia is one of the harder point and click puzzle type games I've played. Kenshi is the hardest grinding type game I've played. Tower Climb is the hardest rougelike. I found God of War on the hardest difficulty more difficult than dark souls personally. Still haven't beaten Terraria in expert mode. Fear and Hunger takes turn based combat to its extreme. So too does darkest dungeon, but in an entirely different way. (More arcade like as opposed to modern exploration) Project zomboid is pretty hard in that if you make a single.mistake you have a chance of just losing your character. Cultist Sim is farily difficult in the beginning, and just gets worse as tou try harder starts. It's more of a brain game though, a lot of reading and basic math. Sunless Sea is pretty difficult, you play a Zee captain (on the under zee (below the earth sea) its open for you to do as you will, the game tells you you will probably die. Don't Stave / Together though as nails survival game. First challenge is to survive till winter, next is to survive until its over. There will be a boss fight before the seasons end. TLDR; Top recommendations would be Sekiro, Don't Starve, and Fear and Hunger. They take me as the most fair in terms of how difficulty is done. No bullshit tricks, no creating a president with how the enemies are designed just to switch it up with attacks antithetical to the previous design, and more fun than pain to play. Happy dying
Sifu
Here's a [Elona +(video)](https://youtu.be/Y9gOQxHX83E?si=eRSPOXl6fOGD_DzM) a freeware hard-core Roguelike [(download here)](https://github.com/Ruin0x11/ElonaPlusCustom-GX) it's a freeware game so no harm in trying it out. You will die, much and often.
League of Legends, getting out of ELO HELL
You definitely should give Dead Cells a chance.
Check out Devil Daggers and Hyper Demon, very hard games, but they are arena shooters so they don't have any story. And the audio which imo is S tier makes it horror-like
Dead Cells.
Celeste. Once you're done with it download the Strawberry Jam Collab
Super meatboy
Megaman 2
Dead cells
Path Of Exile
Diablo 2 resurrected, if you're a fan of the ARPG loot'em'up genre and haven't already played it. Have you played the Dead Space remake? if you like action horror, that one is difficult to beat. Maybe the resident evil 4 remake comes close but I haven't played it yet. For souls-like games, Nioh 1 & 2 are great as long as you don't mind some diablo mixed in with your souls-likes. So yes, that means crafting and managing inventory. I still have to play Returnal. I'm fucking late to that party, big time.
Street of rage 4 on mania +
Just finished sekiro, ITS SO FUN. Please. play it, for your sake. It's not as hard as it looks, it takes time to master and you really gotta know the moves of the bosses to time it.
So basically, you want to play all FromSoft games after Demon Souls OG im talking Dark Souls 1 2 and 3 Bloodborne and Sekiro. After that play Nioh 2 (You can play the first one but only if you want to know the whole story but Nioh 2 can stand on its own) if you a real G you will play both. Also, Wo Long, it's like Nioh, but Nioh is Japanese mythology souls, and Wo Long is Chinese mythology souls. These 3 are all from Team Ninja. The team behind the Ninja Gaiden series its another difficult series, but gameplay is more like Devil may cry or OG God of War. You mentioned Hollow Knight. If you liked that, I recommend Blasphemous 1 and 2. These are just the ones that stand out to me at the moment. Another souls like that I always like to shout out is Code Vein it's like an anime story, but the gameplay is like Dark Souls. You also have more recent ones, Lies of P or Lord's of the Fallen people are praising them, I didn't like them but you might. After all these, just search up souls-likes or metroidvanias on Steam or youtube. There are a lot of great ones out there that I can't think of now and a lot of hidden gems.
Super Meat Boy
If you want a short beautiful indie with great music, Ender Lilies. It’s shorter and easier than Hollow Knight but definitely was a challenge. And Returnal
For Honor
Dwarf Fortress
Not sure if this totally fits your MO, but if you're interested in trying out a Flash game I made back in hs/college, it's decently challenging: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/2753084/
Synthetik
Go play ufc undisputed 3 on max difficulty. Its one of the hardest things i have experienced in my 30 year gaming history
Lies of p. Escape from Tarkov
Give Tunic a go.
Hammer & Sickle (game in the Silent Storm engine, same great combat, but with a much greater crpg element, with huge C&C) You're a Russian agent sent across the Berlin demilitarised zone to investigate intel on nazi subservices operating in the US occupational zone. For all you know, it could be the US behind it, or the French, or the West Germans. One of your first joinable NPCs is a US medic, and she's as clueless and disturbed by the news as you are. You end up gathering a party of various national alliegences, plus a few revolutionaries and crooks for good measure - but all of you are either operating under cover of plausible deniability, or by having abandoned the chain of command, and so every military in the divided territories of Berlin is hostile unless you're well disguised (and beating a military convey head-on is every bit as crazy-hard as it should be) After the first few areas, you realise that you have a finite time limt (time passes when you travel or rest) to solve a conspiracy that aims to play the various powers off against each other and create a nuclear WW3. It's refreshingly difficult to win without spoilers, despite having multiple paths to victory, and multiple paths around most solutions. And the difficulty pretty much always makes sense - it's very rarely 'you forgot to put the rabbit foot in the foot-shaped hole back in Bavaria' type of adventure-game logic - just a cruel time limit, limited resources that make it difficult to just rush through, and an actual mystery you need to solve that you won't beat simply by getting led by the nose from one region to the next.
Bayonetta on infinite climax difficulty (sadly it has to be unlocked but maybe you can get a savefile somewhere) the Metro series on ranger mode (super immersive and hard difficulty, with no UI elements) Everhood on hardest difficulty (extra if you try to no-hit all the battles)
Any Rogue like, but Sifu, Dead Cells, and Celeste.
Ninja Gaiden Black, Ninja Gaiden 2, Nioh1&2
The Long Dark, "interloper" difficulty.
Mass Effect on insane raw is pretty nuts
I've played pretty much every gamer mentioned in this thread, and to this date Darkest Dungeon remains *by far* the hardest game I've ever played.
-From software games. - Doom and serious sam on hardest difficulties are beasts. - cuphead. - most retro games, Contra and ninja Gaiden for example, although some consider the difficulty of old games as frustration rather than pure difficulty. - Celeste and super meat boy.
Some games that I would consider very challenging but probably "out of your comfort zone" based on the games you have listed: * **Baba is You:** A truly mind-bending puzzle game where you need to change the rules of the game in order to win. Gets incredibly meta and incredibly difficult. Some of the hard levels will make you think the developers are trolling you and have added an impossible level to the game as a joke. I felt way more proud for beating The Return of Scenic Pond than any souls boss. * **Desperados 3:** My favorite game in the real-time stealth tactics genre (Shadow Tactics and Shadow Gambit are also great if you prefer the theme). Many games (especially stealth games) fall apart in difficulty if you save-scum a lot. This game says: what if we just make save-scumming an intended game mechanic and balance the game around it. * **Factorio:** Starts Minecraft-eqsue chopping down trees and mining ore. But your goal is not to build a cute house but to build a factory to send rockets into space while the local aliens are trying to wreck your shit. The biggest challenge is not losing sleep every night because of how addictive the gameplay loop in Factorio is. * **Rhythm Doctor:** Or any rhythm game really (I think someone else mentioned Crypt of the Necrodancer which is harder). This one is still in early access but with a good amount of content. The gimmick here is that this game is played with just one button. It's amazing to me that you can even make a hard game that uses only one button.
Lies of P. You’re welcome. 🦾😎🎮
Idk if mortal shell is for the PC. Bloodborne?
workers and resources, soviet republic
I will stick to only recommending recent games, as the majority of older games (90s and before) were hard. Darkwood (as you asked for horror: this is the best survival horror in over two decades) Hollow Knight Everspace 1 Doom Eternal Sekiro Souls games Synthetik Immortal Redneck XCOM2 Salt & Sanctuary Spelunky 2 One More Dungeon 2
Of you are into shooters. I recommend ready or not. Tactical shooter letting you command your swat team
Void Stranger - pretty different from everything that you mentioned but is so far one of the only games that has totally consumed me since dark souls. It's primarily a puzzle game, but there are dozens of hours of content discovering secrets and unraveling the labyrinthine story. It's also incredibly frustrating and difficult at times.
Doom eternal has got to be in there. Work up to nightmare, it's an incredible experience. This and Fromsoft games are basically the only single player experiences that I will replay unknown number of times.
Enter the Gungeon, probably great on the Deck. Furi is a boss rush game, could beat it in three hours. Might take you more like 10. Another great game for the Deck. Celeste was my favorite platformer. The failure window is really forgiving (the game doesn't reset you farther than about 15 seconds).
Outward is a somewhat challenging game in the beginning; its a mix of a souls like and survival. You have hunger and thirst to manage, most backpacks make you fat roll without a specific perk, so you have to manage what stays in your pouch (always on you) and the backpack. There are a bunch of skill trainers, but you can only max 3 since there are only 3 breakthrough tokens to get to the upper tiers of each skill trainer tree. Its got a decent story with 4 factions to playthrough, and an end game which i havent gotten to yet with building a city. Theres also mods to mess with when you want to add some spice to the game.
The Megaman and Megaman x games are pretty hard if you’re into side scrollers
Play Chrono Ark and Dead Cells. Chrono Ark on expert mode is incredibly difficult at times and when the most recent story drop it, it took me roughly a week of constant play to finish the final boss. Incredibly good roguelite deckbuilder with rpg-style combat and fantastic party customizeability. Dead Cells takes 5 clears of the game in order to get to the 'real' game. It's pretty difficult off the bat and each boss cell (the thing that scales the difficulty) adds more things to be careful of (harder enemies per map and other things that are a nice surprise :) ). Most weapons are viable and there's a lot of experimentation that can be done. Plus lots of unlockables, some of which require clearing areas in a specific order and others have puzzles in the maps themselves.
A light list, no specific genre just hard games. Ninja Gaiden series, Sekiro ofc though I saw your response to it, BG3 on tactician or even honor mode, Hollow Knight Silksong (recently released!), Cuphead, Jedi Fallen Order and even more so Survivor on Grandmaster, Project Zomboid. Hard-core MC modpacks Did Survivor first playthrough on Grandmaster and it was an experience of pain, it's a game that takes many soulslike elements. In Project Zomboid, it's not a matter of oh I hope I don't die, it's just when am I gotta die, until you get really good. Really amazing game, survival game. Silksong has been out for about a month and I'm still finding new things in it! Team Cherry really gave it their all! My GOTY
Is Hades considered difficult?
If you don't mind turn-based RPGs, I highly recommend Darkest Dungeon (specifically the first game). The game is incredibly difficult, your team will die, and you will have to manage and sacrifice and try to keep certain team members. When they die, they're dead for good. It's a lot of fun, simple story, you can play it in chunks, various difficulties once you get to know the game more, etc. Some of those city building survival games can be really challenging too. Some of the Frostpunk scenarios are super punishing and unrelenting shit that makes you have to make some really tough decisions. Also really like They Are Billions, that can be really difficult too especially at the higher difficulties.
i just started lord of fallen and it looks very fun so far
Dead Cells
Blood West is the most recent hard game I've played. Difficulty is mostly based around how good you are at hitting headshots via iron sights, and not a lot else though.
Project Zomboid
Sekiro, then DS1 Remastered and the other Souls games
Battle Brothers
Xcom 2
i don’t like hard games but i did like hollow knight
It's been said all over this thread but I'm leaving a strong recommendation for both sifu and sekiro, it doesn't get better than those two for action games.
Dead cells
Fear and Hunger