15 Hidden Video Game Design Secrets That Are Total Genius

11. Far Cry's Difficulty Curve Is Directly Related To How Well You Play

As you'll find when looking into various 'one person against the world' games, the developers need to make sure that - in the case of a shooter especially - you don't get riddled with bullets every 10 seconds.

To do so in Far Cry's case, it involves the game making a series of checks and balances whenever you hit a specific checkpoint. Taking into account things like how much damage per second you were dealing and how many deaths per minute you had accrued, the game could adaptively lower enemy health and accuracy to give you an easier time.

Amazingly, whilst this could've led to a drastically easier game, once you then got through a section and started playing better, those same stat checks reworked so the A.I. could restore the original "designed" challenge, creating a difficulty curve that only makes allowances where necessary.

Very clever.