Week 5: Even steps, uneven difficulty

Turn one dial in equal steps and the game does not get harder in equal steps. The first 50 ms costs 26 wins. A later 50 ms costs 0.4 s.

23 March 2027

Is it me or is it the game? It is you, unevenly. Give each boss anywhere from 18 s to 34 s on its clock and the 100 ms player still wins 12 of 51; at the usual 26 s, a player 50 ms quicker wins 38.

Open the slides

Designers build difficulty ladders by stepping numbers evenly, because evenly is how a spreadsheet wants to be filled in. The game is under no obligation to respond evenly.

The claim#

Equal steps in a parameter do not buy equal steps in difficulty. Some steps cost almost everything. Some cost nothing. You cannot tell which is which from the numbers you typed; you have to measure what came out.

One dial, six even steps#

The dial is the simulated player’s reaction time, stepped by 50 ms. Each row is 51 runs with ordinary upgrade choices.

The first step costs 26 wins out of 51. The step from 200 ms to 250 ms costs 0.4 s of survival and no wins, because there were none left to lose.

The cliff has a cause. The first boss has to be dead by 66 s. Somewhere between 150 ms and 200 ms the typical run stops reaching that wall alive, and past that point being slower barely matters: you were already not getting there.

A dial that does nothing#

The boss’s time limit, stepped evenly from 14 s to 34 s, for the 100 ms player: 11, 12, 12, 12, 12 and 12 wins out of 51. Twenty seconds of generosity bought one win. That is also an uneven step, and you would not have guessed it either.

What you leave with#

One number of your own choosing in the specimen’s rules, stepped evenly across six values, with wins out of 51 and median survival at each. Find the cliff, or show there is not one.

Run it yourself