The walking speed was intolerably slow, compared to Avernum for a start. And unlike Avernum, you couldn't just rapidly tap or click on a square.

The menuing was a bit much. Pick spell. Pick level of spell, pick target. You could hotkey sure, but you'd often find yourself switching spells as need and MP be.

There were too many stats, meaning that you'd have to decide if you want a marginal increase to cartography, or a marginal increase to something important.

It wasn't "too hard", but more a matter of many contributing factors.

NO SHIT! :P

Not a fan of those games. Frustrating beyond belief.

I started a thread similar to this yesterday because I feel like a LOT of games get stupidly hard toward the very end, like the last level or mission. There have been so many games I played that were easy as pie 95% of the way through and then frustrated me to no end in the last section. You can't just give up either, you feel the need to finish that last step. I just bought Mafia in the last weekend sale and I'm pretty sure that's a good example... some shootout in a church.

I just finished GTA5 and there was a mission toward the end where you have to jump on a train with a motorbike and it literally took me 20 tries. I was screaming at the monitor.

Ziggurat handed my a$$ to me and i am not returning to it... At least, anytime soon.

I found Cybermage very difficult and i had it abandoned half-way in the slums (2nd stage out of 10), for nearly 20 years... Then, i suddenly decided to download the guide, the latest version of Dosbox and beat it through and through... In something less than a week.

I found the Suffering 2 to be hard, even in normal, because back in the day, the gameplay mechanisms around it (2 weapons limit, stationary heals) were newfound and experimental, ergo, poorly implemented... And it was imbalanced to hell! Set it to easy and breezed through the levels, without regret!

Some time ago, i started Symphony and Fortissimo, made me quit. I kept it in and continued using new soundtracks, over time. I happened upon a calm music collection and finally, collected all achievements!

Generally, when i get over frustrated, first thing is to quit... Even if temporarily. I am a collector first, a gamer second. A game has to suit my playstyle, tastes, etc in order to make me want to beat it. Unfortunately, i am very picky, on this one. In my case, quitting is temporal, 99%. When i "return" to it, i mostly use one of these methods: Lower difficulty, find a guide, save game too excessively and should all else fail, i go to play something else. Some games, though, i tackle on very hard or hardest, like Rogue mode in Sid Meier Pirates 2004, Awesome saved game rating in Blade of darkness, etc. Or, like in good old days in Red Alert 2, put an ally next to me and face full 6 enemies allied together!

I'll admit that I installed the original one and not the 'enhanced' edition of SS. Maybe that version alleviates some of my struggles.

I think I've generally been spoiled by control schemes that are somewhat standardized. For example: WASD, M for map, I for inventory, C for character screen... I tried to access my character screen last night in Sea Dogs and for the life of me I can't figure out how to do that. Off to the forum and replacementdocs.com

I was more talking about enemy re spawn and weapons that break down after five shots.

I think what you are looking for is called 're-playability'. A game must be fascinating enough when played a second, third time etc. That's why for my taste most of the adventure games will disqualify, wether they are difficult or not. Same for action games where the AI performs the same over and over.

My favorites are actually console games from the 80s like Elevator Action, Turtles, Intrepid etc which I still play on a MAME platform trying to beat the world highscore. These are old 'games' but it's new every time.

Very important point!
When I was younger, I would excessively play every game - no matter what genre, etc., just because the choice wasn't that big (though that changed later on, when I made contact with people on the schoolyard, who would swap a box of empty, unformatted floppy-discs, with a box of filled to the brim floppy-discs).
Yep, same here.
Though - from time to time, I try something harder - just to prove myself, that my days as a hardcore-gamer are really over. :)
It's true that getting back into the controls of yesteryear's games can be a chore - but once you made it an hour into the game (and that game is gripping enough!), it all seems totally naturally again.
The only mistake you can then make, is to pause playing that game again, before you finished it, only to return a month or such later - because then you have to do the chore of re-learning the controls again. ;)

I have to admit that, even in the case I got the time to play, some games are just ... annoying.

I was re-trying Lords of the Fallen, a game I bought two years ago on steam (a DS clone): I was progressing in the story, and grinding for experience to grow my stats.
But then... you meet that new monster, or boss and... I can see the clues. I can see the pattern of attacks etc.
Everything is crystal clear, and I think: I'll beat this guy first time! I'm good and strong now!

NO WAY!

They have that special attack that insta-kill you, that just happen to have a hit box a bit too large.
It's charging his special attack and is invincible (you can't damage him).
Can't be stunned, even if you manage to do half it's hit points in a single strike, and hit you trough.

This oblige you to replay the monster multiple times, until you learn the quirks and get the timing.
Gosh! What a chore.

Space hulk ascension: in the middle of your perfect strategy... here a genestealer ambushing out of the walls (no way to prevent this) and 3 of your terminators are dead before the turn ends.
NO!

The most annoying parts are when the difficulty spike is coupled with a genre change. Insta-fail stealth sections are one example, and are so frustrating, and not what I signed up for, that I've decided that such a sequence is a dealbreaker when choosing whether to purchase or play a game.

Don't make me play a type of game I didn't sign up for, and certainly don't make it harder than the parts of the game that are actually in genre.

It depends on how much each failure loses. A game like Super Meat Boy with infinite lives and less than a minute of progress is lost per death - I can keep trying for a long time, maybe with breaks (though I gave up on the game after my save got lost, I still managed to complete the Light World levels first). Unless I feel like it's literally too hard and I don't stand much chance. Like with Duke Nukem in Death Rally or the indie game Sprinter - I think I'll drop the difficulty to Easy there.

A game like Sonic the Hedgehog with limited lives/continues and then you gotta start over? Yeah, my frustration threshold is pretty low here. Fuck Labyrinth Zone, I'm out.

A roguelike/roguelite where every playthrough is different enough that I don't feel like I'm doing the same thing over and over for possibly hours before dying? As long as it FEELS like I'm getting better, or I still have a chance, I'll be spending a lot of time on this one.

I did put Dark Souls on hold for a couple years because I had a lot of trouble with an optional boss.

This too. It's why I dropped Twinsen's Odyssey, Alone in the Dark and Cyberia after minutes, and have no intention of playing any of the classic Tomb Raiders.

I don't mind hard games if I do have the time to plan. What I don't like at all is time pressure. Usually as soon as a game imposes a time limit on me, I stop playing it, unless the limit is very forgiving or the game is so interesting, that I want to play on in spite of the frustration. I absolutely hate hectic and time pressure. Worst of all are QTEs. They not only create hectic, but also break the immersion every time they pop up. If I know that a game has QTEs, I don't buy it.

QTE?

"All you had to do is follow the damn train, CJ!"
Quick Time Event
aka interactive cutscenes, like beyond 2 souls.