

All those extra critical hits make a normally hard final dungeon much easier than it has any right to be. until you reach the Very Definitely Final Dungeon where you're not allowed to sleep at all and the L-Quilt becomes a Useless Item for the remainder of the game. Even though the L-Glove is a good item the game is much harder overall if you pick it as being able to recover anywhere with the L-Quilt makes some of the later dungeons much easier to contend with. You can pick the L-Glove, which gives far more critical hits, or the L-Quilt which lets you sleep to fully recover HP, BP, and Stamina anywhere and anytime you want. Brave Fencer Musashi has this in the form of choosing two items.In the case of loot-based variants of the trope, they are often dropped by Hard Mode Mooks. Compare Bragging Rights Reward, when you don't need the reward because you already beat the hardest part of the game, and Golden Ending, which is sometimes reserved for hard mode. Some idle games even provide additional features to help players progress if such a mode greatly lowers production, as otherwise the game would be filled with timewalls and not very fun as a result. Some players take offense to Hard Mode Perks, considering them unfair to players who cannot play on the harder difficulty settings.Īnother reason these bonuses sometimes appear, especially in RPGs, is to offset the way a higher difficulty would otherwise slow the pace of the game - giving more experience and gold per fight, for instance, because a higher difficulty makes them take longer and might otherwise force the player into lengthy Level Grinding. Contrast Easy-Mode Mockery, though Hard Mode Perks can be seen as a subtle form of it as the benefits are locked out on easier difficulties. If overdone, the harder difficulties may become easier than the easy ones, similar to the issues with Unstable Equilibrium.

These rewards sometimes cause Early Game Hell: the starting conditions for the harder difficulties are undeniably harder, but as the game goes on, the bonuses kick in noticeably. It's often bonus experience or better equipment, especially when the player may select difficulties for particular missions. However, merely getting Cosmetic Awards may often seem unfair, so gamers may receive some actually gameplay-affecting bonuses to keep up with the challenge. Some video games may reward their players for choosing harder difficulties.
