an even more basic question: how many people actually play videogames for THE CHALLENGE of it? maybe i'm just not a hipster but i didn't think a major reason for gaming was the pursuit of pushing your physiological limits in regards to the EYE and BUTTON PUSHING relationship. i thought that was what all the speed-runner communities were for; people who openly admit YES I HAVE PROBLEMS I BEAT METROID IN 13 MINUTES

well, this depends on the type of game. rpgs and shit, yeah, they are dumb if they are challenging because the challenge is just BIGGER NUMBERS. but being challenged in like, a fps or something, it gives you a real buzz when you win. the final final level of call of duty 4 on the hardest setting, for instance, (spoilers: it's 1 minute long and has like a zillion guys between you and a hostage, complete with slow motion headshot-in-0.5-seconds-or-you-lose bit) is really really difficult and you feel excellent when you win.

i agree with the rest of your post, though.

Yeah that's really my opinion now, that play control is extremely important and underrated. That's why Sega CD was so cheesy, you just pressed a button on the right time and that somehow signified OPEN TRAP DOOR or something.

you say that like it's easy

night trap is really fucking hard even with a walkthrough and it's almost impossible to get a perfect ending

Anyway, I haven't noticed a change in game difficulty at all, with the exception of quicksave making things easier than when there were save points (or NO SAVE AT ALL).  Most games don't keep my attention long enough for me to beat them, but it seems like I give up more out of disinterest nowadays than I used to out of just plain being stuck.  Besides those two things, games haven't changed at all for me, and they're equal on difficulty, but maybe not on INTERESTINGNESS?  Only when a few gems come along do I even stick with those games and pay for them to begin with.

Also, as for playing games for the challenge, I only do this with games I already wanted to play.  I won't play a game because it seems challenging (I won't avoid it either, it's just not part of the equation), but I may continue to play one if there is something I want to beat in it that I had trouble with and I manage to do it without it getting me too frustrated.

I didn't mean Night Trap in particular, I just think games didn't go in the direction of FMV because even if it was cool and new at first it was wrong to think that real people instantly = IMMERSIVE, even if the actors are talking to PLAYER directly. Things went towards 3D polygon stuff imo because it was more the movement and navigating your guy through a LIVING 3D WORLD that gets people "into" a game more, not being convinced by the sounds and images that the game world is worth saving or the characters are worth caring about or whatever. Also the fact that the old games were HARD probably contributed to that immersion back then, because you had to think more about what you were doing. But puzzles in newer games seem to be easier in general because it's not so much about challenging your brain as getting you CONCERNED, and solving problems in a fictional world = real life problems off your mind and crap. And of course the problems in the game have a quick and easy feeling of accomplishment so they're preferable to HOMEWORK etc.

Am I the only one that doesn't use quicksave/quickload?

It makes game a lot harder, also for Bioshock, you can turn off the Vita-Chambers(resurrection chambers) if you download the 1.1 update.  Also even if games have no punishment for dying apart from a minor setback.  I still get one step closer to turning the game off when I die.  I started playing Bioshock on Hard, and when I encountered my first Big Daddy(killable), I probably died about 20-30 times before I finally killed it.   Needless to say, when I got done, I was down to just the wrench and pistol, and didn't feel like going any farther.

Theres a big reason why I don't  play on Easy, or Hard.  Easy is too easy, Hard is too frustrating.

And of course on Topic.  90% of games getting easier came from quicksave/load, and the other 10% came from having better/more control over the dude you control.

The difference between Prey's way of handling death and Quickloading is that when you Quickload, all the enemies you've killed since you saved return, while in Prey they stay dead.  This is most noticeable in large battles, where instead of having to load to the start of battle and learning how to defeat your enemies without dying, you just respawn and kill the ones you didn't kill before.