I want you to try something real quick. Think to your favorite game the current console generation. Bioshock? Mass Effect 2? Gears of War? Modern Warfare 2? K, now pretend you have put that game on the default setting ; the setting that developers believe caters to most game buyers. Do you think it would be perfectly feasible for most gamers to make it through 3 or 4 levels at a time without even dying once? And I'm not talking about the "I didn't know where to go" or the "I screwed up a randomly placed QTE" kill. I'm talking about obstacles and combat sequences that are repeated to make up most of the gameplay formula.

I don't know about you guys, but I actually put this to the test. I got all the way to the Gulag without dying on Modern Warfare 2 normal difficulty. In Gears of War, I had one near-scare where I let myself take a torque bow shot but after that I was beginning to head-shot my way into near invulnerability. I repeated this for more of my favorite games with the same result. Maybe a scare here and there but as long as I didn't do anything stupid or reckless there was . . . no . . . threat.

I'm not saying these games CAN'T be challenges. I now play Mass Effect on the harder difficulties and find myself reasonably challenged, and Modern Warfare 2 on Hardened is no walk in the park (don't even get me started on veteran mode). But you guys remember how in Halo 1 normal mode, we were still beginning to kick ourselves near the end during the Library? Or how in Max Payne 2 normal mode, groups of the elite baddies would find a way to wreck your sh*t despite your best efforts?

My question is, why are games catering to lower and lower denominators of gaming? 

This isn't so much a complaint as it is food for thought. I genuinely believe that the gamers of today are superior to the gamers of one or two generations ago. While I love games like Halo 1 and Street Fighter II, I think it takes a lot more to be elite in Halo 3 and Street Fighter IV today. But if the gamers of today are becoming more and more skilled, why aren't the difficulties being ramped up?

Why aren't we seeing more games like that start out challenging and have you scale DOWN the difficulty if you find yourself dying too much? Why is it that the initial difficulty is just there to hold someone's hand in completing the game instead of making completion an achievement?

As a gamer, I do want to complete the game, but I do want to have to really use my brain to get past the obstacles and actually have them present a real threat to me. I mean I LOVED Mass Effect 2, but it was so god dang easy. And of course after I sink 3 or 4 hours into it, I don't want to start over so I play through it. If it was too hard (like Dragon Age sometimes was), at least gamers would be FORCED to stop and lower the difficulty instead of skilled players who have to make the choice to restart on a higher difficulty.

I understand that difficulty is relative to the player. For example, I can get all the way through the Underground of Tairon on Ninja Gaiden Black without dying once yet consider Half Life 2 a difficult game. Most people would consider Half Life 2 easy as hell and consider Ninja Gaiden Black god's wrath in game form.

But with those few outlyers, I think we can establish the line between mildly challenging games and easy games.

Once again, I'm not complaining too much because with the exception of Mass Effect 2 I have now started every game I play on the harder setting and am able to play each game at a level that suits me.

All I'm saying is, should we have to poke around with difficulty setting in order to get a decent challenge? Shouldn't we be able to expect that from the beginning?