[SH3] Difficulty changes itself from Normal to Easy

[Saavas]

I'm not sure if this is the kind of issue that should be posted here, but its the only place where there's a chance of it being investigated. I was playing SH3 on Normal/Normal but when I finished the game the result screen showed that I played on Easy. I couldn't believe my eyes, and checked the save files. Indeed, at one point the difficulty changed itself. I did a little research on this and didn't find any info on automatic difficulty change, but found two people with similar problem to mine: https://www.reddit.com/r/silenthill/comments/4uojtg/gamebreaking_bug_silent_hill_3_automatic/ https://www.reddit.com/r/silenthill/comments/61z1ao/silent_hill_3_on_pc_just_changed_difficulty_to/ Both of these people were playing PC version, so it might be a bug in the port. I would appreciate if the problem was looked into, because solving riddles on Easy is not fun at all.

[CHNSK]

That's not good. I know the PC version has its fair share of bugs but never heard this before and this kind of bug never happened to me and I have played SH3 on PC more times than I remember. I don't know which version you have but why don't you consider to get the other version of the game.

PAL version 1DVD NTSC version5 CD

[Saavas]

Which version do you have? Mine is apparently NTSC, maybe its exclusive to this region, and that would solve the issue.

[CHNSK]

Oh, mine is 5CD version too. From my experience I thought you have Pal version, that's why I suggested the version change but it seems it has nothing to do with it.

[AeroWidescreen]

I've never heard of this bug before either. Were you dying a lot while you were playing? It might've reduced the difficulty if you were, but I don't know if SH3 actually does that at all. Also, did you notice an actual drop in difficulty in the puzzles or boss fights? Or was the only indication the results screen?

And just so you know, this isn't the only place you can ask for help. The creator of sh3proxy might be a better person to ask, since my "expertise" is mostly widescreen and resolution based.

[Saavas]

It was my first playthrough ever, I died a few times but I don't think it was the reason, since the game is such a cult classic an automatic difficulty adjust would probably be well known. It wasn't the only indication, the save files also started to show Easy after my 33rd save. It's hard to judge the action difficulty for me since as I said - it was my first playthrough of the game, but the puzzles definitely got easier, I checked the FAQ now and the last puzzle I got was Easy-mode one.

I might ask the creator of sh3proxy as well then. I figured I'd ask here since the Widescreen patch for Silent Hill 2 introduced fixes from sh2proxy and more, and sh2proxy 'died' as a result and became inferior solution. I don't think widescreen fix and sh3proxy would work together so I hoped the one ultimate solution for all problems would simply be widescreen patch.

Anyway, I thought maybe people had similar problem to mine, but it turns out I'm the only one here and theres only a select few individuals from reddit who also encountered this problem. I'll try reinstalling a fresh copy another time and see if the problem occurs again, but for now the issue seems to be so rare that it might be not worth looking into.

Thanks for all the answers

[AeroWidescreen]

I'll see if I can reproduce the problem this weekend.

[Brunn0121]

i got this problem about 3 weeks ago, was playing it on hard, and the i managed to beat Leonard with only 5 shotgun bullets, "what the hell?" and the when i went to the save screen there it was.. easy mode.

[AeroWidescreen]

Was this a normal new game or an "extra new game"? I noticed that this is a thing:

[Saavas]

I was playing normal NEW GAME, it was my first finished game in SH3, I don't think I could access those options from the screenshot (bullet adjust and beginner mode(?))

[Saavas]

@Brunn0121 Did you: -play in one long session and the difficulty suddenly changed? or -did you just save and move on in the game? or -did you at some point quit the game or just loaded the save and then noticed the difficulty change? I'm trying to pinpoint a possible mechanism for this bug. I don't think the game would suddenly change difficulty mid game, nor do I think just saving the game causes the diffuculty to change, after all the game is already loaded and just saves the status to the hdd. My bet is on the function that reads current difficulty and writes it to save file - I'd expect it to read garbage from memory/fail to access memory and write easy as exception handle or something like that. Then after quitting thne game or loading the previous save the game is on easy difficulty.

[AeroWidescreen]

My bet is on the function that reads current difficulty and writes it to save file - I'd expect it to read garbage from memory/fail to access memory and write easy as exception handle or something like that. Then after quitting thne game or loading the previous save the game is on easy difficulty.

That's a possibility. I know that Silent Hill 3 required me to run it as admin to write save data, but I don't have to do that anymore ever since I messed around with folder permissions and moved it out program files.

I'm still trying my best to reproduce this issue, but I have to do a full playthrough to be sure.

[AeroWidescreen]

Yeah, I can't reproduce this. I played through the game on hard difficulty and died intentionally up to 40 times. Most of it was done during the boss fights or when I could activate the Valtiel cutscene to see if that would change anything. I also locked my health to a low value and saved at each official save point. When I reached the results screen my difficulty was still on hard for both combat and riddles.

Edit: Forgot to mention that I didn't complete the game in one sitting, so there was plenty of loading and saving. I even switched between different saves with lower difficulties to see if that would have an effect. Nothing.

I highly suggest going to sh3proxy and asking about it there. Sorry I couldn't help.

[jamestglh]

Hello, I hate to bring up an old thread - but this just happened to me! I noticed it in my save games. The difficulty changed from medium to easy. I didn't even need to die for it to happen. It happened during the subway train part. Here's another thing that happened at the same time which may or may not be related, my control schema changed from 2d controls to 3d controls..... weird right?

edit - another thing happened - the playtime on my save games that changed to easy started over. i can send you save files or whatever if you think it'll help somehow.

[ausnick2001]

Can also confirm I have had this glitch. At the same point. My save game changed from Normal to Easy for both combat difficulty and puzzle difficulty. Completed the game and didn’t even notice until I got to the results screen. My timer didn’t reset though, otherwise I might have noticed it sooner.

[StateOfBedlam]

Happened to me as well. It happened either in the otherworld mall or early in the subway. I noticed it early on and decided to just press on and finish it on easy. Some day I may want to play again on a harder difficulty though, which is why I'm investigating the issue now.

[ayoits0913]

This just happened to me too! As soon as I got to the subway, saved and saw it changed to easy.

[phensd]

happened to me too a few years ago, right before the hospital

[determin1st]

the monster on the roof (before hospital) decreases the difficulty when the player looses, just load previous savegame to bypass this glitch