The prior PlayStation had a great run, and Sony promises to release games for the platform until 2025. It’s easy to see why: the PS4 has sold over 110 million copies, making it the fourth best-seller console.There’re various reasons to explain the console’s success. Perhaps the strongest is their catalog of exclusive titles and a wider selection of third-party titles. Amongst these, we’re browsing for some of the most notoriously difficult games on the platform. “You died,” shall you see countless times, but are you up for the challenge?
Selecting the Hardest PS4 Games
Rather than blindly going for the hardest title, the one I wouldn’t be able to finish, we’re for a nice balance.Let me break it down:
Challenge: the title must be difficult enough to force players to understand, explore, and master its mechanics.Difficulty: the challenge may come in various ways. That may be enemies, difficult combat, tough puzzles, environmental hazards, …Authenticity: either kind of challenge needs to feel authentic. It should feel like a part of the world rather than a forced attempt to deliver hard tasks.Fun factor: the game also needs to be fun enough to make you want to master it and play it through the end.Genre: other than that, the title could be of any genre and feature any mechanic. Accomplishment: the best hard games deliver a sense of accomplishment when you complete goals. That means it reached the balance we’re talking about.
Overall, let’s browse through the biggest fights, bullet hells, head-breaking puzzles, and punishing time loops.
The Top 12 Hardest PS4 Games
Cuphead
Cuphead is an absolute indie hit, but don’t let its art style fool you. The game looks like a 20th Century children’s cartoon come to life, and it uses 1930’s-era animation. That’s hand-drawn cel animation, original jazz OST, and watercolor 2D backgrounds.Instead, this is a 2D bullet-hell arcade run-and-gun title. It’s also a boss-run, where you go through a series of levels for continuous fights against all kinds of whimsical enemies. The gameplay allows you to run, dodge, jump, shoot, parry, swap between weapons, and use skills. Mastery requires practice, patience, timing, high reaction times, and understanding the enemy attacks. As you play, you’ll find or unlock weapons and abilities through challenges or secret areas.Many can’t get past the tutorial level. And if you do, the game features many dirty bosses and minibosses. They all feature new mechanics, like King Dice, capable of summoning powerful minions against you.Lastly, you play as Cuphead or Mugman, either in single-player or local co-op. As for the story, the characters embark on a brutal journey to pay back their debt to the Devil. The story continues on The Delicious Last Course DLC, coming out on June 30, 2022.
Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
The Japanese studio has built a reputation for challenging games and skill-based combat. Another defining element is how players must discover the world, the lore, and the mechanics. That’s because there’s a general lack of directions, cinematic cuts, and tutorials. Sekiro is the best their combat has ever been. What makes this action souls-like title unique is the Posture system. Posture is how long enemies can guard against your attacks. Breaking posture stuns enemies to deliver finishing moves. You have a mix of parries, dodges, slashes, special attacks, shinobi tools, and other skills to break posture. As you play, you’ll unlock new abilities to defeat your enemies in melee, range, or stealth. The game is linear, and you’ll go from area to area to defeat enemies, mini-bosses, and bosses. You’ll also complete some puzzle-based objectives, find items, and gather XP. You can level up to learn new skills, but if you die, you lose XP, and every enemy respawns.As for the story, you play as “Lone Wolf,” a shinobi with the power of resurrecting. You use this curse to rescue your lord and restore him to the throne. The story goes across a dark fantasy Feudal Japanese setting.
Bloodborne
Bloodborne sits at the top of FromSoftware’s games in terms of challenge. The difficulty relies on its bosses, Lovecraftian horrors ready to defeat you with broken skills.This is an action RPG that incorporates guns into the familiar parry-block-dodge-attack formula. And as you play, you’ll find better gear, learn new skills, and learn new mechanics.The world takes its cues from the pages of Lovecraft., full of horror and darkness. The settings are a mix of derelict urban areas, caves, and a system of ruins and underground secrets.In particular, dungeons are procedurally generated, adding another layer to the title. As a result, every playthrough may feel different than the last, as you can also try out different weapons, skills, and styles.Lastly, you play in the town of Yharnam, a dark gothic linear city. Your job is cleansing the street from a disease that infected all inhabitants. The world is full of atmospheric storytelling, plus a hunting and gripping style.
Nioh 2
Nioh is a sequel to a violent and punishing samurai adventure. The second part goes above and beyond. The result is a linear action RPG focusing on enormous bosses, creative level design, and lots of playstyle options. Nioh 2 delivers plenty of “git gud” moments. For example, you’ll face a vicarious ape-like yokai monster, Enki, in the first few minutes. It forces you to master the mechanics early and also decide what kind of build you will craft. The title features souls-like combat, as you’d expect. Aside from dodges, parries, and slashes, you can also pick up “Soul Cores” from defeated monsters and learn their skills. Moreover, there’re various magical weapons, each delivering special mechanics and skill trees. These systems allow you to hone a vast host of skills and combos. However, customization starts at the character creation screen. You can select appearance, genre, combat style, preferred weapons, and attire here. Lastly, you play as a half-supernatural spirit hunter (or “Yokais”) in a Dark Realm plagued with grotesque and vicious monsters. You’re in service of Oda Nobunaga. Your job is to cut down rival clans, warlords, monsters, castles, villages, and caves.
Dark Souls 3
Most fans would agree Dark Souls III is the best game in the trilogy and also the toughest one. It pushes the genre’s boundary while delivering many RPG options as before. For example, you customize a character with 10 different classes.Then, you begin a linear action RPG journey with skill and timing-based combat. Nevertheless, there’re no tutorials and no hand-holding. You must discover the mechanics, lore, and story yourself. The story comes through the atmosphere, and the skill comes from repetition. The action is intense. You must dodge, block, parry, and attack with ultimate timing. Also, you have limited “mana” (AKA Focus Points) for your magic. You can recharge it at campfires, alongside your health and your health pot. Resting, though, will resurrect all enemies in the area.Additionally, there’s the “Souls” system that gives a name to the game. You pick up souls from monsters, and it represents the currency you use to purchase items like gear. If you die, though, you lose all souls you’re carrying.Aside from an environmental story, the series features some of the most complex bosses and environments you’d find in video games. It also grants players various weapons, armor, skills, and builds. Lastly, the areas are wider, offering secrets and sights to discover.
Returnal
Returnal is a time-loop rogue-lite third-person shooter. You play through six areas -biomes- which divide the game into two parts. When you die, you’ll return to the beginning of the section but keep the power-ups you’ve gathered.The formula delivers an undoubtedly difficult game. The mechanics are intense, representing the struggle for freedom the story arc chases. So, encounters are fast-paced, desperate, and ready to punish you for a single mistake. Also, many encounters, platforming puzzles, and treasures have a time counter. Also, although the world is linear, you can explore further to find permanent suit upgrades and weapons you lose when your “run” finishes.The gameplay is about swapping between guns, gadgets, and powers fast enough to defeat enemies. And as you shoot, you should jump, run, dodge, and use your defensive abilities wisely. Many moments in the game will check your skills, but you don’t need to be ready: you can just do it again. And as for the story, you play as Selene, an interstellar explorer. She’s trapped in a time loop in Atropos after a crash landing. Your mission is to find a way through ancient civilization ruins, alone, to escape home.
Elden Ring
It delivers a blend of everything From Software has learned but with a massive twist. Rather than a linear story, the title features a vast open-world and the main quest to complete with just a few pointers. Because it’s an open-world action RPG, the game is not as difficult as previous Dark Souls games. You can skip or bypass tough enemies, grind somewhere else, and come back whenever you’re ready. You can also sneak by and jump to skip enemies altogether.The combat is highly challenging, though. As you’d expect, you can parry, block, dodge, use skills, learn rapid, swap weapons, and swap armor. You also level up and craft your build by considering gear, skills, weapons, magic, stats, and more. Then, the magic system is huge. You learn spells by looting or buying scrolls, and dozens of options exist. Learning and using a spell requires you to meet a stat requirement -between Faith, Arcane, and Intelligence. These spells have various effects, buffs, debuffs, damage types, and functionalities. The story follows your avatar in a broken realm full of magic, monsters, and demigods. You’re fighting for control of the Lands Between, and you can do it by finding special artifacts. The journey takes you against bosses, dungeons, fortresses, and secrets.
Spelunky 2
Spelunky 2 is a 2D platform rogue-like title, like its predecessor. The difficulty relies on how and where to get necessary items, most of which lead to getting your head blown off. You control Ana, the daughter of the protagonist of the first game. Ana is on the Moon on a mission to find her missing parents. The setting forces you to navigate through an intricate network of procedurally generated caves. In fact, some people also describe it as a labyrinth simulator.You can dig, fight in melee, use firearms, throw rocks, throw turkeys, teleport, and more. It depends on the items you find, though, but some are necessary to complete the story. And if you die at any point, you lose everything, and there’re no permanent upgrades.Then, you explore the cave in “levels.” Each one introduces new themes or m, mechanics like lava, a liquid physics system, monster, traps, and mounts. Lastly, the game supports multiplayer, with up to 4 people exploring together online or on split-screen. Some parts of the game are ridiculously difficult if you play alone, so you may need all the help you can get.
Control
Control is a Metroidvania third-person shooter with supernatural powers. The title ships without a difficulty setting, and the default mode is quite tough.You play as Jesse Faden, the newly-appointed leader of the Federal Bureau of Control. Your job is to explore the Old House, your headquarters, to uncover a mystery deep within the organization’s roots.As a Metroidvania, the game encourages you to backtrack and explore around to find power-ups, secrets, and quests. Failing to do so results in difficulty spikes and roadblocks that ask you to grind for power. Also, finding new items and skills can open previously inaccessible areas.Combat is very fast, and your survival depends on how fast you can get into cover. Faden can fall easily, so you need to use your defensive skills, cover, and move constantly. Remain active, and expect the best results.Lastly, the Ultimate Edition packs the two available DLCs for the title. One of the two, SMA, includes a crossover with Alan Wake, the protagonist of an older horror classic by Remedy Entertainment.
Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time
The legendary Crash Bandicoot 3D platformer is fast, fun, and over the top. The latest entry is one of the best, as it puts its mechanics and visuals up to date.So, the game remains the same but better. Its platforming difficulty will twist your fingers. Some segments in the game need precision timing, an eagle eye, and Super Saiyan thumb speed. And the game knows it. There’s a tempting “106% completion” achievement only hardcore players could reach. It requires you to pass every portion of the game flawlessly, without skipping a beat (or a life): memorizing the exact level layout. In particular, the final act of the game culminates in perhaps the toughest level in the platforming genre. You need perfect play to reach the end credits, but the game is so fun that you’ll want to master it. As for the story, you play as Crash and Coco, saving the day yet again. The mission is to find four quantum masks that could bend the rules of reality. That brings new abilities, characters, alternate dimensions, and “ridonkulous bosses.”
XCOM 2
XCOM 2 is a turn-based combat game, and the whole focus is on the action. Whenever you’re outside of combat, you’ll be managing your team, research, and gear, or choose your missions from your ship-This is the latest entry in the sage, and it feels familiar yet refined. However, the difficulty level is high, and unless you can map out dozens of turns in your head, you’ll learn through trial and error, lots of trial and error.It’s very easy to make a mistake that snowballs into utter defeat. See, you manage a 6-soldier squad on grid maps, and take turns to move, shoot, take cover, or use items and skills. Each action drains your turn, so the idea is to maximize what you do each round.You play with a top-down perspective on the missions, but on your ship, everything is menus. The missions are go-in/go-out situations, as once you complete the goal, it’s done. That said, there’s a vast combination of missions, locations, and goals to play -maps are procedurally generated. You play as the commander of the XCOM, a resistance force opposing alien invaders. Missions revolve around retaking key positions, eliminating alien bases, retrieving information, sabotaging alien bases, and similar.
Devil May Cry 5
The fifth entry in the demon-hunter saga continues its reputation. That is frenetic and combo-based combat that depends on player skill, epic boss fights, great technical depth, and bombastic cut scenes. It’s much more than an episodic hack & slash title. Winning the game isn’t as easy as mashing the buttons, not even on the lowest difficulty (“Human” difficulty). You need to understand how your skills, combos, defensive abilities, and weapons work well enough to counter and exploit your enemies. Also, the game has a scoring system, and the maximum you can get for an encounter is “SSS.” This depends on mastering the complex and evolving combat mechanics, so you can seamlessly time attacks with style and strategy.See, as you play, you’ll level up to unlock new defensive and offensive skills and buffs. There’re also various characters to pick from, each one featuring different weapons and playstyles. And once you reach mastery, you can unlock “Dante Must Die,” a difficulty mode that makes you question reality. Lastly, you play as either Dante, Nero, and V, legendary devil hunters. The story happens several years after the last title, and a new demonic threat invades the world.
