Celeste is a monumental achievement not only in terms of story, or gameplay, or presentation, but also because its creators were smart enough to add in an easy mode so that everyone that wanted to could experience it. The story it tells is important enough that they wanted everyone to see it. I absolutely love that and respect the hell out of the developers for doing it. Click to read more and watch gameplay.
I played Celeste on easy mode. I feel no shame at that. I beat it with the options for no deaths (no falling in pits, etc.) but I had the default dashes on, so it was still quite difficult and I still had to actually do most of the platforming. It was still challenging. It was still very fun. For this video I turned on infinite dashes just to show things off.
The story in Celeste is wonderful and important and worth seeing through to the end and I am very grateful that the developers put aside their pride - they did make a very hardcore 2D platformer that is excellent - and let people of all skill levels actually get through it all. I don't like 2D platformers and if this game didn't have an easy mode I would have never bothered to play it.
The thing about it, though, is that by adding options to make it easier, the hardcore "real" platforming is still there. Hardcore players can still bang their heads against the wall if they want. Hardcore players can still experience the brutal difficulty if they want. That doesn't change. But now other people can play it too. That is only ever going to be a good thing.
Try telling that to those hardcore players, though. They think everyone is missing out by not getting their ass kicked constantly by difficult games and somehow aren't experiencing the developers "true" intentions. Shut up. Not everyone plays for the same reasons you do. Not everyone enjoys the same things you do. Adding options to allow more people to play should be standard practice.
