Level scaling. It's a mechanic designers put in because they think the game needs to stay challenging, which is true but I've never agreed with level scaling as the answer.

The least bad implementations (but still not good) at least replace low level enemies with different kinds of enemies entirely. The worst, most lazy implementations just increase existing enemy HP and damage.

I think it is much better to have different locations or zones where different ranges of enemies spawn, with more powerful enemies tuned to the expected level of a player character for the quests in the zone.

OG Oblivion has the most utterly broken and unplayable version of this problem that I've seen. Every bandit wearing glass or daedric, every enemy the strongest version, eliminating all variety. And their idea of difficulty? Just make them take longer to kill. All fun dissolves into a slog.

I think it was Skyrim where I found this

Doubt it because the unmodded game allows you to change difficulty even in mid-game, where the novice setting will have you easy kills even at high levels and your player character gets only bruised, and the legendary setting makes enemy NPCs deadly with a couple sword hits or one-hit lightning attacks.

So the was this dnd inspired text based multi user game. Actually there are hundreds of clones and variations.

It was called circleMUD. The server version I played was called Riftsmud.

Now it was a long ass time ago and World of Warcraft didn't exist at all yet.

When I started playing there was a level 50 cap. A few years later they revised the game and it became a level 100 cap.

Now we grinded. Oh my God did we grind.

But when you hit those power spikes it was so worth it. The grinding actually meant something because when you hit the level cap and maxed out your experience you could remort.

Meaning start over picking your class all over again and a keep a all the level up stat bonuses you got every 10 levels.

And also a base increase on your health/mana/stamina

The other thing though was that you also kept 15% of the skills from the class you maxed out.

Some of the classes(casters mainly) got skills or spells almost every level. Martial classes many boring levels.

However after a few times remorting you started to develop a unique way to play the game.

And while originally it was completely random what should you got, to we ended up getting to designate a few skills and you would get one of those 4 for sure, and if lucky more than one.

Some skills were unique to a class. Some were available at different levels between classes. A neat thing was if you had a keep at a higher level than another, if you ever went a class with a lower level you would lower the level on your keep, so keeping them at the lowest level first was awesome, or getting those unique skills first time round

Did my 21 time remort character hit 24 attacks in a really lucky roll when using the ranger skill flurry? Yes yes he did.

Did I find out that if you successfully execute the skill, but a teammate kills the enemy before your hits land the flurry is saved until your next round of attacks? I did

Did I also have a skill called rampage that attacked every mob in the room with your full compliment of attacks? Well I was a warrior and I did have that skill yes.

Did the game give me flurry of blows on every mob in a room? Yes yes it did.

Did I have a skill that could sacrifice gold at an altar to do more damage? I did go Paladin. Did I have a spell that increased my damage by 50% sure why not, keeps baby.

Did I have a skills that did more damage when I was low on life? Also yes.

Did I have sanctuary and also super sanctuary to cut my damage received by 25% and then 50% as well? Sure did.

I maaaaay have walked into a zone that had a high amount of enemies in the same room after buffing the ever loving hell out of myself while at 10% life with a stacked flurry and rampaged on over a dozen mobs.

Did I crash the server?

Yes yes I did.

Worth it!

It's very obnoxious. What's worse is when the secret areas provide armor or weapons that feel mandatory to beat the level with. If the secrets are just for a score I can at least ignore them.

Technically inclined to agree but The Long Dark implements this rather well...

Yeah, I'd say there's no such thing as a good real money loot box. Should be regulated the same as Vegas.

Depends if the achievements are good. A boring and bad achievment is something that is simply tedious, and isn't hard. Like jumping in a specific spot 200 times. That's stupid as hell.

I think a good achievement is "beat level without X ability". Something that forces you to adapt and change your playstyle.

I also don't think games should have hundreds or THOUSANDS of achievements, cause accomplishisng any of them feels like pissing in the wind.

Id much rather have 50 super difficult achievements, so each one feels impactful and rewarding.