History NintendoHard / RoleplayingGames

* In any ''Pokémon'' game where you can catch the lil' guys, doing a [[Webcomic/NuzlockeComics Nuzlocke run]] is partly meant to invoke this in what are otherwise fairly tame games. Under namely the KO = permadeath rule, many parts that were once annoying are now intense. [[VideoGameRandomizer Randomizer]] or not, hope you know which species can learn [[TakingYouWithMe Destiny Bond]], and I don't just mean Wobbuffet (who itself has moves and an ability that make it a Nuzlocker's worst nightmare). Better make sure you're ready before going into a series of multiple Trainer battles back-to-back without a break to heal freely from your bag. And of course, sometimes, even with a Dupes Clause to let you ignore previously-caught species for the first encounter = only valid catch chance rule, you [[LuckBasedMission might]] find yourself softlocked when you don't have anyone who can learn the [[AbilityRequiredToProceed right HM you need to continue]] and you don't give yourself any leeway in those cases. Finally, let's not forget the fact that you may not actually get anyone decent, and thus have to work extra hard to stay alive. And this is all not even considering any of the ''many'' extra rules some players have, or if you're playing on an especially hard hack. How does the average player get through such a challenge? Follow the creed: "Never Give Up, Never Forget, '''Grind Like Hell'''".

* ''VideoGame/{{Underrail}}'' (no relation to ''Undertale'' below - though they are both set underground) is a brutal Serbian tactical [=RPG=] in the vein of VideoGame/{{Fallout}} that takes great pleasure in watching you die over and over and over. SaveScumming is ''actively encouraged'' - the game autosaves before you enter a new area and keeps an extra autosave and quicksave on the buffer as well. It is strongly recommended that you consult the [[https://underrail.com/forums/index.php?board=12.0 Underrail Character Builds Forum]] to carefully refine a character concept before you start... or you can just nick somebody else's; riflemen, shotgunners, crossbow rangers, melee fighters, unarmed brawlers, psionics, there's something for everyone. If your build is anything less than top-notch then you will be seeing the game over screen with frustrating regularity.

* ''VideoGame/AtelierLilieTheAlchemistOfSalburg3'', the third game of the ''VideoGame/{{Atelier}}'' series, has a reputation for being hellishly difficult compared to its contemporaries. It perhaps is not "hard" in the traditional, Battletoads sense, but getting anything other than a very "generic" ending requires that you plan out your entire approach to the game before you even start playing; you must plan what you'll do ahead of time in terms of whole game-years. And a lot of the endings require that you do a ''lot''. The amount of planning required makes this one Nintendo Hard for a lot of folks and hurt the sales of the game.

* ''VideoGame/SekiroShadowsDieTwice'' continues the tradition of punishingly hard FromSoftware [=RPGs=], with some of the most difficult bosses the studio has created yet. It varies the formula from the ''Souls'' series, doing away with the shield and nerfing the dodging mechanics, forcing you to master an aggressive combat style incorporating rapid, precisely-timed deflections and counterattacks. It punishes you for fighting too defensively, as every blow you block (rather than deflect) fills up a Posture bar that will leave you staggered and defenseless for several seconds when full. Enemies are aggressive and smart, and love to take cheap shots while you heal or use items.

** Before they patched, within minutes of teaching you the basic controls there are swarm of enemies gang up on you. Many people could not complete the first quest.

* ''VideoGame/{{MOTHER|1}}'' is often considered the most difficult of the series. A very high encounter rate that plagues you through out the game even if you're not trying to level grind, but you will have to a lot thanks to the DifficultySpike found in later areas in which almost everything is a DemonicSpider. WordOfGod confirms that the final area is highly unbalanced due to wanting the game finished soon.
** The encounter rates are so brutally high, that a player could leave a battle, take one step and immediately be put into another one.
** The game is also notoriously cryptic. Townsfolk are rarely helpful, most of the time offering flavour text instead of help, and to add insult to injury [[ScrappyMechanic some of the NPCs can even sneeze on your face and give you a cold]], which acts like posion and causes Ninten to lose health overtime (it doesn't help that it can only be cured with a trip to the doctor at a hospital, which isn't cheap, or by using Mouthwash, which you don't get until the latter half of the game), and finding the 8 Melodies often requires checking every item that might vaguely stand out (including A Doll in Ninten’s house, a single random cactus in the desert, a canary and a sign just to name a few) toward which the game only gives vague clues (to be fair, there is one NPC in Magicant that tells you the locations of the 8 Melodies... after you've reached the peak of [[TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon Mt. Itoi]] near the end of the game). Enemies can do a truckload of damage from the first dungeon (hell, just from the moment you exit your house and try to the reach ''the first town in the game'') and things spiral out of control by the time the party reaches Yucca Desert, and the difficultly only gets worse from there.
** Amazingly, the original Japanese release was even harder, with more complex dungeons and bullshit tricks (like a random character sending you back to the start of a dungeon if you don’t answer his questions correctly). These were altered for the unreleased US version (which was later released on the Wii U virtual console).

* ''VideoGame/PokemonStadium'' 1 and 2 is the crowning example for the ''Pokemon'' series, with round 2 in particular being infamously difficult. The stadium cups have some diabolical strategies, and Gym Leader Castle has eight gyms that specialize in their gym type, with some incredible team synergy, and underlings that generally use Pokemon that counteract's the gyms weakness. But its their AI that makes them truly Nintendo Hard, as they will switch when at a disadvantage, and often have good selections to whatever you choose. Because of this, they are often accused of cheating, sometimes with the critical hit rng, even though it is a different critical hit formula. No other Pokemon game (or even game mods of Pokemon) come anywhere near the difficulty set by the ''Stadium'' series, making this a standout example.
** This deserves more elaboration. In the first game, enemies were using strategies or moves that abused the short sights of the Gen I version of the game. Wrap and Fire Spin can and will trap your monsters for the entirety of their LP bar. Toxic and Leech Seed sapped health away in large chunks while you mysteriously missed with Psychic. This is when you're not dealing with obnoxious cheating such as a trainer in the prime cup who decided to load up really fast pokemon with one-hit kill moves that hit really hard. Gen II was obnoxious for a different reason. The movesets on average were fair and balanced...until round 2 came along and you were wondering how did Raikou learn Thunderbolt (Crystal's move tutor, which Stadium 2's early purchasers didn't get to just then). Gen II also had one of the worst (if not THE worst) TM pool in the game, and so required lots and lots of breeding for Olympus monsters just to be able to stand a chance against the A.I.s perfect bred, perfect IV/EV stat distributed monster teams.

* ''VideoGame/SacredEarthPromise'': The game has a steep learning curve due to the absence of healing items, forcing the player to rely on EX Recover, buff skills, and Focus to keep themselves alive. All playable characters have their own elemental weaknesses as well, which means the player cannot afford to be careless with their LF. The endgame requires the player to be good at quickly manipulating their EP and EX to keep themselves alive and force the Focus command to cool down faster. While difficult gameplay is to be expected on Hard and Nightmare, Normal can still wreck players who blindly focus on offense or fail to take advantage of all mechanics.

* ''VideoGame/LieOfCaelum'': The in-universe retro game, Star Warrior, is intentionally balanced as a reference to the difficulty of real retro RPGs. There is only one party member, upgrades are expensive, and the RNG can be brutal when it comes to healing and enemy crit rates.

* ''VideoGame/SweetHome'', being the [[TropeMaker granddaddy of]] SurvivalHorror, is among the more grueling [=JRPGs=] of the late [=1980s=]. To do well, players must take notes, remember where things are, manage their inventory, and carefully ration healing tonics (of which there are only twenty-one in the game, ''total!''). Adding to the challenge is {{Permadeath}}: the tonics are the only way to recover HP, and if one of your characters die, they ''stay dead''. Since each character has a unique item that is instrumental to solving puzzles and progressing through the game, the loss of a party member will make proceeding all the more difficult.