Furi

Furi's difficulty forces patient dodging and parrying instead of button-mashing. Boss fights only work as a dodge, parry and counter ballet because the boss can't be beaten by running up and attacking after a few simple dodges. The player must wait for a rare opening to strike.

Mark Brown argues that if you could just wail on the boss, the game would be dull: "difficulty acts like a teacher: punishing you if you play it wrong, rewarding you if you play it right." Furi punishes button-mashing to teach patience and observation, and won't let you move on until you get an A grade against each boss.

Furi's difficulty forces patient dodging and parrying instead of button-mashing. Boss fights only work as a dodge, parry and counter ballet because the boss can't be beaten by running up and attacking after a few simple dodges. The player must wait for a rare opening to strike.

Mark Brown argues that if you could just wail on the boss, the game would be dull: "difficulty acts like a teacher: punishing you if you play it wrong, rewarding you if you play it right." Furi punishes button-mashing to teach patience and observation, and won't let you move on until you get an A grade against each boss.

Furi offers an invincibility option so anyone can get through the bosses. Players can become invincible in boss fights and blitz through them without the pressure of failure, letting people who are overwhelmed by stress still enjoy the game.

This goes beyond a difficulty slider by removing the threat entirely, similar to SOMA's option to turn off enemies.

Furi refunds health after a difficult parry to reward hard moves. Landing a difficult parry restores some health, giving players a concrete reason to use the riskier parts of the move set instead of safe, repetitive tactics.

It is one example of using incentives, alongside scoring systems and adaptive enemies, to push players toward the whole move set.