What difficult games/game challenges did you give up on?

Hollow Knight. I love that game but I am in my mid 40s and my reaction time isn't what it used to be. And it's not even the bosses. I just can't make it past the spike section where you have to air-dash all over the place and can't be a millimeter off or you die.

In the fighting game scene, reaction time is studied, and the 40+ year olds can hang with the kids at the highest level. Your reaction time is a function of your focus. If you put your mind to it, yadda yadda yadda. Then it's just up to you to decide if it's worth sticking to it or getting to bed so you're well-rested for work in the morning, because that's what will separate you from beating Hollow Knight in your 40s.
- I've just moved on to other games. I have a wife and a small kid. I can't afford to spend hours and hours stuck on a game.
I'm guessing you're talking about the White Palace. It's required for the "true" ending but you can reach the credits without it. It's worth watching mossbag's lore videos on YouTube whether you beat the game or not.
- I don't think so. I only beat 3-4 bosses or so. I think it was a dark bluish area with white spikes, some way down from the entrance.
- Personally I got through the "standard" white palace (not the side path. Fuck that).
  
  But I never could beat the Radiance. It's fast, its attack hitboxes are completely bonkers, and I absolutely hate the fact I can't properly train against it to make sense of its patterns. Because every time I lose I have to redo that stupid Hollow Knight section again. It's not even a hard part, it's just wasting my time and making me more nervous when I have to face the real deal.
For me it's not even that, i just get lost a lot and run in circles until i put it down and when i pick it back up again i'm even more lost.
The Path of Pain? Yeah I gave up on that too. Also gave up on trying to beat Grim, even in my second play through.
42 yo here, same as you! I tried the game multiple times as everyone was raving about it. Got so frustrated with the bosses that I gave up.

Jedi Fallen Order. I've tried a couple times because I really WANT to like the game. But I just can't stand the fucking souls style of everything comes back when you save. And the boss fights are just too punishing (for me). It's so frustrating to get stuck on a boss or lost in a zone and come to the realization that I WAS having fun and then the game got in the way of that.

Elden Ring. I had a lot of fun with the game restarting and playing through the first zone on like 6 different characters to try different styles and see what I like. But at some point in the second zone I realized I was just stressed out all the time. It wasn't fun, it was stressful. I can appreciate the game and I don't regret spending the money on it, but I realized it just wasn't for me.

I think I'm done with souls games. They're just not for me. I really wanted to play Jedi Survivor but I suspect the new cool stuff will just make me more frustrated with the souls aspects, Oh well.

I really wanted to like JFO but I just hated the combat mechanics, it almost seemed like it was lightsaber fighting underwater with how sluggish it seemed, and I hated the number of times I died early on from basic beasts just because you can't break a 3-button combo so if they dodge ever so slightly that's a good 2-3 seconds they have to lunge attack.

Permanently Deleted

I adore the Outer Wilds vibe, but had the same experience and it still doesn’t sit well with me! Years later and the game still comes to mind, but the periodic resets were so unpleasant for me that I didn’t see it all the way through. Maybe this will be the year….
- I'm glad I'm not the only one who found the world resets frustrating. I agree that the world is interesting and atmospheric, but as someone who enjoys thoroughly exploring, the resets just kept ruining my immersion into the world. Maybe one day I'll go back to the game.
"True Pacifist" route is worth doing if you enjoy Undertale, it's not terribly difficult and fleshes out the characters a bit more. If you're thinking about going the other way, I would say play up through Undyne and see how that feels. Edit: also play Deltarune if you havent

I really want to like Outer Wilds, but it just hasn't quite clicked with me either. I've probably played about 10 hours but just keep bouncing off of it.

Dark Souls and souls games in general. But the difficulty is just half of it. I have beaten hard games before. The problem is that everything is so bleak I can't even feel motivated to try. I'll do a thing only for some NPC to go "it doesn't matter, everything is pointless and you're so insignificant". Inevitably being spoiled I know that even the single optimistic NPC is not getting it great. Y'all can mope, I'm gonna put my effort where it's appreciated.

The bleakness is why I assume the "age of dark" endings are the good ones. They're the only endings that also end all the suffering of those fucked up worlds. The only weird one is Elden Ring. You can end all suffering, but it's presented as the worst possible end for that particular game.
It's so interesting how tastes can change everything. The bleakness in the souls games is intoxicating to me and keeps me coming back. I imagine it has something to do with psychology
You might want to try Lies of P. All of the highlights of Dark Souls combat and if you play your cards right pretty much every NPC gets a happy ending.

It's free on Game Pass right now too, if you have that.
- I just might. Some fights were infuriating but so was Hollow Knight and I love that game. As long as the conclusion makes it worth it.

So so so many. Right off the top of my head:

Guild Wars Season 2, one of the later missions. It was stealth gameplay. I hate stealth. Paid someone 100g to run it for me.
FTL's boss.
Warframe's Glassmaker season fight with Nihil.
Currently, Ace Combat 7's Pipeline Destruction.

Currently, Ace Combat 7’s Pipeline Destruction.

Oof, that was really tough IIRC.

I usually never complete the "extreme" challenges present in some games, like path of pain and the pantheons in Hollow Knight, or the B-sides in Celeste. I try them, but when I realize that completion will require lot of time and effort, I really don't feel bothered enough. But I'm ok with that because this kind of stuff is optional, and it's actually cool seeing more talented gamers deal with them

Minecraft, I tried summoning and defeating the Wither and was woefully unprepared. The entire world near the fight was filled with craters from the explosions. I was getting ready to throw the entire world away. Then I decided to just cheat and turn Creative Mode on for 1 second, the Wither disappeared and I was able to continue playing, now with PTSD.

It didn't help that I was playing on Bedrock (switch), which apparently has a much more difficult fight than in the Java edition.

Try fighting it underground, it gets stuch on all the blocks and you can easily backpedal as far as you want down a little tunnel. Enchanted golden apples are also very good.

Botw master mode sword challenge. Made it to stage 6

If Hades didn't have God Mode (which actually works in a pretty interesting way and isn't just invincibility or whatever), I would have given up incredibly quickly.

Once I enabled it, shit started to actually feel fun for me.

Now it's one of my favourite ever games.

I have this weird thing where I love a game to be challenging because it's not engaging if it's easy, it makes the game boring to me, but at the same time I despise grinding and generally rote gameplay with the only purpose of amassing more points to be able to challenge the next boss. But very few RPGs I like are like that. Baldurs Gate 1/2 are excellent games that I love but I get extremely frustrated by some encounters which just feels like absolute bullshit and require extreme grinding or going off to do a myriad of side quests to bump up your level. Same holds true for Pillars of Eternity which I also love.

Though I tend to be a stubborn person so I generally come back a week or month later if I get stuck but I tend to put the game down once I've dealt with the immediate challenge and realize that I need to do all that boring stuff again for the next boss and then I just don't start.

I definitely had that experience with Baldur's Gate 2, but I'm about 20 hours into Pillars of Eternity so far and very much not having that experience. Pillars seems to give me all the information I need to know to get through an encounter while BG2 will just say "weapon had no effect" without telling you that this monster can only be defeated by a +3 weapon.
- Well the "early" fight with the noble / king / count can't remember in PoE had me tearing my hair on the difficulty I played on, took intense space bar action and every trick I could muster in terms of abusing targeting and kiting, etc to win it. I don't know how many times I reloaded and how many days I tried, must've been in the hundreds by the end when I finally got it due to a few lucky crits and rolls.
The first bit is basically me whenever I do a challenge run in a Pokemon game.

Control. Liked it despite being in 3rd person view up until the mezzanine fight an hour or two in, then realized that the enemies are just dumb high DPS bullet sponges, the PC is a low DPS squishy and fighting from a cover or any other tactical approach I'm used to doesn't work.

EDIT: There was also a spellcrafting mod for Skyrim where the endboss was immunebto all magic and would teleport away as soon as you got too close while summoning a bazillion powerful minions. At level 50...60 it was litwrally impossible to figjt the bastard. After many tries I just console killed the bugger and was done with it.

I'm about 8 hours into it, and I would say try it again, and once you get the launch ability rely on that as your primary weapon. I only really use the gun in a pinch or against enemies that can dodge launches.
- Maybe I'll give it a retry at some point in the future. If I can recall my forgotten Epic login credentials, that is. Too busy with the thargoid war for the next few years, though.
I also bounced off Control. Really wanted to like it. 3D metrovania in a SCP inspired setting ,how cool is that. The game is a technical marvel. How Remedy got that game to run on base PS4; I will never know. However the gunplay just feels off. I don’t like how the gun recharges instead of an ammo reload system. I feel like I’m too squishy. The weapon mods feel materially pointless. Don’t get me the wrong the setting so super unique. Most of my time playing was spent glossing over all the lore bits. “Threshold Kids” is horrifically fascinating. As if it came straight from creepy pasta. I wonder if I would enjoy Control way more if it was a limited series on Apple TV.

A lot of puzzle games, especially ones by Zachtronics. Eventually I get to a point where my brain just can’t keep up and at that point I consider it done.

Zachtronics games are hard. Every once in a while I try going back to beat Spacechem but I'll just hit a wall, noodle with it for a few days and just sort of run out of motivation.
This was me playing Ocarina of Time.
- It was also me when I played Majoras Mask. Young me did not comprehend that shit at all.
Yes! For most genres of games, I've noped out of some games but completed others. It wasn't until you mentioned it that I realized I've never completed a Zachtronic game. I absolutely adore what Witness was doing, but I haven't finished it. I should go back to it.

I couldn't get past the second area(I think?)of Cuphead, there was a dragon boss that was just a wall for me.

That boss was indeed tough but also one of my favorites from that game. I even have a shirt of it (that is suffering from some wear and tear at this point). I probably spent several hours each trying to beat both that dragon and the game's robot boss as well.
It's a really hard game but I have to say learning to speedrun it was super fulfilling. Time consuming though haha

A bunch of old Sierra games. Like the Space Quest series.

Great games, but unforgiving. Having a walkthrough on hand is a must as a few sections are close to impossible without one

You are aware that the impossible sections were on purpose to sell hint books and to make money with the telephone hintline which one could call being stuck?
- Yes, but I'm talking about in this day and age. There are no Hint Books or Hotlines anymore. So we fall back on ye olde walkthroughs, as without them, the games are close to impossible.

If I picked Wolfenstein: The New Order back up today, I'd probably have a better time with it, since it's been a decade since I touched it last and my gaming abilities have improved since then, but for whatever reason this game was ridiculously difficult for me, even on the easiest setting. It finally came to a point where I just couldn't finish it, and I'm not sure if I ever will.

I remember it being probably the most difficult shooter I had ever played up until that point. The campaign was genuinely so hard. I (barely) managed to beat it and the boss fight at the end took me real life months.

Bramble: The Mountain King

I ragequit half way through the final boss after having died for the thirtieth time. The game is absolutely beautiful, but fuck me some of it is tough.

Ended up watching the last bit on YouTube. No regrets.

Thanks for the unintentional recommendation.
- Oh, it's a stunning game, and I absolutely adored it. But that final boss is an utter prick.

I had a lot of games on PS4 where the difficulty isn't "why" I stopped, but the lengthy loads when I died was.

I'm perfectly happy dying a bunch of times in a row, provided the deaths are fair and consistent. I have a big issue with waiting 5-10 minutes to replay a section that doesn't last meaningfully longer than that.

Getting a PS5 let me go back to a lot of those games and properly enjoy the brutal difficulty without the headaches.

Gave up on gaming in general. Moved to Linux back in October. Had issues getting my games to play because of various issues between Nvidia 535/545 and Wayland, Xorg, or the steam/proton/lutris/aagl/hgl things I tried. Then work got too busy and I've put gaming on the back burner 'til I have more time to troubleshoot it (hopefully with new Nvidia/Wayland packages).

This.

This is unfortunately why I have not switched to Linux as a daily driver
- You might give it a try -- it may just work for you. Not everybody has the same issues, and I'm sure I'll be able to figure it out later when I have time to troubleshoot it. This is just a busy time of year for me, so as long as my work stuff works, I'm good, and gaming has to sit on the backburner for a bit.
- I switched to Linux as my daily driver back last summer and have been able to play every game I've tried with literally no issues. Admittedly, I had issues at first but then I switched to Pop!_OS, which has built-in support for Nvidia hybrid graphics. That solved the few gaming issues I had.
  
  With how easy it was and how many games work with no issues, I'm genuinely surprised to hear people say they are having issues with it. I'm not even close to a linux expert. I'm not a programmer. I don't want my OS to be a hobby, I want it to just work. And so far it has.

I don't think I've stopped in the middle of something without planning on coming back. If something is difficult I'm more likely to do better the next day.

But something that I know I would not have fun with is platinum any Yakuza game. And honestly, I'm glad this game taught me to not worry about not completing things I don't care about.

Back in my teens one summer, I was playing Resident Evil Code Veronica by day at my friend's house and Doom 3 alone in my basement at night, got about halfway through both but quit because of the constant nightmares. Lost to the psychological damage I guess.

Fire Emblem: Awakening on Lunatic mode. It just wasn’t fun and I already didn’t like enemies popping up and getting to attack in the same turn.

Dark Soul serie. After dying for the nth time i gave up. I don't have enough time to red again and again the same path.

Getting over it, well it do save your progression, especially your mistake.

Subnautica and amesia. I fear void place and it's too scary.

State of decay 2 lethal difficulty. You pretty much can't fast search. You can't have a follower because they start brawls needlessly by attacking zombies and they don't disengage, making running away from brawls impossible. And without a follower a feral spotting you is pretty much a death sentence. Add the insane food usage, overly eager plague hearts / sieges and the undying hostile npcs and I have no idea how people play that

Stephen's Sausage Roll.

I play a lot of puzzle games. Some of them are pretty hard (the later levels of Tametsi take quite a while to crack).

But this one is on a completely different level. If there is a more brutally punishing sokoban-family game on existence, I have no idea what it might be.

Stephen, if he exists, is most likely condemned to roll sausages eternally in hell, for the sin of making this game.

Surely, Baba Is You is horrible and awful! By which I mean very good. And either unreasonably hard or maybe I'm stupid. Avoid at all costs!
- Baba Is You is fantastic, and I think its difficulty curve is much, much more reasonable in the beginning than Stephen's Sausage Roll. I haven't finished it, but I didn't utterly bounce off it either.

I play most games on hard difficulty. But i gave up finish Nier Replicant on hard, not because i got stuck, but the hp of the monster was way to high to have fun.

The farewell Chapter in Celeste. I really don't know how to do that room with the three dash activated blocks surrounded by spikes.

It's funny I know exactly the room you're talking about lol

I managed to do farewell in 29:30, flying through the chapter is so liberating after being stuck in every room

I just couldn't beat Guacamelee on Vita, just hit a boss I couldn't beat. I considered getting every Kurok on BOTW at one point but settled on every shrine or it'd have lost its fun.

@MangoKangaroo

Crypt of the Necrodancer

The characters are difficulty levels, some with additional rules.

It's a rythm rpg, lore character #1 can miss beats, collect stuff, etc.

Lore character #3 can't miss a beat or miss and can't upgrade health, so you always die in one hit.

When I beat the 4 chapters with that character I was done :D

I'm about to just toss Remnant 2 out. I thought maybe it would be better than the first one, but it's even more bullshit. Like, it's a shooter and the first boss hurts you while you look at it. The intended method to defeat it feels way more like cheesing an exploit. I've gotten through the first quest in the Labyrinth and I'm hating the bosses even more than the first game with how just annoyingly unfair they are if you're not playing with a group. They're simply not fun.

Returnal is very similar in gameplay, and is even a roguelike with super brutal gameplay; even that game isn't as frustrating as Remnant 2. The bosses are hard, but not unfairly so.

Like every arcade game as a kid: Defender, Xevious, Galaga, Berzerk, Battle Zone, Asteroids, the Dark Knight pinball machine. My 10 year old self had no idea these games were supposed to be infinite/unbeatable. Or rather, I always assumed they were. I had no clue they could crash if you were super expert at them. I think Xevious actually had an end tho.

As for arcade games a casual could finish but I gave up on? A decade later, Virtua Fighter.

2 very recent ones on PS5

God of War Ragnarok: I did the story and as much f the side missions and challenges as possible. But there are a few Berserker Graves, and the final Valkyrie Gna that no matter how many times I tried it would just get absurd. I almost threw my controller through my TV a few times when trying to roll-dodge to the side for an attack after they've already jumped at you and, i shit you not, they change direction in mid-air.
Spider-Man: I did 100% the main game, all the side-quests and collectibles just not all the skills. Did all but the last DLC, but finally ragequit when trying to do the base tokens. Interior with tight corners. and you have to take out a dozen enemies including the whip-enemies attacking you from all directions...while rockets are being fired at you in the middle of 5 enemies.

Oh yeah, I hated the God of War reboot. It was so cool for like 15 minutes. Then I got to the actual combat and I couldn't stand it. It was nothing like the original, it was hard AF, it used button combinations I've never seen before (I think it's based on Souls games?), etc. It was so disappointing.
- I don’t mind Souls games, but I kind of hate how so many games lately (especially sequels) have been trying to low-key fit the genre when nobody asked them to. God of War, Darksiders 3…

Puzzle games like Baba and high skill ceiling platformers like Celeste, Meat Boy.

Soulsborne games are just soothing now. Dodge dodge hit, roll, heal, item, run

I tried Baba and really enjoyed it to start. But once I hit a wall, way earlier than I thought I would, I did touch it for like another year, and haven't played it since.

Diablo IV: Uber Lilith. I did just about everything else, got my character up to Level 100. Then the first season ended (which I didn't even do) and somehow my character got nerfed -- even basic enemies were suddenly much harder for no apparent reason. I was considering changing and upgrading my gear for this final challenge but I couldn't even fight my way around the map anymore. Screw that.

I tried replaying the Kingdom Hearts games leading up to playing KH3. Got all the way to the final boss sequence in KH1, but I just couldn’t get past the second phase, and I didn’t have any good saves for going back and leveling up. Gave up. Already beat it as a kid when it first came out. No need to kill myself in my late-30s for it.