NEOWIZ Overhauls Lies of P Difficulty for Overture to Improve Mid-Game Access

Even after Lies of P built its identity on punishing combat, internal playtests during the development of the Overture expansion pushed NEOWIZ to rethink how difficulty options work. The change wasn’t only driven by player requests—studio staff learned firsthand that a fixed difficulty could block many people from reaching the game’s mid-point, prompting the team to add an easier approach designed to bring more players into the story.

Internal playtests showed the fixed difficulty was too steep

Combat director Lee Jeonghyeon discussed the experiment in the documentary Gamers by Gamers, explaining that the team initially asked members to complete the game on a fixed difficulty setting. For those already used to this style of action, the task was manageable.

The problem surfaced when the playtests included people less familiar with the game’s combat mechanics:

• Most of the less-comfortable testers could not even reach halfway before their time ran out.
• The studio concluded that players outside their own comfort zone faced a clear barrier to progressing through the world and story without prior mastery of the demanding combat system.

The Overture expansion added a lower difficulty to broaden access

After seeing that outcome, NEOWIZ decided to introduce a lower difficulty tier that would let a wider audience complete Lies of P. The goal wasn’t to remove challenge entirely—rather, to offer options so different skill levels could experience the game.

The expansion’s approach keeps the original design available for players who want it:

• Players who want the experience as first conceived can still choose that version of the game.
• The added difficulty options allow users to tailor the experience based on their comfort with the combat system.

Why the combat learning curve mattered—and how the community responded

Lies of P leans heavily on precision combat fundamentals, where timing and observation are central. The team specifically pointed to mechanics such as:

• Correctly parrying enemy attacks
• Learning enemy patterns
• Measuring each move before committing

For experienced players, those systems can feel intuitive. But the studio’s own testing reinforced that the learning curve could become a wall for others. The team also said the update ultimately received positive reception from a significant portion of the community.

In the end, NEOWIZ appears to have found a way to preserve the game’s reputation for demanding fights without making that difficulty level a requirement for everyone—especially since it was the staff themselves who demonstrated how necessary the change could be.