For instance, at one point you’re tasked with taking down three generators after making it through the Free Fire Zone. I tried wading in on foot. Couldn’t do it, I kept getting wiped out. I tried driving through the generator buildings but the car always got trashed. Finally, I remembered I had a jump pack. So, I would rush to the building, jump on top and be effectively safe from all fire. blow a hole in the roof, plant three grenades on the generator, bail out into the nearest vehicle and rush to the next, then trigger the explosion. Missions successful.

Ditto with another, where you’re tasked with destroying a bunch of copters on helipads. At first, I tried rushing the base and destroying them with explosives. I kept getting mowed down. Remembering the mission briefing, to avoid being seen, I jet packed up the side of an obvious mountain, located outside the base. Then, I simply Nano-Rifled the shit out of each plane till it exploded. Mission complete.

I’ve got to defend the difficulty, though. In an interview with one of the designers, which I believe you (or a US colleague) posted. The comment was that Volition wanted to player to feel as though they were playing as an insurgent. The title of the game is Guerrilla. In other words, you’ve got to be sneaky and creative.

The game, at first, encourages a false sense of bravado. With all the explosive weaponry provided, you’re made to feel as though you can run in. So you do, then you die under hail of bullets. Slow down, step back and reassess each situation and you’ll see a different, more obscure method of completing each mission objective. I don’t feel the difficulty is inhibiting, rather it’s a deterrent to a direct “third-person shooter” approach.

For example, when you increase the difficulty you face more enemies who are more varied and use stronger weapons. However, once these enemies are disposed of you can pick up these stronger weapons and the copious amounts of grenades they drop.

With significanly more explosives lying around the game becomes one of abundance, as opposed to most shooters where increasing the difficulty level makes you carefully ration your inventory.

Easy – Allowed you to save 7 times during the mission
Medium – 5 times
Hard – 3 times
Expert – No Saves

I’ll admit that I have done the same with Red Faction, I’m still dying though, but mainly because running around the base with a hammer or rocket launcher trying to level the place… those flyers are annoying though…

silent assassin rank where you could not kill anyone except targets, use any firearms even on targets and have zero alerts made the way you approached a level completely different from replaying the levels for fun with every weapon unlocked so you could run in guns blazing.