Difficulty Settings & Their Impact

Learn about Cuphead's DLC difficulty settings, including Simple and Regular, and how they affect boss fights, achievements, and your overall gameplay experience in The Delicious Last Course.

While Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course doesn't feature explicit difficulty settings like 'Easy,' 'Normal,' or 'Hard' that you can toggle from the main menu, the game offers distinct ways to approach challenges that significantly impact the experience. These primarily revolve around the available difficulty modes for boss fights and the strategic use of characters and items.

Difficulty Modes:

• Simple Difficulty: This mode is available for most boss fights and serves as a way to progress through the story or learn boss patterns without the full challenge. While it allows you to defeat bosses and advance, it often does not count towards certain achievements or 100% completion, particularly those requiring specific ranks or defeating bosses on Regular difficulty.
• Regular Difficulty: This is the standard difficulty for most of the game and is required for many achievements and for true completion. Bosses on Regular have more complex attack patterns, increased health, and faster movement. Achieving an A-Rank or higher on Regular difficulty is a common requirement for many trophies.
• Expert Difficulty: Unlocked after completing the main story and making a deal with The Devil, Expert difficulty presents the ultimate challenge. Bosses are significantly faster, have new attack phases, and require near-perfect execution. S-Ranks are only obtainable on Expert difficulty.

Impact of Ms. Chalice and Charms:

• Ms. Chalice: Playing as Ms. Chalice, especially with her unique dash-parry ability, can make certain boss fights more manageable, even on higher difficulties. Her inclusion is crucial for specific achievements that require defeating bosses with her.
• Charms: Charms like the Twin Heart (increasing HP) or the Heart Ring (granting HP on parries) can provide a significant advantage, especially when aiming for achievements like 'Hearty' (having 9HP at one time). The Cursed Relic and its upgraded form, the Divine Relic, offer unique gameplay modifiers that drastically alter combat, requiring players to adapt their strategies.
• DLC Weapons: The new weapons introduced in The Delicious Last Course, such as Converge, Crackshot, and Twist-Up, offer different strategic advantages that can make specific boss encounters easier or are required for certain achievements.

Understanding these elements is key to mastering Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course and achieving 100% completion.