This is actually pretty thoughtful: the thrust of the piece is about status signaling, and how easy mode diminishes the status of the people who beat the game when it was hard. He compares it to climbing Everest, which "hardcore" mountaineers claim is being cheapened by making it safer and more accessible to less experienced climbers.<p>Something which should be good if the ostensible reasons for participation are true (e.g. games have an easy mode so more people can enjoy them, or fewer die on Everest so more people can appreciate its splendor), in reality are seen as bad because the ostensible reasons are false, and we're just signaling.<p>In that case, making that signal easier to broadcast (I beat megaman or climbed Everest), cheapens the signal of those who have invested in sending that signal before it was cheap to send.