Returnal is all about death and rebirth, but players may get sick of the death part after a while. The game is notoriously difficult, and many players are having trouble getting past the first level as a result. Naturally, some players are scrolling through the settings menu in search of a difficulty setting option, but they aren't having any luck. The reason for this is simple, albeit surprising, there is no difficulty setting in Returnal. Every player will get the same level of difficulty whether they like it or not, meaning less skilled players may find themselves struggling quite a bit.
The developer of Returnal, Housemarque, has actually commented on this before. The lack of a difficulty setting was a completely intentional decision. In an interview with Push Square, Housemarque's marketing director Mikael Haveri goes into detail a little bit about why there are no difficulty options in the game.
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According to Haveri, players don't need a dial or slider in order to change the difficulty of Returnal. By setting their own pace and choosing appropriate paths forward, players should theoretically be able to hone the difficulty to their liking. He also goes on to talk about certain permanent upgrades that persist between each run, stating that newer players may need to take more time to complete runs in search of upgrades to make things easier in the future.
The discourse around difficulty is an interesting one to say the least. On the one hand, having no difficulty settings ensures that all players are experiencing the same challenge. With that framework, accomplishments mean something objectively and there's a sense of community among those that manage to surpass tough spots. On the other hand, having a game with a high difficulty floor can make it inaccessible to more casual gamers. Players that are interested in the story of Returnal but don't have the time or skill to suffer through the more difficult parts of it are basically out of luck.
Overall, players that are intrigued by Returnal but that find themselves struggling should stick with it. What Haveri says about being able to control the difficulty based on playstyle is true to a degree, and the longer fans spend with it the better they will become at recognizing when something is too challenging and should be avoided. If all else fails, players can complete run after run until they can more or less brute force their way through, but there's no way to artificially change the difficulty.
Returnal is available now on PS5.