Desperados 3: Difficulty levels Desperados 3 guide, walkthrough

Last update: 22 February 2021

On this page of our guide to Desperados 3 you will find all information about the available difficulty levels. You will find out, among others, what difficulty levels the game offers, what are the differences between them, and how you can personalize the difficulty settings.

• Key information about the difficulty levels
• The main differences between the difficulty levels
• How to set and configure my own level of difficulty?

Key information about the difficulty levels

1. In Desperados III, there are 4 main difficulty levels: Beginner, Normal, Hard, and Desperado.
2. All difficulty levels are available right away from the start, and you don't need to complete the main story campaign on lower difficulty levels to unlock them.
3. To complete the game for the first time, we recommend that you choose normal or high difficulty. The highest difficulty level in Desperados is strongly not recommended to players without decent knowledge of in-game maps, because it features a very short reaction time of opponents.
4. You don't need to complete the entire campaign on the same difficulty level. You can change the difficulty level when you start a mission.
5. There are some unique challenges (badges) available in the game which are associated with high level of difficulty. Each stage has exactly 1 challenge to complete on a high difficulty level.
6. The Beginner difficulty level is perfect for completing missed challenges. This is especially helpful for those challenges that have very complicated goals like not killing anyone, racing against time (speedrun) or finishing a mission without saving.
7. The game does not allow you to complete challenges at the Beginner difficulty. If you plan to complete each mission in 100 percent, then you need to set at least a normal difficulty level.
8. All difficulty levels except Desperado allow you to stop time by using the Showdown Mode. This also makes it easier to plan actions of your heroes after an alarm has been triggered.
9. The default difficulty levels don't have any limitations in the aspect of saving the game. Even if you choose a high level of difficulty, you can create new saves whenever you want.
10. You can set your own difficulty level by using numerous modifiers - we described this in detail in the last section of this chapter of our guide.

The main differences between the difficulty levels

In the following table, we have collected the most important differences between the 4 main difficulty levels. Two additional notes:

1. On the Beginner level of difficulty there are not only fewer enemies on the map, but also fewer elite opponents - like opponents in ponchos and the so-called Long Coats. On the Hard and Desperado difficulty levels, there are a lot more enemies in ponchos and Long Coats.
2. The detection speed parameter can be quite confusing - a higher value means that the enemy can detect the controlled hero faster. The largest difference in the difficulty level can be noticed on the Desperado difficulty - you heroes may be detected almost instantaneously.

ATTRIBUTE	BEGINNER LEVEL	NORMAL LEVEL	HARD LEVEL	DESPERADO LEVEL
How many enemies appear on the map?	Lesser amount of opponents	Standard amount of enemies	More opponents that usual	More opponents that usual
How many health points do heroes have?	Hector - 6 Others - 4	Hector - 5 Others - 3	Hector - 4 Others - 2	Hector - 4 Others - 2
How much ammo / limited supplies do the heroes have?	Cooper - 8 McCoy - 5 Hector - 4 Kate - 5 Isabelle - 4	Cooper - 8 McCoy - 4 Hector - 3 Kate - 4 Isabelle - 3	Cooper - 6 McCoy - 3 Hector - 2 Kate - 3 Isabelle - 3	Cooper - 4 McCoy - 2 Hector - 2 Kate - 2 Isabelle - 3
How many supply crates are available on the map?	Cooper - 6 McCoy - 4 Hector - 4 Kate - 4 Isabelle - 2	Cooper - 6 McCoy - 3 Hector - 2 Kate - 3 Isabelle - 2	Cooper - 4 McCoy - 3 Hector - 2 Kate - 2 Isabelle - 2	Cooper - 2 McCoy - 2 Hector - 1 Kate - 2 Isabelle - 2
What is the hero detection speed of enemies?	Normal - 0.7 Alarm - 0.9	Normal - 1.0 Alarm - 1.4	Normal - 2.8 Alarm - 3.5	Normal - 10 Alarm - 10
How many save games you can make?	No restrictions	No restrictions	No restrictions	No restrictions
Does the game allow you to pause gameplay in Showdown Mode?	Yes	Yes	Yes	No

How to set and configure my own level of difficulty?

When selecting the difficulty level, you can click on the Show Details button to expand all details associated with the difficulty level. The game allows you to modify settings to configure your own level of difficulty (Custom). You can use this feature if you are looking for an extreme challenge or if you want to encounter vigilant opponents while keeping a lot of gadgets.

The available modifiers and settings are the following:

1. Enemy Setups - You can determine how many enemies can be spawned on the map and how many of them will be elite opponents in Poncho and Long Coats.
2. Player Health - You can determine the health bar size of all heroes.
3. Player Ammo - You can determine how much ammunition / limited skills your heroes can have at their disposal when mission starts and how much supplies can be found in the crates scattered around the map.
4. Detection Speed - You can determine how fast opponents can detect team members.
5. Amount of Saves - You can determine how many save games you can make during the mission. The default value is Unlimited, but you can also disable this feature completely or allow, for example, for 5 or 20 saves.
6. Pause During Showdown Mode - You can set whether the game should stop the time after switching on the Showdown Mode (makes it possible to plan the actions of heroes).