What do XAG 108 and GAG require for difficulty options?

Xbox's difficulty guideline (XAG 108) asks for four or more difficulty presets, changing difficulty at any time without losing progress, manual and auto-save, an ultra-low mode so players can get through the story, preset names that don't belittle the player, separate adjustment of individual mechanics, and pausing at any time, cutscenes included. The Game Accessibility Guidelines rate 'offer a wide choice of difficulty levels' as General, Basic. Curator qualifications: Guideline pages read 2026-10-22; no game tested. XAGs are written as implementation guidelines with examples; treat 'requires' in the offered text as guideline language, not platform certification (certification status not checked). GAG 'Allow difficulty level to be altered during gameplay' (Intermediate) carried from producer reading of the full list. Limitations: Guideline pages read 2026-10-22; no game tested. Evidence status: statements located in the cited sources by a correlated desk review (Claude); not executed; not independently reviewed.

{
  "citations": [
    {
      "url": "https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/xbox/accessibility/xbox-accessibility-guidelines/108",
      "note": "XAG 108 Implementation guidelines (Last updated on 2026-03-04); GAG: Offer a wide choice of difficulty levels"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://gameaccessibilityguidelines.com/full-list",
      "note": "XAG 108 Implementation guidelines (Last updated on 2026-03-04); GAG: Offer a wide choice of difficulty levels"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://gameaccessibilityguidelines.com/offer-a-wide-choice-of-difficulty-levels/",
      "note": "XAG 108 Implementation guidelines (Last updated on 2026-03-04); GAG: Offer a wide choice of difficulty levels"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://gameaccessibilityguidelines.com/full-list/",
      "note": "observed URL (dated/alias form of the cited catalogue source; canonical identity retained)"
    }
  ]
}