It's not a rare thing for games to cheat in your favour, what was the last shooter where you had the same health as the hundreds of grunts and monsters you slew?
That's not the same; not enforcing "realism" (for want of a better word) isn't the same as cheating. A more appropriate example would be something like "when was the last time you played a shooter where your crosshair didn't stick to or gravitate towards enemy targets?".
That's rather common, too, among less-than-absolutely-hardcore-fps games which are still shooters and played in first person or over-the-shoulder. There's quite a few games in the genre that give enemies more health and weaponry than you have, but grant you superior tactical options.
Amen. I've learned the hard way that a few pixels difference in a hitbox makes the difference between them sticking till the end or quitting in frustration from dying unfairly and leaving you a 1/5.
Articles like this only make me grumpy. I tried this game last year, but I gave up on it in disgust for being too hard. And now the developer is telling me that he made it easier than it could have been? Bah humbug!
Still, these details may explain why games like this are dime-a-dozen now. This one gave people the confidence to make their own, not realizing the details sweated by the original developer. Hence, all the knockoffs (especially on iOS) play worse; which initially surprised me, but now makes sense in retrospect.
This reminds me of the mobile UI recommendations of making the hit boxes for buttons be larger than the button graphic, to forgive sloppy gestures.