Optional settings are always good. Enforcing non-optional changes so it appeals to a broader audience is kinda bad.
I'll assume this discussion is regarding optional settings?
I'm not sure why people seem to think accessibility and preserving the essence of the game aren't compatible.
Modern good game design also includes being able to provide a similar experience while balancing out the skill level, or while making up for disabilities.
I honestly despise the idea of games that created a legacy over being "hard" rather than because of other aspects such like graphics, innovation, fluidity, story, mechanics. Like, literally any game can be hard? If the vision of the creator is for it to be hard that's probably an artistic direction I find extremely lame because it's just a strange form of gatekeeping the experience to a certain audience, unless it's intentionally a rage game like Getting Over It or I Wanna Be the Guy where the point is to make everyone frustrated.
And whether or not someone will find it hard depends on the skill of the player? I didn't find Dark Soul, Cuphead, nor Hollow Knight hard despite it being labeled by the media as such, on the other hand I find games that even kids can play like Fortnite and Minecraft extremely tough to learn.
Why bother if the person is experiencing the game the same way as you? I think it's bizarre y'all kinda putting words in the creators mouth on how they wanted it to be. The core essence of the games is for the player to have an enjoyable (even in a masochist way in the case of the previously mentioned rage games) and remarkable experience above all. And as a form of art? The creator expresses themselves, and they leave room for the audience to interpret, that's how art works. Even if your argument is that accessibility damages the experience, it's allowing a huge part of the experience to reach people it would never before. I don't see why it's bad to give those people a major taste of something they couldn't before, why deny them it? It just sounds selfish.
And like, what even is this experience in the first place? If you're tweaking a single aspect while maintaining others, why should you assume they're playing something like a completely different game? It's simply not? Even if they played with the exact same settings as you they'll explore differently and make different options. They'll use items differently, they'll farm stuff differently, they'll do quests in different orders, they appreciate areas and characters in different ways. Your experience won't be the same even if they play it identically like you, button press by button press. And why should it bother anyone? Let people experience things in their ways.
And, like, I really don't understand why it's being overlooked that players a lot of times need a more accessible gateway to get where veteran players are. What's even stopping a player, if they really enjoyed playing on an easier mode, to replay the game on a harder difficulty now more prepared for what to expect? I feel like literally everyone here has done that before? By cutting off people from accessible media you're preventing new people from ever being able to have the content you deem as the proper one, so I don't really understand the point? Shouldn't you be supporting accessibility if it's what enables that?
if anything I can see it the question of accessibility being more of an issue in multiplayer games, because it's definitely unfair that people with extremely different amount of dedication to the game to be equally rewarded. An example is auto-combos in fighting games, or the antenna mechanic in MK that Uwu just mentioned. Those are tougher to balance while still giving different skill level players a chance to compete against each other, and is probably a discussion for another day. But damn, on solo content? Just let people enjoy how they play their stuff.