(Copied from yt description)

I fell in love with this level almost instantly when I first saw it and continued to be obsessed with it days after. The worldbuilding and atmosphere are absolutely fantastic; the two climax parts, 50-67 and 88-100, had me experiencing emotions that I did not know were possible from a GD level. I remember traversing through these broken city structures with the giant humanoid figures and vivid flames in the background in my first blind practice run made me feel somehow powerful and powerless at the same time. Powerful when soaking in the environment surrounding you but powerless when reminded of your place within it. I especially want to highlight the spinning spiral structures at 60 and 65. Getting to these in practice for the first time was like... trying to navigate through some inescapable nightmare machinery, remnants of some long-gone vast city where everything is just so much bigger than you. I don't know. It's hard to recapture exactly how I felt in my initial experience, even if it was only a week ago.

I need to bring up the song too. Opinions on this song choice are somewhat polarizing but personally this might straight up be my favorite song from NG. The level and song elevate each other to such a degree that it almost feels like the song was made specifically for the level. It's odd because song's nautical theme (it's called "The Sailor" after all) might initially seem contrasting with the level's mechanical theme, but I think there's a connection between the idea of being swept away by relentless waves and being swept away in vast, broken (conquered?) cityscapes. As the song builds up to those blaring electric guitar drones it demands to be accompanied with the most overpowering scenery possible, and this level fully delivers. I even love the more subdued parts of the song. The glockenspiel that persists throughout it all adds this element of delicateness that just makes the whole package feel complete.

I've mostly talked about the climax parts up until now, but really the build-up parts are just as immaculate. There's a sense of anticipation throughout the entire first half where, even though so far you are only traveling through this really cool looking decaying world you can sense that it's all escalating towards something. It culminates into this final buildup part at 42% where you get utter chills as the structures rise up into the sky, a prelude of some absolutely insane shit about to go down. The humanoid figures reappearing and moving across the screen as even bigger versions than before captures a similar feeling too.

The gameplay is also a contentious aspect of this level, not for its enjoyability but rather for whether or not the gimmicky nature of it fits the atmosphere of the level. My initial thoughts were that, while the gameplay is very fun and satisfying to learn, it didn't necessarily suit the level except for certain standout parts like the aforementioned spinning spiral ship. However, the more I played it, the more I became convinced that this type of gameplay was a perfect match for the level. surveyor's gameplay style is incredibly unique. The way everything is arranged makes the task of learning the gameplay similar to that of solving a puzzle - it's the type of memory (kinda?) where you can rely on your knowledge of game mechanics to figure it out. This makes the gameplay feel familiar yet alien - it's not pulling any tricks on you with fake or invisible structures and the memory feels completely intuitive after learning. But the gameplay objects manipulated in such unconventional ways with the extensively scaled objects and the long row/columns of portals/orbs/pads. In a sense, the familiar yet alien feeling mirrors that of the environmental worldbuilding. It's what you might feel while traveling through the wasteland of a previously thriving world, one which is now ruled by incomprehensible alien humanoid figures.

So a bit about my personal experience beating it. I was consistently drawn towards doing practice runs over and over throughout the past week, and for the first few days I wasn't even fully set on beating it. With how much I was enjoying the learning process though I later committed to it, which I'm glad about because having this level completed is just so satisfying. Playing from 0 can be frustrating at times dying to completely random things each attempt (not the level's fault), but also reaching the climax parts from 0 is the only way to replicate the feeling of adrenaline I got playing this for the first time. Or maybe an even greater degree of it with how these parts are for sure the hardest in the level raw-skill wise.

redeemer has some fantastic world-building, but its whimsical, 2003devin-like gameplay, overuse of radial blur (which ik may sound nitpicky but it gives the whole level this dreamy, fake-feeling aura), and most of all just plain bad song are incredibly at odds with the serious narrative it's attempting to tell. it's a serious level i find very difficult to take seriously, which really pulls me out of the experience. it always feels bad when my biggest complaint about a level is its song choice as it's the one thing that simply cannot be changed after the fact..i do wish i could get invested in this level like how so many others are able to, but every time i hear that royalty free ass xylophone in my right ear and i just can't do it

the gameplay is meh, just the same thing for 7 minutes and the deco is pretty good but not amazing. the song carries it a lot and i just don't find it fun. it's probably because i'm not a fan of memory gameplay but there's also no variety. it's fun i guess but not for 7 minutes. i feel like a lot more could've been done with the deco, and the last 10% feels really disappointing. i don't really have much to say because the level doesn't have much to it, there's no real progression and it's pretty much the same thing throughout. nothing crazy or really unique

i think most of what i want to say has been said already who can word things far better than i ever could but i still want to say that this is like the best level of the year lol. i really hope it gets mythic because there will finally be a first true mythic extreme (demote throat of the world) and would be the new best mythic.

the gameplay is personally my favourite part of this level, and i've seen a lot of people really... not like it, which is confusing. most fun i've ever had with a classic extreme since sigsegv

wish i could say more as i think this is the best level of the year so far but you can also just listen to electricnj or anyone else yap about it instead

Might change this to a 10 depending on how I feel about it in a few days