It has to be seen to be believed.

SimilarAMZ is a woefully underrated creator active during early 2.1, with most of their work being obscured by the sands of time other than their most popular: Game Time. While I do still really like Game Time for its radically effective integration of Flash games into Geometry Dash (by simply having all of them have physics relatively similar to GD's own), I personally still find it the weakest of SimilarAMZ's most recognised levels mainly due to it being a compilation of snapshots into other, full-length games that should be experienced on their own.

SimilarAMZ’s most polished, and what I consider his main body of work are mostly minigames, and most of the others are either relatively underdeveloped or inconsistent in quality. Hence, leaving only two levels truly core to Geometry Dash’s gameplay: ABLAZE and Cyber Planet. ABLAZE is a fantastic level. It is, frankly, incoherent, but it brandishes its own brand of incoherency that no other level I’ve seen has matched thus far. ABLAZE is not the sort of level that roams free or unfurls into utter chaos; it’s almost theatrical in nature in the way it presents itself and the gameplay having this really stunning introductory sequence followed by a long, drawn out title card, ending in a manic and unrelenting climax both in visuals and the extremely challenging and rather unintuitive gameplay. It also has a nice overarching colour progression from cold to warm to rainbow vomit. For a long time, this was the only level of theirs that I knew. I was content with this level; I thought this would be their peak for that span of time.

Cyber Planet is much more controlled and methodical in its environment, but one can immediately point out the similarities in structuring to ABLAZE. SimilarAMZ’s structuring is extremely grounded with little to no unbounded structures excluding sawblades and the like. Admittedly doesn’t do much in ABLAZE but it does strengthen a level with a name like “Cyber Planet”. It’s in the name. It’s a planet that’s highly technologically advanced — already a pretty interesting theme that arose in this time period of early 2.1 before the oversaturation of “”realism”” art in GD. Here already very strong foundations have been built for any sort of progression.

Even then it’s hard to really overstate the iron grip this level has on its vision for the majority of its runtime, and speaking of, I’d say Cyber Planet has the single greatest beginning section in the entirety of Geometry Dash. The first and sole thing you hear are these acid synths in The Kriotube cut through the darkness of the setting so cleanly they need no additional help; in fact this void is a vessel for them to reverberate in your skull like a frying pan over your head. And then it erupts triumphantly, defiantly, into a burst of colour. The monochrome palette blares deafening; nearly incomprehensible, patterns fly  Though it eventually fades there’s this sense of escalation pervading the atmosphere of the level throughout but composure through its maintaining of the mono-colour palette. The final act is emblematic of the first with light flying around again, only now we see a city in the backdrop that nearly bursts with energy, with an equally piercing navy blue that colours the entire screen.

I see this level as an abstract depiction of a birth, or perhaps some sort of rebirth, of a sort. Face-value-wise, it’s about the birth of life, inferring further the hypnotic visuals are nearly symbolic of induction into some sort of cult. It’s climactic, and even over the top at some points that really sells the power that flows through this world and into the flourishing society we see by the end of the level… but it all feels so distant: we never actually see any aliens. It remains impersonal and still cold before the reset back to the complete minimalism at the end that reflects the beginning of the level. Even that, eventually fades into white nothing.

As for my complaints: the extent of the minimalism is basically my only nitpick here, maybe making stuff more alive would’ve worked a tad better. And there’s also one annoying spider input that I don’t like.

Yeah I don’t know what to say; it’s just surreal and almost a fluke that this level was ever conceived this early into the update. Cannot praise this enough

11.0

They don't make levels like this anymore huh. This reminds me a lot of TMN's levels, especially their "Surge of" series where there are a ton of really cool setpieces that don't share many commonalities on the surface but instead have deeper connections underneath. It's almost dreamlike in nature, and I can definitely see a lot of that surreal disconnectedness present here in Cyber Planet. Like a level like Surge of Creations, not every setpiece lands but the ones that do really sell me on it, and I really love how these parts are able to still have an underlying motif of technology while still not being able to know what's going to come next. The gameplay here is also really great- it makes creative use of GD's sandbox and the end product is these pretty puzzling sections in a similar vein to KrmaL’s gameplay. My main complaint is that the shake trigger is really annoying here- it gets in the way a lot and I feel that the level would probably be a lot better with it toned down a lot more.

Some parts are incredible and some parts are a bit mid. Overall I really really like this but I think the parts don't fit together good enough. Also oh my god that last click is soooooo good. I can't dude it might be one of my favorite endings to a level.

Funniest gameplay of all time, pretty decent all around too, especially for the time. I love this level for no good reason. 10/10