Rating Curve

There's an attitude reminiscent of those late 00s flash games (like Trap Adventure or The World's Hardest Game) in the stark, amateurish execution of such "unfair" gimmicks, painting Cautious as a relic of a more carefree, ironic, irreverent time. Sometimes I think defthlow must be a genius given how masterfully he was able to weave together the audio-visual-tactile experience to evoke both the airy sharpness of a classic ozpectro and the memory-based tour de force triumph of a LunarSimg demon. Immediately afterwards, though, I am forced to consider that he might actually be a total dumbass, since he somehow decided that making such a masterpiece unplayably difficult was the move. What The Hell Man. Seriously. Download a copy and nerf it until it's beatable, and it turns into an absolutely exhilarating time.

Pretty neat aesthetically - the 1.9 deco blocks and metallic coating make for a pretty cool future-industry setting, and I love how the complete lack of speed changes radiates an air of uncaring monotony as though the level's constructed on an assembly line. Unfortunately, that tedium is a lot less charming coming from the layout - a handful of parts are a bit dull, especially the terrible second wave that I can't even handwave away as a tutorial, as it's easier than the first wave. Did we really have to save the introduction of the mini wave for ToE II?

Clutterfunk's industrial aesthetic is impressively captivating for how primitive it is, but the middle's a real mess because the song's drastic shifts in tone don't correspond at all to the gameplay; the mini ball can be forgiven for tutorial reasons, but the subsequent ship corridor littered with saws is way too casual visually and is accompanied by a lull in the soundtrack. I'm also not sure how I feel about the back third being so open structurally, but I do like those flying saw-machine-stairway things, those are cool.

There's something so subtly clever about how xStep's inputs chain together like 4-step dance routines to the tune of an arrogant, showboaty Dance Massacre-esque soundtrack, but I think Rob's integration of the newer visuals leaves a lot to be desired. The pulsing objects are cool, but those curvy platforms and floating bushes look so out of place.

Similarly to Jumper, Cycles struggles with awkward implementation of its tutorial ball part within its attempt at a unified gloomy aesthetic, but it does make up for it later on with the fantastically dreary ship and great breakdown.

Afterlife's art style is cute enough, but it just comes across as a plain, not very compelling experience even with a perfectly functional layout. I don't think the split paths approach succeeds at all given how disconnected they feel despite their obvious contrast, and I wouldn't even have noticed the alternate route if I hadn't read other reviews beforehand. The half-baked narrative also isn't doing anything for me.

🎵drugs drugs🎵 AYO TURN THAT SHIT UP CHARLES

I think we're being a bit overly cynical here; naming your level GD GANGSTER RAP is admittedly a pretty good bit, and it does at least seem earnest in its tongue-in-cheek celebration of GD culture. I don't know why BoomKitty is the main mascot, though. You are not that important pal.

I have no qualms about the exercise of depicting quite a serious topic in an ostensibly immature medium, and I do on some level appreciate how easy this level was/is to chalk down to "GLITCH HORROR - MULPAN GD" - it radiates confidence in itself and the medium. That said, SAVE AS is a swing and a miss. The first third-ish is more than satisfactory, degradation of gameplay is plainly visible/playable and PAHC and triplebarrel are foreboding as you'd like. It's after the first few sequences that the level starts floundering and progression feels empty; SAVE AS doesn't really become any more strained or unplayable after roughly the halfway mark; there's only so much deconstruction you can do when the level is still calculated and on-rails in some way while still also requiring player input - bit of a rough catch-22 where the level might be worse off as a playable (and thus breakable) experience after a certain point. I do appreciate the discussion on GD that this level helped to continue, but I also understand PAHC's disdain for its singularity - his catalogue is a lot richer than this.

The first part demonstrates the level's scale in both space and duration so well that it becomes increasingly frustrating with every subsequent section that drags on and on. The disaster/societal collapse narrative is presented quite well once it gets going, at least. Maybe I just don't appreciate slow cinema.