Rating Curve

Everything is different in the city.

Absolutely phenomenal atmosphere—one of the best I've ever seen in a Geometry Dash level (aside from The Place, of course). The design choice to have everything made out of pixelated outlines bleeds spectacularly into the gameplay, forcing the player to learn the intricacies of the structures they're navigating between. Geometry Dash levels typically operate on a one-block scale, rarely featuring structuring more granular than that. Here, however, the rough hitboxes that trace representations of underwater life—made with quarter-wide pixel blocks—mean that the player doesn't merely move from one structure to another like in a typical level. Instead, they must understand exactly what they're touching, because even the tiniest drop can lead to losing control of the ball or having the ship bounce around in an odd manner—something that matters a lot in spaces as cramped as these. It's much like how realism levels attempt to disguise their hitboxes in a vain effort to move beyond the game's style; however, in Fishin for Fishies, nothing is hidden from you. All the structures are there—you just have to figure out how to traverse them. I typically don't like art levels, because in trying to apply the aesthetics of traditional visual art to Geometry Dash, they often fail to capture the unique beauty inherent to the game. Fishin for Fishies is undoubtedly an art level, but it’s executed in a way that never shies away from the fact that it is, at the end of the day, still a Geometry Dash level. The eponymous fishies are also pixelated, giving them a cutesy appearance and making their eventual deaths in the latter half of the level far more gruesome than if Insidee had tried to represent actual fish. Let this be a lesson to all creators: organic design can be done well.

Holy moly, does this level look stunning. And the gameplay is awesome! Everything just flows perfectly, like a 1.9 version of contemporary flow gameplay that is actually fun to play. One of the era's best.

This isn't just a gay level, it's a QUEER level.

Ignoring unrated levels, this is Insendium's second ever demon level, which is insane if you consider how fun this is. For its time, it manages to introduce so many unique gimmicks into the gameplay: release portals in the wave, the famous cube-wave part, a mini wave click that fades to black right before you reach it, meaning you have to do the click blind, and of course, the awesome dual part at the end that actually uses the weird collision thing that dual ball has. Kudos to Insendium, really.

This is a level that I like, not necessarily for its own merits (although it is quite good), but rather for all the future levels that it may potentially inspire. It's truly one-of-a-kind, and hopefully the first of its kind.