Rating Curve

C H I L L is a beginner level that has some nice ideas, but could still use more work. For a level called C H I L L, it just didn’t feel very chill to me. The super bright colors and screen effect were neat, but a bit too distracting for how slow paced the song and gameplay are, especially with all the flashes. I do like all the ideas presented here, but it just feels a bit messy when all is said and done. This is mostly due to the enter effect on the background, which takes the background from black to a super bright series of lasers. It tends to take my eyes from the gameplay and decoration to the factors around it, which takes away from the rest of the level. I like the collage of colors that the creator went for, and although the deep blues mix a bit oddly with the pale rainbow colors, there was a nice effort here. I think that the structures could benefit more from feeling less blocky and rectangular, and the block designs could benefit from having most of the black glow removed between every block. Overall, I don’t think C H I L L is quite there yet in most aspects for something like a Star Rating, but it’s a nice starting point for a newer creator that could be worked on from this point.

It’s very rare that I can say I don’t understand the hype for a level at all, but I truly meant it when I first said that about Centipede by zander12. Centipede is an Extreme Demon Nine Circles level, estimated to place around top 25 on the Demon List. While this isn’t very new, the contents of the level clearly… don’t shine above the rest. Nine Circles came out over a decade ago, and we’ve seen thousands of levels utilizing the gimmick over the years. While I don’t dislike Nine Circles levels, you need to do something to make them stand out for today's standards, which Centipede simply doesn’t do. Centipede is a fairly basic take on the style all things considered, with the designs mostly reminiscent of the 1.9 era. However, the execution is where I take problems with Centipede. 

I honestly don’t enjoy the visuals at all here. It’s a mix of the Nine Circles style with 2019 styled Glow Design, and the combination of these 2 styles clash drastically. All of the structures feel clunky and out of place, and there’s an absurd amount of dark objects at the top and bottom constantly filling the screen with clutter, on top of chains that directly go over all of the decoration. On top of a color scheme utilizing a less than ideal looking green, Centipede feels like a messy Nine Circles level far away from the quality we’ve seen in Nine Circles levels even from 2.0. Despite all of this, Centipede has attracted a very large fanbase with people constantly begging for it to get Star Rated. Why is this?

I’ve tracked the success of Centipede compared to the quality down to a few things. FIrst of all, it really isn’t a terrible level. While I’m personally very harsh on it, it doesn’t do anything too outrageous to warrant it not getting Star Rated, as well as clear effort put into aspects of the wave designs. The level is also very hard and verified by a top player, which will always bring lots of love to any level that releases. Finally, the general community doesn’t care deeply for originality or quality. To most people, Centipede does enough to satisfy them as a viewing experience. While I don’t personally agree, I can somewhat see the appeal. I really wish that Centipede did more to feel original, especially when lacking great execution while using a style so overdone like Nine Circles, but in all reality, Centipede isn’t even the worst Nine Circles level out there of this difficulty. In all reality, it’s far from it. I don’t think I’ll ever like Centipede very much, but overall, there’s a high demand for the level that I can somewhat understand after thinking it through. When the majority of the community thinks a level of passable quality should be awarded, I think that it could still be overall beneficial to see Centipede receive a Star Rating, despite its glaring issues.