Rating Curve

I'm the creator of this level, and it's been about about 3.5 months since I released this level as of me writing this. This isn't really going to be a review, more so a retrospective writing. I'm giving myself a 9/10 (cue Obama giving himself medal image) because I'm overall really satisfied with how this level turned out even though there are a few things I would change.

I had the idea to make IWTS after I beat Eon and loved the level so much but wished there were more levels like it. At the same time, Cacola's album The Angel, The Demon, was one I was listening to extremely heavily in the later half of 2024 to get me through a really rough time and for that it's one of my favorite albums of all time. With those two things in mind, I got to work making a level using the song [...], one of my favorite songs off the album. Something I leaned on very heavily for inspiration while designing the level was something Cacola wrote in a reply to a YouTube comment where she explained the meaning of the song. I'm not gonna retype the whole thing here, but you can read the whole thing in the reply to the pinned comment on this video. This writing gave me plenty of ideas of what to do at different parts throughout the level to represent the song, and I even named the level after the name Cacola gave to the ambient section 10-14 minutes in.

Initially, building the level was not a huge priority and I felt the idea of building a level this monstrously long was an impossible goal for me, someone without a whole lot of building experience going into this. I also had a lot of doubts on if this level would get rated, if it were to be finished. However, as I kept chipping away at it and gaining more confidence in my ability to build, I began to realize that I might actually be able to finish this level. For the main portion of the song, I'm really satisfied with how I was able to represent the song and a lot of what I was able to make in the first half came out very similarly to how I was able to picture it in my head. I even had a positive feedback loop where my friends would give me great support and share their excitement for my level which in turn got me to keep working on the level. There are some minor things in the 4x speed and the ambient section I would change, but they're minor things so I'll just move on.

I'm gonna skip ahead to the midi section of the level since if there was one part I would rework the most, it would probably be this stretch of the level. I had the meaning of the song in mind again here, but this part of the level is also based on a dream I had once where I was playing the level with this part of the song. I remembered the level had these vivid colors and these blocks that looked like standard blocks from the older updates, but over time it started to all feel off and fake. The block designs started looking warped and distorted, the colors felt wrong, etc. The part of the level looked and felt very strange, but I knew I wanted to make this part as accurate in how the dream felt as possible. I also just liked the idea of this part having that "false sense of security" feeling. And unfortunately, I feel like I was unable to really replicate it to the best of my ability. This stretch of the level has received some mixed reception, with some who really like it but others who don't think it represents the song that well. The way I went about some of the block designs feels way too subtle at times, and I also spent so much time adjusting color & shader triggers to try and get the background to look the way I want, but I also feel like I wasn't able to get that fully right either.

I'm also partially unsatisfied with how I did the last 2 minutes. I was almost constantly adjusting the shader triggers and how they change over time, and this was really time consuming and I had to rework the sepia & grayscale triggers enough to look right and feel natural, but I still feel like around the middle of the section it shifts into grayscale too fast compared to before & after it. I also felt the gameplay here was a bit subpar, I already struggle with making gameplay in bordered gamemodes but at this point in the level after having already built so much of it I was getting really dry of gameplay ideas. The UFO part also used to be extremely rough, it initially was normal sized and making it mini was a last-minute decision. I would've liked if it started with some other gamemode that wasn't UFO due to the UFO being really hard to accurately control at 3x speed, but it had to be via process of elimination: swing copter would be even harder, I couldn't use the wave to start because of the sync system I was using (I'm currently writing a script for a YouTube video about this horrid bullshit), and I wanted the level to end the same way it started with the ship in the void. In the end, a lot of people still really like this part, so that's good.

One final thing I wanted to say about the last 5 minutes I couldn't really tack onto the other two paragraphs was that I feel like doing such a major stylistic switch-up in the level stunted the quality of the last 5 minutes. I had sort of gotten into a rhythm with how the first 14 minutes was more-or-less one section that constantly builds upon itself in different ways, so much so that I felt like I was doing a lot of things wrong when I tried something else that was similar but also drastically different; I was significantly less optimal with my trigger usage, as well as color channel & group usage.

In spite of all of those things, I'm overall really satisfied with how this level turned out and the 9 months I spent building it were nothing short of amazing (aside from the 1 month I spent on the sync machine...). I feel like I accomplished pretty much everything I tried to do with IWTS! I'm so endlessly blessed that this level was able to get as far as it did, and that I even got my first rate as well as the 2nd longest rated classic level in the game??? I don't even know how the hell I would explain where I am currently to 16yo me in 2023. If you really enjoyed my level, thank you so much, I'm so glad I was able to deliver such an experience. If you tried it and didn't like it, I still want to say thank you for giving my level a chance in the first place.

CITYFADE is a level that had captivated me ever since I first watched it around a month after it released. I'll get into what exactly got me hooked in a bit, but for now just know that it was a level I absolutely loved. I voted for it in the GD Awards 2024 and this level was one of the things that got me into Against All Logic (alongside I NEVER DREAM). So, after completing Light Travel in early July this year, I knew I wanted to do CITYFADE next. I began playing it on-and-off over the course of the month and later beat it out of absolutely nowhere on July 28th with a ridiculous fluke from 65%. With an experience that seemingly sounds so great, this seems like a level I'd give a 10, but I've got some issues with the level.

Starting with the positives, the song representation in this level is absolutely phenomenal. Against All Logic's City Fade is a beautiful song, it's both otherworldly and a song groovy enough for the dance floor, but it's also an extremely intricate song. Around 2 minutes in, the percussion stops being like traditional house music and becomes much more free-form, almost like a percussion ensemble arrangement as opposed to a drum rhythm made digitally. After this section, the song also starts introducing more static-y synths, sound effects and reverb for more atmosphere, etc. There is a lot going on in the song, and being able to represent it properly in the form of a GD level is an especially tall order. With that said, MaxxoRMeN steps up to the plate and does the song complete justice. Not only is he able to thematically represent the song well throughout all of its sections, but he is able to account for the eccentric percussion passages really well and integrates them into the gameplay very naturally. The final 20% is just out of this world, there is so much going on in the background and it feels like this non-euclidean metropolis and its surrounding world are collapsing in on themselves and you're on a mad dash to try and make it out alive. The rising synths paired with the ship gameplay at the very end is so climactic and satisfying, it really puts a test on your nerve control. In regards to visuals and execution, this level is an absolute masterclass in what it tries to do and it's deserving of a Legendary rating just for that.

But at what cost does such excellence come at? The level is great to watch, and while the gameplay is mostly good too, that's not entirely the problem. The big problem is that this level lags like hell. I don't think lag is an issue I've ever brought up in a review before since for the most part it's a non-issue for me. I've got a decently strong computer, so most levels I'm able to run without frame drops on full detail and those I can't I'm still able to run well on LDM. The same cannot be said of CITYFADE. There is only one LDM setting, and it is inadequate as I still experience significant frame drops late in the level. The first half runs completely fine but the second half doesn't because that's where the level really amps up in particle & shader usage, as well as there just being much more art & animated things. I play on 144fps, and when I get to the random part (the first really laggy part for me), my FPS oscillates like a metronome between the high 130s and below 100, with LDM on might I add. With LDM off, I can even get below 20fps at some points. The final section of the level is equally egregious as well. Lag is something I almost never bring up in reviews since in most cases it's a non-issue for me, but when it actively gets in the way of being able to properly play the level, it's a problem.

Finally, I want to bring up some other problems I have with the gameplay. The random part is great conceptually, but in practice it doesn't work out as well and the way it plays is the only part of the level where I would say the execution falters. It's still technically sightreadable and there isn't too many different orb combinations, but the problem is that this part is completely impossible to practice. Besides being extremely laggy, trying to place a checkpoint before the random part results in you getting the same orbs every attempt AND trying to play CITYFADE from a start position will cause the game to crash. Essentially, you've got a laggy pure sightreading test in the middle of an XXL extreme demon. What the fuck!!!! I got so extremely lucky only getting to this part of the level twice from 0 ever, if I died during this part 5+ times or had to replay it every time I got to the second half, my enjoyment of this level would probably erode very quickly. There are some other things I don't really like, such as how the vertical part goes on for long enough to start to feel uncomfortable or how the UFO has some uncomfortable click patterns and moving objects that make inputs difficult to eyeball, but the random part stands firm as a cardinal sin MaxxoRMeN committed when building this level.

So, would I recommend this? I'm giving it a high score, but I'm not entirely sure I can recommend this, certainly not as a first extreme. I think this is one of those levels where you have to really be into it if you want to come out of this level with a positive experience, there's a good chance you might not like this level afterwards if you aren't fully invested in it. It's not a horrible XXL extreme demon, but I'd probably be more willing to recommend CICADA3302 or even Light Travel to this. And that's saying a lot, as personally I think CITYFADE might be an insane demon, easier than the other two levels.

Earlier this week, I beat this level as my 5th extreme demon and my first of which to not be XXL or longer. I've had my eyes on this level ever since I first got to know skywalker14's art-based style through his other levels. I had loved its visual style and its approach to gameplay, but it seemed out of reach until recently I grinded it out for hours each day. Despite the amount of pressure I put on myself to finish this level in just a few days, as well as how difficult the level is, I love this level just as much after beating it.

The first thing I would like to bring up in regards to how the level exceeds is the level's name and how this level sorta plays with the player's expectations. I NEVER DREAM shares the name of the NONG it uses, I Never Dream by Against All Logic, but there's a difference: I NEVER DREAM is written in all capital letters in the level's name, which is something level creators sometimes do to their titles to make them feel more impactful. So when I saw the level was called I NEVER DREAM and it was extreme demon difficulty, I assumed the experience might be something dreary or somber. The beginning somewhat holds this up since the level starts much darker and with a more muted color palette, but at 14% the level reveals its true colors. It's very bright, beautiful, colorful, happy, and a little heavenly. This contrast from how the level appears on the outside and how it appears in the heart of the level is really enticing. The level rises higher and higher, picking up in speed as well, only to start revealing near the end the euphoric image this level originally painted was a facade. The colorful flowers become hallucinogenic rainbow plants with eyes, the background goes from a sky blue to a blur of flashing and speeding colors, all the while you're going faster than any other point in the level and the song becomes more intensely-layered with its vocal chops and edits. There's one more reprise of the blissful scene we first saw earlier in the level, then the level ends. With this all laid out, I NEVER DREAM kills three birds with one stone: the level's theme and initial presentation sets up a diversion of the player's expectations, the level also has a very strong progression despite only being 1 minute and 40 seconds long, and the final thing is that this level just looks very pretty and has great song representation.

Meanwhile, the gameplay is a special treat in its own way. I NEVER DREAM gets its difficulty from being composed entirely of unusual cube and ship timings. The level has its own gimmicks with structuring and utilizes them well to make unique gameplay without sacrificing enjoyability. Some examples that come to mind are how jump pads are used on top of flowers with corresponding colors and a trick using orbs and blue pads to make timings where you have to click after changing gravity or you can't pass the section. There could've been more uses of these mechanics had the level went on longer to expand on them more, but I NEVER DREAM still utilizes them enough for them to be a memorable aspect of the level. For the most part, the gameplay is very well-constructed, although the first 13% is easily the hardest part and it has a couple stupid jumps, it eventually gets consistent. I've only one got one main complaint: the spike/saw hitboxes can feel a bit unfair at times. While the circular rainbow flowers feel like they have fair hitboxes, it feels like the hitboxes on the smaller, 2D rainbow flowers are too large in some places in the level. The flower itself does not appear circularly, so it seems like you die despite barely touching it. Something similar goes for the leaves like those used in the beginning of the level. They sway and move around, so it's hard to properly gauge their static hitboxes just by looking at them, causing some deaths to them to feel unfair.

Despite that one issue I have with the gameplay, I NEVER DREAM is a level I would recommend in a heartbeat to anyone looking for a great easier-end extreme, proficient with extremes or not. A level of such extreme difficulty while wearing such an upbeat theme already stands out against the sea of other extremes, but I NEVER DREAM stands among the highest even in that field. And on its way, it also demonstrates everything skywalker14 is able to pull off masterfully as a builder in just a minute and forty seconds.

I had a pleasant time playing through this level! This is another one of those levels that basks in simplicity and it doesn't try to be overly impressive visually or gameplay-wise because it doesn't need to. I enjoyed how the level uses its runtime to try out a variety of different designs but doesn't switch them up so much to the point it feels overwhelming. The level is also very good at maintaining a calm, relaxing atmosphere and it never feels stressful despite its great length.

The only thing I don't like about the level is how it can be a bit boring to replay because of how easy it is and how it doesn't really have a strong progression in the way Scenery does. 9Lives is one of those levels where you need to be really into the level in order to enjoy it, otherwise you might get very bored and the level could read as having a lot of filler. Despite that, I would still recommend the level for anyone looking for a nice, easy XXXL experience! Despite its 8* rating, I was able to sightread it very comfortably and the raw difficulty never really gets harder than 6*.

I really enjoyed playing this simplistic XXXL level! Despite its visual simplicity, Scenery is very atmospheric and really gives off the feel of a freezy wonderland and its beautiful night sky. There are a lot of things I liked about this level, including the pacing, progression, simple gameplay, the usage of area triggers centered around the player, as well as how Scenery syncs with and matches its song. I particularly love how Scenery progresses slowly and each part lasts long enough for the level for you to really soak in all the little details.

I also like the last 25% of the level, but not without some complains. To start positively, I think it's a great way to represent the climax of the song as well as a good reprisal of a lot of the elements we had seen much earlier. However, some of the new additions, especially the art designs inside their own little boxes, are stylistically quite different from what we had seen in the level previously. The gameplay also becomes much more intricate here, with much more orbs and gamemode changes than we had seen previously. This combined with the fact that this is also the fastest part of the level makes this a bit of a chokepoint. I still think it's a great way to end the level, but it could've been executed a bit better considering you're over 6 minutes into the level at this point.

All in all, if you're looking for an easy XXXL level with great atmosphere, I strongly recommend this level! I was able to beat it without practice mode, but doing a practice run first won't hurt.

DISCLAIMER: I have not beaten this level yet. It's currently out of my skill range, though I've done multiple practice runs before writing this review.

When I hear that a level is a love letter to 1.9 or a celebration of 1.9, some things start to come to mind. I usually think of these types of levels as being very upbeat, colorful, fast-paced, sometimes flashy and punchy. They can end up feeling like a soaring euphoria as opposed to a completely honest representation of the time period. I'm not saying any of these levels are bad, I really like them, I'm just pointing this out because this is what comes in my head when I hear that a level is meant to celebrate 1.9.

With that said, Stressed Out is the complete opposite of this. The appreciation for 1.9 is still there, in fact it's more upfront than ever. Almost every section is a remake of a part of a 1.9 level. There are a lot of iconic ones, there's Rainbow Dust, Theory of SkriLLex, Cataclysm, Nine Circles, Bloodbath, the list is so long... but none of it feels right. They're all bent, distorted versions of all these levels it's trying to replicate. They're all stripped of their bright colors and all painted in red and grayscale. The level isn't even all that fast-paced either, it's a lot more self-contained. The level whole has this lingering anxiety and uneasiness, almost like it's... Stressed Out? (I'm so deeply sorry for this pun)

Looking at Stressed Out as just a 1.9 tribute would be a shallow reading of the level. Stressed Out is also a tribute to twenty one pilots, their fourth studio album Blurryface (of which this level uses the album cover's color scheme), as well as their most popular song of which this level uses and is named after. Stressed Out (the song) is about missing the past and wishing to experience their childhood again because of how great it seemed looking back. Stressed Out (the level) represents this really well with its usage of designs from existing 1.9 levels since these levels are a major point of nostalgia for a lot of people, me included. The quieter parts of the chorus, the only times where the level isn't trying to mimic the designs of another level, add to this feeling in the song since they feel like a whole bunch of miscellaneous doodles on a chalkboard a kid would make. The second piece of this two-way tribute has to be when this level released. Stressed Out (the level) released on April 28th, 2025. This is exactly 10 years after the release of its song on April 28th, 2015. That exact date also lands squarely in the time period of update 1.9. The execution of this tribute level, both in the level's quality itself and how many layers there are to this tribute, is absolutely genius and why this level will always stick out so strongly to me as a great 1.9 tribute.

I can't give a strong analysis of the gameplay because it's out of my skill range, but I'll touch up on it since I do have some thoughts. For the most part it seems good, and I had fun with the level during my practice runs, but the style of gameplay was really all-over-the-place, which was sorta to be expected because the design is as well, but so was the balancing. There are a bunch of parts, especially ship corridors, that felt way too easy for an extreme demon, but there were also some wack asymmetrical duals you would suddenly get thrusted into. I got a few of them down in some spots around the level and once I did that they were really satisfying to do, but I bet I would probably get a little sick of dying in these spots a lot around the level since they're easily the hardest parts. Outside of that, I really like this level and what it does! I hope I will be able to beat it someday as I love update 1.9 and it's very clear mephhh does too.

For a lot of people, the gauntlets can be a slog to play through due to having to play through a bunch of levels that they may not enjoy just so they can get another cube or more shards. I've personally always liked the gauntlets, but I can see where these feelings come from, especially in the Castle and Water gauntlets which consist almost entirely of XL demons. When I was playing through the Water Gauntlet when it came out, it was at a time before I learned to love longer levels the way I do now. My first time seeing Soar was in the Water Gauntlet and at first I thought, "oh my god, ANOTHER XL medium demon?" I was expecting to leave feeling frustrated with it like I did with the previous level in the gauntlet, Trek. Needless to say, it was a huge surprise when I came out of Soar absolutely LOVING it and it currently stands as one of my favorite medium demons in the game.

Soar is an amazing level on its own, but it also displays everything that makes Puueds such a great and memorable builder and why he's currently one of my favorite level builders in the game. His style is a great-looking blend between modernism with its focus on strong color combinations and some visual simplicity & a somewhat cartoony art-based style which lets him seamless add animations and give each of his level some worldbuilding without feeling overbearing. His levels are all well-polished, but it's not so much to the point where there's no edge to any of his work. This leads into my final thing, and what I love the most: he makes experimental gameplay that explores ideas and gimmicks that are both unique and really fun to play. This type of gameplay seems like something that absolutely should not work as well as it does with Puueds's style of decoration, yet it somehow does.

Of course, Soar's central gameplay concept isn't the most adventurous thing Puueds has tried, in fact I'd probably say it's one of his more tame levels gameplay-wise, but that doesn't stop it from still excelling in what it tries to do. Soar's concept is that it is meant to be a newer take on a ship-based demon level. In the multiple ship parts throughout Soar, Puueds is able to make multiple path parts, dual action, orb tech, and odd structuring. All of these parts have something going on, either gameplay-wise or visually, to make them memorable from the other parts in the level (though the final ship may be an outlier). All the while, Soar is fast-paced to match its energetic song and playing it in normal mode feels so satisfying despite not even being all that difficult or tight. Puueds is able to make the upbeat, empowering energy of this level so pronounced through his visual style and it's always a blast to rebeat.

I've only got one problem with this level, and it's relatively minor. The first half does a lot to build up its energy and ideas, and the second half is much more relaxed in comparison. There aren't as much new ideas introduced after the first drop. It's still really fun gameplay and a good test of nerve control with the atmosphere changing and the sun setting, but I wish there was just a bit more going on in this last part.

Other than that, Soar is a level I would recommend in a heartbeat to any player looking for a great entry-level medium demon. It does so much right on all fronts and I'm so glad RobTop picked this level to be in a gauntlet.

This is one of the most reviewed and highest rated levels on the site AND it's also a level sometimes brought up in conversations surrounding the "greatest level of all time." I think it's a fantastic level deserving of a lot of its praise, but I don't quite feel the same conviction regarding this level's gameplay.

I'll briefly talk about the visuals and progression in this level since they are without a doubt revolutionary and super ahead of its time, but I mostly don't have anything to add to the discourse that hasn't been said already. I love the way Lit Fuse starts out super lethargic, quiet, and muted with its colors to match its song slowly fading in. The next two parts with a lot more color but still being slow yet becoming more tense leading up to the drop are also amazing. The release of energy at the drop is unlike anything else that was being released at the time and is still mind-blowing considering the fact this was made almost 10 years ago. It's with all of these things combined that make Lit Fuse a precursor to what people began to do with song representation years after, and for that it deserves to held with such high critical acclaim.

So why am I only giving this a 7? Well, something else this level did that no other level has before was that this is the only level I've ever beaten that has given me physical pain. Something to keep in mind is that I beat Lit Fuse as a new hardest almost exactly a year ago and I grinded it out in just 4 days, but on each of those days I poured at least an hour and a half into it each day.

There isn't anything to note in the first section, it's mostly fine though it can get a bit boring. Instead, my first problem with how this level plays comes going into the first ship. It's another ship that is mostly fine, just a bit boring to have to play a lot of. What I don't like is just how jarring the shift in brightness is going into this ship. After playing the dark first cube for a while, getting to the ship is like being flashbanged. In fact, this ship maintains its high brightness and saturation for so long that one night while I was playing the level, I closed my eyes for a bit and I was still able to see the ship part. It's maybe a bad sign if the ship gets burned into my eyes...

On a different note, let me tell you about how the dual part is the bane of my fucking existence. The entire time I was playing Lit Fuse, I was never able to get this part consistently. The ship really sucks to control since it feels a lot heavier when in dual gravity, and the UFO constantly needed spamming to get through. So, I ended up having to try different methods of spamming and praying to get through the dual. Practicing the dual and trying different things may have sounded like a good idea, but what I ended up doing was sending my hand into complete pain from constantly spamming as best I could. At this time that I was grinding Lit Fuse, I was spending my mornings and afternoons volunteering at a summer camp at my local art museum so I was always experiencing the pain from playing this level trying to do basic tasks, all the way down to just trying to open doors. By late day 3 or early day 4, I started to feel like this was becoming too much on my hand so I had to switch to using my left hand for the spam in the dual. One silver lining to this dual was that the second half was a fair bit easier because the wave is not subject to same bullshit gravity the ship is while in the dual, but that still didn't stop this part of the level from feeling like a massive bottleneck where I would have so many attempts get to this dual in one session, but only a single digit amount get to the drop afterwards.

After getting through that dual spam from hell, the drop is quite manageable by comparison. In fact, I'd say it's my favorite part gameplay-wise. While it is meant to be the most climactic part of the level, it's the 2nd easiest part behind the beginning. I never really struggled with anything in this part of the level, the only real problem I have with the gameplay here is that some of the transitions are rough, especially in the second half where you're going into a gamemode portal on the ceiling or ground and you can't really see what comes next very well. These were the roots of some unfortunate deaths (especially 95% twice), but it never hurt truly as much as the dual before it because I felt like I had more control over my cube at this part.

Despite this, would I recommend Lit Fuse as an entry-level insane demon? Yes. I know a good amount of people who still really enjoyed Lit Fuse and there is definitely a possibility for a new player trying to get into insane demons to have a better time with this level than I did. These issues I have in the gameplay aren't overwhelming enough to get in the way of me celebrating this level for what it is and the impact it had.

I wanted to do a review of this level since I also did a review of ascending by skywalker14, another hard demon of similar length. ascending managed to work despite its short length because it was able to pull off feeling too short in just the right way, yet tower descent does something even more impressive despite being shorter: it feels like a complete experience that isn't too long or too short. This is even more surprising when you consider the fact that ascending has a much more noticeable progression than this level.

The fact that this levels feels like a complete experience in just 25 seconds seems like something that defies logic, yet tower descent's trick is simple: it's all action, no filler. You're thrown directly into a fast-paced, rainbow, breakcore frenzy. In fact, the way this level starts is a particularly strong moment of impact because the player falls through and shatters the gray ground that is on the ceiling and is accompanied with rainbow beams of light. I can't think of any other level that opens in such a confusing way that also sets the tone for the rest of the level perfectly. While the level is a colorful frenzy the entire time, tower descent stays fresh by having gameplay which can be quantified into distinct segments that play unique from each other. My favorite is the last one, which while it is almost completely free difficulty-wise, it feels so satisfying after having to concentrate so intensely for the rest of the level and you can just zoom to the bottom with dash orbs in sync with drum rolls in the song. It's an ending that still keeps up the manic energy the rest of the level had, but it makes the player feel relieved after completing such a short but brutal level.

The one thing I'm really not a fan of about this level is the first half, which is also where a lot of this level's difficulty comes from. This half of the level consists of a long string of various orbs you rapidly descend through. This part is so ridiculously learny and somewhat inconsistent that I started to get tired of it. Almost all of these inputs are blind, too, so this half of the level could be considered a memory part depending on who you ask. I understand that this is meant to be a short burst of difficulty similar to a challenge level, but I still think too much of the difficulty is concentrated here. I only had a handful of deaths past the first half and my really high attempt count got inflated just by trying to figure out the click pattern here. After I had learned the level enough to the point where I was comfortable trying normal mode, someone told me that all of the orbs you are supposed to touch in the first half have circles around them. That is a way of indicating what orbs you're supposed to hit, but the fact that I found out that late tells me they're way too subtle of an indication.

Despite this issue I outlined, I would still recommend tower descent if this type of gameplay I described sounds good to you. I know this kind of ultra-learny and unbalanced gameplay is up some people's alleys, but it definitely isn't mine. To enjoy tower descent, you need to willing to accept that you're likely going to spend most of your time learning the first half. Other than that, it's a great lower-end hard demon. Though, like ascending, I wouldn't recommend this to a player trying to get into hard demons due to its raw difficulty.

So it's been nearly 2 weeks since I've beaten this level and I've taken some time to marinate on my thoughts. I've heard near-universal praise for this level and while I see where it's coming from a lot of the time and for the most part I do agree with what's being said, I don't think this level is perfect.

I will start with what I liked about the level. I think this level is a great example of why dongchi is so well-liked as a builder, and its what I call "basking in simplicity." dongchi had been making levels for years before he made Light Travel, but in 2017 he started to take a different turn. Most builders were starting to shift away from the more simplistic yet sometimes chaotic level design pioneered by the Korean side of the GD community, yet dongchi chose not to adapt with them. He continued making levels in this style regardless of whether not they would get rated since he wanted to build the levels he wanted to play. In turn, he ended up making a unique style for himself and Light Travel is 9 minutes of everything that makes his style so great.

Looking at dongchi from this angle, it seems like a curveball for him to make a "travel" level. Whenever I hear something is a "travel" level, I approach it with a lot of apprehension since it's a level trend I hold in contempt due to most "travel" levels being uninspired, copying ideas from "travel" levels that came before it, built to be long for the sake of being long, and just not being fun or worthwhile experiences. In spite of these things, Light Travel is very atypical for a "travel" level because it's dongchi just doing his own thing but for longer than usual. Light Travel doesn't try to make a bunch of scenic locations who's designs would likely age like milk, it doesn't try to be exceedingly cinematic or climactic, it's just a solid 9 minutes of great gameplay and simple, timeless visuals to pair it. Light Travel is the 2nd longest rated "travel" level behind Hypnotic Travel (or 3rd if you count dusty travel), yet Hypnotic Travel feels like an unbearable slog while Light Travel does not despite only being 30 seconds shorter. Why? Two main reasons: Light Travel chooses the route of a simpler visual style that won't age as fast which sets it apart from other "travel" levels, while there is not a single thing Hypnotic Travel does to make itself appear unique outside of being the longest of its kind, which it unfortunately succeeded in for years. The second thing is that Light Travel is just fun with its gameplay while Hypnotic Travel isn't. The question of if Light Travel was built for the sake of being a really long level almost never came to me while I was playing it because I instead got to put my mind towards how charming the level was visually and how much I was enjoying the gameplay. The same can't be said for most other "travel" levels, especially not Hypnotic Travel.

One final thing I want to bring up about what I really like about this level is its song choice. "Travel" levels rarely have much thought put into their song choices, and it's glaringly obvious some songs are chosen because they're long enough to make a level of the length they want to. Two artists that come to mind the most are steampianist and 1f1n1ty/Onefin, two talented musicians who both have decent catalogues of songs that are longer than average, but nothing of outrageous proportions like that of Cacola or Phyrnna. I'm not trying to suggest trance music hasn't been used in a "travel" level before - Dem Travel and Dank Travle have also used trance music and released before Light Travel. However, Light Travel represents its song better than either of the two previous levels have, and I would even go as far to say Light Travel has some of the best song representation seen in any "travel" level (which is admittedly a kinda low bar but whatever). Salvation by CrimzonWolf777 is nothing short of a gem of the style of 2000s-early 2010s Newgrounds trance music. It's a simple song, yet its got a great energy and ethereal texture and is a track you can easily get lost in the groove in for 9 minutes. Intentionally or not, Light Travel reflects all of the great aspects of Salvation in its own unique way. The level itself is able to match its ethereal texture and simple production, but it's also something very reminiscent of the older level building styles the general creating meta has shifted away from. Light Travel's style lends itself so well to this kind of trance music that Newgrounds has progressed away from over the years, and vice versa.

Though, there's something that bugs me about Light Travel and it's why I can't give it the extremely high praise it usually receives from other victors: the balancing. XXL+ levels have been something I've become obsessed with over the course of the past year or so, and for the most part I've been able to take most of these challenges of endurance and extreme length quite level. However, this level is different. It's the first time where I've truly felt the mental burden of playing an XXXL extreme demon. I didn't even feel this way on CICADA3302, which is by far my unluckiest experience and a level where I had over 24 deaths past 72%. In Light Travel, 19-26% is easily the hardest part as well as my personal least favorite part. Two of the level's biggest chokepoints are back-to-back here with a really difficult asymmetrical robot dual, followed by a very tricky spider part, THEN followed by a really difficult asymmetrical spider dual. These two chokepoints right next to each other were why only around 10% of my runs were able to get to the first drop at 35%. Some days, I would play the level for a while and just never get to 35% at all and I had great luck if I had a session which got to 35% two or three times. When I was just getting into the level, my enjoyment was around a 9/10 and the more attempts I poured into Light Travel, it slowly started to erode and that's why my enjoyment was more like a 7/10. Another non-negligible chokepoint comes much later in the level at 64-74%, where once again we have two pretty difficult sections back-to-back. There is a cube with orb combos where you must buffer every single orb, which took a long time to get down but eventually became consistent, and a robot that's a bit learny but mostly just a harder raw difficulty compared to the other parts. we've seen in this level. Nowhere near as bad as 19-26%, however I'm willing to bet half of my deaths past 35% were in 64-74%. Outside of these two areas, I don't have much else complaints with the gameplay, but these two sections did bring down the level a fair bit.

Despite my experience being less than I had hoped, I still highly recommend Light Travel to anyone looking for an XXXL level that puts their nerves and endurance to the test, or even if you just want a good entry-level extreme demon that's a fun experience. However, if you choose to go for Light Travel, be aware of the chokepoints in the level since they can easily bring down your experience if you aren't prepared to properly deal with them. Other than that, safe travels!