Rating Curve

A staple of the 2.0 era. Back in the day, this level was everywhere and constantly talked about, mainly for how epic of a bossfight this level contains. When 12 year old me first saw this, I was so unbelivably shocked. Though this level has not held up as much as I was hoping.

It mainly comes down to the gameplay here. While I couldn’t call it bad, it feels very weird for the most part. It’s learny focused, which I very much enjoy, but parts like the start of the drop and both duals have gameplay that feels kinda awkward to get down. However, they still get very consistent when you figure them out, so I can mostly forgive it. Also, the difficulty of the level drops so hard in the last 25%, it oddly becomes so much more straightforward and easy compared to the rest of the level, which necessairly isn’t a bad case here, but makes it feel a teeny tiny unbalanced, tho the balancing in this level is far from unbearable.

Visually speaking, it shines with the boss a lot, this didn’t become an icon of 2.0 for nothing after all. The design of the boss is very cool, and the animations on its attacks are very fluid. I also like the detail of its hands having indicators on them for each of its attacks, its a really nice visual touch. I guess the only thing I would like to see more is a bigger variety of attacks from the boss, but it is still very high quality, and some of the best looking to come from 2.0. The overall block design, while looking a bit empty for Lazer’s standards, still fits well, as it is primairly inspired by Deadlocked (I mean, why else does it have “locked” in its name lol). And it lets you take in the glory of that awesome boss even more.

If you can handle some weird parts in the gameplay and get consistent at them, I think this is a level worth experiencing. Despite not aging as well as I expected, its a good and enjoyable time imo.

Feels like a bit of a discount version of X to me, but I still like it.

With the gameplay being very similar to X, it still carries over a lot of its fun gameplay styles, and has a lot less transitions in exchange, though I feel a few parts are a bit worse to playthrough, such as the first ship, and this level has an odd screen crunch that makes the cubes a bit more annoying to do. But its still fun to do overall.

The decoration is also obviously very similar to X, though I still prefer that level’s visuals over this. This level just kinda looks uglier in comparison, but it by no means a bad looking level. Once again, my favorite part visually has to be the dual lol.

Also, why does this level end with such a philosophical quote? Not sure, but that’s also what makes it funnier.

I have no idea what the general consensus regarding this level is, but if its reflective of its GDDL enjoyment rating (that being over a 9), then I have to say Crash Game is one of the most overrated insane demons in the game.

Now thats not say this is a bad level, far from it. I would generally say this is a good level overall, but far from a masterpiece, and not deserving of being the winner of the insane demon category in the 2023 awards.

Let’s talk decoration first. As expected from cherryteam, its highly polished, with an insane amount of detail in every type of design throughout, from the structures to the backgrounds. However, because it focuses so much on that, it also tends to sort of fall flat on its primary theme, that being video game themed.

In the first half of the level, outside of some neat details and references (like the orbs being the aliens from Space Invaders in one part), I really do not get a strong video game themed feeling. Two parts are just subway parts with barely any references at all (what does this have to do with video games?), and the other parts just look like generic cherryteam glow levels with some glitchy effects mixed in. Thankfully, the level improves a lot with its video game theme once you reach the drop. Everything is much more themed with video games, as the block designs have that video game like feeling, and the backgrounds are really cool as well, one of them even being Tetris and Space Invaders gameplay. And of course, the endscreen is well-made. If the first half was as creative as the second half in its aesthetics, then this level would easily have at least a 9/10 in the decoration department, but that isn’t the case.

What about the gameplay? It’s learny but gets consistent, and usually I enjoy that kind of gameplay a lot, so surely the gameplay is exceptional, right? Well, not exactly. It’s not the worst thing I ever played obviously, but far from amazing. It is true that it is learny, but gets consistent after you play it enough, which is where a large part of my gameplay score comes from. Problem is… the gameplay doesn’t having enough going on with it, which I felt also hindered its consistency a bit.

There just simply isn’t enough variety with the gameplay; Most of it is unmemorable, boiling down to just a bunch of non-ship/wave gameplay you would find in an easy demon. In fact, Crash Game in general plays like your average 2.2 easy demon where you just follow the indicators due to how much deco obstruction there is, except glorified a lot. I’m usually not a fan of this kind of learny gameplay for easy demons, and I’m definitely not a fan of it here. At least those easy demons have the excuse of being easy demons, as they can’t really be complicated with their gameplay. Crash Game has NO excuse for having this kind of gameplay in a difficulty range where creators like Loltad and Sodaz thrived in making excellent and unique learny gameplay.

This is made worse by the fact that the level went annoying with how it went with its gameplay sometimes, The part at 64%, for example, is bullshit, there is TOO much visual obstruction to see anything, that you pretty much have to remember where to even click/tap. That’s not how you make learny gameplay at all! Also the level does feel a bit unbalanced, with the first 22% taking up more attempts than I’d like to admit, though its obviously far from Necropolis level balancing.

Despite how critical I was about this level, I still think it is good and would most likely recommend it, as it definitely does has it strengths. The second half is great with its video game themeing, and the gameplay has its fair share of enjoyable parts, like the opening spider which is very satisfying to pull off, and some parts during the drop as well. But it is far from one of the best insane demons in the game. Also the fact it has a higher GDDL enjoyment than Cloud Nine is a joke.

One of the most iconic 1.9 levels out there. While I don’t think of it as a top tier level nowadays, this level is still a solid experience overall. The drop is very satisfying to playthrough and gets consistent. I think the only major flaw with this level is the ship at 26%, as it is admittedly an annoying chokepoint, but even then, it isn’t too bad compared to other chokepoints in other levels. There’s a good reason why this is the most common first insane demon to complete.

A very divisive level that has came out in recent months. If you aren’t aware, this level was made for a Stereo Madness remake creator contest hosted by Waboo, with the total prize money of $1000 for first place.

This level’s main identity is being a visual showfest. That alone doesn’t sound very exciting, as there are hundreds of other levels like this, but I actually really enjoyed many of the visuals shown here, particularly its 4th-wall breaking elements. I especially loved the part at around 56% with the person going crazy and destroying all the monitors; Its such a batshit insane part that I can’t help but love how overboard Bli went with it. The fake death at the end also admittedly caught me off guard when I was first playing it, such a fitting finale to the level. And of course, Bli’s insane optimization skill continues to impress.

On the other hand, there are other parts that kind of feel like they were just made for the sake of it, such as that “high-tech” part at around 18%. It’s visually stunning, but it doesn’t really feel as properly themed as other parts in this level, making it feel overall less cohesive. Both ship parts also have this effect of rapidly changing the backgrounds and styles through several flashes, which is fine enough, though other levels have executed parts like this better. I think it would be way more fitting to have these backgrounds themed around GD block designs, or even other aspects of a mobile device, rather than just detailed, albeit generic looking environments.

As for the gameplay itself, yea its quite literally just a slightly nerfed version of Stereo Madness. This seems to be where most people take issue with the level in regards to its gameplay, and that’s understandable, it makes the gameplay feel rather unoriginal. However, whether this was intentionally done or not, I feel like the gameplay just being a reskinned Stereo Madness acts as both nostalgic and a subversion; I actually cannot think of a better level to remake that a theme like this would go with. That being said, the gameplay isn’t without its gripes; A few parts in the level don’t have any musical sync at all, making them feel awkward, and costing the level a bit of that Stereo Madness charm. And I didn’t think the aforementioned “high-tech” part needed to be entirely auto. It’s a pet peeve of mine when 2 star levels have completely auto parts.

Overall, its not a top tier level, and it definitely has flaws, but I found myself to have enjoyed Rage Quit a lot more than I expected. I’d argue the level is overhated, with many seeming to claim that it has absolutely no merit, due to it being made for a creator contest involving money, and others even think its the “worst level ever”. This is such a disingenuous mindset to have; Just because money was a reason for someone to make something doesn’t mean it has no thought at all put into it (By that logic, we would deem any piece of critically acclaimed media to be nothing more than cash cows).

But to be entirely fair, I think this level didn’t really deserve its mythic rating (and im 99% certain that’s why its even so controversial in the first place lol), mainly due to it lacking the substance and depth found in most other mythic levels, its better reserved for being legendary instead. Though it actually isn’t the weakest mythic in the game rn imo (Throat of the World can comfortably take that spot).