Rating Curve

Copy pasted from the description of my completion (makes a bit more sense if you look at the video:)

So this predrop isn't actually too bad, I think it can be satisfying, but it's extremely easy and boring but simultaneously slightly janky. The wave has invisible shit around the structures. You'll get comfortable with your click pattern and then take a bit of liberty with it and die to something you never knew was even there. It's not hard, it's just obnoxious. This memory part is shit because I said so. I actually had a period of time where Sean's ufo was consistent and satisfying but that ship sailed. It became frustrating and awkward and was just an annoyance. Keep in mind that nothing so far is difficult, but it still can and will kill you because YOU WILL BE BORED IF YOU DECIDE TO PLAY THIS LEVEL. You will be bored and incredibly frustrated. This ship should be bad but it's so easy that it really shouldn't matter, and it kind of doesn't, but dying to it is infuriating. This wave is just annoying and feels completely out of your control whenever you die, it's awful. Somehow you can die to THIS transition, I don't know what moron merged this but they did not have access to modern hitbox viewing technology. This ball is satisfying when you pass it but it relies on an annoying strat to make this yellow orb consistent where you click really early right before it. Iblade's part is an absolute atrocity. It is so incredibly easy but so, so inconsistent. You have to do a wave spam into an ANGLED GRAVITY PORTAL and then do a fucking click out of it that depends on how you entered the ANGLED GRAVITY PORTAL and you can NEVER reset your position and it is SOOOO unfun. Fuck this part. Immediately after is a bad but easy ship until we arrive at the worst transition I have ever seen in my existence, where you have to somehow find a way to enter a wave portal in the exact same way every time from a 3x speed mini straight fly--- GOOD LUCK DOING THAT--- so that you can then do 3x speed mini wave spam up and down the entire screen where you CANNOT SEE WHERE THE SLOPES SPIKE UP AND WHERE YOU CAN SAFELY GO. AND THEN, YOU HAVE TO JUST GUESS WHERE THE FUCKING SLOPES ARE IN THE NEXT PART TOO BECAUSE YOU CAN NOT FUCKING SEE A SINGLE OBSTACLE IN THE WHOLE PART. AND. THEN. THE TRANSITION INTO THE MINI BALL IS ASS BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO BE FALLING INTO IT. This memory part is fine. This ship is bad because you can do it too well on the last hold and hit the slopes and then you'll die. Also, you sometimes have to adjust your click pattern and it sucks. Cheetos. This ship is actually pretty fun and easy, but the minute your ship touches the wave portal, it's about as bad as Bin Laden hitting the twin towers, because the transition into the dual ship is HORRIBLE. You can do NOTHING to make sure that your ships are aligned. You just have to fucking hope. This is the worst transition in the level. The ufo/ball dual is fine but I mean look at it, it's not perfect. This ship is frustrating but don't worry because the ufo is worse. I can't explain why. It just feels out of your control and it blows. Just look at how close I get to the saws. This next thing is also an all-timer for the worst transitions because avoiding the orb is straight ass and you can easily start holding too late and hit this saw. This wave is fine. This transition is very bad but manageable compared to some of the shit in this level and despite how ugly this part is the gameplay isn't horrible, it's just bad. This ufo is absolutely awful but it's really satisfying when you do get it. This ship is really inconsistent and bad, which transitions perfectly into THE LINE. Fuck the line. Fuck this line. It is such a bad line. I fucking hate the line. This cube part can kill you somehow. And finally, this next part is bad, but free. If I had died to it from 0, my voice would be going at lightning speeds right now, but I didn't so it's not.

Copy pasted from a part of the description of my completion

This level really is great. There were a lot of things that could've made me hate this experience---underestimating the difficulty, arm pain, and a months-long period of inconsistency could've made this whole thing hell. But they just didn't. I still love Tartarus; I love its gameplay, and the satisfying, yet so tight nature of the clicks; I love the balancing, as the inconsistent nature of which turns a far run into an adrenaline-fueled mission to the end of the level; I love the decoration, simple, yet dangerous, jagged and living, ready to kill you whenever you think you're about to come out victorious. Tartarus is one of my favorite levels ever.

Copy pasted from the description of my completion

So yeah. Washed tartarus jumper versus one of the greatest levels ever made. Who will win? Me apparently, even though I've never touched anything this long and I am notoriously awful at easier gameplay.

When I first watched this level, I immediately knew it was one of the best things I'd ever seen, but I didn't consider beating it. Being in the midst of my Tartarus grind and focusing everything I had on beating that as soon as I could, I didn't really consider doing anything else, let alone something so outside my skillset. It might sound crazy coming from someone who's beaten extremes that Commatose intimidated me, but I really mean it. I am so bewilderingly bad at easy gameplay that this level was actually incredibly frustrating. Despite praising this level as one of the all-time greatest, generally, I strongly dislike levels of its length. I consistently find that the trade-off of long levels having easier gameplay than shorter levels, which is necessary to make sure the level is actually beatable, means that the gameplay is not only unengaging because of its simplicity, but unavoidably infuriating. It sucks to die to clicks and timings that are beneath your skill level as a player, and in a level that's 9 minutes long, you will be exclusively dying to nothing but that type of timing. I knew this going in, but it wasn't at the forefront of my mind, and I really wanted to give Commatose a chance. I wanted to justify my placement of this as my sixth favorite level of all time, and so began my three days of Commatose. So much anger, yet so much love. Never have I directed such rage towards something that, deep down, I had no hatred for---nothing but adoration, in fact. Eventually, I figured out many of the gameplay quirks that were holding this level down for me, the biggest one being the ending dash orbs. This level, despite taking less than 1k, took more patience than I have had for something in a while.

Attempts: 895

Enjoyment: 7/10

Level rating: 9.9/10

Hardest part: It's balanced well but the fast part with the short gameplay changes in the 40s

Food rating: 7.5/10

Rating of this level if it were a food: 7/10

President rating: 0/10

Dog rating: 0/10

Free food: yes

Copy+pasted from the description of my completion:

0-12:

This is the worst part of the level. It's very awkward and kind of ugly, but I still don't mind the deco honestly. The real problem is that it NEVER gets consistent, and although it's not hard, it requires focus to not get caught in loops of dying to it. Looking back, this part caused the most annoyance in the whole grind, except for MAYBE the infamous 67 wave.

12-22:

Pretty forgettable but I think this part is pretty fun and the deco is cool. I like how there's a couple alt strats, like at 12%, you can drop or hold depending on if you hit the orb or not. I do have to mention the toggle bugs though. There are two parts where Hideki made an effect that TOGGLES THE GAMEPLAY on and off instead of using alpha triggers for whatever reason. The first of these isn't bad, it can just cause you to not hit the 11% orb and you have to hold and not collect the second key at 12. The second one is way worse though. At 14, you have to enter the dual in a really specific way to avoid the structures literally clipping into your ship and just killing you. You not only have to hit the pads later than normal, but you have to hit them still pretty far to the left AND you have to worry about not misaligning your ship. I was able to get this to be consistent but it's still annoying.

23-37:

Just a click pattern memorization part. Sometimes you'll die if you don't have a brain (I have a brian). Really nothing to say about it honestly.

38-49:

This part is pretty satisfying to pass but very frustrating to die to. It feels out of your control 45% of the time when you die here, but I still like the part overall. The mini wave and especially the ship are so damn satisfying once you learn them, and despite the awfulness of the mirror portal, the ship got consistent.

50-67:

The deco in this part is alright. The focus is on the gameplay, which is fast paced gameplay done right, bar the ship at 54 which is awkward and just bad. That ship ALWAYS felt shitty to die to, and same with the swing copter even though it's free so it really doesn't matter. Speaking of which...

68-74:

This part is BALLS. It's the most inconsistent part, but I can say very gladly that this did only get more and more consistent, except for times when I stopped playing the level for like 3+ days, in which case my consistency PLUMMETED. The wave is SO satisfying to do. Passing this part makes you feel like an actual god, and this is where your heart rate starts ramping up, so it's always surreal to pass. Seriously, after passing the wave 206 times, that 207th was still so hype. And the 1-3 frame (depending on alignment and fps) at 73, DUDE, it's the most satisfying part. I will say that dying at the ship directly after (which I did 40 times lmao) feels like BS and is always a blueball but it makes up for that in how satisfying that part is as well.

75-82:

This is the "easy" part of the hard part, if that makes sense, and it's the worst too, but it still has some extremely satisfying gameplay. That really is the thing with this level, sometimes it hurts to die to, but when you pass it, holy shit. My thoughts on the deco here are the same as 50-67 but I think this part looks a bit better.

83-89:

What do I even say, more satisfying gameplay but damn is it hard. Just this run alone is carried by choke points, I died at 84 over twenty times and 88 almost as many. The start of the dual gets consistent but not at all easy, which can't be said for the second part of the dual which is completely free and you should never expect to die there from the beginning (ignore that I died there twice).

89-92:

What can I say. This is maybe the most satisfying to hit out of any part in any level. When I passed this from the beginning, there was nothing going on in my mind except grit and adrenaline. Good deco too lol

93-100:

Short and chokable, but pretty fun.