PLATFORMERS! SIDESCROLLERS! METROIDVANIA!

January 25, 2018 12:34 PM

How to play Trap Adventure 2, the cruel platformer blowing up on Twitter [Polygon] “Trap Adventure 2, a mobile platformer that released by developer Hiroyoshi Oshiba (aka “hiro!!”) in 2016, has recently been getting attention for its clever design and hilarious level of difficulty. The spike in popularity is largely thanks to a widely circulated Twitter video of the game, which throws vicious (and completely unfair) curveballs at the player. If you haven’t already watched it, please do so. It’s brilliant, but cruel.”

• Celeste review: With amazing twists, this 2D game reaches great heights [Ars Technica]

“Stop me if you've heard this one before: a quirky, pixellated video game breathes new life into the Mario-like side-scroller genre. Or, well, those games used to breathe life, before they became commonplace. Super Meat Boy set this kind of resurgence into motion nearly a decade ago. That's a long time in side-scrolling years. A peek at this week's Celeste—which favors pixellated designs and squishy, bouncy characters—could make any skeptical passerby sigh in that "Gosh, another one of these?" way. I get that. But I insist there's something here. In the past few years, we've seen a few super-beautiful, far-from-pixellated platformers emerge with serious fans.” [YouTube][Trailer]

• A Satisfying Platformer About Smashing Skeletons And Befriending Acrobats [Kotaku]

“Sometimes you need to punch a skeleton and use their severed arm to smack a ghost in the face. Long Live the Axe is an exciting action platformer about exploring crypts and finding keys. It mixes the sensibilities of Metroid with an arcade brawler, and it’s this week’s Indie Pick. Designed by Jesse Burnett, Long Live the Axe is about an intrepid adventurer setting off to explore caves and gather weapons. The game world is surprisingly large, with many buildings and deep dungeons to rifle through for loot. Sometimes that means bouncing off enemies’ heads to reach a door; sometimes it means bashing your way through a room of monsters. Boss fights challenge the player to dodge projectiles or snag weapons from midair and toss them back. It’s old school fun that’s made more exciting by responsive controls that allow wild acrobatics.” [YouTube][First 10 min.]

• Iconoclasts review – one person can make a difference [Metro]

“There was a time when it seemed like 2D pixel graphics would become a lost artform. When 3D polygons first started being used in home consoles anything 2D suddenly became deeply unfashionable and most major developers allowed their skills to dull, while newer teams never learned them. Portable consoles helped keep things alive to some degree, but it’s been the rise of indie gaming that’s created a second renaissance in 2D video game art. [...] Iconoclasts is a Metroidvania title, which admittedly isn’t a terribly original concept for a 2D indie game. It also accentuates comparisons with the work of Shantae developer WayForward, who also specialise in 2D platfomers with a similar artwork and animation style.” [YouTube][Trailer]

• The End is Nigh: Making friends is hard [Eurogamer]

“Presented as a fourth wall-breaking Let's Play video about a blob named Ash (voiced by Red Letter Media's Rich Evans) playing through a minimalist pixelated platformer called The End is Nigh, all seems well with the affable Ash until tragedy strikes and he gets a game-over. Only it's worse than that. The game crashes, sending Ash into a profanity-laden panic of the highest order. Initially it seems like a cute, clever marketing ploy parodying streamer culture, and it is, but it's also the opening cinematic to the game. Ash, as it turns out, is the last man (or blob. Or whatever) on earth, and his dinky little video games are all he has left. [...] Where The End is Nigh differs most strongly from Super Meat Boy is in its freedom of exploration. While not technically a "metroidvania" in the conventional sense, the game's series of single-screen challenges are loosely connected. Should you leap to the screen on your right, climb an obstacle, then jump back, you'll emerge in the prior screen from the same angle you entered it.” [YouTube][Trailer]

• Prepare to die: Dead Cells [Reno Gazette Journal]

“Now some of you might be wondering, “what is Dead Cells?” In the simplest terms, Dead Cells is a game in the “Metroidvania” genre. This means it’s a side-scrolling platformer in the vein of Metroid or Castlevania, which features a hefty scoop of exploration. On top of that, it’s also has “Roguelike” qualities similar to the classic game Rogue or the excellent Binding of Isaac. It’s a game archetype that can be quite unforgiving because if you die you stay dead and have to start from scratch all the way in the beginning. To keep things fresh, the game serves up randomly generated levels with monsters and random power-ups spread throughout your adventures. One thing to keep in mind is that this game is in early access, so the developers are constantly adding more content to the game. The current estimate is that Dead Cells is about 40 percent to 50 percent complete with 11 floors and 2 bosses. The experience, however, is excellent so don’t let that turn you off of the game. You start off with a basic sword and you can choose between a bow or a shield. Keep playing, however, and you can eventually get some different items to start with.” [YouTube][Trailer]

posted by Fizz (60 comments total)

Oh man, that video is hilarious! Sadly it seems to be iPhone only?
posted by Grither at 12:43 PM on January 25, 2018 [2 favorites]

The Trap Adventure 2 video's circulating on Tumblr with the caption "When the game shits you and pushes its middle finger up to yours" which, yes. Yes, that is an accurate description.
posted by rewil at 12:43 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

I laughed way too much watching that.
posted by COD at 12:44 PM on January 25, 2018 [5 favorites]

videogamedunkey has a review of Trap Adventure 2. It's typical Dunkey (offensive, cursing, yelling, etc.) but he pretty much sums it up in a single word, “Nope.”
posted by Fizz at 12:47 PM on January 25, 2018 [3 favorites]

Dead Cells is coming to Switch YOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

I am going to pick up Celeste tonight. The reviews have won me over.
posted by selfnoise at 12:47 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

selfnoise, you have no idea how excited I am that Dead Cells is coming to Switch. And I'm doing the same thing when I get home from work with Celeste. I can't wait to dive in.

It's kind of why I made this post. I just wanted to celebrate some fun platformers and sidescrollers. So much joy.
posted by Fizz at 12:50 PM on January 25, 2018

me: is this the thing that made me very angry yesterday
the thing: I AM
posted by poffin boffin at 12:58 PM on January 25, 2018 [19 favorites]

I watched the video, and it was entertaining in an "I never want to play that" way, but I don't really understand what makes it any different than I Wanna Be the Guy from (holy shit) 10 years ago.
posted by graventy at 12:58 PM on January 25, 2018 [7 favorites]

videogamedunkey has a review of Trap Adventure 2 yt . It's typical Dunkey (offensive, cursing, yelling, etc.) but he pretty much sums it up in a single word, “Nope.”

I dunno if he's playing it up for humor's sake, but it always surprises me how bad Dunkey is at video games for a professional video game player. There's more than a few deaths in that video that are "Dunkey was bad at games" rather than "oh, another 'fuck you' from the game."
posted by explosion at 1:00 PM on January 25, 2018

I saw that video this morning, I didn't realize it's an actual game. I thought it was a parody animation that perfectly captures what I feel like when I attempt to play any sort of Mario-esque game. (which is why I don't play them...)
posted by dnash at 1:02 PM on January 25, 2018 [4 favorites]

Based on that video, Hiroyoshi has manged to instill a very good sense of comedic timing into a video game.
posted by paper chromatographologist at 1:03 PM on January 25, 2018 [28 favorites]

I wanted to throw a non existent controller across the room just watching it, which I guess is exactly what they were going for.
posted by Artw at 1:17 PM on January 25, 2018 [2 favorites]

a very good sense of comedic timing into a video game.

I feel this way every time I play Dark Souls.
posted by Fizz at 1:22 PM on January 25, 2018 [5 favorites]

games with pixel art graphics that don't conform to an actual grid (Rotating sprites, TRIANGLES) are one of those pet peeves that I will never, ever really get over

These look pretty good, though. Most of my early gaming experiences were through free flash games that, looking back, were mostly people trying to recreate/remix aesthetics and gameplay from the NES C64 etc. era, so I have this like weird second-hand nostalgia for simple but devious platformers and isometric RPGs and, yes, pixel art in everything.
posted by Berreggnog at 1:22 PM on January 25, 2018 [5 favorites]

Am I the only one who got the feeling of I wanna be the guy?
posted by Philipschall at 1:24 PM on January 25, 2018 [4 favorites]

There's video of Trap Adventure 2 being played all the way through, and the rest of it is precisely what you would imagine. I kind of wish there was something of someone playing through the whole thing like the Twitter video, catching all of the ridiculous deaths and places where the designer is taunting the player.

Also, it's a phone game? So you have to tap the glass for every move? I can't even imagine how much harder that would make it.
posted by Copronymus at 1:25 PM on January 25, 2018 [4 favorites]

devious platformers and isometric RPGs and, yes, pixel art in everything.

Oooh, you're speaking my language. I think I just fell in love.
posted by Fizz at 1:25 PM on January 25, 2018

as someone who managed to beat one (1) boss in I Wanna Be the Guy and is still a little proud of that, this is exactly the feeling of that game.
posted by vibratory manner of working at 1:38 PM on January 25, 2018 [3 favorites]

my language.

Pretty much the creme de la creme of this sort of thing was nitrome dot com, who appear to still be operational, albeit with more of a focus on mobile games these days.
If ever you feel the need for literally weeks on end of surprisingly good flash platformers this is the place.

These days, if i'm looking for tiny indie games for free, i would go to itch.io, but unfortunately most of the stuff on there is for windows only.
I think I might be the only person in the history of ever who actually misses flash.
posted by Berreggnog at 1:40 PM on January 25, 2018 [4 favorites]

I think I might be the only person in the history of ever who actually misses flash.

I feel like we've had this discussion on the blue before and you're not alone. I think there are a lot of people that have fond memories/nostalgia for the good old days of flash.
posted by Fizz at 1:53 PM on January 25, 2018 [4 favorites]

THIS IS EXACTLY HOW I ALWAYS FEEL PLAYING VIDEO GAMES. EXACTLY.

(and, you know, life in general)
posted by tspae at 1:54 PM on January 25, 2018 [8 favorites]

I'm reminded of the classic video of a guy trying to play a redonkulous Super Mario Bros. hack. I wouldn't want to play it, but if you're a sucker for pain, I'm glad games like this exist for the people crazy enough to be into that.

(Worth noting that it's not the player doing the voice-over in the above video. That was added later, but it's still hilarious.)
posted by SansPoint at 1:56 PM on January 25, 2018 [2 favorites]

I miss Flash games and animation, but I do not miss Flash as a platform. It was hot garbage, even if some people managed to make cool and funny stuff with it. At least Homestar Runner has moved to YouTube.
posted by SansPoint at 1:57 PM on January 25, 2018 [2 favorites]

games with pixel art graphics that don't conform to an actual grid (Rotating sprites, TRIANGLES) are one of those pet peeves that I will never, ever really get over

Thank you! I thought I was the only one. What's the point of adhering to an artistic limitation if you're just going to cheat it at every turn. It's so artificial. The aesthetic instantly loses me the second I see something violate the grid. It switches from a charmingly nostalgic reminder of the games I used to play growing up to just feeling like the game developer was lazy and wanted to save time with low fesolution art.
posted by zixyer at 1:59 PM on January 25, 2018 [3 favorites]

> ...a redonkulous Super Mario Bros. hack

Kaizo Mario games previously.
posted by ardgedee at 2:19 PM on January 25, 2018 [2 favorites]

games with pixel art graphics that don't conform to an actual grid (Rotating sprites, TRIANGLES) are one of those pet peeves that I will never, ever really get over

I mean, as soon as triangle-based hardware came into existence, people started combining 2d sprites with the hardware capabilities (rotation, scaling, transparency, overlaying actual 3d content, etc). So maybe these games aren't emulating the nes/snes era, but are instead emulating the n64/ps1 era. Certainly you can look at historical games like Symphony of the Night and see all these things being done there.
posted by Pyry at 2:34 PM on January 25, 2018 [9 favorites]

I think I might be the only person in the history of ever who actually misses flash.

I miss the tower defense games most of all...
posted by Artw at 2:54 PM on January 25, 2018 [6 favorites]

Am I the only one who got the feeling of I wanna be the guy?

IWBTG is definitely insanely hard, but it's difficulty to me was more about pixel-perfect execution than it was about loltastic fuck-yous from the game itself out of nowhere.

To date, I've yet to experience a platformer as great as Cave Story, although Freedom Planet comes pretty close. This thing is definitely one of those "more fun to watch than to play" kinda deals, so, I just might fall down a replay video hole tonight.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 3:05 PM on January 25, 2018

Everybody is mentioning I Wanna Be The Guy like it’s the only cruel video game out there when the article itself mentions several other cruel and tricksy video games.
posted by Going To Maine at 3:29 PM on January 25, 2018

selfnoise, you have no idea how excited I am that Dead Cells is coming to Switch.

I too am delighted by that news, but will probably just keep playing it on my PC because there's other Switch games I still don't own that I should spend that money on. Dead Cells is so so good. So good.

And tying together the Celeste mention with this line of discussion:

games with pixel art graphics that don't conform to an actual grid (Rotating sprites, TRIANGLES) are one of those pet peeves that I will never, ever really get over

I'll note that I have a kind of proud-uncle feeling about Celeste because it was originally developed on PICO-8, around the same time that I was getting super into it, and it was just so rad to see these seasoned devs who had released a game I really really liked show up at the same online A/V club I was hanging out and and go to town like that.

And while the release version of Celeste is much prettier and more polished and basically an excellent thing, the original was totally solid and an excellent use of the PICO-8 platform.

And PICO-8 doesn't cheat on the pixels, if you're dedicated to that raster grid. If you want to rotate a sprite, you either write a sprite-rotation function that has to chew up cycles doing a dodgy free-rotation calculation with all its messy noise doing imperfect pixel translations, or just buckle down and fuckin' hand-render your rotation frames and eat up valuable sprite sheet storing 'em.

I used to be a lot more hardline in my rejection of mixed-aesthetic stuff like free-rotating individual "pixel" elements in higher resolution engines—at this point I care more about the effectiveness of the look and feel of the result than I do about the purity of the rendering process—but it's good to know that if you want things like pure, well-behaved retro raster aesthetics, there's stuff like the PICO-8 engine or dedicated throwback projects like Shovel Knight chasing that down.
posted by cortex at 4:25 PM on January 25, 2018 [7 favorites]

I would totally play this game for 15 minutes before rage-quitting and throwing my laptop at the wall if it weren't a phone game. It's a phone game so eff that.
posted by jferg at 4:35 PM on January 25, 2018

Trap Adventure 2 feels more like a really extended inside joke and less a game. That being said, I am sure there are tons of people who are into it and will be speedrunning it to death.

I'm more a fan of side-scrolling platformers like Spelunky, Owlboy, Shovel Knight, Cave Story, etc. I now get to add Celeste to that list and I just played the first few levels and holy shit is it amazing.

There are so many other games out there that satisfy this type of itch: VVVVVV, Super Meat Boy, The End is Nigh, Axiom Verge, Elliot Quest, La Mulana.

I find most of these games to be enjoyable. They're tough but fair and for me at least they require a bit of patience, practice, and nerve. I don't always have this and more often than not, I abandon some of these games half-way through because they become too difficult. But I still love playing them and appreciate the people that can speedrun their way through them.
posted by Fizz at 5:03 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

So I was looking up this platformer I absolutely fell in love with years ago, to link it here, give a shoutout to the creator and insist that you play it. I was doing those things because the review for Celeste reminded me of it. So I dredged my memory, trying to remember some detail that would lead me to it...

Untitled Story, I think that's what it was called.

Matt something... Mattmakesgames.com maybe?

So I check it out, discover that it's a working URL, so I'm probably on the right track, and -- there's Celeste. So, having learned about that game in the last 5 minutes I can confidently say it's excellent, because everything of this guy's I've ever played has been excellent. An Untitled Story is a must-play, and it's totally free, so you really must play it.
posted by dbx at 5:03 PM on January 25, 2018

I do not miss Flash as a platform. It was hot garbage

The IDE was pretty nice though and beginner-friendly without holding anyone's hands. It was my first start in programming anything, so maybe I have a blind spot here, but the IDE was good.

anyway any excuse to rewatch "the hardest mario level" is a good thing
posted by BungaDunga at 5:44 PM on January 25, 2018

If you think a side scroller from a guy named Hiro is tough on the protagonist, you should see the one his brother, Ashhole, made..
posted by Nanukthedog at 5:44 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

Dead Cells has a firm grip on me. I.s fantastic, best controls in a metroidvania ever.
posted by SageLeVoid at 5:46 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

I feel like we've had this discussion on the blue before and you're not alone. I think there are a lot of people that have fond memories/nostalgia for the good old days of flash.

You might be thinking of this discussion from August around a talk on the history of Flash games. And if you missed it the first time, it's worth a look/listen.
posted by Johnny Assay at 6:15 PM on January 25, 2018

Guys, Celeste is super good. It seems pretty reasonable, and then you find a B-Side. THAT’S where the game declares itself off-limits to filthy casuals and anyone else with employment and loved ones (reader, I married it)
posted by DoctorFedora at 6:26 PM on January 25, 2018 [4 favorites]

Surprised to be the first person to mention Hollow Knight in a thread about metroidvanias, but, uh... Hollow Knight? Pretty good, I think.
posted by Going To Maine at 6:43 PM on January 25, 2018 [2 favorites]

Wake me up when they make a Lemmings game that improves on the original.
posted by Index Librorum Prohibitorum at 6:49 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

Weirdly the bridge builder iOS game based on Portal kind of has a Lemmings vibe.
posted by Artw at 7:05 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

IWBTG is the gold standard for masocore games with good reason. It has a pitch-perfect sense of comedy. The apple only falls up once the game has "taught" you that apples fall and apples kill you. Each scene is about building expectations and then thwarting them in the most surprising and yet somehow logical way possible. Lots of things it throws at the player comes out of the rich shared vocabulary of clasisc Nintendo-hard video games, and it constantly walks a fine line between quoting them faithfully and breaking their "rules" in interesting ways. The game and its playthrough videos have a jokey-verging-on-bro-y superficial style, but the whole thing is extraordinarily carefully crafted.
posted by grimmelm at 7:28 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

Speaking of IWBTG: Kayin, its developer, has been working on a rather Castlevania-like game called Brave Earth for about a decade now. It's supposed to read the player's mind like IWBTG, but to create intense action instead of slapstick. Brave Earth: Prologue is supposed to release sometime this year. It was originally going to be a free teaser for the main game, but it scope-creeped into a full-length thing. I'm excited to see where it goes.
posted by skymt at 7:53 PM on January 25, 2018

> I'm reminded of the classic video of a guy trying to play a redonkulous Super Mario Bros. hack. I wouldn't want to play it, but if you're a sucker for pain, I'm glad games like this exist for the people crazy enough to be into that.

Hey, I made Super Mario Frustration! It turned ten last year, which is very weird. I was wondering why today I was getting weird messages from people about it.
posted by RubixsQube at 9:18 PM on January 25, 2018 [12 favorites]

I feel like such a millennial - when I read "Trap Adventure 2" I immediately thought it was a tongue-in-cheek game about trap music*

And I was so sure of it that the more of the description I read the more confused I got

*Gone-Home-style, but in a nightclub
posted by facehugger at 9:45 PM on January 25, 2018

I just thought that it seemed rather tasteless to be remaking that Sega CD game in our current cultural moment .
posted by Going To Maine at 10:29 PM on January 25, 2018

Also! Iconoclasts! Finally! I remember aaaages ago when RPS featured the demo. I believe the context that this was a game that simply wouldn’t be finished, and then at some point there was a stray that all the interest did mean that Sandberg would eventually get it done. And he did! And it’s here! Hoo-ray. His other title on Steam, Noitu Love 2 is a pretty great little beat-‘em-up with a number of unlockable characters with different play styles, and well worth the price. His freebie. one-level long gender-swapped Zelda 2-like, The Legend Of Princess is also worth a shot.
posted by Going To Maine at 10:47 PM on January 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

games with pixel art graphics that don't conform to an actual grid (Rotating sprites, TRIANGLES) are one of those pet peeves that I will never, ever really get over

Related to this is mixing different apparent pixel sizings on the same screen. It makes everything just look dumb and I see even people who should know better fall into this trap. It made Halcyon 6 unplayable for me because it just looks like shit.

Yes yes I know you could pull off tricks on old hardware that allowed you to do this sometimes, under certain limitations. They looked like shit too when used incorrectly.
posted by Soi-hah at 1:46 AM on January 26, 2018

His other title on Steam, Noitu Love 2 is a pretty great little beat-‘em-up with a number of unlockable characters with different play styles, and well worth the price.

If you haven't looked at Shantae: Half Genie Hero, do so, it might satisfy similar itches.
posted by Fizz at 6:00 AM on January 26, 2018

Iconoclasts is pretty good. It's not Hollow Knight good, but it's pretty good.
posted by Merus at 9:41 AM on January 26, 2018

I have been playing Celeste for three days now without using the assist modes. I just finished Chapter 3, and I have now died over one thousand times. And yet it still feels like the game is encouraging me to keep trying. It's demanding and punishing, but the instant respawns and (usually) frequent checkpoints make it forgiving too. The end-of-level sequences can be really brutal, though. I'm pretty sure I died over a hundred times just on the final run at the end of Chapter 3.

My favorite parts are the strawberries that seem impossible to get until you figure out just the right sequence of moves. There are some that I still have no idea how to do.

The character Theo has an instagram account!
posted by mbrubeck at 1:33 PM on January 27, 2018 [1 favorite]

mbrubeck, I came in here to write pretty much what you just wrote in your comment up above. I'm making progress slowly. Despite having died many hundreds of times, I'm enjoying the hell out of this experience. It's very early in 2018, but this will be a contender for my GotY. I'm having so much fun.
posted by Fizz at 11:43 AM on January 28, 2018

Celeste update: this game is very, very good. Mrs. Fedora, who grew up with things like friends to distract her from developing superhuman platforming skills, has also been enjoying it thoroughly. She enabled Assist Mode but has not yet used it; she likes knowing it’s there, just in case. I must say that the crystal hearts have been some of the most satisfying moments I’ve had in quite some time (even if I did have one or two spoiled for me). I audibly gasped when I figured out the one in chapter 1.

This game is so good.
posted by DoctorFedora at 4:10 PM on January 28, 2018 [2 favorites]

I am enjoying Celeste, but I find the encouragement subtext rather grating. There’s something vaguely patronizing about a game telling me that I shouldn’t feel bad about dying a lot, but at the same time counting all of those deaths and reporting them back to me. It feels like a half-measure; you want to cater to the speed runners and high level players, but also, indeed, to the filthy casuals. It’s a bizarre pretense, and one that still makes it clear just where you stand.
posted by Going To Maine at 4:32 PM on January 28, 2018

The story kind of makes it work. I haven’t really minded the encouraging atmosphere, and it’s certainly helped Mrs. Fedora keep at it, at least. Of course, your mileage will necessarily vary.
posted by DoctorFedora at 4:43 PM on January 28, 2018

I've made it into the second world and the difficulty has ratcheted up quite a bit. It never feels unfair though. I also appreciate that the game just lets you figure out new mechanics/abilities without much explanation. Explore, jump, die, figure it out. You'll eventually get it.

There’s something vaguely patronizing about a game telling me that I shouldn’t feel bad about dying a lot, but at the same time counting all of those deaths and reporting them back to me. It feels like a half-measure; you want to cater to the speed runners and high level players, but also, indeed, to the filthy casuals.

The encouraging atmosphere feels like it's likely there for younger kids/children. And even though it does nod to "speed runners and high level players", it's still a Nintendo game, so I get why they're trying to fit this game into this uncomfortable middle ground.
posted by Fizz at 5:59 AM on January 29, 2018

Celeste is an indie game made by Matt Makes Games Inc., for Switch, PlayStation 4, XBox One, Windows, Mac, and Linux. As far as I can tell Nintendo didn't have any role in designing it (though they did have to approve it for their platform, as did Microsoft and Sony).

I took the perseverance-themed dialogues in a different way. I don't think they were thrown in just to prod the player along. I think they're a core part of what the authors are trying to say through both story and gameplay. It's not unlike Getting Over It, the other recent game about scaling a mountain.

I'm in Chapter 5 now, and I'm impressed by how each chapter has a unique feel — the eerie emptiness of Chapter 2, the claustrophobia of Chapter 3, the exposed wide-open spaces of Chapter 4...
posted by mbrubeck at 8:07 AM on January 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Good point. I sort of forgot about the other platforms because I was playing it exclusively on Switch.

I do still think that they might be shooting for a middle ground where the game/story are suitable for children/all-ages.

A lot to chew on with this game. It's designed so well and I'm having such a great time playing it.
posted by Fizz at 12:46 PM on January 29, 2018

After finishing the main story of Celeste, I went back through all of the levels trying to uncover more secrets. I'm up to 144 strawberries and two crystals hearts, and have unlocked six of the seven B-sides. I haven't even started playing the B-sides or made it into the Core. There's just so much stuff in this game! The main levels are also fun to replay; they feel much less intimidating having finished them before and mastered all of the moves.
posted by mbrubeck at 11:24 AM on February 19, 2018

Celeste is very good. I managed quite the trick where I beat the C-side for Chapter 8, but then died AFTER collecting the crystal heart at the end, so I had to do it again a second time (yikes).
posted by DoctorFedora at 8:55 PM on February 19, 2018