Tempy wrote:

Moot_Geeza wrote:

I wasn't sure exactly what to expect, but at this stage I'm guessing it builds you a complete game for every new save file.  Obviously this is what most rogues do

Hate to keep acting like Mr Rogue at secondary school, but this is rarely the case with rogues. It’s usually per attempt, not per save file. Along with everything else you’ve said this sounds as much like a roguelike as Mario 64.

Moot_Geeza wrote:

133. Super Meat Boy Forever - Switch (6hrs so far) This will be an ongoing thing, as I'm determined to at least attempt to unlock the majority of the dark world stages, but I'm ready to review.  It's a truly excellent auto runner.  Most of the layouts I encountered during my first playthrough were better than the best of most other runners I've played, and those 'chunks' are merely a few pieces of the jigsaw Tommy Refenes & co. have been slaving over for years.  Almost every new twist or gimmick works well (the only nope was the way the screen change for the otherwise excellent spider creature disregarded the precision of your jump inputs), but there's a genre ceiling for me, and no amount of blueprint brilliance can smash a great glass elevator through its roof, so to speak.  In a way it's harsh to knock a game for being as could as it could possibly be - Team Meat wanted to make the best auto runner ever, one assumes, and has succeeded - but the lingering taste of what could have been makes it hard to supress at least a whopping pang of disappointment.  Super Meat Boy is my favourite platformer of all time, and while this experience is just as pure, limiting the control of your character has sizeable repercussions in terms of all-timeyness.  The first question I'd probably ask Refenes is why, as in 'why did you eschew the perfection of the original in favour an endlessly repayable auto-scroller' (why, goddammit).  I expect I'd be initially satisfied with his answer, as he seems like a lovely chap, but after further contemplation I expect I'd be tempted to follow up with yeah...but why?  It seems perfect for streamers, as any combination of chunks should create a great experience, but I wonder if at some point over the past six years someone should've Hicks gif'd him with the 'ease down' bit from Aliens.  He was so preoccupied with whether he could, as they say, and may have gone a little overboard with the project.  This purportedly has 7200 levels, but surely that means checkpoints rather than full stages.  There seem to be around 40 chunks per world, meaning you'll see 200-ish on a light world playthrough.  If replayability is your bag you're in for a treat, it could feasibly last forever.  I've got a second save file on the go and haven't noticed any reused segments.  There's a hell of a lot of game here, and it's a bit overwhelming for the likes of me.

At its best it's masterfully designed, and none of the light world levels I played were ever less than very good.  The layouts are partly puzzle based as Meat Boy can change direction by bouncing from walls, and intricacy is the name of the game.  You'll learn what it expects of you, what you can do, and how to solve the patterns either on the fly or after a restart or two.  Please trust me when I say it frequently comes close to genre perfection, the main game is chef's kiss stuff (wonky first boss aside).  I love runners as they're a sort of zone out experience at their best - you know when you go a bit blind while playing something but can still play it?  Pinball blindness, I call it.  Just me?  Anyway, for me, the problems start to rear their head with the addition of the dark worlds here.  For an already tricky runner to get harder, it needs to become more precise.  So that means more memorisation and more absolute pinpoint requirements on the timings, which is when the fun starts to drain away.  The trickier stages were where the original game really came alive, so this is a shame to say the least.  There's also the misstep of the unlock requirements for the dark worlds to factor in, which struck me as pretty mean.  If you can hack it there's a ridiculous amount of content on offer even without the randomisation element (or indeed NG+, which is also a thing).  It still has bandages (pacifiers here) and warp zones too.  I'm almost certain I won't be able to handle it all though, if the first dark world was anything to go by, which makes the more malicious aspects of this one far less appealing than Super Meat Boy or The End is Nigh.     

In summary, I've barely scratched the surface by reaching the credits but what I have played might prove to be close to enough.  It's going in my top 5 for the year, because I can't stress how good this is when you're under its spell, but I expect it'll fade away a lot quicker than the original. [8]