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Celeste Map Reviews #35

Another long while, thanks to the ever present mapping mines... but i've managed to throw together 4 maps i beat while i was on a small mapping break so here they are!

FIRST! - GDDH by Star Sapphire! - This one was a year in the making! I beat the first six rooms almost a year ago now, but I crashed out so bad on final that i stopped playing hardlist maps for a while after, inadvertently leading to the creation of these reviews, since I wanted to play chiller maps instead. The LORE! My complaints at the time were about how chokepoints in each rooms quickly lead to frustation, but I think i was simply too impatient. I spent 7 hours on final all in one day, and that led to so much impatience that I completely lost it! Well now I finally found the urge to go back and finish what I started! It only took 2 further hours, and I guess I can say I'm glad to finally have it well and truly done. I really am a fan of this kind of battery gameplay despite its immense challenge, so cool second hardest (and hardest for these reviews woohoo). Overall, surely FFYL? hmmmm,, 8.8/10

SECOND! - Limerence by kitkat96! - Woag neat map. A short silhouette type that gets darker room by room. I found the precision setups while having to work around the increasing visual impairment to be a fun challenge. Congrats on getting this out!! 8.4/10

THIRD! - When and Where by Crispybag, Appels, tobyaaa, BossSauce, Tear_ and Freeka! - Thanks for making me list like ten million people there, but here's the Fangame Marathon 2025 blind race map, which brought Superfecta and The Climate Crisis before this. This year's rendition had a macrorouting focus to it, which basically means you'llbe exploring around groups of rooms repeatedly to find ways to progress, and I quite liked it here! Each section has a unique identity and takes on the concept, with only a few spots of perplexion thorughout. I really enjoyed my time on this! So uhh, go play it! 9.7/10

FOURTH! - Project Hibernation by kalypsooooo! - Huge beginner exploration-type with a ton of berries? Oh yes! This one's for you if you like running around an enclosed space hunting down berries before commiting to the relatively easily found exit. I had a good time slowly finding everything. 8.5/10

returning to the mapping mines oooo.....

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #34

A long break from map playing due to map making... but I've managed to scrounge up a few maps I mostly beat after all this time! I'll keep it short this time, just not 100% in the yap energy tonight.

FIRST! - Abandoned Metropolis by nyl! - I didn't actually beat this one; room 3 (the final one) was too hard for me to want to spend many hours grinding it out, but the gameplay seems quite fun if you're really into harder dashless-type gameplay. There's a good bit of precision and 6 jumps and other neat setups present here! The map looks pretty nice, but yeah nice fun little 3-roomer, 8.1/10

SECOND! - Spooooky Slip Swap Setup Shrine by paradiseSys! - I quite liked this one, focusing on cool neutral jump gap-setup gameplay. The setups are indeed rather clever thanks to the swap blocks and boosters that enhance the routing aspect. I liked the berries too (wow the 2nd one is harddd to figure out)!. Overall, 8.3/10

THIRD! - Delusional Canopy by aBuffZucchini! - Waow! Yeah so I finally hopped on after the B-side update, and i had a great time of both maps! The temple-ish deco isn't overly complex but very well done. Dream zip movers and boosters are the highlight entities here, and the gameplay made with them is just so creative and fun to play throughout both sides. There are also reverse boosters around, and they certainly heightened the experience of trying to sightread the map's setups, though I'm still not huge on the entity itself. But overall, this map is always recommended around for a reason, play it! 9.5/10

FOURTH! - Supersonic by SuperLan11! - A superfun supercool supermap that also uses a lot of boosters and dream zip movers! The gameplay style here is different though, more about somewhat input-dense tech and speed. The first checkpoint was admittedly not thaaaat much fun to play through, but the map picks up so so much from the 2nd checkpoint onwards; those dream zip movers really elevate the gameplay style into being super satisfying and creative in parts! The decoration is good though a bit hard on my eyes for some reason, and the song picks were great! Overall, i didn't take 3 years to beat a "Supersonic" this time! 9.3/10

idk what to say here..... so..... meowmeow bye!

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #33

big 33?! three.... MTC3! Looks like this edition will be (mostly) mtc3 themed!

FIRST! - Orbital Tumbling by Amphy! - First up, a space map with a song from Fall Guys (made by THE Jukio Kallio! (of Center Of The Earth Mix fame!)). This map was a very fun to go through, speedy dream block redirects and speedy ultras almost never go wrong! The redirect sections are a bit hard to react to at first, but aside from that the rooms are very fun and have cool unique elements (the berry was especially cool!). Also the deco is very well done, good use of purple. Overall, stumble guys is clear, 8.6/10

SECOND! - Bernadette by ricky06! - ricky map, prepare for peak. And peak it was! This easier map may seem to just be cycles gameplay on the surface, but ricky went and did what he usually does, bringing every single room a fun and unique idea that makes you wish it kept on going! The addition of the stop-switches add to this, even causing the fantastic music track to.... sound different i'm not sure what the term is for that but it's cool af! And the map is so pretty too god damn! High recommend! Overall, Raj, 11.2/10

THIRD! - Elusional by BadTie! - Another entry coming in from the bad tie here, and I must say what a delightful little beginner map this was! The gameplay was fun, the map has a nice beach theme and the song was a bop too. Not much more I need add reallt. Overall, yeah screw all yous i don't play rift i only play VIVID/STASIS YATTAAA, 8.4/10

FOURTH! - Overlord by dewie! - This sussy imposter isn't even an entry for mtc3?! What a scam! But regardless of that this map is awesome! The decoration is top notch, and the gameplay was very cool! I don't see many maps with badeline boosts being a prominent entity, but it is like that here, and it makes for really cool vertical gameplay up falling blocks with sprancels and cornerkicks very coomon! The song was also very relaxing to listen to as I made the climb. Excellent work! Overall, get this mf out of the mtc3 review! 3/10. (multiply the 3 by 3.2 for the real score)

FIFTH! - FOCUS by itsDash16! - omgggg super hexagon level!!!!! Ahhh the memories of me beating the game a handful of times several years ago.... This map certainly isn't subtle on the reference, each checkpoint being themed around the three difficulties in super hexagon! It's super fast and input dense, but there are also a lot of timings in there as well so you really gotta think! It was a very fun time, with the map getting better as it went along imp. The ending is also realllly sick! Overall, won-der-ful, 5.3/6 SIXTH! - Magic Moments by Chelito! - A soothing elevator ride? I don't mind the break from all these maps! But there's more than meets the eye to this one, and it led to a cute little package of exploring and puzzles, with some neat extra details of presentation. Great way to make this "3-minute" level keep me around longer with its tantalising secrets! Overall, i'm more a stairs person myself, 8.5/10

SEVENTH! - Eu, Voce, ele e ela by Tear! - Woww this map is pretty!!! The gameplay is no slouch either, with the infamous tear-style routing challenges mixed with the fun air-blowing things powered by switches! Noah's berry was quite funny indeed, and the song is quite pleasant! Overall, sorry no accents here, 8.9/10

EIGHTH! - Weeping Birch by xolimono! - A surprise addition to my play list, this short map uses an entity that I hafven't played with pretty much since sj beginner, the rose! But also there's bounce jellies which I've never even touched before, and from what I played it's a very interesting entity with potential for wacky hijinx gameplay. The gameplay in THIS map uses the two for some nice low-stakes mild routing, with some creative movements throughout. Some small parts were a bit nuanced on the execution which affected the routing, but apart from that it was great! I also loved all the crayon artwork adorning some areas (mirosai is awesome!!!). Overall, step 1 of tob g? who's tob g? 9/10

NINTH! - Blossom by Sapphire_Xer0! - Sophie mtc3!!!! Unlike the last edition where she made like 74 morbillin maps, this was the only entry. First of all, this map is so beatiful! Many custom assets are all over the place which adds so much to the aesthetic it's great to see! The gameplay as I played it was a bit slow and sometimes that led to some mild impatient moments, but I was awed when I realised the true purpose of the seeming gimmicky change to madeline's physics. And such a change is all to do with the map's incredible story which really got to me. Uncovering the pieces in text combined with the environmental effects really delivered some emotional moments; super impressive! The song really added to this too, through the vocals. So yeah, this is a very high recommend, it's only about advanced or so. Overall, 10.2/10

9 maps (three times three...) waow. Surely nothing is soon to release that will take up my playing time!

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #32

Let's keep it simple today! A couple clears, a couple things to say about each one. FIRST! - Madeline Goes Back to 2019 by hennyburgr! - I just have got to be one of the first few people to play this when it dropped during the direct; I was on this within seconds! This long beginner adventure follows Madeline as she tries to rescue Theo from trouble! There are all manner of zip movers and somewhat swappy blocks to platform across to save your friend! I quite enjoyed the gameplay's thoughtful aspects and the map in general has a fun, relaxed energy throughout. The story in question is on the silly side which is always cool to see. So yeah, overall, :catbus:, 9.2/10

SECOND! - Fortress Mountain by Zeya! - One that I've had my eye on for a bit, and it is today! This map is quite long, and difficult and is all about dream blocks! The rooms have you flying about in different directions while performing somewhat dense gameplay with dream blocks, reverse dream blocks, dream zippers, dream swap blocks and more! It's a blast the whole way through and I especially am a fan of this gameplay style. The music choices are great, conveying the importance of needing to finish the map to destroy the beast in the fortress itself. The difficulty curve is very well done, and I very much liked berries 2 and 3 (b1 less so). My only real criticism is that the camera could be better in some parts as high speed makes it hard to see stuff coming up. But apart from that is map is an excellent solo effort! 9.5/10

THIRD! - AIRTH BY BadTie! - MTC3 BABY! This entry to the contest is already held in quite high regard due to its supposedly peam gameplay, and wow were people not wrong! I had such a fun time playing this, the gameplay is soooo impressively made! It's mostly advanced techspam and some precision, centered around the boost block entity, that boosts your jump in the given direction. As I said, the gameplay construction is masterful in the way it incorporates varied dash directions and double dashes to enforce the path in a clean, satisfying way. I liked the change-up in visuals and addition of red bubbles near the end too. The music was a solid pick to me and though the visuals were nothing mindblowing, it still had a fresh air feel to it which I always like to see. Overall, Badtie, you cooked. 10.9/10

FOURTH! - Rainfall Ruins by earthwise! - This short and sweet beginner adventure was very wholesome! The decoration is very good, with really visually appealing colours. The gameplay, which is all about springs and falling blocks, was fun to breeze through, and the berries were well hidden and had some cool ideas. Huge thumbs-up from me! 9.6/10

FIFTH! - New Hangout Spot by tear_! - Beginner puzzle! This Birdsong inspired map was a tough one for the ol' brain, but I managed to do it all without a video! The resemblance is felt, given I played Birdsong (which is from Vanilla Contest btw). For this map, you'll have to think carefully: no refills on ground, dash blocks, badelines and dream and seeker refills litter each room, so you'll have to concoct the right way to clear each path. It was fun for me to do just that, in particular, thinking outside the box of what seems obvious to do, which usually led to the solution. The map is beautiful lookng btw, tear always delivers on that aspect, and the music reminds me of Birdsong too. Overall, I had a great time! 10/10

SIXTH! - Boombox Bayou by xolimono! - Happy Birthday xoliii! This map sure was something, but in a good way! It was cool to see all the cool moves using the throwable desecration explodey boxes! The shortness of the rooms is very much appreciated, though the final room's longer length definitely causes it to overstep its advertised grandexpert bounds. One of my favourite rooms was the second berry, it was a very fun gimmick tech room. Also, this map's decoration is gorgeous! Not really sure what a bayou actually is but the swamp-like look of the map is immaculate! Overall, 9.4/10

I planned to have one more here but i'll save it for next time (it'll be mildly mtc3 themed)

There's also another map i beat which I have not mentioned here but I am sure I will speak on it properly when the time is right...

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews 31 (PART 2)

It's finally time, finally time to go over the main course of my recent modded escapades. The second half of AWWPD's maps (before heartside!). Here it is, the Kailey Special! Major AWWPD spoilers up ahead!

FIRST! - Moon's Mirror by Moon! - My return began here, with this short map that's all about it's symmetry! There are only a few rooms, but the main gimmick still has some neat uses showcased throughout. Indeed, the halves of each room are mirrored, which leads to some fun gameplay moments all about making the best of each half to progress! It was an enjoyable little experience, and more kevin appearances are always appreciated. Overall, i could totally paste a reverse of the above text here for the bit but would take up a lot of space so i'll leave it, 8.6/10

SECOND! - Hiccups Hospital by Pastelle! - Next up to play was this supposed intermediate challenge! I kinda could guess what was up from the title and indeed the dreaded hiccups have found themselves making movement much more unpredicatable! It's a lot harder to beat rooms when Madeline is doing a hop every couple of seconds but the rooms are semi-designed around it so it leads to some cool parts and some tricksy ones but I'd say it was a cool uniquw time overall. This one was also quite short but I appreaciated the berry and the small bit of story to this one! Overall, I could totally add random "hic"s to the above text for the bit but it would take up a lot of space so i'll leave it, 8.1/10

THIRD! - The Purity of Wind by The Purity of Wind! - Yet another short map, though this one is gm so it was quite spicy! Gotta say I quite liked the vibe and music of this one, the map felt very much like kind of a sacred sky area and I think that's really cool. Right away the movement felt weird and indeed that was because goober helper was in play! With all sorts of speed conservation taking place I had to route my way through the dream blocks to reach the end! It was a lot of fun to build speed and fly everywhere and there were lots of lenient spots/minor cheese that made it feel even more free in a good way, more fun to just mess around with. Overall, o'hare air idk, 9.4/10

FOURTH! - The Roots of the Abyss by Kailey the Alien! - After that triplet of short maps, here we've got a longer, fuller experience! At first, nothing seems too amiss. There was a hard spring gameplay berry to find, but it's once I descended on the main path that this map started to truly shine. It seems to be a long way down, but for now, the fun downwards semi-precision gameplay is very cool! I go deeper, things get darker, paths tighter, spinner gaps more precise.... I continue down. Dream blocks, tighter, darker, harder. Further, tighter, so dark that only the light of refills and torches light the path, so precise that pixels need to be lined up. But eventually, after several rooms of genuine tense claustrophia gameplay, Madeline drops down into a cavern with the heart and the all too familiar lobby theme. How relieving! That was tension executed perfectly, and with a very earned ending! Overall, top notch! 9.8/10

FIFTH! - In search of the fabled Crystal City by Aonix the President! - Dashless! And it was pretty fun too! This map is on the long sode actually, all about (mostly) entityless navigation of the environment, aided by jump refills! A lot of it kinda takes place over the void, sort of like the beginning room of SJ's 74, and once again it's just a good bit of fun to try to pull off the necessary jumps and stuff to beat each room! There are zippers occasionally here too which were neat. One thing the map has a lot of is wacky berries! From some hidden away to one I couldn't mash jump fast enough long enough to reach, there are yet more weird ideas on display here, which is cool to see! Overall, Aonix? Aon? hi aon. 9.2/10

SIXTH! - Julie's Hanging hut by Julie! - Summit flags! Ultra jumps! This map was a blast! Similar to Crystal City, there's a lot of mostly terrain based movement puzzle stuff going on here, but here Madeline has 2 dashes, 2 jumps and the ultra jumps variant, which gives a lot of options for getting speed, height or both! The ultra jumps also give cpops for free which just feels cool. There are about 15 gameplay segments of varying type, from careful manouvering like in Crystal City, to fun nyoom! I liked the deco and music here too btw, so this map was just fun stuff all around! Overall, I'm sure this variant is just a one time thing and won't come up again! 9.5/10

SEVENTH! - Celeste-100 by ! - Going into this, I thought the WTF difficulty was like gm+1, boy was I wrong! This map to begin with is... well the 100 does not lie. Each room is based on the vanilla chapters, and features 100. 100 intro crushers, zippers, dream blocks, and so on. You need to open 100 key doors for a berry, and there are some others dotted around as well. Some rooms aren't too bad, some are eternal and the drivable car room is especially insane. I thought I was in the clear once I beat it, just to find out that I only had about 5 from 12 berries, and some of them required FULL backtracks to the start of the map to collect! Nuh uh! Get me outta there! So yeah, this map is very silly. Even the silver is messed up, though you are given like 200 so maybe worth. Overall, I could have pasted the above review like 100 times for the bit, but that would take up a lot of space so I'll leave it, 10/100

EIGHTH! - Madeline gets stuck inside a pitching machine! by The Eternal Motherboard! - Okay well since Celeste-100 was clearly some sort of fever dream, surely this map was the gm+1 one? It kinda looked the business based on short snippets I'd seen. In reality, it's only 3 rooms, and while somewhat precise, it looks harder than it plays. There's some cool stuff going on here, like the first room which was really fun, the second making use of lenient kevin bottom activations, and the third having a very cool climbhop cancel setup. In general, this map is a hub for wacky gameplay ideas and I love that. The music was a bop too, helping this fun experience. Overall, maybe it was gm+1 and i'm just that goated? probably not, 9.0/10

NINTH! - The Deserted Laboratory of the Capricious King Moon by King Moon! - And finally, THE most anticipated map for me in all of this (besides the heartside. The one I left for last, the one that everyone loves. King Moon! This map is a whole lot bigger than the others by a ton. There's a fitting soundtrack, lore sprinkled throughout, secrets, puzzles, backtracking, moonberries and even unsolved ARG elements? But for now it all begins with the main path. King Moon gameplay revolves around ultra jumps again! Very cool! There's more done with the variant in this map compared to Julie's Hanging hut, with more varied nyoom rooms and platforming. One of the popular new moves is a rcb-style cornerboost which is super fun to perform. As usual, the gameplay is super enjoyable to route and beat, and the berries and rooms off of the main path provide plenty of challenge and intrigue too. After beating the main map, I eventually got back in for the real 100%. It starts with solving a certain puzzle to gain access to double dash. This will seem familiar if you've played maps like The Prisoner where a similar approach to backtracking and world depth is taken. This, as usual, is so insanely cool! Getting to work my way back and explore more of the world feels so satisfying, and there is a lot to find! One of the coolest aspects of this map is the connected-feeling world. All the links between various parts of the map makes it feel super open and freely explorable in places, which I find impressive. Along the way, you can recover a permanent extra jump upgrade, which allows for the full backtrack moonberry to be obtained. In general, the variety in what the rooms offer only gets better, and I love the mysterious vibe the whole place gave; it really added weight to the exploration, giving more incentive to discover as much as possible. Eventually though, you can retrack through the map to reach the double dash room again, and use the extra jump to reach the map's true end, where two more moonberries await your collection. Exploring this place was so cool and fun, just like Silence Storm and The Prisoner, maps that all take on this idea. Overall, it did not dissapoint, 12.1/10

BONUS! - Aquattica by Kailey the Alien! - And to round out an epic 10, here we've got a grapple map by the AWWPD creator! This one came out not long after she hopped on the rising grapple trend, and I finally played it! It's supposed to be about advanced, though honestly the gameplay does have hands at certain points, but overall my Into the Blue experience does help me out here.I liked the movement routing for each of the rooms and the map was fun overall! I also quite liked the aesthetic of the map; being confined to the black area is an interesting concept, and I really dug the music here too. The general decoration was really well done and the poetic feeling dialogue and thought-provoking ending bolstered the themes too. Overall, watchmojo top 10 kailey the alien moments, 9.4/10

WOW! It's finally done! Only the AWWPD heartside remains, and I'll get to it eventually. For now, cyaa! meow! Thanks Kailey for being an awesome mapper!

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews 31 (PART 1)

That's right! This edition is being split in two parts cuz there are so many maps to go over and I'd rather less long gaps so I think I'll deal with some cool (mostly) easier maps here and save the true AWWPD Special for PART 2. Let's get into it!

FIRST! - Breathe In by skylaa! - Here we've got a beautiful first map! The outdoorsy vibe is immaculate and the deco is very very well done for a first effort. The gameplay was really fun too, being about advanced to expert focused on dream block redirects and dreamy entities which always makes for a fun jaunty experience. Indeed, the rooms are a bit long but very consistent and enjoyable to play through with minimal stating. The cassette room had a very cool route and it'll be cool to play a b-side of this, if/when it comes to be. Overall, well done!! 9.8/10

SECOND! - City of Broken Dreams by ricky06! - There's no way I could miss this map's release; I mean after all, it showed up in modding_showcase 70 minutes after I posted my new map there!!(play switching jungle plsplspls meow). But focusing on the map before us, the original concept of this map was made for a cancelled "sj-dlc" themed collab, but now exists here as a longer, reworked version! Even before hopping in, this maps incredible visual work is already at play! The chapter card looks so goddamn cool. But then heading into the map itself,I was met by top-notch decoration! The styleground has moving parts and the overall look of a dystopian technologically driven city was nailed perfectly. As for the gameplay, it's about advanced, and is based around a custom mechanic, being the blocks that activates others to move about when you dash into it! Of course, this is also a ricky map, so every room is full of cool unique ideas that take this new gimmick to the max! All sort of repetitions, cool setups, contraptions and more dominate the room design, and it has never failed to be a ton of fun to play! Later on puffers are introduced too, and even more cool setups are utilized, creating even more satisying gameplay. The jaunt levels are off the charts! There are some berries here too, my favourite being the third one (I think it was the third anyway), it was a very cool puzzle! As if all that wasn't enough, there's also a bit of a story here, nothing massive in terms of dialogue, but extra world-building is always great to see. Another aspect of this map that slays is the soundtrack, there being 15 minutes of custom music by thegur90! It's super good, and it really fits the map progression as visuals subtly change and more gameplay elements get introduced. I should listen to it more! So yeah, ricky dropped peak celeste yet again, and everyone has to play this map (and jungle as well imoimo mrow). But seriously, incredible. Overall, 13.9/10

THIRD! - BADELINE: The Super-Fusion Side by sunsetquasar! - Dan strikes again with a sneaky reccomendation during my map clearing marathon! This old birthday map (for powerAV) stars a good few rooms of epic fusion rooms of maps from all manner of creators! But before all that it is estabilished that we play as Badeline in this one who must stop Madeline from doing more Bad stuff than she already has, with the help of the Breaking Bad finger guy. Yep, shit has gone wild in this one. There's a badeline boss type room before the fun stuff and this room was not fun stuff in my opinion but it's not too big a deal when the main core of the map comprisies hit after hit of fun rooms that are satisfying to beat. The map ends with another showdown with madeline which I liked way more and that brings the map to its end. The music was especially a banger I really enjoyed its energy. So overall, Deuteronomy? No that's not the name of the fusion hydrogen. 9.1/10.

FOURTH! - Ferocious Sanctuary+ by iamdadbod! - Glad I finally got around to this longtime classic from an even longer time classic mapper! This map is a 34 room extension of th original FS from sc2020 advanced, a well regarded map. And indeed this map is mostly FS but more! Same cool music and charming deco, and the same style of gameplay, being techspam and neutral focused with fun precison all throughout. There's also more tech used here to up the variety and difficulty, with ultras and cornerboosts making appearances. I mean, I had a blast playing this map, just such fun techspam. The music really brought me back to the old days and sightreading was really fun too. Overall, hell yeah i just gain 45 jaleb points, 9.8/10

FIFTH! - Into the Blue by Blacklight! - nah this map ass play jungle instead it's the superior grapple experience! Just kidding! This huge map is the third in the line of the booming AQUA grapple line! It's not yellow gm, but rather ranges from green to high red! So make sure you train well and play jungle to get used to swinging okay? But anyway there's a lot more tech used in this, like kicking, groosting and somehow managing to be 3x more consistent in attempts than in states. And practice you will have to do cuz the precision here is intense! It's all still a ton of fun of course, the rooms are short n sweet so it never feels too impossible. The sheer variety of tech demonstration and movement is immensely impressive! All sorts of alternate routes are possible but never are any less impressive with the slick grappling moves that they use. Indeed, aqua grapple is truly a gem. Though you will probably need a clear video cuz some of the routing is Very hard! Whether it's figuring out where to go or what to do. But yeah I more than enjoyed my time with this beast. Not to mention the incredible atmospheric music picks, the sublime use of camera zoom and the very earned cutscene atcthe end! This map rocks, so if you're up to the task go play it!!! Overall, jungle better. 10/10

end of PART 1. PART 2 will come. mrrp.

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #30

This review is a bit shorter I think? But not really. I'm goung through a whole ass collab too after all. Let's meet our lucky THREE!

FIRST! - Difficulty Spike by Donker19 and Moladan! - Once meant for a collab that ceased to be, this map has released as a standalone, brought to us by two of modded's best, and with music by iosun!!! As the name may imply, this map is chock full of spikes! The refills are sharp, the floor, ceiling, blocks, stylegrounds; it's all spikes and it always have been! The gameplay is very dashful, featuring little tech Instead, the mosaic garden style of refills are used in conjunction with the vast amount of spiky gates to create semi-precise dashing sequences. I loved this gameplay style; it felt very fast paced without any speed tech and that is helped by the wonderful soundtrack composed by the awesome io herself! I was jamming out while navigating this spikefest and i enjoyed every minute! It's only about expert or so, so give it a go! Overall, no actual final room syndrome ZERO OUTTA TEN, 9.8/10

SECOND! - Winter Collab 3 by, well I'll let you know! - This supersurprise collab was put together in days! A quick meme it must be then right? WRONG! But not because of a gas leak, but because host Sapphire_Xer0 is insane and still managed to make a well decorated lobby and heartside for this thing! Anyway, I think I will do a rapid 7-review of this collab since it's small, here I go!!

UNO! - aon's Ultra by aonkeeper4! - Very fun, liked the 6a vibe. 9.6/10

DOS! - aon's Ultra R-side: Rambunctious Reverse Remix by 4repeeknoa! - ebiv a6 eht dekil ,nuf yreV, 01\6.9

TRES! - Ultras Can Go Back And Forth by aonkeeper4 and 4repeeknoa! - revese chain ultra wounce is a fun jaunty move. This map was cool too! 9.3/10

CUATRO! - The Heaven Below You by andytampan! - Keyhub!!! The custom bubbles were fun to see, 9.2/10.

CINCO! - Temple Tantrum by Daorex! - Fun, creative, though very routeful theo move block gameplay! Took me the longest of the seven! 9.1/10

SIX IN SPANISH! - The Mirror Inside by Daorex and andytampan! - Very cool fusion of the two ideas, thoroughly enjoyed it! Quite cheesy tho. 9.3/10

SEVEN IN SPANISH! - The Threeside by Sapphire_Xer0! - The 2 flags were huge bangers, the deco was sublime and the song choice was great too! The f1 wounce is a bit sideeye tho! 9.7/10.

What a cool (ha) collab! Go check it out! Overall, wait there's a FOURTH wollab in the works??, 10.2/10

THIRD! - Duetside by Crispybag! - This peak-filled journey will bring you on a trip down memory-lane, exploring not only the mapping history of creator Crispybag, but also the maps birthday recipient Donker19! A fusion style heartside of 2 epic mappers with cool looking deco? I expected a lot coming into this and crispy delivered it in spades! The map is impossibly beautiful; i love the overarching blue nature theme throughou and the stylegrounds and atmosphere are perfect. The music track is wonderful at conveying the celebration of maps old and new, and has a cool progression too! But of course the main focus is the fusion gameplay! There are 9 flags with varying amounts of tutorial rooms. Here's the thing, I never once really ran into anything I could say was amiss. EVERY FLAG was peak fiction gameplay, even the longer ones. If this map was in a try not to be fun challenge it is getting disqualified completely. It was so fucking GOOD! I've gotta play more crispy maps cuz I definitely recognized way more of the donker ones. Don't be surprised if cmr 32 is a crispybag special! (Yes cmr 31 is being reserved for something else). There's also a berry but I ain't routing allat sorry :3 But yeah yeah this map is perfect go play it. Overall, PLAY IT. 13.1/10

That'll do i think

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #29

5 mostly chill catsnug maps this time! And a bonus! That i forgot about adding the past 2 reviews! But we ball anyway! Let's go!

BONUS! - SUPERNOVA by evie! - The 2nd checkpoint went up for playtesting a while ago now, and after working my way through the trials and tribulations of dead states every 4 microseconds, I can confirm that this map has only gotten BETTER! With even cooler moves, even more new ideas on the table, and even crazier input density, these rooms played like peak, and I could barely muster up any complaints with it (except for that one GLORIOUS cheese lmao) (its probably fixed now :c) . As before, there's all sorts of sling bubble+gravity+retention shenanigans making up this feast. The input density is really fun and satisfying to do, and I still wholeheartedly recommend this (when it's out!) to anyone who can play this difficulty! Quality! Overall, shoutouts to helper updates breaking unintended but cool behaviour! 9.9/10

FIRST! - slipsling by nascence! - I finally bit down on the grapplepill and there's no better way to get used to the mechanic than this advanced/expert map! With coool swap block movement, simple swings and even a custom grapplable bubble in play, it'll get you used to this nifty hook in no time! There's even a challenging berry to go after as well! As if that wasn't enough, the deco and music go really hard too! The dark and gold blocks really work off each other well. So yeah, I enjoyed this one, and it got me started on my own little grapple map; you'll have to wait and see.... Overall, and it's nascence with the map named SS! 9.5/10

SECOND! - some kind of blueberry by aonkeeper4! - for a map with just 2 rooms it has quite the vibe! This map was only done in like 3 hours or so which is quite impressive given the complexity of the rooms, custom music, endscreen and pretty decent deco! The gameplay revolves around dream toggle swap blocks, and move blocks. It's about high expert, though the routing may be the standout aspect here. It can definitely be hard to figure out how to actually do the rooms; there is a good bit of outside the box thinking needed to get through here. But I had fun and the EUREKA moments are always super satisfying! Overall, CL*UDSCAPE??? I'm sorry it's a 1/10 from me! (actually it's a 9.1/10)

THIRD! - Prew's Devious Meadow by fonda1515! - Thanks aon for just kinda mentioning this map while I was around because I have been exposed to peak fonda fiction yet again! Fonda's maps feed me like I'm Bowser in the victory buffet room, it's all such peak. This time, the map in question is focused on fish refills and supporting dream blocks! Having worked with a fishy madeline in my own map I expected good things and I sure got them! Superboosting a fish on dash is just so speedy and satisfying and the moves fonda cooks with them are sublime! All 11 rooms are plenty unique too so it really does make for a super jauntful time! I had a blast playing it all! The deco was also pretty neat! Overall, wait, who's Prew? 10.6 fish/ 10 fish

FOURTH! - Splinterstate by nascence! - Woagh, another nascence banger in the same review? Okay! Created for a bi-monthly mapping prompt event, this map chose to tackle the "cutting corners" theme by literally cutting out a vital part of the mapping process. Y'know when you make gameplay layouts, then you add the hazards n stuff, then you deco it? Well what if you figured enforcing stuff was overrated and skipped right to deco? Splinterastate is the result! A cool intermediate map with dash block lineups, bubbles and even lillies later too! (^w^). The intended routes are good fun, and the deco certainly did NOT suffer it is soooo pretty, but one of the most interesting parts of the experience were the options to skip out on several chunks of many rooms! That's the consequence for not being a spinner merchant after all! It's a cool showcase of a map that gives the freedom to do as it wants, or do what you want, and it's a very fun concept! I mostly stuck to intended myself. Overall, really? another ss name? what's next? Severance Strobe? pfft, surely too predictable. 9.3/10

FIFTH! - Television Tower by Nibblz! - And finally we've got a mildly dense dance of tech, done to the tune of a cool song! Indeed, this somewhat unofficial mtc entry's deco and vibe take after its soundtrack! I like mtc maps, the music choices and their effect on the maps really enhances the experience for me. Parts of the deco also reminded me of SC2020's Tempoeral Tower, which I don't feel is just mere coincidence. As for the gameplay itself, it's input dense, features a lot dream refills and move blocks, and generally has you teching around all over the place. I love gameplay like this always! Flying everywhere speedily never gets old for me, and though a couple parts in some rooms were on the iffy side I very much enjoyed my time! Especially with the last 3 rooms those were awesome! Overall, cool maps start with tele! television tower, teletown, uhhhhh, well 2 for 2 is good! 9.2/10

WOOOOOOOO Watch out for Switching Jungle Swing coming in....some amount of time....DRAGON GLIDAHH

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #28

Today on "I played 5 celeste maps": I played 5 celeste maps and will proceed to talk about them! Now! Also quite interesting is that most of today's selection are recent releases at the time of writing! Neat!

FIRST! - Aesthetica by Spooooky! - Esoterica Entry! In a contest where gameplay takes a back seat, the name would seem to indicate quite the visual experience, and that's excatly what I got! This map is a masterclass in the exploration of art. Each room captivated me with the ideas they presented, and the tools of lonn expertly used to execute them all. I was in awe at what every new section offered to me from beginning to end. Also present is plenty of emotional value, in the exploration of the artist as well. Someone said it was kinda like The Nothing Man from Breeze, and I kinda agree! Go experience it for yourselves! Overall, Excellent!, 10.1/10

SECOND! - Cold to the Touch by valkyria! - The map to not be made recently, here is a top finisher from Vanilla Contest! I really do love this contest; I did a lot of it after Expert contest and enjoyed a lot of the maps, though with 60+ entries I never fully finished it. Amongst the ones I didn't do, this was one of them! The plan had been to play aon's map Post-stasis which I forgot I had already beaten, so this popular pick found itself taking up my time instead! It's a gm map all about snowballs and iceblocks! Valkyria manages to make cool gameplay with (mostly) consistent snowball hits and reform abuse while under the no-dependency restriction! The rooms all have cool unique ideas and are fun to execute, even with the weird edge dash block break inputs which are quite tight. The deco is very impressive for being vanilla only, really bringing home the feel of a cold abandoned location; and the story is also a neat addition! Go play it! Overall, brrrr is coldd, 9.3/10

THIRD! - Into the City by tastygold! - A recent v2.0.0 update just came for this map, so I decided to run through it for fun! This map is styled after vanilla city, so the deco, while familiar, is very cozy! The map has a lot of rooms and berries to go after. Of course, there are a ton of zip movers and crumble blocks making up the gameplay here, There are some cool ideas with room structure, but yeah it's a very comfy city time, I really enjoyed it! :3 I liked the end cutscene too! Overall, go play it! 9.1/10

FOURTH! - Dancer In Rain+ by IceCream! - Here lies a "plus" map to a map from an old Dream Collab! This pretty map really puts the "Dance" into things, with madeline flying around all over the place with birds and badelines and springs! The gameplay is advanced, and has a focus on station blocks; those combined with the aforementioned entities create quite the winding rooms with plenty of crossing paths and lots of airborne jaunty action! There's also a routing element to things, which is always the spice that makes everything nice! The map's progression also pleased me, introducting in dream blocks and later dream refills to further continue the dance. Excellent gameplay! Overall, Go Try It!, 9.5/10

FIFTH! - Amethyst Plateau by Jackytata! - And to finish things, a first map! This one caught my eye a bit so I gave it a go! This 3-side campaign has a focus on purple and sling bubbles and clouds and switching blocks, and black (red + grey) bubbles also make an appearance! There are quite novel gameplay ideas here! I had a lot of fun with the a-side, the b-side was also good, and the c side was really cool too! I particularly loved the progression here! The sides got more and more, idk, evil going along, culinating in the c-sides hellish red decor. I also liked how the tech at the end of the b-side went right along to being used in the c-side! As for feedback, camera offsets and change respawn triggers go far in making rooms easier to read and more convenient in general! Overall, go enjoy it! 8.5/10

catcat

Celeste Map Reviews #27

After a long time out with terminal mappingitis, I have found the strength to pile together 5 more maps of varying attritubes! Woohoo!

FIRST! - Ultra Sapphic by Sapphia! - No map playing experience is more funny and raw than downloading a freshly baked gamebanana bread on recommendation because of the name and premise. This mod became a must play because ultras (i like those) and sapphic (i like those too). It's a WIP for now, but there's already over 100 rooms and a full gym of everything ultra! All the rooms are, you guessed it, full of ultra-ful gameplay, and it's just raw fun to blast through the seemingly never ending stream of rooms! I realised after a while that the map had a bit of a summit structure, with a zipper section, old site section, resort section (with a huge mess!), ridge section, and a yet to be finished temple section. There are plenty of cool entities and mechanics to keep the gameplay fresh which helped me enjoy this even more. There wasn't really any sapphic *in* the map itself, but that won't affect my opinion. Looking forward to seeing how this map grows! Overall, gultra = gay ultra. 9.7/10

SECOND! - Iota by skqw! - Another map I picked up on recommendation, this map has a cool vibe! The first thing that jumped out to me was the epic bevel tileset which, combined with the screen-locked rooms gives kind of a ultra-hard flash game feel to me, the kind of game i'd've tried and would've been bad at when I was younger. But yeah, this map has about 15 or so small one-screen rooms, decently difficult, with a focus on interesting movement and usage of harder tech. There are rcbs, weird non-functional dashbounces and plenty of precision to go around too! I had a good bit of fun working my way through it all! Overall, what is an iota,,, 8.8/10 THIRD! - The Jellies' Nest by Tear_! - FUSION alert! This map brings together the excellent UFO nest by goopvendor and a map I haven't played, Jellies' Gelatinous Sanctuary by THE scraggly1! There are 29 rooms of expert-gm gameplay featuring the ufo bubbles, jellies (i'd be mildly surprised if they weren't here) and grey bubbles. The decoration is very well done, it has the feel of ufo nest and I think it captures the darkness of JGS as well? Idk I saw like one screenshot of JGS total. The music definitely reminds me of UFO Nest and I like the picks here. My gameplay experience was definitely a bit weird, I wasn't huge on cp1 with it's awkward routing and certain parts of some rooms (and cp1 final causing me to lose some of my sanity -w-). But cp2 and onwards, the map becomes insanely fun! The UFO Nest style of setups combine well with the jellies and higher level of execution to create some excellent flow! I breezed through this part of the map way faster than the first checkpoint, and overall my experience was a good one in the end. Should i play the scraggly map? 9.2/10

FOURTH! - 87.5% by Sapphire_Xer0! - Souaappy delivers yet again on cool maps with cool music and cool short rooms! This map was for CSC i believe, and features gm gameplay all about lillies! It's always nice to see these used, they are a cool entity! Also present are piss bubbles and bumpers and dream refills too! In usual spaospy fashion, the rooms feature lots of cool ideas and moves, like weird loosted supers, the weird bumper-dream jumpifiers(?), lilly-boosted dream hypers and way more! The difficulty curve is pretty good too, and the rooms were fun and addicting to complete. I liked the music saoppie used here, another perfect fit, and I like the colours a lot too, great deco! I would have bombed out since this CSC entry was based on deaths and i am a total death merchant lmao, but I very much enjoyed my time with this map. Overall, poapsy classic! 9.8/10

FIFTH! - City of Gears by Star Sapphire! - The other hard map from CNY2023 collab! I played the first, Electric Miracles a while back, and here I return to this collab again! This map, like a lot of Star Sapphire's maps, is tech-heavy, this time focused on connected zippers that create all sorts of cool moves! There are 7 main rooms that all have unique ideas, and lots of speed sections too! It's very fun, save for a few inputs here and there. Jellies are added to the mix later on too, and they are a fun addition. I got jumpscared by the music when hopping into this map, cuz it's the damn Night Rider song (gd will find me in hell i fear), but it's a banger track so i didn't mind. The deco has an interesting look, though the colorgrade was personally at times a bit rough for my visibility. Still, great map! Overall, will finish this collab at some point now! 9.3/10

epic lineup! My mappingitis will consume me for a bit but I will be back again, eventually :3

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #26

The Boxing Day of Reviews sees a varied gang of 5 maps to discuss! Let's begin!

FIRST! - white by Elysia Vesper! - This MTC1 entry was not what I expected, and that's a good thing! I loved the environment of this map, with its natural light-coloured terrain structures and unnatural dark structures. The background looked vaguely like white noise (the reason behind the name i guess) and I very much felt isolated and kind of unnerved by this map. The music fits perfectly, naturally, with its periods of near-silence, subtle melodies and loud noises to amp up the uneasy air. The gameplay is also takes this atmosphere to the max, with us having to explore this isolated space with only our movement knowledge, similar to The Climb from SC, or Inconsequential from Breeze Contest. The routing does get quite hard at times, and some parts are precise, but getting through it all was fun. I always love seeing maps like these! They're interesting! Overall, there does need to be a climblike alignment chart....., 9.5/10

SECOND! - Foe-en Monolith by MunTheory! - I hadn't any plans to play this map originally, but I found out about it from nilrem, who was playing it for t7 of the week! It's an interesting event that i'll pay attention to from now on. As for the map, it's very kevin-centric! There are 3 checkpoints, the first focusing on kevin wounces, the second on kevin hypers, and the third checkpoint combines the two and is more complex. All the berries in this map are in-room, which is great to see! And the gameplay itself is very fun amd light-hearted, I enjoyed a lot! The decoration is cool too, being this sort of dark+rainbow colour scheme which is unique and works well! Overall, nyoomcore kinda? 9.4/10

THIRD! - Madeline in China by the CN team! - Campaign Jumpscare! This has been on my radar for a whileeee, and finally I hopped on! There are 2 chapters with 2 b-sides. Of course, I can't go on without mentioning the breathetakingly beautiful assets and decoration covering every inch of these maps; these are amongst the best looking maps in all of modded. Reskins, decals, tilesets, entites; all in intricate detail and flawless! The music was also quite great, quite fitting of the map's Chinese aesthetic. As for the playing experience, Ch1A has jellies, red bubbles, reskinned jungle pillars and cloud refills. The rooms are short-middle length and feature a whole range of unique ideas and cool challenges. It was a lot of fun! There are several in-room and out-room berries which were fun to go for and well hidden, a cool cassette, and a very sneaky moonberry! I loved Ch1A; and Ch1B is also awesome! It's a bit shorter, but also harder, and there are wavedashes and wallbounces to add more variety! It's also quite peak! Ch2A keeps the jellies, but now uses move blocks, loop blocks and fish. Somehow, this chapter was even more fun than the first! There are mostly out-room berries this time, but this chapter also has several interesting things going for it too! There's a whole challenge area for a moonberry with even more peak gameplay, and the final checkpoint has us ascend to the peak (where the water flows). That area was super pretty too; I love the cozy air of this campaign. There's also another big secret in this map with clues hidden across it which i struggled with a bit cuz I'm like blind n stuff :laugheline:. Ch2B, like Ch1B, is a bit shorter and harder. A good bit harder actually, this map had hands! Still, the gameplay was incredible, and i loved the touch of the sky fading from day to night as the map went from beginning to end. But yeah, I got through it all! And it was all incredible! Go play MiC please! It's an 11.4/10

FOURTH! - Singularity Station by perilune! - This Starlight Station inspired map caught my interest so I decided to give it a go! I'd heard good things about it's flowy and fun gameplay, so I was intrigued. I liked the setting of an abandoned/malfunctioning space station, and the decoration is pretty well done. The gameplay is full of linked zippers, dream blocks, springs, dash blocks, and portals! It goes from low gm to low gm+1, so it's definitely the hardest thing i played out of this five. There're 13 rooms + 2 berries, and the first 10 rooms (and the berries) were insanely fun for me, full of cool buffer sequences and routing and speed! I was less of a fan of the last 3 rooms, which felt kinda annoying to some degree, with certain parts feeling awkward/inconsistent. The final room especially gave an experience similar to me on gddh r7, and just like that room, I gave it up before I actually beat it for my sake (Sorry....). That being said, I still appreciate the largely complex and intricate setups throughout the map; that takes a lot of effort to make. Overall, sKilL iSuE, 9/10

FIFTH! - Showdown by BadTie! - It's Showdown Time, and Maddy dons her epic hat to traverse the desert with her trusty grapple hook! This MTC2 entry is a short expert effort all about grapples and bumpers! The first 3 rooms feature a variety of grapple+jump tech, which was fun to get used to, thought the freeze frames from collecting the grapple refills definitely screwed with the timings for e a bit. No big deal tho! The final room adds in piss bubbles and demohypers (hey wait this was an expet map-) and they are cool additions! But the map ends shortly after that. The decoration is pretty good, it is a very desert-y vibe, and the music sets the mood perfectly. Overall, 5 cards, 5 cards, 9/10.

nya

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #25

The SPECIAL 25TH anniversary review is here! After a break from the very crowded december, and the infiltration of epic vivid/stasis video game (go play it right now :3), it's time to bring home another batch of cool modded maps! Let the Celebration Begin! FIRST! - NEW! Super Mario Bros Wii! Not really lmao FIRST! - NEW! 4D, 5D, 4Dark and 5Dark! from Monika! - A massive D-Sides update dropped soon after CMR #24, and here, the oldest and crustiest maps left were given a huge makeover! And a fully new 5dark was implemented too! 4D is now much more polished while still retaining many elements from its predecessor. The start is easier but it still comes out to be about the same difficulty by the end. 5D is similar, with a good mix of old, new and a shortened final checkpoint which improves the overall pacing! However, the highlight here are the 2 BANGING remix tracks! BeanJammin cooked a super chill remix of 4b's theme, and iosun (one of our clodded own!) made the 5b remix! I love both the songs, especially the vibe of Io's remix! These tracks also play in the dark sides, of which 4D keeps the same obfuscation gimmick but is of course modelled around new 4D, but 5Dark is brand new! This map is quite incredible, so it gets the bulk of my analysis. The first checkpoint houses the first primary gimmick, being this split where you can see the gameplay above, but the lower half is completely impossible to see, and so you must use your vibes to guide madeline through! It's incredibly tense but fun to figure out how to do the screens! The next checkpoint is another highlight... it's like the Central Chamber area of other 5b'ish maps, but on steroids! The puzzles in this area are genuinely tough to solve! There's loads of gates and keys and alternate routes that need to be considered. Along the way you can even read lore from Mr Oliver- (oh uh, wrong map) Mr OSHIRO about this travel through the temple! Eventually though we reach the mirror and the next big twist is revealed. Dust bunnies in the temple! It seems that Oshiro's influence is felt here now, as we've got to deal with cycles and seekers at the same time. The map gets quite hard from here too, which I don't mind. There was an insanely intimidating room with lava to end the checkpoint, and then it's on to the (theoless woagh) finale! Lots of gameplay variation here, including more of that gimmick from the start. But eventually it does end off with a pretty tough cassette room! Ok yeah so my memory is definitely a bit off but I do remember enjoying this map a lot, the most out of the 4 here. So yeah with this and the music I'd say this update was a massive W! Overall, Oshiro murdered Theo obviously, 9.6/10.

SECOND! - Bone Skull by Donker19! - This pretty popular MTC2 (winner i think?) was next on my wheel spin and I knew I could expect a really good map going in, due in part to Marz's eternal shilling of it! Well, actually heading in, first thing that jumped out to me was the map's incredible decoration and atmosphere. Being a MTC entry, of course it's all meant to fit the music, and it does so perfectly. We start on a beach-like area, and truly, this map is gorgeously decorated. There's also quite the story to explore in this place, with several npcs and environmental aspects to interact with throughout the map, which reminded me of the first time I played Solar Express with it's worldbuilding. And the story here is quite the deep one... I won't go into details for spoiler stuffs and it truly is something you should experience yourself! But I will say it's a damn great story with lots of deep-reaching themes and possibly relatable characters and situations! Very well written! As for the gameplay (finally getting on to that lol), I mean yeah of course it's good! I liked the cool sound effect swap blocks and reverse gravity falling blocks in the first half, and the fish and extrajump gameplay of the second half. Also in the second half was a neat gameplay gammick where you switch between areas and mechanics based on grab presses which I thought was super cool! All the gameplay has nice routing and even nicer flow and it was all a lot of fun. Um yeah, overall, Great gameplay, greater aesthetic, great music, greater story! 10.9/10

THIRD! - Silence Storm by Gorffy! - Sophie's influence infected my wheel and selected this map not long after adding it (baps u). Despite me holding off for a while after getting infected by the vivid/stasis virus, I eventually managed to hop on this map and wow do I wish I experienced it straight away! What I played was a complete EXPERIENCE, not dissimilar to the Prisoner! Once again, I feel like you've really gotta go in unspoiled n stuff for the maximum experience ALTHOUGH you'll definitely want to contact sophie for help with some puzzles (they're hard AND in Russian) and you'll also want a way to read the Russian languaged lore throughout the experience. The map itself is a huge world divided into many areas, with a story that brings it all together. There are warp spots to go between areas quickly (for finding those secrets of course), plenty of berries to find, and even 2 separate endings (told u it was similar to Prisoner). The deco, atmosphere and music choices are all flawlessly done and it added to the immersive vibe of the map for me. The gameplay is on the easy side, mostly beginner and intermediate stuff and is pretty manageable to do repeatedly while exploring. It's still fun wholesome gamplay, even if the camera is weird in a few spots, and there's a couple of janky moments. But yeah, as the map creator pointed out, some of the late puzzles definitely are quite hard to understand, and so you will need that Sophie help unless you are REALLY determined. That's all I'll give here, but it really is an excellent experience, I liked the mysterious and interpretation aspects of it, all very intriguing! Overall, Loudness Calm, 10.5/10

FOURTH! - Halcyon by corkr900! - A quick breezy (BREEZE???) easy map to cleanse off the palette after the many heavy stories, this ambient jaunt brings us through a rainy foresty area as we traverse the many dream blocks and zippers! It truly is a chill map, with nice deco and music (mmmmm rain asmr) and very, very wholesome gameplay. I liked the berries scattered all over the place (and the room with 2 berries in it!). There were some cool setups too! Like the zip-boosted dream jumps which added some fun speed for free! Even the custom end art was cute! Overall, just a very likeable map, 9.8/10

FIFTH! - The Gigglebug by Ukiran! - And finally this 3 room...thing was another fun quickie! It's intermediate and focused around green jellies that kinda stop in midair after you throw them. There's a bit of routing but it's nothing too hard. The rooms themselves are quite fun and creative tho! The deco is very silly (made me giggle(bug lmao)) and the music was neat (honestly i think i forgot what it sounded like I beat this thing in 3 minutes :3). I liked the custom gigglebug art added in (and the npc at the end!). So overall, cool map, surely I will play Frownbug next? 8.3/10

And that's it I think?! Hm I feel a bit rusty when it comes to my yapping and I'm kinda experimenting with the whole not-going-over-the-entire-story-of-the-story-heavy-map thing this time around (back on discord i'd just spoiler up the text). So I don't want the first-time experience of these lore maps to be ruined for other people (do enough people read these for that actually be a real problem tho? idk). Well it probably helps keeps things slighty more coherent and well-paced (well as well-paced as unprompted yapping can be). Hopefully the next gap isn't as long, I was really in need of rest after the peakfest that was december lmao. Now I need to up my vivid/stasis ratingscore. Bye!!!!! Glad to have yapped 25 times about cool maps!

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #24

GLORIOUS DAY! THE LAST OF 2024 (I am writing this as the clock ticks over into 2025). FOURTEEN, YES, FOURTEEN MAPS ALL PART OF THE SCD SUPER FINALE MARATHON! I might tone down the yapping a tad for the sake of getting through all these so HERE WE GOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

FIRST! - Moonlight Daydream by Sapphire_Xer0!! - The Marathon begins here! Sophie cooked up an expert map featuring dream blocks and puffers, and it was a ton of fun! Every room was a blast, I liked the progression of techniques (like the dream hyper fish bhop, and the fish ultra) and the berry was a nice gimmick touch! The decoration is stellar and quite SC-core, and the music was a great cherry to top the fishcake! Overall, I've been liking puffers a lot more recently......, 9.7/10!!

SECOND! - Starlight, Starbright by geb! - Next up we have an adv-exp effort from geb! Very clearly a reference to SC advanced's Satellite, I had a really fun time with this one! The wallbounce and spring gameplay just felt really funky and fun to do, helped by the top notch music. The visuals are pretty good and faithful to Satellite, and I especially liked the quirky room with 2 berries in it! Overall, Hexa trivia fact! Satellite used to be the map I remembered the least from SC advanced, maybe other than The Correlation... 9/10!!

THIRD! - Midlight by yurt7x!! - Here we've got an easier map all about the purple, um burst bubbles? Y'know, the ones from Red Giant? This map is quite the jauntful one (wow this word has settled into my vocabulary with no effort), just featuring a lot of wounces and waves and stuff and some cool bubble cancels too! It was.. just a fun time! Music and deco were a good fit too! Overall, maybe I should try yurt's jauntest map too... 9/10!!

FOURTH! - Overgrown Factory by xolimono! - The peak keeps on coming, almost like it's being produced at a factory! Not this one tho probably, this place is abandoned and overgrown by nature after all! The Overgrown City inspiration is clear, and the Desecration exploding boxes on zipper tracks are a cool entity to play around! The rooms were fun, and I liked the wavedash setup boost in the final room! I'd like to see how this gameplay style would do for longer rooms focused on the speedrun aspect of the connected zippers.... Overall, yes i still don't know what the desecration entities are actually called, 8.6/10!!!

FIFTH! - Sequoia by grog398!! - Here we have a solidly sc gm map (prolly would've ended up in red) based on FotA and Temporal Tower! The TT routing is on show from the start, along with the badelines (that don't kill when you're close to bino, though it confused the hell outta me the first time lmao), and of course we'll have to clear our way with the exploding crystals. The first room was pretty fun to route, the second room was REALLY hard to route, but I'm proud of myself for doing it without help, and the final room was easier to route, but had some cool moves! The heart room was a cool callback to TT's final room, hope it's silver friendly! The visuals have an interesting vibe and the music was pretty good! Overall, 2023 Hexalia would've definitely backed out the clear video for this one! 8.4/10!

SIXTH! - IchiNiSan by Appels!! - A very interesting vibes map! First off, I LOVE the outdoorsy vibe to the visuals, and now I wanna play more maps with this fresh air style! I also like the general color palette and tileset used here, quite pretty! The gameplay revolves around vertical screenwrap and room-wide crumble blocks! The progression is very fun, having 1, then 2, then 3 crumbles. I liked the in-room berries, definitely great to see with their rarity! Yeah, the bubbles and routing also add to the overall cool gameplay structure. Overall, I will code a crumble block that doesn't do the annoying insta-crumble sometimes, 8.9/10!!!

SEVENTH! - Far Flung Moon by Banana23!! - Another banger from the mapper to begin the SCD posting! This one has clear visual ties to Booster in Orbit, and the infamous bubble snakes are a feature here! This map is tech focused, lots of waves, supers, wounces and reverses are just good fun to breeze through as always! I loved the minimal decoration style and the general dark night/space vibe to it. The berries were pretty fun too! Overall, I just really like this map! 9.2/10!!

EIGHTH!! - Scrapyard by butcherberries!! - This map is quite different from all the others! Featuring a monochromatic (or is it grayscale?) Major-Malfunction-y visual experience which I quite appreciate the unique-ness off! The dead-looking trees and all the scrapheaps add to the immersion! The gameplay is interesting too, with gray bubbles and desecration exploders making up some pretty mind-boggling routing/exploring gameplay! Even the bino placements are weird, just like this whole map really, but it was a cool time! Overall, insert joke about the Scrapyard from btd6, 8.5/10!!

NINTH! - Through Time Unphased by MorphedCat!! - Coming in for number nine, this map is also really interesting! The difficulty is all over the place, from techless-ish intermediate, to sc cracked speedchains, all is encompassed by a pretty neat mini-story which I think is a really nice touch! But of course the highlight for me was the backtrack to reach the heart! It really cemented the experience for me! The visual style is very distinct with it's all-over-the-place approach, and I liked the music! Overall, kinda World Abyss-y with those touch switches...cool...9.2/10!!!

TENTH! - Slider Sanctuary by Soloiini!!! - And from some pretty complex maps we cool down with a fun beginner map! I loved the conveyor belt gimmick combined with the moving circle hazards! There were some cool movement ideas in there and all was very fun to jaunt through! I also appreciate the vanilla music in this one, that and the simpler deco feel quite sc-ish!! Overall, :thumbeline:, 8.8/10!!

ELEVENTH! - Rain Season by Tear_!! - More peak puffering perchance? YES!! This high expert map uses double dash, jump crystals, push blocks and fish and creates a super fun map out of them! Lots of cool setups and fish tech, along with fun mini-routing. The visuals are pretty good here, and I like the rain aesthetic, and the music was great! Call me a fan of the atmospheric start to the map with the move block too! Overall, HELL YEAH I AM A REFORMED PUFFERFISH FAN! 9.1/10

TWELFTH! - Skysailing by fonda1515!! - OH GOD YESSSS FONDA MAPPING I'M GONNA MELT IT'S SOOOOO GOOOOOOD! This map is just raw fun, simples. I almost got sad when it seemed like room 3 would be the end, but there was another room and a berry waiting for me! The jelly setups and red bubble moves were a shitton of fun, and I liked the wall/dream grab progression later on! The music also just added to the airborne jaunty vibe, so yeah, I absolutely had a blast! Overall, hmmm, red bubbles are fun... I can use this.... 10/10!!

THIRTEENTH! - Air A Danser by CoolBread! - This map which I didn't play straight away (sorry!) is allll about jumpthrough jumps! I'm quite the jumpthrough jump hater usually but this map was really good! The easier difficulty kept things from being annoying, and I liked the progression of adding neutrals in too! The gameplay is built around the main tech quite well too! I also liked the gimmick berries at the end! And the music and deco were great too! Overall, not so unlucky thirteen I think! 9/10!!

FOURTEENTH! - False Dawn by ABuffZucchini! - To END the marathon, we end on the vegetable! This map was intended to be uncomfortable to play, and I'd say it delivers! It's high expert, and focuses on tech and dream blocks, usually a more jaunty mechanic palette, but here there are plenty of spinners placed to add that uncomf in! I like the dark, unsettling vibe, and the rooms still had some neat moves to them! Overall, True Dusk, 8.5/10!!

SURPISE MOTHERFUCKERS! FIFTEENTH! - Penguin Park by Elysia Vesper! - A quick fifteenth map I picked up for fun! And I even fcg'ed it! This chilly atmosphere houses easy jumps and bubble gameplay, with some wallbounces! It was super fun to play as a map, with 6 varied berries, a fun world full of friendly penguins with some things to say, and a pleasant track! The difficulty curve is very smooth, and it's just satisfying to nail quick turnarounds and bubble sequences! I especially liked the open festival area, just adds even more charm! As for the fcg (or fcs actually), It didn't take that long, map is pretty consistent. Though of course I managed to die in final room somehow lol. Overall, gl on umm, epsilon? whichever room it is i'm sure you'll enjoy it cheepling :trollshiro:, 9.8/10

AND THAT'S A WRAP!

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #23

5 very different experiences coming at ya! MAJOR MAJOR SPOILERS FOR A VERY CRYPTIC PUZZLE MAP DOWN BELOW!! SKIP THE SECOND REVIEW IF YOU WANT TO TRY IT YOURSELF!!!!!

FIRST! - Your Story/My World from SSC3! - Once again my wheel thinks that 8% = 30% and I crack open the ssc3 to clear off an easy map yet again! This time it was the interesting looking map (based on the entrance) from before. I read some of the ssc3 prompts and this one was to base the map on a poem about growing up if I recall correctly. Indeed, throughout the map a poem is gradually told to us line by line. It was a pretty nice poem, and the music had a kind of "nostalgic night" feel to it which definitely fit. The main gameplay of the map is split into 4 sections. The first section has some dream crystals and 4 keys scattered around to collect. This map is all about environmental routing, as in you've got to figure out how to get where you need to go with limited resources (core inventory and not a lot of dream crystals), which leads to some puzzlish sections. It's a bit out of my comfort zone, but I managed the first section pretty well, tho backtracking to get a screen transition or similar definitely eats up time and is a bit boring. The second section is larger and features more dream crystals and the new seeker refill! This will make Maddy part seeker which turns the seeker barriers solid and gives her one shot at breaking red blocks. More of the same routing puzzles are here too, including small conventional gameplay segments to nab some keys. I got stuck on the final puzzle which required BOTH special refills to pass but I think that was a cool little bit too. The third section is the largest and has dream jellies in! There are several things to do to get the keys here, including dashing through solids with the help of the dream jellies. I liked this section! It was fun to take the jelly across the area to find everything. Finally, the 4th section is like just the final room; a bit routey but more of a final skill challenge. The map ends on a 'heart'warming final line, though there is a berry here too! It was a bit weird with the portal core block speed thing, but the big bell at the end was very cool! By the way, I liked the deco in this one, feels like a natural environment with a bit of intrigue. Overall, it grew on me as I went along, 7.9/10.

SPOILERS FOR PUZZLE!! FINAL WARNING!!

SECOND! - Maze of Glass by tobyaaa! - skqw had blood on their hands but I eventually managed to see the light! This map is a true and true cryptic puzzle that very clearly warns you to get the pen and paper out. Once I did it was time to hop in and- oh. It's one of *those* kinda things is it? I saw something similar in the 9d moonberry checkpoint where you traverse a maze of identical rooms with subtle differences until you stumble into the right room, not very enjoyable. This map however takes this concept and turns it into a banger escape room. The maze is constructed from identical plus-shaped rooms with teleporters in each cardinal direction. Obviously we've gotta explore the maze for a bit and note down what leads where. It's a pretty expansive area so get lots of paper. After a while of noting down "gardens" and "bell caves" and such I got my first hint room. This room is the end of the maze with multiple entrance points and contains a note which hints us towards the solution. It took me a WHILE to understand it so for a long time I finished off discovering every room but then I was left hopeless as I didn't know where to go next. The note mentioned a commutative property which I understood, being the rooms that can be traversed back and forth. I also knew of the distinct area types, but not the resemblance. After a little while, I looked into who even recommended this thing into my wheel in the first place, and it was SKQW!!! Cheeky chancer even called it "pretty chill". Yeah! Chill like how the Sahara desert is chill! That is to say it's NOT chill!! I got some hints from skqw tho and combined with a second wind to finish the puzzle I went about trying to redo my map. It was like 1-2am at this point but I wouldn't be defeated yet!! EVENTUALLY I deduced the structure of the areas! 6 areas, 6 rooms each, and similar in structure! That meant I was able to easily explore each area on their own before teleporting to another! I still got stuck on the resemblance for a bit, but I figured out the "order" by trying to "speedrun" reaching the note. After trying some dash codes to no avail, I did eventually figure out the resemblance! The areas looked like the exits! The order is important for that reason. After inputting this special "code", I was OUT!! YES! But it wasn't over yet. I was in a massive room that I could explore using the maze thing as a vehicle and there was a switch in there too! It turned the area i could see between black and light blue... After some thinking it hit me! The switch gate! of course! It was a pattern matcher! I filled in the blue correctly and visited the hint room one last time... The switch gate moved! I could finally escape! After 6 hours the maze had come to an end and I was free! I felt SO good for figuring all that out! I also felt hella tired since it was past 3am at that point! But overall, that was an incredible puzzle! I'm not even sure about what more to say, it took my brain to hell and back, but I came out the other end and survived! That's like 2.5/2.5 for tobyaaa's cryptic mapping! 9.4/10

THIRD! - City in My Ass by goopvendor! - Part of the Technical Difficulty map pack, here we have a gm challenge all about weird zipper funnies! I downloaded the pack after a wheel spin on my first unsuccessful night of Shattersong Silver at 12-2am. Apparentely the falling block map is better according to goop, but I just had to check out this map because of the very enticing city aspect, and definitely nothing else. I was thrown into a pretty cool vibe, with goop's familar mapping structure, decent deco, song was a nice listen... The main focus of these maps is the gameplay, and this one was pretty interesting! There's a whole load of funky interactions and tech at play here, like block-boosted dashes to setup supers and hypers, zipper-boosted cornerboosts, boosted zipper-wall jumps, and even down-dashbounces! Each room (of the 9 total) has something unique going for it, and it was mostly pretty fun to get through. Overall, smirk emoji, 8.8/10

FOURTH! - Shattersong by Hydro! - SHONG SILVERRRR!! The wheel rolled "random sjgm silver" and so I braced myself for the 1/17 pumber odds. Luckily, I got Shong, a piss easy standard cuz of that legendary jelly ch- PAH! LOL! WE GO FOR THE BEEF IN THIS HOUSEHOLD! No Major Skips is a high t5 if not t4, pretty backloaded but somewhat consistent overall (for most rooms). Of course since this was a chance to replay shong I'll briefly give my thoughts on it. It's great! A replay now that I'm better at the game really helps show to me how cool this map is! The short-but-hard rooms work great for this map, and I love the running tech theme of cassoosts and bhops which makes things feel pacey, especially given some of the tight time-windows for making everything work. The atmosphere is nigh unrivalled in sj, and oh god the song! One of sjgm's best of the ost! The map contains 9 main rooms (and 5 berries but fuck off that make it like a t1 to do lmao), split into 3 movements each with different time signatures to the cassette beat. The silver berry teleports us to A2, past the tutorial. This one is like alright, being the first room, though the cassoost at the end is quite annoying. A3 would have been awful if not for the strat that nullifies the turnaround in the back half; that being said, some timings are still hard. Next is the first transition room that usually isn't a huge deal... if not for the strat that uses a moosted ultra from the last block to skip some of B1!! It's kinda hard to do which led to a lot of funny deaths but overall worth? B1 is mostly pretty easy and fun, B2 is fucking EVIL. Thankfully there's a strat to free-ify the jump at the start. BUT! The cassoost on green is FUCKED! it worked so little that a good half of my clears here just jumped normally and narrowly missed the spinners. It got a bit better near the end of the grind but it was definitely a chokepoint. B3 is cheesed to hell to avoid 2 hard downdashes and it's on to Third Movement! C1 was hard at first with the triple bhop but after I adopted the strat it was a bit better. C2 IS MY PERSONAL HELL! 3/27 SUCCESS RATE! It's by FAR the hardest room for me with so many tight inputs! I'd have been screwed if not for the 2-lap strat in hecc's fcs! Cadenza is like hard, but with strats it's decently consistent though there's lots of tiny adaptations to be done in the moment. Overall, definitely a backloader. I got plenty of runs to final third, most getting murdered by C2 of course, and that led to this taking 19 hours across 3 days, but after 2 Cadenza deaths I did eventually manage it! I'm still happy that I took the NMS route and stuck it through! Hydro has been defeated at last! I struck her down with my Blade of Resilience! Rejoice! 9.1/10

FIFTH! - Clouded Memories by Sapphire_Xer0! - "low" expert map featuring cloud zippers! This mod caught me without a certain helper dependency, More Lock Blocks, so that was an interesting highlight. As for the map itself, it's a pretty exploration of memories, with 5 sections of unique music, all of which create varying atmospheres, and I think they all do the job pretty well! The map generally gets harder as it goes along, having the cloud zippers, one-use bumpers, red bubbles, then introducing double refills, cloud refills and dash through spikes at the end. Sophie's trademark short rooms once again cook here, and most rooms are good fun! The last 3 were quite routeful and I definitely did them all wrong but I liked the composition of it all. Overall, go play! It deserves some love... 8.6/10

wow what a lot to say huh?

#celeste

Celeste Map Reviews #22

it's 5am, let's see if i survive this one! 5 maps! 4 are maps, 1 is another map as well what did you expect lmao

FIRST! - Starlight Droplets by Quinnigan! - More strong efforts from the SCD event! This map takes inspiration from morbius (haha) temple to create a chill intermediate experience! I liked the kinda dark space-y vibe the map's got going on so off to a good start there! It certainly looks like sc, and it does in fact play like sc too. Of course the main feature of the gameplay is the top/bottom screenwrap and reduced gravity that is present in mobius temple. This map isn't nearly as routeful, and rather than swap blocks and red boosters there are water jumps and purple boosters. Some rooms were decent fun, and others had some trademark spring collab jank (especially those diabolical screenwrap water jumps those were nasty), but overall it was a nice vibes map to complete! 7.8/10

SECOND! - Chorus of Storms by DanTKO! - This veeeeeery original map brings together two sc classics: the fun flingy bird gameplay in Electric Stratosphere, and the fun nyoomy ultra gameplay of Heart of the Storm. The result here is a red expert map featuring birds, jellies, portals, dream blocks, and interestingly, some routing too! It's definitely pretty spicy routing too, but manageable. The rooms were a lot of fun, especially the last that had some bird ultra speed in there as well. Figuring out the rooms was satisfying, and there was a lot of varied moves and setups throughout! If I remember correctly the music was also of that sc style, and the map is nicely decorated, ESPECIALLY THE ENDING, super pretty! :3 Maybe as an overall package it could be quite polished by sc standards, but that doesn't stop it from being a must-play for electricity fans out there! 9/10

THIRD! - Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley! - I met a traveller from an antique land, who said, two vast and trunkless legs of stone, lie- LOL ok nice lil prank there let's get real

THIRD! - Ozymandias by kitkat! - A map by one of clodded's own, so I hopped on real quick! Even with the knowledge that it was a single puzzle, I would not be deterred despite my tiny meowmeow brain. Indeed, it's a small map, with only 2 rooms, and 2 interactables. Trying to proceed beyond the rooms end the map, but we need to solve the puzzle to find the secret heart! I'm about to talk about the solution to scroll on down if you wanna try this yourself! The first image has a shitton of dominoes and a chart that clearly maps the dominoes to letters. The second image has a compass thing and 8 codes. After a while of me being bad and doing things wrong, I eventually figured it all out. The text represented by the dominoes is Shelley's 'Ozymandias', a banger poem (give it a read!). I had to use this knowledge to slowly fill the chart with all the letters by checking the dominoes throughout the text. Now the second image made sense! when shading in the parts of the grid denoted by the letters, numbers are revealed! And of course the compass indicates this is a dashcode puzzle (thanks breeze). I inputted the code and earned the heart after nearly an hour! That was a really cool puzzle! Loved the link to a poem that's a classic! Even the song choice here was chill for solving the puzzle with! Great job kit!! mrrw mrrp nyaa :3, 8.3/10

FOURTH! - Mount Vesuvius by Yoshachobi7! - Here we go! I'd say this is THAT map to release this month but holy fuck so much peak celeste has dropped this month that several THAT maps exist for different people! Seriously, we're gonna be so stuffed full of awesome celeste mapping that we're gonna crash through the floor if we take another step! Still, this is one of the most anticipated maps of all time, taking over 4 years in development, meaning this thing was in the oven during the sc days! (we'll get to that later :3). This map goes from advanced to gm+1, featuring over 80 rooms of some of the best gameplay ever tto gameplay. So basically, dmr but more of my cup of tea! This is gonna be peak! And indeed, it was! To start at the beginning, this map just looks so dope! We're climbing a fricking volcano and all the familiar areas are coated in such a magmatic red color palette. It has a very natural "heat" look to it and not even for a second did it remind of the more "gd hell theme" blocky red that features a lot in that game. The music all throughout are a bunch of banger picks, will elaborate as we go on. As for the first checkpoint, after talking to granny (i have no clue how she has it in her to climb this thing), we see the primary focus of the map! DREAM BLOCKS AND VARIANTS! Dream block techspam never feels bad to play, and yosha absolutely cooks with it! For now, we are introduced to redirect dream blocks and feather dream blocks (ok well the feather blocks are kinda wacky but at least they're used in this easy section). Oh yeah! This map has 22 berries, and some are in this section! The highlight was the backtrack berry, which was mildly annoying with its long length but it was a cool idea. This is the 0m section of the map, cuz this is a summit map kinda, and there's also a gem room in this checkpoint that is needed for the heart. Interestingly this was the first collectable I found in the map, and the difficulty increase compared to the rest of the checkpoint was very noticeable. But after some time, I did it! After the orb room we are placed in 500m! Of course the zip movers appear here, as well as a good few wall boosters! Dream zippers add to the fun as well, and overall this is one of my favourite checkpoints for the flying fun of it all. Highlights included zipper wall-boosted jumps, the wallbooster berry, and loosted drumps (yes). This section's gem was by far the most mind-boggling, seemingly being a connected zipper puzzle that i definitely didn't do completely right but I managed to complete it with a fucky ultra that barely doesn't ultrafuck at absolute max height lmao. It did remind of Switchback Statiom, the sc expert classic so that was cool. After more orbiness, 1000m is next! Of course since dream blocks aren't limited to just the Old Site section, what's waiting for us here? Blue, pink, blue, pink... cassette blocks! Right away trying to time out the rhythm at the start of rooms is a bit tough with the lack of the cassette beat but it's not a major issue or anything. This checkpoint was mostly fun, featuring some cassette cycle management of course, and cassette dream blocks feature too. This section's main attraction is the key hub, with 3 rooms needing to be done for the keys. I liked 2 of them, and found the third a bit jank, but then I find the ELECTRIC EXUBERANCE (my goat) BERRY!! HOLY FUCK I LOVE THIS! I could practically hear the EE music playing in my head as it dawned on me that this berry is actually kinda hard! The speed requirements are pretty darn tight, but I eventually managed to nab the berry! Loved that! This section's gem is also another reference, this time to hit advanced sc classic, MURAL SKIES! Featuring just 3 cassette dream blocks and our default double dash to collect the jumpy touch switches. It was quite hard! But an enjoyable reference nonetheless! This map's 2020 roots are clearly showing.... But anyway the 1k orb room is the most interesting so far, featuring casoosted wounces which are fun to get an absurd amount of height from! Onward to the "Resort"!

Well, actually, it's the Infernal Manor, and Mr Oliver greets us in! The dust bunnies are here, though no cycles just yet... Hello dream dashes! Routing may be a bit more difficult with these crystals that let Maddy dash through solids. Oh, and hi there, shadow dash! We better watch out for hazards we need to invincibly dash through with this special crystal! This section is my favourite so far, with lots of fun movement with the special crystals, and that's before the main event: The Huge Mess! 3 more sections before we can forge ahead: one focuses on LAVA TECH! That's so cool! 2 (not octillion) lava (not neutral) jumps (certainly no theo)! woo! The berry here was one of the hardest in the whole map! super cool use of the lava tech and there were some cycling dunnies too! (yes i contracted that). Another section focused on the moving manor platforms, kinda short but the nyooming was fun. The last part was one large room with a good few shadow dashes. Once all the burning clutter is put away, the key to progress is obtainable! But first, gotta smuggle a dream dash and backtrack the room before the mess to access this section's gem. It's not that hard and features a lot of pixel gap setups, but the backtrask was so cool that I love this gem! (Still not my absolute favourite tho... stay tuned!). After 1.5k orb, we reach 2000m! This section is one of the most fluid and flying fantastic fun present in the entire map! Lots to introduce here! Boosters in red and green, cornerboosts and the indicators for them that will feature a lot later, move blocks, and dreamy move blocks! The rooms here aren't too long, but feature lots of high-octane speed gameplay, loads of boosted drypers, boosted ultras and coosts lead to absolutely flying through this checkpoint! The notable berry here is pretty hard compared to the rest of the checkpoint, featuring even more fast-paced moves, fun fun fun fun fun! But of course, the highlight for me, is the gem. As I went into the room and saw the dark matter, my heart erupted (omg like vesuvius did) in pure referential joy! STARSHIP RUINS FROM WINTER COLLAB 2021!!! THIS IS SO COOL!! WTF!! Of course, loads of coosts in this one, and the dark matter is so fun to play with! Easily my favourite game room, I enjoying playing Starship Ruins again with this one! But then after 2k orb is done, it's time to enter the hot temple! It's so hard to name my favourite checkpoint so far between 1.5k and this, both had such peak moments! Heading into 2.5k, the gimmicks are clear: swap blocks (what a shocker), and reverse bubbles...hoo boy. The rooms here feature a lot of either swap block teching (even a couple swapping coosts and momentum carries (referring to actual momentum carries here, not the wavedashes and wallbounces we've been doing this entire map)), which reminds me of a certain map based around swap blocks.., or reverse bubble shenanigand of which I will say the usage here doesn't beat my goat Reversed Unreversed from Gallery Collab (this map doesn't have anime girls in it as well so I suppose it never stood a chance anyway), but I guess it's a nice distinction from the introduction in 2k. The only berry here features BUBBLE RETENTION?! that's neat af! As for the gem, the gameplay style reminds me of 1/c which I played somewhat recently, but I'm not sure if that's the exact map being referenced here. 2.5k orb has some very funny cheeses (like a lot of this map actually) but cmon only cool kids do the intended there! Finally... let's tackle the Summit of this volcano! UPSIDE DOWN?! Yes, gravity will play a huge part here! There are 7 flags, and they only get more and more insane! Gravity teleport jump blocks, springy moonboosts, spring cancels that will make dmr look like 7b flag 15, and a whole load of falling blocks that will also make dmr look like uhhhh... some tame falling block map! There's also a ton of lightning strike so I love to see it. Most of the flags were severely fun, kinda tweaked on f5 and f3 a bit but f2 was a goddamn MASTERPIECE!!!

The spin cycle, the other insane cancels. the portal shenanigans (forgot to mention those were here too oops-) The setups that are somehow consistent too! All combine for a really fun challenge! f1 is just some basic easy gp, but once we reach the top of Vesuvius, we gotta jump INTO THE VOLCANO! Madeline fucking burns to death and the map ends there! Overall, excellent effort from yosha, 12.6/10

FIFTH! - The State of Our Shores by Spooooky! - The 12th SCD map is one of the most fun so far! BAHAHAHAHAHAHA alright enough screwing around!

The final checkpoint is easily the hardest of them all, but before we get cooked, it's time to collect the heart from the 6 gems, which I just now found out that it seems that returning to map doesn't lose the gems as long as the map isn't completed? Very convenient. The gimmick is also revealed to us being... triple dash! There were some triple dash crystals in 0m but here it's the full on mechanic now! There are 6 rooms to the end and apart from the increased difficulty, there's a fusion mechanic going on too! The first room is 0m + 500m, second is 500+1000, and so on. These rooms are some of the map's finest, even if I choked ending far too many times... My favourite may just be 2000+2500 for it's variety in fun gameplay, although 1500+2000 was also sick af! And Now, the final screen! 2500+3000! This one took SEVEN HOURS (out of 19 total) because the jumps at the start we so ungodly harder than everything else. I'm surprised I didn't completely crash out considering I was playfrom from 8pm to past 3am breakless, but the rest of the room is so fun! Momentum carry, springy dashless, spring moost, and the 7c don't choke is just really fun (even if I died to the final wavedashes once)! But once we hit that final badeline orb, we are taken to a floating sky sanctuary, where granny, who apparently took the b-side trail or something, tells us about the lava tree thing, and the map finally ends! WHAT A MASTERPIECE! 4 YEARS IN THE MAKING AND 0 DISSAPOINTMENT! YOSHA! BE PROUD OF YOUR WORK! IT WAS INSANE! I LOVED IT! WHAT THE FUCK! PEAK! PEAK I SAY! OH AND THE MUSICCCCC! 3K AND FINAL CP HAVE DIVINE TRACKS, AND THE OTHERES WERE SO GOOOOD TOOOOO! Overall, and I've been waiting to say this! SHE MOUNT ON MY VESUVIUS TILL I ERUPT! 14/10

FIFTH! - The State of Our Shores by Spooooky! - For real this time, SCD #12 gives us a red expert jaunt with fish and dream blocks! I played this one at like 5am which was funny, but it was still fun! Indeed, the techspammy gamplay feels very sc-core, being about 90% consistent and no higher lmao. The map is especially pretty, maybe not as sc-core, and the music was pretty nice and fit the vibe the map had! I liked the varied fishy setups like the boosted fish hyper and the fish supers were well behaved too! Overall, um, fish, au chocolat. 9/10

PLAY FISHMAS CAROL MY BRAND NEW MAP!!!

SEE YA LATER!!

Celeste Map Reviews #21

MORE MORE MORE MORE!!!! FOUR MORE MAPS COMING RIGHT AT YOU!! FIRST! - Old Site Shake-Side from AWWPD! - Another map in this pack that changes up a vanilla A-side? Let's see what's in store! The gimmick is noticable from the get-go, as all the normal terrain has been converted into temporary dream blocks! Indeed, these shaky dream blocks must be used carefully to explore the familiar old site, while collected the several berries scattered throughout. It's fun to completely disregard some rooms, some others are interesting to route, and I let myself Everest softlock way too many times considering you can just dream dash to continue (oops :3). The Awake (by Sailed) (no, by butcherberries) (no, by exok games) section has zero gravity and a different, glitchy-templatey look and from here we have to make it up to the crystal heart area to find the mini heart. Interesting map this was, just like the rest of the pack so far of course, and decently enjoyable. 7.6/10

SECOND! - The Hydroponic Gardens from AWWPD! - Indeed, this map features some water use (like for bhops) and adds kevins, one-use dream blocks and double dash into the mix! This one's a short n sweet 4 room expert map, and it's just pretty fun through and through. There's lot's of techy sections with bhops and ultras and wounces, and some spicy routing from the kevins and dream blocks. Keep an eye out for any water that can be used too! The last room is a fun vertical one that ends at the heart. Music is excellent as always in this pack and the deco is quite nice with the greens representing general plant greenery and the pink highlights looking like flowers! Neat! 9.3/10

THIRD! - Star Jumper from AWWPD! - This advanced challenge is very short, but has a pretty unique gimmick: you've gotta platform across several minisicule dream blocks (manually edited outside lonn i suppose?). These things are 1-2 pixel squares at times and can move quite fast! You can still use the dream blocks but you'll also wanna consider just jumping and dashing across them. A certain section near the end had a lot of star cycles which I guess added some challenge. There was also a massive washing machine at the start...and apart from that there's not really any deco but I like the particles that acts as more "stars" for the traversable dream block "stars" to blend into. We are truly jumping across stars here! (Director: Hexalia, Lead Writer: Hexalia, Writer: Hexalia, Voice Actor: Hexalia, Supervising Producer: Hexalia) 7.7/10

FOURTH! - Volcanic Aviary by Goldenfaf! - And finally, we have a short (3 room) high gm/gm+1 map! This one abuses the stuffing out of feather hitbox preservation, which is basically a thing that happens when a spring cancels a feather and madeline's collision box gets a bit freaky... As the map recommended, I checked out the Feather Hitbox Preservation Gym to learn more and it definitely is needed to understand what's going on and how to win. The gameplay is comprrised of lots of feathers (obviously), core blocks, springs, birds and badeline boss! The idea is that FHP causes Madeline to become very "clippy" and she can clip through all sorts of entity blocks (core blocks in this case) and we must use this to traverse the cavern. Lots of buffers are present in this map to help preserve clippy, since downward movement will cancel it. There's tech like spiked clipcore jumps present and more basic reform tech too. The rooms are very fun though hard to learn, but I had such a great time once attempts were underway. The sprancel hell in room 2's end is very funny and I died there a good few times. Room 3 has a 4-cassette cycle (cassette blocks can also be clipped through) and while the mention of nrcb's spooked me, it's basically just a buffered opposite direction climbjump from the reform of a cassette (after the dash). Lots of clippy in this room too, and it's definitely the hardest, taking over 50% of the 4h20m clear. The music is a banger that sounds straight out of a rhythm game (IN 15 sounding ahhh) and the deco is solid! Good luck Jan-Kegelly faf! (that's my map! play it! please!) 9.8/10

WOOOOOOOOOOOO! MORE! MORE! MORE! (no more maps today tho)

Celeste Map Reviews #20

YOOOOO!! 20 reviews!! Let's celebrate by hopping into 6 maps of many shapes and sizes!! wooo!! FIRST! - The Quarry by xolimono! - SORRY! I missed this one in the sequence of SCD releases so here I am playing it today! Here we have an advanced router with falling blocks and feathers taking the stage!Head down the quarry by using the falling blocks to setup tight gaps, and make sure you take every route into account when taking feathers! The actual routing here isn't hard at all; like I've mentioned before it's like a spice that enhances the gameplay more than anything. Said gameplay is really fun and decently sc core. I liked the focus on feather wall ricocheting for the berries, and the map itself is very pretty! Xolimono deco goes crazy again! The rooms aren't too long and so this experience was quite the nice jaunty one too! Oh yeah, this map is inspired by The Climb (goated map)! Overall, hear me out... The Climb but you go right instead of up! 9.2/10

SECOND! - Debug Map by Adam Korinek! - First it was F5 puzzles (haven't played FFFFF yet actually, I really should at some point huh), now it's F6 puzzles! Enter the debug map and solve as many puzzles as you can! I'll be real I'm still not really sure how this map even works with how rooms disappear when solved but it really adds to the impressiveness of this map. There are FIFTY rooms available to solve, ranging from less puzzly rooms with fun gimmick platforming, to full on puzzles that take a good-thinking brain to figure out. Thankfully, only 33 rooms need to be finished to finish the map, with the full 50 completion unlocking a berry. I'm thankful for the leniency, since some of the puzzles are definitely quite brutal without help... (very interesting in how Boundless and Cube Escape work :thinkeline:). Of the rooms I completed, I liked the Combination Lock puzzles, the Jigsaw Puzzle, The Red Noise, Ghost Leg, Evidence and many more! Oh yeah, there's also a screenwrap gimmick present in the platformy rooms which makes for even more fun thinking depth! The music is quite good as well, and the map is decorated to look like how it does on the debug map which is very neat! I'm really happy I played this map, super enjoyable puzzlefest! Though I will say accidentaly swiping F5 at 25/50 was definitely a moment! Overall, eagerly awaiting F7, 11.1/10

THIRD! - Cinnabar Monolith by juckter! - Hiiii burgerhex!! This should be the most recent SCD map as of this review, and it's a cool one! The opening room features a dream zip mover! A very popular modded entity that will surely lead to very fun ga- oh, it's a zip mover on top of a dream block... Well I sure got fooled by that one lmao (can you tell I'm very smart? :3). So there's the real gimmick, dream blocks with zippers underneath, a good way to build some setups. And indeed, these red advanced rooms revolve around quick paced platforming around dream blocks and the zippers triggered by them. I like the gameplay for the most part, and there are a good few ideas explored around the main machanic. The map has a nice look to it with the smaller spiked blocks involved too! Overall, commas are important! dream zip mover vs dream, zip mover. 8/10

FOURTH! - Simple Complex by _dan! - simple complex? I find it quite complex simple actually. This one showed up in modding_showcase outta nowhere for me, but it seemed interesting so I gave it a go. This expert/low gm short n sweet map feature two very cool gimmicks: jump toggled blocks and fields that change change madeline into bounce helper physics on a dime flip! The gameplay composition is simply outrageously good, the way the blocks are seamlessly reused between physics versions is so fun to play through! Kevins also make an appearance later on too, and they have some good gameplay attached to them. As for the berries, I really like them too! The first showcases the bounce helper speed downboost and the second has a sisyphean reform climb between jumper blocks, great gimmicky uses of the mechanics! The final room is a decent bit harder, utilising everything learned earlier amd having some decently tight input sequences. The deco is pretty alright but the song pick is a banger! Overall, why is it called simple complex when you simp the le plex food the com?? 9.7/10 FIFTH! - Hollow Forest by Aubrey! - My first hard nail map, and it's really, really good! This one is a high gm shorter map that focuses on the elytra (lol), oooobviously this map is a nailer, featuring quick input sequences, nail spikes and nail bubbles too! There's a lot of diverse nail tech used throughout, like nailboosts, nail climbs, and nail bubble boosts. All are used in what is some very fun gameplay. It takes some getting used to early on, but once it clicks you'll be having a lot of fun as you try to clear each room! Final is my favourite probably, the nailboosts are very satisfying to hit. As for deco, this map is pretty! The structuring is intricate and looks good, the stylegrounds and coloring are well done, and the music is quite good too! I highly recommend this map to anyone who's up for a challenge! Aubrey, you cooked! Overall, Hollow forest? I wonder what that could be a reference to? Maybe a hat in time. 9.4/10

SIXTH! - Ascensia by donker19! - And to finish off the review, we've got the newly released Ascensia + The Nexus! No Nexuses here, sorry Nexus fans, but I did beat the 50 room timer tower! After a nice talk with an npc for a strawberry, it was time to climb! There are 5 sects of 10 timer trials each, increasing in difficulty, from int to expert. The whole gimmick of this map is to survive the room for 30 seconds before being able to leave and move on up to the next. The first sect has lots of cycles to dodge, the second is a very bumpery ride (yooo its the things from pumber!!!), the third has icy floors and wind, the fourth has moving platforms, and the 5th is a megamix of guest rooms from various cool mappers! Each sect ends in a special segmented "boss" trial with 3 10 second mini trials. I really like this concept! Sometimes some maps have something like this in a room or two, but a huge map based all around this is a first for me, and that's really cool! Most rooms have some cool dodging strategy to them, a couple were on the annoying side, but I think that was inevitable. Overall, I had a lot of fun playing, the deco is very well done, and the music picks are excellent! (hi bloons tower defense six!) Overall, who is the poor poor person who's gonna golden this thing first? 9.1/10

WOOOOO EPIC!! 2 days of mapping peak brought to you by the mappers above, multicolour thigh highs, skirts, big hoodies, and black nail polish :3

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