This game is a visual and auditory masterpiece
Madeline feels great to control. She's snappy, the screen shake on her dash is satisfying every time, and all the information the player would need (Stamina, dashes, etc.) are perfectly telegraphed to them.
The respawns are instant and there's a checkpoint at the start of every new room. That keeps you from getting exhausted after every death because you have to stare at a 20 second loading screen.
Let's talk level design. A lot of difficult platformers acquire that title by requiring pixel-perfect precision and putting a lot of bs all over the place.
Celeste isn't like that. Not only are the designs natural and fit the theme of the level (e. g. Forsaken City, Celestial Resort, etc.) But don't require pixel-perfect inputs either. A large part of the process of getting through levels is solving them. Figuring out where exactly you have to go, in what order, and how.
The story also does a really good job of exploring mental health and trans identity.
Really the biggest achievement of this game was getting me (who rarely fully completes videogames) to 100% it, beat it around 5 more times and even attempt speedrunning it.
You KNOW it's special when that happens.
Madeline feels great to control. She's snappy, the screen shake on her dash is satisfying every time, and all the information the player would need (Stamina, dashes, etc.) are perfectly telegraphed to them.
The respawns are instant and there's a checkpoint at the start of every new room. That keeps you from getting exhausted after every death because you have to stare at a 20 second loading screen.
Let's talk level design. A lot of difficult platformers acquire that title by requiring pixel-perfect precision and putting a lot of bs all over the place.
Celeste isn't like that. Not only are the designs natural and fit the theme of the level (e. g. Forsaken City, Celestial Resort, etc.) But don't require pixel-perfect inputs either. A large part of the process of getting through levels is solving them. Figuring out where exactly you have to go, in what order, and how.
The story also does a really good job of exploring mental health and trans identity.
Really the biggest achievement of this game was getting me (who rarely fully completes videogames) to 100% it, beat it around 5 more times and even attempt speedrunning it.
You KNOW it's special when that happens.