Ossu! We're back around with lucky number four in our countdown of doooooooom!

https://youtu.be/PahTMJB9GdE

This week we're having a butcher's at:

Midnight Splash! - AcridMiles
The Bomb Diggity - lego1109
Frozen Atlantis - xAlaynax
VR - MISSION ULTIMATE EASY - MaddinAkaBBK
King of the Mountain Top - Salvation120

It's not a bad set this go about, though a few of the levels didn't click for me until the second go around. i hope you'll give some of these an extra chance, and maybe find one you really like. As always, thanks for all the support and feedback and have a great day! (Editor's note: King of the Mountain Top is NOT Salvation120's first level. i made a mistake when i checked their lbp.me profile, clicked on the "videos" button instead of the "published levels" one when i checked before recording the outro. i don't think the mistake overly changes my feelings about the level, but it is referenced in my reasoning for the level's grading...so i feel kind of a dope)

Behind the Curtains Stuffs
i thought i might do a later than usual bonus stream today (basically weekend hours, instead of Thursday/Friday hours...though Thr/Fri is my weekend so...it gets confusing). Anyway, the fact of the matter is, i've spent the last month of free time (give or take) in the house. For my own mental health, i figured it'd be a good idea to get out, and not worry about getting videos done.

So...i wake up and it's raining, because, of course it is.

Well played, gods of weather, well played.

Speaking of well-played and streams, though not, necessarily well-played streams, Biohazard 6 just does not give up once it gets started, does it? It might not have made much of an impression on me the first time, because i was just playing alone. Playing with folks has really highlighted the complete nutso absurdity of it all and i love it.

i had to take a look at an episode from a few weeks back to check if i had a name spelled correctly, only to realize i'd had it spelled wrong (in a different way) in that one. Kind of embarrassing, that. Especially because i'm using my great-uncle's surname. To my, very small, defense, i don't think i'd ever seen the name written down...but still...sorry Uncle Steve...

i'll have to tell his story in a stream or in an Isaac episode some day, it's pretty cool, and kind of nuts. Unless i've already told it..it gets kind of hard to remember sometimes.

Ossu! Tuesday Takeaway time!

Midnight Splash! - AcridMiles
This one's a good bit longer than it seems, but for the most part it keeps itself fun and moving along. There are a few breaks and bugs in it (one area where you can jump out of level, some of the floaty fluid is de-physicalized, the spikes don't always explod after dropping), but nothing that would really keep you from finishing. It doesn't really stretch the bounds of what Oddsock can do, but the interesting visual presentation elevates it and makes it worth a go or two.

The Bomb Diggity - lego1109
This one's got such a great level design and look on the front half. Some of the gameplay is pretty inventive, and it has the feel of some of the really good LBP2 community story-driven levels. The race bit, on the other hand, could stand another go over for fine tuning. The timing towards the end is really quite tight, and it can be tough to see just what you're supposed to be doing. Couple that with the timer counting down, and the frustration can really ramp up. The only other thing i could say against the level is i wish you could skip the story scenes. They're cute the first time you see them, but the first, in particular really goes on, and once you've seen it once, you don't really need to see it again. Still and all, i love the ambition in this one, and that deserves its own praise.

Frozen Atlantis - xAlaynax
The first areas, especially the bit we saw at the end of the video are probably the roughest and most frustrating, particularly in regards to checkpoint placement. Once you get past that, though, this is a really well-done, quite challenging old-school platformer. Like The Bomb Diggity hearkens back to a particular style of story-based LBP2 levels (though natively done in LBP3), this one is quite emblematic of the "it's a platformer, no bells, no whistles, no nods to a grander world, just challenge yourself and beat it" LBP2 style (fittingly, natch, since it's ported over from there). It's a good'un, and worth a few plays if you haven't seen it before.

VR-MISSION ULTIMATE EASY - MaddinAkaBbk
This one only has value as a showcase of poor-to-mediocre example of LBP1-era community levels; which is fitting because this is, again, a port of a poor-to-mediocre LBP1-era community level. Surely you have better things to do with your time?

King of the Mountain Top - Salvation120
Honesty time, folks, i got bored with this one pretty early on this one early on in my third play. It's...fine, really. Like i said in the video, i appreciate the work put in making a story that actually informs the world and gameplay. i liked the houses and offices you could enter. The pick-axe "tool" (you have to carry it with the power-glove, it's not actually its own power-up) is nice-enough, and utilized through most of the level once you get it. Still...the level's aggressively ugly to look at, and pretty dull to boot. If it weren't for the ambition of it, i'd have probably given this one an orange diamond, really.

So that's the that. A couple of gems, a nice Oddsock racer, and a few clunkers. Hopefully there was at least one in there that looked good to you, and you had a good time with. Thanks as always for all the support and feedback, and have a great day!

Behind the Curtains Stuffs
Woke up this morning absolutely certain that it was Wednesday, and i'd not done the Tuesday Takeaway yet. It was actually a bit of a cold sweat kind of thing. Luckily(?), i'd only woken up an hour late. So now i'm rushing about all headless-chicken trying to get the usual Tuesday things done. See ya!

Guten Moregen! Tuesday Takeaway time!

The mansion of bloody hill - flan2007
Ok....so The mansion of bloody hill both regular and easy modes are no longer up on flan2007's lbp.me page. i mean, alright, i was a bit...harsh on the level (though i do stand by my review). The interesting thing is, they now have 20 "remaster" levels of...i think they're all LBP2 levels. i'm going to have to take a look back at the title reading in the video, but i don't think these were existent previously. Maybe they were. It does, at least, mean i don't have to slog through the mansion again, though.

Toggle's Floating Platformer - mrsmartypants10
Those spring-based pull-and-launch things defeated me once again. i just could not get around them. Don't know how i did it when i was playing for the PiPs (i do remember that it took me something like four or five goes at the level before i could). It's a shame, really, because there are some pretty neat (and some challenging) things going on after that point, they're just going to be accessible to a lot of players who find this level, i think.

Cheese n crackers - hall8653
There's not really a lot going on in this one, but it's bright and cheery and i think makes for a fairly nice cool-down kind of run. It's not quite up to snuff for a green-circle, but still is worth a few plays, particularly if you've just run through a bunch of really frustrating levels. hall8653's gone through the effort to put in those SackLasses, but i do kind of wish they'd taken the extra step to put in some animations for them. The way they just stare out dead-eyed at the player, is kind of creepy. Except for the trampoline lass, she's got a goal in life.

"Antarctic Caverns" - xXTomUrbz
i really ended up liking this one. The gameplay elements do stand out a bit from the environment (which, itself, is a bit kludgy-looking) but that's easy to overlook once you get into things. i liked the weaving in of the story, it's unobtrusive enough that it doesn't chunk the flow of the level, but still gives you a good idea of the character of the previous explorer. i still think there should be some indicator of how long you've been in the water, so you can see how close you are to death, but that's really a minor quibble. This one's worth a good play or so.

De fabriek - Basdewinter1
This one's more like the seed of a level, to be honest. You've got all the necessary elements for the level, and there is some flow here, but there really should be some expansion on things. The spike/jump-pad bit could be fleshed out into something more substantial, as could the grappling hook section. Still, i think the basics are present. Now, on the visual presentation here....yeah, there's a fair amount of work needs to be done. A more coherent material choice could be a start. Heck even just putting in background, and lifting the level off the base create-mode floor could go a long way.

So, that's the that for our second-to-last episode, a mix of the good, the bad, and the ugly. Hopefully there was something in the set that caught your eye and you had some fun with. If you got the chance to give The mansion on bloody hill a chance (and beat it) gold start to you. It's always weird to feature a level that later gets pulled. It's like trapping a bit of imagination in amber. Anyhow, thanks as always for all the support and feedback have a great day!

Behind the Curtains Stuffs
Once again, really busy. There's stuff to put here, but no time for it. Sorry!