[MY HARDEST CLEAR] THE EIDOLON INFRASTRUCTURE by Emeowvie CLEAR // Celeste Mods

Well. This sure was a ride.

Stats:
Deaths: 56,744
Time: ~60 hours / 137 days from start to finish (including breaks)
Enjoyment: ?/10
Difficulty: RED GRANDMASTER + 2
People are getting so good at this game they don't know what's difficult anymore...

I started this map the day after it released back around the 9th of August, and expected it to be a slightly harder version of MOCE // LXVI, and while they both fall under the MOCE-like umbrella, THE EIDOLON INFRASTRUCTURE requires tenfold the amount of precision, control, and understanding of EVERY SINGLE INPUT, down to whether you press up or right first in an upright dash, or having to redirect a dash instead of inputting it regularly. The base gameplay too is incredibly harder than that of LXVI, with one of the main features being NASTY crouchclimbs, as evident in rooms, 6, 8, 10, 12 and WRAITH particularly, and most crouchclimbs in other easier rooms being harder than the hardest found in VENUS.

This map pushed my mental further than anything in my entire life. I had to take an unprecedented amount of breaks from the map, being over 5, sometimes for weeks at a time, including a two week break during WRAITH. This stretched out the time taken to finish this project to take almost 4 and a half MONTHS. Every time I took a break this map would linger in the back of my mind, and at stages I wondered if I would ever end up returning and beating this map.

WRAITH:
There is so much I want to say about this room.

Deaths: ~17,000
Time: ~30 hours
Enjoyment: 5/10 overall, 8.5/10 towards the end of the grind.

WRAITH. This is the hardest thing I have done in this game by a long long way, so my opinions may be biased or skewed compared to others.

The start of the room (Start to Badeline Orb 2) gets SUPER consistent after a LONG time, other than one input towards the end of the segment. When learning this segment, it will feel so unfair and random, and this stayed consistent to me for many days. Waves of start inconsistency were the cause of my terrible experience with the room, so consistency is the MOST INPORTANT thing to consider.

Second Segment (Badeline Orb 2 to Badeline Orb 3) This gets very very consistent decently fast, only if you learn the dultra and the end of the segment in particular correctly. Incorrect execution in these parts WILL create inconsistency and randomness, which happened to me and killed my enjoyment of the part.

Second Half (Badeline Orb 3 Onwards):
The dashless section at the start was the hardest part of the room to learn by a fair bit, with awkward control required from multiple jump buttons, with directional releases and grab control. After the dashless section, the difficulty eases off until the reverse un-wave dash. All I can recommend is to find a sequence that works for you, and do it OVER and OVER and OVER again. I did that input to the end of the room SO MANY TIMES before it got consistent, which was worth it because I died to the input 1/7 times I got there from the start of the room.

THE CROUCHCLIMB:
Once again, you just have to learn it correctly and do it MANY, MANY TIMES. The first section and the very end of the climb are the hardest, with all FIVE of my crouchclimb deaths being in and around the first section. The ending inputs are very hard to get consistent, but when you get it down, you get it DOWN.

Crouch Tunnel:
Iron out EVERY SINGLE CORNER of this don't choke trial. There are a very large amount of nuances hidden amongst the seemingly simple section. I believe my crouch tunnel is performed optimally, however if you need help with consistencies, please contact someone in the Hardlist Discord. This goes for anything in the map!

I am still in shock I got this done by Christmas, which was my goal, and to get it done ON CHRISTMAS EVE is just a fairy-tale ending to this story.

Merry Christmas Everyone, Thanks to all that have supported me and helped me, and Thankyou to Emeowvie for creating this masterpiece.