Apollo 11 ~ nasgubb

"Sedulous"
~
Apollo 11 is a level fueled by nostalgia and reminiscence, that has been in the works for over two years, to act as a great sendoff to Nasgubb's creating career. And I think it's safe to say that it's his masterpiece. The theme of the level is a sort of 1.9-2.0 throwback or modernisation, and you can see similarities in design to some classic levels from the time period. It's also surprisingly hard! I started this level right after finishing Tartarus, it looked like a fun change of pace to go for a long level, and I didn't think I'd have to commit very long to it with how straight-forward the gameplay seemed either.
Well I was wrong.
This level is the epitome of "harder than it looks", and actually took me about roughly the same time to beat as finishing Silent Club. The basic nature of the gameplay means that there isn't much muscle memory involved in playing, so once you memorise where to go and the placement of all the different structures throughout the level, there's no real need to practice any further, as completing it is 100% up to your skill. Over practicing and playing for long sessions can actually be detrimental, because you need to save up as much energy as you can for the 0% experience. The lack of muscle memory gameplay means that not focusing will guarantee you to find yourself stuck in the first half, so you're pretty much required to focus for the entire 3:40 duration of the level. I started to get very nervous around the halfway point, and there's still nearly two minutes of gameplay to get through after that, so it was very, very stressful. I got lucky and only died past the second break (the orange cube with the white ground design and wavy floor) thrice, so I'm thankful for that, because I could have been stuck on this a lot longer. I've never played it, but some people told me that my experience reminded them of Congregation. So I guess you can expect something similar to that if you decide to go for this level, which might sound like a surprise.
As for what I think about its design, I think it's amazing. Like I said earlier, I believe this is Nasgubb's masterpiece, and it boils down to the cohesion. It's very good at executing its themes, he never lets a style of part overstay its welcome, yet still gives each gimmick he throws in enough time to shine. For example, the breaks. The first break is long and can be split into two halves with each half having its own gimmick, and you get to see both gimmicks return in smaller break sections, which I think is great. Some other things I love are the modernised throwbacks to old design, in parts such as the ball at 20%, which reminds me of the Theory of Everything 2 ball. I love the similarly structured, yet differentiated ship parts scattered throughout the level to keep it from getting stale. I love the lunar rock designs thrown in in reference to Apollo 11. And I love...honestly, there's just too much to say. Despite the 2 year creation process, Nasgubb seemed to know exactly what he was doing when making this level. The balance and consistency between design choice, gimmick use and repetition is all executed masterfully, and I can't think of much to say in terms of how I'd do this differently. My biggest complaints are simple nitpicks with the polishing, such as big chunks of black void in the ground and ceiling at the first cube, initial large spikes that don't get reused in later sections of the first ship, and desync issues at the dual (Look at the difference in X position between my cubes when paused at the corridor at 2:05). But even then, it's so well done otherwise that I can comfortably look past it.
Overall, I think this level is not only a masterpiece in design, but a fair challenge. If you're looking for a nerve wracking endurance test, you should love this one. I just don't think it was a very good idea for me to do as a "break" immediately after Tartarus...
Since I'm an early victor of this level and it's not placed yet, I'm sure people will want to know how hard I think it is. I actually found this harder than Digital Descent, so hopefully this can get placed on the list.


Total Attempts: 3640

Thumbnail Artist: ‪@Zerex‬

I do not own ANY songs used in this video.
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