Uploaded December 2024 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago

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Blegh. It may not be much of a surprise that I would eventually get to this, as it was only a few months ago that I beat Artificial Ascent. I started to play it after I did Ocular Miracle from what I remember, and after almost getting connecting runs on it I put it to the side. Of course, the reason being that the level was made much harder on 2.2 due to a slope bug at 49% that happened most of the time. There are a couple of other 2.2 related issues later in the level but they're much easier to work around. Anyway, the level finally received a "bugfix" update when I was still working on super probably level, so I knew I would be finishing this next, and wasn't excited about it even remotely.

To be blunt, this was hugely disappointing to me for what the original level is, and unfortunately this is one of my least favorite remakes I've ever played. I wouldn't say everything about it is worse, but probably like 95% of it is. As far as positives go, the green orb nerf in ViPriN's ball is really nice. Of course, the nerfs to Michigun's part were a big improvement (even if I still dislike the wave that replaced the blue orbs), and there are a couple of other, minor things that are better like the start of Zobros's dual ship, and the beginning of AbstractDark's part. Visually, it's certainly an update over the original level and does it justice, though some parts are showing their age now. And that's all the good things I have to say about this. Apart from the changes I already mentioned, everything else regarding the gameplay made it so much less enjoyable for me. It's not even due to its difficulty either; there are a lot of subtle nerfs throughout the level as well as some new gameplay that tends to be easier than what it was in Artificial Ascent, but despite that, much of the time the execution of it was not good and I found myself vastly preferring what it once was. Take ZenthicAlpha's part, for example. I wasn't a huge fan of it in the original level but it still worked and I never had much trouble with it. Most of its gameplay was remade entirely, and while replacing the ufo was a good thing, the ships are just terrible, particularly with the transitions out of them. You exit either of them too high and you'll either hit the side of a block from the first one or you can land on the spike following the second ship, and it's super annoying. The green orb halfway through Serponge's part is another example. It's probably an easier timing overall now, but now you have to worry about landing on the spikes for the next jump if you time it too late, which to me felt much more annoying. Now, of course, there are also a lot of subtle buffs throughout the level, and I hated pretty much all of them. The buffs made on Codex's part and the ships in Manix's part made playing from 0 much grindier and much more annoying to me. The mini ufo in Sanic's part is dramatically worse due to the changed structuring. Buffing Anthrax's part was just always going to be a disaster no matter what, and if anything I think that gameplay should've just been remade entirely. Loogiah's part, while it got fairly consistent, also not one I'm happy with the buffs on, particularly the wave and the last ship, which speaking of that, remember the quotation marks I brought up earlier for "bugfix"? This bug at 49% was not handled properly at all. All that needed to change was for the slope to be non-solid, and instead a teleport portal was added by the cube portal, which not only didn't completely fix the slope problem but also made it so you could die entering wamiq8's part just from clicking into the cube portal, which happened to me a few times from 0. The buffs in Nasgubb's part is infamous for being terrible, which rightly so. The latter half of AbstractDark's part is much more annoying, and with Terron's part I despise how it's possible to die as the ball now in the first dual. And lastly, I highly question why the gravity portal at 96% was rotated. It was much more consistent the way it was in the original level.

I haven't even mentioned yet how bad my luck was, too. I fluked from 45-83%, then proceeded to die twice at Terron's part, twice at Galvatron's part, and many times to the rest of the second half. Everything about this experience went wrong for me and I can't say I'll ever miss this level. Regardless if you've already done Artificial Ascent or not, I would never recommend this whatsoever.

Attempts - 4,309
Worst Fail - 96%
Hardest Parts - Anthrax/Drak, Nasgubb/Th04
Easiest Part - wamiq8/Failure
Difficulty Tier (Non-List Worthy Spreadsheet) - Relentless
Personal Tier - Remorseless
FPS Used: 240
Gameplay (and Experience) - 0/10
Overall Level Rating - F
Original Audio - youtube.com/watch?v=r380hx17U-o
Discord - dementeddd

Content Credits

Level Song: "Surface" by Dimrain47
Link - newgrounds.com/audio/listen/63082

Menu Song: "Serenity" by Heart Plus Up!
Link - youtube.com/watch?v=qRm4IwboNmM