Uploaded January 2026 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago
Oh dear. So, of course I did beat the other Dream series levels just last year, and I loved both of them. I thought both aged pretty well for their time period and were impressively great to play, keeping in mind both were solo built and verified on mobile. I understand with that last bit that circumstances were different here and couldn't stay the same here, which is fine, but wow, how did this level go so wrong? I really don't believe it ever needed to be, either- the original layout that DreamTide posted more than 3 years ago genuinely seemed well made, but despite that most of the core gameplay remained up to the level's release, it is made a catastrophe to play due to a handful of creative decisions and balancing choices, which is such a shame. And I won't just stop there- I seriously think this managed to top Zodiac as my least favorite level I have ever beaten. I can't tell how much of it is just me finding the level that bad, or how much of it comes from it ending a level trilogy that I had loved prior to this, but this is undeniably the most disappointed I've ever been over a level, and in case that wasn't bad enough, it was also my unluckiest experience, but I'll get to that later.
So, the issues I take built into the level itself. I used to not take issue with the song choice, but the longer I had to sit through this predrop, the more I became convinced that Idolize was not a good choice for this. Good song, but there is a serious problem with the part length distribution here. I will acknowledge that Endless Dream and Faded Dream's predrops are also relatively long, but here it's almost a full minute, with by far the hardest gameplay, and also the most boring to play, thanks to the large time sink of just having a bunch of long dash orb holds in the buildup. Especially with getting stumped as much as I did in the later parts, it really was not fun at all to have to sit through the beginning on repeat. If this level had used almost any other realistic song instead (especially the second half of Dark Tides in my opinion), I doubt I would be feeling these issues nearly as much, because almost anything else would mean a less lengthy, more interesting predrop. Next, and by far the thing I hated most about the level, was the implementation of 2.2 features into the gameplay and the visuals. There are 2.1-made levels I've played that adopted new features very well late in their creation process, but this level suffered the absolute worst of it. The camera complaint has been beaten to death by everyone at this point, and it was tuned down a decent amount after the full preview which I appreciate, but it still is a major issue. I don't have a big problem with it in the predrop, but the drop is very bad with it. I grew numb to a lot of it eventually, but it's hard to deny that every transition wave part is made so much harder and worse to play thanks to the egregious amount of camera rotation there. The one at 84% is also made worse due to the camera being weirdly low, which makes some clicks in the wave as well as the cube clicks immediately after it even worse to time. I loathe the camera slowdown that ends the level too- it makes those already hard ending jumps way harder for me and contributed greatly to my nightmare experience with this. And more of a nitpick here- I feel like the design style here doesn't work well with 2.2, and apart from 55-67%, I would even take the older two levels over this one visually as well, but that's just me.
To be more brief on these last points, it felt like this severely lacked playtesting. The main dual section has several instances of "symmetrical" bits that are not properly aligned, and I died a lot because of this. There are several block corners you can hit early on that shouldn't exist, and the balancing is so horrific. The first and last parts were by far the hardest sections of the level to me, and it made everything I had to deal with in between feel even worse, which brings me back to my lack of luck here. I wasn't at all bothered by the 29-91% fluke I had, but to have that and not beat the level for over 2,000 more attempts, over 100 drop attempts, and 13 deaths in the 90s made it the worst of the worst. I have to believe that this is the unluckiest experience I've had on a level, and it couldn't have happened on a worse level for me. I'm sorry to say that I will not miss playing this level. That is all.
Attempts - 7,228
Estimated Playtime - ~13 hours, 54 minutes
Worst Fail - 98%x4
Hardest Parts - 0-11%, 85-100%
Easiest Parts - 30-45%, 55-63%
Difficulty Tier (Non-Listworthy Spreadsheet) - Unrated
Personal Tier - Relentless
FPS Used: 240
Gameplay - :(
Experience - :(
Overall Level Rating - F
Clicks - youtube.com/watch?v=ojR76AMaZG8
Discord - dementeddd
Content Credits
Level Song: "Idolize" by Creo
Link - youtube.com/watch?v=1Ui0K-ZdKm0
Menu Song: "Serenity" by Heart Plus Up!
Link - youtube.com/watch?v=qRm4IwboNmM
Oh dear. So, of course I did beat the other Dream series levels just last year, and I loved both of them. I thought both aged pretty well for their time period and were impressively great to play, keeping in mind both were solo built and verified on mobile. I understand with that last bit that circumstances were different here and couldn't stay the same here, which is fine, but wow, how did this level go so wrong? I really don't believe it ever needed to be, either- the original layout that DreamTide posted more than 3 years ago genuinely seemed well made, but despite that most of the core gameplay remained up to the level's release, it is made a catastrophe to play due to a handful of creative decisions and balancing choices, which is such a shame. And I won't just stop there- I seriously think this managed to top Zodiac as my least favorite level I have ever beaten. I can't tell how much of it is just me finding the level that bad, or how much of it comes from it ending a level trilogy that I had loved prior to this, but this is undeniably the most disappointed I've ever been over a level, and in case that wasn't bad enough, it was also my unluckiest experience, but I'll get to that later.
So, the issues I take built into the level itself. I used to not take issue with the song choice, but the longer I had to sit through this predrop, the more I became convinced that Idolize was not a good choice for this. Good song, but there is a serious problem with the part length distribution here. I will acknowledge that Endless Dream and Faded Dream's predrops are also relatively long, but here it's almost a full minute, with by far the hardest gameplay, and also the most boring to play, thanks to the large time sink of just having a bunch of long dash orb holds in the buildup. Especially with getting stumped as much as I did in the later parts, it really was not fun at all to have to sit through the beginning on repeat. If this level had used almost any other realistic song instead (especially the second half of Dark Tides in my opinion), I doubt I would be feeling these issues nearly as much, because almost anything else would mean a less lengthy, more interesting predrop. Next, and by far the thing I hated most about the level, was the implementation of 2.2 features into the gameplay and the visuals. There are 2.1-made levels I've played that adopted new features very well late in their creation process, but this level suffered the absolute worst of it. The camera complaint has been beaten to death by everyone at this point, and it was tuned down a decent amount after the full preview which I appreciate, but it still is a major issue. I don't have a big problem with it in the predrop, but the drop is very bad with it. I grew numb to a lot of it eventually, but it's hard to deny that every transition wave part is made so much harder and worse to play thanks to the egregious amount of camera rotation there. The one at 84% is also made worse due to the camera being weirdly low, which makes some clicks in the wave as well as the cube clicks immediately after it even worse to time. I loathe the camera slowdown that ends the level too- it makes those already hard ending jumps way harder for me and contributed greatly to my nightmare experience with this. And more of a nitpick here- I feel like the design style here doesn't work well with 2.2, and apart from 55-67%, I would even take the older two levels over this one visually as well, but that's just me.
To be more brief on these last points, it felt like this severely lacked playtesting. The main dual section has several instances of "symmetrical" bits that are not properly aligned, and I died a lot because of this. There are several block corners you can hit early on that shouldn't exist, and the balancing is so horrific. The first and last parts were by far the hardest sections of the level to me, and it made everything I had to deal with in between feel even worse, which brings me back to my lack of luck here. I wasn't at all bothered by the 29-91% fluke I had, but to have that and not beat the level for over 2,000 more attempts, over 100 drop attempts, and 13 deaths in the 90s made it the worst of the worst. I have to believe that this is the unluckiest experience I've had on a level, and it couldn't have happened on a worse level for me. I'm sorry to say that I will not miss playing this level. That is all.
Attempts - 7,228
Estimated Playtime - ~13 hours, 54 minutes
Worst Fail - 98%x4
Hardest Parts - 0-11%, 85-100%
Easiest Parts - 30-45%, 55-63%
Difficulty Tier (Non-Listworthy Spreadsheet) - Unrated
Personal Tier - Relentless
FPS Used: 240
Gameplay - :(
Experience - :(
Overall Level Rating - F
Clicks - youtube.com/watch?v=ojR76AMaZG8
Discord - dementeddd
Content Credits
Level Song: "Idolize" by Creo
Link - youtube.com/watch?v=1Ui0K-ZdKm0
Menu Song: "Serenity" by Heart Plus Up!
Link - youtube.com/watch?v=qRm4IwboNmM
