[XBLA] Super Meat Boy Review

[Bandango]

Super Meat Boy

Title - Super Meat Boy
Platform - XBox Live Arcade
Developer - Team Meat
Publisher - Microsoft Game Studios
ESRB Rating - T (Teen)
MSRP - 800 MSP ($10)
Editor - Mike "Bandango" Bellmore

What's Hot: Impeccable controls. Extreme difficulty with reasonable learning curve. Massive replay value. The sense of satisfaction the beating a level brings.

What's Not: Lack of multiplayer, local multiplayer in particular.

My thumbs hurt.

I am reminded of years past. Simpler times, when video games were flat, and brightly colored characters sped from left to right across cathode ray television sets that had wood paneling on their sides. Times when pitfalls and leaping balls of lava were the only things I really had to worry about. When I would play until my thumbs hurt.

Super Meat Boy basks in those memories, then tears them down to build something new with their bones.

As you should have guessed from my grandiloquent introduction, SMB (nice acronym) is a platformer. Meat boy, the bloody, squelching hunk of meat that serves as main character, is equipped with all the necessary tools: he can run, he can jump… he can jump off walls. His move set is simple, but what can be accomplished with it is not. Every level is a frantic ballet of bouncing and leaping, timing and memorization.

This game is the best platformer for the Xbox 360 I’ve played. Next to Jumpman, it’s the best platformer I’ve played in recent memory. Super Meat Boy is a product of the burgeoning indie scene. SMB’s predecessor, the not-yet-super Meat Boy, is a free flash game that was released about two years ago. Go ahead, play it. You may notice that it’s insanely hard. So is Super Meat Boy.

A sensation akin to fear accompanies the start of every level. Meat boy is placed at the beginning of a deadly obstacle course, and it is your job to guide him through it. Each obstacle requires true finesse and a very specific combination of button inputs to better. That exact combination will not become apparent until you die trying to find it, or, more likely, until you die many times trying to find it. While you have infinite lives, there are no checkpoints. Die, and you end up back at the beginning.

This may sound frustrating, but SMB is different from most platformers. Its levels are compact, short, and designed to be completed quickly. An average sized level should take no more than a minute to run through once you have learned its layout and pattern. Many can be finished in mere seconds. Speed is encouraged (I’ll get to that later.) Sometimes, though, you may play a level for fifteen minutes before beating it.

At no point did the lack of checkpoints lessen my enjoyment. In fact, had there been any, they likely would have detracted from my experience. In any given level, after clearing the first horror-show obstacle, you feel a sense of accomplishment. There’s something to be proud of in snapping the analog stick back and forth, expertly wall jumping, leaping over a bobbing saw, and letting go of the run button for just a second to slow your speed enough to pass beneath another saw without hitting it. It will, of course, take many tries to pull this off. Once past it, another battery of deathtraps waits to be bested. Like I said before, if you screw up on the next obstacle, you have to start again from the beginning. This may sound awful, but try it. Something magical happens.

What at first was an utterly impossible task becomes an almost autonomic process by the end. You’ll have to jump through the same hoops so many times before clearing a stage that the inputs to do so become burned into muscle memory. The convoluted challenge I described above is overcome so naturally by the time you actually finish the level as a whole that it’s a wonder you ever found it hard in the first place. This feeling is a peculiar one. I’ve felt it in other games before, but none have delivered the sensation so totally. It’s some zen shit. Effortlessly sailing through a stage that first killed you 200 times in a row is a great feeling.

And that feeling happens again and again and again. SMB delivers the same thrill hours on end, and it never gets old. It looks great. It’s fast. It controls flawlessly. It turns your thumbs into the adamantium tools of a cyborg ninja. Team Meat created one of the most finely tuned, responsive platformers ever made, and then painstakingly built sadistic and masterfully designed stages to force players into getting the most from the hyper-precise controls. I could say that this game is hard, even prohibitively so. But the act of playing it will train you. It will take hard, fun work, but anyone should be able to beat this game.

And then there’s the value proposition. For ten US dollars, you the consumer can purchase a near flawless platformer that features hundreds of stages. After beating a level in under a certain time (this is where speed comes into play), a dark world analog of that level is made available. The dark world stages are far, far more difficult than their light world brethren. Interspersed throughout the game are secret bonus levels that feature distinct art styles: some ape original Game Boy graphics, some imitate Atari graphics, some recreate 8-bit graphics. Secret characters can be unlocked after completing special series of stages. These special characters are guest stars from other indie games, Gish and Commander Video from Bit Trip Runner among them. There is already a downloadable map pack available, and from the looks of things there is room for many more. If you buy this game, you’ll have plenty to play.

And you should buy this game. I do, however, have one major gripe. The lack of local multiplayer is tragic. Tragic with a capitol T... and RAGIC for that matter. I can imagine there would be some difficulties in implementing it. It probably wouldn’t have worked on most levels, but a dedicated (short even, I’m not greedy) multiplayer quest would have been much appreciated. And if you expect me to complain about the difficulty, I’m afraid I won’t. I will say, however, that if you are easily frustrated or prone to frequent outbursts of rage, maybe you should try the demo before buying.

And it would be wrong of me to finish this review without mentioning the charming cut scenes that orbit SMB’s spectacular boss battles. They are funny and adorable.

If this review is too long, or you find my writing boring, the video below should tell you everything you need to know about Super Meat Boy:

Score: (4.5 out of 5 Cogs)


Mike says, "Super Meat Boy is a precise platformer that is difficult but not impossible. Download the demo for sure; buy it if you need more."

[Lon Lon Rabbit]

This sounds like exactly all the reasons that I really loved the indie game Money Seize.

I haven't played Super Meat Boy yet but I will pick it up as chasing that "perfect run" feeling that money seize gave me is well worth it.

Thanks for the review.

Give Money Seize a try if you haven't already Bandango (I recommended it to you ages ago for a FWEP) and maybe you could recommend it to others as a second, longer demo for people on the fence about SMB, as your review describes how I felt about Money Seize exactly.

It's definitely not for everyone, but I played it through and got every last coin I was having so much fun.

Your latest FWEP also has a little bit of this feeling, although not quite to the same extent, as you respawn so super fast and rush to try and collect more boxes and beat your high score.

[Shrinn]

Everyone said I was crazy for enjoying I Wanna Be The Guy. Now everyone is enjoying Super Meat Boy! How the tables have turned.

This game looks incredible, I can't wait to pick it up.

[Klunka]

Originally Posted by Shrinn

Everyone said I was crazy for enjoying I Wanna Be The Guy. Now everyone is enjoying Super Meat Boy! How the tables have turned.

This game looks incredible, I can't wait to pick it up.

Super Meat Boy is difficult yes, but let's not go comparing it to I Wanna Be The Guy. At least in Meat Boy, it's obvious what will kill you and what won't.

[ElektroDragon]

I don't understand the fascination with this game. I tried the demo and it looks and plays like a BAD FLASH GAME. I must not be elite enough to appreciate "insanely hard" indie flash games that all the cool gamers rave about.

If you're giving this such a high score, you better give Hoard, About a Blob, Swarm, and Ruffians a 5, because that's where the REAL talent is.

[Shrinn]

Originally Posted by Klunka

Super Meat Boy is difficult yes, but let's not go comparing it to I Wanna Be The Guy. At least in Meat Boy, it's obvious what will kill you and what won't.

Hey, it's obvious what will kill you in IWBTG... after the first time it kills you .

Same feeling of brilliant success after you clear a room though. That's why I'm so excited for this game! Should be downloading it today. And probably purchasing it again on PC in November!

[Ravenlock]

Originally Posted by ElektroDragon

I don't understand the fascination with this game. I tried the demo and it looks and plays like a BAD FLASH GAME. I must not be elite enough to appreciate "insanely hard" indie flash games that all the cool gamers rave about.

That is utter bullshit. As someone who plays a lot of bad flash games, because it's part and parcel of the beat I cover on this very website, the level of polish and attention that's gone into Super Meat Boy is miles beyond anything I've seen in that realm, and considerably exceeds that of many other XBLA titles by considerably larger teams / studios.

There are a lot of very good flash games that I like a whole lot, and I've written up a lot of them here. SMB goes much further than they do in pretty much every respect.

Originally Posted by Shrinn

Everyone said I was crazy for enjoying I Wanna Be The Guy. Now everyone is enjoying Super Meat Boy! How the tables have turned.

This game looks incredible, I can't wait to pick it up.

It's a pretty special kind of crazy required to love IWBTG. Don't get me wrong - I understand that kind of crazy. It just isn't for me.

[Wasson_]

that faux 90's commercial is just perfect. Damn they nailed that look.

[ElektroDragon]

Originally Posted by Ravenlock

That is utter bullshit.

I respect your opinion. Can you respect mine? Or do I have to start yet another gaming blog where I can rant about games I think are overrated?

I just don't see how this game can stand with a 4.5 when compared to some other upcoming downloadable game gems for XBLA and PS3. But I suppose the answer is that the score is not intended to be relative to other games.

[Ravenlock]

I can respect that you have an opinion while believing it to be unsupportable. I'm pretty deeply experienced with the games you are claiming this is no better than. I think it's extremely easy to demonstrate where your assessment is objectively wrong.

That said, if you want to start a gaming blog, by all means go to town. I've enjoyed mine quite a bit.

I just don't see how this game can stand with a 4.5 when compared to some other upcoming downloadable game gems for XBLA and PS3. But I suppose the answer is that the score is not intended to be relative to other games.

Yes, I think that last statement is indeed correct. The downloadable space does make it nigh impossible to directly compare games on the same platform, because it rarely if ever comes down to anything approximating an apples-to-apples comparison.

Obviously far less money and manpower went into Super Meat Boy than, say, Shadow Complex. But I believe they're both exceptional games deserving of the highest praise.

EDIT: I should probably clarify that the sharpness of my response was not from some place of "everyone must like this game." I love Super Meat Boy, but of course it isn't for everyone. I was responding specifically to the statement that it "looks and plays like a bad flash game." That's laughable. This game looks and sounds great, with extremely clear and intentional design inspirations, and it controls like a dream - the incredibly tight control is in fact one of its strongest points. To imply that Team Meat skimped on the technical or production elements of the game is an insult to what they've put out here.

[Lint of Death]

Originally Posted by Ravenlock

To imply that Team Meat skimped on the technical or production elements of the game is an insult to what they've put out here.

To elaborate on this, Team Meat (one artist and one programmer) worked on this project to the exclusion of basically all else for two years - programming it for three different platforms simultaneously on top of that. I recall reading in an interview that they spent at least two months refining the character Meat Boy's controls during the early stages.

[ElektroDragon]

Whoah there. It seems that SMB has brought out the Borg Collective effect in gamers. I think from now on, I'm just going to shut the hell up and just list all my perceived overrated games on my new local blog. You can all then flame me there, semi-privately.

[Ravenlock]

Nobody wants to dogpile anybody for speaking their mind. But if you're going to say things that are just absurd, we're going to call you on them. And saying that the aesthetics or controls of SMB are somehow substandard (which is what you said, and a far more objective topic than talking about whether or not you like the "retro platformer" genre) is absurd.

[Lint of Death]

Originally Posted by ElektroDragon

Whoah there. It seems that SMB has brought out the Borg Collective effect in gamers. I think from now on, I'm just going to shut the hell up and just list all my perceived overrated games on my new local blog. You can all then flame me there, semi-privately.

You call one person openly disputing your statements, plus one person (me) providing knowledge about how much effort went into this game, a single-minded army of robots bent on your destruction? I had little intention of contributing more to this line of discussion, but I feel I have to say that your perspective confuses me.

I can't wait for the PC release, by the way. I just hope I won't miss too much any of the XBOX- or Wii-exclusive characters. The Minecraft guy should make up for it, at least.

[ElektroDragon]

Lint, its because I just know that there are going to be vast amounts of people out there agreeing with you guys, and only the smallest minority sharing my opinion. In other words, I already know my opinion is highly unpopular, and I knew that before even uttering one word against SMB.

I'm just an anomaly. I never really cared for any of the Mario games either. My 8-bit platforming days as a kid consisted mostly of some lame Sega Master System card games like Teddy Boy and Ghost House. Never even owned a NES. So most things that attempt to be a retro platformer are completely lost on me.

At the same time, I make it a point to try out almost every new game on the market, and I'm pretty jaded as a result. My experience with SMB went something like this: Hmm... simplistic pixel art. Hmm... I desperately try to jump with this over tiny character to get to odd places and eventually the end of the level. Yawn. To me, Pixel Junk Shooter, for example, has much more graphical charm and interesting play mechanics than SMB. Yet there was no consensus that Pixel Junk Shooter was the holy grail of indie gaming, unlike seems to be happening with SMB.

Also, I never said the controls were bad (a tad awkward maybe, but not bad). When I refer to gameplay, I mainly mean the WAY the game is played and the GOAL, not the effectiveness of the controls.

Perhaps the charm and appeal of SMB just goes completely over my head.

I wasn't stating anything as fact, but merely as opinion. Next time I'll try to make that more clear.

[Ravenlock]

Also, I never said the controls were bad (a tad awkward maybe, but not bad). When I refer to gameplay, I mainly mean the WAY the game is played and the GOAL, not the effectiveness of the controls.

Fair enough - "looks and plays like a bad flash game" implied to me the sort of clunky arrow-keys-and-z-button keyboard controls that most flash games have, which couldn't be further from how SMB handles. But if I read the wrong thing into that, my bad.

I wasn't stating anything as fact, but merely as opinion. Next time I'll try to make that more clear.

Well of course it was opinion, but that doesn't mean it's invalid to question it. The implied challenge to the crowd was "why do you guys like this game so much when it looks and plays like a bad flash game"?

Saying it looks and plays like a bad flash game is a pretty objective statement. And by and large, it's demonstrably false. I challenge you to find even GOOD flash games, let alone bad ones, that have the quality and variety of art and animation Super Meat Boy has. (I'll leave "play like" alone, since you apparently weren't referring to controls, but in the realm of control the same is true.)

Perhaps the charm and appeal of SMB just goes completely over my head.

There's no question that nostalgia plays a large and intentional part in its appeal. I can't be anybody but myself, but I imagine it would be less attractive to me if I didn't have the gaming history I have, sure.

[roseap]

I can quit anytime I want... <twitch twitch>

[Bandango]

Originally Posted by ElektroDragon

If you're giving this such a high score, you better give Hoard, About a Blob, Swarm, and Ruffians a 5, because that's where the REAL talent is.

When I give a score, I'm giving that score to my experience with game X. I'm not giving it to game X in comparison to other games, or to game X 'objectively.' If I played these other games and had fun, they'd get high scores too. I probably would have given Pixel Junk Shooter a four. That was some of the best co-op I've ever played.

[ElektroDragon]

Originally Posted by Ravenlock

I challenge you to find even GOOD flash games, let alone bad ones, that have the quality and variety of art and animation Super Meat Boy has.

Machinarium

[MagGnome]

I can't wait for this to hit the PC!