Ossu! It's Friday (already?!) so that means we're back again!

https://youtu.be/vQSl0ZcqYjU

This week we're having a look at:

Hookshot Towers - RabidJellyfish
~Nature~ - dodaddo304
Unnamed Level - ikamo79
Sweet Skills - CH7MY
The Lost Ruins - MrSackboy32

It's an...interesting mix of levels this time. There was only one i couldn't really get behind, which was what was giving me the stress when i was putting the outro together (there's also one where i completely screw up during the recording, but that one's all on me). Still i had a good time with them, and i hope you give them a try and have a good time with them as well. Thanks as always for all the support and feedback, and have a great day!

Behind the Curtains Stuffs
The hub for this week's level was such a pain in the rump. It is actually moving in the Intro section, and setting that up so that the characters and elements were moving with it was interesting to pull off (of course, i could have used any number of other, easier, methods to get the same effect, but lets not talk about that, yes?).
Stayed up maybe later than i ought to have last night, but i got episode 015 wrapped and completely in the bag (PiPs and all), so my slate is completely clear. It did mean, also, that i didn't get a LBsP out, but hopefully not having PiPs and the like hanging over my head on a Thursday, will make that a bit easier in the future. Also, i'll have the apartment to myself this evening, so i may be able to get one out tonight.
It's weird to read  (or see, or play) something that has some element that you've come up with yourself. Parallel evolution at work, i suppose, but it's a bit disconcerting.
i'm kind of, slowly, getting out of last week's funk, which is really nice. i think the cherry blossoms will be blooming the end of next week or so...which coincides nicely with payday, so that's cool.

'Unnamed level' I think this is the real clickbait here!

I will definitely watch it. Thank you for making it and sharing it!

Yeah, if the level badge hadn't stood out, i probably wouldn't have given it a go. At least it was, in fact, a level, and not...Blood Pool.

So...is it Tuesday Takeaway time? i think it may be.

Hookshot Towers - RabidJellyfish
i got fairly solid with the movement in this level this go around. Still not good enough to top the scoreboard, but i did end up getting a touch over 8,000pts with just one death. It can be fairly tricky to figure how far the hookshot will fire, so that's an issue; but that's something you can spend a bit of time before the race to figure out. Actually that's a nice point i'd like to point out. Not dumping the player directly in the race, but giving them a bit of space before-hand to work out the mechanics of the level. That was nice.

~Nature~ - dodaddo304
There's not really much to say about this one. To be honest, you could probably play the level front-to-back before i could finish writing out the review for it. It's cute, has a nice enough look, and there's just a soupcon of gameplay in there to keep it from being a gallery level. It's not not worth a play, and i think if you're feeling wound up by some real frustrating levels it might be a nice antidote.

Unnamed Level - ikamo79
My hand still hurts, and makes typing a little rough. Really, semi-auto fire would have been so appreciated, either that or making the enemies slightly less beefy.

Sweet Skills - CH7MY
Yeaaah...this was the one that was making my outro so difficult to record. To be honest i was pretty salty with this level, and it was hard to tell how much of that was bleeding into my take on the level. i think it's the loss of progress that really ramps up the frustration in this one. Having a fairly long segment, with multiple points of failure in it...i don't know, it is marketed as HARD, CH7MY's up-front about that; but i think even really solid platform players are going to find the juice not worth the squeeze. None of this is helped by the fact that the level is just kind of ugly in presentation. The music was good, at least.

The Lost Ruins - MrSackbow32
We've done a fair number of ruins/temples levels over the course of the series; like the cardboard ones, they seem to come and go in waves. This is one of the nicer ones i've gone through, i think. The presentation is solid on, it's just long enough to feel weighty, without wearing out its welcome, and just difficult enough to be a challenge if you're not paying attention. i can see the pace being a little slow for folks, seeing as how the obstacles are very deliberately timed; but aside from that, and the rather uninspired musical choice. there's really not much to complain about with this one.

So...yeah, not a bad set of levels this go about. Hopefully there was something in there that clicked with you. Thanks, as always, for the support, and i hope you have a great day!

Behind the Curtains Stuffs
In My Dream's got picked up for LotD today, and that was nice (especially since, for once, it was after i had a feature on it). It really is a fun little level, and i hope rud-54 keeps creating, and gets the love they deserve. Oddly, there was another Dream-esque level that got picked yesterday...Dreamscape, or something like that. We looked at it way back in...hold on, i've got my notes right here. Here it is, Dreamscape by Madstones97. We looked at it back in Season One Episode 008. Geeze, that's well in the back and back, isn't it? Anyway, i was a little "huh?" about that one. i don't remember it being particularly stand out in any way. It was just one of those levels that was kind of there. In fact, the only thing i remember strongly about it was that the environment was pretty blah. i wonder why it got the nod (and why now, since it was published two years ago). Maybe StevenI mis-clicked?
Level recordings and most of the hub set-up for episode 016 are done, which is always nice. We saw a bit of the cutting room floor in the last LBsP. i generally avoid doing that; i figure, if i've picked a couple of not great levels for the set-list, then i'm just stuck with them. i never really wanted to make a "curated" show, because, well, if you're doing that, why not just cut the "first impressions" aspect of it and make a "best of the week" -type show. That being said, i figured folks might not want another "watch waffleking23 die a million times and make no progress" level so soon after Sweet Skills.
i've been spending my "saved" production time on Tearaway and Splatoon2 recently. Well, i'll play Splatoon2 just about any time i've got a decent wi-fi connection (and even when not, as i'm wrapping up the hero-level weapon unlocks at the moment). They've got some DLC coming up this summer that looks nice.
Tearaway, though...it'd been languishing half-finished on my shelf for...for a long time now really. So, something pushed me to wrap it up finally. i suppose it's not saying much to say it's a great game. MM nailed the visual presentation and charm, and i really enjoyed interacting with the character, my environment, and i guess myself. That being said, i think story-wise, they went to the "oh, here's the ending, no, wait, there's still more story to tell"-well a few times too often. If you're going to build to a climax, commit to it, because otherwise, i just feel a little drained by the actual end. Though maybe that's just me.

Wow, our Waffleking even risks his health to present the levels. What a savior!

I think Sweet skills lacked checkpoints. Hard is good, as long as it isn't 'hard' by not using checkpoints. You can present a hard section to me, but at least give me a checkpoint before and after the section, so my work wasn't for nothing, because I die after 2 sections and have to come back to that section.

I'm looking forward to the next episodes.