If you shoot a web with the web gun you can jump while in the web to get to a little bit extra height so you can get to some places you can't usually get to you but it's still trash
I definitely wouldn't say it's ugly but the theme just feels very striking and out of place. I love the red and blue tiles but it doesn't feel as coherent as other zones
I think it's really fitting lore wise, with the Chinese mythology being added with Hou Yi, Hundun and Chang'e, and even the stuff from Spelunky HD like the Yama and the Jiang Shi. It is kind of whiplash compared to the rest of the game, but still my favorite area by far
Temple, fittingly, becomes more viable and the clear choice as you become more skilled. The Alien Compass which you get from Van Horsing directs you to the exit in the Cosmic Ocean -- way more valuable than it might seem at first. The Elixir protects you from afflictions like Curse and Poison, and doubles your healing from all sources. The Scepter makes most levels (and a crime run) trivial; you lose it by going to the City of Gold, but nothing _forces_ you to go there. You can entirely skip the questline (chain) by skillfully maneuvering through the lasers at the top of 6-4 Tiamat's Throne, allowing you to keep the Ankh and Vlad's Cape, with the benefits from Temple. Et cetera... This game has a very high skill ceiling. I think Temple is a pretty excellent embodiment of that. But I do still wish Tide was cooler.
@@rhejdneb3605 99 of all materials is much less important if you have good game sense (and items), if you're diligent in grabbing all the crates you find you'll probably use less materials than you get.
Since each game gets another boss and ending, then that means we have to get past yet another final final area to get to a new and improved very final area of finality (unless you bring the eggplant hedjet crown olmec ultra amulet which lets you enter the ultra finalest area with ultimate arrow traps that one shot you and green frogs probably
This is my most played game (besides minecraft but idk how many hours i have) I cant help myself but see parts of this video and just think to myself "Wow he didnt know this?" "Why would he do that when he couldve done this?" I could talk about this game for hours. Its actually a masterpiece of game design and i still learn something everytime i play it. If a horned lizard eats a dung beetle and gets to one health, whenever he does his weird hoppy thing that he does at 1 hp, blood squirts from his eyes and can get you a lot of health with the kapala if you have the means of dodging him. 150 hours i went without knowing that. Moles can drop pickaxes to reflect their digging, Jiang Shi Assasins can drop spring shoes to reflect their anti gravity powers, bone piles can drop bone keys, royal yetis cant get frozen since they have freezing breath. This game is so intricate it makes you wonder how they come up with all of it. Theres a giant secret questline that i didnt know existed beyond its first half with a thief girl and you can do a heist in the palace together later in the game. Its amazing.
@sweeniedickson8231 I think Spelunky HD does the secret areas and the level design better, but the game feels really unpolished and clunky compared to 2. I want to like Spelunky HD, but it's really hard to go back to a game so old when a newer version is out.
i recently found out that aliens can drop parachute, and they fall without one becouse they drop it for you, and even one time i got plasma cannon from present box in the shop. but i have 510 hrs of playtime and have never seen pickaxe from a mole, i didnt know that
Really resonate with this comment. Tied with another game, Spelunky 2 is my favorite game of all time, and I've been hooked on the series since Classic. It's surprising to me that despite Spelunky's massive influence on the roguelike genre, no other games have come close to delivering a similar experience. I just can't think of any game which represents the genre better. I've put an obscene amount of hours into this game, and I bet I could easily triple that and still be finding new things.
This is a great video! Just a helpful tip with the skeletons. You can tell if a skull is going to come alive if the black of its eyes is slightly larger than usual. For example, if you pause at 5:42 you could see that the skull on the right has slightly larger eyes and therefore it was alive. Practically it doesn't make much sense to specifically go out of your way to look at a skull's eyes especially when you're dealing with a bunch of harder things at once, but in general, there's more black in an alive skull and the futures look more defined. You'll also get more and more used to identifying it now that you know there's a difference.
What I love about the spelunky series is that it can feel like bullshit sometimes but it’s always your fault when you die, there’s always something you could have done to prevent that death. That level of mastery you get is like nothing else I’ve played. Spelunky hd and 2 are some of my favorite games ever.
Technically, but there is only so much you can pay attention to. Something is going to escape you eventually, and whether it kills you or not is just luck.
I already considered Spelunky HD to be the hardest game I've ever played, and I've played those games mentioned in the start of the video, so you can bet that I was surprised by how much harder the sequel is. Haven't finished it yet, got to Tiamat tho
I personally found the jungle to be significantly harder than volcana, the enemies (especially the ******* witch doctors) are just brutal and you have so little space to work around them. At least in volcana you can generally work out a safe path through the level and avoid dying completely - I usually take a hit or two from the fire bugs or magma balls but very rarely die to the lava. This was a brilliant video, great in-depth analysis. I’ve done all the side quests and have a pb of 7-22 in the cosmic ocean. Currently about 300 hours in and still loving this game. And yes the eggplant run sucks just as much ass as you predicted it would here!
Not sure if you still read comments under this video, but there was an ending in Spelunky HD where you could kill King Yama with an eggplant, in one hit, but it is even more difficult than the eggplant ending in Spelunky 2, just wanted to let you know
I've not done the eggplant run in Spelunky HD, but I'd wager that it would actually be harder, simply because the Hired Hands required for both HD and 2 are much more dangerous in Spelunky HD. Not sure though, as like I said, I've only done the eggplant run in Spelunky 2.
24:45 it’s not a bug it’s a feature. When the game was first released Olmec was changed many times. Originally Olmec never stopped shooting bombs, so most people just waited on its head for it to blow up the whole level. Horrible pacing for the game, but it was the most optimal thing to do. Also, great vid btw.
I disagree with your critique of Tide Pool. I actually really enjoy the look of Tide Pool but I guess that is up to personal preference. But i find your critique of no new interesting enemies a bit flawed. Jang Shi are native to tide pool and they only show up in earlier levels for the unique level feelings but that doesn’t change that Tide Pool is their area. You also forgot to mention the giant samurai crab (which I forgot the name of) but that is almost like a mini boss and the octopy do charge like any other enemy but they also shoot ink which blinds you which is clearly unique. The hermits crabs hide in blocks and also are very useful for crates I just don’t get your criticism here? Otherwise the video is pretty good and an enjoyable watch
Ikr, his argument kind of felt half-assed when it came to Tide Pool. He says there are recycled enemies, but you can say that about most of the areas. The tiki men are basically cave men but with a shield and a boomerang, UFOs are like the robots from Volcana but they explode when touching the ground, and Vampires are bats but they can jump around and have more health. I know I'm kind of on a tangent, but his critique with Tude Pool was so flawed that it kind of makes me a little pissed lmao.
RU-vid just recommended this video to me. A retrospective on Spelunky? I'm in. Hopefully I wasn't the only one who got this recommended to and the RU-vid algorithmic gods are in your favor ! Subscribed.
I'm so glad to see someone making videos about this game, I feel like it was incredibly slept on because of the difficulty. This is the most rewarding game I've ever played, every frustration you mention in the video is so valid, but there are really concrete answers to all of them! Not always easy to find, and sometimes still really hard to execute once you know what to do. Figuring out strategies, secrets, and nuances to the game is just an endless source of fun for me. 500 hours in and years into the game's life I'm still learning new things. I've played other roguelikes, there's nothing like this
@@xian2themax The dev knows about the skips, and he intentionally keeps them in because they're a good way to express player skill. In fact, the whole reason he didn't just hard code in the different rewards you get from completing the quests, but rather expressed them with game mechanics was likely to encourage players to innovate, anyway.
Incredible. Everything you stated, from the frustration of BARELY messing up your movement and paying for it severely; to the hatred of dwelling, lizards, skeletons, and moles; to mastering the game and still making beginner-level mistakes; to getting angry and then it making you perform worse and get even more angry and perpetuating the cycle of anger until you ragequit; it's ALL true for me.
You get like half a second of invincibility when walking through doors or pipes so I don't think it's really that unfair to have enemies at the other side waiting for you since you can also just go back through the door when there is a lot of stuff attacking at once. Also I think Temple is definitely worth it. The Elixir you get from the Star Challenge is one of the most OP items in the game (protecting you from Poison or Curse and also doubling each HP that you gain) and the Alien Compass is really really good for Cosmic Ocean. And if you decide to skip Duat you can have the Scepter and enemies shouldn't be nearly as much of a problem anymore.
@@NOONE-bs5zh The Elixir effect would still stay and it is possible to get to Cosmic Ocean by skipping Duat and not sacrificing yourself in the Golden City.
No shot this dude just said the elixir was one of the most op items in the game bruv. I agree with you that you should go temple bc of the alien compass but you outta yo damn mind if you think that elixir beats out clone gun, or madame tusk… or a rock
The elixer is good, but the effect goes away as soon as you get cursed/poisened. Also, with Vlad's Cape, you probably can get max health soon anyways into the later game.
I found this from the reddit post linking back to this video. I gotta say, this was a great watch! Sucks how it gets cucked by RU-vid algorithm like this. Wish you the best man, keep up the good work!
You can 100% react to every time you exit a door. The game gives you very generous s. As for scorpions don't throw pots right in front of yourself. I'm not saying Spelunky 2 is 100% fair but those two situations are very fair.
100% the hardest game I ever played.. and I absolutely love it. It’s a perfectly crafted game imo but you have to sink a LOT of time into it to get good. There are so many things to think about as you play, precise movements and whip attacks, where to place your items and where/when you can move, what clever exploit you can use to easily beat a boss or get past a level.. and the list goes on. This game is extremely difficult but imo that’s what makes it fun and addictive. The difficulty makes it so rewarding to leave a level with good equipment, lots of health, and lots of bombs.
I think the hardest games most people haven't heard of are: La mulana 1 La mulana 2 and World of Horror. A runner up is Diablo 2 Lod on hell. I want a la mulana 3. Also the upcoming dlc for Elden ring might be hard but I don't have a time machine nor is it June 21st yet.
mostly agree about tidepool but the one thing i LOVE about it is the visuals, the colourpallet is just so pretty and light, in a landscape where all water levels in games go for the same dark blue designs, having this lush, colourful coral reef design is SUCH a breathe of fresh air
Every death is fair and your fault yeah right i have 10 clips of stuff happening and there was nothing i could do about it like a frog activated a trap i went down to kill it i died from the trap even tho it was activated
this morning i got a run to babylon and everything was going so perfectly well, i lost my ankh due to a mistake that was mostly my fault, then i lost the run entirely because on of the yellow orbs spawned in directly on a UFO which then shot down onto me at light speed and one shot me cool
How come you didn't bring up the Lavamander in Volcana? They're kind of rare but an enemy that shoots lava at you is pretty damn dangerous, and unless you drain the lava out from under them they're invincible.
This is a great video but unfortunately you said tide pool is a bad area and looks bad so I have no choice but to send an airstrike to your location. 👍
Weird that you're not a fan of tide pool, I've pretty much never seen someone dislike it. Its my personal favorite level in the game, I honestly like how it essentially reuses many features of the jungle from the first game, since that was my favorite level in that game. Edit: I've also never seen anybody critique the visuals of tide pool, that was the most shocking part of this video for me. I absolutely adore how this level looks, personally. I think its gorgeous
I dont personally see how you could place this above SMB in difficulty as getting 106% in that destroyed me but I cant disagree, both main Spelunky games are incredibly difficult!
at first,i hated the horned lizard more than the mole but now? i can avoid horned lizard way more easily and heck,under the right regeration even use them for some profit by making a horned lizard trigger a shopkeeper next to bombs which kills him and allows me to steal the stuff that remained without being chased by angry shopkeepers
I’ve been playing elden ring, i beat cuphead in a single sitting, I’ve made it to the final two bosses in terraria calamity infernum and beaten deathmode twice, I’m missing around 60 steam achievements in tboi, and this is still the hardest game I have ever played. But while all the other games have made me mad at least once, this one hasn’t. Maybe it’s because the game is rigged against you, maybe it’s the fact that I know with progress I’ll get better, I have no idea, but I just haven’t gotten mad at this game for some reason. Gungeon, isaac, and dead cells all have unlocks, hades and cult of the lamb of permanent upgrades you can buy, but with spelunky, you just have to be good. You can get good items, but they’ll only carry you so far.
after more than 200 hours in spelunky hd, hoping into spelunky 2 felt like the SAME when i started spelunky hd, after 5 hours i could not surpass the first biome, just like old times, this games are fantastic and frustating
The normal ending of Spelunky is not even that hard, the issue is the punishment. The game expects you to play with perfect attention, otherwise you will just get instakilled by the most random stuff. It does not matter how good you are, maintaining perfect execution and attention trough a whole run is impossible. At some point you will just look in the wrong direction and you'll die out of nowhere. It ends up boiling down to luck.
12:50 You can instead use the cape(and various other methods such as climbing gloves, the hoverpack, and turkeys) to descend slowly to the spikes, saving lots of resources, in case you didn't know. Happy Spelunking =)
I think royal jelly being given after kappala is a good move. By that point you probably have a good number of the basic items it would give and bombs. You'd also probably have a good number of health but some sources chunk your health down by 10 and you can still get instakilled so it's not like your invincible even with 99 health
I played it and loved how hard but naturally the game felt at throwing all this information but ultimately your death is based on how well you can control what to do next it took me hours to do but around 250 runs for me to “beat” the game i didn’t get to the cosmic Ocean (yet) so I’ve got work to do and my god the little tricks do play a lot into what you could do and what you now know you can do. For example whipping a dart trap to prevent an unbearable “unavoidable” hit and the climbing gloves stick to everything yes BUT whip to not stick 🤌 speed runners hold too much information that’s useful
I love when crucial chunks of the level spawn on the top left corner, behind Tusk's casino and a shopkeeper's treasure, completely outside my view, making me search through the whole level, hitting 3 minutes, dying to the ghost, finding the door, and then realizing i have just 1 rope. I fucking hate spelunky 2, it's the only game i've played in the last 2 weeks
yeah my only big problem in this game is the spike in difficulty at volcona dwelling is relativley easy, along with ice cave and tide pool, but litterally every single time i die in volcona its to a one hit kill... thats kind dumb for it being the second world which is followed by 2 easy ones (then babylon which i think is pretty well balanced [most of the time])
8:38 you can use the web gun as climbing gloves by spamming the shoot button while spamming j 24:30 this was a change made to prevent people from sitting on top of olmec and skipping phase 3, he drops three sets of bombs and this resets every time you break both purple things
36:22 The game freeze you describe is easily fixed by exiting fullscreen (alt + enter) and re-entering it. But I get your frustration because it took me around 6 lost runs to figure that out
Playing on a steam deck, I’m able to pause and return to my run with the deck’s suspend feature. It never occurred to me that this isn’t the case for many.
Don't give up! Was stuck just like you once, just because it feels like you aren't making progress doesn't mean you aren't learning! Muscle memory, reaction time, pattern recognition and new strategies are always being learned in your subconscious even if you are unaware
Currently watching the video, gonna put time stamps to interesting stuff I learnt by myself or just funfacts that can be nice to know ! (I have 500h in total in both games, and I'm still bad xD So I'm passing down some knowledge I've got by watching the community or by trial-and-error on my own). Nice video with a lot of tips, also, by the way ! 4:12 - Doing it when you have one jump like that at the end of a level and have spare time helps practicing it without the fear of the ghost getting to you. But getting it consistently takes a long time, I still can't do it. 7:04 - Learnt that by myself. Once you master the physics of throwing stuff, it's really REALLY useful ! Can save you ropes in a lot of situations, and when you're low on health without ropes, it can save you too. 8:40 - It's actually really funny, but someone despises the climbing gloves SO MUCH they actually found a quilinn skip with the web gun. Nobody will use it, probably, but it's still a quirky thing to know ! xD 9:15 - Notice how he talks about the ghost with the ''She'' pronoun ? For those who don't know, it's a fun lil easter egg that was there since spelunky hd (Not sure for classic, haven't played it) where you can get the camera item and snap a photo of the ghost. It'll slow her down and she will pose for the photo with accessories that are clearly feminine. In spelunky hd, the ghost will have accessories that are obviously feminine (You'll understand why, if you check it out) and in spelunky 2, it's more like a traditional oriental culture ghost pose. 13:00 - Yang is an honestly under-used strategy. I use it when it's not too hard to do so (When he's not behind some shopkeeper for example. LOL). Reason behind it is, if you help him, you get an animal shop in 2-1 or 2-2 (Don't remember by heart, but around those levels) where Yang sells you back all 3 turkeys and 1 pair of ropes. I mean, can never say no to health, and when you want to finish the game, you slowly start to understand how much ropes and bombs are REALLY valuable and a lot of the time mandatory. After that, if you're a pacifist and have extra money, you can buy all of his stuff, or you can also steal or kill him. Pretty useful trick I learnt that saved my runs a whole lot when I could do it. 13:56 - Just something I find cute ! It's nice you put that in the video ! ^^ 16:23 - You have a few frames of invisibility when coming out doors. Use it to jump or whip directly against the enemy who aren't invisible. You can also just go back into the door directly. 26:01 - If you want to get into Tusk's palace (Without causing a scene), you need to get every item in that dice house. There's more item in that shop than any normal dice house too ! 29:10 - Spelunky music in general is always good, but in my opinion, on that one, HD has my heart. But Spelunky 2 music is also really good ! 30:27 - Only compass that actually shows you the exit in the cosmic ocean area. But since you're in temple, you won't be able to go to CO with the Ankh, so it really depends on which helps you the most. Also shows you the alien ''Base'' where there is the plasma canon, some lore (Shopkeepers), and an unlockable character if you haven't gotten it yet. Or you can be like me and use the shortcut and kill yourself in the void endlessly until you actually MIRACULOUSLY find it xD 31:34 - There's skeleton walls placed in a recognizable pattern (Changes each time, but it's easy to recognize) where he flies. Takes some time to see it and recognize it. 37:10 - Honestly in my opinion one of the coolest looking place in the game. I still can't clear it consistently tho. A tip I can give, is PREPARE YOURSELF to get LOADS of bombs to bomb most of your way out. 39:22 - Just 4 words : Pain in the ass. I hate that part in its entirety. Cleared both endings, need the CO ending, and MAN I hate that part. It screws over my runs 99% of the time. So, seriously, prepare yourself for that pain xD 39:56 - Approved. REALLY cool looking place, one of my favorites too ! Even if it's also deadly. Places I actually find good looking (Not in any particular order) - Temple, Tide pools, Neo Babylon, Sunken city, and CO. And shoutout to spelunky HD ice caves, my favorite place in HD (With honestly in my opinion, the best soundtracks of HD) Also sorry if my english isn't the best, english isn't my mother language ! Anyway ! Hope these can help people out ! If anyone has any other tips or things to say, don't hesitate to add them below ! ^^
