Super Meat Boy Forever - A Rotten Sequel 

Hi everyone!! Thanks so much for all the support on this video, fr it means a ton :) I have a lot more videos planned, so don't worry! Though it may take a little bit due to school starting up soon, I hope you all understand. The next video planned will be shorter, but I have another bigger video in the works soon! For now, again, thank you so much for all the support and be sure to look out for more! - Meatball

As someone who really likes Super Meat Boy Forever, I’m really glad you actually go beyond “it’s an autorunner so it’s automatically bad” and have an actual negative review about the game itself. Even if I disagree with a few opinions you have here, I’m just really happy that you’re reviewing what the game is rather than what it isn’t. I feel like a lot of people have done that with this game. Great video.

It's ironic that Super Meat Boy Forever started as a concept for a mobile game, thus why its an endless runner, and yet mobile is one of the few platforms which it never came to. Similarly, for a game with "Forever" in its title, you'd think there would be an endless mode - Especially considering all the effort they went through to make the regular levels procedurely-generated, how do you miss such an easy opportunity for giving your game more content?

I can second The End is Nigh as the official Meat Boy 2. It's soundtrack is also done by Ridiculon and, despite just being rearrangements of royalty free songs, fits the apocalyptic setting of the game.

The soundtrack change with SMB has always been an interesting point of contention. On one hand I don't think the "new" tracks were bad, they're actually pretty cool in their own right, but on the other they certainly lacked that charming Newgrounds, Invader Zim inspired sound you think of when you hear someting is "from Newgrounds" so there's a kind of character that's just outright missing.

I guess it should be mentioned that the problem with the game started because of team meat’s falling out. To keep it brief, while working on SMB McMillen and Tommy tired themselves out hard, causing animosity brown the two, and so Tommy, as to flip off Edmund even more, went and copyrighted the trademark for anything meatboy related, thus impeding McMillen from working with him ever again, Edmund told Tommy to fuck off and they fell out entirely, the problem is that McMilled was the one doing most of the work, and now Tommy found himself without the animator, level designer and joke creator, so he basically dug his own grave. McMillen would then go make “The end is nigh” which is the true spiritual successor to súper meat boy. As for Danny, I think the video forgot to mention that he also had to deal with most of the brunt of Edmund’s rage after he lost custody of one of his creations, which I will say is a shitty move by Edmund, but I’m glad Danny doesn’t regret working for him.

I heard about Forever when it was first announced but comepletely forgot about it after the fact. After watching your video, i wanted to point out a few little things about this (from whats been shown) 1. To me the appeal of super meat boys artstyle is how it felt like a classic newgrounds game, especially in the cutscenes, it had that charm to it with the blurry lines, character rigging, zoom ins, etc, and while the cutscenes in forever look really nice by an animation standpoint, i feel like it completely forgets the what made the og games animations work in the first place, it felt purposeful. 2. I remember Edmund himself stating in an interview with Vinny Vinesauce during his isaac rebirth streams that he saw procedural generation as the future of video games, and while i agree to a certain extent, i feel like their needs to be a limit to it because meat boy is not made for it, the og or forever. Super was about its impecable level design, and you cant have a maticulously crafted level refined to near perfection with procedural generation, mainly because it breaks up the pace, and thats evident in Forever. It wants you to memorize everything and get into a groove but thats impossible if after you finish a level everything you've learned get thrown out the window due to it being different every time, also, since these peices of level are made with pg in mind, they are a lot less focused and lack refinement, like you said, quantity over quality. 3. I feel like this game is a great reminder that a single idea is never enough to carry a full game, they started off thinking "what if we made meat boy an auto runner", the fact that they started off with the express goal of making it a auto runner instead of thinking if it was the right genre for meatboy was in itself flawed, you cant just take an already existing game and expect it to work with any genre, you have to see what works, and auto runners dont work for presicion, especially when every time you play a level its completely different, meaning that even if you managed to memorize it the first time, good luck with next time, if it would have stayed as a small expirament it would have been fine as a test of how it could be. I definitely feel like labeling it as a sequal made it seem even worse then what it could have been had it stayed a spinoff. Overall great video The editing is good, your commentary was enjoyable and im always a fan of videos that talk about media not many have talked about or payed much attention to and explain why it may have been that way. I look forward to more in the future :)

Indie developers often slap an IP they made onto an otherwise unrelated game in order to catch lightning in a bottle again. This often backfires with the fanbase openly expressing their disappointment in essentially being tricked into playing something they wouldn't be interested in under the pretense of it being something they actually want. Darkest Dungeon is currently going through something similar right now.

didnt realize this actually, finally, came out until going to pax prime last year and the spot team meat had been occupying, showing off this game at since 2014, was filled by someone else. I was so excited demoing this and meeting Tommy in 2014 lol and eventually it just became a cute and comfy relic that every year, no matter the pax, you could count on these guys showing off their silly runner game that looked almost finished six years ago.

14:20 Fun Fact: The animator Paul Ter Voorde is mostly well know for animating the Eddsworld Legacy Eddisodes and helping out on the Sonic Mania Intro

I don't think the alternative ost they introduced is bad by any margin I just think it's just so far removed from what the original was going for it just becomes a little jarring, at least you swap back to the original in the options menu

I think the best way I’ve heard SMBF described is “it’s like if you took The Binding of Isaac and made it so every run had the exact same floor layout, rooms, items, and bosses.” It fundamentally changes what made the OG Super Meat Boy so good and doesn’t build upon it or even try to distance itself enough mechanically to work well.

With the new soundtrack in the Meatboy re-release, I think these songs are honestly pretty good listens. Like "throw another banjo into the fire" is very good. However, these do not fit meat boy. The metal/rock music did. These aren't bad tracks in the slightest, they just needed to be in a different game or not in a game that already had a specific style in music.

Edmund McMillen was the creative force behind Super Meat Boy. Without him, well... we get this

Moral of the story: want a proper sequel to Meat Boy? Play the platformer made by the actual creator of Meat Boy :) Even then though The End Is Nigh is just about one of the best precision platformers out there and I swear I'm not biased because it's made by Edmund

You know what, the concepts of randomly generated levels and auto running could work in meat boy, however rather than make it the main game, reserve the bonus levels to those gimmicks. Why not each world has an endless level where you have to go as far as possible and get the best score. the level is randomly generated using chuncks from the world the level takes place and you gain a point for each chunk completed, so the chapter 1 endless level will use layouts and gimmicks from chapter 1 specifically. Meanwhile the auto running could work but the stages would function as Rayman Legends esc music stages where you need to jump and punch to the beat of several popular songs from various indie games like the Cave Story theme, Geometry Dash's Deadlocked, or Binding of Isasc's Mom Boss Fight theme, that would be epic while also keeping the indie references.

what meat is he made of

awesome video i liked when meat boy meated all over mr. fetal

Honestly my least favorite part about super meat boy forever is just the fact that at the end, they had the weird thing with meat boy and bandage girl getting older, they shouldve doubled down on that instead of making dr fetus a cosmic being, and had a grown up nugget fighting a baby/toddler dr fetus. Would've made for a much more cool and fitting boss

Just as an FYI, the speedrun timer was added in a patch after release at the request of the SMBF speedrun community. We often do set seed runs where we've used a formula to determine the fastest seed, and the timer allows us to get an accurate IGT for the leaderboards. It feels a little harsh to call its inclusion "pathetic".

Finally, a SMBF review that isn't just "buuuh its not like the original." Something always felt off about gameplay, but you put it into words

short recap what i learned from this vid: 1. meatboy going from being good game to rayman knockoff 2. ridiculon isnt bad, but isnt good either, they should have contacted mudeth to make the music 3. when main conceptart creator leaves its always downfall

It's a shame that Edmund and Tommy had different visions and trajectories at the time, so Edmund left. It is what it is. I wonder if they'll team up again some day. But not everything lasts Forever, and that's okay.

I'm playing Super Meat Boy right now since it was on sale on Xbox for like $1.50 (it was the 360 version so I can play with the original music on a modern platform thanks to backwards compatibility). I'm on world 5 right now and have done a decent amount of the dark world levels. I'm really enjoying my time with this game. It is crazy how the very second I saw footage of Forever through this video I could tell it wasn't anywhere near the gameplay of the first. Forever really obviously should have stayed a spinoff. Shovel Knight has a similar situation of after a dry spell a new game not based on the original game's gameplay is being released (Shovel Knight Dig). The difference is that they are stating really clearly that it is a spinoff and the time since the last Shovel Knight expansion has only been three years. Even if Dig is disappointing as a spinoff it has more leeway for doing its own thing and the base game was not long ago. Those few differences make a world of difference when comparing Super Meat Boy to Shovel Knight.

Your character is super adorable I love them

This is competently edited and put together. Well done. I can’t say I agree with most of it but it’s always nice to see a new creator. Congrats on putting out a good video

this vid wasn't only better than a lot of people's first videos in this style, it's already on par with a lot of later stuff people put out in their time posting videos onto this site. Can't wait to see what you continue to put out going forward ^^ Also, i'll be honest your thumbnail really enticed me to click the video, i thought your OC was some kind of new meat boy lore character and i was like woah. I really like it though!

Not done watching the video yet, but this game would've been much better if it was just Super Meat Boy but with the ability to punch stuff. Seriously, just A for jump, RT for dashing, and X to punch stuff in front of you. It would have the same simplicity that SMB is known for while having just enough to make it an actual sequel.

Meatball: This game is dreadful Me: You’re playing a Super Meat Boy game, what were you expecting?

epic vid super meat ball

I came to this video because I just beat the game. It was so much more in depth than I expected for an autorunner! I'm not sure if it lives up to the original, but for what it is, it's genius.

Meatball: "Ridiculon is not bad at composing. Far from it, actually!" Meatball (earlier in the video): 5:54

The original Newgrounds Meatboy didn’t ran so slow. I played it and beat it when it came out. The gameplay shown must have been recorded with some sort of bad setup. The game was great and received some awards in the website.

I think this game has the world record for most time, money, and effort put into a game that the least people wanted. EVERYBODY was saying no to the infinite runner thing, even when it was presented as a short term side project.

It’ll be fun to see how the channels humor and editing develop its own personality as time goes on

We all understand that the developers called the game a sequel, just to promote the game. I believe that if they had not been lying and presented the game as an experimental spinoff for mobile phones, which it essentially is and was intended to be, then they would not have received such hatred towards the game. I played Super Meat Boy Forever on my phone and I can say that this is one of the best mobile games I've played, but no more. Very convenient and simple controls, good graphics and some difficulty, but this game is definitely not a sequel.

I actually had more fun with the forever than the og, but I understand some of your points

I was just about to leave a comment about The End Is Nigh being the "true" sequel to SMB, glad I waited for the end where you mention it. Good on you, and great video.

4:03 if they don't want to make a sequel, but people beg them for years, they shouldn't complain that a game that's not even mend to exist is not god like in quality

I wanna put in my two cents on more of a feeling type of thing with this game and the original. The original made me scared as a kid, like it genuinely kept me up one night after seeing all the cutscenes, while with this game it feels more suited for a kid to look at nowadays. I just feel like this game captures what businesses are becoming when it comes to games that are scary, they’re pandering more to kids. Like if I wanted to show a kid something that would keep them up at night, I would show them the og, while if I wanted to have them to feel more safe, I would show them this game. I do wanna apologize if any of this sounds stupid or makes no sense, I just wanted to put in my two cents.

Me vibin to the Forrest funk in the background

Nice editing on the vid! Really got some Sequelitis vibes from it, while explaining your thoughts clearly. I don't agree with a lot of your points, but there's one where you're absolutely right (16:20): the player barely has time to react to the stage design, and just ends up dying over and over, until (s)he memorizes each necessary movement, thus taking out the fun of going through the stage yourself. I got through the game, but that's the reason I didn't get as nearly interested or had fun as I did in the first game

this is really good!! i was really surprised when i realised this is your first video

It’s wild hearing your voice without twitter space compression. I honestly wasn’t aware the level design was auto generated. That sounds like hell for this type of game and seeing some of the gameplay from this vid it be like that😭 You did a very great job on editing this video yo. Excellent first venture. I wish you luck making more!

I love your style, I'm looking forward to what you'll upload next!

Really awesome video! I'm glad this got in my recommendations!

I never took a close look at Super Meat Boy Forever outside of watching a video on the unlockable characters and the bosses. It just felt disappointing and not worthwhile, but I never understood how-so. You capture that same feeling and explain it pretty well here, good stuff! Though I will add that the Super Meat Boy 5th Anniversary Soundtrack is golden, despite its differences from the original.

How tf has this not have more views, you’re fucking amazing

watch out scott the woz, theres a new video game reviewer in town

Fact: Minecraft used to be an indie game, and it's still classified as an indie game in the play store!

this is super good content I was very surprized to see only one video up on your channel

Great video, hope to see more of you in the near future ^^

Man, this video is amazing. Well done!

Awesome first upload!(I think) Can’t wait to see what more you do!

Good first vid, bro! I'm excited to see what other topics you made videos on!!

Hey! Nice editing! Great video can’t wait for more.

"hard platforming" *shows the i wanna be the guy level* meatball please im trying to go one day without war flashbacks

woah, never seen your content before, but I am officially a fan, great video, keep it up. ive never actually played meat boy but now im downloading it as I write this lmao! good shit.

Ok so like I would write an entire essay trying to defend super meat boy but it would legit just boil down to “that’s just your opinion.”

Oh wow! Surprised to see this was your first video!! Looks really good, subbed and can't wait to see what you make next!

New commentary channel? Hell yeah, keep it up!

SOME of the new tracks are way better in my opinion. (Ch 1 as a whole, Ch 2 map, and light world, And the menu music.)

So basically you don't like the game because it's an auto-runner. I won't commentate on the story art style and audio because it's subjective for the major part. - 14:54 comparing a SMBF level to the meat golem is very weird. Meat Golem is bad because it's a glorified 1 minute auto scroller that you have to learn to beat the boss. Saying that you have to learn the levels in SMBF is a huge reach. You can easily beat sections in one try thanks to reflexes and quick thinking, granted when the level-design is clear enough because, you know, procedural generation but this happens most of the time,. Also since its an auto-runner, movement options comes from environnement. It's a shame you don't talk about it. - 16:32 learning the level-design is just the same except you have to run the whole time, i don't see your point here. I could say that the first SMB is boring because you just have to memorize the spots where you have to jump. - 16:57 6 levels that goes from 45 seconds to 2 minutes when some SMB levels goes on for 10 sec or less. Using Procedural generation for level enhance replayability. SMBF emphasises on that because each runs will be different but you'l seel your skill progression increase as you complete more runs (that's why there is a speedrun timer, in case you want to perform on a certain seed or just see your progress through each runs) - 17:58 Yeah checkpoint in sections because if you actually had to restart the level from the beggining just like in the first game it would be a chore. I thought it was obvious. - 20:02 That's a shame. Pacifier is a great way to make you think about the level design and your movement options and provides a really intresting challenge putting your brain and skill at task. Since dying reset the timer you have all the time you want to think about how to get them too. - 20:48 Uhm... What? If there is one thing that SMBF does better than SMB it's the bosses. Half of the bosses in the first one are dogshit (Meat Golem, CHAD, Larry jr.), either script that you have to learn or a waiting room till it dies, when the bosses of SMBF revolves around timing and precision 'except for the last boss, i agree with you on this one). Criticizing the gameplay because it's different and not paying attention on why these decisions were made is a bit faulty. The sequel point isn't a valid criticism in my opinion. Fallout for example did it, switching the top RPG view for an fps gameplay and they made it cool in New Vegas making two intresting gameplay for a same franchise. This game has flaws that's for sure, saying it's garbage just because it's boring is kinda meh for an analysis.

This game gives me duke nukem forever flashbacks

Was blown away when I went to your channel to see what other videos I could watch that you've made and found out this is your first vid. Fantastic editing and video as a whole. Subscribed. Great job.

Video really good! Hope you make more, and the end is nigh is my favorite platformer too!

"...and I spent a bit of time trying to get the perfect run on the Test Your Meat challenge." I did it because i have skill

I'm still at the beginning of the video, but I just wanted to say that I don't think the remixed tracks for the original Super Meat Boy you showed in 6:08 sound worse than their original counterparts, they just sound different. What I will admit is that they don't have the same tension as the originals and don't really match the level they're in.

i just checked your channel to see more great videos and i realised this is your first video so entertaining

"The story is so stupid" I hear you, but the idea a dude with no skin fighting a fetus in a suit leading to anything else doesn't feel right to me

For a first video this was very well done and one of the best reviews for this game I have seen! Can’t wait for more content!

2:17 wait wait wait hold on... you're telling me I'm just a few months older than super meat boy??? Awesome

I always wondered what happened with this game. While the new mechanics look cool and tight at parts, having little time to process things and just memorizing button inputs looks less like Meat Boy and more like Bit.Trip.Runner. (At which point, I'd rather recommend to play that instead. Getting in-the-zone is a very zen experience). Regardless, that was a great informative video. Here's hoping for a more proper Meatboy in the future! PD: @MoskiDraws here. Friends linked me to this video and I got humbled to see my artwork featured on it. Thanks a lot!

I haven't played this, but your footage makes it look sick actually! I'm going to have to check it out.

One thing that you didn't mention is how obvious it is that the characters in the game are supposed to be a kind of self insert for edmund, his wife and his child. These characters were very personal for edmund. So its weird having someone else having complete control over them.

Broski really got 80k views on his first video damn💀💀💀

Exploding out the gate with a damn quality video. Easy sub.

As someone who really enjoyed the heck out of the first SMB, and rage like hell just to go again and celebrate like a maniac to finally beat a level, you dont know how sad makes me hear all the things you said, because they are true im very disappointed by how the game came out, not even by the fact that is an autorunner, that doesnt bother me as much as other things where the game fails, is sad that a sequel that i waited so long ended up being a pile of broken dreams the part that most hurted me were the bossfights, i thought that with the punching mechanics they would do a lot more actives, but more charming than the ones for the first games surely my hopes were too high :c i really wish that, if they are planning to do a sequel (which, by the ending scene, i can say that at least the have the idea), return to the old formula, but add features that could make the game more entertaining than the first one

This is your first video?? This is really well done, like actually good job

There is another reason you should get the pacifiers because it can unlock a secret boss fight in the final world, except you ARE the boss. This is the one time where I think the auto run mechanic works well since its a race of course.

when i was going to try the meat boy games for the first time, i bought the sequel and disliked the game, weeks later i discovered that i got the wrong one. i played the first and really enjoyed it!

No way this is your first vid, it's great and has really good quality

I got the New Game Plush of this game, planned on playing this first before finally trying the first game, maybe mod it for the og soundtrack

I played the original Meat Boy and it was one of the best platformer games that I ever played. For SMB Forever I felt really bad even tho I like auto-runners, especially when I found out that this game is random Everything felt off and nothing like the original I loved EDIT: As for changing genre, sometimes changing it can help the franchise to stand out. For example: POSTAL was a dark shooter game, where you exterminate certain locations, but POSTAL 2 was entirely different, it was a FPS game, but this game is a comedy about U.S. and violence in video games

Super meat boy and Celeste are what I think of when I think of flash game platformers. These are just a lot bigger

You put a lot of effort Into this for your first video and did a Damm good job

Good video can’t wait to see more

While i loved both meat boy games i woulxld love another meat boy game that feels like the original

First video of yours that I watched and i already wanna subscribe :3

Great video! Hope to see more from you!

It's nice to see a fledgling youtuber starting out with some great quality content. Subbing before you reach 100k.

WHAT YOURE THE ONE BEHIND THE CUT CONTENT TWITTER PAGE NO WAY LMAO great video btw!! Subbed

They should make a game where people can make their own Super Meat Boy levels. That way, instead of Team Meat having to make more games, the player base could beat their own meat!

I swear to god if this becomes a pattern for game sequels with “forever” in the title i will-

great video! The moment you told me the game was procedurally generated, my jaw dropped

My favorite part of super meat boy is when he said “its meatin time” and meatted all over those guys

Made a whole channel just to praise your favorite game. That must be a power play if ever we’re there one

This is an extremely high quality video for a channel of your (current) size.

This rules, and I love your avatar! Subscribed 🥰

this is incredibly well made for a first upload!! looking forward to whatever you make next