The Abyss by zYuko - 100% | Geometry Dash 2.2
This very well be my new favorite level in the game.
From the gameplay to the story, everything about this level is almost perfect. While there were many times I got annoyed, almost every time it felt like my fault rather than the level's, which is honestly rare for a GD level. Yuko having already made my favorite insane demon (Moon), it was no surprise I would adore this level too.
The story this level tells is unmatched, in part thanks to the storytelling abilities unlocked with platformer mode. Descending into a deep chasm underwater until the very fabric of reality breaks, and you find yourself in a realm incomprehensible to any mortal being, said to show you whatever makes you happy, but it's nothing more than an empty void of eternal nothingness... as cheesy as it sounds when I describe it like that, the way it utilizes the skill and determination you feel when playing a platformer level as difficult as this makes it an absolute masterpiece of an experience, especially when considering this was made in the first month of 2.2. Unfortunately the spike sound effect bug kind of ruined the immersion of the ending lol, but hopefully that will be fixed soon.
The gameplay is obviously unbalanced, but that honestly just adds to the experience and the intensity. The one part I found slightly annoying was layer 5, I could not for the life of me find a consistent way to do those blue orb timings. The rest of the level, while I know people hate on this tight gameplay style, it's honestly the best type of platformer gameplay in my opinion and I hope we get more skill-based stuff like this rather than garbage RNG bossfights (I'm looking at you Stella Infection). This level totally also ended up being easier than I expected, I over-practiced it a lot so I ended up beating it in 2 hours when I expected to take 8+ hours lol. Despite that, it's the most attempts I've ever spent on a level, probably thanks to layer 6 checkpoint 2, which is definitely the hardest checkpoint by far. I'm happy to have beat this while it was the top 1 (rated) platformer, this will likely be the last time I am able to ever do that considering the difficulty of some of the upcoming top 1s.
To summarize, everything about this level is incredible. From the gameplay, to the story progression, to even the sound design (minus the looping bug), all of it is incredible. I'm glad this level has been solidified as a top 1 platformer, it's the perfect level for the title.
Enjoyment: 99/100
Difficulty: medium-tier extreme demon (around Glide/Niflheim difficulty)
Attempts: 13,232
also the day this video goes live marks 8 years since i bought gd for the first time on mobile! playing this game for 8 years has been insane, thank you to robtop and the gd community for all the memories :)