🌟 Celeste and Farewells

Hey there,

Today's Listening: Farewell

Is it really that simple to say goodbye?

Celeste has one of the best environmental/layered/shadow stories ever. I waited very patiently for it to arrive, and it was so worth it.

So what makes it so great?

(spoiler zone ahead)

So Granny dies

Madeline is understandably upset, so she goes to "space?" to try and bring her back.

What ensues is both a brilliant amount of bonus gameplay, and some sneaky storytelling.

The gameplay is - once again - not for the feint of heart. The difficulty is somewhere between the B and C sides, which is like somewhere between herding cats and herding lions.

And in one of the coolest moves ever, the developer actually teaches you an advanced speed running technique.

For those outside the know, Celeste has a rich speedrunning scene, because the game was 100% made with speedrunners in mind. There is a variety of moves you can pull off in the game that exponentially accelerate your speed, and many of which that can skip some parts of the base game.

So the devs teach us Wavedashing in a very entertaining cutesy manner, and then put a gun to our head and say "Now do it 5000 times".

(Wavedashing is not easy)

So, the gameplay is its signature brutal self once again.

The story though, is a little more interesting.

Madeline is grief ridden by Granny's death and proceeds through the 5 stages of grief in an obvious not so obvious manner. The writing is strong as usual, but the interesting part is contained within the gameplay levels themselves.

During the "Anger" phase, there is a lot more spikes and hazards in very claustrophobic rooms, while the "Acceptance" phase is punctuated with high speed movement and a more uplifting color palette. And of course, the music helps too by blending a signature motif throughout the tracks found within this level.

It once again uses its difficulty to portray a very real phenomena and does it in a way that evokes a response from the player.

It is very likely the player themselves will go through some stages of grief while playing. And if I had to guess, it would be Anger -> Depression -> Acceptance...of the fact that yes you totally finished the game and there actually is nothing left.

Parting truly is such sweet sorrow in three parts.