Favorite Level Types in Video Games (not music)

[Glass Joe]

So, if you've played a lot of video games you'll know that a lot of them share a lot of settings. There's usually boring grassy level 1 areas, and the difficult, daring final boss areas, and everything in between. Which level theme do you generally like the most out of all of them, because of their visuals, music, gimmicks, or other things?

My favorite level theme overall is Ice, because yes, even though they have the dreaded ice physics, they tend to have loving amazing music.

[Ad Bot]

[maplelink64]

a good fire/volcano level
Can also have a good theme

[TheABELBOTO]

Ice levels have good music but obviously the best levels are underwater ones.

[Qwepir]

you left out the best ice world music ever

[Obliviongate20]

THE LEVELS WITH TONS OF ACTUALLY HARD ENEMIES
like not the dark souls 'these guys do lots a damages so it's hard', the punch-out 'this guy is hard to beat because of the way he fights' kind of enemies

i'm also very disappointed you didn't put phendrana drifts in the op

[Epicduke]

i don't have a favorite, but I do have a least favorite
water levels
damn them all to hell, I've never had a fun water level

[Xealyth]

you left out the best ice world music ever

I disagree

[Bushido]

space levels are the best but they have to be the last or next-to-last stage or they lose all their oomph

dead line was a good example

[Ragequit]

city levels are great too

[Dreams_Of_Cheese]

my favorite levels are the ones where the game flips the table and throws a curveball at you
a really good example would be the base defense mission in xcom, where you play offense in every mission until the aliens attack your headquarters out of nowhere

also as a devout arma fanboy im absolutely in love with uninteresting empty fields and stuffty villages. there's something cathartic about playing a ridiculously hard game in a realistic setting and coming out on top of it in the end. esp when you start getting overwhelmed and legit scared. you really start to feel like you're gonna die and its a beautiful thing to experience in a game

[Flamecannon]

like not the dark souls 'these guys do lots a damages so it's hard', the punch-out 'this guy is hard to beat because of the way he fights' kind of enemies

to be frank both games have both asforementioned things

[JJJMan4]

Because of Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze, the savanna my favorite theme. I also love the same theme in Sonic Unleashed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8cNLoNMAIw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRVUfDKJYro

[Obliviongate20]

to be frank both games have both asforementioned things

do tell
i ain't tryna start an argument but from what i've played and seen of, dark souls is just hard because of the enemies do a ton of damage, other then that they're just straight-forward 'walk up and hit you sometimes do a special move' ai

[ChexGuy331]

E1M6 of Doom is probably my absolute favorite map. It's called "Central Processing" but uh...it's got some techbase look to it with a bunch of slime pools. Not sure what that qualifies as.

[Bushido]

do tell
i ain't tryna start an argument but from what i've played and seen of, dark souls is just hard because of the enemies do a ton of damage, other then that they're just straight-forward 'walk up and hit you sometimes do a special move' ai

punch out's got mr sandman who can basically but not necessarily literally one-hit you with a variety of attacks but that makes sense because he's just an unforgiving version of the rest of the fighters you've fought and it makes MORE sense considering he's the final boss

dark souls is unforgiving even on an enemy-to-enemy level so not only can you not get hit without getting either instantly killed or beaten to the brink of disaster, but you can't observe how enemy attacks work beyond 'ok, i think i'm safe now, so i'll sneak in a combo of my own'

like punch out is difficult because you're presented with a challenge the game wants you to overcome and are presented with all the rules and the mechanics you need in order to beat the challenge with proper execution, wheras dark souls is difficult (for lack of a better term i guess) through its deliberate obfuscatation it's challenges and its philosophy of making you play very cautiously in order to proceed at all as opposed to taking a step in, seeing what happens and then taking a step out to process the new information

souls (excluding bloodborne) (because i haven't played bloodborne) strikes me as realistic but not in an interesting way is the thing. hardcore for the sake of being hardcore instead of hardcore in order to prove some sort of point (beyond 'you cant beat this challenge which makes you a BIG NERD')