Game #21 – Super Meat Boy

Publisher: Team Meat

Developer: Team Meat

Platforms: PC/Xbox 360/Wii

Every so often you hear about one game a year that's damned hard. Hard as balls, harder than hell...you get the idea. But you barely hear about the kind of games that do hard difficulty well – wherein you learn from your mistakes and succeed that way. This is exactly the case with Super Meat Boy, arguably one of the hardest, and best games of the year.

The story is the simple video game story of Meat Boy (literally, a wad of meat) saving his girlfriend Bandage Girl, from the evil Dr Fetus (whom is literally a fetus in a glass jar, with a suit, top had and monocle). Right from the get go, the platforming is precise and near perfect – your death is not a result of the game cheating, but a fault on your end. Finally beating a level ends with the satifsying sight of watching all your attempts play out at once.

It also doesn't help that part of Super Meat Boy's charm is its love and respect for other games. Sure, the intros to each world harken back to classic games (such as Street Fighter II and Castlevania), but it also doesn't help that there are plenty of retro styled warp zones and playable cameos from other notable indie games – such as Braid, Machinarium, Castle Crashers, N, I Wanna Be The Guy, Bit.Trip.Beat and more. And all play exactly as you'd think they would.

If you don't mind a bit of difficulty, check out Super Meat Boy – the game that's going on sale all the damned time, and so worth it. That also said, check out its predecessor Meat Boy on Newgrounds!