Yggdrasil

72nd : Yggdrasil Make a Good Mega Man Level 2

"Sorry, am I interrupting you guys? Can you give me directions?"

Overview Creator(s): Zatsupachi Programmer(s): Zatsupachi Artist(s): Zatsupachi Composer(s): Motoi Sakuraba, Michiru Yamane, Yasuhiro Ichihashi Statistics Scores: 25 24 5 18 4 Total: 15.2 / 50 Rank: 72nd Elements: 3 Enemies: Bombomb Rabbit Sear Super Joe Wild Gunner Gimmicks: Quick Laser (drain, instant-kill) Screen Wrap Yoku Block Bosses: Crator Cream Kichona Other Information: Skippable Enjl's Least Favorite ACESpark's Least Favorite

Theme Music Valkyrie Profile - Mission to Deep Space Crator: Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia - Sorrow's Distortion Cream: Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia - Dissonant Courage Kichona: Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia - Prediction of Insanity Stage Order Location: Tier 2 Previous: Airflow Hubble Next: Rush City

"Yggdrasil, the world tree! As a robot with woodland heritage, I really appreciate this level, even if the judges didn't!"

―Wood Man, commenting on Yggdrasil

Yggdrasil is the 72nd place entry of Make a Good Mega Man Level 2. Named after the sacred tree from Norse cosmology, it is a maze-like stage with a pseudo-3D perspective, multiple exits, and a non-Euclidean screen wrapping gimmick, and (at around 92 screens) is one of the larger levels in the contest. The level also features three characters from Zatsupachi's original series, Cutezome Mythos, all of whom are (very quickly) introduced early on before acting as the bosses of each separate path.

While the level is mostly open-ended, it is primarily divided into a "blue" path focused on Quick Lasers and a "green" path focused on Yoku Blocks, as well as a small "pink" path that branches off from the former two. However, the pink path cannot be completed without first collecting the Energy Elements from the blue and green paths in previous playthroughs. Fortunately, there exist teleporters throughout the level that can take Mega Man to other areas, including a pair that will take him to the end of the opposite path.

Strategy

The level starts off with a featureless stretch of terrain, before Mega Man walks in on the Cutezome trio infodumping to themselves, apparently oblivious to his presence. The text will scroll by faster than most players will be able to read it, but almost nothing important is discussed beyond the three splitting up to different parts of the level to man three terminals. Once they walk offscreen, Mega Man comes to a choice between two ladders; one leading up into a blue area, the other down into a green area.

Blue Path – Crator

A series of Quick Lasers blocked by walls appear to foreshadow the main threat of the path, but deceptively, all the lasers from this point are instant death, instead of the drain variants seen in the first screen. However, the Flash Stopper can be used to temporarily freeze their countdowns and get past them safely. Quickly kill the Super Joe above with a Charge Shot or Special Weapons, then run left before a set of criss-crossing Quick Lasers shoot from the walls and ceiling. What follows is a gauntlet of screens Mega Man must run through before lasers block off passages, forcing him to commit suicide. The screen wrap is often involved in avoiding the lasers, with one screen having lasers that move slightly quicker than Mega Man, forcing him to loop around from the left and pop out to the right. In the midst of this gauntlet is a breather room with a checkpoint.

The screen after the checkpoint is a confusing screen wrap maze, again filled with lasers that will block off paths. Moving onto the next screen requires crossing through the middle-right screen boundary; the Flash Stopper is a useful tool for temporarily freezing the lasers and bypassing the maze altogether. However, two apparent screen wrap points (both on the bottom corners of the screen) are really death pits, so avoid falling down them if at all possible. Taking the left ladder upwards, meanwhile, leads to a small alcove with an E-Tank, which loops back around to the checkpoint. A pair of Wild Gunners and Sears bombard Mega Man with their attacks on the next screen; though the latter are easily dealt with, the former are best killed by using the Jewel Satellite to reflect their spamshots back at them. A split path guarded by a Super Joe soon appears; one a drop down to the pink path, the other a continuation of the blue path.

By continuing the blue path, there are more Quick Laser challenges to run through, again using screen wrapping to some degree. One notable screen within this path features a Super Joe, but no lasers; Mega Man can reach the left side of the screen by jumping over some spikes in the bottom right, or he can slide to the bottom and find a Yashichi guarded by two Bombombs. Another has a horizontal laser on the bottom and two vertical lasers right next to each other; without using the Flash Stopper, Mega Man must carefully jump through a screen wrap point to warp himself onto the other side of the lasers. This is harder than it looks, as he can easily clip into the floor and die if he jumps the wrong way. After that screen, keep moving no matter what; a set of lasers come down from the top and bottom of the screen, trying to block off each platform. Guarding a set of ladders are a series of Rabbits; the bottom two are a branching pathway to the pink path (again involving outrunning Quick Lasers), while the top two lead to a teleporter that warps Mega Man to the end of the green path. Just beyond the four ladders, meanwhile, is the door to the blue path's boss, Crator.

Green Path – Cream

After a short drop that telegraphs the use of Yoku Blocks and spikes, a short set of Yoku Block puzzles over pits occur. The second of these acts as an introduction to the screen wrapping gimmick, since the only way to proceed is to fall down the pit and onto a platform in the top-left of the screen. The screen directly afterwards features a ladder and a pit on the left; against all sound logic and reason, do not take the ladder downwards, as it warps Mega Man to the top of the screen (and onto a set of spikes). Instead, either drop down the pit while avoiding the spikes, or jump from the last Yoku Block while holding up to climb an invisible ladder that wraps to the bottom of the screen, then take the pit. Shortly afterwards is an empty screen that serves as a checkpoint.

In the next room, Yoku Blocks in a more complex series of patterns appear; however, the screen has screen wrapping, so it's easier to wrap around to the top and stick to the right before the blocks allow a way forward. A Super Joe and Wild Gunner appear here; as on the blue path, it's wise to use the Jewel Satellite to block their danmaku shots rather than trying to dodge them normally. A ladder to the pink path appears on the top, while the green path continues on a ladder down below. Taking the lower ladder leads to a room with Yoku Blocks over spikes. Though the tileset obfuscates it a little, there is a slide passage on the left that wraps around to the right. Not long afterwards is a screen with an advancing maze of Yoku Blocks, but by staying as close to the top layer of blocks as possible, it can be easily crossed. Right before the next checkpoint is a screen with Yoku Blocks arranged in a smiley face, and an E-Tank on a high ledge impossible to reach without using a utility like the Rush Jet.

The screen below has a choice of three paths to drop down, although the rightmost one requires the Rush Jet or Super Arrow to reach. On the bottom left of the screen below, jumping over the spikes to the left leads to a secret area with a Yashichi, which wraps back around to the checkpoint. Jumping to the right side of the screen on either the top or bottom corners leads to the final part of the path. Both the upper and lower paths contain a long section of tricky Yoku Block patterns over spikes and a bottomless pit, with a decoy block on the lower path, and a block that appears directly above Mega Man on the upper path. Using Rush Jet to fly past all the blocks is advised if possible. The very last part of the path contains three ladders before Cream's door, two of which go down to a teleporter that warps Mega Man to the area just before Crator. The upper ladder leads to a series of Yoku Block puzzles that act as an alternate way of reaching the pink path; many of which require the Wheel Cutter to scale.

Pink Path – Kichona

Accessing the pink path requires going through at least the first half of either the blue or green paths first. The ends of both paths also feature ladders to pathways towards the end of the pink path, but taking them is largely not recommended as getting to them wastes time. Instead, the blue path is the quickest way to reach the pink path thanks to its lack of time-consuming enemies and Yoku Blocks. Regardless of the path taken, both are mostly the same, with multiple platforms over a pit, while enemies try to knock Mega Man off with their multiple shots. The Jewel Satellite remains the weapon of choice here. Both paths also have secret shortcuts via transparent ladders (with the top path hiding its behind a fake spike). Taking them leads to an area with spikes that need to be scaled with either the Super Arrow or Wheel Cutter; going left from here takes Mega Man to a large, non-functioning portal with an M-Tank.

Both paths eventually meet up in a long vertical area filled with ladders, with Kichona's boss door lying in a small screen to the right. If Mega Man hasn't defeated both Crator and Cream in prior playthroughs, the door will not open for him. Back in the large vertical area, a small room close to the large portal contains a smaller portal with four ? Cans. This portal will take Mega Man back to the start of the level with no quick way to return, as the "late" entrances to the pink path found right at the end of the blue and green paths are intended to be one-way, preventing Mega Man from going back through them to reach the necessary boss.

Skip Status

Yggdrasil was made skippable as a result of its long and confusing level design (in particular, the screen wrap is janky, lacks a visual indicator, and is often inconsistently used), and overall high level of difficulty from both the stage itself and all three bosses. Said bosses were also explicitly banned from the Mega Arena, as each of them are fast, deal large amounts of damage (up to and including one-hit kills), are immune to most weapons, and (in Kichona's case) can heal themselves.

Judge Comments

Judge Comments
snoruntpyro  : 25 / 50
Design Fun Creativity Aesthetics Functionality Skip Teleporter? 2 / 15 3 / 10 15 / 15 4 / 5 1 / 5 Yes WHY
JupiHornet  : 24 / 50
Design Fun Creativity Aesthetics Functionality 1 / 15 2 / 10 15 / 15 4 / 5 2 / 5 I'm gonna be honest, what did I just play? No one is gonna be able to beat this without dying several times unless they've already memorized the stage. The Force Beam sections were cheap and there was nothing showing were the lasers would come from. Some of the Yoku block sections were cool, but there was a jump in one of them that REQUIRED Rush Jet or Super Arrow to get across. The enemies flood the screen with projectiles and you're almost guaranteed to get hit by them unless you know where they all are. In some sections, there are instant warps and pits next to each other with no distinction between the two. This is all very unfortunate, because the stage is creative and looks really cool! You have to design your levels with other players in mind!
Enjl  : 5 / 50
Design Fun Creativity Aesthetics Functionality Skip Teleporter? 0 / 15 1 / 10 2 / 15 1 / 5 1 / 5 Yes Usually in my reviews, if a level fails at something I try to isolate this point of failure and give feedback and ideas on how to iron it out to make the level better. In this review, I will omit the latter part, because if all of the level's issues were ironed out, the level would be a completely different level. This level's issues basically boil down to fundamental principles of game design and it manages to fail in terms of clarity, fairness, difficulty curve, guidance, boss design and consistency alike. This level basically asks the player to fully understand how the level is laid out, where every trap lies, how to deal with the incredibly powerful and spammy enemies, and how to fight each of the 3 bosses and in which order to fight them before they even start playing. I'm trying hard to find a redeemable aspect of this level, and I'm sorry, but I can't find one.
Garirry  : 18 / 50
Design Fun Creativity Aesthetics Functionality 3 / 15 3 / 10 7 / 15 4 / 5 1 / 5 Uhhhhhhhhh... what? The level design is honestly pretty shit. Most enemies are unavoidable, lasers are unexpected, and there's more. It's bad. It was irritating. A little fun, but it gets old really, really fast. I kinda liked the ideas here... but it just doesn't really seem to work right. Music is good, graphics are ok. Okay no, I can't forgive this. You don't know where the collisions are, the dialogue is fucked, and everything else is just so glitchy. Okay, there's just so much wrong with this level. Let's start with the basics, the boss sprites are bad, and their designs remind me of very bad OCs. Also, their dialogue is hard to read and scrolls way too fast. Then, the level itself isn't even that good, in fact, far from it. The Yoku Blocks and Quick Lasers are often unpredictable and hard to get through. The placement of overpowered enemies is absolutely awful. Not to mention the boss fights are cheap and random. Then comes the main problem: this level is extremely buggy. I'm often not even sure where the collisions are, the whole warp to the other side of the screen thing is hardly working, and there are plenty of graphical bugs. I honestly can't say anything else. I liked the music choices but it's just so bad!
ACESpark  : 4 / 50
Design Fun Creativity Aesthetics Functionality Skip Teleporter? 0 / 15 0 / 10 4 / 15 0 / 5 0 / 5 Yes That was among the least enjoyable Mega Man experiences I have ever had. Worse than half the nonsense zero effort rom hacks of Rockman 2, more unplayable than those garbage mobile phone ports, more annoying than the Upon a Star OVA, and yes, worse than X7 and its stupid face. I will gladly fight Flame Hyenard again and again, with full sound, rather than play this stage again. Hell I'd happily go through X7 with all the sound replaced with Flame Hyenard vocal cues. My friends, any Let's Players - if you are going to skip any level in this contest - make it this one. I cannot understate how un-fun this stage was. I was stuck in this level for over an hour on my first passes, and I hated every minute of it. Are ya ready kids? Settle in, this is the long one. This level does not start off well. We get walls of text (I know, sorry), from 3 random characters, that speed by so quickly the player does not have a chance to even read them. Going up, with the blue segment, we have Quick Man Lasers. The fact they're introduced safely seems like a positive. Wait a few seconds though on the screen with the Sniper Joe though - and suddenly lasers. There is no indication at all that this room is going to be dangerous, especially since there is a newly introduced enemy in this room, that will stump the player the first time they see it. Home to this stage is a original[sic] warping gimmick - and at first the rules seem obvious - go off the edge of the screen and you'll warp to the other side. This is a lovely idea! But,,[sic] it turns out there are NO rules to this gimmick. At all. The rules to this thing change between rooms. Sometimes you can walk into somewhere complete innocuous[sic] and you'll warp elsewhere. Sometimes logical spots for warps don't have them. Outside of trial and error, there is no way to tell where you'll end up with this gimmick, and whether or not you'll be led to a pit. I haven't even mentioned the enemy set yet. They're so bad. We are not playing Touhou, Mega Man actually has a HUGE hitbox, and more to the point bullet hell shoot em up games actually have PATTERNS to the masses of projectiles... not just total RNG like this. I eventually reached the first of the three bosses, the boss with the sword. Its damage output is nuts, it can and will pull off attacks when it feels like it with little to no warning, and is completely invincible whilst making these attacks. The only good option to beating him is to use his weakness, he is so far off the power scale that buster-only is practically unbeatable. That was one route. Of three. Oh no. The green route, uses Yoku blocks. The main issue with this route is the sheer number of traps and "gotcha" moments placed along the screens, usually on long horizontal corridors. Outside of trial and error, it is impossible to gauge where you are supposed to jump to next, since the platform you are on vanishes just as the one you are supposed to jump to appears. If this is the first route you go to, then this route also introduces you to the screen wrapping gimmick in a manner that is completely at odds with sensible gimmick introduction: You are in the middle of crossing a Yoku blocks[sic], and have to just hope something saves you from falling into a pit of spikes. This might be a good to state this: It is really difficult to tell what is and isn't a spike in this level. And as nifty as the level looks at first it is incredibly hard to tell where is solid at a glance, thanks to the isometric pattern. As we reach the boss of this area, another issue becomes apparent: Bullet spam much? There does not seem to be much rhyme or reason behind this boss, it was rather dreadful, and this point it might be one of the worst submitted boss fights in the contest. Finally there is the pink route. Which might as well not exist - many paths either have no gimmick other than awful enemy placement and bullets flying everywhere, or are poor mans[sic] versions of the other routes. The boss to this section is the only tolerable one - barely. She is invincible for far too much of the battle, and heals herself. But she's doable and at least the player is giving some warning before her attacks, even if it isn't much. None of these bosses should turn up in the arena. So your stage is going to be memorable. For the wrong reasons, but hey, at least people can say "Oh yes, MaGMML2, that had that Yggdrasil stage? Man, I never want to see that level again." "[sic]

Trivia

• Yggdrasil was designed and created in less than a week due to procrastination on Zatsupachi's part; this also left him without much time to properly balance the three bosses' difficulty.
• So far, Yggdrasil is the only multi-Element level in the MaGMML series where one Energy Element is inaccessible without collecting another in the stage first (as the door to Kichona won't open without first collecting Crator and Cream's Energy Elements).
• ACESpark later stated in a video released in late 2017 that he no longer considered Yggdrasil his least favorite level, clarifying in 2020 that Sector Upsilon 6 had taken its place due to its overly long, confusing, and generally draining nature.
• Yggdrasil is the lowest-ranking stage in MaGMML2 to feature custom bosses.