1Up.Com --100%-- Review: "This platformer may be tough as nails, but its charm will keep you coming back for more."

_________________

Giant Bomb's --100%-- Review: "I hate Super Meat Boy. No, seriously--I'm not trying to be all cute here and feign outrage at how hard it is. I hate this game. Sometimes. But I guess I also love it (not easy to admit). It's the times when those two feelings collide in a Venn diagram of pain that you're tapping straight into the bloody beating heart of this brutally hard, ultra-fast-paced throwback of a platformer. It's one of the toughest games I've ever played, but just try to stop yourself from getting swept up in how ridiculous and extreme it all is.

It's also a surprisingly long game. You've got a hundred-some-odd regular levels, and finishing each of those levels under a par time will unlock a "dark world" version of the level that is, somehow, even harder. You can collect bandages to unlock more characters, but most of those might as well be impossible to get. At 20 bandages, you unlock "Teh Internets," a portal through which the game's developer will be pushing out free DLC levels on a regular basis. In fact, they've already posted an entire set of 20 new levels before the game is even out. All this is to say nothing of the numerous, insanely hard warp zones and kill screens hidden all over the game. Every time I thought I had seen everything this game has to offer, it genuinely surprised me with some other crazy new type of level or challenge. On top of all that, the developer has lowered the first-month asking price to $10, which makes this seem like a pretty ridiculous value.


Super Meat Boy knows exactly what it wants to do, which is to baffle, entertain, and frustrate you, to fill you with joy and rage in equal measure. And by God it does all those things without apology. This game is most certainly not for everyone--if you can't handle extremely hard games, you're better off marveling at this spectacle from a distance--but those who can stomach the difficult and appreciate the bizarre will take every ounce of punishment Super Meat Boy dishes out and beg for more."  

_________________

Team Xbox --98%-- Review: "Super Meat Boy is a love letter to everything that's great about video games. The experience runs the fine line of punishing and rewarding and has the ability to make you feel like you've achieved the impossible. It's an absolute must-buy from Xbox Live Arcade and should be found on every hard drive of every Xbox in existence. While this all sounds like high praise, Super Meat Boy earns every word of it."

_________________

GameSpot --95%-- Review: "The level design in Super Meat Boy is absolutely stunning. The usual tricks you would expect in a 2D platformer are here--such as spinning saws, lava pits, and shooting blades--but they are positioned in such intelligent ways that the game is extremely challenging without ever feeling cheap. There is a delicate balance on display that ensures you're pushed to the limits of your skill without becoming frustrated. One of the most impressive aspects of Super Meat Boy is how you learn and adapt while you play. The first time you enter a level, you may be presented with a jump that seems impossible. You may try and fail a few times, maybe even a few dozen times, without any idea what you're supposed to do. But once you figure out the timing to succeed, you can pull off even the toughest moves with a good degree of consistency. Being able to conquer levels that previously seemed impossible is an exhilarating feeling, and the ease with which you become proficient is a testament to how precise the controls are and how meticulously designed the levels are.

It's impossible to point to just one element that makes Super Meat Boy such an extraordinary game. From the intense-though-always-fair difficulty and the inspired level design, to the pinpoint controls and catchy soundtrack, all of the different aspects converge into something that is truly outstanding. When you hear stories of the unrepentant dangers that stand in your path, it's easy to get intimidated by such a daunting prospect. But don't be. The beauty of Super Meat Boy is that it always plays within the rules, and the smooth difficulty curve gives you plenty of time to become acquainted with everything before the true tests are unleashed. Death is always just one misstep away in Super Meat Boy, but the rush of winning is so supremely rewarding that you won't be able to tear yourself away."

_________________

Destructoid's --95%-- Review: "Yeah, that's about all I have for complaints regarding Super Meat Boy. In every other regard, the game just nails it. Unlike a lot of games from a small team, it doesn't try too hard to be different. Instead, it just strives to be the best at what it does, and it gets there. Team Meat has done more here to refine and evolve the genre that started with Donkey Kong than the real Donkey Kong sequels (including the Super Mario series) have done in ages. For that alone, I can say that Super Meat Boy stands amongst my favorite games of all time.

First there was Donkey Kong, then came Mario, Mega Man, and Sonic. Now we have Meat Boy. The world's newest 2D platforming legend has arrived."

_________________

For Vader and Archie.

For Steel.

i remember this from back when it was supposed to be wiiware.  stupid XBLA games i want ... I hate this and i hate Limbo

You can play the freebie original on newgrounds to see if this is for you. I was planning to get it when it was first unveiled but as an indie dev he should have strived to offer all his planned features to all his potential customers, ie, including Wii owners (it will still get released on WW). Even free flash games have leaderboards and online play these days, he had no reason to remove that stuff from any version and so my money will go to someone else.

Ugh, no.

Leo Presents 3 Important Reasons Why ALL Gamers NEED to Love Super Meat Boy:**

__________________

Super Meat Boy has such a reverence for both modern independent game development and the halcyon era of 8- and 16-bit classics. From the former, the developers called in favors from a bunch of their indie friends and included a huge number of playable characters like Commander Video (Bit.Trip), Tim (Braid), the Alien Hominid, and the kid from I Wanna Be The Guy. There must be close to 20 playable characters in here, and they all have their own special powers that let them do things like stick to walls, float in mid-air, double jump, or rewind time (guess who does that one). I only got a handful of those guys, though, because the requirements to get them are even more ludicrous than the rigors of the main game. But I'll circle back around and unlock them soon.


__________________


Anyway, the nostalgia is as thick as the indie cred here, with really specific references to games like Mega Man II, the first Castlevania, and Ninja Gaiden (the NES one, not the arcade one). That stuff comes out of left field, but you have to appreciate it if you have any fond memories of playing video games in the late '80s. The nostalgic bits are woven into the game's own bizarre, sadistic sense of humor that has Meat Boy chasing the evil Dr. Fetus--a fetus inside a robot suit wearing a tailored suit--to recover his girlfriend Bandage Girl. The original cutscenes are riotous too. There's talking poop. There's nuclear war. There's a lot of blood. It's a weird, weird game.

__________________

It's also a surprisingly long game. You've got a hundred-some-odd regular levels, and finishing each of those levels under a par time will unlock a "dark world" version of the level that is, somehow, even harder. You can collect bandages to unlock more characters, but most of those might as well be impossible to get. At 20 bandages, you unlock "Teh Internets," a portal through which the game's developer will be pushing out free DLC levels on a regular basis. In fact, they've already posted an entire set of 20 new levels before the game is even out. All this is to say nothing of the numerous, insanely hard warp zones and kill screens hidden all over the game. Every time I thought I had seen everything this game has to offer, it genuinely surprised me with some other crazy new type of level or challenge. On top of all that, the developer has lowered the first-month asking price to $10, which makes this seem like a pretty ridiculous value.

__________________

**Hint: It's cause Super Meat Boy's Developers LOVE Games and Gamers!

Are you also into S&M?

i refuse to support team meat after what they did to nintendo

So. You are saying you have a problem with your Meat being too small? That's understandable, I suppose...

We all like Large, Beefy Meat!

...in this case though, it truly is: It's not how large he is, but how you use him!

The way he controls, when you master his handling, it can be orgasmic!