Josh Ling @ Adopt Me!

i can't stop thinking about sgail, the last level of hitman 2. it feels like the successor to sapienza in a lot of ways, even though stylistically it couldn't be more different

it's such a feat of level design. where sapienza was "hey what if we make a whole town", sgail pushes hard in the other direction. it's "let's take a weird, contained space and explore everything about it"

there's one small area in sgail that feels like IO's whole level design philosophy laid bare and it was such a fun moment to discover it

rot13, because finding this place is honestly such a great surprise: gurer'f n zbzrag jurer lbh pbzr nebhaq n pbeare va guvf qenhtugl pnfgyr naq svaq lbhefrys va na vzznphyngryl pbafgehpgrq zbqry ubzr, pbzcyrgr jvgu ernygbef fubjvat lbh nebhaq

it's like IO can't resist two things: 1. putting a complicated chef's kitchen setup in literally every level 2. immediately subverting the physical spaces of their levels

the closest they get to playing it straight is in a level set in a vermont neighbourhood, but even then they can't resist populating it with spies and counterspies, poisoners, An Actual Witch