Celeste Mods - drizzle by avvi (Full Clear)

i commend the mapmaker for making this so accurate to real-life Seattle
download the map: https://gamebanana.com/mods/503705

Drizzle is a fantastically decorated map with some serious gameplay jank that makes it a little hard to fully love. If you just saw the trailer, you'd have no idea this was the mapmaker's first map; it's decorated beautifully and sells the "ruined overgrown ocean city" aesthetic so well. I can't imagine the time that must have went into setting up all the moss and trellises. The music is all excellently picked and adds to the already great atmosphere being made by the visuals. I could keep gushing about the art and atmosphere all day, but I'll leave it at this: drizzle proves that the mapmaker avvi is far "beyond their years" so to speak, at least when it comes to visual design. In that department, the map is leagues above average first map quality.

I can't entirely say the same for the gameplay. The moving block gimmick is incredibly cool at first, though it really could have benefited from being a true custom entity instead of dash blocks inside eeveehelper containers. The "refills" used to activate the blocks are a lie - they're just flag triggers over dummy refills. This means blocks are activate-able without actually collecting the refill associated with them. The gameplay varies but generally gets more and more jank as the map goes on, with one specific checkpoint 4 room being the bane of my existence.

The story is just there to justify the introduction of new gameplay gimmicks, which is fine. It's background lore that's not really necessary to enjoy the map. Some people are going to get angry at the incorrect Latin, but they should consider going outside.

The map also features a 1-dash winged berry which as of the time of writing (4/6/24) cannot be collected due to a bug with the 1-dash refills. Rooms on this route range from basically unchanged to abysmal. It's very clear that the map was not designed with this challenge in mind and it was not playtested at all. When the closest analog to some rooms on this route is Spike Party, you know there's a problem.

With all that said, I would still wholeheartedly recommend drizzle. Despite all its flaws, it's still an incredible debut map and I can't wait to see what avvi creates next. I'll be there to make a video on it, I'm sure.

like and sumpscribe!