Hardest MBP (Completion)
The lists are a mix of both 2007 and today's knowledge. I haven't played MBP a lot except speedrunning a little whenever wanted, so most of this list comes from when MBP came out. Nearly all UTs were based on my best times as well.
Most UTs were made in mind that as long as you didn't screw up badly, you could easily reach them. Shortcuts since them pretty much decimated them.
Major note: The list looks at levels when they have had
NO CHECKPOINTS. When checkpoints were added (end of development) I didn't replay levels much so my knowledge of difficulty comes from the development era.
1) Space Station. The compilation of tricks, the dark skies + underside made it pretty hard for me. I have raged over this level way too much trying to get a good time, let alone get past the crazy moving platform station thing at the end of the level, followed by the damn tightropes which were harder only because of the gravity and some gaps right at the end. Even today I consider it the hardest MBP level to date.
2) Daedal Helix. I find the Havoc Zone to be the toughest single part which is the hardest in MBP by miles. You can get stuck there for ages and it kills your speedruns. That alone is why this level is #2
3) Speed Attack. Admittedly, it shouldn't be that hard, but a few things from back in the day made it much harder than it is today (checkpoints, actual interiors, smooth stuff). Even today though if I'm not careful, rage can happen. The magnets were tougher, the loop was an ***, tornado was **** and a few other things really hated you.
4) Trapdoor Mania. It's like scaffold but worse with the turns. No checkpoints made this ever so more difficult to finish.
5) Bouncing Fun. It's a mix of easy and hard, and if you're not careful or know what you're doing, the level will eat you alive and without salt. The long bouncy jumps before the tornado used to get me a lot, the tiny time travel at challenge 5 or 6 would get me as well. The gravity before the level was quarked was insanely hard, and the bounce side-to-side with the gem and time travel was horrible, and a few other parts would just hate you as well. It was hard to navigate, and you had to do so carefully.
6) Mastering the Marble. Not too difficult except the very start. Otherwise a few other parts would be hell like gem/time travel on the sand, the wall jump after the small bouncy trims (which I didn't have trouble with!). It got extra difficult from where the checkpoint before the sand slope, side-to-side jumping (small room, ice, etc follows), with the big run stretch being the 2nd hardest challenge of MBP.
7) Dizzying Heights. The wall-bug made this level way harder than it should be, and due to the shortcut I barely played it fully, but when I did, it was tough. The shortcut was obvious so you could skip the level and hence it was not expected of the player to go the full way.
Rolling to Eternity. I've had some odd problems, specifically the Super Jump/MP part gave me lots of trouble, and sometimes the fan jump would piss me off. The level itself isn't bad but try and go fast and it becomes a nightmare.
9) Slip Up. The only hard part of the level was that stupid jump from the ice to the small room section and then navigate that carefully.
10) The Ultimate Friction Challenge. I found it a lot easier than most, mostly because it is the same as its MBG counter-part so I was already used to it. Lack of checkpoints? see MBG.
11) Wall Master. Those wall hits were hard at times, and there were a couple of spots right at the end of the level that I could barely do on the life of me. The wall hit upwards to a gem (slope, followed by a wall) is still impossible for me. #3 hardest challenge because I can skip it :Par
12) Ice Cold Pass. Ever tried the full way? Surprisingly hard. I found it way harder than the level seemed, but almost no one realises that because of the obvious shortcut to the finish.
13) Don't Jump. Just an increasing challenge where you had to be careful and sometimes you would just be trolled and there is nothing you could do. Fans would lag on computers at the time, but not on today's hardware.
14) Nukesweeper Revisited. Difficult until you figure out the route (which you can use level editor/paint/whatever you want to mark in the gems) at which point the level becomes easy. Its UT is done so that you don't screw up badly, but you are allowed to mess a few jumps and hit walls.
15) Double LoopLoop. The gem on the bottom isn't bad, but those steps to go back up always gave me trouble, especially in the pre-quarked version which was nasty hard.
Special Honour:
Skill Zone. The beginning Super Speeds are my #4 hardest MBP challenge because the hell is that
Morph. Nowadays you have no wall bug and a smoother blue slope at the playground section that doesn't leave you when you screw it up. Back then the blue slope had a misalignment so 99.99% of the time you would be thrown BACKWARDS (and platform left you!), so you would be stuck. You had to do this specific jump pattern in order to pass that misalignment, and then you had another one right at the top with the next platform stretch that also destroyed you. Made the level incredibly hard just for that. Since then we made the platform not leave so it was better, and later on the smoothed interiors made it easier and lastly today no wall-bug (I never had problems with that challenge, somehow) means no one has a reason to complain about difficulty.
TTotTS I never had a problem with, even without checkpoints. Hardest part was Phil's platform going up with the triangle bits and the time travel after the 2nd one.
Hardest MBP (Ultimate Time)
1) Space Station. Literally my best time was 6:07, with the UT being 6:15 because I missed that 8 seconds time travel because the jump to it and back is really difficult for me due to whatever reason. I always considered it to be the toughest UT. It also used all the shortcuts I knew of at the time.
2) Lightning Ice. Also hardest EE IMO. I find this pretty tough to get the speed, and maintain it throughout the level to finish it under the UT. Level is fun, but getting UT is a nightmare.
3) Mastering the Marble. UT is hard only due to the difficulty of the level, which is a piss-off. Going fast on the level only makes it worse, and again the ending destroyed many a run.
4) Sand Storm. Getting the last TT was really hard on me, and that meant that I had almost no time to waste to get the UT. A small mishap = restart.
5) Speed Attack. Getting everything done perfect without the game screwing you over was one of the hardest challenges in MBP. I've died so many times it was not funny, and the UT was bloated so you could skip quite a fair few Time Travels and go slowly on some parts.
6) Trigonometry. I found this one of the harder UTs MBP has to offer because I just run out of time. I dunno why. I had to practically use a traplaunch to usually make it past the UT.
7) NeonTech. I found getting a fast time was pretty hard because you had to get the TTs at the start and both together were hard for me to execute. Remainder of the path wasn't bad.
Ground Zero. Plain luck. That is all.
9) Magnet Training. You had to go the full way, and then you had to get somehow lucky with the magnets. Admittedly hard, but once you understood where the sweet spot is, you got it more than half of the time. Just had to be fast.
10) Swivel. The level layout wasn't that difficult until you had to get all the Time Travels and perform a nasty loop exit directly to the finish. That loop exit by itself is probably one of the toughest challenges you can do, and doing it on a good UT run is even harder.
11) Strategy Climb. Always go fast, and always just barely have the time to finish under the UT no matter what. Definitely one of the hardest ones.
12) Buse Bee... . Had to make a double Super Jump that would just have enough height so you didn't lose too much time on the gems.
13) Wall Master. The UT was always hard on me because of the wall hits to do, then the sign hit, and then doing the run perfectly fast. Overshooting the gems and not having enough speed were two of my biggest problems.
14) Stamina. The level itself doesn't seem hard, but doing it fast was. Always made it to the end with little time left on the clock, until I eventually pulled 4-5 secs better consistently.
15) Loop Exits. One of the harder UTs because you had to do a proper loop exit so you had to exit at a certain spot, and going fast made it hard.
Special Honors (in no order, but all were harder than should be due to no checkpoints, length or some random challenge):
The Tale of the Tall Skyscraper (length), Michael's Final Adventure (tighrope jumping), Rolling to Eternity (fans, SJ/Trapdoor/run back), Ring Stunts (little time), Gym (overall difficulty), Marble Agility Course (****ing small half pipes at the start), Spin Practice (ending), Sprint (had to jump from start platform to the one on the other side), Roll Like the Wind! (trapdoors)
I didn't include the following:
Catwalks. I never had a problem with this level, even with speedrunning. Did I fall off a lot? yes, but that's because I was trying stuff that normally I never would, and UT doesn't need it anyway.
The Ultimate Friction Challenge (UT!). Slightly harder than its MBG version, the ice definitely makes some difference, but not by much.
Cardcaddy's Diamond Collection. Admittedly it IS harder than the MBG version. The reason was I messed up the markers, and they were set on Accelerate instead of Linear. This originally made this version way more difficult than I expected and I wanted to reverse it, but the MBP staff (with Oaky's spearheading this) wanted it to stay as-is. I was going to change the Ultimate Time, having difficulty with the route (the original route was so epic simple, it was a joke). However after 30-45 minutes of play I figured a new route that surprisingly needed little deviation from the original route, and it was still easy. I knew it could easily be improved, and Xelna shows why.
Platform Mayhem. I never found this level hard because the route was simple and pretty obvious. The UT was indeed made with some difficulty in mind, but I did not have *personally* problems with it as long as gems weren't missed badly.
GMC / RUC / DHeights / Combo Course / Treacherous Path / Par Pit / Nuke Field, Battlecube series. Never found these hard. UTs were inflated to make sure they less-experienced players would be able to attain them more easily.
BFinale is stupidly easy. I realised the level way incredibly big when I actually play tested it, and on completion it was extremely long, but even my basic route back then was fast enough that I didn't feel the level being that long. It has virtually no challenge but the tarmac.
Arch Acropolis. Like catwalks, virtually never had problems. I mastered my gyro, yo.
Other levels that people find hard I found easy for various reasons. Go figure. Skillz.
Community's Hardest Levels (Vote!)
And then the Advanced. Holy nopeville.
