Super Meat Boy Message Board

Mew-Genics, the cat-breeding-based follow-up to Super Meat Boy, has been in development for almost a year and half – that’s almost a decade in cat years. Too long, too long! We’ll all be crawling under the nearest chest-of-drawers to die soon. At least we finally have some in-game footage to look at, even if it does take the form of an animated GIF. But given cats and GIFs are the bedrock of the internet, it is only appropriate.

Warning: cartoon cats shagging below. No feline winkies on show, though.(more…)

If you haven't yet experienced the soul-crushing difficulty of Super Meat Boy, now's your chance: From now until 7PM on November 7, the indie platformer is available on Steam at an 80 percent discount.

Including 300-plus stages, boss fights and sadistic jumping puzzles, Super Meat Boy is not for the faint of heart. It does however, offer immense bragging rights for anyone able to finish the game. Then, once you've trumped every level, you can start building your own diabolical masterpieces in the game's level editor, or pour another dozen hours into Super Meat Boy seeking its hidden warp areas and well-hidden secret characters.

The one major caveat here is that while you can play Super Meat Boy on a keyboard, the game's split-second timing almost demands players utilize a gamepad. Fortunately, the game's rudimentary control scheme lends itself well to almost any controller, including Sony's new DualShock 4.

The first trailer for Mew-Genics, the upcoming "cat lady sim" from Team Meat (of Super Meat Boy fame) has arrived, and it's... uh... well, there's singing, giant cats exploding, microscopic cats being injected into another cat, a cat pooping out another cat, and we're not 100 percent sure, but some cats might also be up to some NSFW activities at one point in the video. The teaser ends with a cat exploding into a mushroom cloud, which rains down more cats while a "Coming 2014" fades into view.

About that 2014 release date: In an email to Joystiq, Edmund McMillen of Team Meat wrote that the game is "definitely one of those 'it's done when it's done' projects," so exactly when in 2014 we'll get our hands on these adorable kittens is up in the air.

McMillen described Mew-Genics as a cat breeding sim, cat fighting sim, cat hoarding sim, cat pageant sim, and cat racing sim, all rolled into one. While you wait for your chance to breed, fight, hoard, show off and race your cats, why not sing the Mew-genics theme song to your cat and/or friends? Trust us, they'll thank you.

The brutally difficult Super Meat Boy is a measly $3 on Steam today, with its synthesizer-charged soundtrack also discounted to $1.20.
For 300 levels, a level editor and 16 unlockable characters, Super Meat Boy carries a ridiculous amount of content for the asking price. While its unforgiving difficulty curve can inspire some creative language, we thought it was one of the best games of 2010. If you're feeling free with your wallet, Super Meat Boy is included in the Good Friends Bundle with games like Portal 2 and Psychonauts for $25.

When the creators of Super Meat Boy were approached by a Hollywood guy who said their game would make for a great movie, they thought they smelled a scam. Who knows what the script-shopper really had in mind, but being clowned for nearly an hour in a Skype conference (audio above) probably wasn't a goal. Read more...

Developer Team Meat has stopped production of the next Super Meat Boy - the mobile version - to focus all efforts on Mew-Genics.

"We decided to officially pause work on the next Super Meat Boy and remake Mew-Genics outside of flash, making it our new full time project," the developer noted on its blog. Team Meat co-founder Edmund McMillen elaborated to Joystiq, "It's the new Super Meat Boy made for touch and other platforms. We pitched the idea as a re-envisioning of Super Meat Boy on iOS and people assumed it was just a remake or port, but it's actually a completely new Super Meat Boy game. But yes it's on hold til Mew-Genics is done."

Mew-Genics was announced late last year and Team Meat's Edmund McMillen said it was the strangest game he's ever worked on. This is coming from the guy behind The Binding of Isaac. Hold us, we're scared.

Miaow miaow miaow Team Meat miaow Super Meat Boy miaow The Binding of Isaac? Miaow miaow miaow Mew-Genics, miaow miaw miaow. Miaow miaow don’t know miaow, miaow miaow miaow miaow 12,207,031,250,000,000,000,000 cats miaow miaow. Miaow!

(Restarting cat-human speech translation engine…) (3… (Miaow… (1…) Miaow.

While Team Meat are still stubbornly refusing to share quite what manner of game this is, they have been sharing tiny kibbles of tease and hint over the past few weeks. The most obvious, and delightful, place to start is with the theme music, as written and composed by Matthias Bossi and Jon Evans. (The former also voiced the narrator in The Binding Of Isaac).

I could probably leave that playing for a disturbingly long time. It’s very Danny Elfman, BUT WITH CATS and a bit of skiffle.

The other thing is that Mew-Genics appears to be doing with with cats what Borderlands does for guns. As in, a number of different potential variations of them so high as to be in appearance infinite. 12,207,031,250,000,000,000,000 is the estimate, and with a claim that “you’ll never get the same cat twice, unless you clone them, and even then depending on their childhood they still wont act the same.” The impossi-number even only applies to the cats’ appearance – apparent it’ll shoot ever-more skywards if you factor in “personality variables… ability variables, personal stats and a ton more secret stuff.”

With all this talk of cloning and personalities, the big question for me is whether players can strive to recreate an appoxrimation of their own household miniature murderer. In other words, I want to create/clone a black cat with a small head, a bit of a belly, a very squeaky voice, a peculiar fixation with foil and a fondness for cake.

Also newly-revealed are collectible ‘trinkets’, which appear to have some mysterious in-game effect. “Food, poop, barf, kittens, mail… etc” apparently crops up naturally during the course of the game, but “sometimes these things appear imbued with magic properties that change space and time.” Hmm. Well, given how ludicrous Doctor Who’s plots have been lately, the revelation that the TARDIS’s time-travel powers were fuelled by magic cat poo wouldn’t surprise me in the least.

The entire gaming world and its robo-dog is currently going from door-to-door and begging for cash, so a shaft of philanthrophic light amidst the Kickstarted darkness is a welcome one. We posted about Mario/McMillen & Refenes mash-up Super Meat Boy Galaxy last week, but it was unclear whether Aubrey Hesselgren would ever share more of his half-gag, half-tribute project with the world. Turns out, he will. BUT ON ONE CONDITION. That condition is cash. Of course it’s cash! This cash will not, however, go to the developer – it will go to The Samaritans. If SMBG is successfully ‘ransomed’ for £10,000, its prototype will be freed and released to the public.

Blood money, I call it! Blood money! And also a very smart idea.(more…)

Over-talented game dev Aubrey Hesselgren crafted an unofficial 3D mashup of Super Meat Boy and Super Mario Galaxy, apparently “for Tommy Refenes’ 30th Birthday”. You can see a video of it in action below. Hesselgren says on a Reddit thread devoted to the idea: “It’s just an experiment in adaptation. I kept hearing people write off 3D games with all the arguments about spatial perception, limited information etc, and wanted to try to tackle a few of their points, just for my own edification. I didn’t want to dismiss what they were saying, but I felt like I had to see for myself. I learnt a lot!”(more…)

Four words all but guaranteed to win my attention: “a game about cats.” When said four words are twinned with the knowledge that the game in question comes from the creators of Super Meat Boy and one half of The Binding Of Isaac team, my attention becomes unwavering.

We know precious little about Team Meat’s Mew-Genics other than that it’ll be “randomly generated, strange and involve cats” so even a tiny, kitten-size scrap of detail is enough to cause a flurry of fluffy speculation. Today, that’s two new shots showing in-game characters.(more…)

Go to your Netflix account and add Indie Game: The Movie to your Instant Queue right now, because you totally can. Indie Game: The Movie won a Sundance award for editing, was an official SXSW selection and was the first feature-length film to ever launch on Steam. How inspirational.

Not everything Valve touches turns to gold, so proveth the rocky launch for Steam Greenlight, and the ensuing response to the big changes Valve has made to its independent-focused service just a few days after launching.

The change that’s caused the most discussion and raised exasperation is a new requirement for submission: pay $100 for the potential opportunity to become part of the Steam marketplace. It’s a chance, not a guarantee, and Valve’s tried to block some criticism by promising to send every payment to Penny Arcade’s Child’s Play charity.

The requirement was prompted by a slew of junk submissions, including fake version of Half-Life 3.

Greenlight is a new Steam initiative to ostensibly help games from falling through the cracks.

“Two things we’ve noticed so far,” said Valve in a blog post. “First, there are a ton of legitimate submissions that people want to see. Second, there is unfortunately a significant amount of noise and clutter being submitted, either as a joke or by fans not fully understanding the purpose of Greenlight.”

Greenlight is meant to curb an increasing problem for Steam. The company cannot realistically judge every game that’s submitted for consideration, and decided to enlist the community for help to ensure games deserving of a spot don't slip through the cracks. I’ve heard from frustrated developers over the years upset at receiving little to no feedback from Steam after being rejected, and Greenlight is (in theory) meant to keep those examples to a minimum. Or, at the least, reduce it.

The change does not impact games already been submitted, and is required once per developer, not per game.

Developers I’ve spoken to since the change occurred have expressed decidedly porlaized opinions.

“It's good they are doing this, it keeps the flow of games down to people who are serious about their work,” said Super Meat Boy and Binding of Isaac co-creator Edmund McMillen. “It's $100 to enter into the IGF [Independent Games Festival], I did this for years [and] only made it in 30% of the time. You should only put your stuff on Greenlight if you believe you have a realistic chance of getting those votes, the 100$ charge makes that a very clear barrier of entry. Same goes for the IGF.”

Michael “Kayin” O’Reilly, better known as the creator of the sadistic I Wanna Be the Guy, is working on a game for submission into Greenlight. He’s not so sure Valve’s quick decision to charge $100 for a Greenlight listing was the best way to solve its problems.

“If we're talking about a service that's meant to try and manage small indie games, is the best way to try and charge money from a group of traditionally poor people?” said O’Reilly. “It is -a- limiting measure, but is it the best one? [...] if Valve was pocketing the 100 dollars, I think we'd have to accept that this is a part of business, but clearly this is a situation where there are a lot more possible solutions that can possibly benefit Steam more in the long run.”

I Wanna Be the Guy's creator is still considering Greenlight, despite the issues he has with it.

O’Reilly said Valve should have implemented less drastic measures to tweak the service to avoid this reaction, and would be “exceptionally surprised” if the $100 requirement sticks around. That Valve didn't introduce the $100 fee with other substantive changes struck him as odd and reactionary.

“The 100 dollar fee isn't meant to necessarily stop games that may or may not succeed, it's meant to stop junk entries or REALLY low quality entries,” he said. “So it's tough. Greenlight was supposed to reduce a lot of the risk and frustration of dealing with Steam, so it's really sorta hurting itself by making it seem less inviting. I think alternative ways of getting on the services is it's best bet. A bigger budget game will probably just drop the 100 bucks, while smaller games might use other methods.”

McPixel designer Sos Sosowski was part of Greenlight’s beta, and sympathized with Valve’s plight. It did, however, prompt mixed feelings about the difference between going through Steam’s regular submission process and rolling the dice with an active community of users on Greenlight.

“It struck me that anyone can submit a game just like that in the very beginning, but I was sure that it's going to be well managed and under control,” said Sosowki. “Valve got disillusioned quickly and got reminded what the internet is.”

“I think that the fee made the Greenlight service redundant as soon as it was introduced,” he continued. “If there was a fee for the standard submission process, where Valve team reviewed each game, Greenlight would not be needed at all. So now that the fee is introduced, and only people that are serious about it and want to invest this much are allowed in, Valve could easily manage to look over all the submissions as they appear and make their picks. I don't agree that paying for ‘maybe’ getting onto Steam service is wrong. I'm saying paying to get onto Greenlight makes it redundant.”

It’s been less than a week since Greenlight launched, though, and the $100 requirement is a rather huge change in philosophy after a few days of content submissions. Proteus designer Ed Key is puzzled at the move.

Key proposed a two-step renovation. There would be a pre-Greenlight listing phase, in which the community would help filter out the crap, and avoid having the front page overrun. It would create another layer between what the general public sees on Greenlight and power users. Given the fiery reaction to the $100 requirement, Key suggested Valve start offering free Greenlight listings to nominees and finalists in the big festivals. I wouldn’t mind seeing popular Ludum Dare entries given the opportunity to submit sans requirement, either. Outreach could be key.

“I'm a bit worried the $100 will further skew the balance towards safe commercial games rather than games that could find an audience once on a major platform,” said Key. “[...] Big kudos to Valve for updating the system and being so agile, but charging a fee just seems like the 'nuclear option' at this early stage.”

Here's how Greenlight look on my Steam client, as Valve tries to push the good stuff to the top.

Alexander Bruce is the pink-suited designer of the hopefully-almost-done puzzler Antichamber, and cautioned against developers anxious over Greenlight’s changes, and to consider all available options.

“Several people have pointed out that there are talented people out there who live day to day who would not be able to afford the $100 fee,” said Bruce. “I don't understand this argument, because even without the fee in place, there's no guarantees that those developers would get their game on Steam in the first place. So they're either relying on their game being on Steam to support themselves, which Greenlight isn't offering in the first place, or they are able to support themselves independently and should be able to find a time somewhere when paying the fee would be reasonable.”

Bruce suggested developers stressing over the $100 should stop thinking Steam as the center of the universe. Maybe put Steam on the sideline, and focus on launching the game elsewhere. Games like QUBE and Offspring Fling have used pre-Steam launches to build word-of-mouth. With enough buzz, it may even be possible to avoid the Greenlight process entirely, and even if that’s not possible, the outside reaction should help your cause on Greenlight itself.

“If by going through these methods you're unable to find an audience to give you $100 for a Greenlight submission,” said Bruce, “I’m not sure what makes you think that your situation is going to be any different once you actually have your game on Greenlight and then need to drum up enough support to get it noticed by Valve.”

The developers of AaaAaaaAa are avoiding taking a stance, while also sorta taking a stance.

If the $100 requirement does remain a permanent fixture of Greenlight, some will help shoulder the burden. AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA developer Dejobaan Games is running a contest of sorts to loan $100 to a creator. Nicalis, responsible for helping bring Cave Story, La-Mulana and NightSky to places outside Japan, is also offering up $100 to three developers.

Both Dejobaan and Nicalis said the idea isn’t about whether the fee is a good or bad idea.

“I don't have the foresight to see how all of this will play out,” said Dejobaan president and co-founder Ichiro Lambe. “Will it help highlight new and wonderful games? Will it keep potentially great titles out? I think we'll find out over time. Who gives two rat's asses about my stance on this?”

“The folks I've met from Valve genuinely want the industry to be a better place for small developers, so I'd like to see more of 'em on that platform," he said. "If I can help a ramen-eating dev team submit a great game--and encourage other successful indie devs to do the same--then we're indies at our best. If it means that that great game gets a chance to sell on Steam, fantastic. And you know what? The worst that comes out of this is that my $100 goes to a charity that uses video games help kids cope with illness.”

[Photo courtesy of Stephen Geyer.]

Super Meat Boy creator Edmund McMillen is releasing The Basement Collection in a few hours time. McMillen's compilation includes updated versions of Time Fcuk, Grey Matter, Coil, Spewer, Meat Boy, Triachnid, and two other unlockable games. Among the extras is stock footage from Indie Game: The Movie.

The compilation comes to Steam (and other portals) for PC and Mac at $4.

Edmund McMillen, best known as one half of Team Meat, has announced a release date of August 31 for The Basement Collection. The bundle is an odyssey through his creative past, which will feature updated versions of eight of his previously yet less recognizable games. The time-travelling portal of choice will be Steam, on which the compendium will be released for both PC and Mac for $4.

Already announced as inclusions are Time Fcuk, Spewer, Grey Matter, Triachnid, Coil, and the less super (but more original) Meat Boy. There are also two unannounced games, one of which will receive a considerable update in the form of "new music, graphics and gameplay." McMillen's website offers an overview of the updates for each game, as well as the announced extras, which include 15 minutes of unseen stock footage from Indie Game: The Movie.

We're gonna let the "Ouch, my wallet!" jokes simmer for a couple days (or until we can think of a good one, whichever comes first) and instead we'll just give you all the straight poop on today's Steam Summer Sale offerings.

Amongst today's Most Discounted Things[TM] is the Carpe Fulgur series, which includes Chantelise - A Tale of Two Sisters, Fortune Summoners and Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale. Today's offering also boasts a heavily discounted Total War mega pack, Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion and Super Meat Boy. In addition, there's a new Indie Bundle that features Q.U.B.E. and Dungeons of Dredmor, among other titles.

Oh! Here's one: What's the difference between a second mortgage and the Steam Summer Sale? With a second mortgage, at least you get to keep the house!

... No? Okay, maybe next time.

#thebindingofisaac Edmund McMillen speaks his mind. Whether it be about games, religion or poop, he never holds anything back. More »

Indie Game: The Movie has come full circle, first covering games as they limped their way to their first platform launches, only to end up on one of those very platforms itself. Indie Game: The Movie is available on Steam for $10 as the first feature-length film to ever be hosted on Valve's service.

The full documentary is also now available via iTunes and on its official site.

Today, Super Meat Boy, Braid and Lone Survivor were added to the fifth installment of the Humble Indie Bundle. Just when you think things couldn't get more awesome. [HumbleBundle.com] More »

Edmund McMillen of Team Meat has so far been coy about what the mobile version of Super Meat Boy is, but he's fairly vocal about what it isn't. Super Meat Boy: The Game won't be a shallow, easy-to-play money-making machine like so many other mobile titles today, McMillen writes in his latest update. He even tells us a little bit about what it will be:
"We want to make a game that WE would love to see on the platform, a feature-length reflex-driven platformer with solid controls that doesn't manipulate you with business bullshit in order to cash in. We want SMB:TG to show the player we respect them, not only by not manipulating them, but also by understanding they want a real challenge and they want a real sense of fulfillment when they have achieved something that's difficult... you know, like real games do."Team Meat has also revealed the first bit of art from Super Meat Boy: The Game, the chapter screen for The Green Hills you can see above. McMillen assures us that even though there are only eight visible level pads, the mobile title "will rival the original" and have dark worlds.

Team Meat's Edmund McMillen has made some more comments as he goes mobile with a completely new version of Super Meat Boy. According to McMillen, Canabalt is providing some basic inspiration for development.

"Canabalt is closer to what we're thinking about. But Canabalt is very surface-level stuff," McMillen told Polygon. "[The original] Meat Boy was a twitch-based game about memorizing things. [iOS] Meat Boy is the opposite. That's the foundation of its design. But it's also on a touch device, so there's that as well. We want to make a twitch-based platformer that's not about memorization."

As for the art style - the mobile version forgoes the pixels for a more hand-drawn look - McMillen says the more "gentle" approach allows Team Meat to lull players in, only to surprise them with some shocking visuals. "I'm happy about the art style. The more gentle and nice we make it look, the more vicious the story can be. Wouldn't it be so awesome to bait kids in with this happy little Meat Boy thing and then, the ending of the first chapter, instead of the squirrel getting his head knocked off, Meat Boy gets his face sawed in half? Like a skinned looking face looking at the screen?"

Ultimately, McMillen said, "My goal is to scare the shit out of my three-year-old nephew."

#supermeatboy When Team Meat set out to create a Super Meat Boy version for touchscreen mobile devices, creators Tommy Refenes and Edward McMillen vowed they wouldn't just slap a virtual gamepad on the thing and do some half-assed port of their downloadable hit for PC and Xbox 360. More »

#supermeatboy When Team Meat set out to create a Super Meat Boy version for touchscreen mobile devices, creators Tommy Refenes and Edward McMillen vowed they wouldn't just slap a virtual gamepad on the thing and do some half-assed port of their downloadable hit for PC and Xbox 360. More »

#supermeatboy When Team Meat set out to create a Super Meat Boy version for touchscreen mobile devices, creators Tommy Refenes and Edward McMillen vowed they wouldn't just slap a virtual gamepad on the thing and do some half-assed port of their downloadable hit for PC and Xbox 360. More »

Above is the first proper look at the prototype, "probably going to change a lot" vision of Super Meat Boy on iOS. No, this isn't an April Fools' joke, unless Team Meat have decided to reveal sensible, already-announced information as part of its months-long ruse to get everyone excited for mobile SMB before stripping it away entirely -- a plan they decided to ditch once they realized what a genuinely good idea that is. However, we really don't think that's the case here.

In February Team Meat's Edmund McMillen divulged the first details of SMB on iOS, saying that if the idea was good enough, they would create it as an entirely new game without the "shitty touch controls" standard in most mobile touchscreen titles. Looks like the idea was good enough.

Mobile SMB is "a feature-length touch-controlled platformer SPECIFICALLY designed for Touch devices," McMillen wrote today, continuing to say it isn't "a shitty port of an existing game with non-tactile buttons spread all over the screen blocking the player's view and making for frustrating controls" or "the Super Meat Boy you're used to: There are aspects of Super Meat Boy in there, obviously, but this is a brand new game with new art, new sound, everything."

#gamemusic You may have heard that it's tough to make a living as a musician. You heard right! It's a tough world out there, and very few people get paid a good living to make music. But while it may seem daunting from the outside, there is actually a greater demand for music than ever—there is more media created each day than ever, and most of it needs music. TV shows, movies, commercials, websites, podcasts, web series, promotional materials, and, of course, video games. More »

Yesterday Edmund McMillen and Tommy Refenes of Team Meat dropped a gigantic, raw bomb on Twitter (gross), announcing their intent to strip down Super Meat Boy and rebuild it completely for mobile touch devices. They were vague on details apart from an intent to create a brand new game in the Super Meat Boy universe, and that they definitely wouldn't use "shitty touch controls."

We thought they were being coy, but it turns out they don't know much more about the touchscreen version than we do. It's still in the engine phase of development, McMillen told Joystiq, and they're pretty much winging it, playing with things that work and throwing out ideas that don't -- even if that includes the entire game.

"I mean, honestly, this is simply a challenge for us," McMillen said. "It's easy to poo-poo a new system because of its horrible use of touchscreen on ported titles; it's harder to attempt to try and figure out a design that works and make something worth checking out.

"So that's basically what we are doing -- no idea how it will turn out -- but Tommy and I wanted to jump back into dev again with something that isn't going to take a year-plus to make, so prototyping this idea seemed most appropriate and inspired."

#supermeatboy Despite the fact its creators have railed against the quality of iPhone games, and openly trolled consumers on the iTunes store by selling a parody game for $350, Super Meat Boy is being rebuilt to be playable on touch-screen mobile devices, the game's two-man team said in a Twitter conversation today. More »

Super Meat Boy has seen success on Xbox Live, PC and Mac, but as is often the case while playing SMB, Team Meat have decided that's not good enough. Edmund McMillen and Tommy Refenes of Team Meat announced via Twitter today that they're rebuilding Super Meat Boy from scratch for a potential launch on mobile touch devices.

In a six-part tweetfest, Team Meat disclosed the following details: The touch title will be remade from scratch and won't play like Super Meat Boy; it will be a larger, more traditional game, unlike titles such as Doodle Jump; and they promised it won't use "shitty touch controls."

"if you liked SMB im sure you will enjoy this (if its good enough to continue on :) ) we just had a few cool ideas and wanted a challange," one of Team Meat's tweets reads.

Team Meat said that if the project fails and turns out to not be any fun, they'll scrap it and move on to the next idea, which we can only assume is a Super Meat Boy live-action point-and-click adventure title in 3D. Those adventure things are all the rage these days, we're told.

Who wants a long look into the mind behind The Binding of Isaac? Edmund McMillen recently spoke with design3, a web portal offering education and advice for game developers, and the resulting conversation is wide-ranging, fascinating and what I believe must be referred to as ‘refreshingly’ honest. That’s as honest as the country pub with the shaded garden serving up the first beer of a summertime Friday evening after a day of fielding calls in a thimble-sized office cubicle. The interview runs for an hour and a half but is certainly worth sticking with if you have an interest in Ed and his games, the indie scene, making games of your own or the wider industry. They cover it all.

(more…)

If you aren't familiar with Team Meat's work, this picture does a terrific job summarizing it.

“You feel like you’re walking into somebody’s mouth and they have the flu when you walk into a lobby. I feel like there’s an ass in front me and it’s farting constantly, and I have to breathe.”

That’s Edmund McMillen, the art and design side of Super Meat Boy developer Team Meat, talking about....airports, naturally.

“‘Did you try turning it on?’ No, it’s *crag*ing broken. There’s a line down the screen!”

And that’s Tommy Refenes, the programming half of the two-man studio, explaining what it’s like to return a tablet to a Best Buy store after purchasing via BestBuy.com. Hint: it’s not fun.

The three of us recently spoke via Skype to discuss an important milestone in Team Meat’s short history: a little more than a year later, Super Meat Boy has officially sold more than a million copies.

McMillen and Refenes didn’t actually reveal this tidbit until days later, but the moment the number ticked into six zeros territory was--and they claim they aren’t making this up--on Christmas Day.

The occasion was a joyful punctuation to what was otherwise a “cluster*crag* of a month,” where Refernes was forced to frantically finish work on the game’s delayed Mac port. Refenes admitted to not having much of an understanding of OS X, so Team Meat had initially outsourced the Mac version. But what came back wasn’t up to the duo’s personal standards, so Refenes was tasked with frantically cleaning it up. Even still, it's not perfect.

“I answer everybody’s email from tech support,” he said. “I feel like that’s the right thing to do. I answer the emails, and when they have a Mac problem, it’s just like, I go uhhhh. [laughs]”

My recording says we talked for 30 minutes, but Super Meat Boy only came up during a handful. It’s hard to keep McMillen and Refenes on a subject for very long, and the moment one gets serious, it’s as though the other can’t stand it, which means you’d better be ready for a dick joke to derail the conversation--and result in a fit of giggles.

Take, for example, McMillen trying to explain what it’s like to say he’s sold a million copies.

Super Meat Boy is part of gaming's refreshing challenge renaissance, right next to Dark Souls.

“Neither of us have a word for anything other than ‘This is life changing, and once again, this is insanely, crazy life changing event that I can’t process.’” he said. “ I don’t know. I can joke about it. We can make jokes about it forever, or be honest and say ‘Hey, this feels really good,’ but in reality, I can’t even define [it]. I can’t define the feeling of selling a million copies because it’s so foreign and bizarre and surreal and unreal. It’s beyond anything that I can really say. I can’t articulate it in any form other than it feels really great!”

“The closest thing is having a boner,” added Refenes.

“No, no, it’s better than having a boner” quipped McMillen. “It’s more like cumming for a month.”

“It’s exhausting and feels amazing,” said Refenes.

“At a certain point,” said McMillen, as laughter filled the Skype call, “it’s like when you jump out of a plane and get that initial rush, just like when you’re going--we’ll say going, rather than the c word. You’re ejaculating. I’ll use the technical term. You get the orgasm feeling, but I’m sure if you ejaculated and had an orgasm for a month long, you’d get used to the feeling, right? You’d become almost numb to it, but you’d still be feeling pretty good about it.”

This off-the-cuff, no-filter (and I mean no filter) approach is why Team Meat is Team Meat, but the consequence is finding themselves as a reliable source of controversy, a rub that appears rooted in grappling with skyrocketing fame. Each are fiercely passionate about protecting the integrity of the other, and this even came up during our chat.

When McMillen brought up a Formspring question about some issues in the PC port, he lit up.

“I kind of got upset, even though the guy wasn’t being mean,” he said. “I wrote this kind of manifesto of what people don’t understand. The more I thought about it, the more I realized how insane it is because nobody knows you made the engine that worked on all consoles all yourself, then when we went through the crunch with Microsoft, you got four months of work done in two months or less, and then when you passed it, you passed it faster than anyone who’d ever done it before. You jumped on from that schedule to doing the PC port in a month, and then when it came out, you fixed all the *crag*ing major problems within the first week. People still complained! It’s just so *crag*ing bizarre and so frustrating because nobody understands the amount of work that goes on in the background.”

Someone with public relations training would have said the exact same thing off-the-record, but like I said, Team Meat is Meat Meat because they don’t think like that. It might rattle some fans, but don’t mistake it for the two of them not caring. Moments later, as McMillen calms down, Refenes explains how his own angered response to criticisms of his work is simply driving them to avoid similar problems when it comes time to finally ship their new creation.

Once Super Meat Boy shipped, McMillen almost immediately went to work on The Bindinf of Isaac.

Next time, Refenes wants to hire a company to test the game on way more computers. Refenes had several systems for testing out Super Meat Boy, but at the end of the day, they ran out of time and money.

“For every little email that I get that [says] ‘I can’t get the game to run blah blah blah,’ it’s not like I look at those and go ‘ha ha, you’re dumb,’” he said. “I look at those and go ‘Dammit, I wish I would have had the time to actually address this properly. I wish I would have had that time before we even launched it, and now we do. That, to me, is really, really exciting.”

The above back-and-forth is how most of a conversation with McMillen and Refenes goes, sporting a tangible tension between wanting to be taken seriously, while having trouble with the idea of taking themselves too seriously.

I mean, these are the guys who asked their fans to draw themselves nude for a Christmas fundraiser.

But it’s clear Team Meat is ready to move on from Super Meat Boy. The idea of putting that little wad behind them comes up constantly, despite their intense gratitude for being where they are today because it was such a success.

With them, however, the tension is described with an orgasm metaphor.

What comes next isn’t described in any specifics, but Team Meat appears to be following a path similar to Jonathan Blow after Braid. Super Meat Boy helped lay enough foundational support that Team Meat hopes it to avoid most of the problems that plagued them the last time around. Notably, enough time and money.

This is the fan-made charity painting that won Team Meat's Christmas-timed fundraiser.

“There’s nobody above Edmund and Tommy,” said Refenes. “We don’t have to answer to anybody. We had to answer to time last time, that was above us--time and money were above us.”

“The next big game that we work on is going to be very, very different from Meat Boy, and it’s not really going to be comparable, and I think usually that’s the way to go,” said McMillen. “But I think, either way, me and Tommy--and I know Tommy for a *crag*ing fact--is going to be much more happy with his overall work on the games to come than he would be on Meat Boy, looking back at it. I know for a fact that we’ll both be happier with the next project, and we’ll both probably think it’s much better, and that’s usually what matters.”

Asked whether living up to the legacy of Super Meat Boy will haunt them, McMillen isn’t worried.

“You only get depressed about that kind of stuff if you know that the next game is half-assed in some way and you feel bad about it,” he said, “but if you try your best, and try to make the best game you can and try to put your all into it, I don’t think there’s much regret there, when it comes to 'oh, it’s not as good as my last game or whatever.'”

Before Team Meat's next game arrives, you'll be able to see them featured in Indie Game: The Movie.