My 2nd favorite game of all time. There feels like an endless amount of things I can praise this game about. In every jump I make I can feel the love poured into this game. The level design is immaculate as every single screen is always challenging yet fair and very fun. The level themes all excellently build tension and ramp up difficulty in such a natural way. All levels have the theme of ascending upwards, both mental and physical (with exception of Reflection which purposefully reverses these two to represent Madeline's current state up until the end where the conflict is resolved and Madeline begins moving upwards again). The gameplay and level design also reflect the story in a beautiful way. The story takes a little and creates a lot - there are only a few Theo or Badeline encounters, yet the game feels brimming with a rich story and deep, realistic characters. That's one of the most immaculate things about the game - one one can read every line of dialogue and have a wonderful experience, and one can can skip the entire story and still have a wonderful experience. However, the story is excellent and feels real as Madeline struggles with mental issues. She has no idea who she is or who she wants to be, so she does whatever aimlessly hoping to find value in herself. She feels so real in this regard, a real human being uncertain about life. Despite this, she is committed and determined to discovering herself, not necessarily overcoming her fears but rather learning to move forward instead of staying stuck. Her story has helped so many people, including myself, in teaching them how to deal with your problems. It shows a healthy way to begin to heal. In addition to this, the music is absolutely phenomenal. Fantastic track after fantastic track that perfectly complements the levels, gameplay, and player's emotions. The base tracks make the levels feel so atmospheric, tense, or whatever emotion the level wants to make you feel. The B-sides are all charming remakes that are absolutely bangers, and the Farewell tracks all work in tandem to paint a larger picture.
Like I said at the start, Celeste is a game I could compliment for hours and hours, so go play it and replay it and replay it again.

A really fun game with a great sense of progression until a brick wall comes out of nowhere stopping all forward progress. The game is challenging but manageable up until this point. This forces players to either grind a lot or pay up to roll for better characters. For a hard stage before this, it would be a very minor grind to overcome it. Past the brick wall, every level takes hours to grind for. Everything up until this point is phenomenal however with great pacing and decent gameplay. The gacha isn't too egregious either.