Level 14 is the nadir of the whole game. "Hey, so now that we've spent 13 levels establishing the mechanics of the game and training you on puzzles emphasizing correct order and planning ahead, here's a gauntlet of obstacles that you have to clear quickly to progress, and also kills you instantly if you don't react at the start! Also we hid the correct path off-screen and behind the menu buttons, even though we've never had any fourth-wall breaking mechanics before and never will again! Isn't this fun player? AREN'T YOU HAVING FUN?!"
@TheBigDawgJ: The goal is to surround each tile with exactly the amount on that tile. A "1" tile must touch exactly one other tile, a "2" tile must touch exactly two other tiles, etc.
All joking aside, this is an excellent example of rising and falling tension through simple game mechanics. As the two sides get closer, so does your possibility of failing; but when the two sides get close enough, it's much more likely that the balls will get trapped at the top of the screen long enough to build up a damage bonus. Often, when the armies are just one space apart, that's when you get 100+ balls with 2x or 3x damage wrecking both sides mercilessly. This then leaves a wide gap between the armies, meaning that your failure has been staved off, but you also won't get that kind of massive damage bonus again for a while. So you keep playing for a few more rounds, waiting for that next spike of tension and subsequent release. That's why it's so addictive, despite its simplicity. Well done, eddynardo.
If your meter fills up 99% of the way and gets wasted because one escaped off the bottom of the screen at the last possible moment, your balls should turn blue.
I played this game when it was originally released on Newgrounds. It was great for its time, and people praised it for its tight and responsive control scheme. But, as with all the best games coded in Flash's heyday, it's aged like milk. Plus, a decade of different browsers on different operating systems with different keyboard drivers has turned those once-great controls into something slippy and unresponsive. If you want the real Meat Boy experience, I suggest you go buy Super Meat Boy instead.
@JackVermicelli, I wholeheartedly agree. As soon as I saw it went to aa, I took that as a definitive sign that I had just about reached the end of the unique content. I know I'm not picking this game up again until they introduce some more proper -illions.
@simple56: Actually, you can sort of figure out the optimal crop layout without a gold/s counter. The pixie always rewards you with an amount of gold based on your passive gold/s. Every time you test a new layout, catch the pixie; if the gold reward is higher, that means the new layout is more efficient.
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 "Sprite Sequence Volume 1"){kind=icon}
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 "MoneySeize"){kind=icon}
 "Farming Carrots"){kind=icon}
 "Valdi: Shadows"){kind=icon}
 "Orcs VS Elfs"){kind=icon}
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 "Meat Boy"){kind=icon}
 "Idle Hamlet"){kind=icon}
 "BrainCreator"){kind=icon}
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I hid the hints in the pause menu to prevent the temptation to use them all the time.