Corrupted

Ninth and last part

**Corrupted** is the first Story level of *Just Shapes & Beats* as well as the very first level of the entire game. Corrupted is not preceded by any levels, and is succeeded by Chronos. This level is a tutorial level; it introduces new players to how the game works and allows them to prepare for harder levels later on.

The level can only be played if the player starts a new game on Story Mode or in Chapter Select - Once the player completes the level, it cannot be replayed in Playlist or Challenge Modes.

## Description

As mentioned, Corrupted is a tutorial level; It is designed for a new player of *Just Shapes & Beats* to learn about the game's mechanics. Dangers and hazards throughout the level are easy to avoid and the player has unlimited lives, making this level impossible to lose. Checkpoints are unlocked by collecting the triangles (though another checkpoint will be unlocked later on).

Hazards involve most of the game's core hazards that will later make its appearance throughout the game, notably the round spikes (sometimes called as thornballs or spiked balls) that move in one direction, exploding spikes (sometimes called pulse bombs) that explodes into small pellets and beams (sometimes called lasers) that warn the player before its attack. As well as some obstacles that the player cannot pass through without getting damaged, but can be avoided by dashing through them.

After completing the level, the first three starting levels - Chronos, Milky Ways and Logic Gatekeeper - will be playable in Story Mode.

## Layout

After a few seconds in each section, a Triangle will appear and must be collected to progress. Each time a Triangle is collected, the player is teleported to the left of the screen and into the next section. Each Triangle acts as a checkpoint.

Triangle 1
There is nothing on screen but the player and the Triangle.

Triangle 2
A series of slow-moving spiked circles will appear in the middle right of the screen, in time to the music, and move to the left.

Triangle 3
Spiked balls will ascend/descend from the bottom right/top right of the screen and burst into rings of eight pellets each. These balls are pulse bombs.

Triangle 4
Pulse bombs reappear here. In addition, rectangular columns will periodically outline where they will appear. These "outline" columns are warnings for hazards. Afterwards, they will properly appear, at which point they are hazardous. They start off in the middle and gradually move to the right, looping back if the end of the screen is reached. These columns are lasers.

Triangle 5
This area has pulse bombs and a different laser arrangement, in which there are two packed together on the left and two packed together on the right whose warnings are constantly visible. The leftmost and rightmost lasers will appear first, followed by the middlemost lasers. This keeps looping until the triangle is collected.

Triangle 6
Pulse bombs continue appearing in the same formation. The laser arrangement will become five warnings equally spaced out between each other and the edges of the screen. Lasers 1, 3, and 5 will fire at the same time, followed by lasers 2 and 4. There is also the addition of four circular outlines, two between each two columns. Every so often, they will erupt into full hazardous pink circles. These circles are black holes.

Triangle 7
Pulse bombs only appear half as often as they have for the entire level here, but there are also two solid columns of spiked circles: one on the left, and another on the right. The player must dash through these columns to reach the Triangle. Birds will fly in and dash through the columns as an indicator of what to do.

Triangle 8
Pulse bombs are absent from this set of hazards. Instead, they are replaced by the previous columns of spiked circles that sweep the screen from right to left. When this column reaches the middle, another column will appear at the right and do the same thing again. This continues until the Triangle is collected. The column must be dashed through to reach the Triangle.

Triangle 9
The hazard set for this section is identical to the one in Triangle 8's section, with the addition of black holes on the top and bottom of the screen which sequence rightward to the music,

Triangle 10
The longest segment of the level follows the collection of the ninth Triangle. Six circles will appear at the extremities of the screen, then expand and converge into the middle of the area, but will stop when nearly at the middle. Following this, they will repeatedly flash and then disappear, and in their place, the first section which truly features a lot of hazards at once will be there. The hazard list is found below:
* A spiked circle column that fills half the screen will appear from the bottom right and move to the left, with another one appearing at the top right of the screen after a while and moving to the left. These columns continuously appear, alternating starting positions each time.
* Continuously appearing black holes will appear in columns and sequence downward. They can appear on the right, middle, or left of the screen, but only in one place at a time.
* Pulse bombs continuously appear on the top right and bottom right of the screen and burst into rings of six pellets.
* Lasers frequently fire. These can be horizontal or vertical and can appear anywhere. Their fire rate is very quick which can be surprising to a new player.

Should the player break at any time during this segment, the game will rewind to right after when the circles have expanded.
At the end of this barrage, a single column of spiked circles will appear. This is the final obstacle that the player must dash through in order to finish the level.

## Gallery

* Beginning, collect the Triangle to progress
* First part
* Second part
* Third part
* Fourth part
* Fifth part
* Sixth part
* Seventh part
* Eighth part
* Intro to last part
1/10

## Level difficulty

Medium. The last part may be hard for some. but that's more or less the only thing making it a bit hard, as the half of the first parts are very easy.

## Tips And Tricks

The beginning is REALLY easy and self-explanatory, but the final part is difficult. Do NOT do these things:

* Stay near the top/bottom. You'll get hit by a moving saw wall, or possibly a Pulse Bomb.
* Stay at the left/right or middle. You'll get hit by a flashing circle wall.
* Stay in the same spot forever. You can get hit by anything.
* Not dash. The levels are based off of dashing, so DASH!

Try this instead: Move around a LOT and dash, but not into pink.

## Trivia

* This level introduces the game's first composers: Danimal Cannon and Zef.
	+ Other soundtracks for this game that Danimal Cannon and Zef composed together are the following (apart from this level): Chronos, Logic Gatekeeper and Legacy, all of which appeared on their album *Parallel Processing*.
	+ Two other soundtrack for this game that Danimal Cannon composed alone are Long Live The New Fresh and The Lunar Whale. In addition, he also composed the theme for the Boss (and the theme of the Tower world), the theme of the Industry world, the theme of the Paradise world (titled: *Agrobacter*), the 'Intense' and 'Frantic' themes during some Story Mode sequences, the Fanfare theme after a successful Challenge run and the game's main menu theme music. He would later remix Strike the Earth!, a level from Update 1.3.
	+ Another soundtrack for this game that Zef composed alone is Core.
* The level is unique in the following statements:
	+ It is the only level that does not display the track's information at the beginning; one can see by pausing the game or looking at the game's credits.
	+ The player(s) has infinite lives when playing this level, as it's meant for tutorial purposes.
		- However, the player can be damaged normally; should the player break at any time during the point of the level, it will return back to the last checkpoint.
	+ This level has the most checkpoints in the game.
	+ This level has no Hardcore version of it.
* Going back to the map in the pause menu will lead back to the title screen.
* The level's/soundtrack's title is a wordplay, like most other levels in the game. Corrupted likely refers to the foreshadowing of future events that will happen in Story Mode.
* The middle laser in the fourth phase always misfires (it has a warning and a visual effect, but doesn't deal damage).

* This level and Till It's Over have many bearing similarities to each other:
	+ These are the only levels that do not have a progress bar.
	+ These are the only levels that can’t be replayed in Playlist mode, they can only be done so by modifying or hacking the game.
	+ These are also the only levels that cannot be played in Challenge Mode.
	+ These are the only levels that are only progressed through player interaction; For this case of this level, collecting the triangles.
		- Collecting triangles counts as a checkpoint, and each time that a triangle is collected, a checkpoint will be triggered. There is only one checkpoint that is not triggered by collecting triangles, which is the introduction to the last section of the level.
	+ These are the only levels that cannot be level selected in Story Sequences.
	+ These are the only levels that the soundtrack progresses *if* the player interactively progresses in the level.
		- A certain part of the track loops for 6 seconds during the triangle-reaching sequence and it progresses once the player collects a triangle. After collecting the last triangle during the level, the track stops looping and continues all the way until the level finishes.
	+ These levels move the player's starting point from the left side to the middle area of the screen.
	+ These levels are the only levels that are impossible to fail.
		- The player will never run out of lives as stated above.

## External Links

* Official soundtrack
* Gameplay