Hardest Stage Two bar 29

[darthvaderlim]

Which Stage Two do you think is the hardest by difficulty barring 29 due to that one being unfair?

Mine would be Sasuke 27, due to DSSL and Unstable Bridge combo with all the upper body strength required and the Metal Spin. While 25 and 26 have the same exact obstacles, 27 had a reduced time limit with 90 instead of 95.

Another one for me would be 38, due to the Rolling Log before its nerf

[zoran]

Would say 38 due to the harder log and ruthless time limit.

Although it is unfair, 20 with glitches stick slider could get a dishonorable mention. 30 as well due to it being an easier version of 29 with a glitches Swap Salmon ladder.

[dakohosu]

Out of the non-broken stages like 20, I'd probably go with 27 as well. It had the combination of being an upper body onslaught, as well as there being several places to make mistakes like the Balance Tank and Metal Spin, and the time limit was pretty strict unless you just powered through the first half of the course, which most competitors couldn't.

One version I don't think gets enough credit is Sasuke 5's Stage 2. Shingo was absolutely rapid in the first few tournaments, even beating 3's Stage 2 which was also fairly time restrictive with 13 seconds left. On 5's Stage 2 he barely cleared with less than half a second remaining. The obstacles themselves were not difficult, but the time limit was brutal and also fatally penalised rushing which is how Yamada and Takeda failed pretty instantly.

38's Stage 2 difficulty I think is slightly overstated, mainly because it was anomalously challenging compared to the mostly underwhelming Stage 2s we had otherwise in this era, especially being bookended by 37 and 39's considerably nerfed versions. We still had 5 clears out of 14, and 3 timeouts only within 1-2 seconds. Araki would've also cleared had the log not got stuck. I think competitors were just thrown off by clearly not expecting the log to have the effect that it did, but I think the clear rates wouldn't be too dissimilar to how they are now if competitors trained for expectation of the original log.

I'd also say that even discounting the SSL glitches, 30 is still up there. I watched the DVD version with all the runs and it seemed like any hesitation on the Swap SL, like taking an extra swing before a transition, put you at serious risk of timeout, as well as the Swap in and of itself being far more difficult and punishing of mistakes than the Nobori/Kudari. The walls also played a huge factor, not having the counterweight feature and the first wall having those undersides, which resulted in prominent competitors like Yusuke and Yuuji timing out, and majority of clears were still with under 5 seconds, which is quite significant for a 100+ second course.

[subtleagent]

Aside from the ones mentioned I would pick 23 with the reduced time and the Unstable Bridge near the end being tricky and a time Eater. Considering Okuyama who had the fastest time in 22 almost timed out I think it got the job done of trimming the fat.