Ranking Isaac CURSES by How Bad They Need an Update

[@V.Sensei]

I will not stand for this curse of the labyrinth slander. An XL floor is an absolute blessing if you're trying to go for boss rush or Hush. Found or spawned an item in the secret room? There are effectively two floors to get a roll or charge your D6. Found a golden bomb/key or have Mama mega? Double the effectiveness! From a gameplay point of view, this curse is absolute peak. It changes the way you play and adds new opportunities in exchange for resources. It is the only curse with upsides.

[@pydro_]

EXACTLYY i was fuming when he said it was the most hated one, not to mention it saves you 2 keys for the treasure room floor one and the fact that it simplifies chapters so you could clear them faster if they prove to be too much of a hassle (eg. using card reading to skip straight to mother in corpse) plus how much more potential a bigger floor has overall like you stated, you can not go wrong with labyrinth its literally the ideal curse

[@xeldrine66]

Also, it's really good when you have dross/downpour XL since you get double the charges/item as a normal XL floor.

[@person_on_the_internet_]

And if you get a XL floor on the start of the run you get 2 free items and a shop, it’s just good

[@jeremypanjaitan4039]

​@@person_on_the_internet_ quadruple floor is peak

[@speedy-do6nv]

You lose to much for it to be a good thing. You lose 1 shop, 2 secret rooms, 1 curse room, 1 challenge/boss challenge room. Those are just the guaranteed loses you could also lose 1 planetarium because its not gonna double the chance on and xl floor so if you have like a 20% chance you essentially lose a whole chance of getting one another is crawl spaces if you have we need to go deeper or something else that spawns one you lose one as its 1 per floor. The last one is maybe you are a character who uses sacrifice rooms a lot you lose one potential one right there. Its a lot to sacrifice in the early game so unless you really need the speed its always bad.

[@Sprungusbungus]

Curse of darkness would be cool if it acted like don't blink from enter the gungeon. Rooms pitch black and you get a flashlight that points where you're aiming. Enemies that are in the beam are stunned but enemies in the dark have glowing eyes and are faster+harder hitting. Would be so cool and nerve racking.

[@johnzhou4877]

Honestly sick idea, love it

[@jeremypanjaitan4039]

night light is crying in the corner rn

[@duckiequackers9122]

Surprised the curse of the lost effect isnt just how the map functions on the aprils fool challenge so you can still see the whole map but its hard to tell where you are

[@eimazd]

Similarly, having Blind be the April Fool's pickup effect would be interesting as well. Particularly as it would make it an interesting counterpart to the suggested Unknown effect.

[@ink68.9]

Dont blaspheme Lil haunt, he destroys greed mode with gnawed leaf!!1

[@ryanbushway2011]

There was a long time that I thought that gnawed leaf was One of the most useless items in the game. Embarrassing😅.

[@ink68.9]

@@ryanbushway2011 truly embarassing.

[@Сричеблядть]

​@@ryanbushway2011 I mean, if no familiars=no use for the leaf

[@aidencalhoun4893]

​@@Сричеблядть contact damage items

[@ink68.9]

​​@@Сричеблядтьtheres also contact damage items such as mom's heels and also tainted maggy (Edit: there's also orbitals)

[@erikm8373]

Like how Nightlight cancels out Curse of Darkness, more items should negate specific curses. The Mind, Treasure Map, any map/navigation items, etc. prevent Curse of the Lost. X-Ray vision, 20/20, any eye items prevent curse of the blind, etc. Also, my concept for curse of the unknown is that it locks all your HUD information (consumables, health, item charge) to what they were when you entered the stage, but as soon as any of those values change, they're replaced with a question mark. So while it still throws you off, you can still keep track in your head.

[@LilyTheSmol]

So what you're saying with curse of darkness is that you want it to go from "dims your screen" to "making a new variant of every single enemy in the game"

[@Tymbee]

Yeah, no way that's happening. Completely unhinged take.

[@davidban2536]

Just make a new game bru

[@ReconVelocity]

Neat idea for Curse of the Unknown is that it could affect your active item. It would show the charge bar, but it would be left blank alongside no sound for when your active item is fully charged. It would still play the sound of the item gaining a charge, but you wouldn’t know if it was fully charged unless you’re paying attention (to help with this, the active item would either always keep or never have the white outline around it, indicating that it can be used.)

[@ReconVelocity]

Because Curse of the Unknown is really only impactful to characters that have health, hell it doesn’t even really matter if you have a ton of health. I think affecting the active item slot would give it an actual negative effect that affects ALL the game’s characters.

[@Alister1310]

that curse of the blind rework sounds like it would be pretty fun to play with ngl

[@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac]

i'm cooking in this vid i swear

[@Vulpercool]

it is, because then, EVEN THOUGH I DONT KNOW THE ITEM, i can know if its gonna be a god item (if its yellow) or trash (grey/gray items) or anything inbetween

[@an_annoying_cat]

been wanting to make something like this for a while now

[@IKEACherryChair]

A good mod i use is "overcome curses," basically makes it so i dont have to deal with curses permanently in a floor. just kill the boss and i can see items or my health or the map

[@Sugarman96]

Makes Sol _even_ worse

[@superexplosion5985]

In other words: I installed a mod that makes every run start with Sol (and also made Sol almost useless).

[@stormRed]

This is by far my number 1 pet peeve about this game, i keep looking for mods that improve them or add better ones, but there's very few good balanced ones...

[@SilverFoxeGames]

I think another cool idea for a cursed door curse could be that the last door you went through is spiked, so you are forced to take damage once if you decide to backtrack, but not every room you need to backtrack, otherwise keeper would be almost guaranteed death if he gets hit in a room

[@kittenxmari]

I mean, "Cursed!" challenge does that. Although, I find an actual run like that would be pretty cool. Same thing goes for the Red Room challenge... Would be an interesting curse.

[@SilverFoxeGames]

@@kittenxmari the challenge makes all doors deal damage, my idea of balancing it for adding to the regular curses is just make it annoying and harmful, but a lot less detrimental for characters who can’t take that much damage like keeper

[@kittenxmari]

@@SilverFoxeGames I say we make a curse named "Curse of Ultra Hard," where every enemy is a varient, no health through the entire floor, every curse is done at once and it's just Ultra Hard the entire game. :)

[@rustonatorbro-6400]

Curses are curses, to give xL 2 shops, 2 item rooms, 4 secret rooms etc defeats the purpose of it being a curse...

[@ZeKuso]

This. I get it as a veteran you want to min/max and to use every respurce available to you, but curses are meant to be detrimental by either obfuscating your resources or taking them away. At least in this game it isnt risk/reward, its straight up fuck you deal with it.

[@reneiscrumbling]

I think that the solutions you provide kinda go overboard with quality of life maming it f3el like for some of these curses you straight up removed their significance completely, so here are some of my ideas Curse of the Blind: Still a question mark, but you can see the quality of the item so you can kinda guess but kinda not (silouette idea is also decent, but blury silouette sounds pretty wack) Curse of the Unkown: You only see the starting amount of pickups, health and stats you had when you entered (they don't update so you need to keep track of everything yourself untill you leave the floor) Curse of The Lost: On the map you only see the room you cleared without the adjacent ones (also the fact that floors are biggger and all that makes it a challenge of basically just finding the right doors without having to keep track of all the rooms you already completed) Curse of The Maze: Rooms can only switch up to 3 times, also you can't be tp'd to major boss fights (Mom's Foot, It Lives, The Lamb, Delirium etc) Curse of Darkness: Isaac now has a glowing aura around him with everything else being completely dark (gamma cannot affect it this time), but for the sake of balance enemies can only see Isaac when they enter his aura, which changes it from sometimes borderline unfair or useless with turning up the gamma to actually something mildly interesting Curse of Labirynth: The shop on the XL floor is now the giga shop that Tainted Keeper spawns, also there are now two secret and super secret rooms (Fragemented Card makes it three). Tho I don't think that XL floors really need a change that much since they do provide some help time wise Curse or the Curse: You get full mapping from the get go and I agree with getting hit by the doors only when you leave, but I'll do you one better: bombing a door removes it's spikes (similiar to flat tile) Curse of The Giant: Just needs map generator to actually work with it, otherwise it sounds fun as heck

[@addisonpernsteiner6569]

I thought so too

[@Error_glitch-01]

for the curse of the blind, there is actually a mod that colors the question marks in the colors of their quality! so quality 0 being gray, 3 pink, 4 gold etc.

[@addisonpernsteiner6569]

@@Error_glitch-01 that is honestly a good solution for balancing it.

[@Purpleman187]

I think that curse of the lost should be where you can see the adjacent rooms to the room you are in and that's it no other rooms

[@vandakarabeyan899]

16:43 xl floors are always good early game with treasure rooms and stuff but gets sk annoying late game which is just womb because sheol cathedral chest and dark room cant have xl floors

[@anthonyferranti7018]

I like how the blind portion of this video was just wanting to avoid cursed eye

[@idrinkpastaforaliving_6269]

Rightfully so, cursed eye sucks

[@marooniballooni03759]

honestly makes me sad :[

[@Fahimlol]

i lost my unlocking d6 with bluebaby run because of blind ipecac, it was very sad

[@omarl66]

15:53 an idea i had for curse of the unknown is that instead of not showing your hearts it should tell you how many hearts you had in the previous floor, maybe like a drawing on the ground of your hearts from the previous floor like the basement 1 first room drawings, and if you get it two floors in a row it updates to show your previous floor hearts

[@eimazd]

I like the Unknown change, and Blind sounds interesting. I think a neat Mist implementation would be that it disables X of your items, where X is however floors you've passed, changing each room - so a Depths 1 would have 4 random items disabled, then you go to a new room, get those items reenabled, but 4 random items are disabled again, and so on. Maybe cut that number in half, rounding down, for T. Isaac (still devastating with 4 items on post-Womb floors, but really, you should be beyond broken by then anyway).

[@LimboEffugiumWritter]

Since curses consist in randomly punishing the player without reason, I think there should be some upsides, like negative status effects in lies of P that also makes you slightly stronger. I think cursed here should give you an advantage as well based on what curse you got, just to make it fair since you can't do anything about it

[@LimboEffugiumWritter]

That or there should be a way to avoid them by being skilled enough

[@saxolot2810]

I think the Curse of the Labyrinth Shop dilemma could be fixed with two shops but I think a fun idea is making it so XL floors always have greed shops. So, you know, passive restock, reroll machines, beggars and etc, and maybe even slap the dono machine there. That would make it so Curse of the Labyrinth isn't just taking things from you but changing the dynamic a bit

[@BasicallyAsh_]

Imagine A Curse Called Curse Of KZbinr Luck. You're Just Too Lucky

[@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac]

thats actually a fire idea lmao guaranteed Q3 or Q4 items for a floor

[@BasicallyAsh_]

@@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac Guaranteed Q3 Or Q4 Items But Except At A Cost. You Lose An Item Every Time You're Hit (Similar To Humiliated Lost Unfortunately)

[@dirtpig02]

​@@BasicallyAsh_ seems like a fun drawback

[@bukkchickenbukk]

Why is every word in this sentence capitalized

[@CaramujoDaLeste]

​@@bukkchickenbukkCurse of the KZbin Video Title

[@G-Shroom-The-Mushroom]

You mentioned the fear or getting cursed eye or tm trainer But what even worse then both of those is Missing .no

[@lemin1]

An idea for curse of the mist is that all non stay up items you have would give you stat ups like you voided them so your the base character with stats that would be appropriate for whatever floor your on

[@ryanburke1426]

Maybe curse of the labyrinth could have only one of each type of special room (ie shop, boss, item) but have larger more impactful versions? Potentially containing bonus items or options.

[@gablink5190]

The way i would do curse of the darkness is like spelunky's version of it: no/very limited light on the player and slightly bright fireflies scattered around, if isaac is in the dark he gets the fear status effect.

[@QuinncyHy]

some rooms get fireflies already! wish more did they're really cool

[@gablink5190]

@@QuinncyHy i know, i checked the video for it, for my idea to work the need to be brighter tho.

[@Breeze45-s4h]

i love it when youtubers beg you to subscribe like they're starving hobos

[@dakotacornish6616]

to be honest i feel like a could way for curse of the blind to work is that the ? changes color depending on the quality but it has a 10% chance to display something a tier lower then the real item and a 15% of one tier lower this would add a risk reward while still letting you play it safe if you don't wanna risk it

[@Nitosa]

Curse of the mist could work if you begin with some of your items missing and after each or a couple rooms gain back a random one, which scales more on deeper floors like, on basement it's 40% of your items, while on shaol it's 60%. And even if you didn't get every item back, by going to the next floor they all return back. With some items of course excluded like character items, challenge items, skeleton key and health ups. The only annoying problem that this would cause is that it would ruin some priority item synergies i,e rock bottom but those cases can be circumvented by some items gaining first priority upon room clear.

[@Nitosa]

Another niche issue is that if you have more items than rooms it would cap on how many rooms there are. For example you have 100 items (rigged) on the womb which should take half your items normally, but there aren't enough rooms so it will only take like 28 items. A more evil approach is that it will take 2 items per room until it has halve your items.

[@hulabulia1329]

for curse of the mist you could also so something where it removes either every treasure room item you have picked up or every boss room item you have picked up, with a 50/50 chance for either, you could also do something where it removes 1/2 (normal/hard) item per floor you have cleared

[@ninjapumpkin0127]

I think there should be a "curse of the minotaur" style curse that if you are on that floor for too long, it spawns a Dark Esau equivalent. Would be one of the more frustrating curses, but would allow for a free devil deal and if they made it work like the old one where it can be killed (and not make you a lost), you could get a one room mama mega effect. Could be nice.

[@XenoverseCoverGoku]

6:32 THAT'S ME! I play the hit game The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth for the Nintendo 3ds XL.

[@UnchargedBattery978]

i like the idea of Curse of Darkness being a creeping darkness that’ll start in a room after a little bit, slowly creeping in around you and damaging you if you’re in it

[@amethysttheotter5943]

one thing i hate that you have missed is that when you start eden run and get curse of unknown at first floor, you litterally dont have a chance of knowing your health in any way, with the fact you get random health, so you litterally may start with one soul heart and not know it

[@izoomee9838]

My personal rework ideas: Curse of Blind - The smudged outlines is good but an alterntive bersion is having the question mark outlined in two separate colours indicating quality. Maybe one colour for 0-2 and another for 3-4 Curse of Darkness - Have a slight bit of screen darkened like glaucoma but increase chance of champions and champions with the camo status Curse of Lost - Have a chance for enemies from other floors appearing on your floor (HP scaling applied obviously). Also have the map exist but remove the player icon (and maybe icon of special rooms) Curse of Labyrinth - I disagree with adding another shop but instead to increase the chance of other special rooms spawning (so things like bedrooms, sac rooms, dice rooms have a higher chance of spawning). Having this effect also apply to red key would be a nice lil synergy for the XL floor. I also think that if you get a basement XL you should get one free red heart hit before losing deal chance. Maybe add an additional secret room too. Curse of Cursed - Special rooms could have spikes on their doors (risk-reward type beat) Curse of Giant - Maybe change size/hitboxes of the enemies.

[@liricopetanco6257]

They should add the double trouble bosses in curse of the gigant. Just imagine, a pain of a level and then 2 easy bosses together.

[@EmoryIllustrated]

My idea for Curse of the Mist becoming a full curse could go one of two ways 1. Every room, except the boss room, has a chance to remove all your items. All enemies in the room are D10 rolled down one stage in Chapters 1-3, and two stages Chapters 4-6. Rooms that do this have doors with a black mist coming from them. 2. Every room removes 10-25% of your items, except the boss room. Enemies have a 15% chance of being D10 rolled down one stage.

[@XragebootsX]

How I would change some curses: 1) Curse of the Lost & Maze: I would combine these and make it so that every room teleports you, but always between those locations (except into boss rooms) making you remember the pathways as if you didn’t have a map but still technically having one. 2) Curse of the Unknown: I like half of your idea to show the ?hearts equal to the amount you had when entering the floor, but I would keep it as that. If you have 3 hearts it has 3?s but if you lose a heart or gain a heart it doesn’t show until next floor. I would also remove all item descriptions leaving just their names when you pick them up, and show random numbers for your pick ups and active item charge. 3) Curse of the Blind: I like your idea but I want to go a step further, and have the sprite of one item but when picking it up it’s NEVER that item but in the same pool, (You see D6 but pick it up and it’s D20, see cursed Eye but get rock bottom, etc.) so there’s still an inherent risk but allows a “safety net” of knowing it isn’t one item 4) Curse of the Cursed: enable it in normal runs, remove all pickups from every room and have every room after being cleared spawn a Half-heart, half-soul heart, and a coin. But also guarantee a Devil/Angel deal for that floor

[@SlyRocko]

My suggestions for each curse: Blind - Silhouette, but parts of the silhouette are shuffled (to make it glitchy like TMTRAINER) Darkness - The darkness is as potent as the dark rooms in Mines/Ashpit, but get a flashlight (without the slow). Items that negate curse of darkness will instead brighten it up to the current curse of darkness. Lost - Only show the current room. Alongside this, add question mark icons adjacent to the current room icon lining up with the doorways (if the adjacnt room is a special it would show that instead of a question mark) Maze - I like the idea of this, but I feel like it needs better visual feedback: The map shows a random pair of rooms being swapped everytime you go through a door. If you are in one of the pairs of rooms, regular curse effect happens. Unknown - The biggest issue is that people may forget their previous counts before entering this floor. I think I prefer this solution: Show a snapshot of your health and pickup count when you entered this floor. For the floor, you will only be able to see this snapshot. (To make it more obvious that it is a snapshot, maybe those UI elements can be discoloured or smth) Labyrinth - This messes up progression way too much and it is ridiculous that it is still in this game. It is conceptually flawed as a randomly encountered curse, and it serves better as a gamemode or challenge. I would rather entirely replace this with the current Curse of the Giant, alongside also making all Boss rooms guaranteed to be Double Trouble (if applicable). As an added thing to make it more fair, maybe the floor is overall smaller in Chapters 1-3 Cursed - As it is, it's still a funny challenge seed. However, it really should be limited to putting cursed doorways on special rooms (except boss rooms) if it ever gets added to the game as a random curse. Giant - Now that Labyrinth gains the current Giant concept, this would have to be different: Enemies are slightly bigger. Champions are much more likely to appear, and they have a slightly higher chance to drop their champion reward. Mist - This is purely for the Mother sequence, so I doubt this would even make it into the game. If it ever does, it might be cool to do the following. When you enter the first room after the starting room, the Mother spirit appears and does its charging thing through all the rooms. When it hits you, it does one of three things: If you have passive items - Removes them (starts at 1 item, and removes more items with every subsequent hit) If you don't have passive items - Turn you into the Lost without the Mantle If you don't have items as the Lost - Lose a life/run As soon as you defeat the floor's boss, the spirit disappears, and any items that were removed will be given back to you.

[@Deathtank75]

the idea of curses is to annoy you, not help you.

[@andwhat390]

Exactly what i was thinking, he only wants them to be less annoying and more beneficial 😂

[@space-diny7667]

5:37 it said impact 5/5 it should be 4/5 honestly

[@anders_x3]

I have a fun idea for a curse: Curse of the Addict: Every combat room (where the doors close) a syringe spawns in the middle of the room. This syringe chases you (for 5s) and if it hits you get a random negative effect, (kinda like a bad pill) that lasts until the room is cleared. I would imagine some stat down options that are the strength of a horse pill and some other effects like you magnetically attract enemies or your movement keys are reversed or you shoot diagonally. Ok now after you've cleared the room you get a very small random stat up, like the one you get from candy heart (any effect you had from the syringe is reversed). The syringe disappears after 5s so you can't just kill everyone and then get a stat up after killing 1 enemy. I think that would be a nice curse that fits well into the game.

[@DoDo-ve6ef]

Personally what I hate the most about the curse of the labyrinth is not just the fact you're missing one extra shop, but the fact that you only get a single deal chance for two floors. I've had it happen to me more than once where I was trying to beat mega satan and just didn't get the HP for the sac room, as well as no angel deal until it was guaranteed at the mom fight (Got hit on the first XL floor so I lost the guaranteed devil deal chance 😔). It would be really nice if curse of the labyrinth at least gave me a deal chance on the first boss room as well, so if you have a 33% angel room chance you at least get two opportunities for it to happen, instead of just one

[@brandenblomberg3048]

you dont know the pain i experienced with a curse of darkness room in the womb with those little diglet enemies that come out of the ground to blast you

[@morphious86.]

i wish curses were more like those in Spelunky: all of them are risk-reward. there's no curse that is strictly bad, there are always unique upsides too. curse of the labyrinth is the closest isaac gets to that, if only it kept all special rooms of two floors combined, it could've had the risk of longer traversal with the benefit of being able to choose how you explore the larger floor. for example, i would keep curse of the blind as it is at the moment, but add some sort of reward, such as item rooms having an extra item. that way you don't just go "ugh, another curse, this will inconvenience me", you go "ooh, another curse, how can i make the most of it?"

[@Taratathetarantula]

Putting a curse thats not in the game in the thumbnail?

[@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac]

but oh confrere it is in the game

[@Taratathetarantula]

@@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac curse of the Giant Is only achievable with debug

[@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac]

@@Taratathetarantula yea but like its in the code so TECHNICALLY its in the game checkmate

[@Taratathetarantula]

@@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac Just like you can get the hold item when not playing as T. Blue baby? And G FUEL!!!!! on a normal seed? And passive book of Belial Without Judas birthright? And recall Without T. Forgotten birthright? And passive damocles Without the active? And the light Blue colored flip when not being dead T. Laz?

[@plushloler]

Blind: I think this curse works well, the point is that I don't know what the item is, at all. Not picking anything is the safest option, but it might not be the best option. If you find an item in the curse room and it's blind, then it could be a hard decision. I personally like cursed eye (though I did have many runs end on the final boss because of it, so I get why someone might want to not use it), but something like dead cat can take away all your red health, which might ruin the run on a late floor. At the same time, curse rooms have many powerful items, which you would really want. It's a risk, that you need to think about first, considering what items are in the pool and how some of them could impact your run. Darkness: I don't turn up the brightness, because that turns off the curse, as you said. But maybe to make this impossible, and make the curse itself more impactful, I think something like darkness from mario maker 2 could work, everything outside of your circle of light is completely black. Though, that can be extremely harsh. I think the light should be bigger for bigger rooms, and even bigger for hush and delirium fights. Trying to do a bullet hell in a small circle of light would be insane. I don't really like your idea, it keeps the theming for the curse, but not the point. I think dark alt-floors like what you describe could be cool, but they are alt-floors, not curses. The point of this curse is that it makes the game harder by obscuring your vision, not with harder enemy patterns. I think the curse works fine, personally, but if it would be reworked I would want it to still be about obscuring your vision. Lost: It can be annoying, but it can also be difficult. For example, if you're trying to go fast, you really need to think and remember stuff if you want the floor to not horribly slow you down. I got it in the void once, and it was really difficult to deal with, exploring the biggest floor while not being able to see the map, but at the same time it was kind of a memorable experience. Though I'm not gonna defend this curse too much, because I don't find it SUPER interesting. I don't think the idea with fake rooms would work as well? It would not be that impactful at all. Though mimic doors are really fun, instead of them being a curse, I would actually want them in the game normally, hurting you if you try to enter. Maze: I love this curse, it's really funny. I don't think your idea would work as well, because if the point is that the mini-map is always accurate, that would mean that some pickups would stay on the same tile and become accessible when they're supposed to be behind rocks or something. Or what if they teleport onto rocks? Or what if they are meant to just lie there, but get teleported behind spikes? I think it's better as-is. I would expand the room-switching idea though, and make special rooms swap with each other as well. To make the mini-map less annoying (though I think it can stay annoying) I would just make rooms switch while you're not in them, and reflect the change on the mini-map. Unknown: Doesn't take away what you can do, it just makes it riskier. First of all you are more likely to at least remember your max health when you get it at the start of the floor, for devil deals. If you manage to remember your exact health as well, it's then another thing you can keep track of, and it does make doing any sacrifice stuff harder. But you can also know when you restore health, if you pick up a red heart, you know that you have at least one extra red heart, and if you spent it you would not die. If you can't pick up red health, you know you're full. If you get hit and don't lose your devil chance, you know you weren't at your red health, and if you remember it being full before, or even the maximum, you then have full grasp of what your health is. From there, just track hits and health. It makes you actually pay more attention to stuff, and use things like picking up hearts to gather information. And if you're unsure, you can play it safer, but there are options for how to still be risky. I think your idea for showing how much but not what health is not that good, it makes the curse less harsh, but the main considerations of "can I even go into the curse room?" mostly go away with it, unless empty containers are also visible I guess. But the idea for making curses for resources is actually genius, I really want to see this in isaac and other roguelikes. Labyrinth: I don't think it REALLY needs a rework, it's a curse, and the curse lies in the fact that you miss out on a floor and the extra rooms in it. That is very impactful. But it's not run-ruining. I think it's very in the spirit of isaac to just say "no, you don't get this, lol". I think that since it's a CURSE, that's fine. However, I think it could be reworked basically like you describe, if it's just a special thing that can happen and not a curse anymore. Maybe in Isaac 2 or something, XL floors can even be a positive unlock? My idea for changing them would be to combine duplicate rooms together into bigger rooms, or rooms with more stuff. So there's be one boss room, but it's double trouble and gives two items. Your deal chance is higher, so if it would be 33%, it's 66% (keeping the chance is harder though, because the floor is bigger, and the boss is harder). Maybe you even get special deal layouts, devil rooms would have more items to choose from, and angel deals would have two angels and two items to pick up. I think there should be one treasure room, but it should always have two items inside, and two keys to enter. Maybe the treasure room is actually also big, so if there are pick-ups or enemies there's more of that. Shops should also either be "super shops" each time, or be like the greed shop, and have more inside them. Some other rooms could also be bigger, maybe you could even have big secret rooms. Imagine an L-shaped secret room in the middle of the map. I think that this could make XL floors a really exciting event, where you get to see cool, big special rooms, though once again, they'd have to no longer be a curse. Cursed: I think making the floors linear and discouraging backtracking would make the game less interesting. What I would do instead, is that curse of the cursed would make just a few doors on the floor be spiky. To make this less harsh for tainted lost, just make him immune to this one curse. Every other character would then need to pay half a heart fee to go to that part of the floor. Sometimes it might be the route they need to take for the boss, sometimes it's only for the treasure room, sometimes it might be for both. It would also make backtracking a bit harder, if the shop is on one side, but you need to go the other for the boss, but after the second half you have more money so you try to go to the shop again, but then you of course need to go back, that's 1.5 hearts of damage. And if there are more cursed doors, it might really make you consider whether you want to do this or not. This still has issues, like what if you just have half a heart from combat and can't heal? But I think this is at least the start for making it work in the main game. The other idea would be to make special rooms cursed, so treasure rooms, shops, secret rooms, sacrificial rooms, arcades, etc. all also have spikes on them, besides their usual entrance payment. This would avoid the issue of the player having no health at all and dying, but tainted lost might still need to be immune to this? His whole thing is that he doesn't need to get the item annoyance that the lost does, and I think "you can't get the shop or the treasure room or anything on this floor" would go against that. At the same time, it's funny for him and tainted keeper that you just can't do anything on one of the floors. This aspect would need testing before being put in the game. Giant: I will be honest, I have never played with this, so I have no idea if this would be good or not. I think the way to make it not as annoying would be to not combine rooms, but just only use big layouts. And to not make it as repetitive, because the game has more small rooms, I think more big layouts would need to be created, but I don't know how many or how long that could take. Mist: I think the idea you had with "items from this floor only become active on the next one" is the best one. Another thing could be that you just don't get any items this floor, but that's way too harsh on the player, even for a game like isaac. I think there are kind of other curses in the game. In the purist challenge, you get no item rooms, I think something like "curse of the starved" could make you have no item room for a floor. But isaac actually already has this idea, as very rarely, you will get an item room without an item (and there is also a chance that the game doesn't drop enough keys and you don't get a treasure room on earlier floors), I think the chance for this layout should be a little higher though, I only got it twice ever. Another curse is the effect of ultrahard, that hearts no longer drop, I think this could be "curse of the feeble" or something, would not affect keepers and losts. I'm also pretty sure ultrahard spawns even more champions than normal hard mode? That could be "curse of the champion" perhaps, though it would have upsides in the form of pickups, so maybe additionally champions would not drop pickups, or drop them way less, when this curse is active. Even though I disagreed with so much, I did like your video, it's good to see content where someone thinks how games they like could be even better.

[@FlashOfAsh]

I will say one thing other than that main suggestion you have for curse of the unknown, you should in the first room only get to see what you have, not when you leave and come back either, just when you get into the floor. And your suggestion for the hearts is while nice, kinda ruining the point, maybe a more general description of your health, just getting told low medium or high should be enough to keep it somewhat needing of memorizing, while still understandable if you don't care.

[@kevinharshman4280]

been around since 2k subs. just finally feel the need to commend you for your editing. i can tell you put a lot of effort into your videos and it really makes you stand out in a sea of isaac content. content in general really

[@chibisatan2901]

Theres another case where XL floors are good, if you have a 5 pip dice room/Forget me now. When you activate it itll put you on the first floor of the chapter essentially giving you another 2 floors. Sure itll be harder to reach boss rush or hush but if your not going for them its very worth.

[@worldtrademark_]

i like how instead of just saying “this curse bad change it now” you actually gave suggestions for how to make them better

[@thatlittlemonstrosity]

I kinda think curses should be an extra challenge that you can counter with skill or other tricks. As of now, they are all just like a crying kid in the 12 hour flight, it’s something you have to sit through and hope nothing worse will happen. You can’t counter or affect it. My proposal is make them in a way that encourages extra thinking or tactics that nullify the problem or even make them into blessings in disguise, for diligence is a virtue I’d make curse of the lost just make all rooms blank. You can see the layout but you have to remember which rooms are which if you plan on backtracking. It will make you think more and won’t be as annoying. Also make all doors blank so you’d never know if the next room is a treasure room, shop or a boss room (unless it’s a softlock arena). Curse room will act like spike chest, revealing itself when really close. All special rooms are free to enter but you have to remember them. Maybe also make it so it won’t tell in which room you are, so it will become confusing if you are not keeping track of it curse of the blind, outline obviously. However to this I’ll add the fact that it cycles between 3-5 other items like glitched crown, so it will be even more obscure but also rewarding if you play your cards right and pick a silhouette of a better item curse of darkness, make it pitch black except for outlines of pickups, traps, obstacles and glowing eyes of enemies. You can’t counter it with higher brightness and you have to be more watchful with how outlines of the enemies look. Of course bonfires and Isaac emit some light curse of the maze is kinda alright, I’d make an addition that if the whole floor is cleared, you may or may not appear in red rooms or unexisting rooms that do not progress you in any way but may give extra pickups but not ultra secrets. You can stall with it but at some point you’ll end up in I’m error room curse of the unknown is also alright but I’d make it freeze your current hp once you enter the floor, so you know how much hp you had when you came down this floor and can calculate how much you lost or gained by counting hits or heals from that initial hp. Yeah it’s basically the same but without the FOMO effect in which you’d wish you remembered how much hp you had before you came down this floor. Also I’d say hiding the bomb/key/coin/active item charges would be kinda nice, like randomising which ones will be hidden will make this curse even more varied and fun to play with curse of the labyrinth. Just make it an actual double floor. Double shops, double secrets, double planetarium chance, double special rooms. And make it so beating a boss can proc a deal chance, so there is a possibility to get two deals in the same floor or something like that. I hate missing out on things that I had no control over curse of the mist can be split into two curses. Curse of the chase and curse of the hushed Curse of the chase will be pretty much what you said, it’s a good concept. I’d make a funny interaction that if TJacob gets it, it will be the opposite and Esau will not spawn on the floor (it’s a good and a bad thing). Call it like a blessing of tranquility curse of the hushed will be a unique curse that doesn’t appear on floors but on rooms. A random chance of being without items in one room. For balancing sake, these rooms will be hush zombies rooms so that you won’t be screwed over in endgame rooms. It’s basically like blue key effect in which you appear in between rooms

[@RedMinjo]

I swear to God the minute I pick up an item that improves my map, the game just says "screw you, Curse of the Lost" for the rest of the game

[@brandonhelcher3691]

Black candle makes you immune to all curses. I feel like some other items should logically grant immunity to certain curses. Lost: Map Maze: compass? Darkness: night light. Also some Angel items that grant light could work. Blind: plenty of "eye" items could qualify. Unknown: gaining an hp up that floor negates it. Labyrinth: ???. Honestly no idea on that one.

[@eloimontier2307]

For the XL floor shops, maybe reuse the Creed shop with a garented reroll machine and a donation one This way we Can finally have some spécial rooms which are other things as 1×1

[@mr.mister3960]

The worst change they made in Repentance was making it so tear effects cant light up Curse of Darkness rooms anymore. It didnt even make the curse any harder to have, it just removed a cool thing

[@darkwolf9637]

An idea to make curse of the mist keep its identity but not just be a boring no item floor could be something like, you start the floor with no item but each room you clear gives you an item back and defeating the boss gives you everything back. So you can either deal with normal rooms to re-gear for the boss or just do the boss with no items and get all your stuff back instantly

[@hombrenan]

I have some ideas for curses that i'd like to share with yall Curse of the weakling: lowers your damage and tears by 10%, and causes all enemies and bosses (except history bosses) to become champion enemies, even if that enemy doesn't have a champion variant, like red flies, this doesn't apply to bosses though, if the boss doesn't have a champion variant, it will not turn into a champion. Curse of the damned: Causes the player to be followed by a dark esau-like enemy for the whole floor, this enemy acts exactly like dark esau, but it can't deal damage to other enemies, this curse can't appear while playing tainted jacob, for obvious reasons. Curse of the hobo: Causes a bum-like familiar to follow the player for the whole floor, this familiar will try to steal pickups from the player, like a regular bum, but will give nothing in return. Curse of the betrayed: Causes the player's familiars to have a chance to become hostile towards him, like one of the siren's attacks, this curse won't affect lillith's incubus or tainted lillith's gello. Curse of the forgotten: Causes the player's pill rotation to be rerolled into another one, it also causes question marks to be over the cards' name and image, like curse of the blind, it also causes the enemies to have a high chance of spawning again after being killed, this doesn't apply to bosses that spawn in the boss room, and finally, it has a chance to suddenly make random cleared rooms uncleared rooms, making whatever that was inside the room be completed again, this doesn't apply to boss rooms.

[@B1esky]

the first and last ones are perhaps some of the worst ideas i have ever heard im sorry 😭 having enemies all have twice as much health and you do less damage would make like half of all eden starts with it just plain impossible or insurmountable for almost every single player. having enemies respawn would also just be insanely annoying and most players' least favorite enemies are the ones that have some invulnerability factor

[@awkward1290]

Ay, dont hate on XL too badly. Its double the treasure/boss items! Yippe!

[@B1esky]

xl is really cool imo especially on the first floor because you get extra deal chance afterwards and all it removes is a shop you probably wouldn't have been able to utilize very well

[@DarkEyeMuzak]

ok hear me out. If curse of the giant ever gets implemented in game whether through an update or mods, I want each floor to have their own Titan for that specific curse. think like revelations mini-bosses but Having their own unique area and are HUGE.

[@yourdemiseishere]

Honestly curse of the blindness having like 5 shapes to use based on what item it is, you can tell if it's cursed eye if its a blurry circle but a square/rectangle could be several things like mask of infamy. Curse of the unknown should show you only the hearts you started the floor with as ? hearts, same thing but you didnt remember your hearts sometimes.

[@Bonkus..]

There is actually a mod that reworks curses so well that I never complain about them Its called "curse remover mod"

[@faih1741]

I have the best curse idea: Curse of the Won. The current floor only has quality 1 or quality 0 items 😈 "Won" is not misspelled, it's to trick you into thinking the curse is a game winner 😈

[@fragil2554]

Curse of the unknown could also make the sprite for pickups you find become the same, but only keep the sounds different so you can still keep track. Maybe it also obscures cards and pills but still allows you to figure them out by looking at their descriptions.

[@TheLethargicWeirdo985]

Imagine if curse of the giant also had giant item rooms, shops and curse rooms too, that would be so cool even if it will never happen

[@gamecubeking]

Weird idea for Curse of the Blind, that maybe doesn't entirely fit the *name* but fits the gameplay idea of not being sure what item it is, is make it so it does something similar to a Glitched Crown effect, but out of the number of items, only one of them is what you will always get when you pick it up. That way, it isn't broken by being able to tell silhouettes apart, but you can still have some clue of what you'll get that will inform the decision of making on whether you should risk it or not. If you're wondering how this'd work with actual Glitched Crown/Tainted Isaac, I'd say, make any items you could get part of the effect's cycling, but desync the Curse's cycling from the actual cycling.

[@vandakarabeyan899]

I actually love curse of the maze. It can be abused for free treasure rooms and probably secret rooms and it also helps you with back tracking

[@NinthSettler]

curse of the blind should show you item quality instead of a silhouette, precisely because the challenge posed by silhouette blind can be overcome by outside knowledge which is super wack at least with item quality you still don't know what you are grabbing but it's also not as bs as cursed eye curse of the blind (remove cursed eye)

[@sufferingmp4102]

7:38 Isaac really said “… That’s it?”

[@Henry-de4ox]

I like the idea of curse of the unknown affecting other things than just hp, but the rework on your health count kinda defeats the purpose of the curse. Unless you're trying to minmax items like dark prince's crown or adrenaline it doesn't really matter whether you have 3 red hearts and 1 soul heart or 3 soul hearts and 1 red heart. If brimstone costs 2 red hearts and 1 soul heart and you have 4 hearts you can take brimstone and still be at 1 heart. You're usually trying to avoid damage anyways and that shouldn't change based on what kind of heart the damage would go into. The only time curse of the unknown would even influence your health this way is if you have rotten hearts or bone hearts, since they take 1 or 3 hits to fully deplete, instead of 2 hits like other hearts.

[@SneepBeepins]

I don’t mind curse of the Labyrinth at all tbh. Your points are all very valid tho, and I don’t have anything to defend it. But I’m in camp “Labyrinth is cool as is”

[@zimownik]

9:00 1,5k hours in and 3 dead gods and never have I ever encountered that

[@blackseraph5939]

6:05 not picking up the Paw for Guppy progress hurt my soul

[@thraxus6661]

I've thought that curses were kinda outdated and not great for isaac as a whole since probably afterbirth+ and I'm a little disappointed we didn't get an overhaul on them for repentance. It always upset me that The Mind can be literally useless with one random curse and there aren't very many other items in the game that that applies to. I definitely don't think they should be removed, but the fact that a couple curses just make a small handfull of items useless is very frustrating

[@Daeived]

I am wrtiting a comment since like forever, hello there everyone-.. ehm... back to what i wanted to write : Curse of the Blind update idea : leave the question mark there BUT.. its points out what rarity of the item it is based on the color of the pedestal itself ( just barely visible change like slightly golden looking pedestal for getting like Pyromaniac and such ) Curse of the Darkness update idea : same as before it is now, just make enemies faster and a tiny bit harder to kill, not too much but not too little Curse of the Lost update idea : i dont have any BUT you idea AnotherMatt was good ( i approve *thumps up* ) Curse of the Maze update idea : every 2 minutes the whole map layout changes, not the amount of rooms in total ( it will be annoying late game with a lot of rooms but i like that idea ) Curse of the Unknown update idea : i like your idea a lot Another MAtt again,.. with also if you have an active item it would also changed the amount OR every room it changes the HP you have, like you have 5 hearts and the next room you suddenly have 3 hearths and 1 soul hearth ( for The Lost.. it would just change that you can suddendly habe no Mantle when you didnt get his or something similar to that, for The Keeper it would change the amount of money HP you have, like you went in with 3 HP but suddenly you have only 1 or 2, something like that ) Curse of the Labyrinth update idea : still merges 2 floors together WITHOUT the deal chance BUT the 'next floor it will go back to normal'.. ( you get Basement XL, you beat both bosses and go to the next floor, instead of Cellar or .... i forgot the names of the floors lol, you'll get Basement 2 ) Curse of the Cursed update idea : it can appear in normal game, changes special doors into cursed doors, you'll take damage only when leaving said room ( making backtracking a lil annoying ) Curse of the Giant update idea : changes the whole floor into one GIANT room, beating it spawns all special rooms ( will not merge rooms, could make new 'giant' rooms ) Curse of the Mist update idea : any room have a chance to take away SOME of Isaac's items ( can take the best items for example, leaving you with your beloved Curse Eye >;p ) OR being in a floor for too long it has a chance to deal damage to you ( similar to Damocles but not as 'deadly' ) Curse of the empty : my idea of a curse if it wasnt added somewhere already *sweats heavily*, for the whole floor, whenever you would get a pickup it instead gives you a small note saying 'thanks pal for this'

[@rosiesuwu]

For curse of the blind, an Idea I saw a mod do perfectly that still keeps the spirit of curse of the blind, show us the quality of the item. The mod in question does it by coloring the question mark differently depending on the quality of the item, so you'd know not to take quality 0s

[@touhou8765]

Me getting Curse of Darkness with Another Matt's idea..and gets a room with 6 Shadies in it: "well....fu-"

[@malicioususer1837]

I can't find any info on it I feel like Curse Of The Maze can't tp you to Mom. It never happens now, and it feels like they removed its ability to do so so that it doesn't lock you out of the Ascent path. That'd be unfair so I'm assuming they took that into account. I'm not sure though.

[@an_annoying_cat]

i will be considering some if the changes in here, i e been wanting to make a mod that addresses curses for a while now

[@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac]

That would be sick 😨

[@RJLK0518]

Something cool for curse of the darkness could be that you cant see what type of room you're going to enter next (except the boss probably). That could maybe make Sol a good item 💀

[@enoraltheoutcast]

7:26 That idea reminds me of how the map works in April Fools challenge. The map is correct, But your position is shown wrong.

[@SMJ-ix8qn]

I don’t really mind XL. It can be super helpful when speed running for boss rush/hush

[@vandakarabeyan899]

Guys curse of the lost should turn you into lost for the entire floor( and your still registered as the character you are before so you cant abuse it for unlocks)

[@CoryTrevorson4570]

i know this is probably mathematically impossible but i swear when i played afterbirth+ after having installation issues with repentance on my ps5 i spawned in an xl cellar with 2 treasure rooms on either side a curse room south and no north door and when i exited and reentered there was a north door and it took me to an i am error room and the game crashed

[@ronnywerner1996]

curz of the maze i think the item chest... shut swap with the room becuase wehn it lands on gap or hole or between stons you cant get the item or chest or sackannymore when you not have fliht or boms

[@Jarli477]

A note on curse of the maze (curse of wasting my fkn time), I havent checked it out but it feels like it was MAJORLY toned down for repentance. Before it would literally drive me insane, i would be in my chair SEETHING about this waste of time, and now its just a nothingburger, and that is fine and based. Base game curses are stupid and icky and i want them gone, contributing nothing but annoyance.

[@nicklasbertelsen8717]

For Curse of the Lost, first of i think the +4 rooms should stay, because it both makes sense, and strengthens the effect of the curse, but is also a benefit for having the curse however small it is. BUT, instead of making the map wrong as you said, i would just have the player able see 2 rooms in a ny direction at any time. Basically you would be able to see part of the map, but not all. And the especially splunker hat, and also the other mapping items could increase this range by 1 each. With this effect it still keeps very close to the original effect and feel, but allows you to remember the map much more easily from seeing parts of it, and it would be easier to get a feel for where secret rooms and such might be. I mean i have some other notes on the rest of the video, but this is what i wanted to say most Oh yeah also, your idea for the lost curse, i think actually fits MUCH better for the Curse of the Maze, because the random extra doors work well with the teleporting effect of the maze. And i think so does the extra rooms on the map. Because here you still keep the map, it just becomes more confusing which is kinda the entire deal of the Maze.

[@nicklasbertelsen8717]

I also think the best way to solve curses as a whole is just to add something like a planetarium that increases in chance for every curse you get. This also makes the curse pills and such better.

[@nicklasbertelsen8717]

Also curse of the Labyrinth does NOT nearly always badly effect you. Sure you lose a shop and other special rooms, but on basement and downpour it has clear positives, and in general as a person who loves to optimize and rig the game, labyrinth gives much more rooms and opportunities to do so. For optimization, a new floor is basically a reset on what you can do. All the pickups, and items and so on are now GONE forever unless you have something like moving box. But even then you can't take everything with you. Also improves things like some diceroom effect, and other thing that effect the whole floor, like golden keys/bombs, and mama mega. Especially for t.cain a bigger floor can be a wet dream. Because of that i simple don't think it is nearly always bad. But you only mentioned a fraction of the benefits. That said i think it could have some amount of changes. I don't think extra shop should be added, because i think that is to much, but that said i think a chance or a guarantee to UPGRADE the shop by 1 level is an excellent idea, or guaranteeing a certain minimum shop level. Or even guaranteeing no greed in the shop. For secret room, i would also add a normal secret room, because having multiple of those on a big floor makes them super fun to find, but i don't think a super secret is needed. Because they are mostly much weaker and often not even worth finding, and also due to the way they are generated they often generate right next to each other, when there are multiple of them, which is boring. And last, as you mentioned the chance of getting certain special rooms, is lower because the chance isn't rolled twice. So here my solution would just be to roll ALL special room chances twice (maybe even including deals, but probably not). Especially because having many different special rooms on the same floor is super fun, so basically doubling the chance on this floor would be super cool. Sadly XL floors has another problem. Every floor, when generated, is guaranteed a certain number of dead ends, because they need to exist for special rooms to be placed. But sadly XL floors don't even nearly double it. It just gives +1 iirc. But 5 + 1 is not exactly a large increase. So therefore i would love if it instead added +3. Because this would somewhat increase the likelihood of having more special rooms, because there is now actually always space for them. Edit: oh and also you forget to mention you can avoid it everywhere, but the first and 1 late floor, by just switching between alt path and main path, because you will then only be on the second floor of each chapter. This is especially good if you also want boss challenge rooms, because those are also guaranteed this way.

[@nicklasbertelsen8717]

Oh btw, just wanna say i do like the video, and somewhat like many of the ideas. Just have disagreement on some things.

[@mrkrabsswz]

I think the mimic doors and fake doors for the curse of the lost would be cool for curse of maze rather than the lost

[@ardaoguzhan8181]

20:40 the fact that you didn't pick gilded key while having mom's key bothered me so much

[@travisromero9528]

What if for Curse of Cursed, only special doors hurt you on the way out? Regular rooms are fine to go through, but you can only go into special rooms once for free

[@bigfungus4203]

The number of time curse of the lost made me miss my boss rush.. I hate this curse like no tomorrow.

[@Kalightortaio]

I like some of your ideas! I might try my hand at modding some of these.

[@turtlesoar]

i actually like curse of the labyrinth :/

[@Rathzul]

I think how curse of the unknown should be done instead is, your bomb, key and Coin amount will be randomized, say 50 coins, 23 bombs and 3 keys, but your real collectible stats are (20 Coins, 5 bombs and 2 keys) when you try to spend more than 20 coins, use more bombs than you actually have or more keys than you actually have, your bomb and key count will proceed to go to 0 with isaac doing the bad pill use animation and the bad pill sound playing, as for the coins, if you say try to buy a soul heart at 5 coins, but you only have 4 coins left, it'll then go down to 4 coins and you obviously won't get the soul heart, the health in my opinion should stay the same, whilst it is annoying to not know how much health you have sometimes, I think it's fair enough this way

[@LocalGhostSoru]

Curse of the mist needs to be reworked because in combination with some mods it just causes the game to crash. Now even after deleting all the mods I can't play the moms shadow part because it got corrupted beyond end. So I'm just using a mod to have the knife piece outside

[@pixlen4371]

GET THIS VIDEO MORE LIKES!!!!!

[@monstery8372]

About the alternative for the Curse of the mist, maybe for each rooms theres a chance for a random item you own to be unusable.

[@Themoonfighter]

There are a mod show the quality item color in Edges of the ? Mark with curse of blind

[@MeedasGuy]

that's a really bad way to change curse of the blind. item quality is supposed to be a hidden mechanic that's just there to keep tainted cain balanced (as well as make like 3 item effects work) and you're literally never told about it in the game. a big issue with curse of the blind is that ot removes strategy, whenever you can choose between multiple items you just have to choose randomly now, with this change you just choose the higher quality item which isn't any more interesting.

[@Raiom.]

12:10 Another Matt, you little ######, you made a #### of piece with your trash video. No man but really, I wanted to see what those would reroll into, and you stripped that away from me in the last second. I'm mad. Also, great video.

[@AnotherMattPlayingIsaac]

@Raiom. just business sorry

[@Starci.]

The curse of the lost idea you mentioned woul only work if you go into the floor having mapping though, no?

[@ViIvaNunner]

tbh if i could change curse of the cursed id just have it only effect special rooms and itd just not show up on characters itd be horrible on like the keepers heck if you wanna make it a change stuff instead of making stuff cost extra health you could have it so the normal requirements to get into special rooms is different; so instead of a key its a spiked door for the item room and shop; or for a bedroom itd be a spiked door without the two bomb requirement