After 15 years and 700 hours of gameplay, a speedrunner conquers Super Meat Boy without a single death, receiving praise from co-creator Edmund McMillen.

Super Meat Boy stands as one of the most challenging platformers ever made, earning its place as a staple of the masocore genre since its debut in 2010. Despite its legendary status, no player had managed to complete the game without dying in the last 15 years—until recently, when speedrunner shredberg achieved this monumental feat and received recognition from one of the game’s co-creators.

While players have successfully navigated individual sections of Super Meat Boy without dying—thanks to various achievements for completing specific worlds—pulling off a deathless run through the entire game, including all bonus levels for a total of 106% completion, is a whole different ballgame.

In a Reddit post, shredberg shared that it took “probably like 700-800 hours of grinding” to achieve the final two-hour deathless run in mid-December. “I know I had to get at least like 100k deaths to be able to beat it with 0,” shredberg noted.

Edmund McMillen, who co-created Super Meat Boy before going on to develop the acclaimed roguelike The Binding of Isaac, acknowledged shredberg’s achievement. “Congrats!” McMillen tweeted, adding a follow-up message saying, “You are awesome,” complete with a smiley face for good measure.

The difficulty of Super Meat Boy is well-known, and it’s surprising that it took this long for someone to complete a full deathless run. Typically, tough games inspire hardcore gamers to tackle the most outrageous challenges right away, but it seems Super Meat Boy truly lives up to its reputation for being exceptionally tough.