I grew up with CV3 and I’ve finished it lots of times, but when I saw this was made by a speedrunner I was worried it would be too hard, despite his assurance that it had difficulty similar to the original.

I would agree with that: the difficulty seems very similar and is quite restrained. I had an absolute blast playing through these new levels: they’re very well-designed with some nice creativity.

I mostly cruised through the game (I did all the routes with Grant), with the odd game over, but there were about 4 levels that gave me trouble. But definitely in a good way. The second last level was the toughest, and I eventually resorted to save states to practice all the sections. But then I went back to do it legit and on my first life one-shotted the whole level. So tough, but fair I think.

I was relieved that the “falling block” level was much more restrained than in the original, and was actually fun. So does that make this better than the original game? Maybe.

The hack itself is fairly bare-bones, and if you squint you can “see through” it a bit and see the underlying structure of the original CV3. But that doesn’t detract from an excellent set of new levels that make the game feel fresh again.