Overview
A comprehensive list of unlockable characters featured in Super Meat Boy.
Introduction
In addition to our meaty protagonist, Super Meat Boy has various other characters you can play as. Some are unlocked by collecting enough Bandages that can be found on levels, while some require you to beat a warp zone or input a code on the character selection screen. In some special occasions something else is required.
Most playable characters are from other indie titles such as I Wanna Be The Guy and Minecraft but in some cases you are allowed to play as other characters featured in Super Meat Boy.
This guide will introduce all the playable characters and their special abilities, excluding those exclusive to XBLA version. Characters are not presented in the order you unlock them but divided into separate sections depending on the method they’re unlocked with. Enjoy!
Bandages
Characters in this section are unlocked by collecting a certain amount of Bandages. For more information about Bandages and their locations, see: [link]
From Half-Life
Bandages to Unlock: 10
We’ve all come across a headcrab or two at some point. This Steam exclusive little fellow doesn’t have any really outstanding special abilities except for his lovely appearance. He can run fairly quickly with his four little feet, and in many occasions he can jump far enough to reach safety. But what’s unique is that while holding Special button and clinging to a wall he slides down very, very slowly. Holding Special and Jump down at the same time will make Headcrab cling to ceilings as well. Unfortunately Headcrab can’t suck life out of anyone or turn anyone into a zombie in this game. Imagine how fun that would be?
From Machinarium
Bandages to Unlock: 30
The lovely little robot from Machinarium is as adorable dodging saws in Super Meat Boy as he was solving puzzles in a dystopic police state inhabitated by robots. He runs slightly slower than what would be ideal, and his jumps fall a little short as well. His special ability: pressing Jump mid-air propels him upwards for a short while. When jumping straight up from ground this doesn’t really do anything and it might at first seem useless. On long jumps, however, it can make a difference, and thus this ability should not be dismissed as completely worthless.
From Alien Hominid
Bandages to Unlock: 30
Alien Hominid comes as a sort of bonus with unlocking Josef. He doesn’t get announced like all the other characters after they’ve been unlocked, and unlocking him doesn’t yield an achievement either. Furthermore, he cannot be switched to if a level has already been loaded. Instead you have to chooce him from the first character selection screen. Why is he being discriminated against like this? Pressing Special mid-air makes him shoot glowing little projectiles which, unfortunately, can’t be used to kill any enemies. If you keep pressing Jump button, shooting such a projectile will slightly boost Alien Hominid upwards.
From Super Meat Boy
Bandages to Unlock: 40
8Bit Meat Boy and it’s 4Bit and 4Color variants are first playable only on retro Warp Zones but become playable as regular characters after collecting enough bandages. They play similar to Meat boy but, as discovered by users on Team Meat forums[supermeatboy.com], they seem to spawn a little faster than the original.
From Aquaria
Bandages to Unlock: 50
This quite fishy looking (a lame pun, I know, and I didn’t even come up with it myself) gal comes swimming from the depths of an ocean that is Aquaria. She cannot run, which makes her uselessly slow on the ground. But we don’t want her to run anyway so it doesn’t matter! Pressing Special mid-air makes her float with a yellow glow appearing around her, and her appearance changes from your regular fish girl (I mean, this is how they look, right?) to some sort of devilish evil twin type of character. While in this state, releasing Special makes her dash with an incredible speed straight ahead, slightly upwards, making her any speedrunner’s first choice. Hitting a wall or ground cancels her special condition, turning her back into her normal self.
From Super Meat Boy
Bandages to Unlock: 60
4Bit Meat Boy got his bits cut in half. How sad.
From Runman
Bandages to Unlock: 70
Naija may be a little lacking in her ability to run but our little buddy Runman from Runman surely isn’t. This star shaped fellow can run fast, and he can also run faster! With an incredible speed that is. Holding down Run while he’s running makes him run FASTER THAN YOU COULD EVER IMAGINE! And even without Run his running is very fast compared to that of the other characters. Unfortunately he can maintain his faster running only for a short while. Did I mention that while holding down Run he can also jump a long way? Like a really, really long way.
From Super Meat Boy
Bandages to Unlock: 80
4Color Meat Boy. He’s got four colors. Also he’s gray. Pretty cool.
From VVVVVV
Bandages to Unlock: 90
Incorrectly spelled “Capitan Viridian” in-game, Captain Viridian has come to reverse gravity once again. He’s not very fast and he’s not the best character to climb walls with since the controls are a bit awkward but he is incredibly useful in some situations where you can bypass many obstacles by just going straight up. For example I found him very useful when no-death running Hell Dark World (because I’m a wimp). He needs solid platform to stand on to be able to reverse gravity so open sky means unavoidable death.
From Minecraft
Bandages to Unlock: 100
Steve from a game called Minecraft (you might have heard of it, for what I understand it’s very popular these days) makes an appearance as well. After busting your behind, going through all that trouble collecting each and every one of those damn Bandages, what do have we here? What can he do? He can place blocks. Well I’ll be damned, who would have guessed? No, actually it’s pretty neat. He can place blocks even in a middle of a jump, and he has the ability to remove pieces of ground and walls. Utilizing this he can make tunnels under buzzsaws and over missile launchers. It’s a slow but fun way to avoid obstacles if you ask me. Note that you can’t use Steve to unlock No Death Achievements because that would be lame.
Warp Zones
This section lists all the characters than can be unlocked by completing specific Warp Zones. Otherwise similar to retro Warp Zones, these zones give you infinite attempts, and you get to play as the character you are trying to unlock.
From BIT.TRIP RUNNER
Warp Zone: 1-12
Commander Video, with his rainbow cape and noble posture, is the first character that becomes available through completing a Warp Zone. He is slow but his special ability is neat: holding down Jump mid-air makes him glide through air in a straight line for a short while. This is especially useful for picking up Bandages from some tricky locations.
From Mighty Jill Off
Warp Zone: 2-8
Jill and her dominatrix outfit make quite an impression. Pressing Jump mid-air makes her stop falling for a split second. Repeatedly tapping Jump will allow you to maneuver around different obstacles like a boss.
From Jumper
Warp Zone: 3-16
Ogmo bears similar appearance than Meat Boy, although with Ogmo having being around since 2004 it might actually be the other way around. Ogmo is the first one available of the two characters who can perform a double jump, and also considerably easier to unlock. Double jumping is as simple as it sounds: jumping mid-air makes Ogmo perform a second jump. Changing direction in the middle of a jump requires two jumps so be sure to know where you want to go! Tip: Running off a platform allows you to perform two jumps during the fall.
From Flywrench
Warp Zone: 4-18
Flywrench is a flying…thing. His ability is being able to triple jump, which allows him to cover long distances with little momentum. However, each jump has less power than the previous one, and they are pretty hard to control precisely. Other special thing about him is that pressing Jump while he’s against a wall makes him slide up instead of performing a wall jump.
From I Wanna Be The Guy
Warp Zone: 5-7
Those who complete the insanely hard Warp Zone in Rapture are awarded the right to control The Kid. Arguably the better of the two double jumpers, The Kid is faster and able to jump further than Ogmo. Being able to jump far is important if you specialize in jumping! The Kid makes many parts of the game much less painful which is, in my humble opinion, only fair concidering what a pain it is to unlock him. He is more precise to control than Ogmo but despite his speed and agility, he still is not The Guy.
deviantART user TheInfamousTheft has put together a neat little guide[theinfamoustheft.deviantart.com] to demonstrate how the warp zone can be played through. It will not play the level for you but you will get a pretty good idea how to do it yourself.
Code Input
Characters in this section become playable by typing in a code in the character selection screen before entering a level. You will be able to play as them until you exit to map, after which you need to type in the code again.
Some people have had to hold down Shift while typing in the code in order to make it work. If you’re sure you’ve entered a correct code but all you get to play as are regular boring characters, you could try doing that.
Also keep in mind that the codes are supposed to be written with QWERTY layout. If you’re using a keyboard with a region-specific layout such as AZERTY you need to take into account the key placement of a QWERTY layout and in some cases type in the code “wrong”. For example, on a AZERTY keyboard ‘ballgoo’ would become ‘bqllgoo’ and ‘petaphile’ would become ‘petqphile’. Many thanks to Steam user Cantavanda for figuring this out!
From Super Tofu Boy
Code: petaphile
A joke character taken from PETA’s Super Meat Boy parody game Super Tofu Boy, Tofu Boy in SMB is nothing like his namesake in the game made by PETA. Tofu Boy moves really slowly and his jumps are abysmal, making him unable to beat all but a few levels. He looks so miserable I almost feel bad for him. Typing in the code and playing as Tofu Boy for the first time unlocks an Achievement “Well look at you!”. Tofu Boy is exclusive to the Steam version of Super Meat Boy.
From The Salt Factory
Code: RB RB RB B B B X
First encountered in the boss fight of Chapter 3, this brown fellow is also a playable character. He’s basically just a reskin of Meat Boy. Inputting the code for Brownie requires Xbox controller even on PC. If you don’t have Xbox controller (or even if you have), or are running the game on Mac, on which SMB doesn’t have controller support, you can play as Brownie in some community created levels in Super Meat World. Hooray!
From Braid
Code: outtatime
Rewinding time, trying to save The Princess, comes Tim. And what do you know, his time turning abilities work even in the Super Meat Boy universe (coincidentally it’s done here as well by pressing Shift, er–I mean Special)! Turning back time just for the sake of it is as entertaining here as it was in Braid. Furthermore, as pointed out by Steam user Llefty (thanks!), you can utilize the time travel to snatch some of the more tricky bandages and even dodge missiles by becoming invincible! I wonder who’s doing worse; Tim, who is constantly failing to locate the correct castle his princess is in, or Meat Boy, who fails to save his girlfriend from Dr. Fetus throughout Chapters 1 to 6.
Some people have experienced troubles when trying to play as Tim. If typing ‘outtatime’ does absolutely nothing for you, it has been suggested that holding down Shift whily typing the code might do the trick. Alternatively, some people have reported that putting in code ‘outatime’ worked for them. If you’re having trouble, these are possible solutions but I can’t guarantee they work either because I’ve never personally had any of the reported problems.
From World of Goo
Code: ballgoo
Gooey Goo Ball from World of Goo has the ability to cling to walls. Holding down Special does the same trick than with Headcrab, except Goo Ball can jump silghtly higher than Headcrab which could be considered an advantage as Super Meat Boy is a platformer game. But I personally wouldn’t expect anything less from a ball of goo! And what a funny name it has too, Goo Ball! Out of all the characters in Super Meat Boy, Goo Ball might be my favorite.
Other
This section lists all he other playable characters that are unlocked by any other means than the ones already mentioned.
From Super Meat Boy
Playable from the beginning
I’ve got such a witty sense of humor, don’t it? Evil Dr. Fetus has kidnapped Meat Boy’s girlfriend Bandage Girl, and now you need to save her! Meat Boy is a boy who has no skin, which leaves all his muscles visible and unprotected. This causes little things like salt and blood (and saws and missiles) to kill him him. This condition has created a strong bond between him and Bandage Girl – Bandage Girl is not just his girlfriend he loves, she’s someone he absolutely needs in order to stay alive (you too should watch IGTM, btw. Some really nice facts there). Super Meat Boy is very fast and he’s really good at dodging things that try to take his life. He’s the character the game is named after in case you didn’t know.
From Super Meat Boy
The only playable character in Cotton Alley
The better half of Meat Boy who Dr. Fetus kidnaps, setting into motion what happens in the game. You know, the things we as players are part of. In the final final Chapter 6 named Cotton Alley the time comes for Bandage Girl to show she’s not merely a damsel in distress. She has to overcome a set of the most brutal and unforgiving levels in the whole game. And all by herself! Yes, when you finally get to play as her, you have to play as her. She’s a badass.
From The Future
Unlocked by completing the game 106%
106% means you need to complete everything. Including but not limited to: glitch worlds, all of Cotton Alley, Skyscraper and The Kid’s Warp Zone. And collect every bandage. Everything. Meat Ninja is basically Meat Boy with a fancy ninja costume but he does have a special ability – an ability so powerful that leaderboards are disabled when you choose to play him. He can teleport through everything that usually kills you. It is done by holding down Special and running into things like a maniac. It doesn’t work every time, though. Actually from my experience it’s very unstable so don’t count on it in a tight spot. Still, he’s a fun character to play around with.
From Super Meat World
Playable character on Chapter Super Potato Boy in Super Meat World. Lots of fun! Potato Boy replaced Meat Boy during the 2011 Potato Fools Day[valvearg.com] (thanks to Slowpoke for pointing it out!).
From Super Meat Boy
Available only in devmode
Yes, you can play as Dr. Fetus but it requires some fiddling around. Devmode is enabled by right-clicking Super Meat Boy on your Steam Library and selecting Properties. There you click on Set Launch Options and type in “-devmode”. To specify Dr. Fetus as your character, type in “-devmode -char -5” without the quotation marks. Pressing Special makes him fire a missile. Here’s a post by Team Meat[supermeatboy.com] with more details. Steam forum member bigcow200 is also to be thanked for lending his wisdom.
From The End
Playable after defeating Dr. Fetus
The very last character you’ll be playing before seeing the ending and the credits. Meat Boy carrying Bandage Girl on his back, how sweet. Also playable in devmode by typing into Launch Options “-devmode -char 27”.
