The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth offers a great variety of overpowered runs that trivialize the later game bosses, in addition to terrible builds that make the game almost impossible. Nowhere is this more on display than in the game’s challenge mode. Challenges serve as pre-built runs that give the player a handful of starting items as well as certain restrictions.
These challenges range anywhere from being unable to attack with traditional means, or even forcing you to play with as little information as possible. The decision to tie these challenges to in-game unlocks builds this collective feeling of frustration and relief among the community as they make their way through the list.
10 Cursed!
Cursed allows you to start with Magdalene along with Yum Heart and Child’s Heart, meaning you have a good chunk of health to work with from the very beginning. You will need every bit of it, as this challenge replaces every door as though it were a spiked cursed room door.
The big saving grace for this challenge is the Blue Map item, which gives you information about rooms well in advance. Using bombs to get through secret rooms and heading straight for the boss room is much easier because of this, but that also limits potential items to improve your attack. Only having to defeat Mom in this run makes it far less daunting than it would be otherwise.
9 Beans
For this challenge, Isaac is blindfolded and cannot shoot tears. The only damage you have access to is through poison with items like The Bean and Butt Bombs. This challenge becomes an exercise in futility, as Butt Bombs are the only substantial damage Isaac has access to.
The Bean has a short range and isn’t reliable. Your biggest obstacles are running out of bombs, which makes the rest of the run take significantly longer, and the boss Brownie, who can’t take poison damage and is more or less invincible.
8 Suicide King
Suicide King starts the player as Lazarus with Ipecac, Mr. Mega, and My Reflection. The challenge here is attempting to navigate your own tears, as they will both be significantly harder to aim, and they will also damage you if you run into them.
Your shots do pack a decent punch, so once you have gotten used to the firing path and playing around it, enemies can be defeated fairly quickly compared to some of the other challenges in the game. Lazarus also has a second life, which gives you a decent margin of error if you mess up late.
7 BRAINS!
Brains force the player to utilize one of the most powerful and also the most frustrating items in the game. Bob’s Brain can deal a great amount of damage, but also damages the player if they are too close to the explosion it causes.
??? also starts with three soul hearts, making it difficult to regain any lost health throughout the run. The three Bob’s Brains you start with also take a while to respawn, forcing you to both wait between rooms for them to respawn, and also avoid trouble in the middle of many boss attempts.
6 Cat Got Your Tongue
In this challenge, Isaac starts with the full Guppy transformation. Isaac’s inability to fire tears means swinging wildly and praying that Guppy’s Hairball makes contact with the enemy is the only source of damage. Thankfully the way to finish the challenge is by beating Mom, as any further, it would be a much bigger challenge.
Once you’ve gotten more comfortable positioning yourself with Guppy’s Hairball for the best damage output possible, it shouldn’t be too much trouble. This is a challenge that tests your patience more than your skill.
5 Family Man
Family Man is a run that prevents Isaac from firing tears. His damage output comes from his familiars: Brother Bobby, Sister Maggy, and Rotten Baby. The best damage output comes from Rotten Baby, which spawns a blue fly that aggro enemies through obstacles. Only the blue flies from Rotten Baby will scale with your damage stat, making it your best damage output option.
The Dad’s Key item also helps you save on keys and by extension other items. It’s difficult to get the familiars in position without being vulnerable to damage, so it’s best to hang back and let the blue flies do their thing. This challenge is definitely difficult, but it’s more tedious than anything else.
4 Purist
Purist may be the most RNG-reliant challenge in Rebirth. The lack of treasure rooms and starting items mean you need to find a serious increase in your damage early on. Getting good RNG with the angel or devil rooms and even post-boss items make or breaks your run.
Finding an item like Mom’s Knife or Brimstone makes the challenge a great deal easier, but resetting to get one is a chore. The Bible-activated item can automatically defeat both Mom and It Lives, the last boss needed to finish the challenge. If you manage to get far enough to fight both, having The Bible turns it into a quick finish.
3 Aprils Fool
Aprils Fool sets out to leave the player with as little information as possible. Every pedestal item in the run will be replaced with a question mark. Not to mention every other item in the run, such as bombs, keys, or coins, will give you a random item instead. There is absolutely no way to identify what item you end up with until you’ve picked one up.
The random nature of this challenge can turn into some good RNG as well. The most common pickup in the game, pennies, now have a chance to turn into soul hearts or black hearts. Utilizing items that increase your coin output or sacrifice rooms can break this run much more easily.
2 SPEED!
Speed, as the name would suggest, runs the game at a much higher speed than normal. Thankfully, Isaac also moves at an increased speed to counter this. The launch version of this challenge kept him at normal speed, making this challenge almost impossible. This does make much easier enemies more difficult than they would have been at normal speed.
The optimal strategy is to rush through every floor without fully exploring everything, as once the run passes the 16-minute mark, Isaac will start taking half a heart of damage every 10 seconds.
1 Ultra Hard
Ultra Hard, as the name would lead you to believe, is the hardest challenge in The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth. All enemies with champion forms will spawn as such. Isaac will suffer from multiple curses in the run, which causes problems like not being able to see any of the pedestal items and removing your map from the hud.
No hearts will drop, and the only way to heal is by finding pedestal items that increase your health. Every boss that can be doubled will be, and the player must make it all the way to Mega Satan and defeat him. So yeah, good luck with that.
