helmutlord's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Snailer]

Hilarious

This is a great joke link.

[Ragdoll Goalkeeper]

Great idea

My main complaint is that it's near impossible to guess both where and when the ball is going to go in. Every jump is more of an educated guess than a skilful move.

I'd almost add a little hovering circle showing 'where' the ball is going to land, and then have the ball flying through the air indicating the 'when'. Just an idea.

Looking beyond that unfortunately central flaw, the rest of the game is excellent. Polished and smart.

[The Killbots of C Station]

Really impressed

Did it win the 48 hour comp? It should have.

I consider this game to be a (very successful) proof of concept - and what's really exciting is the potential. Obviously it was bare bones, but I can really see the full version of this game becoming one of my favourites. More levels, different troop types, individually customizeable squads and hot keys, different terrain, zooming ability - it could be big.

[Canabalt]

Great all round

Looks exceptional.

Personally I would have preferred more interactivity - even a small amount - but for 5 days? Well, I can't argue with that.

Really hoping for a sequel to take it up a notch

[A blobs tale]

Disappointing, but on the right track

I see this game has only scored moderately. While the menu looked great, the visuals were good, and the was music appropriate - I must say I did not fully enjoy this game. If the following things are fixed for the sequel, I would score it a five; and I believe others would too.

1. Sound Effects
Several sound effects, (mainly the Walking one) were not only too loud, but extremely annoying. I would have much preferred even no sound at all. If I hadn't been able to jump everywhere and bypass the noise, I wouldn't have played past the first level.

2. Enjoyability
This type of puzzle/side scrolling adventure relies primarily on the enjoyability of the puzzles or 'activities'. I believe here was your second main falling out with your audience.
You see, with each activity idea there is only finite amount of interest inherent in it, and you must tailor the completion time to match. Match that to people treating your game as a 'time-waster' and you should start to feel the faster pace needed. Otherwise it just feels like work.
- For example, the 'Find Flower --> Meet Woman --> Receive Shovel' activity in the first level, I believe there was only a limited amount of 'meat' in it, and it required much too much walking.
- For a further example, the arbitrary trial-and-error 'Stone Code' activity has been done many times before so many people will know what's expected of them - either have a twist, or make it much shorter.

3. Challenge Level
With each activity you are aiming for that sweet spot where it is neither frustrating nor boring. Most of the activities seemed to replace 'Challenge' for 'Length'. Also, if every activity is really easy, and then you hit a particularly challenging one - most people will either skip or try and quit. Working out what to do with the boomerang was just such an obstacle - One I couldn't be bothered working out.

4. Checkpoints
Maybe you weren't expecting anyone to die, but I found them to be badly placed. For example, dying during the 'Shoot the Squid Spider' activity should take you back only to the start of that activity. In longer, more detailed games of other more action orientated games having more 'punishing' Checkpoints can work to an advantage, but here it simply toys with patience.

5. Basking
Basking is the moment after a fight which slows down the pace and lets people 'bask' in the moment. It gives a feeling of accomplishment, and acts as a sort of mental punctuation to the player. Some games do this with a 'Completed Screen' with some statistics and 'Replay' and 'Next' buttons, and others do it with Cut Scenes.
To use the example of the Squid Spider activity again, after the the Squid is defeated, it near immediately disappears into the depths, and the scene ends.
What I would have suggested is some manner of fanfare, or drama. You know, the Squid wincing and spluttering, and then exploding - even some victorious sound effect. Simply pausing, while the ship slowly sails out of frame would have done in a pinch.
Pure puzzle games don't ALWAYS need this, but there were times in your game I think it would have added to the experience.

6. Polish
Some players, such as AnthroFurry10 (below) have mentioned the 'glitchy-ness'. I don't believe your game had any actual scripting errors, but here's what I think they meant by that:
If you look at your character moving, he's barely animated. When he jumps, he simply rises into the air. When he collides with obstacles, he reacts jaggedly without any 'give'. All this, while technically not glitches adds up to the subtle impression of something 'uncarefully' put together.
Some of the most fun side-scrolling games concentrate on the main characters fluidity of movement. That means when the character lands (ESPECIALLY a blob character) there is some squash action and some subtle sound etc. If the player accepts the main character's animation, and believes he really is moving around - they'll accept pretty much anything else - even badly drawn backgrounds.

I hope you are not too discouraged by my comments, I say them because I think you were close.

[Toss the Turtle]

Close to perfection

There have been a lot of games in this genre, and with a few additions to this game I might need never play them again. The following are just some nitpicky opinions for you to think about in the chance that perhaps a future game might be that one step closer to perfection, but I really think this game is excellent - it looked beautiful and was balanced like a dream:

1. The ability to see 'Best' and 'Money' while playing. I like to see how much I'm collecting, and how close I am to beating a record.
2. You're game has a near perfect balance of chance and skill. Closer than any other 'launcher' game I've seen. The only suggestion I could make is perhaps have the money and ammo collected with the mouse, rather than the turtle. Flying high has skill involved, and flying low has avoidance skill involved, but adding mouse collection could potentially add skill to the mid flying parts.
3. Some kind of 1/500 ultra rare combos or power-ups I think could push the addictiveness into the third hour. Mix that with aligning your backgrounds in a linear, unchanging order to give people the unconscious reward for travelling into new areas and this game could be an all day affair.
4. There were a couple of clipping issues that allowed me to fly straight through certain power ups. Not a deal breaker by any means, but fairly consistent; about one for every launch.
5. This might be un-do-able, but there were many times where I was unable to judge my speed and adding specks of 'dust' that sped up and slowed down in exact proportion to my speed would have been great. Well, that or just a speedometer of some kind.
6. Lastly, and maybe most importantly a quick restart button. Later in the game I'll accidentally just tap the mouse and the turtle will drop out of the canon - now I have to wait for up to 10 minutes while I rack up a measly 20,000ft. Even if I was able to just manually slow down the turtle very quickly with the keys, it would be an improvement.

Also, that last medal remains elusive. I've launched the turtle well over 350,000ft without touching the ground, and it still remains unchecked. I don't know what you want from me!

Anyway, great job!

[When Pigs Fly]

Great

It was fun, and the difficulty was perfect. Challenging, but fun.

Two things to consider:

One was the pig noises: Not only were they annoying and too frequent, but they didn't seem to fit in the 8-bit world. Perhaps some Midi pig-like noises might have worked better than simply being able to mute them - which was better than nothing I will admit.

Two is some advice for your next game. I think there needs to be more incentive to keep playing.
People usually do this in four ways:
1. Engaging story
2. Promise of reward
3. Progressive game elements
4. Progressive level design

The story was really nothing more than a framework, so 1 wasn't 'grabbing'.
As for 2, there was no visible counter, and we didn't know about unlockables, so the only thing to look forward to was the Finishing Cutscene... which was probably going to be as anti-climactic as the Opening Cutscene.
And while your Level Design did Progress, adding more glimpses of the sky - Your Game Elements remained virtually the same 'avoid spikes,' 'avoid walls' and 'avoid lava'. I think to remain engaging adding perhaps falling stalactites or moving obstacles or, I don't know, wind or something would have been good. So people feel like if they keep playing, new interesting challenges will be revealed.

Anyway, good job.

[Vorago]

Well made

Inventory system: Great +1
Voice acting: Phenomenal +1
Creativity of puzzles: Clever +1
Creativity of idea: Not really -1
Visuals: Unexpectedly unpolished -2

The worst thing that can happen with these types of games is you go around clicking everything and trying every possible combination on everything for hours.

This happened much too frequently. -3

Here's a little Point&Click rule to possibly help in future projects:
"The less logical the solution, the more obvious/noticeable the steps need to be"

[Bucketball]

Not worth the challenge

If a game is going to make me play a level a hundred times just to get one ball into a bucket, I think there needs to be more variety with each shot. Things to bounce off, or things to collect, or random events, or moving levels - as it was, I was doing the same thing over and over again. Quite bland.

Also, the balls couldn't be launched very high, nor could they really be bounced off objects. Over all, the game bored me beyond the first level.

A six for polish.

Komix responds:

the sequel will make it all alright.

[Neon Maze]

Fun

Enough for wasting an hour or so, but nothing I'd get attached to.
Very polished and visually interesting.