Bezman's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Rebel Noel 1]

play it

+++ well-drawn graphics.

+++ Well-suited bgm.

+++ Well voiced menacing 'ho, ho, ho'.

---- I really hate the way we need to wait a few seconds, every time we want to retry the game.

----- The effect of stuff we knock down - whether it slows down santa or not - seems random. The knock-on effect (no pun intended) is that success feels more like luck than good judgement/timing/skill.

!!!!!!!!!! After beginning level 2, I swung on some tinsel. As I landed, I just stayed in place. Santa advanced from off-screen, ever so slowly. Score of 1000. Pressing space made me jump, as per normal, but I just stayed in place and the score didn't advance.

==
Played 3 times, mainly to check whether I was missing something.

Won't play it again.

[Jingle Ballistical]

due to luck

+++ Variety of moves...

+++ Santa/Toy have great winning poses. Great lighting/colour for thos poses!

--- Why no winning poses for Frosty/elf-kid?

--- When we try and attack in mid-air, it 'feels' wrong - attacking, then dropping, rather than bringing out a leg or fist as we drop, as I'd expect.

!!!! A couple of times, an enemy got stuck on a different vertical plane, walking about as if the ground was above me!

==
Played as santa, was beated by frosty, changed gore to max, rounds to 1, played as Elf-kid, first beaten by frosty, then winning game. Played as toy, then gave up.

Congrats on making a vaguely playable beat-em-up. I've long thought this kinda game is the hardest to implement well in Flash.

Unfortunately, it still seems kinda stilted and unnatural, with not really enough 'broadcasting' to counter or evade properly. Winning felt hollow and more due to luck and 'the game letting me' than any skill.

evolart responds:

Thank you but the engine isnt mine. And if there is a bug its my fault

[alien invasion!]

drops when an enemy gets too close

+++ Fairly well drawn, clean, graphics.

+++ Cool tune.

---- Though the tune takes up more filesize than appropriate for a 'game' like this.

--- No risk of a loss.

--- No variation in the animations.

==
Shot one. Let the next two come at me until I was confident I wouldn't die. Shot maybe 12. Closed.

It's really not much of a game as the only thing 'success' indicates is how long we waste. No skill, tactics, good choices, reactions, hand-eye co-ordination or anything necessary.

I personally don't find shooting stuff in games stress-relieving.

I think this could actually make for a decent game if you just added in some energy that drops when an enemy gets too close, playtested and tweaked a few numbers.

king-ben responds:

errrrrrmmmmmmmmm............. .......'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE MOVIE' 'LINERIDER THE

[Which Clock are You?]

entertained, what

+++ Cool tune. Kept me amused.

++ Questions were interesting in creating a point of view on the clocks.

++ Fairly good ending.

--- The background/text colour/style combo kinda hurt my eyes. I'm not sure, but I think you need more tonal contrast. Like have the bg be a much darker red and the text almost white, or viceversa.

-- I, too found the buttons a bit fiddly. Enlarge the hitboxes!
Also, keep them in the same place.

- 'strawberries' is misspelt. Don't have apostrophes when using plurals. 'Pineapple' should be made plural.

==
I wouldn't have known your secret had you not written it in the comments! (I made a point of reading it after.) I suppose it just worked out that I was clicking mostly straw/orange and the end coincided with that. Otherwise, I'd have wondered...

Kept me entertained, what with the crazy music and everything.

Frenzy responds:

Thanks!

~ Z

Great review, and that secret is basically because this was a submission that was kind of just an idea that popped into my head; and I wanted to make it for Clock Day!

Thanks again for the great review!

~ Z

[Fat Santa]

missing the treats

++++ Groovy music

+++ Clean graphics

+++ Like the style of the sky

++++ Seeing santa increase in size, accompanied by the reindeer and the laugh made me chuckle.

----- Unclear losing parameters. When I lost at 426lb, I was surprised. Didn't think missing treats would result in any bad effect (which would be a criticism). But you need to give us feedback. Maybe show icons for 'lives' and cross them off. Maybe have Mrs Claus pop up, tutting and saying 'don't waste food!'.

------ Repetitive gameplay. Very little to think about. Just having to click a few times before each treat takes little though. Maybe have them appear

?? Why not have santa's girth increase gradually over time?

==
Played once. Ate sprouts for a laugh. Played again. 426lb.

Was surprised when I lost.

Tested a few times to check that - yes - missing the treats eventually makes you lose. Hard to work out exactly what the losing parameters are.

Won't be coming back.

[Gone fishing penguin game]

working on this

++++ Intro made me chuckle.

+++ I like the texture of the ice on the penultimate level - the chase.

+++ Variety of game styles.

---- Level design forces us to walk (slowly amble) multiple times over ground to collect fish. Collecting fish requires no skill, nor effort of exploration or whatever. Just preperation to s l o w l y get them, walk back to the point where we can get back up... walk over, fall down to collect some newly spotted fish, walk back...

--- The collage of photos and your animation looks rather ugly for the most part. Colours at least could be matched better.

--- somewhat poor collision detection for the bears.

--- In final game, as fish land to left/right, it becomes impossible to tell exactly where our dish begins/ends.

- Slow movement. Specially in the y-direction. Falling is stupidly slow.

!!!!! In level 2, after dying, I went into some sort of endless loop. A bear was exactly at the starting point, meaning I died, respawned, died... I click-played.

!!!! High scores don't work.

!! Dodgy jumps, taking advantage of the dodgy motion. When we start falling, we seem to instantly be transported up a little, to allow us to get up onto a platform.

! icy tops of platforms should be in a layer behind the penguin.

==
Really great for a first game, but you really need to work on your design.

I played it until getting in the loop on level 2, right-click-played, got to the chase and carried on before finishing with around 65 fish.

Some parts entertained. Some parts irritated. Some parts seemed to drag on (e.g. final level).

I'd reccommend that you carry on working on this, maybe with all-new levels.

[ChumpHunter]

1923

+++ All fairly polished graphics. Well cut-out.

++++ The various animations made me chuckle at one point.
Who's the girl in the angel outfit? I recognised the Star Trek dude's uniform, The HSBC guy, Blair, Thatcher, that tellytubby... not the others though.

+++ Good, fast, progression of difficulty.

-- Limited in nature.

??? Maybe it'd be cool to have a quick 'fact-file' for each person after having met them?

??? High-score tables? Or at least a 'personal best' to be recorded during play?

??? Maybe explicitly tell us how many points we get for the different things - maybe showing '+10/+whatever' after we shoot, or maybe on a seperate screen.

?? Maybe a big red flash or some on-screen indication as we take damage? The sound wasn't too obvious at first.

==
Played 3 times. 12??, 9??, 1923.

Amused but won't return.

[Penguin Rescue]

popping out

+++ I like the style of everything. Has a cool, crisp feel. Clouds are specially pretty.

- Penguins are cross-eyed.

-- Hittests can feel unfair. After last time, I realised that I need to get them to hit the nose exactly as they cross that horizontal line. It's understandable, but still feels odd and overly exacting when the penguins pass through the nose from the side.

---- Often, missing a penguin or losing a life felt unavoidable as penguins fell near-simultaneously or icicles fell at the same position as a penguin.

---- No feeling of risk or any surprises. 3 different bounce-patterns and icicles just aren't enough. 30 'lives' too many. And we should be reminded of how many we can kill somehow.

----- Early levels involve a long 'wait' in between each 'touch' we need to make.

==
Played this when it was released. Got to 16. Seeing it still in the portal, I was intrigued to see whether it actually got any better.

The last level did seem to have some challenge. But despite so many losses, I still won. Most losses were due to my increasing apathy or lack of concentration, around 10 felt forced upon me.

This, to me, just seems like a far worse version of that 'Fire Escape' G+W. There, partially due to the technical limitations, we never felt 'cheated' by any timing or collision detection issues. However, the high number of folk popping out and the lower number of lives ensured faster, more frantic, gameplay.

This just seemed boring.

[Hungry Bugs]

polished

++ Fairly polished graphics.

++ Different speeds for differing enemies.

-- Repetitive bgm loop.

-- No indication of when the berries will run out.

!!!!!! Rather than 'refuel' our beetle-eating capabilities, as we'd expect, eating a berry when one is already active does nothing but 'waste' that 2nd berry.

!!!!! Whilst playing, some bugs got stuck in the scenery. One walked straight through some obstacles.

!!!!! Often, the beetles get stick in an endless loop

==
Possibly the most annoying iteration/clone/copy of Pacman I've ever played. And I've played quite a few.

After seeing the splash-screen, I was expecting something a bit more polished. This just feels too random, and it's too easy to feel like deaths are a necessary part of trial and improvement or - even worse - that they're due to the RNG.

Do some more tweaking and playtesting.

[Space-taro]

ever, is agregiously

You're 'a game designer in the works'? That just sounds cocky. No idea what you mean by that, but you've got a lot of work to do.

++ Intuitive objective.

++ Good music.

--- No difficulty slope. Start is the hardest.

----- The whole game mechanics are broken. As below reviewer pointed out, after killing the first lot, we can easily survive practically indefinitely (there is occassionally a random one set just to move outside the field then come back in) simply by clicking rapidly.

!!!! When we lose, we remain on the screen and continue to attain points.

==
It strikes me that little actual design went into this. Sure, you may be an aspiring designer, maybe even a skilled coder.

This game, however, is agregiously designed. Broken and unworthy of our time.