FutureCopLGF's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Exhibit of Sorrows]

Wow, quite the spooky adventure! Very powerful visuals and audio that delivered some great spooks despite the simple, technically low nature of the presentation. That's not to say that it was that simple, as again the game impressed with the cool analog interactions on all sorts of objects. Love the way it built up the experience bit-by-bit in the initial loop and then turned it on its head in the next loop: really let the tension and dread set in when the realization hits. I'm sure a few people will be bummed out that the game kind of forces their hand to do evil stuff (even I was a bit annoyed) but it was still very cool stuff. Again, some great stuff here (and it didn't even rely on blasting my speakers out with jump scares, so thanks for that!)

The only thing I was a little bummed out about was that I felt like it didn't lead to an effective climax. It almost felt like I got off too easy when I got out at the end. Maybe there were multiple endings, or subtle lore I missed? I did notice the paintings/pictures change here and there but I wasn't sure if there was something specific it was doing. I really felt like it was building up to something, like some sort of revenge, or abuse, or whatever, but then it was over before I knew it. Still, it's not like it ruined the experience or anything, just a little bit of a bummer that there wasn't some sort of, I dunno, center or theme to it all beyond 'whoa, spooky clowns" (to be fair, though, they were pretty spooky clowns).

[My First KAMIKAZE]

Bit of mixed feelings on this one! For the most part, it is a rather cute and amusing game which, while not having the best first impression in the way that its a bit overly simple and crude in terms of graphics and mechanics, it does pick up the pace in the later levels with some interesting challenges and variety. Also, I did like the little touches the game had, such as the amusing way the bird would react when the rocket would get close. Cute stuff!

Unfortunately, I did find myself that, the longer I played it, the longer I didn't want to play it again because of the life system and the fact that you need to start all over. I understand what you're getting at with the way it is designed, where you fight to see how long you can last until you run out of lives, but I wish the game was just a standard level progression with no lives or anything like that. Basically I'd like to just be able to go through all the levels and continue where I left off without needing to worry about starting all over and going through all the boring no-challenge early levels to get back to the good challenging stuff at the end. Perhaps I'm wrong in wishing for this as it might make it too easy, I dunno.

Apart from that, there were also some other minor nitpicks like how I felt the spaceship was a little too simple (I really expected it to have more analog turning controls instead of angle snapping, though I guess that wouldn't work with the cramped levels) and that I felt you should say that you are able to hold the jump button when you hit the springs to jump high (the controls say press which implies you have to time it, which you don't have to luckily since the game is nice).

CubePunks responds:

I tried making the rockets work like they did in Asteroids but it was more difficult than fun, after further testing the simple snapping was the best solution.

The tutorial text is written the way it was because originally the Mario styled “timing the jump button to get the bounce”. Even after widening the margin of error people were still getting frustrated with it so I changed it to hold (read old reviews it’s pretty much what all of them were talking about). I may get around to changing the wording in a patch.

I have plans on making a deluxe version that adds additional features and difficulties. I may add a casual mode that gives you infinite lives but also won’t submit to a leaderboard.

I did the shotgun level challenge approach because I assumed the audience playing would prefer a more hardcore experience. I wanted to make a game that encourages speed running, making it more than just another simple indi platformer. Also for this beginning faze of my game dev process, im trying to build more arcade styled experiences before moving onto something with a larger scope. better to experiment with the medium while I develop my skills, before committing to something that’s more expansive. I’d be surprised if I make anything more complicated than the original Alien Homined NG game before 2023.

[Yu Dragoon]

Pretty neat game! Definitely quite impressed at the systems on display here such as the 3D map navigation along with the battle system. Love the lighthearted story with all sorts of little touches like how it skips over the generic story to get straight to gameplay (my kinda game, haha!) And to top it all off, it's done in that classic genesis graphic style. As said, pretty impressive stuff!

Unfortunately, while I do think it is kinda cool from a technical standpoint, I did find the game itself a bit repetitive and boring. Not bad or anything: I was still hooked enough that I wanted to keep playing thanks to the story, but the combat was way too old-school for my tastes in that it just featured repetitive 'taking turns attacking' style combat with cool moves locked behind a resource that I didn't know how rare it was (so I never wanted to risk using it) and the map was lacking in interesting design, mostly just featuring a bunch of wrong turn dead-ends (would be nice if there was at least some optional rewards or treasures around). Also, the jokes did tend to get a little too fourth-wall breaky and overly jokey so much that it as well got repetitive. There were also some other minor nitpicks such as random combat encounters (even in town!) and typos/script confusion.

Again, quite the impressive and cute game at first glance and I do think it has a lot of potential, but the core gameplay itself didn't end up being that much fun for me due to the lack of combat depth, lack of exploration and a bit too overly jokey (but that's personal taste). A good attempt, however!

[NG: Zero Hour Lite]

A little bit conflicted on this one! For the most part, it is serviceable, but pretty lacking in some areas to make a great shooter. First and foremost, the enemies were really lackluster in AI (most can be easily beaten by standing below them and shooting upwards), way too damage-spongy, and devoid of satisfying audio/visual hit feedback or death explosions. I also really wish it had some extra buttons to lock aiming/movement as most modern (like Cuphead) or even old-school (like Hard Corps) shooters do to help the awkwardness of traditional movement/aiming being tied to each other. Game just also had a general sense of jankiness and weird confusing comedy to it all. I'd say it is an ok prototype that can be worked off of.

Now obviously, the caveat of this all is that the game is an April Fools, and probably not representative of what the final product is going to be. So yes, my feedback is probably useless and it's just a big joke I'm not supposed to take seriously. "Haha, we made the bad game, but we made it on purpose, so jokes on you!" That's one way to put it, but at the end of the day, irony and all that aside, you still made a bad game, so I'd prefer you just make a good game instead in the first place (well, I wouldn't say it's BAD per se, just lacking given the legacy behind it). But on the other hand, maybe I am being too serious and you're allowed to do whatever.

Nonetheless, at the end of the day, I am looking forward to Newgrounds Zero Hour, so best of luck! I love me some boss fights and I love me some bullet hell, so I'm hoping it delivers that goodness!

[Pingüino]

Pretty cool game, but a little confusing at times! I quite like the game at its core, as the feeling of speed was nice and the game, while simple, had an addictive nature to it. Also, I love the amount of little touches the game has, such as being able to pick on the penguin at the start and it makes a little noise, along with all the nice visual/audio effects like the death animations, going into tunnels, the speed lines, and so on. Overall it does feel quite smooth and polished.

The main issue I have with it is that the mechanics are a bit confusing. As said, the main mechanics of dashing and jumping through the course to get to the end is fine and feels great. But the additional aspects to the game are weird.

For example, fish are a bit confusing and the game can't quite seem to decide what to do with them: first it tells you not to get them since it makes you fat and slow, but then the game gives you 'points' for getting them which seems like a positive. This made me think I needed to get them for a high score, but just not get too much so as to not be able to finish (aka five of them). But then I noticed that the score numbers were technically getting redder the more I ate, so I figured, ok, I guess it really is a bad thing and I should avoid them. But then I noticed that some courses can't be beat if DON'T eat fish because it needs you to go slower, while other courses can't be beat if you DO eat too many fish since you don't have enough speed to make jumps. It just feels unfair and confusing: do I eat them or not? I just want consistency. Maybe you think it's part of the challenge to figure out whether to eat or not to finish a course, but I hate that kind of trial and error: fish should really just be an extra score thing, I think, and not softlock you into not getting through a course if you don't guess right the first time.

Moving on from fish, there was also weird stuff like the slow-mo. It's a nice addition, but why in the world does the slow-mo bar keep draining even when I'm not holding it down? You'd think that as long as I stop using it, it would recharge or at the very least not keep draining. It takes what could be a fun mechanic you can use sparingly here and there and makes it this ultimate choice where you have to use it all now at once or else waste the whole damn thing.

Finally, there was also some other nitpicks like how I had no idea how to get out of the hat menu once I was in it: how the heck do you exit? I just mashed keys until the game started somehow.

Overall I'd say that this game has a lot of promise: I think the core mechanics of speed and jumping through courses is fun and smooth. It's just that the other mechanics of fish and how the courses are laid out are a bit confusing and unfair at times. Once those are all settled, I think this could be great!

Oh yeah, and I'd love some little sliding sound effects.

[Duck It!]

Not too shabby of a little metroidvania game! I did like the cute graphics/animations which, along with the funny concept and amusing characters, made it quite the charming adventure. There were certainly some rough spots to it: I didn't like the overall slow speed and awkward acceleration/momentum (which differs depends on which direction you switch), the hitboxes were a bit wonky, I wish the bonfires stuck out more/were noticable, the game had a bit of an annoying back and forth aspect to it where you have to keep going back to upgrade instead of finding them out in the wild, and the upgrades were a bit lackluster both in functionality and in the way your character progresses visually (seems like all the character did was get a sepia filter, haha). But despite that, it was fun and the way the level kept looking back on itself and opening up more was nice. Liked moments like going down the pit with the groundpound and trying to find a way back up top (and seeing the rich duck on the spikes if you try to jump there without the upgrade yet).

[Sausage Game]

Wow, cool little adventure you got here! Had a good time exploring this charming world: kept me hooked through the sheer abundance of wacky scenarios (most of them involving that classic edgy/gory Newgrounds humor, haha). All-around the game felt very smooth and well put-together, and presentation was very well-done with the 'movie theatre' aesthetic and stellar animation/art. Loved some of the puzzles as well: felt clever figuring out that gummy bear/dog one before the game even needed to clue me in.

I did have some minor complaints. For one, as charming and goofy as the game was, it felt a little too random to the point of being directionless at times. It's a bit vague to explain, but considering our initial goal was to get out and see the wilderness or whatever, you just end up walking around the movie theatre and getting involved in weird stuff that has nothing to do with that goal. Didn't feel like there were enough puzzles or moments that use your brain either: just felt like you follow a lot of people places instead and events solve themselves without your input, except for rare occasions. Also, I was annoyed at the lack of highlighting for interactable objects: would've loved if the game would indicate what was interactable by making them glow or having text pop-up, instead of making me get carpal tunnel trying to click every pixel to see if I'd missed something. Still, despite all that, I found the game charming enough that I want to keep going.

[Light Push]

Wow, really tricky game! The concept of light paths is pretty cool and led to some challenging puzzles: I got stumped for an embarrassing amount of time as early as level 3, haha! Definitely a solid puzzler as usual, though maybe could've rearranged some of the earlier levels, like having the box/plus level before the plus/plus level (but maybe that's just how my brain works, where I want the new mechanic to be introduced alongside the old instead of by itself first).

Unfortunately, while I think the concept it great, I found myself not wanting to play much because of how tough it was to grasp and how dumb it made me feel, haha. Something about the game just felt so cramped, claustrophobic and boxed-in due to the limited light paths and difficulty of traversal that it kind of made it an unpleasant experience for me: very limited freedom than usual, I suppose. Again, though, that doesn't necessarily think that it's a bad game, per se, but just that it doesn't gel with me.

[Bird On Bird]

Interesting game! Feels well put-together in all aspects with a funny concept, interesting mechanics, and a nice world to get through that provides a lot of mystique with its alternate paths that make you want to go back later once you pick up enough feathers or abilities. Love the polish in that everything feels very smooth, bouncy and animated, with fun little events like the chickens calling you a traitor randomly. Definitely kept me hooked and wanting to see what the new levels brought up next. There were a few times where I got a little confused, like learning the 'stop flying' mechanic has you have to hold the button instead of just press it (I swear there were some strange times where a bird would stop flying without my input as if they got tired, while others would keep flying forever?), and there were some frustration at some obstacles where it feels like you just have to die to see it coming in the first place and just how short your jump is, but overall was solid.

Starblinky responds:

Appreciate the feedback and honesty!

:)

[Bandit RIP [BETA]]

I like what the game is going for, but it's in a pretty rough state at the moment. I know that might be obvious since it's labeled as a beta, but it's because of that I don't want to pull punches since I want this game to get built up into something great. I'll try to just hit on the important stuff to keep it as short as I can.

The controls felt very frustrating and confusing to deal with. Having something as simple as dropping down a platform requiring you to press three keys simultaneously felt pretty crazy considering that most games require you to just press down. Blocking as well had you do a crazy combination of buttons, and getting used to doing those buttons in the heat of battle is nuts. Speaking of blocking, I know you make them press three keys to drop down because block shares buttons and you want them to be able to block without dropping down, but in that case, why didn't you just make block a separate button, like holding F, so it's not an issue in the first place?

Even once you do accept the controls for what the mess they are, the precision required felt very frustrating: there's no input buffering so I found myself dropping combos constantly because the timing required was too tight that even mashing didn't help. Some fighting games do look for you to require precision, but I feel like a party game like this should opt for buffering to reduce the skill floor. Finally, I didn't like having to deal with so many cooldowns on abilities: I don't know why they existed since it slows everything down and it was difficult to tell when you were on cooldowns since you have to look at the way down in the corner (maybe play a sound or flash red or something if you attempt to use an ability on cooldown).

The game is also very dry at the moment. While you do have some slight special effects here and there, like puffs of smoke for running and fancy attack animations, there are no sounds or impact to it all. When fighting, it's very unclear whether you hit or get hit because there's no feedback like a sound or a spark or something: just feels like everything is punching at the air. All in all, it just leads to the game feeling very muted and unsatisfying.

I'd like to say that, despite my criticism, I still think it's very impressive that you created a multiplayer online game: lord knows I wouldn't do that since I don't want to deal with that level of complexity. And while I do think it's impressive you put that together, I still found it very janky. I had plenty of times where I tried to play only to go into some dark void softlock where I could never spawn, or if I did actually get in a game, we would just have out attacks phasing through each other without getting hit (though again, this could just be due to the game having very bad feedback/controls and not necessarily a network issue, it's unclear).

Again, I do think the game is interesting as a concept: you got a lot of potentially cool characters and I love a multiplayer brawler. But it's just very rough and I hope the feedback I provided can help you polish it up.

Zetoman77 responds:

Hi. thank you for your long feedback!
The game is indeed in beta, so things will certainly change, especially the lack of sound effects (which I have tried to add but failed miserably) or more animations. The online play is really what I am trying to make sure works for everyone. It seems like it doesn't work well for you, is it a server in a EU or Asia that is laggy? If possible, could you let me know xD

It seems like ASD to drop down is the major control issue, as suggested by others as well. I will add the option to double down to go down. I think that would fix the issue xD It is fortunate that blocking and going down platforms are generally not really needed that much so i still have time to fix it xD

For the precision, it is actually extremely easy, if one holds down the left click to attack. To me it has always felt intuitive to hold down to spam attacks/shoot, but I have also noticed that it isn't always the case. So the buffering is there, and I made it clearer in the in-game tutorial. I see less players in game clicking one by one. I will try to make it clearer!

So every character's first attack is super spammable. and a secondary that is often stronger and with higher cooldown. The thematic usually works well except for pico where his usual weapons are the uzi so players might want to spam the uzis, but end up not being able to. I will try to fix that in the next update as well xD

Thank u for the feedback xD