FutureCopLGF's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Pico-Raiders]

Hmm, this is a tough one for me. On one hand, I do think it is very ambitious of a game, being a strategy game, to run on PICO-8, and is pretty cool with the way it captures that old-school DOS/Atari/C64 feel and style quite well. Has some neat little touches like the animation for the sinking boats and such, and I did have some fun skirmishing with the units when I could figure out how it worked. On the other hand, I feel it is too ambitious for the system its running on as, while I was able to figure out some aspects, the game just seemed way too complicated and PICO-8 just isn't able to tutorialize enough aspects to get all of the intricacies and rules across (had no idea how many of the units worked, like boats and such, and wasn't sure whether there was a strategy for army unit attacking an army unit, nor if catapults can kill a castle, etc). Controls were a bit annoying as well: so many times I'd select an army dude with the intention to move him: I'd hit move, but since I wasn't holding a direction before I did that, it'd treat it as me skipping and I'd lose the ability to move that unit (argh!). Also, that cool animation for the sinking boat starts to get real annoying once you've seen it for the hundredth time and it just makes the wait for your turn even longer. Anyway, it's a neat game, but it might be a bit too much for me, not being a big strategy fan. Felt like you, unfortunately, recreated everything about old-school strategy games too faithfully, as that included the outdated design bits, haha!

KJScott responds:

It was originally a 48k spectrum game which I tried to recreate and was right at the edge of how much I could put it before I reached the code limit so I was unable to provide any clear instructions (which I knew was going to be an issue). Yeah, I totally agree with all your comments about the controls, instructions, animations, etc, but as your figured I was trying to recreate all the old design choices. The controls was the biggest obstacle as I needed to port over full keyboard support to effectively a controller scheme which I know needs more work but hit the limit of the code to refine it further. I do have a game on the back burner which utilises a lot of the ideas but reworking it hopefully for the modern era but will see when I get time or motivation to finish that off. Thank you for the comments!

[Capuchin Centauri: Station Cohabitation]

Wow, really cool game! I absolutely loved the whole concept of the upgradable suit parts, as well as the cool dynamic between the monkey and their suit as you get parts blown off and need to either try to deal with some parts missing as best you can or jump out to stitch them back on. The upgrades made for some really cool customization and feeling of progression, and the monkey/suit transitions to repair made for some really cool scrambles and thinking on the fly. Overall I thought it was great: only had a few minor complaints. I thought it was a bit annoying that if you pick up a new gun, for example, to test it out, your old gun doesn't fall to the floor so you can't go back if you don't like the new one. Bullets in general felt a bit slow and unsatisfying at times until you get some speed upgrades (which I didn't find many). Levels were a bit drab and repetitive and the map felt too big. Sounds were a bit wonky and too sharp at times as well. Still, really clever game that felt very well executed in general: would really love to see this idea fleshed out into a more polished and finalized version!

[Skeletons and Skulls]

At first, I didn't have the best impression of the game, seemed like a very bog-standard top-down melee game. Once I learned on my own, through no help of the game, that I could summon skeletons, then the game got elevated as it was quite fun to micromanage my little army, which seemed to have decent AI as well! Seriously, you gotta have a tutorial or onscreen instructions to teach about the summoning skeleton business: would hate to see people dismiss the game and not realize it's there! Anyway, the game was quite fun and did a good job at quickly elevating the difficulty level-by-level. Even had some neat stuff like deflecting projectiles with melee, which is always cool in my book. I will say, however, that the game still does have a bit of a boring feel to it with the lack of polish: not much feedback and impact to attacks (I couldn't even tell I was hurting the red imps because the red flash isn't apparent on a red enemy), lack of graphical variation especially for the levels, sloppy graphics with how the player character can overlap walls they should be behind, etc. Difficulty was a bit higher than I felt as well with hitboxes being a bit wonky and everything moving a bit fast and erratic at times. Still, not a bad concept, had a decent time with it and I'd like to see more of this game if you build upon it!

[Stupid House]

Quite the interesting adventure! Definitely was very weird and surreal and that served as an effective hook to keep me going. I felt like the puzzles were balanced quite well: difficult enough to make me feel clever for figuring them out, but with enough clues and not too difficult to cause annoyance. Well, that's not quite true: I was annoyed by the fact that there was no way to speed up the intro for watching the TV to memorize the pattern, making repeats annoying. Also, I felt like the piano puzzle was too difficult because it didn't use all distinct sounds, but rather it used, for some sounds, different pitches for the same horn sound: it can be really difficult for a normal person to discern those and memorize the exact pitch they need. Still, overall I had a good time figuring my way out of this stupid house! Also, as a side note, I'm glad the game was just eerie horror, and not jumpscare stuff: I woulda shut the game off immediately if that was the case, haha!

[Match-Off]

Really interesting concept! Imagine my surprise when I was just trying to get any match I could find, when I suddenly realized that a match actually does an action according to what's on the card. Makes it so that there is an interesting strategy to making matches, and I thought that the fact there are some logistics to think about, like collecting bullets before being able to fire, was quite unique. Having said that, though, I didn't have the greatest time: felt like the match just dragged on and on due to the high health bars and sheer amount of cards, many of which are boring actions (bullets and shields). My time was split between me and the CPU just loading bullets or using/wasting shields which didn't make any progress in killing each other, and the rest of the time was the CPU constantly unloading on me since it was always finding the shooting cards. I dunno if I just got unlucky, wasn't playing smart or the CPU cheats, but yeah, this might be one of those games where it's a cool idea in theory, but not in practice (but maybe I'm just impatient). Still, kudos!

[ROBO-GO!]

Nice, short and sweet puzzle platformer! Had a good time with my only major complaint being that I felt it was over too quick! I really liked how it kept escalating the challenge and adding new mechanics: was expecting it to go on a bit longer to combine 'em all in more interesting ways. Overall it was nice, but I do have a few minor complaints. I felt like the jumping was a bit wonky at times, with it being weirdly delayed or not coming out. Furthermore, some of the jumps were way too tight in terms of timing: I felt like you wanted us to always be going for those jumps on the absolute edges of platforms and it got a little exhausting/frustrating at times due to the speed of the game and the previously mentioned wonkiness. Oh, and also the brick collapsing noise was really jarring and hurtful to my ears. Still, solidly designed with a good difficulty curve and evolution to the mechanics!

[Super Raft Boat Classic]

Had a ton of fun with this one! It started off a little slow, with the game being a little wonky with how it puts the cooldown meters all the way in the corner so you can't read em in the action and how you can't see highlight targetting for your building, but that's just minor stuff: once the game got going it delivered some great arcade fun! Loved how fast the game escalated in terms of difficulty and I loved the variety of creative enemies you have to blast through and obstacles you need to look out for, all while managing your boat the best you can: made for some really dynamic and hectic multitasking scenarios which were so fun to get through by the skin of my teeth! I may have made it all the way to relaxation, but I'm definitely looking forward to trying the game with some more characters and looping: a nice short and sweet game!

I will say, though, my GOD was that default screenshake waaaaaay too much, haha! I usually love screenshake with the more the better, but this was a rare occasion where it was absolutely nauseating for me. Not only should you consider lowering the default, but maybe only utilize screenshake for hitting enemies, or maybe enemies dying, instead of for every shot you make (since that means you are constantly shaking, augh!)

[Drop Cannon]

Fantastic stuff on display here! Overall it's a very charming game with excellent assets in all areas. But even if you're the big cheese, I do have a few complaints to make (though nothing big enough to kill it for me, haha).

I found it a bit odd that, while the main menu buttons highlight when you hover over them, the world map destination buttons were very lifeless with no highlight (they do have an animation when you click on them, sure, but I'm a strong proponent in button feedback of all sorts, especially highlights). Also, I found that the transitions between phases were very jarring, especially the transition between finishing the assembly and going to the battlefield: would love if there was a fade transition like the great gears transition on the main menu, maybe with a banner that says "Job Complete! To the Battlefield!" or something.

Finally, while I don't mind shooting the drones during the battle scene, I didn't quite like shooting the drones during the assembly scene: specifically, I didn't like how it interrupted the flow to go to a turret section. Instead, I'd much prefer if you would have to shoot stray drones during the assembly: obviously the number of drones would be less than in the turret section lest it be too difficult, but I think it would be a lot more fun to deal with as it gives you even more to juggle. Also, I wish there was a crosshair for the shooting segments, I kept easily losing my mouse during those.

At the end of the day, however, despite my nitpicks, I felt like the game did have a great level of professionalism to it, and I loved how it kept escalating with new mechanics and difficulty to contend with for each level, so nice work all!

[Tricky Keys]

Very nice game! Definitely knocks it out of the park in terms of graphics and overall aesthetic/concept: feels very high quality all-around. Definitely was a delight to play and I enjoyed how the game kept evolving in terms of difficulty and mechanics: had some great, clever puzzles to get through. In terms of gripes, I only have a few minor ones. I felt like the wall jumps were awkward and I had to get used to how they work specifically in this. For one, when you're running into a wall on the ground and you hit jump, it'll immediately walljump, which I felt was really weird as in other games, it will typically do a neutral jump (aka if you were next to the wall and just hit jump with no movement). Additionally, to jump off a wall, you can't hit the opposite direction and then jump as you would expect, because you get detached from the wall too quickly and it eats your jump input, so you end up having to keep the direction held pointed at the wall when you hit jump, which makes your momentum once you're in the air very awkward to control since you're influencing it to go backward in the direction you want. On another side, I like how the virus is animated, but I wish they had some anticipation frames for their attacks, like a telegraph for their punch: the visuals would make it easier to time certain elements like when it forces you to jump, instead of having to rely solely on innate rhythm. Anyway, solid work here!

[Jaded Slasher]

Hmm, it's decent, I suppose, but not my kinda jam. Controls were very awkward to figure out at the start with the way you just teleport around to objects instead of moving around. Feedback was awkward as well: if you don't get damaged at all when you attack it'll play the slash animation, which is nice, but when you get hurt when you attack, even if you hurt them back, it plays the pain animation (I guess it kinda makes sense to have the pain animation take precedence but it makes me think I didn't even hurt the enemy when I did, would love to see damage numbers pop up so it's more clear). Anyway, I can go on with a lot of nitpicky stuff that made the game feel bland, but in the end, it felt like the game unfortunately devolved into endless grinding and boring kill quests where there is no real strategy, just kill until you can get enough defense (which is odd because you need 4 defense to negate 1 damage, dunno why you don't just make it equal numbers so it's more logical for a player) to not take damage and then keep going ad nauseum. Probably an audience for this as there are people who are fans of clickers/idlers/grindy games, but I'm not, so sorry. However, I would like to see more fully fleshed out projects in the future though: all gotta start somewhere!