FutureCopLGF's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Hexplore]

Pretty neat game! Graphics are very charming as well as the goofy characters and music, and it was fun wandering around and seeing everything the world had to offer (including all the violent deaths haha). Was a little bit confusing at times: sometimes it was difficult to tell if you were highlighting something since it was so subtle at times and it was a bit annoying to pixel hunt for clickables. Some of the puzzle logic was very odd as well: having to wait after giving the hamster a carrot and giving moose a flashlight for him to stomp (and then to use the batteries on a tree?) were some real WTF moments. But, I suppose figuring out that weird puzzle logic is part of the fun of these games, so...yeah!

[ROOM ROOM]

Love this game! Very creative and clever concept and I love the way the game slowly introduced all the mechanics in a very cool mind-bending way. Once I realized that I could actually go back to a room by intentionally hitting it and I'd have to do that to get all the orbs, man that felt cool, like my brain had just imploded. Loved the puzzles too, felt like little Warioware games how they have these little clues to try and figure everything out while you're dancing around trying not to die. This might've been a short game but it was very sweetly put together: great work!

[Closed Circuit]

I dunno if I'm missing something, but this seemed like a real disappointment for me: a classic case of good graphics, animation, music, and sound...but no gameplay. It's just running down a corridor and shooting people while they shoot you. No strategy, no ducking or hiding or anything: it's just mash fire fast enough to kill them before they can kill you. You can aim in all these directions, but you never have to point anywhere but forward. Don't get me wrong, I know game jams are tough and such, lord knows I can't do 'em, but I think this missed the intention of game jams by focusing too much on the presentation and not enough on interesting gameplay.

[International PixelArt Gallery 2020]

Very neat gallery; great to see many different artists all over the world. I felt like the navigation was a bit clunky however. There's always a bar at the bottom which can obscure some of the art: would prefer if the bar hides itself and pops up when you mouse close to it. Similarly, I wish I could get the artist to pop up if I would hover my mouse at the top. Hitting back/next at the bottom is a bit clunky and awkward: would prefer if you could just click on the screen anywhere to move to the next picture, or maybe click the sides of the screen to go back or forward (sometimes I think it does this but then doesn't for others?). Wish the res marker in the upper left would go away so I could just view the pieces without outside interference. There was also some clunky overlapping text and graphics in some locations, just giving it a bit of an unprofessional design, taking away from the ease of viewing the art. Still, hearts in the right place!

JamesChapp responds:

Thank you very much for the feedback.
All these suggestions I will take into account for the next update of the gallery.

Thank you very much for taking the time to share your suggestions.

P.S. don't forget to follow your favorite pixelart artists on your social media.
Greetings.

[Manorvania]

For some reason, my initial impression of the game wasn't that great: not sure what it is, maybe the player movement or the camera didn't feel that smooth or the sprites were too tiny of something (I'm getting old lol). But whaddya know, I found myself addicted to the game once I kept going, so nice work on that! It just has such a charming atmosphere both in the way Vlad and everyone else bounces around so animatedly and the way they talk. It was very fun to learn more and more about the manor as you collect more and more powers. Got some small annoyances here and there but nothing major. Was a bit of a bummer because I made it through a good portion and then turned it off, hoping it saved my progress, but it didn't, so now I gotta start over. Would love a save system, but hey, it's a charming enough game that I'm fine playing it from the start!

[STARSHIP PROTOTYPE]

It gets pretty exciting in the later stage what with the boss fight and everything: loved fighting that thing by rocketing one direction and letting myself drift off that momentum while shooting at it, felt pretty cool to dance around like that. But other than that, I felt like the game was overall a bit clunky and confusing. For being all about revenge, I didn't really feel like I got to fight anything except the last boss: before that, it was just dodging glitchy seaweed and not even being able to shoot turrets, only being able to shoot their bullets. I'm not even sure why I was landing on planets in the first place. Also, the HUD was a bit lackluster with just bland numbers with overly long decimal places (round those suckers up) instead of some cool graphics, like an actual life bar for health (not that it mattered because you pretty much die in one hit to practically everything so why bother with a health bar). I think there was some fun gameplay in there with the physics based movement and the shooting: would love to see more bosses to fight for revenge!

[Bright in the Screen 2nd Session]

Hmm, it's certainly quite stylish and interesting, presentation-wise, and has some interesting gimmicks like the projector screens for displaying information, but overall I feel like I had a bit too much of a confusing and frustrating time. Controls were very awkward and unintuitive at times: why I have to click on things instead of just hitting space bar or enter or down to interact with them is odd and very frustrating, especially when I needed to click on a tiny elevator button when I was outrunning something and the camera was shifting it, making it unnecessarily difficult. And then, once I get used to the mouse clicking, suddenly it goes back and uses space to interact with things instead! Just very odd. Movement in general was very annoying as well with sprints being required for big jumps but, my sprint was very fidgety and would sometimes not work properly, leading to me never feeling confident my jump would work. Still, tempted to go back in just because of the interesting design, so kudos on that.

[TEXT 'N' DRIVE]

I do have a fondness for educational games that seek to educate through fun gameplay, and I think this one did a great job! Great message and a very fun and well put-together game system that accurately portrays how difficult and silly it is to text and drive. Very, very clever stuff! Though I have to admit, for me, it actually might've been a bit too fun to the point of making me want to text and drive since it's such a fun challenge, haha! I'd actually want the game to go one step further and make it so you have to erase any typing mistakes you make, since that would more accurately portray the difficulties of texting and driving, because then you either need to correct your mistakes or chose to look down at the keyboard/use both hands to avoid mistakes, heightening the intended challenge that is crucial to the message. As it is right now, it can actually be a bit too easy to fat finger the general area of the keyboard like Homer for each letter to type in the sentences. Still, great job!

[State your name]

Pretty neat story with some interesting twists and turns! I like the slow reveals and the funny ways your responses change as you get into it deeper and deeper. My only complaint was that it was a little too static for me, and that made it feel a little less organic for me. I'm probably not going to explain this properly, but I would've liked if the interruptions and such from yellow and violet and so on happen in a linear fashion no matter what type of choices you make, as long as they follow a general nature. Instead, their responses are tied to certain choices you make, making them feel less like dynamic characters reaching out to you and more like scripted programs (which might fit given the whole simulation nature but still). For example, It's possible, when you loop back, to pick answers that you've chosen previously and the story will loop back to that point in time as it replays the same responses yellow and violet gave before, despite the story suggesting that they've moved on from that point and wouldn't repeat themselves. I guess it just kinda gave me a Truman Story vibe: suddenly it was too obviously a rigged game that was leading me down one route. Again, maybe that's kind of the intention, but I felt like the game would've been more powerful if it was programmed in a way to be more dynamic and organic.