FutureCopLGF's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Newgrounds Ms-Paint Collab III]

Hey, nice to see this art gallery come back! Overall this is a pretty dang cool and creative art collab and I really enjoy the 3D gallery concept as it is a breath of fresh air compared to typical slideshows!

Loved the little scanner device you have that allows you to get details about artwork and even link to the artist's page: very nice quality of life! I will admit, though, that I'd kind of prefer if the scanner blanked out when you're not looking at an art piece instead of freezing with the last seen one: that's just my preference, however. I also found it disappointing that there were a lot of artwork like decals and characters that I wanted info, but the scanner doesn't give anything for them: oh well!

I have to admit, that as cool as the gallery is, I was getting a bit exhausted of it halfway through: it just felt like so many of the rooms were the same bland purple-blocked rooms over and over with the same music playing the whole time. Would much prefer if there were a higher quantity of rooms (or at least rearrange the architecture to better pace the journey) having cool and unique themes, construction, and music to them, like the COD Zombies room, for example. It was also a bit strange to see so much reused stuff from the previous collab. I also felt like maybe there were less easter eggs? Or maybe they're just hidden too well, haha. Anyway, the combination of these factors made me feel like this gallery was a bit less well-developed, even though it is still nice in a vacuum. I guess you raised the bar so high I couldn't help but want more from ya!

[ULTRAFUN]

Hmm, this was a rather mixed one for me!

On one hand, I really love the absolutely strange vibes that this game puts out: it was like trying to figure out how to fly an alien spacecraft and reminds me of other bizarre games like Frog Fractions and the like. It was very intriguing to see what the heck happens next as the epochs went on and either new mechanics got patched in or weird events got put in like Qubert wandering around. Putting the main loop of voidling shooting aside, it was also interesting to try and figure out what was going on in other places, like the Ky Fragment: a little experimenting made me learn that I could feed Qubert, and I was also having fun trying to figure out the weird exp minigame and how to grow the tree. For all I know, there's probably so many hidden layers to the game, and I was eager to see where this weird journey took me!

Eventually though, around Epoch 6 or so, the pacing of weird stuff the game was introducing started to slow down, my initial fascination and allure of the game started to wear thin, and all I was left with was a rather mindless idler game that has no sense of challenge except mindlessly blasting away and getting upgrades that I wasn't even sure if they were doing anything as, well, it's difficult to decipher or trust the game. As much as I was curious to see what happens next, it all just started to feel rather pointless and I felt like I wasn't making any progress.

I'm a little worn out by the game, but perhaps I'll try revisiting it later on. Even though I got a bit soured by it, kudos for making something as experimental as this: it's certainly quite memorable!

[Jack The Racoon]

Hmm, for the most part I thought this was nice, but it kind of let me down as it went on!

As said, in general the game feels pretty competently made: it's got a cute aesthetic and premise, the controls and physics feel nice, the hitboxes are quite forgiving, and the levels slowly introduce more complexity in their design to keep things interesting. Decent stuff: feels like a proper retro game!

However, I felt like the game stalled out early on and failed to keep my interest. It took around until world 2-4 for it to finally introduce a new emerald jumping mechanic, but until then, every level was pretty boring and just featured the same platform jumping and spike avoiding as every other level, and I was already feeling like I wanted to quit around 1-7 or so due to boredom. Sure, it tried to spice things up with dialogue and increasing level length, but it all boiled down to the same mechanics being recycled for too long. I just feel like the pacing needs to be sped up a bit, as this feels like a classic case where a game has been stretched thin to pad its play time: I much prefer a more short and sweet experience! Either that, or the game needs more fun and complex movement controls that can allow players to have more freedom to let them enjoy flexing their stuff.

As a side note, I wish there was some way to fast-forward text when you're talking to someone. I also don't quite agree with the respawn system being so lenient, as it allows you to cheese levels by intentionally killing yourself to quickly backtrack to the start to go down a different path, when I feel like making your way back to the start should be part of the challenge.

Oh, and I hate to be a nitpick, but it's spelled raccoon! Eh, maybe it's intentional, what do I know!

[Dave the Game]

Ehh, this was a really weird one for me, as it's a bit of a beautiful mess, in a way!

I actually found it pretty novel that it seemed to lean heavily into some unorthodox controls and physics to create some absolutely bizarre jumping puzzles: in a way, it was rather unique and mindbending to wildly walljump and rocket around! However, the more I played, the more it felt like the game was not properly coded and was just an absolute mess, and any intentionally I assumed previously was either a mistake or an excuse: bad either way.

It's just so bloody unintuitive, janky, and lacking so much quality-of-life or refinement that I gave up. It didn't help either that the game is so tiny and doesn't explain anything effectively, along with having a very boring and grey world. It's a shame since I thought the boss fight was promising at the end, along with some of the level design and little charming bits here and there, but yeah, overall I felt like this needed way more time in the oven. I understand it's a game jam game so you were limited and did what you could, but it is what it is: it's at least neat enough that I'd like to see another attempt from you in future!

TheLoFiBoi responds:

This review was so honest and constructive all i can say is thank you for the insight and for playing the game, and you already know our next projects shall be even better!

[MODE GAL]

Huh, interesting little game you got here! While the sharp physics were a little weird to get used to at first, the game had some decent platforming action, along with a novel amount of weird transformations like umbrella, blockbreaking, frog, and gravity that created some nice changes of pace to keep my interest. The general presentation was also pretty cool and served to intrigue me. It was an alright adventure overall!

The game was a little weird at times, though. Unlike the first level, which had a clearly visible collectible, it seemed like the rest of the levels also had collectibles, but they were totally invisible? At least I think they are collectibles: wasn't quite sure why I'd get those random explosions here and there. Not sure if this is intentional or not: if I am supposed to find and collect these, it'd be nice if there was some sort of score tally at the end. There were also a few invisible blocks in places as well, which seemed like it had to be a mistake.

Also, as much as it was an alright adventure, I couldn't help but feel a bit unsatisfied: not only was there no ending, it just felt rather half-baked in its execution since so many of the interesting transformations only happened once before being abandoned and returning to basic platforming. I would've loved to see how the transformation levels evolve over time to become more interesting challenges, but alas, no such luck here. I suppose take it as a compliment that I really wanted more from this!

[Race Against a Duck]

Hmm, this was a rough one for me! I want to like it since it has such a goofy premise and charming presentation, but the gameplay as a big miss for me, as it is not the racing game I want, but more an idler/clicker in disguise.

It's a pet peeve of mine when roguelites go too ham on the metaprogression to the point where it is not a helping hand anymore, but more so a required time-commitment grind to make it even slightly feasible to win in the first place, and that was exactly what this was. I want something more like RC Pro Am or Death Rally where racing is a fun combination of upgrades and player skill, whereas this is only upgrades, no skill.

In addition to all that, the game also felt rather clunky in terms of hitboxes, graphics, physics, and so on, so yeah, its a miss for me. I can imagine plenty of other people enjoying this, embracing the grindy nature and the funny premise, so don't mind me too much!

[Primo Richards: Case 1]

Hmm, not too shabby of a detective game! Feels like it's doing a decent job recreating that 'ace attorney' visual novel style, and its got some fancy and appealing presentation to it: pretty promising stuff!

In terms of feedback:

I know it's a demo so it's still under development, but the game was pretty rough in some aspects, especially the audio department which had tons of overused sound effects (like the droplet sound) and the music cutting in and out haphazardly. It looks pretty good in most respects, though, so I'm hoping it all gets polished in future!

It can get a bit overly verbose at times. I don't know why, for example, the chief was giving me this whole history lesson and opinion piece on the victim's backstory: not only is it too much front-loaded exposition, it feels like that should be stuff I should be picking up during the case if it is relevant, while the chief, as the hard-ass he is, should just be giving me the bare minimum starting details and let me hit the street pronto!

Maybe it's just me, but I found the rhythm of the character emotes to be a bit strange? The way they emote was just a bit awkward at times, like maybe they return to neutral too quickly instead of staying with their pose, or the explosive effects are a bit too fast and confusing, or how some side characters are frozen and lacking any sort of unique poses compared to main characters, etc.

Nothing major, but there were a few typos and grammar mistakes here and there: nothing enough to hurt comprehension so it's ok, but definitively give it a once-over when you have some time.

I do also wish that there was some more quality-of-life designs, like an easy way to fast-forward text on replays: right now, it always forces you to wait for each line to load and for the characters to do their emotes, and it's a bit awkward to have to hit the arrow on the right instead of just being able to click the text box, or the whole screen, as other visual novels typically do. I also don't know why you made it that interactables like the body in the apartment don't react on mouse-over: I feel like they should act just like the other buttons do where they get highlighted.

arrogancy responds:

Excellent feedback and constructive criticism, thank you!

[Loch Crystallo]

Nice, chill game! It's pretty much 'shower thoughts' or 'thoughts that creep up when you're trying to sleep' the game, interspersed with little funny riddles here and there. It wasn't necessarily much of a 'game' per se, and I was a bit worried that it was gonna be too preachy or navel-gazey, but the great presentation quality and cool atmospheric vibes chilled me out and let me enjoy the experience, think about a bunch of stuff, and have a few chuckles. In particular, I found the aspect of censored answers a clever way to have multiple-choice answers but not let you easily guess the right answer: you still need to think of it on your own as if it were a free-text answer, in a way! I also appreciated that you could fast-forward text by clicking (though speaking of, it might be nice to have a prompt appear when you're supposed to click to proceed to the next line). If I were to have any feedback, it'd be cool if the game had a big databank of thoughts and riddles that it could randomize for each run so that it were more replayable.

[Impossible Angles and Tough Topics]

Huh, interesting little game! Certainly got some very cool visuals, and the aspect of trying to remain calm and talk in such a way that you fit in with this horrific situation you've found yourself in was rather amusing, especially when there are so many answers to pick and choose. Short and sweet, and while I wish it had a bit more meat on its bones, I liked it enough that I found myself going back to check out the other answers and endings you could get!

In terms of feedback, I do feel like the game is way too tiny, in particular the text: I needed to slam my face right into the monitor so I could read comfortably, haha! I also felt like some of the endings were a bit weird. I got one ending where he ends up getting booed (and maybe killed) and another where he seems pleased with the experience, and those were fine, but then I got this other ending where I feel like the author shoved himself into the story to endlessly preach about how horror works because of hope and blah blah blah: insightful stuff but it just felt so unnatural and out-of-character, and not in a funny non-sequitur way. I know the game is about horror in a few different ways, but it was the most "sir, this is a wendy's" moment I've had in a while. Maybe I'm thinking about it too much.

[Questern]

Huh, quite the interesting little game! Reminds me a lot of those goofy web comics, forum collab works or CYOA stories like Homestuck, or games like the Loathing series. It's a bit of a bummer that I'm not making any choices and am just reading a story, so I somewhat struggle to call it a game, per se, but nevertheless it is a rather charming story with very goofy and amusing art and prose.

I am a bit torn though: as much as I do like the experimental process of audience participation and all that jazz, it's only the lucky ones that come in when it is still being written and not only suggest options, but have their suggestions integrated into the book, that have the most fun. For everyone else, they're just reading a book that isn't finished yet and so have to wait unsatisfied, or feeling bad that their suggestion didn't get selected, or, someday eventually, just reading a completed book, which as funny as it is, has no interactivity to it. Not saying you shouldn't keep what doing what you're doing: shine on you crazy diamond! It's just that I am one of those unlucky ones that is feeling a bit unsatisfied, as much as I do think it is a charming story.

NickJam responds:

Not the creator but I helped with the UI. The story is still ongoing! The description has the link to Laken's suggestions thread. I'd recommend reading up to the latest page before posting there, but the story is still fairly early on and there's plenty of opportunity to jump in and give suggestions on where it goes next :)