FutureCopLGF's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Magirune 2 - Demo]

Hmm, bit of a mixed bag that's a bit rough at the moment, but that is the point of a demo, so hopefully I can give some feedback to make it better!

*Overall I found the game to be pretty bland and lifeless in all aspects. The story was pretty drab and unexciting with no real big goal (though walking outside to see how desolate the world is was pretty neat), there was no animations or cutscenes which made events like dad falling down or the mayor running away confusing since they just vanish, there was barely any music or exciting sounds or effects, and the directions were pretty vague with no journal or anything to help keep track (don't get me wrong, I don't want a line or marker to follow as I like exploring, but sometimes it wasn't clear what's going on).

*There were plenty of typos and odd phrasing: felt like the script was badly translated from another language and could use a proof-reading pass.

*Controller controls were pretty bad: I had no idea how to navigate the inventory menu with the control and access other tabs. Felt like I was forced to use the mouse to access things like inventory tabs when everything should be possible with just controller. Perhaps it was because I'm using a Playstation controller: some games aren't built for it.

*I didn't even realize that I was being hurt when engaging in combat because, unlike the enemies which have good feedback to being hit by shaking and the slash mark effect, the player stands stock still and doesn't react. Even disregarding effects, though, combat was pretty boring and devoid of strategy (though it was kinda cool to get flashy kills when you level up enough to one-shot them).

*I felt like the whole way that enemies respawn when you reenter a screen was really annoying and punishing. I felt like the game could have a survival horror aspect to it where you really gotta plan whether fighting is worth it, but plenty of times I was forced to fight without knowing I'd end up going the wrong way, and it felt frustrating to go back and refight everything, especially considering I don't get exp from it. Just feels like it leaves too much up to trial and error and luck.

I certainly think that it has some interesting ideas and could shape up to become a grand adventure, so hopefully my feedback can help somewhat!

FluffyLotus responds:

Thanks, there's some good feedback in there. This will make me focus some of my time in directions that I wasn't thinking to much about.

[Pixel Dash]

Huh, this felt a little half-baked and lacking in content for me. It reminds me a lot of the game Qix where you keep drawing lines to form squares and in doing so you fill out the board bit-by-bit, with the challenge being that you have to be careful of bouncing balls on the board colliding with the lines while you're drawing. The problem with this is that while there is a challenge and strategy to Qix, this game has none of that. I found that I could easily just place blocks whenever and wherever I wanted: I didn't need to time my placement or anything like that as the bouncing balls avoid getting caught, and even when they do, it's a non-issue to free them with no penalty. Without needing to be careful with how you place blocks, and with a way too generous time limit, winning is a foregone conclusion in this and it just becomes an incredibly repetitive affair of placing blocks as fast as you can to get a pointless high score. It's a bummer for me especially since you need to click on each block instead of being able to hold click and drag, and that easily flares up my carpal tunnel. Even worse is that there's only a single level: I was really hoping that the first level was just a tutorial and it would keep adding new challenges and such, like maybe a level with multiple green zones where you need to catch a certain amount of balls within them, so you need to strategize and time splitting the herd up and such. It certainly could be promising, but this is barely even a prototype in its current state for me.

blit-blat responds:

Sorry to hear about your carpal tunnel man, the click & drag method sounds interesting, though I think that would just make it even easier to be honest! I am working on a follow up with more levels & challenges so watch this space!

[Creature Collab 2022]

Pretty decent collab! For what it is, this collab does a decent job at making it a bit better than your bog-standard slideshow, as it uses a rather stylish shelf display layout. Other niceties in place are things like being able to click on the artist's name to go to their profile and achievements. There are some little things I'd liked fixing up, like hiding the up/down arrows when there isn't anything to go up/down to, making the arrows react to hover, and fixing the weird glitch where scrolling to the next screen auto-selects the creature in the same position as you previously selected last screen, but it's for the most part put together alright.

I kind of wish it had a bit more to it: when I heard it was a creature collab, I kind of envisioned being able to see the creatures move about and such in a fish tank or ant farm environment, or even see them locked up in test tubes like some SCP lab you can explore, but that's on me for expecting way too much. Having said that, though, I was really surprised to see that hidden easter egg: hiding it after a few shelves of empty space, the glitchy name with the secret youtube link, what a cool little treat! Bit of a bummer that I feel that most might not make it that far to see it, but on the other side, it does take some chutzpah to create such a cool thing that not everything might end up seeing, so kudos on that!

Thetageist responds:

That’s what I thought was going to happen for the final version too (it would’ve been so cool!) But I know OneDude had some trouble trying to find a programmer and, after the first guy couldn’t do it anymore, finding another one. So I’m happy it still made it to the final product after all!

[MemMento]

Hah, not too shabby! It's definitely a bit shallow in terms of gameplay, of course, but accepting it for what it is, it's a funny enough experience with some goofy presentation and moments that I enjoyed. Reminds me a lot of @plufmot style games. I also am probably not the intended audience as I haven't seen Memento before, but I at least knew enough about the premise to gather the broad strokes: I wonder if I can consider myself as having watched it after this?

adriendittrick responds:

Thanks for playing, I always enjoy your reviews :)
I'll have to check plufmot then!
And yup, you've definitely understood and remembered everything about the original movie :p

[Sun Escapes Me]

An interesting little game! It's a bit shallow and short, but it doesn't overstay its welcome and keeps things interesting and novel by switching up the rules with each wave. There are some frustrating bits like how difficult it is to ricochet shots back at the sun since there's so little room to work with, but for the most part the game is exciting and fun thanks to the explosive feedback/effects and intuitive arcade gameplay.

That said, the design of the game was pretty questionable at times. I expected the rock wave to require you to shoot the rocks down quickly to prevent the sun from absorbing them and gain power: that way you're forced to play effectively and risky to keep all the rocks away. But no, you can just leisurely take your time and shoot the rocks at your own pace, killing any sort of excitement until you reach the required 100 points. It just made it a bit confusing because you'd think the game would always focus on you vs the sun, but when it comes to the rocks...why are you getting points for shooting them? The other waves made more sense since it involved you fighting back. Also, why does the game even have a high score system when getting points is required to reach certain wave progression at 100, 200 and 300: doesn't that just mean everyone who beats the game ends up with the high score in the end, unless perhaps the sun's final phase health bar has some wiggle room?

Overall though, it was quite the memorable experience due to the interesting wave progression that gets you to the final showdown: a nice, short and sweet story!

picochaz responds:

Thanks for providing such comprehensive feedback! You're totally right on all your points here, relying on score for progression was meant to be a temporary thing but I ended up getting distracted by other things in the game jam.

If I am able to prioritize revisiting this game, I'm going to use your comment as a blueprint to dramatically improve the points mentioned. Score should matter more beyond the final phase and things falling into the SUN should add to its gravity. This might even spur levels in the game itself... who knows?

It is most appreciated that you took the time to provide your thoughts like this.

[Little Fellas]

Hmm, seems like a decent concept, but at the moment it just didn't seem to have much to it.

Usually with these types of games it can be really fun to see how the little guys grow and evolve as it can change their behavior pattern so that they have all sorts of fun dynamic interactions and such on their own accord that are fun to watch, similar to a fish tank or a game of the Sims or Spore or whatever.

Unfortunately here, the little guys just seem like boring shells with no personality or autonomy: they just exist for you to directly make them breed or feed instead of it happening organically. Because of all of the guys being boring shells with no personality, I felt no reason to want to breed or grow them into evolved forms since it was purely cosmetic: what's the point?

Not only that, but the controls were frustrating as well: was never sure in what way or how long I needed to shake to get them randy, and a lot of times my shakes would end up chucking them into the wall for insta-death.

Again, I think it could be a good idea and it floats some interesting ideas around like how you have to sacrifice units to feed others, but in the end it just felt repetitive to grind out all the different forms and it just hurt my arm from all the shaking.

0chin responds:

Its a bit hard to animate all of that in two weeks of work with some of us working actual jobs on the side and only 2 animators. Maybe with an update we’ll add more 👍🏾

[Vizzy & The Lost Cat]

Fun little platformer you got here! Loved the manic and fast-paced platforming fun that the game had, the good amount of enemies/obstacles/layouts to the levels, the satisfying juicy effects for things like collecting loot, and the smooth controls. All in all felt well-constructed and fun: fun enough that despite not getting to the finish line on my initial playthrough, I have now already replayed it to get all the way to the top!

While I'm overall feeling good about this game, there were some nitpicks to be had:

*Enemies felt like there were a bit too spongy at times: I would prefer more of them to take less shots as this sponginess coupled with not being able to hold down to auto-fire really dud a number on my old man hands.

*I know it's probably part of the appeal and to add replayability, but it was quite frustrating to not have any way to backtrack: so many times I'd jump up only to realize that now I had missed a yarn ball and had no way to get it without restarting the entire game. Argh! This also extends to the doors: I'd prefer that you have to press up or something to enter as sometimes I would accidently go through by just passing by when I wasn't finished yet exploring.

*While the enemies do explode with loot in a satisfying way on death, I still found it a bit lacking that the enemies themselves did not explode with a graphic or sound or shake or any feedback: I know they overlap so some might say what was the difference, but it just bothered me slightly.

*Found death a bit overly punishing: I got practically all the way through the game, only for me to die once near the end and lose all of the money completely! You'd think it would just take a certain amount or just restart me back to the amount I had when I entered the level.

*While the levels do a good job at mixing things up, especially with the levels that had moving/rotating platforms, it still did feel slightly samey at times, especially due to the same graphics and music being used over and over. Maybe add a bit more variety or cut it shorter so that the time commitment matches more closely with the level of content. It's not that bad though: there are practically in sync already.

*Unsure if there is a bonus ending or anything for collecting all the yarn balls and a high score of cash? Kinda of felt pointless since it felt like it didn't make a difference at the end.

Nice work!

[Mini Musou]

Hmm, not too shabby! Like a Musou game, this does a decent job at making it feel satisfying to cleave through swarms of enemies: it's nothing super great, but it's satisfying enough feedback considering it is a jam game.

Unfortunately, while it is initially fun to run about and smack enemies, the novelty doesn't last that long. With only one enemy type, a simple combat system, and this very small map with no other objectives, it easily becomes very repetitive to just keep going up and down, cleaning out the bases over and over. To add insult to injury, the controls can be a bit janky: not too bad to do the normal combo attacks and movement, but I had a ton of difficulty trying to do the charge and dodge moves.

It's not bad as a prototype or skeleton for a musou game: as said, the cleaving through enemies is fun, so if the controls were ironed out and more content like new enemy types were introduced and maybe some sort of story/objectives or escalating difficulty to the game were added, I think it could be quite fun! To sum it up, if possible, please focus on making the mechanics more involved rather than thinking more booby costumes will be enough to keep me distracted, haha!

cheesycoke responds:

Thank you so much for the feedback!! Yeah enemy variety is something I wanted from the very beginning but unfortunately couldn't get realized in time. I def would like to expand on this eventually with more enemies, boss fights, etc but that story/objective idea is really interesting! Has a lotta potential I'll keep it in mind, seems fun to mess with.

Also oh god yeah I was fucking around with the controls until the very end. Lotta back and forth of trying to get certain functions working, really needs some polish there. Very unfortunate though, was hoping the booby costumes could distract from that (but for real appreciate the feedback!)

[Roxy's Windows]

Hmm, it's certainly an interesting idea very reminiscient of games like Hypnospace Outlaw and Gone Home and such, games were you piece together a story from scattered documents, but unfortunately, unlike those games, a lot of things kind of bogged it down for me and it never felt like it had a strong initial purpose so it made me lose interest rather quickly.

For one, the controls are quite wonky. It gets most of the controls right and intuitively follows most OS rules, but there were plenty of times where it would act in odd ways, such as selecting the wrong file when trying to click on a file next to another one. It actually took me a long time to even realize I needed to tap a document to make it create other lines: I thought they were just all one line documents at first, haha! The worst part for me was trying to read documents in a folder, as there was no back or next button: I'd read a document, close it, then have to open up the folder again to find the next document and click on it: sounds minor but when you have to do it constantly it really killed my motivation.

But more so than that, I just felt lost without some sort of guidance or goal or story. I mean, there was a story about these characters and dealing with normal angsty young people things, but I didn't really have any setup or much reason to care about the characters. Most of these other interactive UI games or investigative games provide some sort of impetus or quest or reason, but it was absent here. Most other games start small and build up some tidbits of knowledge to work from first as a basis, whereas this one just dumps it all on you at the start. Besides story, I'd also love if maybe there were some more puzzle elements or something, like having some documents locked away behind the cloud and you need to search for the wifi password and enter it to get access, instead of the wifi password just being a little joke. Basically, for me, this was just a haphazard array of documents that felt aimless, but that could just be me: some people might actually like the level of freedom that this provides to just wander about.

Bleak-Creep responds:

Always appreciate a detailed review. I think a lot of these thoughts are totally valid too. We had originally planned there to be more puzzle solving elements in there and we had even made up some locked folder icons, but we didn’t have enough time to work them into the game to meet the deadline. I’m not sure if that’s something we’ll add in later on, but I do think it’d help shape the narrative in a bit more linear sort of way, which could be a better way to experience the story.

Thanks for playing!