FutureCopLGF's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[The Planetologist DEMO]

Seems like a decent Survivors-esque twin-stick shooter! Certainly showcases some solid fundamentals, but I do have to admit that while the game isn't bad necessarily and provides some grindy shooty fun for a short time, in this world of millions of Survivors-esque games vying for attention, this really isn't exciting me or being memorable and I drop it rather quickly. You're free to make whatever you like, of course, and perhaps it's unfair of me to compare, but I feel like it's inevitable. There are some aspects on which it shows some potential to differentiate itself, such as the diverse cast of characters might allow for a lot of different playstyles, or maybe the story mode will be unique, but I don't have any proof of those yet in this small demo.

I'm spitballing here, but given that the game is named the Planetologist, I thought that there were going to be more planet or science-based mechanics, and that could be a nice way to make this game stand out in a unique way. For example, maybe the planet could have more hazardous weather conditions or natural disasters you need to deal with randomly to keep you on your toes or prepare beforehand. Maybe instead of just shooting hordes of mooks, your primary objective is to gather samples by searching for locations to setup drills you then need to defend, or hunting down unique boss enemies. You could also maybe have to build up turrets or defenses like an engineer.

Some other minor feedback would be that it'd be nice to have some sort of visual HUD element to see our roll cooldown (similar to the reload bar), and to see our EXP progress in a bigger way than tucked in the corner where it's barely visible. I also found it really weird that our gun doesn't fire a bullet but instead seems to be some sort of invisible laser: makes no sense why we get powerups about increasing bullet size or speed. More razzle-dazzle in general would be nice too.

JamesChapp responds:

Thank you so much for playing the game and leaving a review!

This feedback is fantastic because it gives us a lot to think about and work on. Guillermo and I aimed to get the demo out there to test the core mechanics of the game. It's still a work in progress, and we're receiving a ton of valuable feedback on the project.

Since it's published on Newgrounds, we're dealing with a very demanding audience that, at the same time, understands it's a project in development being carried out by just the two of us. =)

[Gods of the Arena Dungeon [DEMO]]

Pretty cool game! Reminds me a lot of games like Realm of the Mad God, or perhaps some competitive form of Risk of Rain. Certainly looks to be a rather charming game in terms of presentation and while it's already quite fun in its single-player state, I'd be very interested to see how the gameplay shifts when you need to deal with other players competing and sabotaging each other. Overall it looks incredibly promising and I'm sure loads of people are gonna love it.

Having said that, though...the game really didn't work for me personally. It's still good, but I felt rather underwhelmed despite what looks like a quality product. It's hard to nail down exactly what it is, but something about it just really didn't gel with me: both the micro minute-to-minute combat gameplay and the macro mechanics of levelling and looting just felt really awkward, confusing and unsatisfying. If it helps, I think it's most likely a personal preference thing, similar to how I don't like The Binding of Isaac that much, but can still see why many others would like it. If I were to offer some feedback, though, it'd be:

*This is a bit vague, but as said, there's something about the combat that just felt really off to me. Maybe it's the slow projectiles, maybe it's the hitboxes being placed or sized oddly, maybe its the way the enemies are placed in the world that doesn't match when viewed in a 3D perspective, maybe it's the hit/death feedback, maybe it's that projectiles can clash, there's just something about it within the nitty-gritty that just didn't work for me. I don't have anything specific, unfortunately, so it's up to y'all.

*I was constantly trying to use my RMB skill and being shocked that it wasn't ready yet. It's ok that abilities have long cooldowns if that's what you want for strategy purposes, but I'd like it if you try to use an ability before its ready, that it notifies the player, like having the cooldown remaining flash above the players head briefly, and their character makes a little noise or shakes about.

*I'd like it if loot on the floor has the little info pop-up when your character goes near/over the item, not just when the mouse hovers over it: would make it a lot more convenient to examine loot as typically I'm trying to fend off enemies and I don't have the luxury to mouse over loot during that.

*For a game that's all about racing to level up, levels come and go with the player barely noticing it. At the very least, I'd like it if there was some more fanfare when you level up to give a sense of gratification, but you could also make gaining exp a bit more exciting by turning it into crystals as they do in Survivors games: this could have the added benefit of making multiplayer a bit more exciting as players could plan to steal the crystals that scatter from another player's kill.

*I found it very confusing to grasp the whole class unlock system: why am I having to jump through all these weird hoops to have fun? I just leveled up, so let me pick whatever one of the two classes on offer I want instead of giving me no choice at all unless I do these quests that I don't even understand: the ones that take honor to unlock are self-explanatory, but I have no idea what the other requirements mean.

*I don't feel like the tutorial prepared me for the game properly. Sure, it goes over the basic controls, but I felt completely unprepared for the actual game as I had no idea I wouldn't be able to start as the fire mage immediately, I didn't know about collecting keys and ascending classes and searching for bosses and competing against other players and moving onto new zones and all of that jazz!

*Loot was a bit boring and devoid of anything really exciting besides minor statistical increases. I also don't know what some of the stats mean, like bullet HP.

*Bit frustrating that you can't pause and read tooltips and such at your leisure. I know it's because it will eventually be a multiplayer game, and eventually I'll learn everything and won't need to pause, but still, it was frustrating, especially since I'm playing it single-player at the moment.

Looking forward to seeing how this shapes up with its final release: as said, I think the multiplayer aspect could be very interesting!

gasgod responds:

Hey man
Just saw your video. I appreciate your feedback and this big review!
This game is essentially if you crossed a .io game (like diep.io) with, as you alluded to it in the video, Realm of the Mad God. It's supposed to be a relatively casual experience you can just kind of zone out to and frag your buddies with abbreviated leveling and RPG-light-light mechanics.
Might make more sense in that context

[the ancient little wizard]

Hah, quite the amusing little game! I quite like the goofy vibes to it and especially enjoy all of the interactions you can have with objects and people. Creating a whole stealth system for these stores was very interesting and livened up the experience above my expectations. There were also a lot of secrets like NPCs that sell special items, recruitments, and the ability to find a pointier hat that upgrades your height stat by 1 which I assume makes no actual difference in anything important, haha! All in all it seemed like a fun little adventure!

While I did enjoy it at the start, I'll admit that around the second trinket I was starting to fall out of love with it. The stealth system seemed buggy and I got seen plenty of times even though I was clearly hiding behind objects that should've blocked their sight. The combat system had no depth to it and could easily be solved by just spamming meteors and meditating with the occasional heal thrown in, turning it into just a hassle (maybe my fault for picking combat mode, but how was I supposed to know without trying?) And every store just felt like more of the same without any sense of progression or escalation, which alongside NPCs repeating lines just made the world lose its allure.

Having said that, morbid curiosity did make me go back and play a bit more, and for some reason I encountered the void walker and was able to go home with only 3 trinkets? Not sure if that was a glitch or maybe I get a better ending if I get all 5?

Would certainly love to see more goofy adventures like this: just needs a little bit more meat on its bones to keep the adventure novel and interesting the whole way through instead of stalling out like it did here!

ArlucGames responds:

Thanks for such an in depth review! It's nice to hear of someone trying to engage with the whole game, which does of course expose its flaws...
The stealth (like most games) was never fully padded out, as the game is so short anyway, but I understand how that can be frustrating.
Combat was also thrown in for variety but not fleshed out, again just wanting to keep the game simple.
You can actually reach Void Walker with just 1 trinket. This was intentional and reading the item descriptions will make it clear which one it is 😉
Did you get the secret ending? If you help out the skeletons, they'll point you in the right direction. Though the secret ending is also simple and more of a gag so you may not want to go through the effort 😅
Thanks so much for playing and hope you'll try out my other games in the future! Which I hope to be a bit more involved than this quick little project 😁

[Martian Mayhem!]

Hmm, not too shabby!

For the most part, it seems like a decent Minecraft/Terraria-clone with enough of the fundamentals down-pat to create that classic addictive loop of looking for resources to create the next thing, but at the same time it feels like a very early alpha or a tech demo, showing off that its got all of the necessary functionality to make a game, but not actually being a game yet as it is still lacking the bells and whistles to make it appealing, stand out from the crowd, and truly suck me in.

I gave it my best shot and had a bit of fun at the start, but it quickly lost me. The world just felt so big, dry and lifeless that I easily got lost and it quickly felt tiresome, it didn't feel like the building tools allowed for me to get creative or build something nice like a house, and there was just a lack of any sort of guide, motivation or goal to strive for. The biggest frustration was trying to find coal to build a furnace: I looked and I looked, but every time I thought I might've found some, it turned out to be flint instead! Wish those two elements looked a lot different from each other so I could spot them more easily, and wondering if I got screwed by the procedural generation.

Other than that, there are some minor issues like how I wish moving items around in the inventory was a bit simpler by just holding down left-click to drag items instead of having to double-click to engage this movement mode it has.

Basically, it's currently a good skeleton of a game: just needs some meat on its bones!

masonmcleen responds:

thanks for leaving a review! yeah, future updates of martian mayhem are sure to bring more content to the game and make the world feel more diverse. what i want to eventually do is add more creative options (i.e a set of 7 blocks for each color of the rainbow, more decorations) and also more functional items like chests and signs and the like. With coal, I've made it blue in the upcoming update because you're not alone - alot of my friends had the same issue haha! the two resources look very similar. i'll see what i can do with moving items, dragging them might be hard to figure out how to do in the game engine i use but i will for sure look in to it. i'll also make a walkthrough and add some in-game hints so players looking to "complete" the game have some guidance. but anyway, thank you for playing and reviewing! your criticism helps me make the game a better experience :)

[Wallpaper 2.0 Collab]

Hmm, I don't want to be mean as I think the intention is good in making these collabs and there's a lot of great art here. But, for that very reason that there's a lot of great art and artists that deserve appreciation here, I want the presentation that this collab offers to make the art all the more appealing. When looking at this, all I could think of was Gordon Ramsey's famous words: "it's fucking RAW!"

Forget displaying the art in a very creative or interesting fashion that could garner attention, this presentation is the absolute bare minimum that could be done to present the art and nothing more. It is completely lacking any sort of quality-of-life features as well as any bells and whistles to make the experience appealing. Seriously, the official playlist you made for the art is miles above this: at least there you can easily access the artist profiles to see their other works or follow them, as well as being able to see the art itself in a larger view and download it, which makes sense for a wallpaper.

Again, the art is lovely and I love the sense of community and cooperation that comes from events like this: I just think that more effort needs to be put into the presentation to match the large effort that the artists put in when making their wonderful pieces. It's all out of balance right now! But hey, better luck in the future and I hope to see more cool projects like this.

ColorfulCeleste responds:

Honestly I absolutely agree. I really feel like it would've worked better if scratch was only used as a last resort to package it (it really isn't too difficult to build a gallery now and days). It was really an issue of not asking if anybody had an alternative to scratch tbh.

[Nefarius - The Last Wizard (Updated)]

Hmm, this one is a bit of a mixed bag for me!

It certainly started off very strong with a great first impression. Overall I feel like the graphical presentation of this game is exceptional and very impressive: even aspects that are typically overlooked like menus, death animations, and so on are high quality. Got some fantastic music as well!

Once we start to get into actual gameplay, though, it starts to fall apart, as while it is a somewhat serviceable Survivors-esque game, it feels very bland and dry which is in stark contrast to the beautiful assets used. There's barely any enemy variety and they are easily exploited by running circles around them to corral them together. The weapons/items on offer are tiny, unimaginative, and give no sense of variety between runs. The act of hitting enemies, collecting experience and leveling up is not exciting at all due to a lack of feedback and juice. Frankly, it's just pretty boring to me and feels more like an early alpha or a skeleton to work from: needs a lot more meat on its bones before its actually fun!

Other points of feedback:

*The volume balancing is terrible with the barely existing sound effects being so easily drowned out by the music. I needed to turn the music down to like 1% and the sound to 100% to make it so that it works better.

*Strange that the game teaches you how to dash from the very start, but it doesn't even start you off with a dash since you need to get boots first. By the same token, it's very strange that the laser power requires you to hit a button for it, but the game doesn't teach this at all: I kept waiting for it to activate since I thought it was a passive!

*Weird that the terrain, specifically objects like trees, bushes, and so on, doesn't block the player or the enemies from moving straight through it. I can understand the game allowing enemies to move straight through them, but allowing the player to move through seems weird as they should be obstacles that require the player to strategize and not get stuck: without that, the world feels unexciting and you can just run around without a care in the world.

*Laser is a bit of a death trap in that, while it looks all fancy, it freezes you in place and easily sets you up to be killed right afterwards as the enemies just swarm you. Maybe it needs to freeze time or something else?

*Main menu is inconsistent with control scheme: the main options require you to use the keyboard, but if you go into the options, suddenly the keyboard is unusable and you need to use the mouse instead? Even weirder is that if you try and use the keyboard while in options, it will still keep moving the main menu around.

*Finally, maybe the most important of all, is that even if everything is fixed up, there really isn't anything interesting or unique about the game that grabs me and makes me want to play it. The world is absolutely awash with Survivors-esque games that are competing for attention with all sorts of appealing attributes, and this needs something special to stand out: right now I'm not seeing that.

Hope this helps and you work on it to create a final version which plays as well as it looks!

Snow-Hex responds:

Thanks for your comment, I assure you that the programmer and I will take into account each of the points you mention, thanks again for your review, this kind of comments is really useful in every way. 🦖

[MEATY MAYHEM (The Full Experience)]

Huh, I was pleasantly surprised by this!

I feared the worst when starting out because this game unfortunately feels very similar to the demo that was posted before: while the world and vibes that the game gave off were very goofy and charming, overall the gameplay felt rather generic and bland, controls felt awkward, sound effects were missing, difficulty was simultaneously too easy while also being too punishing, and so on. Basically, it felt like it hadn't taken any of the feedback into account, so it wasn't the best first impression.

Nevertheless, I pressed onwards into the new content, and felt rewarded for my persistence as around the start of world 2, the game started to get quite interesting and cool from there! Levels started to get a lot of new mechanics like the bounce pads and moving platforms, and overall the game became more of an interesting and challenging precision platformer. In addition, there was a lot more novelty to keep things fresh: there were weird secrets like running into the gorilla, and a lot of great setpieces like the weird ghost levels, the crazy boss fights and the clown chase sequence and so on! Really neat stuff!

So yeah, the controls are still a bit awkward, the game is a bit jank and it takes a while for the game to get good, but when it does, I was quite impressed! If I were to guess as to why this is the case, I suppose it's a classic case of the programmer getting more skilled as the game was developed so the quality of game gets better the deeper you go, haha!

BakethedBean responds:

yeah as time went on i found ways to come up with more robust solutions in less time which gave me opportunities to put more stuff in. thank god for the redemption arc!

[The Test of Insanity]

Cute game! Feels very much like a successor to The Impossible Quiz, what with its wide variety of questions and minigames, and its focus on mind-bending trickery and lateral thinking. As someone who already played The Impossible Quiz back in the day, I was already very familiar with the tricks this game was playing (for example, the math question where the answer is clicking on a number within the question) so I didn't have too much trouble making my way through, but all in all, it was a nice, enjoyable, goofy adventure!

If there were any complaints, it'd be:

*As said, it might just be because I'm already familiar with this kind of game, but I made it through rather quickly and was left hungry for more, so yeah, it's a bit short! Also it is kind of rehashing a lot of stuff that's come before, so I'm not quite sure if it has its own unique voice or appeal yet: in a way, the game kind of makes you want to go back and play the Impossible Quiz instead of seeing this as the superior version.

*The game felt a little bit dry, especially with no music: could maybe stand to have some more aspects to pep it up.

*I feel like it was somewhat awkward to have the scroll-clicking game as the very first thing you encounter. For a quiz game like this, I feel it'd be better to start with something more standard, like the question about fish, then later on you can get into the more action-y minigames. It's not bad, just made the pacing a bit strange, but maybe that's just because it actually took me a while to figure it out and I'm just compensating, haha.

jacklehamster responds:

Thanks, great feedback!

[The Newgrounds Bug Collab]

Yowza, what a cool art collab! I love to see art collabs that present the art in a very creative and compelling fashion, and this game delivers that in spades with its wonderful Pokemon-esque world that you explore in! I enjoyed all the people and things you can interact with in the world, and I enjoyed the zoo with all its marvelous bugs and fancy cages, and very much appreciated its plaques that contain links to the artist's profile. I couldn't help but wish the game was full-on Pokemon with being able to collect and battle these critters, but I understand that's a big ask and I already applaud the effort that was put into this: well done!

In terms of feedback:

*I found it very odd how the bugs move around: instead of smoothly transitioning between grid spaces like the player does, they insta-teleport around. It's kinda scary, almost like they're SCP-esque monsters! I'm guessing it was done because it was too much to ask the artists to make walk cycle sprites in addition to all the directional poses, but even then, I wouldn't mind and would prefer a more smooth and slow movement instead of the teleporting, even if it looks a bit odd that the legs don't animate.

*The glass in front of the cages, particularly the thick upper line of them, really bothered me as it is constantly blocking the bugs and not allowing me to see them clearly. Wish it was made thinner or transparent or taller so it doesn't end up occluding them.

*The place is absolutely huge! Wish there was something like a map so I could easily get a read of the museum layout and plan out my trip, and I also wish the map design had more shortcuts and would constantly lead into the lobby instead of having long stretches that lead to dead-ends that you then need to backtrack on. Could stand to have some fast travel checkpoints (I thought this is what these elevator door things were) and maybe change up the colors of some of the rooms to represent different wings and allow you to mental map the facility better.

Frosty responds:

thanks for the good reviews as always!!

[Pumpkin's Sky Tea]

Pretty cute game! Love the presentation and vibes that this game gives off, and as a fan of games like Euro Truck, Elite Dangerous, New Horizons and so on, the trading aspect alongside some SHMUP combat was very compelling and right up my alley! The inclusion of meaningless but amusing aspects like a meow button were very charming, and the goal of the game being to purchase cat pictures was hilarious (and not a bad motivation!)

However, as cute as the cat pictures were and all that, I had to admit that the game quickly became repetitive and just wasn't keeping my attention. The SHMUP gameplay felt very shallow and never seemed to evolve in any interesting way as the game went on, making it end up feeling like annoying filler before long, and the trading was all the same as well. Trading was a bit of a bummer too because while I want to buy cat pictures periodically as I play for a reward, that seems like a dumb idea because it removes my trading power, so its better to just keep trading and buy all the pictures at the end in one fell swoop, which makes it such a slog.

I think what this game really needed was some sense of progression: typically the charm of these trading games is upgrading your ship for bigger cargo loads or faster speed or the ability to utilize new routes, giving it an addicting sense of escalation. In this game, however, your ship remains the same and all routes and goods are open to you immediately, and since all you blow your money on is cat pictures, it feels like a loss and makes everything else feels unchanging as you just run the same loop over and over.

All in all, it's still impressive given its a game jam game, and the cat is very cute, but yeah, just wish it had a bit more meat to its core gameplay loop!

Chris responds:

Thanks! I agree with a lot of what you have said which is why I plan to make another and build on it a bit. The short time frame for the game jam was quite limiting in what I was able to pull off.