FutureCopLGF's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[The Faces of the Forest]

Pretty awesome game! Really sweet and interesting story that both endears you to the characters in the world and gets you pumped to smash the system! Thought the game did a nice job at portraying the peaceful nature of the story in its gameplay mechanics, by, for example, only being able to stun bugs instead of killing them. Loved the whole mask system and the way you can slow down time to draw the sigils and the way it changes the music: felt so cool to get better and better at drawing them quickly and gave me a real Trauma Center/Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow vibe. Some parts of it were a little bit of a nuisance: if you jump on a bug and a bug is right next to them, you'll get hit by that bug despite the fact that you shouldn't have ever been in danger, the world is huge and locations can get a little samey without any significant landmarks to guide you, and I also felt like sometimes the game just went overboard a bit as I couldn't take two steps without being forced into drawing another sigil, haha, maybe a few more normal platforming parts could be needed.

DavidMarchand responds:

Thanks! Fair points all around. I saw you play this the other day! https://youtu.be/NNLQIwDowlg?t=17710 The whole team was really happy to see that. I'll eventually get around to fixing the typos you pointed out and maybe adding a blinking effect for when enemies are about to recover, since all of those are pretty easy changes.

[Curly's Chase]

Hmm, between two minds on this game! On one hand, it's a very cute game, and it is kinda fun and challenging to puzzle out the ideal route since you need to compensate for your turns in advance. But on the other hand, the controls were quite difficult any annoying to get used to at times: there were a lot of turns where I was just stuck and I wasn't sure if it was the games fault or if I was just confused on what the heck to do. While most of the time the turns were smooth and nice, other times the turns just felt clunky, and also the teleport was unreliable on how far it'd send you back, and sometimes it'd spawn me inside a cloud block for some reason! Feels like the teleport was maybe just a cheat, an easy way out of not fully designing the movement properly: for example, the turning might've benefited from other aspects being redone to compensate, like zooming out the camera to give you more room to compensate, or being able to shift half-way to do an s-curve and such. Basically, a mixed bag, but a very interesting experiment!

aeveis responds:

Thanks for the feedback, some good observations there!

[Disc Us]

Pretty ambitious and impressive to get all of this setup! Unfortunately it was just a confusing experience for me, both because there was barely any way to learn what the heck to do in the game and because the online experience seemed pretty glitchy (countdown timers getting stuck in an infinite loop that goes into the negatives, people not voting and not knowing what to do and pressing buttons and such randomly, the game keeps putting me into chat mode when I'm trying to move around, etc). But I suppose I'm not the intended audience as I've never played either Disc Room or Among Us, so I was totally lost as the game didn't provide much instruction since it assumed you already knew how the game worked. Still, I think I started to understand how everything works after awhile (maybe) and did have some fun and I think it does have a lot of potential: just maybe needs to slow down a bit!

keybol responds:

Yeah I have presumed players have idea on how to play Among Us and other social deduction games. The instructions aren't clear also for both teams, which items go where and how traitors will actually win. Though with games like these, I feel part of the game is to try the game many times to actually understand it (the same is said by Secret Hitler designer in his GDC talk).

[GUNWYRM]

This was a bit of an odd duck for me! On one hand, I think it looks great and is a really interesting concept! Presentation is great with the wibbly-wobbly letters, the menus, the transitions, the pop-ups and the HUD and so on all looking great! Gameplay is pretty solid as well: it took me a bit too get used to it and to use the dash more often, but once I did, I was making good progress and it was neat to get a gunwyrm going with all sorts of guns and abilities. But on the other hand, I don't feel like I had as much fun as I should? There were a lot of confusing aspects of the game: there aren't any cool effects when you dash like glowing or turning blue or blurry to let you know you're invincible; while there is a 'ding' that lets you know when your dash is ready there's no bar that fills up to let you know dash is on cool down in the first place (nor is there an error sound if you try to dash without it being ready yet) leading me to thinking my dash was malfunctioning; and there was a lack of feedback in general. It just didn't feel satisfying for some reason: enemies die without much fanfare and the guns fire so slow and nothing sounds powerful and the levels and enemies get really samey quickly. I mean, when I die, I get a big, crunchy explosion, but when enemies die, it's practically nothing. I think some juice and variation to make the gameplay not only more satisfying, but more intuitive by giving more information, would help. But still, rather solid for what it is!

THXsprites responds:

Hey! Thanks for the feedback, I totally agree with what you have to say about the game lacking "juice", I would love if there was more user feedback and things felt better to do. Sadly, due to the constraints of the jam we didn't have time to polish the game as much as we would like, thus there isn't a ton of wave varieties nor did we get around to adding things like a bar for the dash as we just didn't have time to think about it.

Thanks for playing! :)

[Deadswitch 3]

Pretty impressive game! Entire thing has a really professional design to it, both in terms of menus and gameplay. Game just has so many little touches to it that make it feel great, like the countdown timer for a match starting and so on. I wasn't able to play the multiplayer unfortunately since it wasn't working possibly from lack of players, but kudos for attempting anyway: thanks brains and guts to make a whole multiplayer component. The single player content was great anyway: enjoyed the survival and operations modes, though I wish maybe they were more apparent in the main menu instead of being shoved into ranked. A few confusing aspects for the gameplay: one, was a bit of a bummer I couldn't switch weapons with mousewheel, two, headshots didn't seem to do any bonus damage despite giving bonus cash, three, it's a bit too easy to get shot from off-screen causing frustration. All in all, a really ambitious shooter that delivers on it!

WilkinGames responds:

Thanks so much! Multiplayer should be getting more players as I release the game on other sites/platforms. New operations will be coming in future updates as well! I recommend you play in fullscreen to avoid getting shot off screen. :-)

[Luminous Edge]

Wow, this game really blew me away! It was a little confusing initially, maybe intentionally, with the whole reset spawning a clone of you (maybe it shouldn't say reset, but clone? or maybe it should say both, like 'hit R to reset and clone'?), but once I got past that everything was awesome! I loved the smooth and fluid way the game played, and the animations and special effects for all the moves were so great and satisfying! Loved the escalation of challenges as well with the introduction of new powers and levels that combine several mechanics. All it needed was for you to have to dock the sword in the stand at the end for it to be epic, but I'll let that go, haha. This game had it all: awesome puzzles, great boss fights, heck yea! Absolutely want to see the continuation of this!

Yword responds:

Thank you so much for playing! I'm very glad you liked this game. Thanks!!!

[Little Maddie Dear]

I found this pretty dang impressive! I'm not one for these RPG Maker games typically, but this one seemed so custom-built that you could barely tell it was built from it initially, so kudos on that! Really cool and intriguing presentation and theme: I got really hooked into it and wanted to see where it went! Love the weird little dialogues with the characters as well that had a real Darkwood feeling to them. Some aspects of the game were a little confusing, like how despite every other item, like the drawing, having a descriptive label, the candies don't. Would help also to be able to see/know what items were interactable or not: some items like the meal were shining, but I was surprised to see I could interact with the inconvenient tree and pushing boxes. Also, I felt like the inclusion of some meme stuff, like the yaranaika pumpkin, for me, wasn't good since it took me out of the spooky experience: I can understand wanting to get some jokes in to lighten the mood or what-have-you, but I thought you did a good job building up the horror so it kinda shot itself in the foot with that. Also, I wasn't sure if keeping the lantern on was a good or bad thing? You can turn it on or off, but I wasn't sure if there was a reason, like if it helps not let enemies detect you or something.

Marckel responds:

Hi Futurecop! Thanks for the review! I'm so glad the Darkwood inspiration shows through, I really love that game. Sorry for the memes all over the place, that was partially stress relief due to all the rushing we had to do to finish the game in a month. The lantern is incredibly vital in stages 4 and 5! The mechanics for the two new monsters in those areas are heavily reliant on it.

[Phase Shift: Lab Escape]

Hmm, it's an interesting take on the classic infinite runner, but I don't know if it went in the best direction. Most infinite runners have the player run automatically: this turns the game into an exciting test of reactions and quick planning as you try to keep your eyes ahead and pick the best path and have your fingers ready to deal with any obstacles that come. This runner, however, doesn't run at all: the player can move back and forward at their own pace. I suppose it's a unique and different take on the system, but it just doesn't feel as satisfying because of it. I know the game does have the bot chasing you, so technically you do need to keep running, but it just didn't feel the same (especially since the robot cannot be outrun if you do not get upgrades, making it seem like you're not in control of your own success since you can't beat it with your own skills). Also in general the levels seemed very depopulated with not enough obstacles, and the color switching mechanics just felt very odd with there not being an intuitive way to memorize which button does which color.

Pastruvium responds:

The running system was based off of Dino Run and was implemented in response to my designs for future obstacles (particularly later ones). However, I do get your point about it feeling a bit slow, and I probably could have/should have designed the obstacles to function a bit better while moving quickly. I think the movement system works particularly well during the boss battle and later in the game when things get a bit more hectic, but I can see that the feel and especially the early stages feel off. On that note about the speed upgrade, it's a good point and something that Dino Run specifically did well. Maybe if I were to re-do the game, I would remove the speed upgrade and put something in the game to increase the player's acceleration/speed, or even add acceleration and add an upgrade that decreases the time it takes to get to max speed.

On the depopulation of obstacles and such, the early stages are meant to ease the player into the admittedly complicated control scheme, and the game becomes much more dense as the player progresses.

On the note about early game, a lot of decisions were made for late game (hard obstacles), the boss, and endless mode (unlocked after completing story mode). I think they work a bit better in those cases, however as a result, the early game feels neglected and off-putting. I should have gone back and touched up the early game after getting the flow of late game down (at least I think I did!).

On the control scheme itself, I implemented the keys in a way for ease of use and speed in switching. I often think about them as most used to least used from left to right, or forward, up, and down. This was originally set as, from left to right, yellow (air), orange (solid), blue (liquid) for up, forward, down. This was changed as I felt that orange (solid) state would be used most frequently. In addition, through your video, I could see that my tutorial was maybe a bit too sparse, though I like tutorials to let the player figure things out by themselves more and mostly explain controls. In the future, I might include more text or optional explanations to help things along. Also on this note, it seems I failed in explaining the plasma dashes (w, s, and shift) properly. They, especially when upgraded, help the player moved from platform to platform, and to outrun the chaser bot when it gets too close, especially on endless. This is tied to the meter on the left side of the screen and is refilled when defeating enemies that can damage you. Money (Genetic Material) is gained through defeating the running enemies (scientists).

Thanks for your detailed feedback, and I really appreciate the video you put out! It really helped me see how someone else directly interacts with the game and tutorial without me around to explain things when they become a problem. It also really helps to see when mechanics and gameplay becomes frustrating or boring the moment it happens. I particularly liked the moment you figured out how the colored floors (gas and water funnels respectively) worked, though I definitely could have done a better job of explaining everything in the tutorial.

[Sludge and Sorcery]

Pretty goofy game that has a great start, but kinda loses steam as it goes on (though I do still want to go back and beat this eventually!) I really love the quirkiness of the game's story: very charming to pull the rug out from under the player and do a whole character switch, which was great because I really love the slime team. I figured that, because of that, the game wasn't actually an rpg but just playing around with rpg themes and it would be just a nice adventure game. I wish that were the case, but no, unfortunately it does actually remain an rpg and that was my biggest problem with the game: the combat was just so weak for me since it just drags on and on. The dialogue was already becoming an issue because I couldn't advance text with a button press like how most games handle text (not saying I wanted to skip it, I love the dialogue, I just read fast) but the combat is so slow with its slow transitions and slow dice rolls and way too much health for all the enemies and due to the randomness the fights can just drag on. Honestly, I wish the combat was just taken out of the game altogether so the game can focus on the best part: the funny story and quests. Or, at the very least, I wish the combat was replaced with something quicker and more funny to fit the overall unserious themes.

migmoog responds:

Thanks for playing our game and providing feedback! Just a disclaimer I didn't weigh in on the design of the game much, that was Polyducks' field, I was just an artist and the only one of our team with an NG account. The whole point of the game's main characters becoming the slimes was for mainly writing purposes, and it says this game is an RPG in both the genre and description, so we didn't intend on changing that. The speed of the dialogue was a limitation of the engine we were using (GBstudio). However, I do believe that the heavy RNG in the battle system is a bit of a bore, especially in a game like this with so many fights. We're very glad that you took the time to play our game!

['Llama vs. Llamas']

Pretty cute and charming game! Love the concept and I love the charming graphics and animations for all the characters. Game is nice and sweet and simple for the most part and doesn't overstay its welcome. I definitely had a lot of fun with this but its not without its problems as it does have a overall feeling of jankiness, particularly with the hitboxes. Most likely due to the 2.5D perspective, there were tons of times where I swear I shot water at fire but it just whizzes right over it without hitting it, or it ends up hitting another fire I wasn't aiming at. Maybe the hitboxes need to be more generous or something about the graphics needs to change to serve to pointing you towards where the ideal point to aim is at. The aiming/firing is odd too: most games have the crosshair serve as a general direction for the projectile to go, but the projectile continues past the point of aiming, whereas this game has the projectile stop and explode at the point you clicked at. This isn't necessarily bad, but I think if you want the aiming to work like this, the crosshair should be not a flat circle, but tilted as if it was painted on the ground, indicating that it will hit the ground at that point, making it more intuitive. I think I still had an overall good time, but definitely a little clunky in its implementation: luckily it kinda adds to the whole goofy charm, haha!

Butzbo responds:

Glad you liked it!

Yeah the hitboxes ended up being more troublesome than anticipated, in terms of perspective, and also at the time it was hard to find the proper size for them, big enough so that fire would get hit by the water, but not so big so that the llama would get hit if it passed behind it (probably having hitboxes for different purposes would have been a better choice). Also, I didn't put much thought about that crosshair detail, considering the 2.5d perspective I liked making it so that the bullet went right where you aimed, but I get how it can be confusing as its pretty unconventional, having it tilted to match the floor is a pretty good idea!

Thanks for the review! These detailed comments are great to get me thinking more in depth about design and mechanics.