Psychofig's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Manhattan Project]

Decent!

I played this around twice and couldn't beat it in 25 days, but it was pretty fun. The graphics are neat in how everything is a cardboard/paper cutout, and the humor is cool as well. There are minor flaws though that affect gameplay, and I'm taking 3 points off for these as they easily could have been fixed.

1. Lag.

This is actually really simple and easy to fix. Since the game has quite a few things offscreen, I suggest putting code on things that are no longer in view to stop animating completely. I have done this several times as a quick fix for my platformer and it works as a charm.

Assuming you are using AS2... you could probably adapt it for AS3 if need be:

if(this.hitTest(_root.vcam)){
this.play();
} else {
this.stop();
}

I don't know if your game works like that, but it would work in some sort of variation. Another thing you could do is cut animation down a notch, maybe skip on a filter or two, etc.

2. Replay value.

Many of these games go for a long time, but this game in particular has very little replay value besides medals. There were not enough upgrades in general and the locale was the same the entire time. You could turn it into Infectionater more, where you could travel the world and do this, maybe, let's say, 80 days? Yeah. I do however appreciate the work that is in it already, and I must say, this is a very solid game in general.

3. Reactions.

Sometimes it felt (yes, I know, ironic) as if nothing was really taking place in the game. I would shoot objects and there wouldn't be a sense of reaction from them. Blood or jolting from people when you shot them would have been nice, and maybe cars could have done flips in the air when they exploded, and debris could explode into pieces everywhere, causing even more chaos.

Just some ideas for a sequel.... which I desperately want to play.

But overall, this is a pretty decent game and I hope maybe some day we can collaborate!

[Quick Sand]

Good concept, needs tuning.

I found this game very fun, but a few things did hold me back from calling it great. Although I was able to pass it, I found the controls to be extremely slipperly. I could gently tap the keys on my keyboard and I would shoot across the entire stage.

The other main problem, which isn't noticable, except to the trained eye, is that the quicksand actually helps you. There is one level where it looks as if you have to wall jump from wall to wall to reach the top, but actually, all you have to do is let the quick sand bring you to the top.

This isn't big, and seeing how you probably had no beta testers to test it out, that's okay. But yeah, fix the slippery controls, maybe make a few more levels and a scoreboard for the fastest times, and this could be a real hit. (but I suspect you will get publicity from it winning a daily award... today!)

[Flyerman Demo]

Has potential.

The presentation was really sleek, but unfortunately, you didn't show many mechanics at all. The controls and animation were great but there was no objective or anything explaining what we should expect in the full game. It looks good so far otherwise, so props.

Hope something wonderful comes out of this in the future!

[Chaos Faction 2]

Really good!

I'll hit on the Campaign first. It isn't really a campaign this time around, dialogue is zero, which I guess is good for a pure action game, but then you added having a partner, which completely takes away the need to fight anybody. The entire first zone was beatable with me only jumping around, I didn't have to fight a single person.

It got progressively harder, the main problem with the campaign is that there is no incentive besides medals to progress. Sure, medals are nice, but this game would do awesome with some sort of character progression.

I think my main problem is that not much was improved from the first Chaos Faction. While I liked it, the game felt really unresponsive at times. Sound effects are lacking in certain areas when they should be there and any fighting without weapons just feels plain weak. It doesn't feel like I've hit anything in particular when I smash a guy. Some enemies ignore your punches all together.

Also, some of the harder stages rely on plain luck. Some may be impossible depending on what weapons fall, but sometimes you can beat the stage in seconds, let's say, if you get an extremely overcharged weapon.

What I did like however, was the graphical improvements. Although the game kind of loses it's indie feel now, it looks really professional and the characters are pretty funky and awesome. The game is really action packed and a ton of work has obviously gone into this to make it as professional as it can be.

I remember playing the original Chaos Faction for around 10 hours because of it's glory, although I can't really see myself playing this version as it seems a bit uninspired. It's great, but it's missing a certain hook to it that the original version had. But anyway, great game, and I'm looking forward to seeing more from Dissolute in the future!

(also, your logo on the original is waaaaay cooler.)

[Enough Plumbers]

Very original, execution is very good.

It's rare that you see an original concept that works REALLY well. To the point where users can play this as if they're champions without playing a game like it before.

The concept is cool albeit a bit overwhelming at first. A few too many concepts were introduced at once and at times it can be hard to tell what you are supposed to do. There is a bit of trial and error, but it's fun.

The artwork is great, music is funny, and it all flows really nice. This is a perfect little game to play at work or if you just want to pop off a few minutes of spare time. You can jump right in, which makes it nice. The medals are very challenging, but pretty rewarding so I can understand them. I would suggest making them more frequent to keep the player even more attached to the game, give one like every 5 levels or so, maybe make a few timers for higher scores, etc.

The difficulty curve is what brings out this game. While it's a bit overwhelming at first, once you understand the game, there wasn't a single point where I felt the game backtracked to an easier difficulty. On top of that, the game never came to the point where a tiny tap could decide life or death. Taking these into account, this is one hell of a polished game compared to quite a few other games on this site.

I fully support this game and I wish you luck on the next project you pursue! Perhaps we can collaborate in the future! =D

[Canthos DEMO]

Really cool!

Artwork was dazzling, I'll get that out of the way first. Animations were tweened, so they look not as organic as they could be, but the rest was fascinating. I congratulate you for creating a dynamic and fun world. It takes lots of skill and talent to make something engaging for the player.

Music was great as well, I don't know why the scores are so low though, many of those tracks are wonderful, done by the amazing Cazok... I even used the Canthos theme for my own game, hope it doesn't inflict anything on this, but it sounded so cool.

Gameplay is where there are a few issues. I won't rate you on it too much because it is obviously still in demo form, glitches are expected. Here are the glitches I encountered.

-Grappling is extremely glitchy, sometimes I was thrown around an entire object and other times I instantly died or was able to climb into infinite space.
-Combat is a bit dull with the main characters, you should add combo moves.
-When you roll under something and try jumping it messes up. I actually have a solution for this, for as I have the same kind of mechanic in my game and I used a method to fix it.

Go to your character code. Make a variable around the jumping actions,

if(jumping){
//your code
}

Then, go to a part where you have to roll. Make an invisible movieclip box on that area and make hittests that disable the jumping variable when your player is touching them, but make an

}else{
jumping=true;
}

command so that jumping is enabled once you out of the whole.

Anyway, onto the rest of the glitches.

-Menu should be mapped to P and arrow key navigation is recommended.
-If there was a ceiling that was walkable and i was underneath it, if I jumped, I hit it and then boosted up, looks a bit jaggy.
-Grappling to walking lines should be automatic instead of pressing CTRL, or at least have a command pop up over the characters head that says CTRL so it is more obvious.

Most of the glitches are found in the grappling move, though. Unless it's too late, I suggest scrapping it or taking away it's functionality of gripping to walls because it will be really hard to make it glitch free. Critics notice tiny little errors like this and go mad.

Otherwise, really cool project and I am behind it 100%!

Xiphon responds:

thanks for the review, I'm actually trying to find more beta testers that know something about code.
Once, some time ago, I was trying to find someone to just code it for me cause I didn't know what I was doing, unfortunately it didn't turn out many promising results, so I undertook the task myself.

The crouching thing, yeah, that's a bug that's there and I've had a plan to fix it and just always forget to when I open up the file.
The grapple is probably the biggest rediculous thing I've been trying to make work, And i dunno if i should bother with it.
Originally, you were supposed to be able to aim it in any direction, but I wasn't sure how to do that (at the time). I want to keep it in the game, I just need to find a way to make it work without throwing the character all over the place. And things get even worse when you try grappling to enemies off of walls and stuff like that...

[Super Mario Crossover]

Decent.

The concept here is pretty cool. Playing as different 8bit characters is really fun, but this game has a few flaws preventing it from being too great.

First of all, I applaud you on re-creating all the original Mario levels. That in itself takes a long, long time, I would know, I've been working on a game since February 2009 and I expect to release it soon, level design is a long, hard process. You should check out my game when it comes out too :P.

The problem is with the controls. It feels a bit sticky, there is a bit of delay. That I can understand, not your fault, actionscript. But at times there are things that could have been fixed. Sometimes the jump just won't respond when I press it, which is annoying.

Also, characters like Samus just feel horrible in the levels. I understand you want to keep the original mechanics of each game intact, but there is a limit when a character is harder to play and takes longer to complete a level with. There is no need for that, some things can be substituted.

The graphics are all very nice, I take it you made some sprites for characters as I have yet to see them in the actual games. As much as this is a homage to classic games, standards are a bit different now and some things are desired. For instance, it would have been nice to offer some sort of story to compel the player. Yes, Mario has no story, but maybe the story can change for different characters like Samus and Link.

My main problem is that you could have gone a bit beyond the normal and expanded on your original idea. I respect the time and effort you put into this though, it is a pretty fun game and it has received some pretty rave reviews so far. I just think it could have been more and that some opportunities were missed here.

explodingRabbit responds:

My vision goes beyond this but what one person can do in a limited amount of time is limited. I've never experienced the control delay so I don't know what's causing it. Are you playing with a gamepad? That helps a lot. I appreciate you taking the time to write some your comments. I hope you enjoy the game for what it is.

[Flaming zombooka]

Very good, addicting!

I love this game. It's very rare for me to play through an entire game like this, but the great physics made this really addicting. The graphics were good, they could have been better, but as long as the game runs at a silky 40-50fps, I'm okay with whatever they look like.

Consider everything I don't mention to be perfect the way it is.

-Difficulty curve. It was good, but sometimes there would be an odd level just to show off some sort of trick, like having a ball crush zombies. The difficulty curve would sway to hard, and then dip down to extremely easy to show off a little something neat.

-Purpose. I think what this game really could have used are scoreboards. There isn't really any point in trying to get a high score when you can't post it and show it off to anybody.

-Minor Presentation Issues. These aren't big, but sometimes when I ran out of rockets, the game would just sit there, I couldn't press replay or menu and I had to wait 10-20 seconds until the game showed blood and I could restart. Also, when you finish the game, it just loops to the end. I would have at least liked a "Congratulations" screen. Players don't like finishing 50 levels without a reward.

Other than those things, this game is great. It's nice to see little games like these on the front page that have very little flaws and are just enjoyable for a quick coffee or lunch break.

[Hippolyta]

Good game with poor presentation.

The game itself looks magnificent, the voice is great, but you have problems with gameplay, which essentially ruins a game if it isn't pulled off right.

There is no tutorial for the first level, and it is extremely hard to see incoming objects. I got hit by tree branches I thought were part of the background. This could have been easily fixed by turning up the brightness or making them stand out more. I died 10 times and had no clue what to do.

Now, I could have rambled about the controls, but you were kind enough to add custom controls. The default scheme could have been better, but again, I can't complain about that.

The game is also not so responsive, relying on visual flare more than content and precise controls. As an avid fan of your game, this was a bit of a let down. I really enjoyed your artwork though, and if you took this game down to fix some of the mentioned flaws, I'd come back with a 10, for what this should deserve.

[Theia]

Very nice artwork, very poor gameplay.

I'll say the positives first: this game looks amazing. The animations are really slick, the art direction is fantastic, and the presentation is great.

Now, about the gameplay, which has severe flaws. You seem to have chosen a layering technique which is cool, but very buggy. Since the rocks are flat, knowing when you are in between them is almost impossible since they flatten the view of you. Also, when I was in between two, I had to shuffle for about a minute to actually be able to walk out.

The enemies look cool, but attack way to far. I spent so much trial and error on this game that it wasn't even funny. Another problem is your difficulty curve, which is wack. First level shows you how to move around, 2nd shows you how to dig, and then the third one is extremely difficult for a person who has just learned how to play your game.

Some of the angles you have chosen to display your art at are terrible. The game's dimensions are also pretty big, I had to scroll up and down to see my player, and zooming out with my browser made all text on the page unviewable. The gameplay feels sluggish in movement and a bit wonky.

Sorry.