Bythemark's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Fethas Vacuity Dragons Survival]

Can't figure out how to start it/play--no instructions. I just get a scrolling background and a sprite of a dragon flies down occasionally. While writing this review, my browser opened a message box saying that the game was over and asked me to restart, which is the most interactivity I found. Please please please, don't ever have a flash game open a message box. Put it in the game window instead.

Perhaps you uploaded an older test version? Lava background is well-done, though.

[100 Seconds Or Less]

I made it to screen six, the one with the staircase full of monsters. The game is overly hard, and at least part of this is due to the controls. If you hit z while running, your character won't stop and shoot. Instead, you have to stop first and then shoot. My first few tries, I couldn't tell I was being damaged--the health indicator doesn't make an eye-catching change. When you hit the top of the enemy, you're frozen until you push them back, and while it doesn't take forever, it does take an awkward, too-long amount of time.

On screen four, there appears to be a higher path you can take, but it doesn't go anywhere. Screen six appears impossible without spending a ton of health, as you cannot jump while shooting. You can jump while running just fine, so I'm not sure if it's a problem with input. I can press a lot of keys before my keyboard ghosts, so if this isn't a gameplay choice there's a problem elsewhere.

The dropdown on screen four, where you can see that the enemy at the bottom of the pit is a shooting enemy before you land, is very well telegraphed, so good on there. Screen three is also pretty well-done, though it would be nice if it was possible to jump under the monster on the second platform. If you can, I couldn't figure it out.

I dig the concept and the flavor of the game--with some gameplay and design tweaks/fixes, I'd gladly give this a higher score. Also, a thumbnail image of any sort would help with first impressions.

The problem is the gameplay and level design, mainly. The art is nice, and meshes well with the sound effects and the music you picked out.

[Jackie]

I really like the core idea and the way the game works. It's not dissimilar to the games I made a long while back, but personally I would remove this and resubmit when it's a bit more complete. I applaud how quickly this was completed, and it's great for that restriction, but unfortunately that doesn't mean that reviewers should rate the game any higher.

You also might have miscategorized the game--This is more of a twist on the scrolling shmup or bullet hell genres. Maybe something in the Action or Skill categories would be more appropriate.

I appreciate the instructions in the author comments, but it's really unclear what the player is supposed to do without them. I had to guess at how to start the game The music is beautiful, but I don't think it fits the presentation and fast pace of the game.

The sound effects are well-done, especially for the time limit--they're all unique enough that I know my shield is down even if I'm looking elsewhere on the screen, for example. Then again, the lo-fi sfx clash with the clear tones of the piano.

Emerysfire responds:

Thank you for your feedback, I'll work on a few things post jam, you're totally right about the controls etc. I'm going to refine my game a bit, your review was really insightful and truthful, I think I need to step back from the code a bit in order to foresee things like those you mentioned.

[Animal Squad!]

I'm guessing this was originally made for Ludum Dare 35?

Anyway, it's cool. The animals all have their uses, and you clearly have some level design chops that make it all work. The cat wall-sticking sprite brought me great joy.

A few things that you might want to update if you want to polish this a little more--the tiny gap in level 4 (I think the idea is to stick to the wall as the cat, turn into the ball, and then go through) is hard to get into, I found myself floating next to it a lot before figuring out I could jump while floating to right myself. Also, sometimes I had to navigate later levels by guesswork, which is fine, but a minimap or a teensy bit more viewing space would be very nice.

yaup responds:

Haha no, the matching theme is complete coincidence.

And hmmm We'll definitely think about how to make level directions more obvious! It is part of our goal to hopefully add in some more exploration towards the later levels, but perhaps those aren't as intuitive as they could be?

Thanks for the feedback!

[Alphaland]

Cool Beans

Personifying a game in its early stages is really a great idea. Even the little coding I can do results in cool little quirks that I have to "kill" because they weren't intended.

The puzzle design and integration was also solid, and getting lost at the beginning was really a great experience.

[Super PSTW Action RPG]

Clever

An excellent parody, I laughed more than a few times and was filled with a sort of shameful nostalgia for FFIV, DMC, Golden Sun I'm not even going to list all the games in which many of the same things happened. Good work finding the most important ones and distilling them so well.

[YouFindYourselfInARoom]

Awesome

It wasn't really hard, but solving it made me feel clever :P.