Plasmarift's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[DARK SWORD: The Light of Ainn]

Well, here’s some feedback and possible bugs/things that could be fixed:
- When you grab the two collectibles from the beginning of the game, the shadows underneath them remain.
- Why does the game sometimes take you to the upgrade area whenever you collect stuff? Just leave the player where they are. The only except would be the dungeon.
- I managed to glitch past a section of the wall with no way to get back (it was to the right of the necromancer area where the book was, away from the enemies).
- You added more collectibles yet you don’t actually tell the player what they do (the descriptions in the menu don’t always help), and a giant picture of them will appear on screen, blocking the screen. Why not just have some text in the corner tell you “you picked up…” with a small picture maybe?
- Why can’t I skip the opening cutscene?
- What happened to the sword bosses music? There was a horrible bass-y overlay. I had to turn off the sound completely because just lowering it wasn’t enough.
- You have regular enemies scattered throughout the game. Why? They aren’t a real danger and killing them does nothing. I can dash passed them. Having them appear in boss fights is interesting though.
- Why did you have to add bonfires for saving? Why not save before fighting the boss? You can still have bonfires if you want, just make it so the game saves at a boss room and you appear outside a boss room if you lose.
- Once the boss is defeated, make it so all the enemies they summoned die as well. Otherwise, the player might just be killed.
- Why does the red flash indicting you’ve been hit appear during the tutorial of the game?
- On the left side entrance (the area that’s covered in blood), just as it switches to a regular floor, it still makes the squishing noises/
- Should the music that plays when you’re near the girl continue to play while in the common area? Because it continued to play.
- Maybe make it so common enemies will stop pursuing you when entering miniboss rooms.
- Upon switching to the hammer, you need to press the right mouse button before it will appear and work (I switch to the hammer and the claws were showing until I did this. Before equipping the hammer, I had the sword equipped, but, in the past, I had equipped the claws)
- A piece of the castle wall isn’t appearing properly on the right side of the map (to the left of the pile of rumble you can hit)
- Maybe make it so if you stop using the healing spell, the sound for it cuts off.
- No choice to change difficulty (that’ll come into play down below)
- Why does the timer have a “:” on the end?
- I thought the whole thing with the “heart of the corrupted core” was to take out it’s minions, but while you’re doing that, it gets stronger or if you take too long, it will wake up. Now it wakes up as soon as you attack it so you can just go after the minions first. You could have had it where it slowly gains a second health bar or something. Speaking on this matter, my “partner” woke up the heart when I didn’t want it to; not sure much can be done about that though.
- After beating the “heart of the corrupted core”, it showed the statue, but it didn’t break; it screen just stayed on it (the game wasn’t froze because I used the “2” spell).

I’m sorry, but every time you’ve updated the game, something always seems to be broken or just off in general and it’s usually pretty obvious. It’s important that you play your own game extensively before release to catch this stuff, otherwise it just makes you look bad and upsets the players. Either that, or get way more beta testers.

Personally, I think you’re making this too complicated in a way. The first version of the game was simple; you just fight bosses. It was great! Further updates added more bosses, which was good, and changes to combat (I was a bit non-plussed about that, but it made things interesting), then you started adding exploration, upgrades, a bunch of lore (a bit of lore wouldn’t be bad, but the lore you included comes off as meaningless as it just feels like generic confusing fantasy writing. The gameplay isn't influenced by it; knowing it doesn't change anything, reveal any secrets, change our interaction with the surrounds, etc. Less is more when it comes to writing. You want just enough to get the player to fantasize about the meaning. As it stands, it just doesn’t feel interesting because, me personally, I just want to get to the fights). It feels like you went from emulating Shadow of the Colossus to Dark Souls and now you’re stuck in-between them and you’re burying your game underneath stuff that doesn’t need to be there (weapons that most people won’t use, lore people won’t read, small enemies that are just distractions when not fighting bosses, extra graphics that might look nice, but add nothing to the game, etc.).

The upgrade system is killing the difficulty. I upgraded the standard gun to max and I started tearing through the bosses easily, sometimes in less than a minute (granted, I’ve fought some of them in previous versions so I knew generally what to expect, but it has been awhile). Then I upgraded the sword completely, I killed the boss in the upper right corner on the first try and that one was always difficult, even when I knew what I was doing. Another thing, when I came across an actual tough boss, like the witch queen, I thought “I’ll come back later after I’ve upgraded more”. It discourages players from taking on challenges. Another personal thing, some of bosses are far too easy since you included the healing function because, if you’re patient enough, you can just hit and run away from them until they die (my biggest concerns were stray bullets that I didn’t see coming). Maybe the enemies could do with being more aggressive, or a smaller area. Now, I get this is just my experience; others might be saying “it’s too hard” and the truth is you’re never going to please both crowds. The question is which crowd do you want to please? Keep in mind, a person who finds the game hard can become better at the game if they play it longer while, if the game’s too easy, skilled players will find it boring and will stop playing and won’t talk about it. It'll be a glorified art gallery.

I think it’s also important that you keep in mind the perspective. You can have so much happening on screen that attacks and special effects overlap (even the enemy can block sight of the attacks) and players can miss this, end up getting hit, and wonder “why did that happen?” because we’re looking down on the action, we’re not actually close up to it. I'd say keep this in mind when including special effects.

While the graphics are good, they can blend together at times due to the limited color palette. My beef the graphics is that I can't interact with the environment much at all; you put all this work into it (and I'm astounded by the effort and detail) and it's just a backdrop; it’s like having a tray of desserts in front of you and told not to eat them. And the environment only influences gameplay minimally. You can hide behind objects and some objects can be destroyed, but there's no environmental dangers, no way for you or the enemies to use the environment their advantage, like shooting through fire to light your bullets on fire. Or cold weather slowing you down. It just doesn't feel like a living breathing world.

I’m being negative, but you have done good in the game and in the previous version (otherwise. I wouldn't have spent so long writing this review). The way you hid the key (new hiding spot) was clever, some of the bosses really do present a challenge, and, I enjoy the combat. The music is great and the graphics are good.

I'm sorry to say I've beaten about six main bosses and I’m just bored now (I stopped after the game got stuck on the heart statue not breaking. You put so much area in-between the bosses that it can feel like a slog sometimes. This kind of thing worked for Shadow of the Colossus because it built anticipation and there was generally nice scenery and you could look for small upgrades. Your game, despite having well put together scenery is pixelated and the upgrades are large and require that you return to the main hub to upgrade (same with changing the weapon). Please take my review with a grain of salt as I’m just one voice here.

[Rabbit Hole 1.03]

There's a lot I enjoy about the game, but I feel like it has issues that are holding it back:
- Why can't you pause the game when you're in a fight? Sometimes, I want to restart right away and this means I either need to beat the enemies in the room or just let them kill me, both of which waste time.
- There's no option to replay the tutorial, no way to replay the opening cutscene, and no way to skip the opening cutscene.
- You can't cycle through NPC text fast. It makes you wait before initiating another dialogue box.
- A lot of things in the game go unexplained with only vague descriptions (if any) and must be learned, like $(gun); I thought this meant I could pay money for a gun. It actually meant they'd take my gun for money. While this can be fun to some extent, it should be cleared up soon in the game. I ended up buying something at a shop that had no directions and it ended up being a book or a tank of gas (the latter of which has no immediate use and the former of which I was unimpressed by).
- The control layout for the melee attack is awkward. While I know you said that you couldn't map it to the mouse easily due to limitations of the program you used to develop the game (and that the right mouse button would be used for something else), it really is something that is killing the experience a bit for me because the melee attack is actually pretty important, with it doing so much damage and having the ability to knock enemies back and in some cases cancel out their attacks. I would literally need to undo years of conditioning from other games and change the way I position my hand on the keyboard to make it work. The melee attack is already difficult to utilize effectively because it locks you into it when you use it and touching enemies hurts you, which means you need to position yourself just right, so it doesn't couple well when I imagine most people like me having to take their finger away from a movement key to use it. For now, I've reassigned the button to the crouch button since I never use it so maybe that will help.
- I appreciate a game that is difficult and rewards you for accomplishments (though the game doesn't do a lot of the latter). I really did like the game giving me a bonus for beating the first boss without taking damage. Still, I can't imagine beating the second boss without a number of powerups and the golden revolver. Maybe if I had more practice with them, it would be doable (for instance I just realized I could keep pushing the melee guy back by repeated, well-timed melee attacks), but that would involve making it to them multiple times, meaning I need to fight through the first and second floors just to reach them. In a game where no upgrades are permanent and there's no health given for the next level, both skill and pattern memorization is a must. It kind of feels like the gameplay time is being artificially stretched out due to this. Sometimes, it feels like I should just restart the game if I take too much damage because if your health is too low or you still haven't gotten enough upgrades or good weapons, it seems like you'll just end up dying later anyway.
- I honestly feel like about half the shops are useless, specifically the slot machine (why does it take health instead of money?), mafia person, and person who takes health for health. Saying there's more risk than reward would be an understatement. They can negatively affect the rest of your run if it doesn't pay off and depending on whether or not you can make up for what you lost.
- What purpose does the crouch mechanic serve?
- What's the point of having some guns that launch you upward?
- When I turned off sound and music, some sounds still play, like when moving over dialogue boxes (mafia person) and when the meters number decreases when entering an area.

Still, the game has many great qualities:
- You do describe the game as "tough-as-nails" so you did give fair warning. And the game is very addictive.
- The graphics are charming and music is actiony and fun.
- Most of the NPC are well designed, but are kinda boring to me since their personalities don't really shine through, except for jacket giving girl. I was actually curious what would happen between the main character and her.
- It took me a while to realize you could actually go back to previous rooms, allowing you to revisit shops. You even made it so health drops don't disappear so you can go back and get them later if you wanted to.
- The enemies and NPCs are well designed and each have their own attack patterns (Mind you, I've only reached the 3rd floor once).
- I really feel like some interesting stuff will be coming up in the game, both storywise and fight wise, though I don't know if I'm skilled enough to reach it.
- Combat feels rather smooth.
- I like that you put in a mechanic that brings all the coins to you after beating all the enemies in the room. It saves time and prevents you from missing them.

Let me be clear; I'm not asking you to nerf the game. I hate it when developers do this because some people say it's too difficult. I just wanted to offer my opinion on the matter. I also want to make it clear that despite my criticisms, I'm intrigued by the game. I used to comment a lot on games years ago and now I only typically comment on games that I find both impressive and that have issues because I want to see both the game and developers truly shine.

I wish you luck in your future endeavors.

[MÆRE]

It's definitely scary in a number of different ways, brilliantly utilizing both visuals, sound, and a bit of storytelling. The artwork is good and the game mechanics are well implemented and designed. It is short, but I'd prefer a short good experience rather than a long average one.

SPOILERS AHEAD
My issue is that the game is not just easy; it appears impossible to lose (I know because I've tried). The closest you can come to losing is on the last level and, even then, you have to make a conscious effort to stare at the ghosts as well as closing your eyes to keep the fear meter from draining when ghosts aren't around. Plus, on each level, scary stuff will just stop happening after about a minute or so. I'm guessing it was developed as a no lose scenario so people wouldn't replay the game and see the same scares in the same place (I'm guessing it was also designed to be easy so that a player trying to complete the level would complete it at around the time that scary events stopped happening). If you ever decide to expand on this, a few suggestions:
- Have the fear meter go up when the player character is uncertain of what's going on in the room, with it rising in response to how uncertain you are.
- Utilize a bit more sound effects. Sound effects can be reused more than artwork without it seeming forced or out of place, especially in a horror game.
- In the last level, you have a laughing face appear when the player closes their eyes. While this is good (and could increase the fear meter as well), I'd also suggest strange visual effects at times when the eyes are closed, such as seeing veins, a dim light, a few shapes well placed to look like a face. Basically things to always keep it interesting and keep the player on their toes, thinking "it's safer when I close my eyes, but maybe it's not always completely safe...". I'd also like to note I like the fact that you have an almost static effect when the eyes are closed and I like it.
- Perhaps have more visuals in the room move from one place to another when the eyes are closed, like a picture frame moved on a wall or the tv is on the floor now. When this happens, the fear meter can go up and the player has to be aware of what's going on.
- You can also add "check under the covers" with the down button, maybe add an indicator of sensation of something touching the player character.

Well done and I wish you luck in your future projects.

[Madness: Fueled By Hotdogs]

The game was short yet I enjoyed the first person action. However, I feel like there are a few problems and missed opportunities:
- On the last and second to last (mostly the last) level, sometimes enemies that come out of the doors start spinning in circles and basically don't really attack.
- The idea of running around and scarfing down hotdogs while fighting off enemies is appealing. However, it doesn't really work out that way because in order to pick up a hotdog, you need to drop one of your weapons (if you're holding two) and, when you're in a rush, you can end up picking back up the weapon you dropped or an enemy could end up picking up your weapon in the mean time. It probably would have been better if you couldn't store them and could simply pick up a hotdog and eat it while still holding your weapon (with a few seconds of vulnerability between eating it and getting the effect to build tension). That way, when the effect runs out or your health is low, you could swing by the hotdog stand for another.
- Trying to pick up weapons in this game is a pain for a multitude of reasons. You need to be looking at it in order to pick it up, which means you're looking away from the action. Plus, you could end up picking up a gun you already used up (maybe it'd been better if those guns just disappeared after throwing them). Also, when the enemies are piled up, their weapons are as well, making it even more difficult to pick up a specific weapon during a fight.
- I'd have liked it if I could throw the weapon immediately after it runs out of ammo instead of waiting a moment for the character to realize that the gun is out of ammo. It would lend itself to much more fast paced action (it'd also seem fair considering the enemy never runs out of ammo and would keep shooting you while you realize you're out).
- The dive mechanic, while interesting, doesn't really help much. Since it launches you forward haphazardly, you could end up launching yourself passed enemies, putting your back to them and leaving you vulnerable. As a platforming ability, I could only think of one segment of the game where it was useful to jump across a gap, but there was no point to it (except maybe to sneak up on the first enemies of the level perhaps). Plus, it feels clunky to pull off in general, which makes it even more awkward to pull off in combat. While you are invulnerable while using it, it also uses up tac and you can't effectively attack someone while using it due to how fast you'll be moving. It'd been cool if you could dive into enemies to knock them down.
- Speaking of the diving mechanic, as well as the vents, it'd been interesting to see them more integrated into the gameplay, like maybe a level where you sneak up behind people using a vent to kill them (there was one level where you could use a vent, but it just dropped you in front of the enemies I think) or using the dive to jump across a gap to sneak up on enemies (though I think with the level I mentioned before, that was the intent, correct?).
- The aim in the game seems off for some reason though I don't know why. I could have my gun pointed straight at a stationary enemy and somehow miss while other times, it seems to work great. Sometimes, I found using the gun sight didn't actually help much.
- It's pretty easy for enemies to sneak up on you with the player only realizing this once their attacked or dead (I know it's the nature of 3D games and the game being 3D also contributes to a few of the problems I already mentioned). Part of this is due to the fact that enemies make no noise when moving. The only indication that more enemies are coming is the opening and closing doors, which is greatly appreciated. It'd be cool if there was a peripheral vision feature where if an enemy is on your right or left, there's a red glow on the right or left (the closer they are, the brighter it gets).
- I kind of wish there was a way to restart the entire game from the menu instead of refreshing the page, but this is just a small detail.

Overall, it was an interesting play. Often times I've played 2D games and wondered "how would this handle as a fps?" It's cool to see what it would look like and you did it. I wish you luck on your future projects.

frdy responds:

Best review I've gotten.
- diving can be done in any direction, and you can still control your movement in midair. Shooting enemies will diving is hard, but a very good strategy if you can pull it off.
The level design absolutely should have had diving in mind, and a lot of them are nothing but enclosed halls.
I may have messed up somewhere, but you are supposed to be able to pick up nearby weapons regardless of where you aim, and aiming directly at weapons was supposed to give it higher priority.
Enemy indicatiors absolutely should have been put in.
Bullets originate from gun muzzles, and aiming was not originally going to be put in the game. That leads to the case where aiming does little more than give you more consistent hits at close range. It was an interesting idea that didn't really pan out.
I.... changed the x button from immediately letting you throw into instantly dropping it at the last minute. That was because I got a complaint about not being able to skip the throwing animation.
Being able to instantly eat hotdogs is a great idea I never considered. I'm wondering how one could control saving it in your inventory vs using it instantly

[Train Journey]

I can see the game had a lot of passion and imagination put into it. Almost every one of the train stops (including the train) feel like their own world with their own behaviors and rules. I finished the game. However, I almost feel like I shouldn't have. Let me explain (SPOILERS AHEAD):
- Trying to dig was annoying because you couldn't dig horizontal while standing on a pile of dirt; you would dig down, reach solid ground, then dig horizontal. This made things more tedious, especially the free the spirits part.
- There were so many parts of the game that just forced you to wait or ate up your time. Wait for an enemy to finish their attack before you move, wait for an enemy to move out of the way, hold down the fire button and wait for the enemy in your way to die, wait for the boss appearance animation and/or dialogue to play every time you go to fight them, wait for that long awkward cutscene after stopping the conductor to finish, kill this group of enemies because you'll die if you try to run by them or they'll interfere with your jump. I can understand waiting being an aspect of the game, but I don't think it's a good idea to be a core aspect of the game, especially when the character isn't moving fast and killed enemies come back when you leave the screen. While you can take the hit in some parts, there are just so many that it will whittle your health down quickly if you aren't careful.
- Back tracking is also annoying, especially when you take the prior point about waiting, movement speed, and enemy respawn into account. Having to backtrack on the train to get upgrades and clock parts and reach the exit, look around the confusing moon base level looking for keys, being sent all the way back to your seat after losing to the conductor, having to backtrack with the diary pages (This one is especially annoying because it is set up for backtracking, but the player doesn't know this, especially if they missed the rock like structure near the beginning with the skeletons so I ended up going back into the cave after getting all the diary pages because the text said something like "I should put these with the rest". Plus, I asked myself how would returning pages to a diary help progress the game when I knew I needed a shovel?). Backing track should only be done when there is something to be gained from it in some way or if the experience will be different somehow, such as unlocking a new power and applying it to places you've been or if it's in small doses. Going back to the train in every world was slightly annoying, but in the first level at least, you got to reach areas you'd passed that you weren't able to before, like a letter and the clock piece.
- There was at least two glitches; the diary page count broke on me and started going into the negatives (luckily it still recognized when I collected them all) and it seems to save outside of the conductor room, but still sends you back to your seat). There might be one more; after getting the rocket pogo, it wouldn't always work. It would act like a regular pogo. Sometimes, I think this was due to me holding down the jump button, using the rocket, returning to the ground still holding the jump button (and it wouldn't rocket up again) while other times, it felt like it just didn't work.
- I like that you included two endings, though the ending where you got all the clock parts was annoying. You had the player go through a long section where they are freeing spirits that hurt them on touching them. This part felt unnecessary as it wasn't enjoyable, added nothing to the story, and just felt tedious, as did fighting the bosses again because it added nothing to the game experience since you beat them already (boss rushes typically work if the bosses are slightly different, attack you all at once, or they occur one after another because then it's not just about beating them since the player would have done that already; it's beating them while making sure they're combined efforts don't drain your health to zero. With the new blaster, it would have been an interesting fight; new blaster vs. 4 bosses, no health recovery inbetween). The part where you have to go back to the apartment was less bothersome than the spirit freeing one, but still had its problems. Story wise, why was everything possessed by darkness? Having to go through this part was hampered by the fact that there were enemy that could attack you from below (which you really couldn't do much about accept jump and potentially get hit by something while vulnerable in the air) and there was very little health and no save states (though I liked the health upgrades. It went well with preparing for the final boss and was much appreciated).
- Finally, due to the game being pixelated, there were parts where it wasn't clear what was background scenery and things you could step on though I've found this issue in other Pico-8 games so I don't think much can be done. To be fair, I think you did a pretty decent job on making this clear usually.

There were definitely good things in the game which is why I ended up playing it to the end (the final boss of the good ending was good), but it just almost didn't feel worth the grind to get there by the time I reached it. The artwork and music were good. The story was good as well though the epilogue of the good ending was a little weird. I don't comment on games as much as I used to, but when I do, it's because I see a lot of potential in those ones and the people making them. I wish you luck in your future endeavors.

Meivuu responds:

Thank you so much for all the feedback!! This was really helpful to read! I was aware of some of these gameplay issues in a sense but it was really really helpful to read a player's experience with these issues. I'm sure you realize that I won't likely change this game very significantly anymore, (I did mention a remake in another reply so if that even happens I'll definitely use your feedback very directly when making it) but this certainly helps for future projects! And thanks for the bug reports, anything going into the negatives is a yikes lol, that thing had been causing trouble but I thought I fixed it. Anyway before I get into spoilers, I wanna thank you again for this feedback! My favorite reviews and comments are always the ones with loads upon loads of feedback like this, and I really appreciate you taking so much time to write this and explain your experience with the game.

(SECRET ENDING SPOILER AHEAD plus major plot point explanation in case you want to figure that out on your own)
[REDACTED]

[Apocalypizzapie]

I really liked the game. Here's the good and bad I found with it:
pros
- I really liked that you didn't indicate in the game that you can or should destroy the aliens (I know the instructions tell you that you can, but not everyone reads the instructions). I know this seems like a strange thing to praise, but far too many games hand-hold and don't let the player find things out for themselves. Beating the game without killing any leads to a desolate ending which makes you think "there's got to be a better ending". The intro sets up the game as a pizza delivery game so finding out that you can kill the aliens was a fun surprise.
- I like that the game is light-hearted and funny in an alien apocalypse. The comedy really comes through in the cutscenes and the intro does well in setting the mood for the game.
- Gameplay is fun and difficult. Having the different attacks depending on the position of the enemies near you is a great idea. I've played the game multiple times and it's easy to mess up. Being strategic in how you take down enemies helps you advance and is fulfilling when you pull off a combo. I felt so accomplished upon getting the best ending. Also, thank you for including a quick reset feature.
- Graphics are cute, cool, fun and retro. The music is also retro, fitting, and just great sounding in general.
- The multiple endings are awesome.
- Thank you for including a pause function, sound control function, the ability to rebind the keys, and a list of controls in the game.

Cons
- Why does the amount of pizzas you have to delivery change every playthrough? I played a game where I had to deliver 10 pizzas and another where I delivered 7 pizzas (it's always between these amounts). The 9 and 10 pizza amounts occurred during playthroughs when the game first came out while the 7 and 8 amounts happened when I came back to the game later. Did you change the difficulty by reducing the amount of pizza deliveries? Why isn't it consistent?
- Doors sometimes appear overtop of windows.
- Maybe have the reset button not be next to the jump button? While it's unlikely to be hit by accident, better safe than sorry.
- There's no credits page. While there is "credits info" on the game page, it only lists the voice actor and author. It doesn't say who made the music, what the name of the songs are and who made them, who programmed it, and who drew the artwork (while many of these might be credited to the same person, I'd still like to know the names of the songs).

Aside from the amount of pizzas changing every playthrough, the game was extremely well put together. Great job!

[Buns: Bunny survivor]

I played the game before others took notice (around the same time you released your second game) and I'm glad it's getting the attention it deserves! I'll say it right now; please don't lower the difficulty.
- I like the music. It's a little upbeat and adventurous with a feeling of "better get busy" to it.
- The pixelated graphics are good; the bunnies and bunny girl are cute. I really like the screenshot artwork. I also like that the hair color of the character changes depending on which dash ability you pick, almost showing how important it is to victory.
- Most importantly, I really like the challenge. It's easy to lose if you're not careful and, even if you beat it once, you might not win on your next playthrough. Coming back to the game a few weeks later, I managed to beat it on my fourth or fifth attempt. Some of the upgrades are better than others in the long run and playing the game and learning this is part of the experience. Even with the element of luck involved (the player is offered only certain upgrades at each level), skill is still a definite factor in the game.
- I also like that, instead of having the enemies come from off screen like other games, they come from a surrounding darkness that you can walk on, but it damages you. I wonder if there's anything beyond the darkness.

Very good job on the game!

[Tux Planet Speedrun Any%]

I'd say the game offers a lot of challenge. It handles the same way I remember the first Mario game did; very slippery since momentum continues to carry you forward. However, with the speed the character moves, a skilled person could do a spectacular speedrun of the game. Honestly, if it weren't for the save states and slow down mechanic, I wouldn't have been able to beat it. I personally don't think a change in difficulty is needed because:
- The two mechanics I mentioned before can be used at the player's leisure to make the game as easy as they'd like (though even with them, the last two levels are still pretty hard).
- The difficulty is part of the game's aesthetic; without it, it would just be another platformer. It'd be like having a Resident Evil game without zombies. (I actually thought level 5 was impossible until I remembered you could phase through some platforms and walls with the teleport).

Although there isn't really a story, I liked the dinosaur and how nice it and and the yeti were.

For possible improvements:
- I'd recommend having a reset button for the game. That way if a person wanted to speedrun it, they could reset the timer.
- Make it so when you load a save state that the game doesn't try to automatically make the same moves you made before reloading (because, usually, these were the same moves that led the player to die and load the save state in the first place).

A cute and tough game. Good job!

dtsudo responds:

Thanks for the feedback! I certainly agree that the game was meant to offer some challenge; though I acknowledge that it seems player feedback is mixed on the difficulty. (This is mostly just me reading the comments and looking at the Newgrounds medals to see how many logged-in users cleared each level.) Perhaps the difficulty can be slightly tuned and refined in a way that doesn't compromise the game's overall challenge.

There is a reset button on the homepage, although I admit it's not a great solution. The reset button does reset all progress (including the timer) although then there's no way to get back. Maybe I should offer multiple save slots.

It is also true that the game will replay past moves when loading a save state. I totally agree that this can be annoying sometimes (it's even annoying for me though I made it that way). The original intent was that a player could play out a sequence of moves which ends in failure (let's say they try jumping on 4 enemies in a row but miss the 4th enemy and fall into a pit), and by reloading the save state, the same sequence of moves will replay -- the player can intervene at the final step (the 4th jump) to correct their mistake. But there are also times where this mechanic is annoying, so perhaps I'll make it toggle-able in the menu. People who like it can use it and those who don't can disable it.

Thanks for playing and for writing the detailed review. :)

[The Bunker: Prelude]

The pictures for the game is good, but is hampered by bad design choices:
- There is WAY too much waiting. Every time the player changes screens, they have to wait for the arrow keys to load to go to the next area; why not just have the arrow keys load immediately as soon as they get to the next screen? Sometimes, when the arrow keys lead to a new screen, text will appear and the player has to wait 3 to 4 seconds for it to go away and for the arrow keys to appear again. This happens every time regardless if the player has already seen the text before. Why not have the text and arrow keys load at the same time; that way, the player isn't forced to wait. I'm guessing the "waiting" was done in an attempt to increase tension, but this only serves to hamper the player from exploring and decreases replay value and encourages the player to avoid checking out previous areas.
- Sometimes, the arrow keys won't work and you have to click on them multiple times (this might be programed into the game that they won't work until a certain amount of time has passed.
- The position of the arrow keys can be confusing. I'll enter a new screen I hadn't seen before and click on one only to be brought back to where I was before. This wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the waiting.
- While the pictures look nice, the game doesn't offer much in the way of puzzles or using objects (except for the key card). Often times, I click on things, see them change, and wonder if I'm making any progress. In one instant, I clicked on a switch to activate it, left the screen, came back, and the switch was no longer activated.

I hope you will continue to work on your games. I wish you luck.

ArcheonMedia responds:

Thanks for the critiques. Yes, you are right, the arrow keys are timed so the player can read the text and will not allow click until the time elapses. It's an old feature I saw on the early point and click flash games that I transferred over. These first Bunker games were intro items to the series that is coming right up. Some puzzles are planned for the futire entries.

--the switch was a small oversight noted prior.

Thanks again!

[The Ferryman]

Well, this game is definitely an experience. It's clear a lot of work and thought went into making it. Many parts of your game, especially the atmosphere, is very good though I did find a few problems with it. I'd like to go through the good and bad in list form:

SPOILERS AHOY

The story is pretty good. I'm gonna take a guess and say it was inspired by Soul series games (like Dark Souls), correct? The history of this world isn't revealed and large pieces of the story aren't elaborated on, such as why did the great light go out, who are the Harbours, what makes people plagued, etc. This isn't necessarily bad though since it keeps mystery in the game and allows people to fill in the blanks for themselves (and can definitely work in your favor if you decide to make a sequel or prequel to it). However, since there's a lack of gameplay variety, a lot of the entertainment value falls on the story and people wanting to learn more and more about it and a lot is left unanswered so some players might feel cheated. It'd been nice to have some extra story information that you could work toward or find, like a letter in a bottle that splashes abroad your ship or that you can catch with a net. Or maybe some of the empty lighthouses have notes. Take this with a grain of salt however. You can't please everyone!

The artwork seems good to me. Due to game lag (I couldn't say it was the game's fault. My computer is sluggish at times), I don't think I got to appreciate the animations fully. I kind of wish there were some more scary visuals in the game. For example, you never got to see the wall eaters' faces (unless you count that one guy) or the fog eater's face (though the sirens' were pretty good). It'd been cool if there were sometimes some scary visuals below deck (maybe representative of the mental state of the Ferryman), especially later in the game; this would reflect the kind of struggle the broadcaster mentions. It just felt like the sea and struggle wasn't shown to be as terrifying as it could have been.

The gameplay is okay.
- When starting the game and looking around, I could tell something unsettling was going to occur. The first time I saw a wall eater, I definitely jumped. However, the game becomes less and less scary as it goes on, mostly due to the fact enemies didn't directly hurt you, only your ship (and it's kind of a let down after hearing what happened to Keeper 2). I get that by attacking your ship, they would kill you, but the Ferryman doesn't really die (based on the dialogue afterward) and the death isn't really scary. Had the wall eaters been able to attack you when your back was turned or the sirens been able to pull you into the water, it would definitely make things more nerve wracking. I also like the idea of having to cover your own lantern to protect yourself from the fog-eater, but this makes you vulnerable to the wall eaters.
- Also, with the gameplay focusing on routine tasks, it could maybe due with a few more, like having a fishing rod on deck to fish for food. However, I will say that the difficulty of balancing tasks peaks at about the time when the player can settle down so I'd say that was good pacing on your parts.
- There were a few things that went unexplained, like why a wall eater kept clinging to the chimney on the ship; what danger did it pose? Did the fires that broke out on the upper deck pose a danger?

The voice acting was extremely good for most of the characters. Very well done! The sound effects and music were good as well. The only character I didn't like was the kid. The voice sounded like a kid, but the lines felt forced; like he was reading from a script. If the point was to make it seem like he was putting on a brave face, then it didn't come across that way; I'd have recommended throwing in a few slip ups that would show his true emotions on the matter. (If you need a voice actor in the future, reach out to me ;)

The radio was interesting though there were only three stations and they repeated themselves; this gets old really fast and it really hinders replay value for the game. I'd recommend having a couple of songs/broadcasts to be randomized on those stations, especially considering story is such a large part to this game (broadcasts that give updates and background on things).

Lastly, there were some glitches I came across:
- You can sometimes see wall eaters crawling around off screen (by that I mean in the sea, on the air, in the darkness around the ship when you are below deck).
- After Lighthouse 10 (I think. It was later in the game), the sound effects started glitching. The sound effects for repairing, putting out fires, etc. would just stop playing and then would later come back (only disappear and come back again later).
- The radio started making a thumping sound. when I tried to turn it off, it started making a double thumping sound, where it felt like the glitch duplicated itself.
- Radio playing after I made it to a lighthouse.
- Siren stayed on ship front after it crashes.

I apologize if it sounds like I'm being overly critical; I enjoyed playing your game and I wanted to give feedback (I wouldn't have written this much if I didn't think your game was cool). I wish you luck with your future endeavor!

crelish responds:

we made this in like 5 days homedawg