Plasmarift's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[The Holy Inquisition]

I was skeptical when I read the author's comments and even when I saw the simplified interactions the player was allowed to have in choosing questions. I thought that this game would make fun of Christianity. However, I liked the way you went about this game. You took actual replies from Christian forms instead of paraphrasing a stereotypical response and you presented each side of the argument well (there were some answers that made sense while others did not). This is why I am not a strict follower of the Catholic religion, but I am a Christian. I think bad things happen to good people because God has basically let us go on our own. (Don't worry, I'm not going to go on a religious rant).

The storyline was interesting (I like that you gave the player the choice to choose at the end) and the music was good as well (I noticed that you used what I believe to be a classic sounding piano piece). The music also reminded me of the silent film era movies. My only two complaints are that I couldn't hit a back button to ask the other questions in the listing since they don't appear again and there is no mute button.

Still, a great concept and great game. Hope to see even more from you in the future.

handcraftedbymg responds:

Thank you for your thoughtful critique. I did take the whole enterprise of making this very short game in all earnestness. I would like to believe in Christianity but there are just some things that don't fit for me but might make sense to other people. The game was inspired by a famous thing Mark Twain said in his autobiography: “But who prays for Satan? Who in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?” I think the redemption of Satan is the key to the saving of humanity, as he says to the Pope in the game: “If there is no hope for a fallen angel, what hope then is there for you?”

* About the music: It is indeed a piece of classical music by Béla Bartók.
* About not being able to backtrack: I thought it would give the game a little replay value.
* About the mute button: I'm totally going to implement that in any future game I make. It makes more sense to have people click on a mute button than having to make them lower the volume manually.

[RedMan]

To all those who are complaining about the difficulty: if it is too hard for you, go play something else. Some games are easy and some are hard.

I liked the game. The graphics and environment were good (the environment appeared mcu hmore vast than what it may have been, which is a good feeling to have while playing. It gives a sense of freedom). The concept for the most part was unique; the player technically only had one devise to you (this being the bomb), yet its inclusion was a major part of what made the game fun and challenging along with the Redman's strange jumping and running mechanics. The game did remind me of Mario Bro. 2 (it looked like the RedMan was pulling the bombs out of the ground) and the coin dispersement after being hit reminded me of Sonic the Hedgehog.

I must also compliment you for taking the complaints and advice of the commenters to make the game better, like you did with the longer invulnerability.

I do, however, have a few things more to say about the game.
- I was disappointed that there was no actual ending. I really wanted to find out what the RedMan was after. What was your inspiration for this game (it reminded me of a Native American because of the setting, the hidden crouch the red man does when he's still, and the spirits of the things you kill being left behind. The missiles made me think the Americans were trying to take the land. Also, I was playing this without sound so it may have had something to do with thinking this).
- I didn't really see the point in collecting a lot of coins seeing as they do not help you in any way other than allowing you to take one hit. Sometimes, if hit close to a wall, the coins would lodge themselves in it.

Still, you did a great job on this game, just as you have in your past ones. If you ever need any help making games, voicing acting, or even beta testing, let me know.

Floriaen responds:

Thank you for the review, it must appreciated.
I take in account your request about a real ending and your help on making games.

About collecting coins, it could become useful if I add a scoring.
This was my first intention but finally I didn't without real reason.

... I will see if I can use those coins with a special ending :D

[Lone Cistern]

The gameplay was good and the grades were good as well, but the Mech upgrade that makes it so you can shoot from front and back makes it extremely difficult not to destroy the factory and to get the good ending. In a way, this makes it unfair and when you compare it to the story, will either mean you shot from the factory entrance and let the robots destroy it or you moved around and ultimately destroyed the base yourself. I'd suggest making it so the player's bullets can't destroy blocks. Also, for the mech upgrade (the upgrade where the entire appearance of the mech changes), Perhaps you should have an indicator for which mech has already been bought.

The only only thing I can suggest is a level selection screen of some kind or being able to replay the last level after beating it because as much as I enjoyed playing this, I don't want to go through it again to get the best ending medals and I like medals. Still, very good job.

tadgamers responds:

The trick is to hold the S key to stand still and then make sure bullets go only left and right, the enemies will circle you and all eventually die. And only 50% of the factory bricks need to remain. Thanks for the feedback, and thank you so much for playing the whole game, it does auto-save, so as long as you have not cleared your browsers cookies, you will auto-start from level 10 next time you play, thanks again!

For everyone - Here's how to play and beat the game real easy -

You don't ever need to buy armor, just keep your health at 400 - 500
when you have a lot of money, get your health to 1,000 (lvls 7-10)
first upgrade speed to at least 1050 before any other upgrade. (lvls 1-5)
this will upgrade your rate of fire a lot! The game gets really really easy then.
next concentrate on getting to the 7,000 cistern upgrade,
then you also need to have 7,000 more gold by the time the games over to get the best ending
read my note above about how to not destroy the factory,
thanks for playing! Enjoy your shinny new medals xD

[Escape #7: The Office]

Ah, we've missed your escape games, Afro-Ninja. Thanks for another great game. Your games use common logic that can be figured out with enough thought and that's what I like in escape games. Others say that this is shorter compared to your others and I really don't see it; any escape game can usually be breezed through in a small amount of time. Though I must say, I liked your older games. They just seemed to have more surprise, sneakiness, and creativity to them. (no offense). The game was fun regardless and I like the backstories you throw into the mixture; it adds a sense of reality and in this case comedy to the situation. Very good job.

[Broken Dreams]

Alright, I've read the reviews and the amount of criticism this game is getting is ridiculous. People have described it as being a plagiarism. The sprite characters are indeed taken from Maplestory, but so what? Do you complain about a game that uses a Mario sprites? I've yet to see anyone complain about that so why is this different. It does take a lot from The Company of Myself, in the shadow concept and when the game switches to two characters, but the story, background, music, sprites, and level design are different and those who say the background art is stolen have yet to give one single example.

Even if you did consider this a remake of "The Company of Myself", so what? It's a lot more polished than the original and wouldn't it be paying homage to the game? Though I do think the author should have given credit to the game and said where he got the sprites from (You should always cite your sources). Had the author done this, I'm sure he wouldn't have gotten so much hate/

I thought the voice acting was great: it had emotion in it, which is good. The puzzles really weren't that tough, but this is just my opinion (some of them were tedious, like the 10 lights level).

People are also complaining that the guy is possessive. Yes, he is. That's what the author was trying to convey and I thought the ending line was perfect: it brought truth to the surface and in a way, "broke" the foundation of the main character's dream. I do feel that after the "The End" text appears that the level should end; not just go on for eternity.

The music was fitting and beautiful and overall, it was a good art game.

[Notebook Mayhem!]

As much as I hate to agree with the guy below me (who I'm sure doesn't know how young you are and who claims he likes making games, yet he hasn't posted any), he does have a point. I know Stencyl is capable of making great games, but you seem to be recycling things you've used in your previous games and no offense, this one is bland (a guy trying to get home was the plot of another of your games). I hoped that each new game you released, I would at least see something cool and new (like a rotating hotdog in the background). Perhaps you should start experimenting with other game making programs like Unity3D or Game Maker Studio (they are both free to download). You can also get some free sound effects for your games off of freesound dot org. You could also ask your family for help. Maybe they could assist (there are definitely a lot of tutorials on making games online available). I really do hope to see more games from you. Just try and improve with each one, no matter how small.

[Sanity Drop]

This is pretty good for a game made in Stencyl. I've seen a lot of other games made in Stencyl that put the product to shame. Very good job on this.

I haven't found any game breaking bugs, but the medals are no longer working. I've unlocked the ship and reached the blue tiles with the fish and I haven't gotten the medals.

The game itself isn't extremely new (though the different characteristics for each character was a very nice touch. It adds more variety to the game). I hope to see more from you in the future. Good luck!

Galdon responds:

Unfortunately, I am not sure why it did not award you the medals. I'll try tinkering with it to see if I can get it to award them more reliably.

[Vote Kick]

This game is definitely interesting. Are you keeping track of the results of each round through some in-game mechanic or is the social experiment primarily to reveal inner working thoughts to the players playing the game? In my case, I usually voted in the following way.
- whoever took the donut
- the first person on the list
- big medal earners
- If there was a player I was friends with, I would spare them until the end (since only occurred with one player).

It also seemed the more I talked at the beginning, the more times I was kicked out in the first round.

The walking sound glitch is gone, but I found another. If you walk against a wall long enough, it will temporarily (sometimes permanently in one game) mess with the moving function. I managed to glitches off the screen. I was able to move around the island (literally) and you could see my name at the bottom, but I couldn't come back into view. I managed to do it once by accident (someone else did it in the same game) and I did it again by walking diagonally against the corner in the down-right side of the map (it isn't a big deal since this is just an experiment though).

I'd love you to do more with the puppy island idea. Make another whole game around it where the island is huge and maybe where the players need to work together to make something in a certain amount of time. Or it could just be a one player adventure game.

Still, although this is interesting, it suffers from similar flaw like many other multiplayer games on newgrounds: it requires people. Within a week, there may not be enough people to play a round and when that happens, people will have to open up multiple windows, which no longer makes this game an experiment.

I applaud you on the game. I do like it and I hope to see even more from you.

Snakebee responds:

Thanks for taking the time to write this thorough review!

Yes to both of your initial questions, and I do have certain events tracked. I hypothesized about what would make players vote against each other and the results have been both expected and unexpected. I'm not too worried about the longevity since I planned on this being a short term thing from the start anyways. This project was a break from a bigger game I am working on, but I'll probably come back to expand on some ideas from this game at some point thanks to the encouragement I've received.

[Fuzzy Ninja]

I have never played Fruit Ninja, but I know what the game is and this works similarly. Still, the game has many problems, both in performance and in entertainment.

Mechanic problems:
- As you stated in the comments, the hit boxes do not respond very well. Since the game is based primarily on the mechanic of slicing the fuzzy things (hitting the hit boxes), this problem interferes with and hinders the gameplay and annoys the player so this takes away from the fun that can be had playing it.
- The medals do not work for me and it would seem the last time they were working was 3 hours ago (according to the medal details).
- The achievement page has no description so I can only guess what each of the achievements are for.

Game entertainment flaws:
- I believe Fruit Ninja offered a combo bonus for taking out multiple fruits at once, but there are no bonuses in this one, just slicing (except for the killing the black fuzzy with a skill).
- There is no time limit or any limit whatsoever on the player. The fuzzes just keep popping up until the player kills enough to reach the next level. There's no challenge in this. If there was a timer or the player could only miss a certain amount then it would be different, but as it is now, anyone can advance to the last level given enough time.
- I do not understand why there should be a score chart if my score gets reset after each level. Is there an achievement I would get if I reach a certain score?

The music, however, was good and I can see why someone would play a game like this (a slicing game). This may just be my opinion, but the game seems kind of boring and repetitive and I don't want to gain a skill just to have to buy it again. I will commend you on the slicing animation for the fuzzes however. I hope you improve on the game and I hope you will continue to make game (please do not let my comment discourage you). Good luck.

REDF00Q responds:

Thanks for the comment! its helpfull! it helps me understand the problems where i have to work! and yours tells me almost all ! it was a timelimit! in my first test! i wondered about it if to put it again or not! but syncronizing it to be able for gaining each level it`s a bitch cause sometimes you dont get enough fuzzys! but that will change! in future update! as the coliding boxes! etc!

[Protector of the Portal]

There are definitely problems with this game, but it isn't unbeatable.
- The guns only do damage to enemies nearby (which would go against the point of having a gun since it's suppose to be ranged weaponry). Guns is no different than fists in this game.
- the guns can also attack those behind you, even if your not facing in their direction.
- If you jump above the Uber kids, they will continually hit and juggle you until you get to one of the higher platforms
- If an Uber kid is above you on a higher platform, they will sometimes start punching.

And to address some of the other things people brought up
- It is true; you are not offered a lot of money for each kill at the beginning. Upgrade "cashing amount" to get more.
- In different games, Pico has been shown to be taller sometimes.
- If you alternate between attacking and blocking, the enemies can't hurt you.

And as for the game itself, it is simple and is a little bit of fun, but the problems and game limitations (one screen and no variation of enemies) does not help. There should also be better descriptions in the upgrade menu; one of the upgrades said "enemy attack strength". Some people might think if they spend money on that one, they are upgrading the enemy strength instead of decreasing it. The music is good. However, once you get all the upgrades and reach Wave 10, there really isn't anything else to do other than to keep fighting the same enemies over and over again with only their numbers increasing or quit. Still, this is better than any game I could make by myself. Good job and I hope to see improvement in your new games.

IndigenousDigitalist responds:

Thanks, I made this game awhile ago, it's nice to see that people still care about it. Since I made it awhile ago, a lot of those errors you pointed out were simply because I was inexperienced and didn't know enough about programming to make a better game, but I'm glad that you enjoyed it!