Plasmarift's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Paradise Inc]

I like the art and concept, but the plot of the game seems flawed. Why would this Paradise company create a horrible and depressing virtual world for people to live in? Why not make a pleasant one where the people sent there will enjoy it and won't want to come back? The protagonist seemed to be expecting something pleasant. Why would the company even bother copying the minds over into something when it seems more humane just to kill them off in secret while pretending to send them somewhere?

Unless the point of the story is to say that a virtual world can never compare to the real thing (even if it is full of strife) or that without struggle, life isn't worth living, then the story makes no sense.

However, I do like the way the story is told and I kind of wish it was longer and the process of escaping the virtual world was more complex. I'd have liked to meet more characters and really see more of the darkness the virtual world had to offer (I know you only had a short amount of time to make this so I do understand why it is so short).

I hope the game did well in the competition and I wish you luck in your future of game design.

Criobite responds:

Thank you for playing, and for the feedback. I definitely agree that there are quite a few plot holes. I guess that just shows my current limits when it comes to writing a compelling story within a short amount of time. If I eventually revisit this idea (or at least something similar), I'll definitely put more time into thinking everything though! :)

[You Are Undead]

It's a cool zombie game. I've always wanted to play as a zombie going around eating people (too many games go for the "zombie swarm" approach or overpower the zombies you control). Still, the game has many flaws.
- You don't inform the player about the different abilities of the zombies you allow them to choose from. Although it is fun to figure the zombie's abilities out, it gives the initial impression that there's nothing special about them, but aesthetic appeal.
- You need the fourth zombie (the strong one) to break through some boards on an early level to get all the humans. If you don't choose the strong one, you can't get three stars on that level, which means if you want to try the level again with the strong zombie, you need to go back to the previous level, beat it with the regular green zombie (which is extremely tough sometimes) or beat a level farther back and work your way up to that level. Since that early level where the strong zombie was needed, I've always chosen the strong zombie, even though I'd like to use the flying zombie, but I needed the flying zombie in a later level.
- If you want to fix the above problem, allow the player to choose the zombie they want based on the previous level's star count, even when entering the level (have a button or prompt that leads to the selection screen). Another benefit to this system would be allowing players to experiment with different zombies on the increasingly difficult levels.
- You don't list the level number anywhere on the level. If you are still advancing through them in order, it will be pretty obvious from the stars, but what if you want to play a specific level that you found fun. You might not remember which one it was.
- There's no pause button.
- You can't tell what the field of vision is for the enemies. You can slightly estimate it, but on many of the later levels, you need to be almost literally just outside their field of vision to get to the humans before they turn around.
- When you get to the last person on the level and attack them, you automatically get three stars and can move on to the next level. Was this intentional?
- Why not just have the player hold down the down arrow instead of rapidly pressing it to eat the person.

I do like the fact that you can't be seen at night unless you are under a light and that when you are eating a human, you can move in and out of buildings to avoid being seen. I wish you luck in your future creations.

fabioecco responds:

Man, if I could I would pin your coment in the top of the page. There are many good points there that I could have used.
Not telling the habilities: on purpose, I loved how a guy on youtube reacted to the skeleton zombie hability.
The bulk pink zombie: Since the stealth mechanic is limited to doors and lights I wanted a zombie which could easily navigate through house's debris, unfortunately I'm not the best level designer around there. Your solution (total stars count) is excelent.
I didn't think that level numbers would matter, but you're right.
I don't know how to code a pause function (it's my 2nd game). I'm serious. hahah
Hide the field of vision was a design choice, I think otherwise would be easy to avoid them.
Last person on level: Why force people to tap the button till the end if the victim can't escape?
Tapping, not holding button: The faster you tap, the faster you finish eating. Holding would take a constant duration (random durations would be odd).
Finally someone mentioned the "hide the body" mechanic! But I can't complain because I didn't make a proper tutorial due to the time constraints I took.
I'm curious if you got to the storm level. Thanks a lot for the amazing feedback!

[Crown Dungeon]

I agree with the others when they say this game is inventive. I like the art and the puzzles. The game is just fun overall.

However, I had to try playing the game on three different browsers. The reason being because when I played it on Google Chrome, the white gloved mouse didn't always match up with my computer mouse, making it difficult to click on some things. On Safari, there was no sound (I checked to see that the music option was on. It was and there was still no sound). It worked fine on Firefox. I'd suggest in the future testing the game out on different browsers; even if you can't fix the problems, you can warn players not to play on those browsers in the description.

I look forward to your next creation. Good luck!

Drawmaneater responds:

thanks for feedback. I add this in the description

[Mario FPS]

You could be onto something big here, but right now, it isn't nearly enough and needs a lot more work. The overall premise of the game is good and the first few levels are fun, but nothing new is added after this; every level that comes after involves getting more coins and going through more near identical mazes. This isn't fun, it is a chore with no challenge, but you can make some changes to correct this.
Let's start with the basics:
- It would be a good idea to include a mute button, pause button, and to include the controls in the description (the last one seems small, but it is still important).
- Perhaps include a run button or run option. After doing circles in the game looking for coins, I realized how slow your guy walks.
- You really need more enemies. I know the original Mario game didn't have a very large variety of them so you could bring some over from the other Mario games. To make it easy on yourself, make the enemies 2D models.
- For some reason, I couldn't hit the Goomba's whenever I was backup close to them and shooting.
- Add some more platforming into the mix like jumping over bottomless pits.
For some more advanced stuff:
- Perhaps include pipes in the game. Instead of having them teleport you to different spots, have them move you one floor up or down in a moment's notice, almost like a jump pad.
- Perhaps make it so you can jump on them as well.
- If you bring in the turtles, make it so the shells start bouncing off the walls when shot or hit. They can hurt you and the enemies.
- Perhaps make the bricks in the game breakable when shot at enough times (though you should include some blocks that aren't breakable so the player can't take quick shortcuts to the end of the game).
- Perhaps don't make the coins mandatory; make it so that collecting them will get you extra lives or allow you to upgrade your character.

I'm sure there are plenty of other improvements that can be made and I think if you included them, this game could become extremely popular! I wish you luck.

PaulHTML5 responds:

Thanks for the constructive feedback. I'm planning on making a future version with more enemies, the ability to jump over/on things etc. Great idea about the bouncing turtle shells, I'll try and incorporate that.

[A shard of mine]

I've beaten the game and I must say I prefer the original - it was straight forward and to the point and didn't take extremely long to finish. This version seems to be designed with the purpose of extending the game's length, which I think ruins the experience.
- You have items that you can't pick up until "you know" that you'll need them (instead of being like an actual adventurer on a journey who takes what they can get. why wouldn't I pick up berries for my journey?). This forces the player to backtrack and search for those items if they had found them before.
- You don't explain what the colors signify for the enemies once you start the game, which forces you to find out for yourself just how powerful the other colors are. Even when you know, you'll usually have to backtrack to the tougher enemies to fight them later either to level yourself up or to get passed them to reach an item.
- The map helps very little; there are no signifying marks for items you've come across, it's poorly drawn to where it looks like there should be paths where there aren't, and the brown colors in the map kept throwing me off even though I knew they were just signifying that there was a path in that area (which wasn't really necessary). It could have helped a lot to have a map that told you what enemies and items you left behind, that way you don't have to wander aimlessly through the world.
- Compared to the original, it seems like you cut out a few art assets because I remember some of the areas being more distinctive than the ones in this game (like lily pads and hedges). Everything just looks the same in the game.
- Lastly, you put the heart pieces all across the map. It's annoying, but I can tolerate that. My complaint is that you don't tell the player how many heart pieces are left to find and you don't add anything new to the world other than a wavy effect and a red overlay so essentially the player is backtracking, yet again, through the world.
- Although the combat system in the original was simple and bland, it didn't really bring the game down too much, especially since exploration seemed to be the focus of the game and the battles didn't last too long. Not only do the battles now feel like a chore with grinding and defeating some of the last enemies when getting the hearts, this feeling may have come about for me because the combat system and benefits for different armor and weapons wasn't thoroughly explained. For example, how much does bleeding take away from the enemy, how long are they stunned for, does increasing "skill" make the stun and bleeding effects more potent, what does upgrading your equipment with materials actual do for them, for defense, does it lower damage reduction based on the armor or does the ability stand alone? While it is true that I could test this kind of stuff out, it would involve taking a risk of investing more points into one category than into another, which can't be undone. What if you discovered later that bleeding and stunning don't help that much and you are now at such a disadvantage that you need to reset the game? For longer RPG games, experimenting with combat traits is a good investment because the experience is going to last longer and different classes have different benefits in the long run. This game is far too short to be experimenting with stuff, especially when logic is telling me to stick with the sword and shield; you only find a certain number of arrows and feathers so relying on the bow isn't such a good idea. Also, while the battle axe increases damage dealt and has other benefits, it takes away the healing ability, which is how I got through a lot of the early battles and the later ones (though not without getting bored of gaining 14 health, just for them to take 12 of it away again)
- I really wish the battles would've moved a bit faster. After hearing some of the same lines over and over again, you just want to speed through the boring battles, but there are pauses between dealing damage and getting hit, as well as waiting at the end of the battle for it to tell you you won and how much experience you got. It'd be nice to have the option to fast-forward through this stuff.
- What's the point of the one defense buff at the beginning of the battle. It's obvious if you are going up against a tough opponent that you should use it at the beginning, but then it's useless; you can't keep adding to the buff.
- I wasn't able to find the leather and wooden armor. I'm certain I looked everywhere.
- I came across a glitch for one of the sparkly items, where whenever you interact with it, it will repeat some enemy dialogue and freeze. I did this several times to test it. Thank you for putting that load to last save point feature into the game (it saved me from starting over). Also, the boy was still in the town square when I was inside Luna's heart.
- Also, for the storyline, why do the people blame the protagonist for all of the problems in the game? They shouldn't even recognize you and it really isn't her fault.

I did like the retelling of the story 'SPOILERS' where you are actually a piece of Luna's heart 'SPOILERS END'. I also liked the music.

Also, please don't get discourage from this review. I enjoyed Luna's Heart and your other games as well so please continue to create. I wish you luck in your future projects.

xinelu responds:

Thanks a lot for your review (I only saw reviews and critiques like this on steam haha)

I will address a proper answer to you by pm but let me say I'm truly glad for your review!

And please, every time you fell the need for an honest review do it! Only with good critiques can I evolve and enhance my work!

[The Fishing]

I like the concept and the adventure (and the creepy fish. That is a very nice touch). This is especially good for a Ludum Dare game made in such a short time. I look forward to future work from you.

However, I find fault with the fact that you can easily run into a fish by exploring because the screen doesn't show the player enough to allow them to see the fish and not accidentally run into them. Had the map showed nearby fish, it would have helped.

It kind of stunk that there wasn't a special ending from having collected all the gems. It just felt useless to have gone after them to have it not affect the ending.

Good luck on your future projects.

punknower responds:

Thank you very much for your feedback.
Your ideas are good and would make the game better. We tried to polish it as much as we can, especially making it bug free, adding a mini map, fishes variety, atmosphere and sound effects and we falled short on the timeline unfortunately to polish all that.

We could have put different endings (when all fishes are catched, when all gems are gathered) but we had time to put only one when you reach the bottom of the level.
We will let this game at this state for the LD, but we never know if that catches some attention, maybe remake it in a real little game and fix everything up, why not :)
Thank you again.

[Deluded Hero]

The graphics and music are not only good, but unique when compared to games being released now. I hope to see even more games from you. I find some faults with the story and game play. Let me elaborate:

Story
While I like the idea of a deluded hero, the game tries to portray the main character as the one at fault for the princesses' death when this isn't the case. It's not just his fault.
- The knight protecting the princess kept the main character from going after her. If he hadn't done that, the princess would still be alive. The knight also judged the main character based on his vision, which was clearly misleading and self-fulfilling.
- Why was the princess in a castle filled with monsters? If I were the knight guarding her, I would have worried more about them then the guy with a sword. Plus, why would she run out into the castle, filled with monsters she couldn't reason compared to staying where she was with a man, who would be more reasonable than the monsters?
(I know the game was made for a jam, but the story just falls flat due to this problem. He's not a deluded hero, he's a victim of screwed up visions and fate)

Gameplay
I like the limited attack options (the one attack), as it forces the player to be more careful when fighting and to spend more time putting themselves into the proper position for an attack. I wish their were more battle situations, but I understand the lack of them due to the time constraints. My only complaint is with the boss battle.
- The boss launches an attack as soon as the cutscene is over. Unless you know it's coming, there's no time to dodge it.
- Getting hit by the boss is devastating so I usually ended up jumping over him and then slashing at him from behind. If you're careful, the boss is easy and very boring. There were just too many ways to avoid the attacks for the fight to be entertaining.

My last criticism is with the fact that the last cutscene replays after the credits have been shown. To restart the game, you need to reload the page.

Good luck with your future projects!

Yipcks responds:

Wow, Thank you so much for this feedback man! I really appreciate it.

Yes you're right, that story is a complete mess, my original idea was something more complex than that, sort of like a Anakin going Darth Vader thing, with much more leading the main character turning evil. Unfortunately due to the lack of events in Construct 3 Free Version and planning of myself, I ended up simplifyng the story to its maximum.

Yes, that boss simply kicks you because of his "surprise atack". I hate to give excuses, but its the same thing that happend with the story, lack of events and planning. What really bothers me, is that I forgot to change the checkpoint spawn, which was a very simple thing that I needed to do.

Hehe, I rememer being like 11:15 when I finished that animation and put it in the game. I didn't test it to see what happend after it finished playing so I only realized that it looped infinitly after the game was uploaded.

Again, thank you so much bothering to create this amazing review for my dull game.

Hope to see you again mate!

[Anima Daemonium-Beta]

I can't beat the first level. There's no way to get up to the higher platforms. I've occasionally been able to reach some by trying to jump while next to a raising platform, but by the time this happens, I don't have enough time to beat the level.

The game seems interesting and the graphics are nice, but the fact that the sprite animations don't play when they should (it will look like I'm standing still when it should look like I'm running right or left). It would also be nice if the screen was wider so that the player doesn't run into enemies they can't see until the last minute.

I hope to see more games from you. If this is one of your first projects, it is very good. Good luck!

SinistraDei responds:

Thank you. I will take your advice into account and it is indeed my first game.

[HRQ Game - Hardcore]

I think you have misunderstood the term "hard". A game being tedious is not hard; you can easily program a game where you have to kill 1,000,000 identical looking zombies to progress. A game being annoying or unfair is not hard; a child can be annoying and it is easier to make a game unfair than it is to make it fair. Making a player wait for a bullet to move out of the way is not hard; you can find waiting at any store or restaurant. A hard game is where, whenever a player loses, they feel like and know it is their fault they lost. If the player feels like its the game's fault then it's not a hard game.

Outside of waiting and the early tricks, your game isn't hard at all. I've reached level 17 consecutively and I could beat the game, but I don't feel like going through all that waiting again. I have a life and things to take care of. A platform game being hard is when it requires critical thinking, quick reaction time, and/or special timing to progress. Your game has only one of these (special timing with specific jumps). Besides this, your game suffers from other problems:
- You only included the ADW keys for controls. Not everyone has the same keyboard setup (some people have keyboards where the ADW keys are not even near each other). Why not make the arrow keys another option for controlling the square. You can also make the spacebar the jump button to make it more comfortable for the player.
- You are able to hold down the jump button so that if you hit a ledge while moving, you will jump, taking away some of the challenge of special timing (for the long jump near the beginning, you can do this). I'm guessing that you intentionally put this feature in because there is no other way to reach the platform that is near the stairs without it.
- Speaking of that platform, that special feature doesn't always work. I found that when I'm not holding a directional button when trying to do it, it will work more often.
- On level 22 (I went to level select), the game doesn't always allow the player to move left to keep from falling into the water and dying. I know this because I played the level several times.
- You said you are going to add a 500 point medal. As far as I know, the medals only go up to 100 points max. You'd have to add 5 medals of 100 points each.

However, there are positives about your game. The movement is smooth, the idea behind some of the levels are fun (though simply adding something new each time to the old level gets old fast). The level select feature was also nice as it gives players the chance to see the entire game and to practice specific levels without having to replay the entire game. I hope to see more stuff from you in the future because this is a good start if it's one of your first games.

stephenjalex responds:

Yup brother, this is my first fully developed game. So, my first thought was like "hard game, but possible to beginners". So I made a game like that. That was my first game. Why am I saying this? Becuz this hardcore game is not the first game. And also, many of my first controls were based on arrow keys and spacebar. But, another user made me change that, saying that would be much easier. As a beginner game developer, I couldnt make a really hard game, as I thought it would be too hard. Anyway, thanks for your feedback, and notify me if you want some other changes.

[Abaddon Ascension]

The idea is good, but something isn't right. I'm not sure whether or not it is your in-game explanation of air strafing or if the mechanic hasn't been polished enough (I'm guessing it is the last one), but, much like Hesiolite, I can't get passed the second section using your strafing technique. I'd like to bring up all of the problems I'm having with your game mechanic, as well as other aspects of your game.
- At most, my speed will rise from 9.5 (max walking speed) to 12 while using air strafing. This seems like it is barely enough to reach the distant platform in the second section.
- Even when I repeat my movements to perform an air strafing test, the results are almost random. I'll get anywhere from an unchanged speed of 9.5 to something like 11.21.
- Trying to "aim" your character while air strafing is also a problem. You've made it so the player needs to look toward where they are jumping, while the direction a player is facing determines which way the directional keys will take them (the "left" directional key will still take the player left, but once they turn left, they are now heading backwards compared to their original position). Why would you make a mechanic where the person's directional view and orientation needs to be shifted suddenly in order to gain more speed?
- The first challenge can be passed without using air strafing. All you need to do is jump at an angle to reach the platform blocked by the see-through wall.
- Even the directions provided in the game on air strafing don't provide enough information. Do you shift the camera once you've jumped or just before you jump? A video tutorial might have helped, such as showing the player what a successful jump looks like and how it is done.
- I discovered a way to move forward and use air strafing to some extent: while moving forward, quickly shift the camera's direction to the left or right and then jump. This will increase the player speed slightly.
- You put a speedometer and a line tracing the player's former path (after dying). I'm guessing you put them in to show to the player that the air strafing does increase your speed (or to ensure to yourself that the game is working), though if the effects of the air strafing were more dramatic, then this wouldn't be necessary.
- You have a top speed listing though falling will make the top speed for the player around 25. This seems kind of lame.

I don't like the sign that says "Persistence is Key". While many great games require persistence in order to beat them, these games have a legitimate difficulty, where when a player fails a level, they know it's their own fault, not because the mechanic literally sets the player up to fail in the first place (There's no skill in trying to figure out how far I have to turn the camera around after jumping, especially when the results are random). Since I can't beat the second section of this game, I can only assume that I'm not using the air strafing correctly, the game is broken, or the chances of successfully completing the jump are miniscule. This seems like an excuse for the flawed game mechanic. There's a difference between difficult and tedious (and randomness).

I hope that whatever the problem may be, whether it is the game or the explanation, that it is resolved because I enjoy 3D platformers like this. It definitely looks interesting and I would like to continue playing, but only if progress is more than luck. My apologies if this review comes across as mean. I wish you luck in your future in creating games.

tgannonavi responds:

Thank you for the detailed review I have added a tutorial to the description and have come up with a few fixes for the jittering/stuttering
-playing in Firefox
-lowering mouse DPI (using razor synapse or something is the easiest way)
-adjusting resolution (usually lowering it)

if you are still having problems getting above 10 speed please PM me and I will try and improve the mechanics and/or tutorial