B1KMusic's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Ventures Of ♛Cyberdevil]

It's fun at first, but it falls short.

I can see you're going for an 'I Wanna Be The Guy' theme here, but the thing about IWBTG is not the traps, but the actual working difficulty. IWBTG, unlike 99% of its fan games, is actually fun because, aside from the occasional trap or two, it's actually a challenging game, no matter how many times you've played through it, or how well you've memorized it, you will still die, a lot. That's why I like Solgryn's I Wanna Be The Boshy; it takes what makes IWBTG work so well, and amps it up to 11. IWBTB was, and still is, the hardest game I've ever played in my life. Not even Ninja Gaiden holds a candle to that one.

So where am I going with that point? When you abuse traps, it creates fake difficulty. When the player memorize those traps, they will virtually no longer fall for them.

Case and point: it only took me 3 runs of this game to no-death it (IQ:600-something), with barely any effort, on a keyboard, with the backwards right-hand-movement control scheme. The difficulty is non-existent in this game.

The other glaring issue of this game is, and lots of other people have mentioned this, the floaty controls. The character slides around too much, making precise jumping very tedious. Tedious, not difficult. It took the first two plays to adapt to the weird physics of this game, but that does not excuse them. Along with the sliding floaty physics, the jumping is also wacky; I shouldn't have to spend more than a second jumping onto a platform. Why am I falling just one pixel short of getting on top of that block (the down-to-jump level)? Why do I have to go away from it to build momentum just to jump a little higher? That strikes me as a bug.

The thing is, if you had just used Macromedia's or Adobe's Flash IDEs, instead of some "game maker" program, these problems wouldn't be an issue. You'd have to spend more time creating the physics yourself, and thus be able to fine-tune them, and build the levels more precisely around the character. That would not only eliminate the terrible controls, but it would also make for finer control of the difficulty.

If you plan to do something like this again in the future, I wouldn't say to emulate The Unfair Platformer, or IWBTG, its flash tribute, etc. But instead, I Wanna Be The Boshy. IWBTB has the most solid controls out of all the "I Wanna Be The [Thing]" games that I've played over the years. This game has devious level design, made precisely for soul-crushing difficulty. Aside from the occasional trap/joke, your deaths are your own fault. This is why I use it as THE metric for judging IWBTG-like games.

DIWAKAR responds:

OOOoooooo !!
OOK Sir!

[A Koopa's Revenge 2]

I notice that everyone else here is either too nice, blinded by nostalgia, or remembers the first game, and wants to get his review in first, so he doesn't play this game, and gives a fictional review.

But this review is going to be brutally honest.

Update: I've gotten a chance to re-write this, so I amending the mistake of judging too early by re-evaluating the game based on new experiences.

- - - -

Here is a list of my criticisms and commentary:

1. The controls.

The first glaring problem is the controls. The fact that I have to set control based on pre-configured schemes is pretty irritating. You explained to me earlier that this is because there are a few buttons that need to be hard-coded to be hidden from players. So how about making those, and every other control, customizable, BUT, put the special controls' labels as e.g. "SP 1", "SP 2", etc. That way, nobody will know what the control does, but they will know that it does something, probably serving to activate functions for certain power-ups. If you can make the controls dynamic, and customizable by the player, then that would be amazing!

In addition to this irritating "fixed controls" decision, the controls themselves are a little awkward. For example, in scheme 5 (the closest scheme to what I would have set it to if I could), why are the action buttons h,k, and l instead of j,k, and l? Why does jumping arch so bizarrely? I recall Super Mario Bros. 3 having a much wider parabola, and a slower descent, and seeing as you are emulating the games for the NES and the SNES, I think it would be nice to preserve the tight feel of the controls.

2. The art.

You'd think after years of development, the art would be a little more refined. But it looks like art that you spent no more than 5 minutes drawing. I don't mean to be harsh, but perhaps you could have commissioned / partnered with an artist who specializes in this kind of thing?

I'm keeping the above for posterity, but you explained that the art was intentionally cartoony to match the look of the first game. I'm perfectly okay with that, as long as it wasn't induced by limitations.

3. The music.

It's all over the place. A lot of the music doesn't fit. In the end, it just feels awkward. The music is at least catchy. It's pleasant to listen to. Just doesn't fit very well with the stages.

4. The style.

The style is inconsistent at times. Why does the first level end Mario-3-style, but level 2 ends like the first Super Mario Bros? With these two clashing styles, why is the map presented Super Mario World style?

You did present them nicely, though. They match the look and feel of the originals. And I guess I am taking this a little too seriously, seeing as this is a flash game, and not a big multi-million dollar production. Fan service is fan service, but it still irks me in a way.

In the end, I have to admit, the style has some charm to it.

5. Game Over.

I've been thinking about this one, and it still puts me off, honestly. This game is supposed to be your Magnum Opus. It's the sequel to your previous game, which was, and still is, very popular. So using a stupid old meme like "EPIC FAIL" just seems seriously inappropriate, and clashes with the overall charming style of the game. I think you should just stick to the tried-and-true "GAME OVER"

- - - -

I put this game on-par with its predecessor. Charming, unique, and fun, yet rough around the edges. I notice that this game is a lot longer than the last one, and I commend you for doing this all on your own. I can't wait to see what you'll come out with if you collaborate with other artists! Most of the best flash games you've ever played here were collaborations. Even K.O.L.M., for example, was a collaboration between THE-EXP and the company he worked for at the time. The company funded it, and he developed it. The funding allowed him to focus on the quality of the game while maintaining a tolerable lifestyle; it allowed him to really polish it.

I apologize for the overly-harsh tone in my last review. I felt disappointed by what I saw on the surface, and lashed out. So now I'm giving this game the score it really deserves: a 7 out of 10.

Lambtaco responds:

1. Seems to me if someone is that bent on having the controls the way they like, they should be using a controller anyway. That's my excuse at least. I split the item box button up, because when it was closer to the other keys it was too easy to hit accidentally. It's like the select button, intentionally hard to press. The jump arc is what it is because turtles are slow.

2. I'm assuming you don't draw much. Because five minutes is absolutely ridiculous, even as an exaggeration. Just based on the volume of art in the game, I'd need to have spent less than 1 second on each asset. I like the way the game looks. It's basically what I wanted it to look like when I imagined it. Am I supposed to have a realistic looking Mario game?

3. I think I did a damn good job with the music considering the limitations I had. Some self-imposed. You're the only person to complain about it so far. Which is actually a pleasant surprise. I was expecting tons of bitching about the lack of Mario remixes.

4. You'e the only person to complain about the different level endings, and I think you'll be the only person to ever do it. The reaction has been overwhelmingly positive and stand by my decision.

5. Another thing you seem to be the only one complaining about. I think we should all be tired of the words GAME OVER by now.

I think we just have fundamentally different expectations for what the game should be. I wanted a content heavy game, you wanted a very polished game. I wanted to make it on my own, you wanted me to collaborate. I think one of the reasons your criticisms get me so fired up is because I disagree with them. We wanted different things from this game. Seems you would like the game, if it were an entirely different game.

Thanks for re-reviewing.

[Execution]

I don't get it.

It doesn't matter whether I play YOLO or not, I always start this game up to Sir Giant Pink Lizard, tied up, ready for shooting. Doesn't matter if I kill him or leave him alone, reloading the page brings me right back to the same part, over and over.

Is it broken?

raitendo responds:

Might be..! You know it's rather old at this point, and all.

[Reach The End]

While the concept of zooming in on a pixel is neat and all, I feel the viewable area is too small, and could be bumped up without affecting the difficulty, and still meet the criteria of the challenge. Just make the viewport (or "stage") a little wider and taller. At least 4 - 6 times larger. Please do that.

Aside from those complaints, this game is pretty good!

FattyJoeMan responds:

The reason for the small stage is due to the ow Resolution Jam's main rule. The game must have a resolution of 32 by 32 pixels. This rules is the reason for such a small view area.

[TEOTWAWKI]

What am I supposed to be doing? It's very unclear. There's no feedback when I do anything beyond a few numbers quietly changing. And what's this? Why I have -16 lives?

What are the black stickfigures? Are they allies? Enemies?

Are they attacking me? Are they spawning to build the things I'm clicking on?

Why are they horizontal when walking up from the bottom right? Wouldn't it be a better idea instead of rotating them on a circle around the house, to draw versions if them facing in different directions? Because stick figures walking horizontally just doesn't look natural to me. You need to test all your cases.

Oh, now I have -1,400 lives.

So apparently, I have infinite lives. Oop, now I've lost.

Why does the windmill jitter when I hover my mouse over it?

God, this game is so buggy it's painful.

Next time, please test your game before you submit it.

For now, I'll give a barely passing score of 2/5 on the blam-o-meter, and a 1.5/5 here.

ajopart responds:

Thanks for the constructive feedback. I'll try to improve my skills.

Best regards,

[Mr.Buffer 2030]

So, you took a crappier version of Happy Wheels' Physics engine, and did nothing with it but make a single test-room? It's also not clear what my objective is.

There's a astonishing lack of effort evident here. You did not even make this yourself. It looks like you just opened up a program like TGF2 and pasted blocks at random. I'd estimate the total time this was made in to be between 1 and 2 hours.

According to the author comments, my theory is accurate.

This is not gonna fly. Newgrounds is not for small tech demos. At least flesh out your 'game' to a playable, entertaining demo before submitting it to the portal. Or use the dumping grounds and make a post in your personal news feed or the BBS linking to it.

But here? Don't be surprised if it gets blammed.

0.5 / 5

jiz2014 responds:

*smartone you talk too much bull_shitz.
explanations:

What i see: 80% you only complainant!
20% that you helped me with this post: in my second game i'll put "Menu" Thank U ;)

About 15 hours(of my life) took me on all :P

I see you too *smart for this simple game, change to next one... and keep commenting Man, it's really helps(at least to me)...
But! don't take it too seriously, Life is too short...

Enjoy

[The Wyrm]

It's boring as hell, just like Flappy Bird. I can't score this on my overall opinion, because then it would be a 0, because I find the "helicopter" genre of games just boring.

So instead, I'll score it on my initial impressions of the technical quality of the game. It's well-built for what it is...that's really all I can say. I mean, it's just a screen and some obstacles moving left. With an object that falls down and has its gravity vector negated when you click the mouse. It's kinda hard to screw up. Just like it's kinda hard to screw up a snake game.

2.5/5 feels about right.

xinelu responds:

Thats a nice review by ours, in the future i will do something that deserve 5 stars.
Thx for our opnion!

[Bike Rider Dhoom]

Is there even a game here?

I'm sorry, I have to give you zero stars.

amaarweb responds:

i think ur browser could not load it
there is huge game here 7 MB

[NFL-3:Loader-3]

This game is obnoxious, but I can tell a lot of effort was put into it.

I suggest trying to make the graphics a little cleaner, because it looks like the entire game is a mashup of scaled up .jpeg's. Unless that's the art style you're going for...

I'm feeling a 3.5/5

fiuplink responds:

Thankyou "B1KMusic" Thanks for playing. It is on the way. Play it again and leave some word. thankyou very much.

[Times Table Challenage]

This "game" has several flaws. i'll list a few.

* There's a severe lack of diversity.
The player will get bored after two minutes. Add some extra problems, like addition, subtraction, division, modulo, etc. But "Times Table Challenge" by itself is hardly a game. And adding difficulty levels that don't seem to do anything is not diversity.

* No visual queue of whether the answer was correctly guessed.
How about, as a tacky example, turning the background green for correct answers, and when an answer is incorrectly, make it red.

* Bad graphic design
For example, the "Try Again?" button is not even close to centered. You have a powerful IDE for developing games at your fingertips. How about using it to properly design your buttons?

* No checks on user input.
Ex. 1. I can leave the username field blank, and it names me "<INPUT NAME>". How about making a default value, like "Johnny"? How about putting an array of names in your code and having it select randomly from the list in the event that (username == "")?

Ex. 2. I shouldn't be able to spam-click the answer button. Why is there no check for (answer == "")?

* Score builds up throughout game without ever being reset.
The fact that the game wants me to "try again" is a pretty good hint that it wants me to start over. The fact that the score just keeps on accumulating points throughout all plays is just plain absurd. Obviously, this is not right. If you want to keep track of "all time scores", either make an array of all scores and make it available through some "stats" menu, or just keep an individual "score" and "high score"

* Wrong answers don't cause point penalty
How can I have 550 points when I have 55 correct answers and over 300 wrong answers from spam-clicking? Shouldn't the wrong answers count against my score?

* Can't play via keyboard.
It's not hard to implement. Really, it's not. There's an entire class called Key that is devoted to making it as simple as possible.

* Timer ticks at an interval of about 2 ticks per second.
Obviously, this is way too fast. The general assumption here is an interval of one second. To make it tick twice a second is non-sensical. If you're using getTimer(), don't. Use setInterval() or setTimeout() instead.

Overall, this game feels like something that you made in less than an hour. Am I wrong? Did you take longer?

This game deserves a 1.5/5 in its current state.

Acroy responds:

There is the answer to the previous question displayed, but your idea about the screen changing colour to green or red receptively seems like a very appealing improvement. I never thought about fault testing the user's name, that is a very nice extra for games. I have realized the score accumulates throughout, I shall try to fix this in future games. I believe that is wrong answers would subtract from the score then people would end up with negative scores a lot, bearing in mind this game was designed for primary school children. I never realised the timer ticks to fast, thanks you for your feedback and ideas!