Fro's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Metal Dungeon Cube]

I have a few comments.

I'll go along with the whole shift key thing. If you press shift more than five times on your computer it brings of sticky keys. Of course this is only when you press it five times in a row without a press from another key. In this game that was actually common though as you could very well hold the arrow key on some levels and just tap shift. I would suggest changing it to another button.

I would suggest adding something at the end of the level so people know it's the end of the level. I know that it's pretty self-explanatory to just walk of the edge, but it would probably be better if they had a goal to reach such as a flag, tunnel, or some sort of item. This will just help clear up some things and in my opinion will probably make the game more interesting.

What's the point of collecting things if you don't actually get points or have a reason for collecting them? At first I thought you got something, but shortly after getting a few here and there I noticed that they virtually did nothing. Not only that, but you got rid of them in later stages. (I say stages even though I only made it to stage two for reasons that I'll talk about later)

I liked that you had multiple levels and even a boss later on. The thing about the boss is you had no idea if you were actually hurting him or not. You need to give the players some feedback by having an explosion of some sort or even a health bar that moves down as you hit him. The best case scenario would be to add both the health bar and the explosion.

Here's a comment that goes with the boss and the rest of the game. You basically have no control over the direction that you shoot. More than half of the time my fire would just go straight through the ground during the boss fight and during the second level of the sewer stage it would hardly ever shoot in the direction that I needed it to shoot. This really took a lot away from the game. I would suggest having it as a mouse option so when you click it goes in the direction of where the mouse clicked.

I also don't think the graphics were the best, but they kind of had their own little style to them. A simplicity that wasn't terrible, but wasn't really that great either. I say they get by for the game, but it might be nice to add a little more here and there to make the game more pleasing to the eye.

Leaving on a positive note now, I really enjoyed level three of the first stage. Challenging enough that it was fun, but not too hard to make people get frustrated. The fact that you had placed items in areas that would confuse them added to this challenge. Sometimes there were collectible (and useless) items that would make you die if you went after them and sometimes there were platforms that were too far away and useless, but if you would have just been more patient you would have noticed that proper path to take.

dullsworth responds:

I agree on several aspects of your review. In a revised version, I would change the jump button from shift to ctrl or z, clear up the usless collectibles in the first few levels, fix up the graphics and add more animation.
The fact that you can't tell that you're damaging a boss is part of the sound issue that I had to fix. The program can't play multiple wavs at the same time, so any sound effect would interrupt the music. as for the direction of the fireballs during the first boss, you can control them much easier in later stages.

[Meteorite smash 3]

Keep on trying!

I know that you said this was a final one, but can I suggest that you make it a little better with a few hints and tips?

Things to fix:

1) When something explodes it never actually leaves the screen. It leaves that weird imprint on the screen and it really looks bad after you kill a certain amount of things.

2) I'll go with one that you already know. You obviously can't die in the game so that is something you want to learn how to fix for sure. I'm assuming it's another thing that you can just ask in the forum and learn how to do.

3) I know that nobody with the right sense of mind would travel all the way to the right side of the screen, but for some reason if one wanted to they wouldn't be able to because there is some sort of barrier there. Perhaps get rid of that if possible.

4) I hate that the background doesn't move. That's one of the things that really throws me off in flashes. If the space ship is moving then the background should slowly be moving to the left. It'll actually give the illusion that progress is being made.

Things that would make it better:
(Note, I know your a beginner, but I'm just giving you suggestions of things to slowly learn and implement into your game)

1) Make it have levels of some sort. I actually don't think that levels are very hard with this program.

2) Make it have bosses or other things to change up the pace of the gameplay. This would go along with the levels.

3) Have upgrades of some sort come into screen. Perhaps like a shield or whatnot, but you would probably just want to start off with something simple like a health upgrade.

4) Make the plasma stronger or the regular gun weaker. I found that it didn't matter what gun that I used. I suggest making the blast for the plasma a lot larger so it has the potential to hit more things.

Other comments:

Keep on working. I think you're going to be on your way to creating decent games pretty soon. Once you create a couple of decent games you'll be on your way to creating some good games. It's only a matter of time, patience, and practice.

CAN-OF-SPAM responds:

Im still new to the program lol, im still learning and whatnot. if i could i would make it so enemies have to take more than one hit to die. and i cant seem to fix the death bug its really frustrating the piss out of me that i cant find where its going wrong at.
thanks for reviewing :D

[Getting Screwed Over!]

I don't like ignorance.

Let's see the options when submitting on newgrounds.

Option 1 - Movie
Option 2 - Game/Interactive Movie

Which one is this? The Game/Interactive Movie. Hey look! The author isn't being ignorant at all! In fact, it's the people calling him ignorant that are! Who would have thought that there would be a bunch of people on the internet thinking they knew what they were talking about?

~ Animation/Graphics ~

Perhaps add a menu that has some sort of animation in it. It's really not necessary, but it's just something to think about in the future. It's like a dress up game in ways. There are the normal ones that have a bunch of items to choose from and then there are the ones that include a couple of small animated items. Sometimes just a little bit here and there can really add to a piece.

I didn't like the background for the game. I feel that you should have had someone create one or at least find one that was big enough that it wouldn't get pixelated when you stretched it out. I would also suggest making the screen a little bigger and making the letters of the usernames bigger as well. I know they aren't the point of focus, but I think it would look better.

~ Story/Content ~

I love that you always do these things for charity. I've seen you run a lot of these charities and I'm sure all the money you've earned for them has helped out even though I can't see you making a crazy amount of money out of these submissions. (Probably more than I'll ever make from newgrounds though)

Like in every single one of these types of submissions there are the good and the bad art pieces. Sadly the lower quality do seem to out number the great ones, but there are some really good ones in there. Perhaps in the future you should be a little more strict on what you allow in, but I can understand that these things don't always get a good turnout and you might need to accept the ones that you wouldn't normally.

~ Audio ~

The audio playing during the submission itself was pretty good, but I think that you could have picked a slightly better song for the credits. It wasn't a bad song, but I'm sure there were better choices out there. Your a voice actor right? (I know you are, no reason to answer that) Implement some voices in here every now and then. Anything to break up the boring look at picture 1, click, picture 2, click, etc... with the same song playing over and over.

~ Overall ~

Keep up the charity work, decent job, and thanks for not being ignorant by putting this in the movie section. It's clearly not a movie and it's interactive, therefor in the right section. It's nice to have submitters be able to read and use logic!

Be safe overseas! Respond when you get the time.

ForNoReason responds:

I really appreciate the thorough review! You bring up a lot of good ideas and I will defiantly utilize them in the final collab! I appreciate the support as well! I agree that some of the art isnt great, and plan on being a little more strict in the next outing. Also, the tips about screen size and resolution will definitely be used! Thanks so much!

[Pumpkin Invasion]

Way too easy!

~ Comments ~

I don't see how people are complaining about what happens when they die or anything like that. The only time I've died is on survival and the only reason I died on survival is because I got pretty bored for playing so long and I died on purpose. If you have any decent gaming skills this game is extremely easy. It's all about avoiding the incoming shots first and being accurate second. In fact, you'll eventually hit the enemy. Just hold down the shoot button and avoid the the bullets. Anyone with any reaction skills should blow by this game really quickly.

~ Animation/Graphics ~

There's a lot going on and almost no lag on my computer. I'm impressed with that! Usually games where there's this much action I can't seem to avoid the major lag issues. The graphics were good enough. I kind of liked the art style.

~ Story/Content ~

A cool type of Halloween game. You took an old type of style and added a few new things to it. I agree that being able to go up and down would help, but it's not necessary as the game was easy enough without it. I would have also liked to see more weapon upgrades than the ones that you had. Perhaps two or three different things. Also, upgrades or other things appearing would have been nice for those who seem to be lacking in the game. :P

The medals were actually fun to get. The hardest medal to get is the 10,000 kills one in my opinion. It's not really a hard medal to get, but it just takes longer than the other ones. The high score system along with the medals makes this a fun game to come back to.

~ Audio ~

The music was very fitting and the sound effects were pretty good. I liked that the shooting sound effect was present, but wasn't over powering to the rest of the noise going on in the submission. All in all a good job there.

~ Overall ~

For some reason people are complaining about this being hard, but I found it to be way too easy. In fact, I didn't even know there was a health power up until I read your author comments and read some of the reviews because I never had one appear on the screen.

I liked that you had to different modes with survival and arcade. Perhaps implementing a cheat system or just working on an advanced upgrade system in general can improve this game or make a better future game.

I don't think it's a perfect 10, but I'm taking in consideration of how much fun I had playing this game so it does get a 10 from me.

NipponMonkey responds:

@Fro, thanks for the great review - I think I agree with you on almost every point.

I'm a bit surprised people are finding it so hard, you've worked out the game-play perfectly.

It's about dodging the bullets, especially the bigger bullets, and shooting down the enemies quickly and in a logical way.

It's designed so the best players can complete the Arcade Mode without losing a life. It is quite hard to complete without being killed, but it is possible. The hardest parts are the 4th Bat Boss (it has a quick and powerful weapon), and the final boss (it is surrounded with evil purple pumpkins - you should try to kill them off early before concentrating on the boss itself).

I didn't have time to add loads of extra upgrades and things, I just wanted to get loads of action on the screen at the same time with loads of explosions - and good game-play of course.

[Rune Hunt]

Hm, I thought great at first.

~ Animation/Graphics ~

Did you create these sprites yourself or were they something that you found? Either way they were really fitting and if you made them yourself then they were professional looking sprites. The animation was smooth, but it did tend to create a lot of lag for some reason. I'm assuming that problem was simply with my computer and not with your game.

I really enjoyed how fluent and realistic the shadows were. At first I didn't really notice it, but they were actually very well done. When they were almost vertical they still had a 3-D look to them, which I liked a lot.

~ Story/Content ~

You get an A for the idea of the game as it's very original. The beginning of the game was really creepy and I fully enjoyed the atmosphere that you created there. I found the game to get a little difficult and I'm saddened to say that I couldn't complete it. It wasn't that it got too hard, but I didn't find that the story kept me interested enough to keep me in the game trying over parts where I had once failed. All and all the game play got boring for me. :(

~ Audio ~

This had very good music all around and the sound effects were very fitting. I like that you had text instead of a voice actor just because these games don't seem to be very fitting with voices.

~ Overall ~

I believe that I can't give this a fully honest review because I haven't finished it, but I also have the excuse that the story wasn't interesting enough in my opinion to keep me into it. All in all it's a very original idea for a game and if I had more patience tonight I'd probably be able to make my way through it.

~ Review Request Club ~

lithander responds:

I made the sprites myself and seeing my abilities improve was great. The lava pit and the altar were the last sprites I did and I'm really happy with them. Pitty a lot players seem to not like pixel graphics!

[Scrabbled!]

Great idea!

I think this was a great idea that just wasn't put to it's full potential. I'll not go into much detail like I do sometimes as I feel it's been stated already in the review below me, but I will give you my general thought of the submission as a whole.

~ Animation/Graphics ~

The graphics and everything were good enough for what you were doing. I don't really see how you could improve on them more except for the Player 1, Player 2, More Tiles, and Random buttons. They could have been made a little bit more fancier as the were very simple, but other than that everything basically get's the job done.

~ Story/Content ~

I love the game of Scrabble, but one thing that I'm terrible at is actually knowing if something is a real word or not. Therefor a dictionary is needed and you had one, so great job with thinking about that! (Even though I do enjoy the computer versions that tell you when something is right and something is wrong instead of having to look it up yourself)

Anyway, looks like you just have the basic drag commands here. I think it would be cool if you could have the pieces lock into place instead of being able to be off by a little bit. I don't know how complex the random tile buttons were, but I wouldn't mind having the score be kept on the screen and things such as that as well.

Anyway, if someone wanted to play against one of their buddies the old fashion way without the board then this would be great. I don't see people coming back to do that though because there are so many versions online that do things automatically for you and are just better well done.

~ Audio ~

I think that the song wasn't the best fit for the submission. Perhaps implement a music player of some sort where they can choose from several songs of their liking, but for sure I would add something more ambient and relaxing if you were to ever revisit this again.

~ Overall ~

This is like the board game, but with other versions having automatic systems this isn't really necessary or fun to play. This does make me want to play scrabble though so I'm going to go look for something to play now. :P

~ Review Request Club ~

up-a-notch responds:

the reason i made this is that when i looked online for scrabble there was no real "free" version without a sign up or anything

[-Space Scavenger-]

I agree with the others on some aspects

I understand that this was a school project and everything, but I'll still review it like a regular submission.

~ Animation/Graphics ~

I loved the moving background here and really enjoyed all of the art work. I didn't really see anything as simple and thought the entire thing was visually pleasing to the eye.

I did see one thing that stood out though. When moving left or right your ship slowly tilted, which looked great, but when you stopped moving the ship instantly went back straight. This should also be a slow movement as well.

~ Story/Content ~

Hm, there weren't any enemies so I don't see where the reviewer was getting at below us. But collecting space junk is a nice change of pace from the regular shoot the enemy space shooter that we tend to see. Maybe adding different space junk and maybe an enemy every now and then would have made this game a little bit more interesting though. That would make things a bit complicated as you don't actually have a gun on the ship as the laser looking thing is only a tractor beam.

The game does actually get challenging later on. I feel if you could move diagonal that the game would be way too easy. Even though it's odd not being able to move in that direction, it does add to the challenge. The only odd thing was when you got hit because all of the space junk reset over to the top of the screen.

~ Audio ~

A nice ambient background song would have really helped this submission out along with the tractor beam sound effects as well. The explosion noises sounded great though.

~ Overall ~

It's very simple and there are only a few odds and ends that need fixed up in my opinion. Some sound effects and music are the biggest flaws in my eyes.

~ Review Request Club ~

fallensoul289 responds:

Thank you for the kind review.

[Masiko Dress Up!!]

Hmm.. well there is a lot that isn't good.

~ Animation/Graphics ~

The pictures here really weren't that well done. They seems to be rushed just to get the production out as soon as possible. It's really nice to see your own artwork though as the only scene creator games that I have ever made were with sprites. The thing about this is if you are going to do your own art then take your time. Use something more than simple colors such as shading and gradients. All in all it's just very rough looking.

I know it's only a dress up game, but it's really cool to add simple animations to these sometimes really add to a piece. It could just be an eye glistening or the hair moving in what could be the wind blowing it. To get the full effect of these things though you need something like a background...

~ Story/Content ~

You've done most things wrong that I wouldn't like to see when it comes to a dress up. I'll make a list of those things below, explain them, and say how to improve those things. The majority of it is going to come down to organization.

Organization - Everything is a big mess here. The items are way too cluttered and it's just really hard to get a decent looking picture because of this. To fix this I suggest doing something such as making the character slightly smaller while also making the items that fit on the character a tad bit smaller as well. On top of that make the screen a bit bigger. (If possible) This will leave you with just enough room to organize things a bit better.

Center the character in the middle of the picture and then have the items all around it. You can also have the character in a corner with the items off to the side. The way the character is there makes it seem very unprofessional because he is off centered on the screen like that. Going along with the same theme I would add sections to keep things better organized. Draw a line separating the eyes from the hair, etc... Do this so certain items have their own sections.

Background - Please add a background to the piece. In fact, the only thing that is just as simple as doing the drag action script is doing the gotoandstop action script that is need for a next button to switch backgrounds. A variety of backgrounds can really make these games from what you made here into something decent or good. In fact, don't be scared to make some of the things in the background animated just because it'll really add to the value of the production and make things more original.

~ Audio ~

Every piece needs audio. I really can't think of a situation where a flash couldn't use audio of some sort. I suggest adding at least one song to this piece, but if you really want to create something good then I suggest adding a music player that will allow people to choose their own songs. Pick from the audio portal here on newgrounds as there are literally thousands upon thousands of songs that would be great for a submission like this.

~ Overall ~

As far as dress up games go this isn't very good. The graphics could use a little work, it would be nice to implement some simple animation, it desperately needs organization along with backgrounds, and needs at least one song in the piece to prevent it from being what it was, which is boring.

~ Review Request Club ~

JabberWocky responds:

Believe me when I say this; I would fix this up if I could. My computer was being a dick and it deleted all my flashes. Along with the rest of my data...but if I make another dress-up, I'll take the advice.

[Rigoberto, The Yak]

Are people playing the wrong game?

~ Animation/Graphics ~

The graphics were really cool. I love how there were random items in the dirt such as swords and robots. The backgrounds were really sweet and I loved the animation that was going on in the background. It's really nice to have a background that moves instead of the same stationary background that you get use to in most games.

I guess all in all neverzonegaming did an excellent job with the art. I loved everything from the backgrounds to the character and enemy designs. Great job here.

~ Story/Content ~

The game isn't impossible by any means. It's very hard, but that's something that you should aim for when making a game. A game should be hard to the point where you actually have to be good at games to beat it and there is a lot of challenge. You've got the right amount of difficulty. I still have a hard time beating it, but I'll keep trying unlike most.

~ Audio ~

People are complaining about my voices? I was impressed with how funny they sounded in your flash. I love the roar and the chirps that I did for you along with the yak sushi. I personally think the voices turned out great.

The music was also very nice. You did a great job at finding the right assortment of songs for the different levels and situations in the game.

~ Overall ~

I'll come back and revisit this game when the medals are accepted. It'll be challenging for sure. :)

~ Review Request Club ~
I feel like I'm not playing the same game as the other people who have reviewed this submission. It's like their playing some spam submission that has no effort put into it. Since that's not the fact then the only thing I can think of is they suck at the game and they leave a low score on the review because their a bad gamer. The only worst thing that having low reviewers is having people who give low reviews and suck at reviewing.

MonoFlauta responds:

For "~ Animation/Graphics ~"

Yes totally agree, i think neverzonegaming its a great artist and the idea of the moving background was awesome (it has his idea) i really liked to work with him

For "~ Story/Content ~"

Yes, the idea was to make a difficult game... that you couldnt beat it at first or second one but that could be possible, i had won it a lot of times, so people will be able to win it

For "~ Audio ~"

Yes fro, your voices are always awesome, this one arent the exception, i will ask you more often to make animal voices lol. and for the music too, i think i get really nice music.

For "~ Overall ~"

Great :P

"I feel like I'm not playing the same game as the other people who have reviewed this submission. It's like their playing some spam submission that has no effort put into it. Since that's not the fact then the only thing I can think of is they suck at the game and they leave a low score on the review because their a bad gamer. The only worst thing that having low reviewers is having people who give low reviews and suck at reviewing."

I agree with you... dont know what happened... u.u prorably that

PD: AWESOME REVIEW THANKS FRO :D

[Judas bread attack!]

I have a lot of complaints about this one. :P

~ Animation/Graphics ~

I think the animation and graphics are good enough. Of course they could be better, but for a game like this you really don't need amazing graphics or anything like that. It would kind of be a waste in my opinion and it's a little funnier with the poorer drawings. I think the picture as the background looks funny as well. :P

~ Story/Content ~

Hmm, I've happened to take second place overall. If I would have hurried up I could have had the highest score ever, but it seems that you can't score more than 2,000 points in this game so I'll always be stuck at number 2.

So I have a lot of complaints about this one. Not really complaints, but more like things that I wish you would have added. THINGS THAT I TOLD YOU TO ADD TO MAKE IT BETTER AND YOU NEVER DID. So here they are..

1) Make it so the arm stays on the screen during the entire submission. When you mouse moves to the left the arm would move slightly to the left and the same with the right, etc...

2) When you throw the bread you need a throwing animation along with the bread being thrown. I think this is the biggest thing, but I put it at number two because you can't do it without the first part.

3) You need to slow it down a little. I know it's suppose to be hard and I can't complain since I've tied for the highest score, but you know people on this site. They really suck at games and they can't try more than once without being little crybabies.

4) Show how much bread is left by having a counter on the bottom of the screen. You could have a couple pictures of the bread to show how much you have and when you throw one then a picture would go away.

5) Have the time show up on the screen so people know how long they are taking and it's easier for them to figure out how fast they have to go to beat their highest score.

6) Have a counter off to the left that shows how many head shots they have, body shots, and how many misses. This will just keep it a lot more organized and it's another thing that will help people when they are trying to get a higher score.

Other - I recommend if we were every going to revisit the game again or another game of this type that we do all the small details that I listed above, but also make it a little more complex. For example, add levels that people can continue on if they score a certain amount of points. I think the other thing that could make it cool would be to add a store for people to buy more bread, bigger bread (better chance of hitting Jesus), and maybe something that allows them to slow the time down a little or stop time. (This one would be very expensive though)

~ Audio ~

The voices weren't that good, but in defense I really did rush them because you wanted the game done fast and I always have a hard time because I only have one voice. When I only have one voice it's very hard to do voices for two different characters in the same flash submission. :P

The song was also of poor quality, but it was nearly impossible to find a free song in the audio portal that was fitting for this game. I tried my best, but like I said it was very hard and it was the best thing that I could find.

~ Overall ~

This isn't spam by any means, but really isn't that good either. I feel that a lot of people don't get the jokes, but meh, you can't blame people for being stupid kids who can't be a simple game. :P

~ Review Request Club ~

MonoFlauta responds:

Just going to say something:
"This isn't spam by any means, but really isn't that good either. I feel that a lot of people don't get the jokes, but meh, you can't blame people for being stupid kids who can't be a simple game. :P"

I am agree lol

and with the corrections too :P
Thanks for the review, you know WE rushed making it haha