MLScherbatov's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Rowan Reed]

im also stuck at 88%

VideaVice responds:

I'm sorry to hear about the issues some of you experienced with the game. If you still want to play it here's the link to Rowan Reed on itch.io https://videavice.itch.io/rowan-reed.

Thanks for the feedback.

[VALOR: The Lord and Savior]

even the most basic controls in this are difficult to use. at first glance it seemed like it was kind of like an old arcade fighter, but its really not so much. the movement is just absurdly jerky and it doesnt make much sense that i cant just walk. if you want to make the movement all dash based, you cant leave us with such a small screen.
you should never have the player use arrows, mouse, AND spacebar. we have to be able to hit any button without moving our hands back and forth. i feel like there are plenty of keys near the ones used that make mouse controls obsolete. at the very least you need to add more optional controls, say WASD and mouse OR spacebar and arrow keys, etc
i dont even understand how the map works. how can it be 2x2 areas when the
im not saying this game is that bad but there are so many technical issues in just the first few areas
that give me a headache
maybe ill come back later

Newshield responds:

So basically either I'm losing my mind are people here just refuse to read. This is why I stated before hand that this game was made because I wanted to make it. I didn't do it to impress anyone. I know that you like many others refused to read the game or, refused to play and just try jumping into it and rushing through it.

I know this is true because in your own words you claimed: "at the very least you need to add more optional controls, say WASD and mouse OR spacebar and arrow keys, etc"

The game tutorial clearly tells you at the very First area of the game that you can use the WASD keys or Arrow Keys. You don't even have to use the Space Bar because that attack is optional. You strike enemies by tapping or holding down the S or Down Arrow Key.

Plus, just like its explained in the tutorial the whole Dashing run is there to allow you to evade attacks instead of jumping which would still leave you open to take a hit. The Dash (if did at the right time) allows you to dash through enemy attacks. There's even a Wiki that shows how the game is suppose to be played.

[Blinkous]

the game started a little too abruptly and i didnt get to read the controls. then i realized that i was actually doing what i was supposed to do, but the movement is just really erratic to the point where i assumed i must have been doing something wrong
in general this seems cool but it didnt grab me. its really hard to control the player and i feel like im either moving way too fast or way too slow. ill probably give it another try later but didnt really enjoy my first time

marcosfl responds:

I assume you pressed F to go fullscreen and the game started, right? I will put the F key as an exception for the "any key pressed" thingy. We should make the game wait some seconds before starting spawning enemies so the player can get ready for the action. I liked your point about the movement being too erratic, I never really thought about it, this is definitely a game too different from the usual but sometimes we should make things more similar.
Thank you for your valuable feedback. Getting used to the characters's control is part of the game's challenge, but it may be a little obnoxious to get used to the slow/fast movement. I hope you do try again, maybe you'll enjoy this time :)

[EVO]

i love search for eden so just based on the description im hoping this is a similar title (that game is fucking impossible even with emulator save states lol). i will just write random notes as they come up now
music is pretty nice. animation seems about as good as anybody needs for a flash game, and the backdrops are really great

obviously we have enough hp to test which tokens are gonna hurt vs help us, but you really should tell us that the red dots are hostile and the bubbles are evo points. the sound effect for taking damage still seems like a positive noise and i was down to 7hp before i realized that it was a sort of minefield. its not like a conscious player would fail this first segment, but i think you could have made them more obviously dangerous (idk, make them jellyfish even if they are immobile, and add an electric buzz sound effect, etc) i realized later that this sound is the failure noise from pazaak in kotor so golf clap and all for sourcing but it wasnt clear that i was being hurt at first

frame rate slowed significantly just before the first evo checkpoint. this may have just been my pc, but having played a number of browser games as well as like anything else on pc, im pretty sure this was a problem on your end. ill make note of whether it continues consistently or sporadically

apparently i can only get 50 tokens max here? idk if it really makes a difference, but maybe consider only having 50 tokens in the area with 30 easily accessible ones. i didnt notice the number wasnt going up until i had already got them all

i know this is an issue ppl are divided on so go ahead and take it with a grain of salt, but please add WASD controls. arrow keys are simply not convenient for most users. if im using my mouse at all its a chore and a source of back pain to keep my hand on the arrows. im assuming ill have a jump and attack button later, but its still pretty normal for popular games to use wasd and arrow keys optionally with alternate action keys as well

funny that you had jellyfish in the next stage lol
im still feeling a little underwhelmed but ill keep playing. wish you had more choice based evolution (for instance a lot of games dont give u complete customization like the original evo, but have an evolution tree of preset organisms)

i probably would slow the difficulty curve a little bit. the big brown fish are too much to deal with for the 2nd level, and we havent encountered moving objects at all yet, so its probably better to stick with jellyfish and goldfish, then maybe the big turdy bois + jellies on the 3rd stage.

the parchment thingies in between stages are cool. i know its probably more of a hassle for u to do this, but for the larger bodies of text, id recommend partitioning them and adding a next button or scrolling or whatever just so that u can increase the font size.

when the actor jumps, you really need some forward momentum. it seems like im just jumping in place regardless of whether i was moving when i left the ground. again im sure this is more difficult than the layman would assume, but stage 3 is a little too difficult. the jump imo should be at least enough to completely leap over one of these enemies, whereas now its difficult to even hop n bop them.
when i transform from reptile/amphibian duder into what seems like a qt ferret, i lose the ability to even jump on enemies heads to kill them. as with the first stage, its cool to have the player explore the environment to some degree and learn how to play vs different enemies or with different characters on our own. on the other hand, losing my only method of self defense while surrounded by 6 enemy lizards is no fun.
upon further inspection, some of these enemies just dont die. im still getting damaged by most if not all enemies near the rock on the right side regardless of whether i am a qt ferret. this level is proving to be extremely tedious given the slow move speed, weak jump, and the fact that i lose all my eggs when i die. i know its difficult to make a balanced game, so pls dont think i hate u for it or anything, but wow is this level frustrating. just because ily i am gonna try to beat it tho

spongebob french accent voice 12 hours later
yo this level is not really possible imo
i like this game and i support anyone who is trying to make a game like the original evo cus that game was beautiful but had major flaws. i just cant keep playing level 3 all day tho bb im sry. ill follow u and hope that u put out an updated version even if its just little things.

ty for contributing to independent gaming. this type of thing is what i come to newgrounds for, and i know its not gonna be anywhere else :)

paulocosta0194 responds:

@MLScherbatov UAU !

Great check list. First of all thank you very much for playing EVO, I am extremely grateful. Second and what makes me happier still, is this your genial comment, passing improvements for future corrections. It was simply spectacular. Some things I noticed just like you. On the third level, mainly, I've had the most work to create a certain idea, but when I played I felt the same thing as you, regarding the jumps and the monotony of the game itself, because really "boring" being in a single environment reaping Some eggs, but I could not see / fit a better idea, and I'm too embarrassed by enemies to be born "in the void, in the nothing", but in fact I could not see an incredible improvement yet.
This is just a playable prototype, the next one will take a little more time to get out, because the base is all ready and the transmission of the idea too, however I will work on constructing and redesigning the whole new layout, leaving the whole game in pixel Art, involving scenery, enemies and player. And of course some bug fixes of course. Like the collision boxes it has also been making me upset. The question of sound effects I intend to change very little.

Thanks for this check list, I am extremely grateful and happy as I was able to tell you earlier.

Good morning, my friend, and when you want to come back, you will always be welcome.

Hugs,

Paulo Costa

PS: Actually, I've removed the respawn effect from phase 3 so that the staff can continue the game, but I can not upload it here, and I do not know what the reasons are. :(

[The Unknowns Saga Remake]

the game doesnt progress past the first image. im just staring at a meadow with an empty text box labeled "angel" and nothing to interact with.
opening menu seemed alright, i liked the sound effects, but this isnt even a game, its just a title screen.

Bigattck responds:

fix, the problem was with bust image not working well with javascript, i had to remove everything in battles to get it working in html.

[Clash in Dark Maze]

i thought your level selection was the game for a few minutes and couldnt figure out how to move. once in the actual game, it was just kind of tediously slow and i kept getting stuck on walls along straight hallways for no reason. this might be cool but it is just not appealing to me right now and is moving way too slow

DimPossible responds:

Well, thanks for the tip. In the next version, the game interface will change, features will be added. Now the approximate version is in Google Play, and it will undergo changes.

[Deterministic Dungeon]

for a game where we're mostly just clicking a button (although its a cool concept and i like it so far), i feel like there should be less waiting. especially when placing the stages i really wish i didnt have to sit there clicking then waiting a second then clicking again when i could have generated the map in 9 quick clicks instead. ofc we should have the opportunity to wait and try to time it perfectly, but we'd still have that without the little interludes between each selection, and it really doesnt seem to make a huge difference where everything is placed anyways when every space is still gonna end up being adjacent to any other space.

scrolls only allow 1 effect at a time. while in some games this might have a balancing effect, we still need to be notified about the fact ahead of time. i used a poison then a freeze which i had been saving specifically for a boss battle, and found that the poison only did a total of .6 damage?? i feel like this is quite imbalanced and the fact that we already dont know how much damage or what effects each scroll might yield in the first place makes it seem pretty unfair. it's not that the game is even very difficult as far as ive seen, but i hate playing titles where so much of the strategy seems based on how much we've played already instead of allowing us to think of a build or make a plan for our character from the get go (especially when the whole game is about "giving us the power")

PestoForce responds:

There's a skip button on the map creation.

And yeah, there's a fine balance between allowing stuff to be discovered and overwhelming the player with information.

Thanks for the review!

[Terracell]

took me 3 tries to even survive 1 second because there was a lion literally already touching me when i spawned, but idk... it seems interesting. i think the gameplay needs to be a little more fluid and maybe begin with less enemies

Peps1992 responds:

Yeah, I am aware of that problem and I will try to fix it on my next and final update. From reading the comments, I've decided that whenever I do make a sequel it'll be an isometric game and will allow the player to aim with the mouse instead. As for now, I'm about to start working on a new adventure game :).
Thanks for reporting how much that problem reoccurs.

[Cope]

it was pretty difficult at times to tell whether i wasnt able to click on an object/area, or whether the game was simply being unresponsive. you should have some little pop up arrows or highlight the edges of the screen when we scroll over them so this is more clear.

the static noise at the end was a little too loud. the girl's vocals were pretty quiet, so i'd turned up the volume to compensate, and it was earsplitting lol

i'd like to see some more parts where we have to use or combine certain items in less explicitly instructed scenarios, and i wish we had a little more space to explore even if the outcome would still be the same each time. maybe you could make a sequel with a little more complexity to it.

writing and animation were pretty great. no complaints there. good work

KLawter responds:

I appreciate the input! Good idea with highlighting interactive pieces, I'll definitely keep that in mind. And yah, going to put a larger focus on gameplay and intractability for the sequel, for sure.

[TINY BUD ADVENTURES]

we should be able to move while the instructions are on the screen. i refreshed the page before realizing that i just had to click the text to continue, because i thought the controls just weren't working. nbd, but it might be offputting to some players. first impressions are important, especially on a site like this where a lot of games can be kinda unfinished/untested/broken.

we should just press space to continue when we die. there's no reason to make us press another key that isnt already in the control scheme. also, the music should probably keep playing even while that "press a to continue" is there. this game is very chill and the audio is a big part of that, so making it cut off kinda kills the mood, especially because right after we've failed is probably the time that we'd need calming music the most.

having limited lives is a good way to challenge the player, but i think maybe you should make the first few levels a little easier so we can get the hang of things. i lost like all of my lives on 1x4 because it was so hard to get used to the limited length of the jump. these first few levels should be tutorial so that we can ease into the more difficult parts of the game. it's no fun having to do the first 3 over again when they're so 1 dimensional, especially because it makes us redo the first level which is 100% tutorial.

i think you should really consider having a health bar or giving us a few chances, maybe have the spikes knock us back when we touch them but we only die instantly from falling. the game is just really frustrating in it's current state, and it shouldnt be given how simple it is.

i agree with pretty much everything said in previous reviews. im still stuck on 1x4 after 3 runs, and im just not so motivated to finish the game when it's already this aggravating at such an early stage. the visuals and the sound are really great, and i think this could be a great game, but there are a lot of reasons why it failed to keep my attention

PRGAMES responds:

Hi MLScherbatov

I Really Thank you for your detailed Review

This being my first game I might have missed out on a lot of things
but i will shortly (will try within 2 days ) come with a lot of changes

Thanks