GreenCastle's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Orin Squares]

Too bare-bones

I understood the concept of the puzzle, but this flash just isn't polished enough. The lack of polish combined with the difficulty of the game made me put it down.

- even the "easiest" level is very hard.
- why is there no navigation to get back to the menu once you've started the puzzle? No way to reread the instructions? Was this playtested by anyone before submitting?
- there's no way a game this size should take this long to preload. Are you trying to run an ad? There's no way to justify putting an ad in a flash like this.
- no music or graphics, nothing else to create an atmosphere or hold our interest
- there are text fields inside your buttons which turn the cursor to a I-beam which means your buttons aren't symbols like they should be... it doesn't affect gameplay but it just shows laziness and should be avoided

This shows a nice concept for a game - should be way more polished and start out easier if you want to make it addictive.

nem02 responds:

Hi GreenCastle, thanks for your review. This is my first flash game I have ever made. I made it mainly to test stuff.
1. difficulty - wow, and I thought that it was extremely easy and wanted to create 7x7 square. I will work on difficulty.
2.a back to menu button - you are right.
2.b it was tested by a few of my friends, non of them had been as helpful as you
3. I put the ad there just to test it
4. I am not musician, nor graphics designer and it is very confusing whether I can use free stuff
5. text fields - right again, I didn't know about that

Thanks again

[Sinta]

Very neat.

I'll be sure to share this one. I'm not sure how many other people here remember the Mac game that you based your engine on (Dark Castle! B-) ) but I sure do. Adding the stars was a nice touch. I got 291/300, I wonder where the other 9 are...

Warnockworld responds:

At last! A fellow Dark Castle fan! Its funny, I'd been waiting almost 20 years for DC3 to come out, and after getting tired, we thought we'd make our own. Then, like 3 weeks from launching this game, RTDC came out - full of awesomeness. Thanks for playing.

[CannonCrotch]

Very nice working platformer!

Fun animation, and just the right difficulty level for me.

Playing this, I felt that it was like Bionic Commando, but with a third leg instead of a third arm.

I-smel responds:

oh THAT was clever. Well done.

[Magic and tactic]

Great. Also familiar.

I'm not doubting that you did this yourself, but the cards and engine are copied from Moonkey's Monster Master: newgrounds.com/portal/view/377987

You have given the game a lot more polish, and all the graphics are improved. It's also harder than the original game, and you added a gold system. But I'm bothered that you didn't mention Moonkey's game in your author comment or anywhere in the game because you took intellectual property from it.

antebios responds:

Ho, it was "monster master" and not" beast master".
Yes indeed, i copy the gameplay.
thank for your review.

[Artifission RPG chp1]

Excellent

I enjoyed playing this very much and I am a hardcore RPG fan. You certainly improved on your engine. The animation was great, and I could follow the story. As far as Flash RPGs go, you have a really good one here. Your level up system is like Final Fantasy 2's without the ridiculous glitches, seems to work well. Now that you have established yourself, I think you should try to make the future chapters longer... You only used 4.5 M of the possible 10!

Here are some of my ideas for improvement:
1) Put a save point near the start. I couldn't find the way across the River, and I was running out of First Aid Kits.
2) It would be nice to be able to run away from regular battles. For instance, if you're in trouble and just trying to get back to a save point. Even if running had a cost (e.g. decreases all experience bars a little bit) I would like to see that as an option.
3) An option to change your equipment in battle at the cost of a turn. Otherwise if you get surprised by a boss and you don't have a shield you're screwed.
4) The dungeons are a little linear, with short branches - usually with items at the end. Since this is the first chapter, that's probably fine. I'm sure they'll get more complex as the game continues.
5) Pretty trivial, but is there a way to see the names of the monsters we're fighting?

Very good work.

Fickludd responds:

Thanks a lot!

I won't be making any longer chapters because this already had my computer on it's knees while editing. Regarding your suggestions, I'll be sure to consider them for the next chapter.

[Breakout v1.01]

:-(

I like the fact that the bricks move down at you, that seems to be a new feature. But like you said there are some performance issues that need to be fixed.

More importantly, the ball hits off the paddle at the same angle regardless of where on the paddle it hits. This is not how breakout works and your way takes all of the challenge and strategy out of the game. All you have to do is chase down the ball and hit it when it reaches the bottom, and hope that eventually all the bricks fall. So whereas it's a nice try for a first time actionscripter, there are still serious issues which prevent the game from being playable. Graphics look smooth though.

~gc

Spudz responds:

Yeah, I agree but as I said in the last reply I need feedback, thanks for the advice. Much Appreciated.

[Tattoo Artist]

Fine work.

Hey, this is a pretty entertaining minigame. I didn't feel like finishing all 43 of them but the difficulty definitely picked up. Seems you have a highscore system in place and all. Not exactly clear on how the scoring works but I assume you get points for percentage of paint inside the line plus area covered. Seems to work pretty well.

I've read the reviews to this game (2-3 pages of them). You would probably do a better service to ArmorGames by not using your 'get the last word in' power to act like a total asshole. Personally I don't think it makes you any bigger a man that the idiots that wrote the initial comments. Defend AG by continuing to produce successful flash and place their name on it (like all those flash over 4.00 and on the top 50 you pointed out) and not by flashing your e-penis.

Obviously you're right in your comments about acheiving frontpage status. It's a completely subjective acheivement. Noobs will always expect more from frontpage flash and there's not a lot any of us can do about it.

~gc

Kenney responds:

Yah, You're completely right ^_^

[Sleepless Knight: Part 2]

Nice improvement

Although I disagree with your assessment that ArmorGames is responsible for higher quality flash content on NG, this game is very nice and a HUGE improvement from the original. If being paid caused you to work harder on this sequel then hey, whatever works works. A lot of artists will struggle to make MORE games and not better ones as a consequence of doing it for money, so it's nice to see a change of pace here.

My main complaint with your first game is that you lost all upgrades when you died, and that doesn't happen here, so that's good. Also I thought that the play control was a lot better in this game, less glitchier. I run a machine slower than 2.0 ghz and I was fine. The upgrades were cool looking. I have not finished the game yet but I probably will at some point.

The huge, 3D spinning advertisement for ArmorGames at the beginning was unnecessary. Maybe you could have used that file size to uncompress the sound a little more, make a new level, or better yet, advertise YOURSELF.

Best wishes, ~gc

The-EXP responds:

The 2.0 ghz is recommended minimum, as i've only used it on mine (athlon 64 3400) my gf's pentium 4 2.8 and a laptop with 1.5 celeron i estimated it form the decline in performance. I assume that although its playable its sort of slow. I mention armor games because so many people hate them just because they sponsor a lot of flash games. The fact is, theyre providing money to those making flash and asking nothing in return other than a banner in your game. They dont' ask for big flashy intro's, I just did that for fun and put in extra effort to show my loyalty to them. Armor games is run by a couple of friendly Newgrounds members who actually make very little money form it compared to the vast amounts of work they do. For that I salute them. Thanks for your review.

[HaXXor Knight]

DEGpunx:

What made you think that Armor Games was better than this? They sponsor shitty flash games all the time that may or may not have good graphics. I believe the only qualifier for being on Armor Games is knowing how to use the blur filter. That and being willing to accept money from them to advertise their website on your work. Incredibly overrated website.

Now back to this game. It is a left/right rock dodging game. Not bad if it's your first work, but you have several flashes in the portal, you should be trying to improve. The up for jump is totally unnecessary unless there are some goblins that come running in later. I didn't see that part because I got bored.

Kenney responds:

First of all, we are a new studio called Armor Studios. The new first developer for Armor Games websites, games and software.

Our games get autosponsored, so whatever we make is sponsored. Even if it's shit as hell.