Ralix's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Blocksticles]

Ahh, nothing like the start of summer to play a winter-themed game. :)

I think I've seen someone use the same template/tutorial for this game before, since the core gameplay was pretty much the same. I'll repeat what I wrote back then:
– There's no point in having a score if it gets reset in between levels. That way, a player who didn't die once during his entire playthrough AND a player who kept dying constantly during all levels will end the game with the same exact score => score for the last level. Pass the score between levels.
– I like that crashing doesn't send you back to the start immediately, but there's a slight delay. That's important because you have time to acknowledge the cause of your crash.
– It doesn't have to be a long, wide, straight road. How about a branching, winding path? A high-risk narrow detour which results in a score bonus? You could even set up a scoreboard, so players can compete with each other.
https://bitbucket.org/newgrounds/newgrounds.io-for-unity-c/

But I think your version has nicer graphics. Although some background objects don't have colliders, so things can pass through (e.g. the gate and the trees at the very start). I also loved the last level with the jump, I think it was a great way to end the game, but I don't see the point of the floating fence.

The game crashed with an exception a couple of times when I fell from the edge.
https://ctrlv.cz/shots/2019/06/07/yRtD.png
"Failed to execute 'setValueAtTime' on 'AudioParam': The provided float value is non-finite."
See here if it's similar to your problem:
https://github.com/Tonejs/Tone.js/issues/347

The options menu is complete garbage, though. :)
https://ctrlv.cz/shots/2019/06/07/xX4t.png
It's unusable because the layout isn't anchored properly and there's no "Back" button (!!), so you have to reload the game in order to get back to the menu, which resets the options.
https://ctrlv.cz/shots/2019/06/07/wbue.png
Even when you go fullscreen, it doesn't get better; the options are randomly scattered around (instead of being in the same column), there's no padding, the fullscreen button doesn't do anything… and of course, it's still all pointless, because you can't leave the options settings.

P014r1s responds:

Big thanks for your feedback, I'll try to update the game.

[Space Hole]

I think it's a pretty good idea. It was fun to play for a while.

The controls could be slightly more intuitive – like holding the mouse button to keep the spaceship in and moving the "space hole" around and releasing to release the spaceship. Just clicking and instantly teleporting around makes it much easier to make a mistake.
It might also be a good idea to add some sort of sound for warping from one place to another.

Sometimes I teleported in the last second – the brick crashed into me but I survived, and then there was a bug with two space holes simultaneously onscreen.

Draining your life while hiding was a really good choice to prevent the players from spending most of their time in the safety of the space hole. However, since there's no way to replenish lost health, not even slightly, you're basically guaranteed to lose after some time. Losing should depend on your skills and you should be able to delay it indefinitely if you're very good at playing the game. I'd make the bottles replenish a bit of your health.

And since it's a spaceship, you could make the graphics more consistent and instead of "spaceship, bottles, bricks" make something closely related, like "spaceship, stars, asteroids".

PhongDuong responds:

Thank you for your feedback Rallyx. I hope you enjoy it

[Ketch Up and Down]

Wow, it's a well-done game. "Hardcore vertical Flappy Bird?" :)
But honestly, there are so many additional mechanics, like different kinds of food to collect, gradually losing jump power, danger at the top and bottom of the screen, changing orientation.

On PC, if you use the mouse, I'd make right-click change the orientation, so you can play without using the keyboard at all.

Edit: Of course, you have my permission. There's no "copyright" for ideas and all reviewers mostly want to help you make the game better. So, yes, definitely; you're free to use any idea the review might have given/suggested to you.

Max-B responds:

Tnx Rallyx,

Something like that ...

I like the mechanics of Flappy Bird however hate the direct and dumb game cloning.
So I've mushed it up with my own shticks :)
The aim was to have as less controls as possible thus i decided to toggle one button for side movement.
At first I made spiky platforms slide down but found out that game play was a bit linear so i decided to add another item to collect upon reaching the top or the bottom, to make it more challenging :)
I like your input about making the right-click change the orientation, i might even implement it with your permission ;)

[missed messages.]

Sorry. Uncaught exception whenever I try to start the game, and since you disabled exceptions in build (resp. they're disabled by default), it doesn't say anything more specific.
Does the game work for you? If not, do you want to upload it again?

I can't say anything about the game now, but as for the menu:
– Quit button is pointless in a WebGL game
– The music is pretty loud until you lower the music volume

But judging from the screenshots shown on Steam, the game looks gorgeous.

---

Edit: The game was updated and works now.

zephyo responds:

Yea it works for me across browsers and devices, that's weird! Can you let me know your browser? Also I enabled exceptions now

[Sneaky Rooftop Escape]

It's so great to see you try new things – and the game turned out more than fine!
I hope you liked working with Unity and we'll see more of your games made with it in the future (especially since Flash ends in 2020 :) ).

I dig the little details like items moving to your inventory when you collect them, the interactive rotating cube, or the animated menu. You could also make the "orange levers" animated, too, so they would move gradually, instead of just shifting to position.

One thing I'd suggest about 3D adventure games, though – add a way to highlight interactive items. There's a lot of detail in the background and literally anything could be interactive (doors, windows, posters, mailboxes, plants, cocktails…). Add an outline ("outline diffuse shader") on mouse hover, show its name in the text box, change the mouse cursor to "hand" (Cursor.SetCursor)… anything.
But it's not fun to have to click on everything in a scene. I've said it about your "asylum" games before and there, the objects usually seem out of place somehow (different perspective, size, lighting)… here everything looks like it fits in the scene and the collectable/interactive items just don't stand out.

The text is a bit blurry. Perhaps it's because it's resized, perhaps there's a wrong filter used. Would this help?
https://youtu.be/ccYJOT7bUUY
Or try TextMesh Pro which renders the text in a better way and allows you to use more complex text effects:
https://assetstore.unity.com/packages/essentials/beta-projects/textmesh-pro-84126

Also, I'd try antialiasing to see if it improves graphics. For example, the policeman has jagged edges which don't look too good when he's moving. Post-processing effects can also help you improve the overall feel – if you wanted more vibrant colours, for example.
https://youtu.be/IkRMMcPBFsc
https://github.com/Unity-Technologies/PostProcessing/wiki

I'd fiddle with the shadows settings in Graphics and on your lights, because now some objects look like they're floating – see the postbox. The shadows should start where the objects touch the ground.
https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/83596/why-are-shadows-not-snapping-to-the-objects
Ambient Occlusion effect might also give the scene a more "natural" feel.

And finally, it's absolutely possible to add medals and scoreboard to Unity games… I've done it a couple of times before. You need to enable the new API in Project System and then continue from here:
https://bitbucket.org/newgrounds/newgrounds.io-for-unity-c/
There's a working example for unlocking medals on the page. There's no scoreboard example, but it's very similar to that.

I wrote more than I thought I would, I hope it was helpful. :)
Good luck with your future games! I'd love to see a low-poly asylum game at some point. :)

selfdefiant responds:

Wow, thanks for all of that! I will definitely be following your advice. Many, many thanks!

[Don't burn your asshole]

Weird game… but that's probably what makes it more appealing.
I like that there are multiple endings for every step of the process, although neither is terribly surprising… but I wish there was a command like "Wait" which would discard the remaining time and let us see the ending straight away.
Thanks for the to-do list, because I would be completely lost without it. The commands are rightfully quite bizarre, and before I noticed the list, I had been trying commands like "walk left", "lie down", "use coffee", "help" which of course didn't work. I'd mention the to-do list in the in-game instructions though.

I think the in-game text seems a bit too stretched horizontally. And the input field absolutely should auto-focus because it's a bit annoying, having to click on it every time even though you normally don't need to use the mouse.
https://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/UI.InputField.ActivateInputField.html

The tragedy and the true horror of this game is that I now know the process of self-administering an enema and I actually looked it up to see if you got it right. Btw, is it a "nosel" or a "nozzle"? :)

Edit – Great, I bumped the rating up. The title screen still has a typo though ("Perfiorm"). :)

Booanimation responds:

Thanks for the Rallyx I really appreciate the feedback! Just finished working on your suggested edits the input field is now on autofocus and fixed the text as well as adding the additional instruction. :)