Ralix's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Chilazer]

Not bad for a first game.
However, it's a bit too fast and gives you no chance to recover when you make the slightest mistake. I would at least make the purple enemies take like 1 out of 3 hearts, so that you have a chance to complete the level and don't have to choose between crashing into a pillar and being shot.
In countless of tries, I only got past the three pillars once (they're too close to each other), only to be immediately shot by other enemies.
Also, a pro tip – if your first-person character is a plain old capsule with a floating gun, disable the shadows on the mesh renderer, otherwise, everybody will be able to tell.

RywarGames responds:

Thank you for all the tips!

[Swingin' Reswung]

Whoa, easy with all those post-processing effects. Bloom is kinda cool, especially with so many things glowing, but the motion-blur makes it harder to see what you're doing, especially in a game like this which needs you to be laser-focused.

I've had a lot of problems with the rope not appearing when I clicked sometimes (evidenced by a plethora of NullReferenceExceptions in the console), even when I started spamming the mouse button.

I'd say 'holding' Z and X to change the rope gradually instead of repeatedly pressing and changing the rope in large steps would result in more fluent gameplay, but of course, I can't be sure.

You also don't see too far ahead (and there's no a priori warning), so until you memorize the sequence, the majority of revolving saws will probably hit you.

(Also you need to add 38 to vertical resolution in Project Settings if you use the Unity footer.)

Nicely done; I see the improvements from your previous versions, but the sometimes unresponsive controls make it more frustrating than it needs to be.

nulledwine responds:

Thanks for your feedback!

Yep I probably added too much motion blur, I'll tone it down soon.
For the rope not appearing when clicking, I'm gonna look into that. Thanks for telling me.

Dunno why I didn't think about holding Z and X.

Thanks again, I'll be working towards fixing these things.

[Convergence]

There are so many things I like about the game… the tutorial is great (brief, and to the point), shooting enemies is fun, the white/green colour contrast, the final battle with all your comrades.

However, I'm not sure about the story… it feels like I'm missing something. The dialogue at the beginning made it seem like there's a mystery to uncover – but in the end, it's just ‘kill the big bad guy’. The reason might as well be running out of time because of the game jam… but I wouldn't exactly call the ending ‘a satisfactory conclusion’. But the gameplay is pretty good nevertheless.

Edit:
Thank you for clarifying the story. I got that pandemic analogy and the importance of team effort in the end, but as for the rest… I think the main thing which undermines the "alone, hopeless" feel is the radio communication throughout the game. You're constantly talking to an authority figure who is comforting you – so you're feeling neither completely alone nor hopeless.

Imagine this: the main character doesn't have anyone to talk to, the radio is silent (in truth, you're too deep underground to get any signal). He fears he might be the last person on Earth. In hopes of leaving at least some legacy, he records his thoughts on tape (so you can basically keep saying the same things which he already says in the game).
He goes further, but there's no improvement, the enemies only get stronger. Then he runs into "the main boss" and thinks he's done for, but suddenly, reinforcements appear and you defeat it together.
At least that's how I'd go about it if I wanted to make the player feel lonely or depressed until the very end.

VascoF responds:

Thanks for the review, glad you liked it.

I guess my idea for the story didn't really end up being very clear. The idea was that you were supposed to feel alone and hopeless throughout most of the game (which originally was supposed to be longer to increase this feeling), and then at the end the player discovers that there were many teammates in the same situation, and you all came together in the end, and this would be an exciting, happy end. This was all supposed to be analogous to the pandemic situation we're facing now, it's kind of how I feel about it.

Edit: Thank you for the clarification, it's very helpful. I see what you mean; the feeling of loneliness/despair could be stronger. I wanted the radio to tell some parts of the story (and it's also a better analogy to what's happening now), but didn't have time to make a long enough game to space out the radio transmissions more, and have the player play through various days.

[Deal or no Deal]

Yes, it's all right – it's a simple game, after all. I probably wouldn't use bluish underlined links (yes/no and play again options), as they look like plain hyperlinks (which they are) and don't fit with the colour theme of the game, but that's just nitpicking.
However, I think the medals don't work (at least the first one doesn't).

Mocha2007 responds:

I changed the buttons to look like gold bars like the rest of the interface - do you think this looks better?

Thanks for playing :3

[Barghest]

I like it! A nice simple game which gets more challenging over time. Just when I thought the gameplay is getting a bit stale, the enemies started exploding.

Just a little complaint – you can see the ghosts briefly flashing on the screen frequently. I don't know if you're reusing the same objects and snapping them to position, however, whatever is the case, I'd turn their visibility off when you're moving them across the screen. It can be confusing.
Also, once you die, the score number isn't centered on the screen unlike everything else (which is quite noticeable if the score is a single digit).

And there's a bug – if you pause the game with your sword unsheathed, the sword stays where it was even after you unpause the game. Although that's almost a feature – because you can leave your sword at a strategic position, and only focus on dodging while your sword destroys enemies far away from you.

WondO responds:

Yeah the weird flashing when they spawn was a bug i could not fix when i was making the game like 2 years ago, i didn't know the pause one tho, thats like melee's advanced tech.

i wanted some more varied ways for enemies to come up but i really could not figure out how to do that kind of stuff, my abilities were limited then and sadly even more now atm.

also if you didn't notice, the trail gets longer the more points you get, thats probably my favorite detail in the game

[Corona Dodge v2]

It's well made, with nice UI and effects – and I certainly appreciate the viruses don't move along straight lines which makes it less predictable. But all in all, it's also very repetitive; i.e. the gameplay when you start the game is exactly the same as the gameplay after one minute.

The trajectory of the viruses also doesn't even initially incline towards your position, so there can be long periods of time in which you sit in the middle and do nothing. I usually lost because I became complacent after twenty seconds of doing nothing, and then I got one-shotted by a fast-moving virus.
I'm not saying they should all be aimed at you (as that would make the game impossible), but consider slightly (or by a random percentage) tilting their initial trajectory towards your position.

It's a good game to play for a couple of minutes, but there's not a lot of reasons to keep playing for a higher score. Perhaps consider introducing new things later on, or add medals/scoreboard to attract more players and make them compete with each other: https://www.newgrounds.io/

QuanDiep responds:

Thanks for the feed back!!!
Good news!! I just fixed it! Try it out!

[LLamas Proto]

Well, okay…?
Four short minigames, but what happens after you complete them? The game is missing some sort of conclusion… be it going to other cities with new minigames, or simply a final challenge.

Also, your character is maybe going too fast, the bushes make you spin (freeze rotation on the rigidbody if this is unwanted), and you can get stuck at the borders of the screen. I checked the browser console, too, and you're constantly outputting debug numbers every frame which might be unwanted.

Drag0n1x responds:

Hey Tank you for the feedback. I recently upload a more complete version( still not the final)

[My First Game]

This is absolutely incredible. Speaking as someone who browses the Under Judgement games section a lot, you managed to represent so many of the common types of ‘first games’ which appear here. All that's missing are bare-bones Construct 3 platformers, but those probably don't even qualify as games yet.
Nonetheless, I agree with you. Everybody has to start somewhere, and doing simple clones of well-known games is probably a good starting point – but I do enjoy creators who finish the templates and put a creative spin or their own touch on them before hitting ‘Publish’.

I also like the shaders you used, and the fact that the games gradually get harder and harder as new elements are introduced.

Great idea; perfectly executed.

HealliesGames responds:

I'm glad the game reflects your vision.
Thanks for the review and for playing, Rallyx!

[[BTNverse] There is nothing here.]

I did not expect what is going to happen when you collect the final upgrade. I think it's a brilliant idea.

I was originally going to say one-hit death is too harsh, but it's actually perfectly appropriate, especially since the stronger enemies serve as barriers until you collect power-ups.
Also thanks for adding things like the minimap, otherwise hunting for that one forgotten 'enemy' in the last stage could have been frustrating.

Really great, well done.

adriendittrick responds:

Thanks for reaching the end :)

[Learning project #1]

It's fine, but since it's an endless game, it starts feeling repetitive eventually. For me, that mark was around ~35 when I felt I'm seeing similar patterns.
Of course, it's perfectly possible to lose, but I think I could keep going for a good while if I played it safe and stayed near the centre.

From a game design perspective, endless games have to have 1) good replay value (tick), and 2) evolve over time – which I don't think this game does. And without new elements being introduced, it's a matter of time before you lose out of boredom (instead of lack of skills).

A couple of ideas:
– Over time, slowly speed up the red block, or add more of them. This is the simplest way to add increasing difficulty to the game, but it does put some upper cap on the score if you don't stop increasing since there comes a point when it isn't humanely possible to continue anymore.
It also doesn't really add anything new to the game, it just makes more challenging, but shorter.
– Add a "challenging dodge" every, let's say, 20 points; stopping all blocks from spawning for a while and spawning a scripted red block pattern – e.g. waves, or concentric circles with gaps…
Make a couple of those, at least to cover 0–200 points.
– Add a slow-moving "gold block" every once in a while which you have to pick up, otherwise you lose.

And by the way, you can have an actual scoreboard. Newgrounds has a built-in scoreboard system you can use. See API Tools in the Project System, and this:
https://bitbucket.org/newgrounds/newgrounds.io-for-unity-c/src/default/

Its-Kaleb responds:

Thanks for the tips (especially for the score board) , I will work on it more