Syncopated's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[The Savior (battle)]

Pretty mixed feelings on this one...

Well its almost hard to know what to say here...this is a sweet game and fun to play, but, as others have pointed out, it's really buggy. It's strange to see a game which is refined in so many ways break down in so many obvious aspects. Anyhow, still worthwhile...

Also, I was able to beat the game on master mode relatively easily, and if anyone is wondering how to do so I'll explain briefly. I started out with all of my points in strength. Then, I leveled about five times only by killing the fire elementals and hitting the theif; I never hit the boss so he never got better moves. I kept doing this until I had maxed out my weapon (I personally took the path on the right, which ended in a blade called the Chaos Savior, it's special was a summoned energy/lightning storm that goes to the right dealing 500 dmg). Anyhow, each time I leveled I put all the points in strength until around level 3-4 where I would put 1 in defense and 2 in strength. Eventually when he started getting better moves I moved into 2 defense 1 strength. The other stats didn't really seem to help much. Anyway, I didn't start taking the boss down till my weapon was maxed and once this happened I just pounded away on him. Very little need to dodge attacks cause of all the health I had at that point. Occasionally, I would use my limit break when he was about to use an attack I couldn't dodge because it gives momentary invinsibility. So it took a whlie but I did finally beat him. (It may or may not be worth noting that it says 'congratulation' at the end and not 'congratulations' as it should, if the author is reading this...I hate it when things get misspelled in games)

Also, for anyone interested in what you get for beating the modes, the first two levels give you an extra 50 health when you start the game (they don't seem to stack though so I think the max starting health is 150). When you beat master mode, you get a savior medal and some card thing which are going to be used in the next game...given all the glitches I saw here though I have serious doubts about whether or not these things will actually get transferred. I would like to see that though, given that I think this series has potential if bugs are worked out and if there are ideas for expansion like some sort of card/armor system in the works like it seems there are.

Anyway, all in all its a cool game with a rough learning curve but I look forward to seeing what comes next.

[The irRegularGame of Life]

Haha nice work

This is really pretty perfectly executed. I just started up java programming and read about the game of life, so it's cool to see it taken to the next level. I really think that you made the concept as enjoyable as it can be. I'd love to give it a ten, except the levels aren't as much riotously entertaining as they are interesting...but of course that is because of the choice of material, not because of you. I can definitely tell that there was a lot of thought in this and you must have had a pretty good background in the game to make this, so good job! geeks everywhere rejoice at your work.

squidsquid responds:

Hey thanks, its great to get such a well-reasoned and positive review :) Because in the game of life it is hard to predict the outcome from only small changes in initial conditions it made designing the levels challenging. In fact I went over my initial levels twice and altered and reordered them etc to make it more playable. I'm pretty pleased with the result and also pleasantly surprised by the game's reception so far :)

[Body Ladder]

WOW

Really innovative, fun, and overall awesome game. Realllly nice work here, I liked it a lot but there are a few spots where I would like to see improvements. Not even improvements, maybe, but opportunities to make this a much bigger game than it is that could truly be epic.

First of all, some of the programming seems a little shoddy. I had zombies go through holes in my body pile, and the height bar shouldn't just go out of the box and then off the screen. Same for the height value...shouldn't remove digits as it hits 100s. Obviously these are small complaints but for what I feel seems like such a professional game otherwise they should be fixed. Also another minor tip would be to include a way to skip the tutorial...I had to play it 3 times which was undesirable.

Also I feel that the whole game is set for players who are going to do poorly and doesn't support more dedicated gamers. Had there been more powerups, more weapons/checkpoints, more scenery changes, more enemies, perhaps upgrades, and some way to refill grenades I could have gone at this for hours without a doubt. Especially if there were unlockables that were seemingly impossible to achieve, which there were not in this case. It was just too easy to finish. I felt like I could have gone on forever in the current stage but had little incentive to. I got to like 50,000 and just made the decision to stop. Once you get the hang of things its too easy. The beginning was just incredible though.

If there was a longer game that extended how I felt about the beginning of this game it would make my favs for sure. I hope we get to see something like this in the future!

[Bubble Adventure]

I believe there's potential...

I have noticed you responding to these initial reviews at least, and I appreciate when authors do this so I will leave what I hope to be some constructive feedback. You have produced what is certainly an ok game. sweet, albeit very safe, music selection and everything is executed in a passable fashion. I played through the first two levels but unfortunately lost interest very quickly due to the drudgery required to collect every single coin. It's just no fun initially at least. I would recommend making it necessary to only collect only a certain percentage of coins in each level, maybe somewhere in the neighborhood of 75-80%. This will allow less interested users to access more content in the game before stopping, and will also leave room for perfectionists (such as myself) to explore every corner of each level to find all the coins. Perhaps achievements could be rewarded for finding every coin on a level.

Although I did give up on the game relatively early. given what you said in the instructions, it seems like things get interesting when you have to judge the stability of platforms based on bubble responses. However, I would put this feature in the game earlier on. Also, this sort of puzzle element seems like it would lend itself well to a game full of secret platforms which yield unlockables. Or, perhaps they could lead to other areas with troves of coins that would help reach the necessary percentage I recommended before. If you chose the unlockables route, it seems like there could be a certain synergism with the achievements aspect that could also yield unlockables. Perhaps I'm too focused on this unlockable thing, but its a feature i love to see in games and one that worked VERY well in amorphous so maybe it could work here too. Like perhaps an extra jump or parachute or speed boosts or costumes or the like.

So all in all, its a pretty plain game but the bubbles things seems like it could be cool. I'd be happy to hear what you think of my suggestions and I wish you good luck in the future!

51lver responds:

thankyou for the very full review =]

i admit the amount of coins you need to collect on some levels seems a bit daunting at first..and perhaps in another update i will make it so you only have to collect 75% of them, also with the unlocking part, i tried to keep this as simple as possible, without making things too complicated for myself

and as you didn't play too far into the game ;] then you didn't notice any of the invisible or fake platforms that were hidden there

once again thankyou for the full review

[Towers of Hanoi Puzzle]

Nice work

Ah, the tower of hanoi has always been one of my favorite problems...I love the fable associated with it: at the dawn of time, a monk was faced with a tower of hanoi with 64 rings. he is able to move one ring a second, and when he completes the puzzle, the universe will end. That gives us about 600 billion years to work with, so no worries =). Also it just gives you an idea of the POWER of exponents (pun not originally intended but duly noted).

So the game itself is obviously not a completely new concept, but still well done. I found the music was appropriate and liked the ring selection option. i have no real complaints, except for that the piece selection did seem a tad buggy as someone has already mentioned. Doesn't really interfere with playability though. So really a good job overall! I would love to see more novel games in this vein.

[Ultimate Defense 2]

Definitely a solid game

There's just something wrong with these two games that you've put out. I've enjoyed them to a certain point and then they get tedious. Don't get me wrong; when I enjoy them they're definitely good but something just isn't there. I know that's very vague so I'll give some specific areas where I could see some improvement, particularly along the lines of what's been changed in the second one...

So the difficulty was definitely increased here...but not really successfully. The beginning was very tough, and took me a few runs to get past stage 3-ish. I think that this is because bad set-up in one stage hurts your money flow and ruins you for the rest of the game. I think the levels should be more independent of one another, or more time should be allowed for good strategies to be thought of. Also, there should really be a way to heal. Oh, it's so hard to figure out how though. Oh wait! There are mana potions...how about health potions? Woah! Sarcasm aside, there could also maybe be repair troops that would heal you over time. Moving on in the game, the intense difficulty was replaced by pitifully easy gameplay after the dragons were unlocked and basic strategy determined. I found myself setting up a dragon and two ninjas initially and then just digging the rest of the level. So I'm glad to see work done on the difficulty but I still don't think it's right.

Next up we have the new features you've added. The new units were definitely fun and kept me playing repeatedly to unlock them all. However, I don't think that they were all actually useful. In particular, the knight was really pretty bad. With a range of one attack square on boards with widths between 3 and 4...that's not a reliable help. And the new spells were sorta eh also; I didn't use the ice spell once because the difficulty was so low by the time I got it. I did really like the trap spell though because I had to figure out to use it as a mana drain once I reached 100, so good work there. In terms of the slots, I really would have liked to see them move faster at times. I had 13 credits after one map and it took forever to spin them all. The odds of winning something were also pretty bad, as someone else already mentioned. Although he calculated the chances of 3 symbols in a row at "like 1/255", they're actually 1/25, given that the first symbol can be anything, the chances for the next two to match are 1/5 and 5*5=25. Not completely awful given how many spins I had, but once again those odds are likely to pay off only later in the game at which point the money is worth less and the difficulty has declined.

But while we're on the topic of features...there were some seriously lacking areas here. Since the game got pretty slow at times, a fast forward button would have been very nice. Although digging would be harder to keep up with when this was activated, that could be fixed by allowing the mouse to stay as a shovel between digs, only changing back when the icon was reclicked. Also why is there no save feature!!! It's pretty desperately needed. I also could have used help on the maps in terms of figuring out where enemies were going to enter and exit. On one map in particular (I don't remember which), I put up my defenses at the exit and nearly screwed myself for the entire level.

Also worth mentioning are a couple of glitches I ran into in the game. At one point my mana bar began remaining fully blue regardless of how much mana I had. Usable spells also grayed out occasionally.

All in all, good additions to a good game...but I can't help feeling that this project doesn't deserve any more work. I think that it's just a premise that has something wrong at the core difficulty-wise that might not be fixable given the conscious decisions you seem to have made for the project. You definitely have potential, though, and have put out two defense games that are worth some time. So good job!

As always, I really appreciate comments back from programmers, so please write me something back if you have any thoughts on what I've said. Thanks for all your work!

[Amorphous+]

As awesome as it is addicting

I usually wait until I'm entirely done with a game to comment on it, but seeing as how youre still replying to some of the comments (a trait in an author that I'm always glad to see) I'll post my thoughts now on the off chance I get a response.

I really couldn't see how this style of game (i.e. simple enemy slashing fun) could have been executed much better. All of the Glooples are interesting in their own, unique way and they are always exciting to discover. And the achievements are really incredible. I consider myself an exceptionally achievement-driven person, so I was particularly drawn in by this feature. So many of the descriptions are very funny, and often appropriately humiliating. I might have been proud of my first three hit combo but your comments put me back in my place. Some of the achievements are downright awesome, like the absentee one which i found i had won after pausing to go to mcdonald's. The different styles of play are also a nice touch...even though they're nearly identical they are able to add enough variety to keep me going (currently I'm up to the Addiction time award if that's any indication of how entertained I am). I also really love the reward system...they're all a mystery and I really want to find out as many as I can! The last one is particularly attractive, clearly, although I've yet to unlock it. I've gotten *spoiler* sprint (#1), saw drone (#6), repulsor (#8), and teleporter (#10) at this point and I usually take the repulsor as it's good in a number of different situations (particularly when mobbed by inkies). (to anyone else reading this review, maybe post your favorite rewards you've unlocked?)

Now, although I clearly love this game there are a few points where I could see it improved. I personally find the nests a tad difficult; i took the small one out after a few shots but the big + huge have given me a lot of difficulty...i feel like maybe big should be a little more doable for the "medium" level? Just one man's opinion really, though. I also have two game play suggestions that I couldn't help keep thinking about while playing, but I apologize if they're already been mentioned by others. In order to keep up the whole theme of simplicity, would it make sense to map the power up key to the right click button? this could be a nice addition that would keep game play exclusive to one hand which could be sort of fun. also, i know that a lot of people have been crying for extra attacks and one that i feel could fit in here is a charge attack. if i could hold my mouse button down for a couple of seconds after a swing to unleash a 360 degree swing, that could add a nice element of strategy to the game. of course, the awards would probably have to be altered a little but it could be nice in any case. speaking of things that other people want...i think the idea of changing movement to wasd keys is a poor idea and i support your decision of mouse movement.

On the whole: really really nice work. I enjoyed this game a lot and hope it makes front page. I look forward to more!

innocuousGames responds:

I feel like it's only fair that I show a little gratitude to the people who take the time to share their opinions with me about my work, and it gives me a chance to talk, which if you've played the game it should be pretty clear that I love to do. :)

I really think that (other than pause and save, of course) the thing that the old game really needed was a sense of accomplishment or progress. Since the game follows a very loose structure, I couldn't really introduce stages (I mean... I guess I could have, but it would have fundamentally changed the way the game played... to me at least, part of it's charm is it's sheer unpredictability). So, my next thought was to do an achievement system. And then, to give THOSE more purpose, I decided to add the Rewards on top of that ( some sort of set of Power Ups or Equipment was easily the third most requested addition for the old game). I really agree that it adds something vital the old game needed. And man were they fun to make.

The Award descriptions did sort of absorb some of my natural snarky-ness. Glad you think it works!

The larger nests are a bit difficult, no doubt (Huge is completely rediculous, I am not ashamed to admit) but the addition of Rewards I think makes them a bit more reasonable. A lot of people complain about the time it takes, and there's no doubt they can take a while, but that just makes victory that much sweeter. As you say, that's really just my opinion, but I do like a challenge.

Mapping the reward key to the right button is actually a damn good idea. I have to admit I'm not exactly sure how to do that in flash without it popping up a menu, but I've no doubt it can be done and it's something I should learn for future projects.

Also your charge-attack idea I think is quite good. I like it.

As far as movement goes, as I've said it's not that I don't see the value in WASD movement, but to me that's mostly just that it frees up the mouse cursor to do other things. Like aim, in games where that applies. I'm sure for people who aren't used to the mouse movement control, it can seem a bit strange for a while (or if, say, you're forced to play on a freaking TOUCHPAD... bleh). But in the longrun I'd never change it for this game. I agree with you agreeing with me. :P

Anyway, Thanks for your review (I love the long ones) and I hope you waste many hours enjoying my strange little blob killing game!

[MetalHead]

Not as bad as others make it out to be...

Parts of this game were actually pretty nice. Mostly the Van part of the game...the monsters were all pretty well done. I particularly liked the demon who stood on his wings, it reminded me of a creature in the nightmare before christmas. other parts really should have been expanded on or made more clear (especially the drummer's part).

switchedagain responds:

your right about everything seriously !
first i begin with ches which is painted graet second one i made zohan i didn't like it cuz i didn't have an idea of what to do !
3rd ven when i made it game it was graet nice idea nice game and nice painting i liked everything about it .
and the last one was vix .. i didn't have time i wanted 2 finish the game as fast as i can cuz i must send it 2 the teacher .

thx for wt u say ..and sorry for the bad english

[Circus Fantastico]

Ehh

This is an alright game...but needs a lot of work. i know you said it's an 'update game' but ng doesn't really like that; you should have a fully playable game before it's released. and this is really borderline playable. first of all, there NEEDS to be an option to fast forward to the show because i can spend all of my money in about 10 seconds. i cannot emphasize that enough. also, the help section is really pathetic. email you with questions? yeah right, more likely its just find another game instead. also things cost waaaaaay to much. even a few days in, the numbers seem really unmanageable. at least include some cheaper purchases for earlier players maybe. and even with the performers, is there a benefit to the more expensive ones? there should be more specifics on the pros of each. also there should be limits on the game. i mean it seems like i can just buy as many acrobats as i want at the beginning of each level and i would eventually get enough money to meet all the goals. is there a time limit (in terms of days)? there are just a lot of areas that need work here and you could maybe have an engaging game. hope to see improvements in the future.

World-Amazing-Games responds:

as i said and also u did this is a upgading game. the "long time show" is a bug that im dealing with. your right with the help thing but i cant come up with how i shall right so much text in that place + that u get borred reading everything. u get 20 % profit on every show = if u buy performers for 1000 $ u get 1200 + tip after show.so u get ur profit in % so yes its a benefit to buy expencive once . and i think u can get that much money u need for the expensive things for 40000$ in lesser then 20 shows. and 20 shows is much but when u can save the game u play a bit then u stop, then contiue tomorrow/ if u like the game. but its maybea bit expensive. time limit not set yet but i will soon ....

thx for reviewing and ur advise

[Tails: Cosmic Rush]

WOW

Really nice work! This is a refreshingly original game with a great sense of speed that any sonic fan would be proud of. Perfect difficulty makes the game hard but not frustratingly so. Nice changeups in gameplay too. If this is just a demo then i reaaallly look forward to the full game.