Syncopated's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[LRU 3: Darkness Reborn]

Just wow

So I just finished my entire first run through of this game. It must have taken me at least 5 hours to get through all of the content. I did everything and I loved it. I'm tempted to play again as Lethal to see how the story changes and to see how my powers and weapons progress. That is a lot of time input, though, and I just don't know if it's worth it. I guess I'll give a run down of all of the pros and cons (mostly pros) that I found in this awesome game.

I'll start off with a couple of complaints. First of all, some of the animations were a little sloppy. Like when the captains died in a pool of really linear and unrealistic blood I felt like the graphics just didn't match up to the rest of the programming in the game. There were also a couple of glitches I found. I can't go back down from the top right room of the second city...it seems like the arrows are too far in the wall. Also, when I hit level 19 my mana went up to something like 15,000 for some reason and then went back down to normal when I re-leveled. There were also a few annoying parts of the game. First of all, the trees are completely solid, which doesn't make any sense. You should be able to walk through the top parts of them because clearly they aren't on the ground and create too big of an obstacle. Also, the mission to take back all of the colonies from the Abyss...really? That legitimately took me an hour of no-fun grinding. It should have been split up. There was really not much incentive to do it before the mission so I ended up having to do it all at once. Also, the enemies' heal spells were pitifully bad. Looking at another successful RPG like Sonny, when an enemy heals its a big deal. Here, it's like "Oh thank God, I just got a free turn". Not that I'm saying you should try to replicate Sonny exactly (I finished this one but not Sonny) it just seemed like this part of the game was a little silly. Also the spell descriptions were confusing. The assault spells said "One Use" so I thought I could only use them once in the game. This should probably be changed. Finally, the progression of difficulty seemed a little off. Once I got all the spells and such there was really no challenge to the game. I died a reasonable amount in the beginning but I think after I hit the second half I didn't die once. Even Fatal didn't prove too much of a problem (still a fun and engaging battle though).

Ok ok, now for the good parts of the game which really overshadow the bad parts even if the paragraph ends up a little shorter. I loved the customization of the character, as others have mentioned...it made me explore the entire map on new areas and added some nice spice to the game. Also, the parts where you destroy the generators was fun and a good change-up in activity. And I loved the side quests...they were all very compelling and resulted in a nice feeling of accomplishment. And the weapons looked really sweet when you upgraded them, so nice job there. The selection of classes is also compelling...I am still interested to find out more about the staff (it might be one of the reasons I go again as Lethal). I did look through the beginning of the game as Lethal and it was cool to see people interact differently with him. It was almost unexpected that so much work would be put into a part that so few people will see, but I always appreciate it when programmers do just that. Also, even though I may have knocked the graphics of the game you have mastered the art of cleavage. Truthfully, I kept almost expecting a dating sim aspect to the game. Maybe that wouldn't have really fit in here, but maybe some ability to chose one of the three commanders at the end would have been cool (I vote the Paradiso chick personally). I also loved the Fable-like part of the game where you choose between killing or saving the guard. I didn't think to save him before it was too late though, and now I'm very curious at what's in the other chest. I'm sure it's more kick-ass armor, but do you think I could have any hints?

All in all incredible work! I'm looking forward to more!

Benspyda responds:

I see you have thoroughly played through the game. Thanks for the full review. Yeah that magic glitch is quite funny. I should probably fix it though.

Its good when people notice how much hard work goes into these games.

[Ultranium]

Hmm...

Well this game definitely had its pros. The beginning seemed terrible with nothing to separate the game from the slew of brick brakers. First of all, instructions would have been a plus, if for no other purpose than to maybe explain some of the power ups that would tempt a user to play this game. For example, the vector power was very neat. My main problem here is that the game is WAY too power-up dependent. Some levels definitely cannot be completed in under an hour without the fireball power. I think it was level 7 where there was a mess of the red block creators and that was just impossible until i got fireballs. After that, it was no problem. That's just not good designing. Also, lives were waaaay too easy to come by. Were they just as common as all the other powerups? When I exited the game from boredom I had something like 20 lives and thats just too many for what is already an easy game to begin with. Also, you should set a limit to the number of powerups on screen at a time because sometimes it just gets out of hand like after i get a fireball and go through the entire level. I do like the block creators in small amounts; these are just one of the somewhat redeeming aspects of the game. Also, as someone already said, the music doesn't loop until you finish a level, so that should be fixed. I hope my thoughts are in some useful order here...pretty good work here, and good luck in the future! I look forward to some good games.

[AstroFlyer]

Wow

Ah I'm sort of conflicted in writing this review. I can tell there was a lot of work in this game and it's very cool, but just so hard to play. I don't know how this could be remedied, but something is just off. The game uses the crosshairs too much I think, the ship does little but depth perception. I guess this is the way its supposed to be but its very foreign to me and probably most people. Really a cool concept, but difficulty should be set a little lower or at least have a better learning curve.

[Mk5]

Huh

Well I'm confused by this game. It's a good concept and is fun in the beginning but I kept expecting things to change and they never did. OK theres floating guys and saw-bars but nothing else is ever different. I got all the way to lvl 21 without a single reason to keep going. the animation made it seem like the levels would change once i passed the test or whatever, but its not worth continuing on to that point after 20 levels of the same thing. If new parts were added throughout the game, it could be good.

Also, since the score was money, I kept expecting to go to some store where i could buy stuff, but this never happened. This could have been a good touch. buying upgrades is always a plus. maybe you could buy something that would let you destroy a number of lasers each level, or a temporary, recharging shield, or something to shoot the flying guys, or something that would increase the frequency of power ups, or would increase handling of the ship or let you hover without falling or let you slow down time or be able to buy extra lives or AHHH look at all the things i just came up with! any of these could have made the game better but instead a cool concept is just really bland in execution. perhaps my ideas could help?

[Matrix Pandemonium]

WOW!

When I saw this i did not have very high expectations...just a seemingly very late matrix game. but i must say im impressed: this game plays pretty flawlessly. Nice work!

I seem to be a tad stuck on level three though. any tips?

[Cursor Quest]

Great work

This was a very well done game. Nice music, had a fresh feel to it, and was a pretty good length/difficulty. It would have been very very hard had I not known about the secret levels, but once I found them I was able to just enjoy myself for the most part.

My only major complaint is that I'm not exactly sure what the bounding box is on the cursor. What counts as a collision?

[Avoid_It]

Huh

I was excited for this game after figuring out the secret formula and all...but the stupid death system makes this basically unplayable. theres no way im waiting 10 seconds while the screen tells me i failed only to have to restart afterwards. some of the levels start out waaay too fast for me to have to restart if i lose (the spinning pinwheel-type level did it for me). if you fix this i think you can have a good game.

[Attack Barack]

Err

Shouldnt this be called protect barack?...i know it doesnt sound as snazzy, but really.

[7DeadlySins]

Nice

Reminded me of the actual game where you had to commit all 7 deadly sins...this is really borderline game its sort of a movie.

lol@gluttony

[The Frustration Game]

Nice work!

This was actually a fun mouse avoider game (i don't say that too much). a lot of them you can easily cheat on by right clicking, but not here which is good work. the obstacles were nothing new i guess, but well varied. also, the levels were nice and short which i liked. some games like this make me pull my hair out but i actually was able to enjoy this one (i finished w/ 16 mistakes). the music was good too.

only two problems...the first i already mentioned is that there isn't really anything new here except for the comments (which i did find clever/funny, esp. the first one) and that the high scores weren't working for me, but that could just be some pop-up option i have set. in any case , good job!