Labmouse's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Pixel Blaster]

I'd buy that for a dollar!

This game is hot. Well done.

The game is a top-down shooter, and movement is controlled separately from weapons fire, which is somewhat reminiscent of the arcade classic Smash TV. The physics are very glossy and smooth, and yield a wonderful gameplay experience.

In later levels, enemies are thick skinned, so it becomes necessary to charge your weapon to get kills. At the high end, managing your energy resources between your cannon and shields is a fine art.

One detail that I really enjoyed is that once your weapon is charged, the charge depletes over time, not by shots fired. This is huge, and awesome.

Please, move the shield key off of 'q'! It makes me sad having my mobility affected by reaching for the shields, so shileds need to be on a key that can be held down while 'wasd' is being used- 'shift' or 'ctrl' would be great, or you could even take over 'space'. (Who needs brakes, anyway?)

As for things to add- in that limbo when you have just died and are waiting to be reborn (so you can get shot at more times yay), I would like to have a little mini-game appear wherein you can repeatedly punch a baby seal or something. I don't know, I just wanna punch something.

The laser is really cool, but I feel like there should be weapon upgrades or special weapons or something. Big explodey weapons. Put the shield key on 'space', and 'q' can set off the bombs :D

Energy is replenished by making kills, but it's hard to make kills without energy... Maybe make energy slowly regenerate over time to provide another way out of energy debt?

It would be cool if shields reflected shots. What if you could bounce incoming shots by timing your shield just right?

I'm only giving suggestions because I'm excited to see what you'll do next. I commend you! Excellent work!

I'm off to get beat up by hard mode a few more times...

[SC Guitar Maniac Dx 3]

It keeps getting better!

Nice game, sir! There have been a lot of improvements of SCGMDx2. I like the new layout, the options to disable effects, and of course the new kickass tunes make the game. Very nice.

Linux is not be problem- game plays and everything. (OpenSuSE 10.2 w/ Firefox). The only problem I noticed was a timing offset- the arrows get there about a beat before the music. It would probably be horrible to program, but adding an option to calibrate the timing would let me correct the gap... The same timing issue happens in SCGMDx2. I haven't checked #1.

But the good news is that it's probably a linux-only problem. When I play through a different OS, the timing is very nice and crisp, and makes me want to issue double rations of high-fives.

Did anyone else notice that the little stick figure guy is actually playing the song? That is so frikkin' cool! But dude, what is with the pelvic thrusting? Was that really necessary?

Was it?

[Broken Wings]

Playing once is not enough

I have to start by defending the play control. It is silky and smooth. There is a short learning curve, but come on, people, it is not that difficult to grasp. Just remember that pressing a key to steer gives you an acceleration, not a flat velocity. As the author mentions, you can use this to lead a target with the machine guns, and once you get a feel for it, switching back is unthinkable.

I played through the game a couple of times, trying out different stat combinations. The challenge of the game varies greatly depending on how you design your ship. If you find that your enemies are too difficult to kill, chances are that you would have an easier time by putting your stat points in different places.

If you're having trouble, try exploiting your fail-safes. There are three types of fail-safe:

Red- launches a barrage of weapons fire
Yellow- lightning discharge that damages all enemies on screen
Blue- vortex that damages all nearby enemies while stealing life to recharge your shields

Fail-safe is charged by making a string of hits against your enemy. Because you can carry up to two at a time, and because there isn't much reason to stop firing your machine guns, roughly speaking you should be constantly firing off your fail-safes to avoid wasting them.

This does break the game a little. Red fail-safes are basically a freebie, because all that weapons discharge is sure to earn you another fail-safe, and blue fail-safes recharge your shields to such a large extent that damage is never really a problem. As a fail-safe junkie, you don't really need to dodge all that much, and you don't have to put any points in the defensive stuff like armor or sensors. (I put my speed at around 15, then load up on precision and overkill.) If you focus your weapon points on increasing your fail-safe damage, you can easily stomp through the game by launching off special attacks like a pissed-off Pikachu. Adding to the machine gun speed means that your failsafe charges faster, but I leave it to you to find a good balance.

I think machine guns are more useful than missiles, but you can get by either way.

I experimented trying to find a way to make the laser useful, but it was just too slow to use. Even pumping the damage, width, and "effect" (whatever that does), the laser has too much waiting involved to still yield a high average damage per second. Waiting to charge the damn thing was bad enough, but being unable to fire anything else while the laser is on means that the laser is pretty, but otherwise useless, much like my ex girlfriend from high school.

After beating the game, I would have liked to replay the old levels with my shiny high-level ship. The effective length of the game could be easily increased by repeating the levels, having higher HP enemies that fire more often (even if they look the same), and changing the background image to make it feel like a new stage. You might also have randomly generated levels where waves of enemies are selected randomly from the earlier levels. Cheap, but effective. As it stands, the game was too short for me to fully upgrade my ship into a Godzilla Armageddon Monstrosity, which is something I would very much like to do.

Overall, I thought it was a very fun use of a couple of hours. Even though I had those minor nit picks about play balance, they were more as afterthoughts, and the in-game experience is good times. To get a full sense of the diversity this game has to offer, you really do have to play a couple of times and try different things. Definitely check it out!

Thanks for the game!

[- Bubble Bust -]

Not ready for prime time

Interesting idea, but there's a lot of polishing to be done. I feel that around the time the game starts to require some interaction is also about the same time when you get sealed in the corner waiting for your death, temple of doom style. I feel the graphics were a bit plain, and even a simple music loop could have added a lot of warmth to the game experience.

Here are some changes I would like to see-
1) add some background art that changes upon level up
2) sleeker graphics for the bubbles, perhaps something with a little transparency
3) music

This would be more difficult, but making the green boundary box a different shape, such as an irregular polygon or (better still) a maze would add a lot more interest. Or alternately, having the bubbles be actual enemies with AI and blasters would add a lot more interaction and a lot more fun. Another thing you might try would be to include a weapon or powerup that you can use to fragment and scatter the bubbles. Just some ideas to mull over.

I think the general idea is interesting, and the play control itself is pretty smooth, but I think it needs better packaging to become a more complete gaming experience.

Don't get discouraged! I think you're heading in the right direction! I look forward to seeing more of your work!

0koopy0 responds:

Thanks very much for your comments! This is the first game I have made and I was more focussed on just getting something out there and seeing what happens than producing a polished, final game. Despite this, there will definitely be a sequel on the way with better graphics (where did i get that idea from!) and maybe some music (BTW I tried to find some music but i had no idea where to look, any suggestions).

thanks!

[The Puzzle Game]

Aaah! F[beep]!

A fresh version of the classic game Mastermind, complete with top grade taunting awesomeness. Audio is a definite must.

Play this game, or else I will destroy... Outer Space!

[Ninja Guiji]

Maybe fill it with cement and call it a 'bricken'.

I gotta get this off my chest- I need there to be a comedy mode where the ninja kills a samurai with a rubber chicken.

I only have two nits to pick- for some reason, I can't press up, left, and space at the same time. Perhaps I'm not venting to the right people and I should take it up with my keyboard vendor :)

Also, the combat system was a bit too 'rock paper scissors' for my taste, and I would prefer something more interactive.

With that out of the way, this game does everything it sets out to do: put on some galoshes and wade silently through buckets and buckets of blood.

The claw is super cool.

But a real ninja would use a rubber chicken.

[Gateway II]

Bravo!

I couldn't ask for anything else from this wonderful game. The minimalist approach was an artistic choice that paid off in a huge way. Don't be tricked by the apparent simplicity, this game holds a wealth of complexity and depth that left me breathless and speechless.

Do yourself a favor and play it all the way through.

[Tactics Core Demo]

I so horny for this game!

Gorgeous graphics, interesting tactics, and a few suprises! Once you figure out the rules, it's quite fun. Best tactics game ever done in flash, no questions asked!

[Jack French #1]

Canadian Cuisine?

Excellent!

The intro drops you right into the action of investigating the crime scene, and although the game is easy to navigate, you'll need to have a lot of attention to detail to solve the mystery.

Revisit scenes, uncover new evidence, interrogate witnesses... Things aren't always what they seem. Nice art, nice voice acting, wonderful and cohesive plot. It's easy to see how Jack French is successful enough to warrant some sequels.

The only problems were a few very minor bugs such as the cursor vanishing, and a little bit of bleed-through from the different lines of dialog, but it was never too distracting.

Thanks for all your hard work! This is lots of fun to play!

Johnnybdesign responds:

Hey! Thanks for the review. It is appreciated.

[Forgotten Rites - Alpha]

Very promising demo

The backstory and atmosphere are awesome! I was a little disappointed when I reached the end of the demo, because I definitely wanted more.

Play control is very smooth, which is a definite plus.

Once you're done with the game, be sure to use the author's code to try out the special attacks- some of them are quite spectacular!

Well made game! I'm eager for more levels to explore!