Griffonmender's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Pico and Angry Faish]

I like it, but the reeling noise plays way too loudly, and I second that that the reeling animation takes a bit too long.
Overall though, it's a fun little distraction, and the art is simple but nice.

[Aisaac the Hedgehog 2]

Recolored sprite, uninteresting level design, overly loud sounds, and really should not have the background and the water hazards be such a similar color.
Also, how is there water just... standing up next to a hole in the wall like a solid object????

[Aisaac and the Ark of Weirdness]

Still a recolored sprite, still just blank shapes for backgrounds, still playing sounds way too loudly, but platforming is actually possible.

[Aisaac the Hedgehog 3]

Blatant recolors, blank shapes for platforms, deafeningly loud sound design, poor controls, and I got softlocked in level 1 by jumping through a hole in the wall into an area filled with physics-defying water.
Better than its predecessors, for whatever that may be worth, but not upload ready by any stretch of the imagination.
Maybe next time will be, if your skills continue to improve.

[Lava Joe]

Touch controls are probably better off just being removed entirely.
Hit boxes are very strange- there were times when an enemy hit me through the underside of a platform or seemingly without touching me at all. In level 2, the first moving platform and the fireball are timed in such a way that it is nearly impossible to make the jump onto the platform, as when the platform is close, so is the fireball. And it is a *very* tight jump to make, especially with the limits of the controls.

Computer controls far better than mobile, which would actively lag out or flat out refuse to respond to input, but it's not great.
More importantly, platforms act a little strange. It's very easy to fall off because the edge of the platform image goes farther than its hit box. In level 2 there are fireballs in the beginning that fly straight through the ends of the platforms. It's possible to climb a ladder while just barely touching the side of it. And moving Platforms are much harder to land on than they need to be because the edges of the platform effectively don't exist.

There are also times when the design of the level is counterintuitive.
Multiple spots have enemies that can fly out from offscreen and kill you instantly,
Level 2 has the worst instance of this in the area right before the first moving platform, with several snails and a rock creature all crammed under a platform topped with two more snails.
Even if you don't run directly into them by accident, it is impossible to clear the area without dying multiple times. If the enemies on the ground don't get you, then one of the snails on the top platform will if you try to climb up.
And if that doesn't happen, then you will die on the ladder because you somehow managed to brush the underside of a snail on the platform above through solid rock, or just barely touch the top of the rock creatures head somehow.
There are also a lot of spaces with enemies, but no room to maneuver to actually jump on top of them, which results in cheap deaths.
It's not great.

The enemies aren't that great either.
Even ignoring the "pulled from Facebook" aesthetic of the snails, they are poorly designed on a strictly mechanical method. The combination of absurd speed and needing to hit them 4-5 times, in addition to the aforementioned hitbox issues, is not a good design. These guys are irritating, perform the majority of the aforementioned ambushes, and are such a pain to kill that it is more practical to run past them than to attempt it all.
The rock monsters can't be attacked with the jump alone, but tend to be in places where high ground is hard to reach. Except the area right before the near impossible moving platform in level 2, which *technically* has a platform right there... if you live long enough to reach it.

Overall, the idea is fine, but the game is very rough in its current state.
Broken medals are the least of the problems here.
The game might be controllable, but it's not fun to play.

[Bando's Comic Wizard]

Are there any examples of this in use?
It sounds interesting for sure, but I'm a bit confused on what the end product would look like.

KittyhawkMontrose responds:

Hey! Looks like you already read "the Jar", so you've seen it in action. Congrats on finishing! :D There's several others in the Game Portal so far, and I'd love to see more! If you're wanting to see some more of my comics, please check out my other series, "Paradise Slice": https://www.newgrounds.com/playlists/view/c4542ee899d10d165adad13c7c27a5b7

[Dungeon Survivors]

Mobile support isn't quite right.
Either that or the game really doesn't like my tablet.
Regardless, despite being stuck in place and lagging severely, I am somehow killing orcs and gaining levels, so it does appear to work.
I also got pc controls only in the instructions, so I have no idea how to do things like switch characters
The character select screen was kind of confusing.

Pixels are cute.

Edit: Consider using the coauthor function in project settings to add the rest of the team to the credits and allow the game to show up on their pages with the other projects they've worked on.

Edit2: Noted. Hope testing goes well.

Darkpouetman responds:

Thanks a lot for your feedback! I don't have a tablet to test on so I didn't consider this, I'll see what I can do to make sure the mobile controls display properly. I'll also add the controls for the gamepads as well.

There is no team, only myself, the credits are the itch.io pages of the assets packs that I used to make the game.

[pico rope game PicoDay2023]

Reminds me of the random jumprope game that's just hanging out in the Switch eshop.

[Castr 3]

It's not bad, but it's a bit strange and inconvenient that I can't tell how many points I've put into each of my stats.
It's also a bit annoying that the same enemy type can have a completely different element.
I know random elements are the point, but it's still a little frustrating.

The enemies seem somewhat interchangeable.
There doesn't appear to be any significant difference in behavior between a goblin or a ghost, or it's so subtle as to be undetectable.

I do like the basic concept, the battle system is functional, and the graphics are nice, but I feel like the game could use a few tweaks.

Mythicvenom responds:

Thank you. Fixed the first two issues. :D
I upped the enemy damage though.

[Toppy´s fun web game]

20's web design? I'm just gonna assume that's a typo.
The aesthetic seems *possible* with 2000's technology, but the style doesn't really feel like it comes from that era. At the very least, I never saw any flash games that featured this lineless art back then.
However, it is nice to look at.

I'm a bit confused on some of the other design choices as well.
The orange glitchy effect doesn't look like it comes from the same game, and blackish gray "glitch" that covers Toppy's face doesn't really look like anything in particular?
It's hard to tell from such a short demo, but it seems a bit derivative of Amanda the Adventurer and Andy's Apple Farm.
However, this aesthetic would be very unique for a FNAF game, as most tend towards a more realism based approach.
Also, there is a lot of spelling mistakes that do not seem intentional, including in the newspaper(?)
at the end.

As for the horror, there is potential here, but there needs to be more buildup and atmosphere.
Jumping the player with "spooky" stuff in rapid succession, especially in such a short game, reduces and even nullifies the effectiveness of the scares.
Don't be afraid to have stretches on occasion where nothing bad happens, but it *feels* like something WILL go wrong. Sound design is you friend- pick your sound effects and music wisely, and know when to bring them out and when to leave the player in unsettling silence.

In short, you've got a good start, but it just needs some more refining.

mrchees responds:

thank you i am making a 2nd game with a lot more games so the build up to the jumpscare, and the next game is gonna be set place in 2011 so the game is gonna look better, and this is gonna be one of the gameplay in the full fnaf fan game, and no it would be the same like this, think of this is a demo to see if it sticks or not, and the bad english is for i am not native merican