Kalar's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Madness: Recommencement]

Fantastic game on it's own, but of course it lives in the shadow of something far better.

The Good:
+ Compared to a certain other game, I like the little differences. The special moves seem like a good idea but I didn't find them too useful. Being able to throw grenades on the fly is fun too.
+ The gameplay is actually quite fun and the different modes give it some replay value.

The Bad:
- Weapon Balance is off (more on this in suggestions)
- Damage is practically impossible to avoid. When you have a stream of melee guys (or zombies) coming at you and firearm mooks magically shooting through them, you have no choice but to burn a ton of ammo to kill the kamikaze baseball-bat wielding idiots just to get a shot at the gunmen.
- Medkits are way too random.

Suggestions:
* The pistol is as good or better than all the other firearms. I don't know why the starting weapon with the most plentiful ammo deserves to be so powerful. The Shotgun is just horrible, I'd suggest increasing the number of pellets to 4 or 5. The Assault Rifle is okay, but isn't really that much better than the pistol to warrant switching to. The Flamethrower is pretty beastly but runs out of ammo extremely fast, ammo is hard to find for it, and it's basically a melee weapon. In other words, it sucks too.
* Likewise, the Sword is actually better than all the other melee weapons. The Knife is just sad, the Baseball Bat functions exactly the same as the Sword, and the Axe is far too slow to be of any use (considering its the last melee weapon obtainable). Make the Knife the starting weapon, not the Sword. Nerf the baseball bat's damage a bit and make the Axe faster. This way, it would be Axe = Sword > Knife = Baseball Bat.
* The MAG Agent is pathetic for being a boss. He needs a lot more hitpoints and needs to swing his axe slightly faster.
* Medkits should not be as random as they are. A system like 1 medkit every 2 waves or X # of enemies on endless would've been much better. Considering how unavoidable damage is from the huge groups of enemies later, it requires some lucky Medkit drops to make it through the later waves.

Final Words: Great game that would've deserved 3.5-4 stars a few years ago. Unfortunately, since it's so similar to a superior game (Project Nexus, of course), the rating is hurt quite a bit.

Verdict: 7/10, 3/5

[HTD: Chibi Balrog]

Please stop the severe medal abuse. There has never been an easier way to earn them before you came and shat all over it.

100 Points for clicking a button? Really?

275 Points for clicking a button 8 times?

Sorry, I do enjoy free medal points from time to time but this is just horrific. Stop, please.

[Glean]

Best mining game I've played to date. Mining games usually hit the spot for me, but this was something special. The graphics, the mechanics, and the upgrade system were way above par.

That said:

The Good:
+ Graphics were amazing. I loved the background space, stars, and planets when at the spaceship (which was fantastically depicted as well). The ship, minerals and rocks flying off as you drilled into them really set a new bar for the genre.
+ On that note, the music was fitting and never tiresome.
+ The upgrade system was phenomenal in depth and innovation. I loved discovering new pieces to find out how they fit in my robot.
+ The modules to allow refueling and repairing at the ship made the game feel a lot more user-friendly in the middle-late stages of the game.

The Bad:
- The upgrade system, probably as a victim of its own depth, was incredibly annoying. It shouldn't take me 2-3 minutes of creating sub-pieces just to achieve one upgrade (lvls 4-5).
- Climbing upwards was incredibly tedious before teleport pads were viable to make, unlike in most mining games where it was straight-forward.

Verdict: 9/10, 5/5.

[Color Man]

Sorry, but this was shockingly bad.

The Good:
+The concept was interesting, I'll give you that.

The Bad:
- Graphics are terrible, the "bullets" don't even shoot out of the gun and when you aim left the gun is upside down? lol.
- It was extremely easy. I'm colorblind so I just spammed shift and left mouse key to kill everything. I didn't die once.
- Level design was very poor. It didn't offer a challenge at all and level 6 wasn't even a level!

Thanks for the medal.

Verdict: 1/5, 2/10

thePalindrome responds:

Heh, at least you stuck till the end!

I know there are issues with the graphics, sorry about that!
I couldn't figure out how to make the game difficult while still making it easy to kill stuff!
I'm not a very good level designer, as you can tell.

You are welcome :P

~thePalindrome

[Greydient]

Mixed feelings.

The Good:
+ The story was cute and well done. I felt happy after beating the game. The problem is, that's all this game has going for it..
+ The music matched the current theme in the story well. When it was sad, it felt sad. When it was happy, it felt happy.

The Bad:
- Controls are way too finicky. The fast-sliding boxes are a pain in the ass. A game's difficulty shouldn't be rooted in slippery controls.
- The puzzles are poorly thought out and some are just frustrating (the level when you meet the girl comes to mind).
- The graphics are extremely boring.

Verdict: 2/5, 4/10

[Morax and Murmur]

Fantastic game, the theme and the new additions to the genre make me wonder why this has such a mediocre rating.

The Good:
+ Soul collecting & eating your own troops. Cool stuff.
+ The theme was otherworldly and not like anything I've seen before. The moon's voice was terrific.
+ Well balanced units and upgrades.

The Bad:
- The hero was mostly just a liability.
- Gameplay boils down to holding on for dear life for a few minutes as you get swarmed. Eventually the enemy just stops making units and you can just waltz right through. I'd have preferred a more tug-of-war style gameplay to just a straight-up defend for X amount of time.

Verdict: 4/5, 9/10

[Somby Brain]

Good. Medals work, nice artwork, and it's sufficiently creepy.

Got to rate it in the top 25% of games in this year's Stencyl Jam even though its not terribly original.

Verdict: 3/5, 7/10.

Satyre responds:

Thanks for commenting and rating.

[Cult Prophecy]

What's up with the main character? After he sees ghosts, dead bodies and scary ass bloody notes he just keeps exploring the place? I'd be busting back out the front door ASAP.

Good game, the tab button made it easy to cheat though.

[Relive Your Life]

MEDAL GUIDE FOR ALL ENDINGS

Female Endings (Don't Tap X at all during intro scene)
1. Take Left Toy -> Let Time Run Out
2. Take Left Toy -> Hit Heart with Needle
3. Take Right Toy -> Let Time Run Out -> Let Time Run Out
4. Take Right Toy -> Let Time Run Out -> Beat the challenge
5. Take Right Toy -> Beat the Challenge

Bi-Gender Endings (Tap X during intro scene but don't win)
6. Don't Wiggle (Die)
7. Wiggle a little (Not too much) -> Let Time Run Out -> Let Time Run Out
8. Wiggle a little (Not too much) -> Let Time Run Out -> Type Sentence
9. Wiggle a little (Not too much) -> Hit X when eyes are half-open -> Let Time Run Out
10. Wiggle a little (Not too much) -> Hit X when eyes are half-open -> Beat the challenge
11. Wiggle a little (Not too much) -> Hit X when eyes are fully open -> Let Time Run Out
12. Wiggle a little (Not too much) -> Hit X when eyes are fully open -> Make the shot when hands are high
13. Wiggle too much -> Don't punch (Gives another achievement) -> Scratch-off Left
14. Wiggle too much -> Don't punch (Gives another achievement) -> Scratch-off Right
15. Wiggle too much -> Punch when guard is down -> Don't tap X
16. Wiggle too much -> Punch when guard is down -> Hit X enough times

Male Endings (Hit X enough times in the intro scene, can be difficult)
17. Don't tap X at all -> Let time run out
18. Don't tap X at all -> Beat the challenge
19. Tap X but don't win -> I play the guitar and fail the sentence -> Let time run out
20. Tap X but don't win -> I play the guitar and fail the sentence -> Beat the challenge
21. Tap X but don't win -> I play the guitar and type the sentence -> Miss the high-five
22. Tap X but don't win -> I play the guitar and type the sentence -> Hit the high-five
23. Tap X but don't win -> You girls are so pretty and type the sentence
24. Tap X and win -> Don't type anything -> Let time run out
25. Tap X and win -> Don't type anything -> Beat the challenge
26. Tap X and win -> Fail the sentence -> Tails
27. Tap X and win -> Fail the sentence -> Heads
28. Tap X and win -> Type the sentence -> Let time run out
29. Tap X and win -> Type the sentence -> Beat the challenge (This one is worth 100 points!)

I'm guessing 29 is worth 10x more because you have to beat every single challenge (Womb, then bus, typing the sentence, and beating the bear).

Great game, props on this one.

Verdict: 4/5, 9/10

FrozenFire responds:

You. Are. Amazing. Thanks ;)

[Monsters' Den Chronicles]

Great game, although character progression feels excruciatingly slow. The interface is one of the best I've ever seen - a lot of thought clearly went into the item system. The character balance seems off, the mage characters don't do enough damage for being so squishy and rangers make better healers than clerics which I found quite strange. The melee characters do more damage and are much tougher to kill.

As an aside, the medals don't work. Please fix.

Verdict: 4/5, 8/10

garin-dan responds:

Oops, the medals worked in testing. Fixed now.