HerbieG's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Bullet Heaven 2]

I'll be updating this review with more thoughts, but some things were made better in the first version. I have to say that I am not praising this game like most of the people. Few things so far:
1. Not being able to stay in the full screen mode if you want to pause the game and restart it. Pressing escape makes also exits full screen mode.
2. About multiplayer and alternate controls scheme: using right-click for anything has to be changed, because right-clicking in Firefox disables the keyboard. The game should be fully functional for all browsers.
3. The description of the NG medals should include all the requirements that have to be met. Hovering over all of the ? boxes in the in-game medals section just to find a certain medal is a bit annoying. At least it would be better if the medal icons were grayed out until unlocked.
4. As for some medal requirements: a bonus round is a bonus round, so it should not count.
5. Changing the normal upgrades system into a system based on purchasable cheats is a bad thing. And having to purchase the handicaps is a bad thing as well. Having a traditional upgrades system makes it possible to create levels with much more variety of fair difficulty.
6. I admit I am not necessarily a fan of bullet hell games because of one thing: after some time of playing and heavy focusing on the screen it always makes the eyes unnecessarily tired, especially when you have to dodge tons of flashing bullets. It's simply unhealthy.
7. On the other hand, positive this time: a pacifist mode is an interesting thing to try, it actually helps you understand the patterns much better than playing a level in a traditional way.

A PS to your concern:
As you probably know on Newgrounds flash games are not going to die thanks to lots of effort made by PsychoGoldfish and TomFulp. Besides, there are still many ways to keep playing flash games anyway. I wouldn't be so sure about the sponsor of your games Kongregate though since they are "re-profiling" and flash games actually can be dropped by them.

matt-likes-swords responds:

Some of this feedback comes a bit late as Flash games are about to stop working in browsers... I've heard tomorrow is literally the last day.

[Ordeals of December]

Nice game! There only should be a way to skip the tutorial, especially if you choose to "try again".

TwoPigs responds:

Thank you - glad you enjoyed it! That makes perfect sense, will put it on the to-do list :D!

[Bauble Buster]

1. Is your game re-checking medals? Because for some levels they failed to unlock for me.
2. As for your answer to SOLjack-arts: it isn't an anti-cheat system, it is your game disconnecting from NG, which can be solved by adding a code that would force the game to connect to Newgrounds before posting a score/unlocking a medal.
3. The game should allow the player to play further even if I reached the level's minimum score, but I still got gnomes left.
4. The speed of the paddle is too slow.
5. When the "ball" comes out of a bow tie placed in the lowest row you are almost 100% finished, there is no way to bounce it back up.

Omael responds:

Thanks for playing and for your patience with medal stuff, Herbie,
The medals wheren't unlocking because i was unlocking them for the first time while you where playing and was having a hard time getting to those 100% ;-)
There's now an option to stay on the same level as long as you want.
i've spoken with Jack and he told me that he left the game open for a couple of days so the disconection was expected after the session expired, i'll look into that.
You may throw an additional gnome as long as there are gnomes falling. But i think your way may work better.
I'm adding 20% more speed to the paddle right now.
The bow ties are supposed to be hindering traps to play around.

[MazeWorld: MMO]

Good game overall, but getting the last medal was annoying because of how the game works:
1st attempt: ruined, because you updated the game in the meantime;
2nd attempt: unsuccessful either, because the game disconnected form Newgrounds; apparently it can't stay connected to NG for more than few minutes;
3rd attempt, finally successful, but only because I quit the game just before reaching the diamond and reloaded it.

larrynachos responds:

That's very strange, even moreso now that reloading seemed to fix it.

Not sure why the game would keep disconnecting from NGio api, a newgrounds login is required to play the game at all 😂

Sorry it gave you so much trouble!

[Glide]

Steering sucks. Speed losses are too big. And if you get too many obstacles requiring going up in a row you're basically done.
Oh, the controls are a bit overresponsive.

bluswimmer responds:

Thanks for the feedback. I've adjusted the gravity so that it's more forgiving.

[QWER]

Your game is disconnecting from Newgrounds annoyingly fast. I just set a record of some 26 points, just 3 minutes after I started playing the game and already it was too late for it to be submitted. At least the game should remember the highest scores.

PS

I reloaded the game, scored 12, lost, score submitted. Played again, scored 18, score not submitted...

IF-dev responds:

The problem has been fixed.
I recommend clearing your browser cache before attempting to break any records

Sincirely, Kees van Beilen

[Crystal Charge]

There is one big problem with the game: most of the times it fails to load saved level progress.

Jordio94 responds:

Sorry about that. It's been saving fine for me, but I know it doesn't work for everyone. Will definitely try and fix it.

[ROOM ROOM]

In my opinion those 3 minutes times are unrealistic because of the randomness of the game. Your game reminded me this submission, which is fair (and much better done), while yours is not:
https://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/640594
The way in which the squares move is completely random, from vertical to diagonal etc. without any physical logic in it. Additionally, that initial spin of the bunny is making things even worse, because at this stage you cannot move while the squares can and you may even die before beginning the stage with completely no your fault in it. Again: unfairness to the player.
Oh, I even could not figure which key is responsible for the speeding, because that medal... unlocked for me several seconds AFTER I finished the all orbs run. Probably a bug.
And another thing: the game disconnects from NG quite fast, after I restarted the game I improved my time, but it was not submitted, so it is important for the game to remember/store the player's best time for both 3 orbs and all orbs modes.

Pachachos responds:

Thanks for playing! The squares bounce normally and the weird behavior may be because the corners are kinda rounded. During the spin when you enter a new room, there is a growing orange shield in the middle that prevents you from getting hit inmediately, but I agree it sometimes leads to tricky situations to avoid. The 3 minutes are definitely doable! Specially if you find the "secret button" that you have to hold (there are actually multiple buttons that work and they are pretty common).
And yeah, first time messing around with the newgrounds api, so I'm sorry about the very likely bugs with the leaderboards/medals ^^'.
Thanks again for your nice feedback!

[Poppy Skully]

Main question and offense: why the game is not saving progress? Oh, the 1-to-last level is completely dumb in the context of getting 3 stars because the box can easily fall in a way in which it will get stuck. It makes this level purely luck-based.

ZeroStas responds:

I have tried to implement save system but I had too much complications with it, for example the level select not working.

[The Office]

Wow! Now that is entirely different from all of your previous games... and is telling me that Unity games are becoming so good that I will need a better computer to play them smoothly ;-) But I admit I'm impressed! Keep it up!

larrynachos responds:

This game should run fine on lower spec computers, I just don't know how to optimize for WebGL so it runs really poorly compared to my preview within unity3d xD

I'm glad you liked it! I hope to learn more and make better 3d games in the future!