HerbieG's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Unfriendly Skies]

The game is promising, but there are some things that could be improved:
1. It seems like the hitbox for hit detection is much bigger than the box for catching a power up, many times an egg just flies through me, but I do not pick it;
2. The power ups you get by reaching higher scores should improve your combat abilities rather than decreasing them. After unlocking the lance the game became worse, because in comparison to the rings of fire the lance is pretty useless.
3. Lots of times the game places the birds in the places where there is no possibility you can reach them, for example right inside the cloud or just next to the jet fighter;
4. The birds themselves should appear in more regular time periods. Sometimes I fly a really big distance without meeting any of them while last time I met 2 in a row, the second one just seconds after I hit the first one.
Think about expanding the game, maybe with a story. Check Sky Quest here on Newgrounds for inspirations ;-)

ben-giantsquid responds:

Thanks for your review! I made adjustments to the game. This is a work-in-progress and I will tweak it whenever I have a chance to. I may not have complied with everything you mentioned exactly due to game design, but it's coming along.
1. The eggs are designed such since 2 eggs are always emitted by the bird so having a delay allows the player to see the eggs and choose between 2 weapons. I tried different things but this seemed to work out the best since he has multiple weapons.
2. I adjusted the power-ups and swapped the Lance for the FireWheel power-ups. I made the SawBlade power-up grow to a larger size to make it stronger than the previous. You can actually kill the jets with a lance by positioning yourself (in the perfect position) in front of the jet. When you acquire the chainsaw, it is the same, but much easier to do.
3 and 4.The birds may be surrounded by an enemy but one should be able to shoot or kill enemies surrounding it since the birds come out at the same intervals now. Birds appear just before a power-up will expire. The player should be aware now and be able to shoot down enemies surrounding the power-up bird.

[ZS Dead Detective - Murder Case]

Another day at the detective's work! And another great game with interesting plot. Although it has several flaws and bugs, mostly happening at the Lurr's farm:
1. There seems to be a problem with leaving the rooms fluently. When going out of the location with One-Eye after clicking on the exit Margh moves, then stands still and then after you click again the transition animation of the screen getting dark etc. finally happens;
2. When you try to leave the location near the stairs, where Acka is standing you click on the right part of the screen, Margh moves there and disappears, nothing happens, then you click again and just before the screen finally goes black you see a speaking bubble with the text "I don't think it is a good idea" or some other text like that.
3. A bit funny: when you return to the dead brain's cell Acka is still talking to you (as a ghost? can a zombie become a ghost?) despite she is no longer there. You can even click on the place she is standing while being invisible.
4. A minor issue: for some reason my score was not posted at the first time.
One remark: this new deaduction system - everybody noticed the pun? ;-) made this game a bit too easy. It shouldn't be too hard to combine all the clues in your brain, it hasn't been eaten ;-) Additionally I had a feeling that this game is easier than the previous ones.
By the way, this game gave me some thoughts:
1. If the zombies cannot die again then is the "murder" crime present in their Penal Code?
2. Would the "murderer" be charged of his crime because he murdered a brain or because he caused some financial losses to the Lurr's farm?
3. If the Zombie Society is "farming" people like people are doing it with animals then how would it be handled generally? Maybe we would come to a conclusion that zombies treat people in a more humanitarian way than we treat the animals?
Hmm...

Muja responds:

Thank you a lot for your review - and for your detailed feedback, it's very appreciated!
I've just uploaded a new version of the game that will fix all the bugs you mentioned.

As for your other questions:
1- Murder crime is present in their Penal Code because even if zombies cannot die, living humans can, and
2- killing a living without eating him is considered a big crime, as it's a waste of brains (a very rare resource nowadays)
3- Living humans are raised with the utmost care... until their brains have matured enough and can be extracted. All in all, I'd say that's very similiar to how we treat animals in "classic" farms.

[Floppy Pipe]

Oh c'mon, another flappy clone? Ok, the mechanics isn't irritating, but at least change the background. For some reason the current one with the add-on of the birds makes my eyes tired very fast.

Catomgames responds:

Hi HerbieG, It was made for fun, but it seems that this game is receiving so much attention! Thanks for your feedback, we will think about changing that distracting background

[Sisyphus]

An interesting new installment of Take a hike game with the use of Greek myth, good idea!
There are some things I would like to mention/change:
1. At the later stages you barely got time to put your fingers on the keyboard and if you get caught you are falling very fast, I managed to deal with it by keeping my fingers prepared while clicking start with my left hand using the touchpad, but that would not be a bad idea to give the player some time to prepare, like a board with "3, 2, 1... go!";
2. As I mentioned at the later stages you fall very fast, so it is only a matter of luck whether you will proceed or not. If you will get caught it is almost a 100% fail, because after you will click your way out of it you will be already too low to recover;
3. As for the luck upgrade: the next levels description is confusing: ow wait, I upgraded the chance of getting caught from 100% to 200% and even to 300%? So I actually made it worse for me? ;-)

AlexTheGreatish responds:

Thanks for the review, I tried fixing the things you told me.
1. You now have time to prepare before you start pushing the boulder
2. It now takes longer before you are able to get caught on a rock
3. I fixed the luck upgrade info, no clue why I didn't notice that lol

[Unsealed Door]

Knowing your previous games when I saw whose game it is I knew that it is going to be tough, but this is quite... brutal. Very unforgiving. Welcome to the hall of pain. There is one thing I would actually want to see improved though: at the current state the dash isn't very functional, it would be much better if I could use it while running down and being able to attack at the same time, to make it something like a piercing attack. Also in regard to the lifetime kills medal it would be good if the game had some kind of a counter for this, so the player would for example know for sure that his progress is being continued after returning to the game.

RainbowCemetery responds:

lifetime kills are reported in the web console when the game ends, though that's more something i forgot to turn off than an intended feature. appreciate the feedback

[Block Mystery Crew: Dracula's Castle]

Absolutely brilliant idea of using Lego for creating a game! An advice: to make the areas look similar before and after taking some things from it etc. place a camera on a small tripod. This will help you take another photo from the exactly same position.

selfdefiant responds:

Thanks!! I started using my dslr camera then found my camera on my phone took better photos but had that problem with not being the same position. I will figure it out and make it better next time. I had no idea how lighting and everything can effect the photo! :)

[Lost Temple]

Like JCLV wrote the game seems to be not saving progress at all. I already passed several areas, finished few levels (the water one, the fire one), but had to stop playing. I returned to the game and now I will have to start from the very beginning.

Is it an AUTOsave or do we have to do something to actually make the game save the progress?

JeffreyDriver responds:

Sorry for the trouble. There is an autosave and it saves every time you switch to a new scene. When you come back to the game, 'Continue?' should appear under the title. Clicking that should take you to the last scene you were on.

I haven't been able to replicate the problem, but I'm looking at it.

[Jumping to the Top]

Last time when you submitted this game you accused me of putting a crappy review to your game before you pulled the game out for obvious reasons. As you can check I played over 3 500 games here, being a witness of lots of different and weird control schemes, game mechanics etc., but what the hell, I may know nothing ;-)

Well, your game is still bad, because except adding a small intro you did not change anything significant. Oh: one thing for the bad: you can sometimes get stucked like for example when you land behind that rotating coin to the very right, it is impossible to jump to the left when you get stucked there, so you have to reload the game, because there is even no reset option, button or whatever.

But there is one much more important thing, besides the fact that the controls are overresponsive: your game needs a meter that will show the player how much power did he charge for the next jump. This would make it possible to learn the controls better, but there is even more important reason to this: take note that your controls may work in an entirely different way on different keyboards. One is more sensitive, one is less and the same time of holding the left/right button can result in an entirely different behavior of the jumper.

Add this and I will surely rise my rating of your game.

CitizenGoose responds:

Hi.
Thanks for the collaborative review ;) I have made the changes. Please check it out. And you can press R