Blank-Mage's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Gap Monsters]

Aaaaagh.

Man, that's one crazy game mechanic. It's like one of those slide-y puzzles, only 4 times more difficult, and with screaming. Some of those levels were fiendish, the Mario one really drove me up a wall.

The writing was great, with its' somewhat Portal-inspired callousness, the music was perfect, and the bizarre screams (Micheal Jackson?!) were fantastic.

(These monsters have developed art, culture, and love. Burn it. Burn it all.)

Nutcasenightmare responds:

Portal was a great source of inspiration for this game.
My words to my beta testers were simply... "Continue testing".

I do sort of see how the bizarre screams could remind you of Michael Jackson...
Negative space... "It don't matter if you're black or white".

[HeliCops]

Visibility is kinda an issue.

The game itself is great, I love anything with upgrades, and the controls and background are fantastic. My problem is that I can't see 10 feet in any direction, which means the only fighting I can do is at ridiculously short range. (Radar is useful, but I can't aim with it, after all.) Dodging bullets and rockets is similarly impossible.

The-EXP responds:

Don't want it too easy do we?

[Z-Rox]

Easy... once you get the hang of it.

I was doing great right up to 35, and while I know what shpe it is, I can't think of a name for it. A box with arrows on the ends? OH WAIT! IT'S A FRAKING HEXAGON! You clever bastard! I'll beat this game yet! (And you thought SQUARE ROOT would get me, didn't you?! HaHA!)

Anyway, you get a 10, because this is entirely too addicting.

Evil-Dog responds:

Come on man, don't give answers in the comments, it could ruin people's fun!
but yeah...once you see it the right way it'S rather easy...but wait till you get to the extreme part :) Not so easy! haha

[Amorphous+]

Great way to kill some time. And Glooples.

This game wouldn't be all that remarkable, but when you factor in the awards, rewards, humor and surprisingly thorough science, you get something awesome. I was getting bored killing the things, and then a grey appeared. While I was trying to figure out how the hell to KILL the thing, it turned into a void eater. Sure, it killed me almost instantly, but it's that kind of weird gameplay that makes this unique. So, you don't quite get a 10, because it does get a little repetitive, but it's a nice game nonetheless.

You might want to consider adding RPG elements, as I'm sure others have said. Everything is better with upgrades, in my opinion. You may also want to give hints about how to unlock awards, considering how many you have. (Somewhere between "Oodles" and "Oh dear God.") And fighting anything bigger than a grey is almost impossible, but then again, that's the point, isn't it?

innocuousGames responds:

I honestly don't think RPG elements belong in an arcade-style game. That sort of defeats the point to me. The idea is for the game to be something engaging but casual (admittedly the Awards sort of skew this idea a bit, but not in the same way that statistics or attributes would). All the clamouring for life bars and a variety of weapons would make more sense to me in a game where you actually did and recieved damage, rather than in a game like this, where typically something dies when it's successfully struck, and so does the hero.

As with many games of this species, fighting the big things is often a matter of knowing how to deal with them. That's what practice mode is for :)

Thanks for the review, and good luck with those Void Eaters!

[StarBaron - Skirmish]

Excellent game, I thought this might help...

This game is one of the best I've played on NG. It's simple enough to be played with one button, but with enough strategy to keep me playing for hours. My biggest request is online multiplayer. I know that's probably not easy, but it really would take this game to a whole new level. You get a 10, because while this game may not have much in terms of campaign or multiplayer, it's only a beta, and the game so far is incredibly promising. Great work! And I came up with an idea that you're free to ignore, if you so choose...

If you add a campaign mode, you could have it in the form of a galactic map, with each system being a skirmish. Think the board game "Risk" and you'll get what I'm talking about. How you start each skirmish would differ depending on your progress on the galactic map. For example, if you've flanked a system before engaging battle, you might start out at two different points at the outset. It might also affect resource gathering, overall defense/offense, I'll leave the details to you. Well, I've never designed a game, so I really don't have a clue how it would work, but I hope I helped. Thanks again for this kickin' beta!

alienpro responds:

I like your campaign mode idea, particularly the part where your progress on the campaign map affects your starting positition in the battle. Unfortunately it's a bit more than I had planned for the next version, it's definately what I'd like to do down the line a bit.

Thanks again for the feedback!