BlazingDragon's Reviews

[Echo Force Zero: Vol1]

Despite the cliches, or perhaps because of, I greatly enjoyed this! :D

I particularly like how fleshed out the world is. It feels organic, as if there really is a history to it, and that makes it easier to care about. The characters each seem to have their personality quirks, none being totally flat. There is a variety of music, and the voice acting isn't over-dramatized.

On the other hand, the animation was a distractingly choppy in a few spots, and questionable spelling took my attention off the actual story ("all ready" vs. "all ready"). Still, it's clear that a great deal of work went into this, and the result is terrific. Can't wait to see more!

Also, thank you for using my track!

LewToons responds:

Thank you so much for appreciate the amount of work - - sometimes i feel like it is so easy for viewers so just dismiss things - but its very nice to have someone appreciate the amount of work - -

and yes it is BECAUSE of the cliches that you like it, thats why i make it.

[Cliff of Sorrow]

Nice but underdeveloped

Thank you for using my song. It is greatly appreciated! :D

The flash has potential but is currently too empty. Aside from the pleasent FX and sitting animation, it simply loops indefinitely. A little more substance would be helpful, even if it was only him turning over to sleep, laying down and staring upward, etc. There are some subtleties that would have also improved this such as some small twinkling stars at night, a cloud or two, etc. The Clif was nice (looked like a face, BTW :P) but was the only thing with any substantial detail. Lines in the sand would of been a nice addition. Also, during the shift from night to day, the hue (?) is a bit ugly at some points. Day looks good and night looks good, but the transition back is a little iffy. Everything turns somewhat orange and hazy.

It is a decent loop but could be so much more! There is great importance in subtle details. Rework it a bit and it could be quite nice. Also, the audio quality was slightly muffled for some reason. :(

Thanks for using my tune and happy b-day! :D
~Blaze

gnome42 responds:

yeah this one was actually pretty basic
i was really tired so i just stopped and submitted it
but i updated it with a few changes, alot of the ones that you just mentioned (are you sure you didnt watch "cliff ofdespair"?)
great minds think alike hehe,

i should probably put stars too. ill put it in the... next next one. because todays will be cliff of fire or cliff of hell or something and i doubt they have stars there.
ill change the hue to a nicer color too. the reddish orange did look pretty crappy.
and sorry about the audio im not too good at that . but great song anyway ^^

[Desert (first flash)]

Nice first attempt!

For a first attempt, this appears to be fairly solid. There's no stick figures (Hurrah! :D) and it's colorful. The animation is a bit primitive, but you'll work through that with some sweat and experience.

On a good note, everything was very colorful, and the drawing were decent. What I really thought was cool, however, his the way the flash flowed with the music; when the protaganist (?) shed a tear the music began to pick up as if he were battling with inner turmoil. Probably unintentional, but very cool!

There are things to improve as well. The animation is quite rough. As has been previously said, I believe more keyframes and pumping up the fps should help. I understand that this was just a quick attempt, but why not submit something until it is the best it could be? If you do that, you'll find yourself greeted with some surprising results! (In a good way) The music also was too long for the flash. I don't know if there is a way you could make it fade out with flash, but that would be helpful.

Not a bad job at all for a beginner. Spend more time paying attention to details, read some tutorials, and keep working at it despite what anyone may say. :)

~Blaze

PS. Thanks for using my song! ^_^

HypeSystem responds:

Thank you alot for the review!
(the way the music fitted to what happened was partly intended. I shortened and lengthened in the scenes to make it fit)
I chose your song, as it was the best fitting i could find!
Anyway, thanks a lot!

Oh yea, and I will be putting more work in future projects, don't worry :P

[Moonkid]

Despite rough edges, this interactive story is enjoyable and worth replaying. I love the emotional contrast between the ending outside the boy's house and the, err, other one. ;)

The music you chose is interesting from my perspective as composer. I composed Ambient Evening when I was about 13 years old and The Haunting when I was 21. Although the older tracks aren't as complex or well-mixed, the context of the game breathed life into them. I got a fresh perspective on my own music!

Did you write out the story and then choose the music at the end, or did you have tracks in mind at the beginning of the process? At what point did you decide to go with my music?

Beautiful Betrayal and Impromptu - Spring melded so organically with the two endings that I got chills. However, I think that the final note on Beautiful Betrayal should have rung out and then faded to silence, leaving only ambient noises such as wind or rain. Repeating the track causes those last notes to lose their eerie drama. The repeat of Impromptu - Spring also sounds awkward in the current context. Lastly in regard to music, the transition between tracks when entering a different area is slightly jarring. I slower cross-fade might help.

My complaint about level design is that there appears to be a few useless rooms that NPCs never even enter (correct me if I'm wrong). I wasted time my first playthrough exploring these areas despite the fact that they don't contribute to my understanding or appreciation for the story. This is a bit annoying when time in the game is limited.

Finally, there are small design details that I appreciate. I like how all the animal heads and decorations in Granny's House gives insight into what kind of man her son was. I especially appreciate how you incorporated the music and timed it to fit the emotional contour of the endings. There are many other things about the game I could comment on and ask questions about, but I'll stop before this turns into a rambling wall of text.

Thank you for the wonderful game and for using my music. I'd love to work with you in the future if you're ever interested. ;)

MikeSalyh responds:

Thank you for the review; I'm honored! I started listening to your music very early on in development. I had a few concept sketches and a general premise in mind. I listened to "The Haunting Loop" and "Time Forever Gone" about a thousand times while I was writing the script. (They have a perfect 'air of memory')

Funny story: I had written and animated a different ending before I finalized the song choices. But once I heard "Beautiful Betrayal", I re-wrote the *SPOILER* ending so it would live up to the track. Then, that ending was so dark that I re-wrote the parent's ending to match "Impromptu - Spring". So really, I'd say your music was key to developing this game. I hope I did it some justice (despite the rough edges) ;-)

Cheers,
-Mike

[Mega Boulder Rampage]

I wish there was a method of easily pausing the game. A phone call came in during an intense round and I nearly peed my pants! Unfortunately, I died due to lack of pause. :(

Also, I wish the character couldn't jump quite as high. It is just a tad bit difficult to control those wild jumps, but maybe that is what you were going for. I also think you should show the ability to double jump in the tutorial at the beginning. It took me a looong time to accidentally figure out that was possible!

Otherwise, this game is really fantastic. The music seems anachronistic against the seemingly stone-age setting, but then again, so do the falling saw blades. I actually like the dichotomy those two things produce. You end up with this overlay of very modern elements against a primitive backdrop. And I have no idea why falling rocks produce currency or mushrooms give you life, but I like it.

The upgrades make for high replay value, and I love the variety of enemies. I really like the subtleties in the game such as the screen shaking when objects hit the ground and the temporary invulnerability after being killed. That last one is hugely important. As always, nice artwork.

Loved this, and I can't wait to see what you come out with next!

5/5

[Last Dance (Part 1)]

This reminds me of the old Goosebumps books where you got to choose the scenarios. The bottom of pages would say something like, "Go to page 66 to turn left into the dark ally..." Good memories. :)

That said, this game was fun. The descriptions were vivid and the humor was a nice touch. The ability to go back to the nearest set of choices was a wonderful addition.

There was a spelling mistake (switching "if" and "is" accidentally) and that slightly distracted me. The artwork was basic, but you'll improve over time. The gameplay was slightly repetitive, but maybe that comes with the genre. When you get a bit more experience under your belt, and perhaps some collaborators, it would be awesome to have at least some of the various scenarios as short animated clips. Adding basic sound effects such as doors opening, etc could also help bring the text to life.

I give this a 6.5/10. Solid ideas and a great start, but some fleshing out could easily take this to a further level. Improved art, added sounds, and a little more material could make your sequel polished and immersive. Perhaps even some voice acting.

Fantastic first attempt. Congratulations on the daily 4th place and thank you for using my music. I'd love to collaborate with you and look forward to watching you grow as a game maker.

Shroom-Cushion responds:

That's nice, thank you!

I will try to do the sound effects in the sequel, I got discouraged of doing so in this one, because making the song you composed loop and play without starting a thousand times over over kinda took me a bit to figure out, so by then I was a little over any kind of sounds. But now that I know how stuff works in the sound department, this part should be a breeze in the sequel

I tried to animated a couple of things in this part too, of course not many... like... 2 or so - didn't work out too great, but I will try and see can I pull the animation off when I get to it.

So thank you for the review and for making great music!

[Winter's Embrace]

So lovely! The beginning reminded me of a track from Maple Story. So pure, comforting, diatonic. I didn’t expect the wonderful harmonic twists ahead! I’m a sucker for chromatically descending lines. The sort of darkness there just makes the return to the original material even more joyful. And I love that you change the register at 1:38. Gorgeous ending, too, like a warm hug.

Everratic responds:

Thank you for the review!!!

[Woven Tapestry]

You have a beautiful grasp of harmony. I love the chord progressions in the handful of pieces I’ve heard so far.

My recommendation is to experiment with form and coming up with clear melodies. I’m not saying you should change your style - just that I think you would benefit from exploring these areas as a compositional exercise. The pieces I’ve heard sound very improvisational, like you’re “noodling” with cool chord progressions. You could level up your music by learning to focus it a little more.

For example, you could try to compose a piece with this form: Intro, A, A1, B, A, Outro.

That means you have a short intro to set the mood, but it’s standalone and doesn’t necessary show up again. Then you have the main theme, A. Then you repeat it but with some variation, which is A1. Then you make a contrasting section to keep things interesting, which is B. Then you go back to A before wrapping up the piece with a little outro.

It might seem robotic thinking of music in terms like this, but it’s a great way to push your creativity within some set boundaries. And if you’re the improvising type, you can even practice making up stuff on the fly within a structure like this.

Just an idea, take it or leave it. You have lovely sonic worlds, and I’m looking forward into exploring more of them.

[Within These Castle Walls]

Absolutely gorgeous. Parts of it remind me of the Tristram theme from Diablo, which is one of my favorite pieces of video game music.

I think it would be cool if you experimented with delay effects on this. You could also master the track to bring the overall volume up without losing the dynamic range. You have a decent amount of headroom leftover in the waveform. You could also let the final chord ring out longer, since it cuts off a little abruptly.

Flamadour responds:

Thanks for the review, I thought about using delay but I didn't want to oversaturate the composition. And thankfully I have Wavelab Elements now, so all my tracks will be mastered from now on.

[Old Mario Bros 2]

I second PoisonHeart. This looks really fun!

The hills in the background have dark ovals. Are those supposed to be cloud shadows? If so, I can't really tell. Also, the grass looks a bit too patterned and thus unnatural. I love the Mario variations though. Especially the mage and ice(?) versions!

Cool stuff! :)

[New Beginnings]

Beautiful! It looks like it was taken from the storyboard of some Hiyao Miyazaki film. I feel like writing music to this image. :)