Backspin's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Family Restaurant]

lol. it's dead on in a way.

a lot of fun, i'm not too far in, but it's funny that i would come from work at a restaurant and be willing to play this game for more than 30 seconds.

one thing though, after that last guest leaves, you should be able to fast forward. just like in the real business, you want that last lingering bastard out the door as fast as possible so you can close up, or in this case, move on to the next level. lol.
good job though, definitely.

[Insurgo]

could use some tweaking, but overall, really great

kept me captivated for some time, which is how i think games need to be ranked first and foremost.
the physics seems just a little strange though, i don't know what it was. probably it is just harder to build towers than i want it to be, i guess that's why you don't see construction crews just showing up on the job and eyeballing it, right?
wow, yeah, no it's definitely really great. a mode where you have more than 2 starting pylons would be a great addition, if you do look in to a sequel.
also, as you build your tower higher, a little minimap that shows stress points building up would be swell, so that you don't have to scroll down to see what color the bars on the bottom of your tower are.
i can't so much give corrections so much as expansion possibilities, because i think this game has a lot of room to grow.
objective based games, such as build a tower that can support X more weight, or build a building that is x feet by y feet and has n volume, (wow, i feel like i'm in math class). but you know what i mean. something beyond just the height of the thing.
great job on the physics and all, and now i'm off to go check out your other submissions!

VoidSkipper responds:

I never thought of using a minimap to display stress, that's a possibility. I wouldn't look too closely into my other submissions - I spent a lot of time learning flash and physics, and studying what makes a game fun after they had such mediocre response x3

Thanks for your review!

[Castle Crashing the Beard]

*bug report* pretty entertaining though.

yeah, i liked it and all, definitely a classic boss-fight style.
i don't have too much to say about the game, but i noticed a bit of a glitch.

if you use your ranged fireball magic attack, but then die before it hits, and then it hits and you cause damage, you may still level up.
you return to the game play screen but can't move or attack. it's as if the tomb stone symbol is replaced by your player character.

i only had this happen once, and i dont' know if i could be bothered to recreate it, it's a bit difficult to time, actually.
anyway, good game.

[Drunken Masters]

this is well and truly fantastic

i've experienced just a couple of minor bugs that i wasn't able to get out of, and considering the scope of this game, i think that's miraculous.
this is a truly inspired bit of design and innovation, taking flash to that upper echelon of game, one of those games that is actually worth coming back to.
my only bit of disappointment was in the music, not so much that i didn't like it, but that it might have been a better choice to have seamless loops in spots where there are verbal introductions to songs (i'm getting at that "raising the bar" track that you hear at the menu and all). don't get me wrong, i liked the music, but hearing that intro over and over was a bit annoying. that's nit-picking, though, because i couldn't find anything legitimate to complain about in this game.
oh, yeah, i guess the balancing trick is a bit overpowered, considering it's difficulty in comparison to things like the superman and frozen coast. you can beat most of the vs matches by doing a single 30 second balance, which is kind of lame.
anyway, the game play is great, the physics seem dead on, and the customers have so many different variations that it doesn't get boring in that respect either.
absolutely fantastic job. i know the word gets thrown around a lot these days, but i'd say this is epic.

[Linkaball]

for a relaxing game, it's awful frustrating.

maybe i'm missing something? i'm reading over the help section, but i'm confused.
i have no control over anything but the white balls, which means that if a green ball heads towards a chain, all i can do is watch and yell angrily.
beyond that, the music, while technically relaxing, is an unfortunately short loop that grows annoying sooner rather than later.
i guess i'm disappointed because i was looking for something to wind down to and instead i'm moreso upset.
good effort and all, though.

[Who Am I? Objects]

not bad

but perhaps you're not taking in to consideration your audience, or audiences, in this case.
you need to code more "correct" answers, for instance,
the chap before me was saying he had trouble with the phone booth answer, this might be due to the fact that where he's from, they call it a "phone box" instead.
another example i encountered were glasses vs. sunglasses, that's getting pretty picky in a game where all i can see is the frame.
beyond that, it seems like half of the people on the blagosphere can't spell these days, but it's awful hard to code for the intended meaning, so i guess i can't hold that against you as the author of this flash.
simple, but reasonably entertaining, so good job.

[Cosmo Cabs]

i feel like it had more potential

it's good, dont' get me wrong, but it could be a 4.3 instead of a 3.6.
the speed cameras seemed too difficulty to get past, i'd slow down, try to goose the throttle through and end up momentarily passing above 90 just because of gravity. eventually i didn't even bother, because it looked like all they did was take some money away; money that i would save by getting my fare there faster.
upgrades would've been a great idea to prolong gameplay, but then you'd probably have to make more maps, too. collision detection, while efficient, was a bit strict at times, and some of the background/foreground objects were hard to distinguish.
not a bad submission, by any standard, but a few tweaks here could go a long way.

[Planet Defender]

could use some tweaks...

but let me firstly say that it was a great game.
the things that let me down were in the repetitiveness, really. beyond that, it's pretty well done. some notable fixes, i think, would include:
1) enemies who are "targeting" the player's ship should not count as having reached the planet just because they cross it. this would introduce a bit more strategy to the game, luring enemies around and then using your guns to target other incomings
2) drop the decimals in the money/shop screens. i know this is a minor detail, but it looks unprofessional, whatever that means on newgrounds.
3) sound options: either have better music, or a way to turn off the music (keeping sound effects might be a plus though). though i loathe to admit it, i'd rather be playing this game to some euro-techno beat than the music that is playing now.
4) accuracy bonus? you're keeping track of hits and misses, why not introduce that as an element of gameplay?
5) button remaps: at the higher levels, i'd rather my upgraded cannon be number one instead of 6. i ought to either be able to remap the keys, or, and this would be a great change to the gameplay: have a limited number of slots on the ship to fill. and then adding the new cannon, for instance, would force me to remove another of my older weapons. this would also introduce more energy balanced weapon loadouts. tying in with this is number 6
6)weapon groupings/quick changes: the freeze cannon is kind of pointless if it takes me too long to switch to it, fire, and then switch back to cause damage. i guess this helps to make the game more difficult, but it might also be cool if i could configure weapons to fire, say, every 5th or 6th shot.
well, i guess i had more to say than i thought, it's a good thing, though, i think your flash has a lot of potential and i'd like to see that come out in a game that the community might tag as epic. as it stands i don't think this one is quite there. i don't say that with hostility, though, you've done a great job here.

[Make A Tonberry 2]

well, it works...

the problem is it just wasn't very engaging.
i mean, the graphics were nice and the weapons were well drawn, but in all honesty, why would i want to make a tonberry?
i'm not trying to bash your flash(es), as i see that all of your previous submissions have been tonberry related. this just, well, wasn't very fun. you grab a two out of 5 because i think there is enough effort to warrant not blamming it and all, of course, but in the future, i dunno, make your flashes a bit more worth while, i guess. be more innovative, even. i'm sorry to sound like such an ass.

JackalTonberry responds:

Yeah I know.
But this isn't exactly supposed to be an engaging game.
I'm aiming it at the person who just wants to mess around in something for a bit, not the person that wants to go on a giant adventure or something.

[Ogotu]

has potential

seems like i might enjoy playing the game more if the banner "STOLEN" wasn't flashing the whole time...

Jindo responds:

Haha yeah sorry about that, I noticed just after playing ;p.

It was to stop people from taking it from my site, but I forgot to change it before uploading.

You may notice that it's fixed now :).