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MinatoArisato

13 Game Reviews w/ Response

All 62 Reviews

M U T A T E

ThatWormStudios responds:

m u t a t e

The tutorial is kinda bogging this down, can't skip it and its egregiously slow each time you die

PixelHeadAche responds:

Sorry about that! the infinite tutorial was a bug, the idea was that you could only do it once but it's fixed now! once the tutorial is finished you can't repeat it.

Amazing game.
-10/10 Cute character design
-Surprising amount of content! I kept seeing more stuff and expected like 2 ghost models.
-Black on white easy to read colourscheme
-Built in challenges that feel like you actually playtested and cared about what you made
-Interesting and fun mechanic
-Quite a few creative powerups

The only real bad thing I can say about it is that I wasn't sure if the eyeball powerup was an enemy or not, but that's hardly a slight for something otherwise so fantastic

Instead of just offering praise though, maybe I can ask some questions.
-How many people worked on this game?
-Where did your inspiration come from for the art/gameplay?
-Did you build it in a game engine or make it from scratch?
-Does your character have a name?
-What are you/will you be working on next?

FodderLabs responds:

Thanks for playing!

Yeah, we are thinking of a way to keep the current eyeball powerup design but to better convey to the player that they are friendly. (Maybe we should have come up with something more cute instead lol)

Glad you enjoyed the game and thank you for the feedback! :D

Ooo, great questions! :D

1) Stix and I handled the code + art aspects, with Legobuzz12 being commissioned for the gameplay music. (Cloud Road Music made a track for an old game I was working on a while back but it ended up fitting better for this game!)

2) As far as art inspiration, I would say Undertale is a big inspiration in terms of character design/ aesthetics. (Muffet is my favorite character! :P ) But gameplay-wise, it was more of a last minute decision lol The original game was made for a 1-bit game jam (The theme was "Light and Darkness")

For the gameplay inspiration, I've always LOVED the game "Streamline" as a kid (You can play it here on Newgrounds! :D ) and I have been wanting to make a level around synchronized music + gameplay. (Especially with such talented musicians at my side!) We shall see! :3

Also, vampire survivors was an inspiration as well. (Maybe I can lean in more on the randomness/ rogue-like elements for a spin-off! :P )

Originally, I was going to try making a "Celeste" style game with Violette platforming around instead. (There would be sections of the level that would have darkness that would hurt/ insta-kill the players, so staying in the light was the objective!)

But after a couple of days, I realized this was going to take too long for a game jam (This one gave you a week, so it was a bit better for my schedule), so I decided to scrap what I worked on and make something else smaller in scale.

I knew a single screen game would be easier to manage, just needed to have enough variety + gameplay elements to keep someone interested for a few minutes! :P

Thus, "Bleek" was born! :D

3) This game was built in a game engine. (Construct 3)

But I wouldn't mind re-working + re-tooling from scratch!

4) Yes! Her name is "Violette". (Though, despite the black and white aesthetic of the game, she does have color!) :3

5) Our next focus is going to be working on more Bleek content!

I've already met with Stix and we have a pretty good idea of where to go next with the content. (Also Legobuzz12 is hard at work cooking up some sick beats!)

We are aiming to release it around December 18 - 20.

After that, I want to go back and improve some of the old games I've worked on. (The "Weapon Switch" game on my itch page needs some love, same with Plague Princess and Battle Ninja Otter.)

Then... I dunno, I haven't thought that far ahead lol

Thank you for taking the time to ask these questions!

Hope you'll stick around for the update! ;D

Grey screen with tiny text "No game for you"

Thetageist responds:

Try it now! I reuploaded the old file, see if it works.

So visually I think this game and concept is super cute, you're a little ghost recovering riches in your mansion, I like the gem collecting, the secrets and extra collectables by making par and such, (Not that I have yet). But I have a couple of glaring issues that are getting in the way of me just bingeing the whole thing, we'll start with the obvious one others have mentioned.

[CONTROLS]
The game is in no small part difficult already with timing your jumps with enemies moving around the room or trying to work within the timer, but I find myself constantly fighting with the controls trying to make precise movements. Like I can see where the gems are, and what pattern I'd like to take, but making tight turns consistently is near impossible without tremendous effort. I even tried to use myself as a wall to rest on, but the turning and directional movement feels overly sensitive and fast. Which in itself isn't a bad thing, feeling sluggish while trying to dodge enemies sucks, and the faster you can move in a game like this where levels are already going to take awhile the better, but with so much of the goal tied to ACCURATE movement, we have a problem. I'm unsure of what the best way to fix this would be without understanding how the movement is programmed, but my advice is just take the Nintendo approach of reducing it down to as simple and accurate as possible first, (as in, step by step, block by block movement with infinite wait time before being pulled back) Then seeing what you can do to make it faster from there once accuracy is 100%. You said it's meant to be hard, and I can appreciate that, but their is challenging design, and frustrating controls, and this is the latter which you already know. If you want to be successful with your steam release, finding a way forward with that is a must, experiment a bit with control styles until you arrive at something good. Actually idea just now for short term success: Add a modifier button/key (I played on both KB and Controller) that won't let you get pulled back to your point of origin as long as its held down, or a 'slow down time' modifier for precise intricate movement. You could even add a power meter so you can't just do the whole level with it and have to use it for the tricky parts.

[DIALOGUE]
I like a good story, the extra dialogue both in the intro/certain levels and journal is a nice added touch, but where its fun to read, it goes on a little too long or adds detail that we as players aren't going to care about. Like I ended up skipping some of the intro because it was just textextextextext that could have been summarized a lot quicker.

The Journal is a really cool addition and one of the things I like a lot about the game, having the big gem and collection screen, tutorial and enemy pages etc. But even these entries just go on much too long about things that aren't going to be interesting to the player. Let me give you an example:

Spectral Binoculars:
"The spectral binoculars have special lenses that bring spectral light into focus, revealing certain hidden objects and allowing the user to view distant hazards"

This line in itself is pretty verbose, but if that was the whole entry with a little drawing of "Press Y to activate" that would be more than enough. Instead we have

"Activate the spectral binoculars by pressing the Y button on the controller or spacebar on the keyboard. Press the button again to deactivate the binoculars. "

You don't need to say "The controller" or "The keyboard" because the player already knows what control scheme they're using. You could summarize this with

"Activate/Deactivate the spectral binoculars by pressing Y or the space bar"

There is like a page and a half explaining how they work, so by the time we get to the following blurb

"Spectral lenses are lenses that have been treated with a special spectral solution that permanently alters their crystal structure allowing them to enhance the visibility of spirits. There are four different colours of lenses, each with a corresponding spirit class. Unfortunately, the smaller lenses that can be switched on or off have gone missing. They must be somewhere in the mansion"

I'm not a writer, I suck at writing, but as a player I read this and know that the crystal structure, spirit class, and spectral solution have zero lore implications or interest for me in the stage of the game I'm in. There is no puzzle or relevant information here besides that "These can probably be upgraded later and maybe reveal stuff in earlier levels which could be cool"

With my limited writing I would summarize it kinda like this

"These special lenses enhance the visibility of spirits. There are four different coloured lenses, but some of them seem to have gone missing... They must be somewhere in the mansion."

It may appear too simple, and I do like that you tried to add more personality and lore, without it tying much to the in game context, it will just come across as needless fluff or boring. So consider reducing journal entries down, or even adding more pictures if you'd like to keep explaining the lore. That would make it more interesting for players reading them.

Like I was actually quite interested in picking up journal pages and reading up about all the enemies until I realized most of them read a bit like this.

Those are my main gripes, I don't mean to come off as harsh or too critical or rude, so if any of this ended up personally offensive I apologize, I just like the game and see such nice art and charm that I'd like you to have a better chance of success when you release it in full.

Muketronics responds:

I too find that the controls have issues, specifically with the player falling back when they want to turn. This problem can be fixed by using a controller, as the keyboards issue is related to having to release one key as you press another. Getting these things right is really difficult and I'd like to thank you for your insight.

The Journal entries are still rough drafts so there are all sorts of issues with them. They may feel a little long and drawn out, but they have a low character count. The journal is Mr. Stretches scientific journal from his past life, so it has a lot of commentary about the ghosts, and what makes them unique. The lore is not very connected to the game yet, but neither of them are finished, and we have big plans. Collecting all of the journal pages will have a different reward other than all of the reading material.

Ok what the fuck, I just completed like 11 levels without knowing the camera rotates. I was like "Ok I can turn the opacity up and down with W and S? but sometimes I have to move to different parts of the screen first?" soon as I got frustrated and decided to click off the screen I saw what the game is supposed to be about lol

3p0ch responds:

You haven't been the only one, I guess I shoulda made the instructions stand out more

I really like the art and concept, but the game itself is very clunky right now. I was trying to wall jump in level 1, but without doing the tutorial there's no explanation on how to do it even here on the page.

So even with the wall jump, the wall grab, the slide, its all very fast, I'm fine with difficult, but when you wall jump it's not a very smooth animation, maybe the character has no air control? it's very difficult to be precise currently.

JR01Games responds:

Thanks for the review!
It's true that it relies too heavily on the tutorial to teach the game, even for a game jam, I would like to smooth this out if I ever come back to this project. All the movement is based on motors (ground & air), so its controlled over slowing down first.

My tree is fucking hideous

Extar responds:

That's the Christmas spirit. :)

It's a game, but I don't think its really portal worthy

T9Studios responds:

I agree. The reason I uploaded it was because I wanted to get the game on another site other than scratch.

That was pretty neat, I liked the sound design and challenge in the ice cave where the crystals just start shooting off when you break one. It took me a few tries, but once I realized I could just recover heat by breaking one and hovering in a safe spot for a bit it felt pretty fair. I ended up getting some crazy momentum and zipped through it. Pretty cool game.

morazor responds:

Thank you!
The cave is the part of the game I'm most satisfied with. I like how it came out in terms of gameplay because as you noticed you can take it slow and careful or try to speedrun it with a greater degree of risk. Also I like how it feels in terms of mood, most of which is also thanks to the beautiful music by Meydän. If you liked it, check out his other works, there's a lot of good stuff!

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