DasSG's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[The 2nd Gardener]

The game was nice and original, however, I was puzzled by a lack of map and a clear objective(there is no sense of ugrency, it's like gardener going for a walk). The levels are linear, but it doesn't feel that I'm travelling somewhere, he just goes North/South/East seemingly random level border and teleports somewhere that afterwards I don't understand how did I get there (in the dead end at the center of the level)!? Enemies like ghosts and note-throwers (musicians?) seem to diasappear by themselves after some time. Being low on health I wanted to revert the weapon to the crystal blade I found on the first level to heal a little, but haven't figured out how to change a weapon. Looks like the game autosaves at the start of the level, but why am I losing my weapon after loading ?
The story begins nicely, but the end is somewhat unrewarding (to be continued... !?), has he reached his destination or it's some other house under similar circumstances?
Seems to have no replay value, apart from choosing a different healing flower (but it seems purely cosmetical and doesn't affect anything).
Liked the idea of ghosts and sucking plants with berries,ability to extinguish the flames by water channel. Liked the comments of the gardener describing features of a weapon, wish there were more of them so that the gardener would be more fleshed out as a character, to know his motives and history. A tutorial can be done like that.. (Now that I've got seeds I can... or this log is blocking my path, perhaps I can move it by channeling the water ...). The quiz was refreshing but pointless - the question looks to be always the same - and you had to answer it anyway by trying again. To me the quiz should've opened some kind of bonus, not mandatory to game progress (e.g. you're smart - get your reward, else proceed without it).
I don't know why this game isn't popular, but here are my thoughts anyway:
The story so far: Gardener got a mail with invtation and came. I think players like to associate themselves with hero, like "hey I'm ninja/pirate/policeman/soldier/warrio r/berserker", something they are excited to be (or think of exciting). But "The gardener" - I'm a bald monk which can wet you with water and plant flowers, I'm in harmony with nature and can heal people with medicinal herbs, oh.. I can defend myself with a club also. Maybe people doesn't find it exciting enough to play. The other kinds of people, who possibly enjoy farmerama, happy farm or something like that would be disappointed that the gardener doesn't involve much of ... gardening :)
I personally think that the idea is well for children, gardener shows a good role model - helps people, cares about nature. There simply isn't enough positive games about good people and deeds (perhaps because it's not popular/exciting enough :( ). Keep up the good work.

[Sanguine]

I liked the game - it has a nice classy feeling with nice music and graphics. The only annoying thing was fillers after dying when fighting the last boss (I think i've revisited the same places for three or more times there).
Now my thoughts:
I was dumb enough to fail several times at the first tutorial level with "ceiling dash", so maybe it's feasible to mark a way for the jumper somehow... by blood trail perhaps :).
Tutorial level always shows the same keyboard hints regardless of your keyboard configuration. The idea of abducting people is fun but underdeveloped - there is nothing to do with a human apart from eating,and it's not a shield for bullets. Maybe you should incorporate this element more in the game - a human sacrifice for the altar, or simply bloodshed for some thing to happen.
Train level with moving backgrounds is awesome but short, maybe the similar part with flying ships would be good.
I didn't really get the meaning of the ending, so i feel a little disappointed. Perhaps some explanations would help (I hope I don't spoil anything).
The game doesn't have a replay value for what I think, there are no optional achievements apart from main plot, you can't upgrade the blood meter or change outfit (apart from infiltration part which was nice and original).
As for the achievents - the game is harder that usual newgrounds stuff, so I would be nice to have a newgrounds medal for finishing it. That would help advertise this game to more people, since someimes people become interested by seeing a new unknown medal on some other people's profile.
I think you've done a good job, keep up the good work. Thanks for a game, it was totally worth spending time on.

[Dark Soul]

Excellent rail shooter - movements are smooth, artwork is great and music is ambient. However there are some minor drawbacks - due to large amount of monsters their sounds are a bit repetitive, so a slight variation would be good. After level 13 there is nothing I can buy from the upgrades, so it would be great if could upgrade even more. Some ocassional mini-bosses or some forks on the road possibly leading to the same exit, but with some tweaks would make the game even better. Apart from that - excellent job!
P.S. I think this game was made by Russian-speaking developers, due to label price for beast upgrades (Cena) and a strange tooltip for ammo (patrons!?). What is "glasses"? "ochki=points"? I would love to play the original Russian version (if such one exists) :)

[CASTLE ESCAPE ! v1]

I reley don't wan to say this, but I have to now. The game is so buggy...
- There is neither sound nor music
- Ugly black boxes around "Harry potter" styled text
- Inability to skip the intoduction scene
- The buttons "Play again" and "To menu" work the same
- Blocks on levels are placed unaligned
- Lava!? flow is jerky, and I can see the border line in the middle
- The main character is always flying near the floor
- Hit detection is really strange (the head is non-collidable)
- Fonts are inconsistent (The font alone can seem to look cool, but together with other elements it's a mess)
-Monster movement is jaggy- they teleport, same for introduction scene.
- Overall game looks like a patchwork without it's own style, even sprites and character names Dante and Virgil? Are you a fan of Devil May Cry?
- URLs are neither clickable nor copyable in credits
Even without this obvious bugs which create a terrible first impression - there is nothing unique about it to remember. Of course - making the game from scratch is hard, but the result is still disappointing. Game factory games look better, so why don't you use available solutions, flixel for instance ? As an end user - I doesn't really care how did you get the result - took a solution from the shelf or created your own code and tools from scratch. I see the result, and I don't like it.

Try harder next time.

macobex027 responds:

Thx for the Suggestions it really helped .. dont worry ill patch things up :) ill update it later for some minor problems of the game, yea im a huge fan of DMC :) how bout you? hehehehe

[MINECRAFT: flash game]

It's pretty dumb

I'm tired of clicking but nevertheless I got all ingredients and made a cake. I can't see any connection between the mine and cooking a cake. I think even monkey can play this game. It has no sense. You should try harder :)

Little-Rena responds:

And yet it's still better than any game you have made!

[Ultimate Assassin 3]

Simple and challenging

However there are two things which make guards seem dumb:
1 They ignore blood trail while searching.
2 They shoot through other guards and even through target, never ever hitting them as by some kind of magic.

Removal of mission timer is the best feature.