Rate Each Game out of 5!

I'm not great at transferring what I like into numbers, especially since I can't be sure what to hold as my standard for 5 and 0. I'm also not sure if I should be thinking of the games in a vacuum, or compared to each other in the contest, or compared to indie games in general. So what I've done is taken the lowest number I would give it and the highest, then set the rating to the center of those two with a variance. If I think the game is at worst a 3 and at best a 5, for example, I'll rate it as 4.0 +/-1.0. It's essentially a great way to justify being non-committal. XD
 
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Goblin Noir: Cement Shoes Are Highly Unfashionable

3.5 +/-0.3
 
A great idea for a game. I naturally gravitated towards the conflict system which functioned like a manual conversation. The characters were great and the world was fun to be in. There's a lot that needs touched up and perfected, but the core of the game is solid.
 
Exeunt Omnes

3.9 +/-0.3
 
I left a lengthy review of my thoughts here. Basically, a great concept worth exploring.
 
D is for Dungeon

3.0 +/-0.5
 
I'm not a big fan of dungeon crawling, but this was easy to get into and pretty easy to hold me. The premise is really my favorite part! XD It's funny, quick, and easy to digest because it works off of a common trope. The areas were a bit bland. Having "Wee Lad" (as I named him) crawl around was exciting, though, because the absurd contrast never wore off, although it might for some people. Having teammates made it even funnier. The game is about the core experience of dungeon crawling, which it accomplishes well. That alone makes it above average.
 
Sunken Spire

3.3 +/-0.3
 
This is a sweet game. The story isn't incredibly compelling, and dips the more you play. In opposition, the growth systems for the characters expand as you play. The characters are great-ish with Alma stealing the show in depth and elsa feeling fairly flat. The core of the experience is the interesting battle customization, which I think it does well. What drops the score for me is that I became less and less interested as I played, but it's still a great entry.
 
Ruselan 

2.5 +/-0.1
 
I really enjoyed the atmosphere here with its great mapping and nice color palette. It has a somewhat Harvest Moon vibe to it. I'm not a big fan of the classic type of battle system, and there were moments I wondered if having battles at all were necessary for the gameplay even if the premise required it. The characters were great and the village itself has a ton of feeling to it. I liked asking questions, too. A system to somehow track that information would be nice, but it's not that hard to understand what you were just told. But, despite not having any heavy issues for me, by the end I wasn't as impressed as I could be, which makes it a solid middle-line experience. 
 
Ars Harmonia

3.0 +/-0.5
 
I liked the atmosphere, the presentation, and to a good extent, the story. Having the POV switch between the protagonist and antagonist roles was refreshing and well done. The gameplay aspects were lacking and either needed to be removed or expanded on.
 
Oh! Ko! 

3.2 +/-0.3
 
Great entry! Short, sweet, and utterly charming. And charming really is the key word here, because for me, that's what held the game. I wasn't excited by the pacing or the systems or the story, but somehow the charm kept me going to the end. I'm glad I got to play it. 
 
Unraveled

3.5 +/-1.0
 
This game is tough to explain. I loved the graphics, the ambiance, and the concept for sure. The battles felt "injected," but I don't take issue with that. I loved the battle design, but I think it could have been improved by giving the player a numerical concept of attack power and HP rather than a filled gauge of health and the concept that a harder to access move used in conjunction to the State is just better somehow. But I kind of drop the score in that I didn't finish it. The jungle was beautiful, but it got me lost. Somehow being un-entertained in that one area was enough to overrule the other great aspects and make me turn off the game.
 
Oneshot 

3.7 +/-0.6
 
So far one of my favorite entries. It starts somewhat slow, then I became invested. I think the cool tricks were gimmicky in a way that appealed to me but also made me hope that it's not what's made this game so popular. I think the world that was crafted, the art style, the gorgeous music, and the simplicity in progression are what made it a good game, but I have a fear that the ability of the game to know my name and never play for me again are what people are going to focus on. In any case, if you can make it to the end (or an end), you'll probably have a good time of it, even if the game is designed to discourage you from getting there. 

Eden

3.7 +/-0.2

Innovative. That's a big plus for my personal biases. I like a game that sticks out a little in a non-gimmicky way. The design of this puzzle game isn't a very good hook (which might lend to being a gimmick), but is still new and fresh (which lends to innovative). The learning curve isn't nice, and the teaching mechanics are sloppy. It kind of looks "eh," too--the text box on the left, specifically. But still a great game worth trying out.

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So far I've had a legitimately good time with every entry I've played, which makes me a bit lucky. The numerical scores I've given might not be the most flattering, but a lot of these scores have room to breathe because I know the 30-day development time is a choker, and it wouldn't make sense to rate one of these games a 5 when I know that a few more months of development would essentially transform it into something better than a 5, destroying the system and breaking the universe...

 

Yeah expect your problem with targeting, as you are supposed to use your mouse in combat. Mouse is also recommended to be used outside of it.


We made it clearer that mouse support exists in-game and made it possible to use just keyboard to save in circles and pick-up all the souls on the map.


We also added more to the early story.

 

It would be interesting if you put the tutorial of the battle. Not many people experience to use a mouse in RPG Maker games.

 

Yeah, we added splash screen later on to inform about the mouse support. It was an oversight not to have such screen when the game launches.


Still it is common sense with PC games.

 

@ Alkorii: Wow, I didn't realize that you reviewed my game. Thanks for checking it out, I'm glad you liked it. I've since updated the game a bit to make it a bit brighter( But not by much!) and taken a few suggestions to make it overall better. Once the contest is over I'm considering doing some more adjustments to the game. Thanks again!

 

Prelude Act 1  4/5

Spoiler

Oh my, I just finished this and it's brilliant, well conceived, beautifully portrayed, in visuals, music, plot and almost all characterisation (there was one that didn't ring true to me), I don't know why this doesn't have more attention. There were a couple of glitches that I posted over on the game page on RMN. I'd reiterate them here except I put in a couple of screen shots and it makes no sense to reinvent the wheel. Overall, I thoughtfully enjoyed this game, and the 90 minutes I spent unravelling  the mystery left me wanting more. People should play this. A more indepth review will be at that gamepage once it is accepted.

 

Reviewing while playing: Prelude Act 1

First of all: PRELUDE ACT 1? Why not call it Introductory Prologue of Prelude Act 0.5? I'm just kidding but the game's title is really silly.

The screen tint of this first map is terrible. I think all the colors were taken out except yellow/green (not sure how that works in Ace). The shadows and title screen are nice but those are plug 'n play scripts made by someone else. The quote shown when the game starts is great, though.

LOL Oh Em is coughing! I have that in my game, too. Did the developer record himself coughing as well or is this a stock audio from the internet? It sounds like a guy, but it should sound like a girl.

The lantern light charset has cut-offs on the left and right. It needs to be made bigger.

The lighting inside is a bit better but the furniture shadows are pitch-black.

LOL THIS SINGING. I'm sorry but it's too funny. Is that a computer voice that was pitch-edited? I can't take it seriously.

DIalogue could use some editing. They're a bit too unnecessarily long. In one conversation with Misses Plum they said the same things several times but rephrased. Also what's that terrible sound whenever I cross into a different map?

Maybe Em's hair could move when she walks. It's a static sprite.

Mapping is a bit confusing. Not sure where you can transfer to other maps because doorways aren't indicated clearly. Instead, I keep running into lamps because they look like map transfers.

Need to improve map transferring in terms of screen tints as well. You keep turning the screen tint up to normal then down again, which allows me to see the map fully before I'm supposed to (e.g. when going to the snow area). Also if you want it to look dark decrease every color except blue. Blue just a little. And desaturate by making it a bit grey. That way you can still see but it will look dark. Here, the maps are just almost pitch-black with a couple of highlights from white areas.

WHAT THE HELL. Why am I Game Over? I just walked left from the last snow man. And no auto-save! Baaaad.

2/5

Edit: So the game intrigued me enough to start over and I passed the snowman bit. However the puzzle right after it got me stuck and there's no save function so I just gave up. Shame. I love the game's premise.

 

Since we're all doing shameless plugs, here is the link to my first ever game.  It has a lofty 15 minutes of game play, since I had no idea how long the complete game was (I was too busy playtesting and building it to time it):

http://contest.rpgmakerweb.com/game/view/id/91#.U8eqvfldVyI

It's a sci-fi thriller RPG called "Phase Out".

Completing it was a good learning experience, but it's always great to know what I need to work on improving the most, skills-wise.

 

Planning on weekend or next week. I resolved myself that I only review the games that the developers are activating in my eyes. If they didn't, I won't review it. Well.. it would be rather feedbacks than reviews, but whatever. Time is money, and I'm not a Buddhist monk who put myself to the depth of adversity.

 

I'm planning on posting a list with the games I've played rated during the weekend. From the moment I have to say that I've enjoyed most of the games I've played and that I'm pretty amazed with the quality of the contest entries, being a 30 days development.

If any of you want to rate our game, Panorama, it would be appriciated. We're happy with the feedback it's gotten so far, but kind of discouraged with how hard it is to get people to play it. But I guess that's normal, on a contest with 600+ entries.

 

Gotcha!

Reviewing while playing: Panorama

Note: I'm playing the contest version, not the updated version.

Nice fog on top of that first map there. It's rare to see someone use subtle fogs like that. The music is a bit overdramatic but I'm guessing that's part of the game. It's a bit distracting, though. I see I can't run; hopefully the maps aren't too big.

I love the first riddle. I think I've seen it before but I don't instantly go Game Over upon the wrong try here, which is great.

Wait, the resolution of the game is different. The battle background has black bars on the side. :') Intentional? It looks awkward, though...

I think the first knight's arrow is stuck in the wall. I probably shouldn't report on bugs as I'm playing the contest version, ha.

Mapping of the studio's a bit empty and bland. Also the characters just walked through an NPC.

Pretty fun gameplay so far. Love the comedy bit.

Walking from set to set's a bit slow, and I'm not a fast reader. Then again one speed up might be too fast, so it's okay.

Aaaand I run into a passability bug when following the dancer bit director. Can't judge the full game then but from what I've played:

+ Unique premise, solid gameplay.

- Some rather bland and empty mapping, especially the studio bits.

Also I think the "different genres" could be taken even further by changing up the graphics style and throwing some filters on it. There are plenty of scripts out there that can help with this. I don't really have a great knowledge of different movie genres, but for example:

- The black & white comedy bit could have a noisy filter over it. A static fog that changes very quickly with a parallel process.

- A horror section could make use of extremely heavy shadows (there's a script for that) and an over-the-top "flashlight" effect to make fun of it.

etc.

Solid game, though. I think this is the second or third game I've played that I didn't rage quit, lol. I do feel like there's "something" missing with the story, but that might be because I had to end the game early.

3/5

 

Thanks Cinnamon! Really bummed out about the passability bug you ran into on the musical. What did happen exactly? The "contest" version is pretty unpolished but I hoped it was at least playable and had no game breaking bugs... It a shame you didn't get to play the rest, the story is constructed in a kind of "crescendo" and the ending really brings it all close together, I'm sure you'd have  enjoyed the game a lot more. I you feel like it I encourage you to try again!

As for the things you comment on:

- The music on the first map is this way intentional but I agree it was a little distracting, we tried to fix this a little in the updated version.

- The resolution of the battle is different... The battle is just a one time "joke" and we didn't really want to waste time finding the solution. It does look awkward, and we still haven't fixed it... On the to-do list it goes!

- The areas between sets are indeed a bit empty. We focused a lot on the actual "scenes" and these areas were kind of an afterthought, and it obviously shows, but they do have a purpose on the story help to give a little breathing room to the scenes.

Anyway, thanks for playing, we really appreciate it!

 

Let me reply to you in your topic instead. XD

 

Pretty sure that is based on the musical definition of prelude as well as the literary one. Also the insta-gameover seems to be because you didn't pay attention to the warning given, Karma in action. 

I agree about the transitions, they do need to be clearer, but it's a shame you didn't get to progress through the story, that really is the highpoint. (also, no I have no association with the game, I just like it.)

 

So the actual "full game" will be called Prelude? I suppose that makes more sense.

Insta-gameover would make sense if there was an (auto-)save function, otherwise it's just punishing the player instead of making it a fun experience. I might've missed something but I didn't see any way to save.

 

I think so, also it's a lead in to another game by the same developer called Mirror (which I haven't played, thus far)

I'm a big 'save anywhere' fan, so autosave is a nice function, and I always appreciate it, but given that dream sequence isn't long, and there is a save diary in Em's room before you go to sleep, a restart doesn't lose more than a minute or so of play.

 

Oooh, there's a save function in Em's room... Would've been nice to have that pointed out. >_< Thanks for letting me know.

edit:

Reviewing Panorama (updated version):

Ah, you fixed the music, good!

The dancing was kind of fun but I thought the controls were a bit awkward; having to use just one hand. Also when the letters started dropping down vertically I didn't realize what was going on and got almost all of them wrong. Might be nice to have a second row of vertical letters or just a few at first to get used to the sudden change.

The actual eventing was excellent, though. The other dancers running around, it was so colorful!

Aaand I run into another bug. After listening to them talk through the window (detective area) I tried to go in and they cut the scene as I did something wrong. Upon my second attempt -- after picking up the gloves and wrench -- I can't enter saying I have to listen "in front of the windows first". But I already did that and can't do it again. Bug?

 

ok, as I said I would

We Were made to Perish 2.5/5

Spoiler

The game was so slow at the beginning, and I will admit patience is not a virtue of mine, but I was willing to wade through the text to get to the game, and it was, ok. The main character really didn't catch my interest until almost the end but by then I did care about her. The matrix-lite vibe was all right but a little derivative, though nice attempted subversion by referencing it, didn't have much of  challenge enemy wise and I got the good ending which is still a little dark, but that's the way the game felt by then anyway so it worked. I didn't like losing control of my character's walking speed, I'm a bit of a dasher and having that only work sometimes annoyed me and the game was quite linear as well, you really didn't have a lot of choices in exploration.

Soul Echoes  2/5

Spoiler

Ok 6 people party, that's a bit of juggling but ok, very high level characters but no advancement, hmm, then I hit the battles. Oh no, it's so slow and whilst I understand I'm a party of superheroes long long battles against only bosses can get tedious very fast, there isn't a lot of character development, I really don;t know who these people are or why they are doing what they are doing. They feel like set pieces being moved about to suit the whim if the game rather than people on an adventure. Though the sort of timed release of places to go was a nice dynamic, but that seemed to be all that it was about. There were some ok ideas but overall, less fun than I hoped.

 

First of all, thanks for playing the game. By what you say I can only guess you didn't like the game because of the long battles and what you feel is a lack of character development.

Battles are done like that on purpose: we thought it would be better to have a short game with tactical battles against bosses instead of endless random battles to fill up your time. It's ok if you didn't like them, though. As you said in your other review, if you are a dasher then maybe this game concept won't be to your liking.

I'll take into consideration what you think about the character development, as maybe we tried too hard to keep inside the concept (a short story unfolding through player discovery with boss fights as the main game mechanic) and got lost in the way.

Thanks for the feedback ^_^

 

Added in another ten games.

Would definitely recommend Oh! Ko! because it's so friggin CUTE. Nesos: Castle of Promise wasn't great, but had some funny moments.