TharosTheDragon's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[Dr. Sweetvalley]

Nice attempt. But it needs a lot of things to make it playable.

First, and this is the easiest thing to fix, allow the player to get past the continue button with the keyboard instead of just the mouse. If you don't do this, the keyboard controls in the rest of the game are for nothing.

Second, you gotta make the isometry less ambiguous. Maybe have a color code so you can tell what height a block is at. And make everything transparent so blocks can't block other blocks.

On level 12, I glitched into a wall by going down through a portal when the exit portal was right on top of a wall. I could move out of the wall, but strangely enough I could move right back into it.

[Binary]

I pressed Z over the pause symbol and switched between the screen with the six X's a bunch of times until the game froze while I was outside standing over the pause symbol. I guess it's possible that the game lost keyboard focus and has nothing mouseEnabled for me to click on to get it back.

[Blobbeez]

The puzzle mode is actually pretty good.

[In Utero]

Original Creator should be Tom Fulp's parents.

[Fathom]

A lot of work was put into this, I can see. Probably wouldn't take much more to do it justice by expanding the level design a little.

I didn't really notice any change after getting the speed upgrade.

[Cactus Chyps]

Finally got used to all the controls and managed to beat the first level. Then I wandered into the "delete save" portal, not knowing what it would do.

Mouse controls kill this game. I think you've got a pretty good start, though, and I do love 3D physics (even in Banjo Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts). The trick I used on that first level was to start the blueprint off at my destination using the scrolling, and then build towards myself. Obviously it's good that your green block cursor is always connected to the existing blueprint, but how come it can go diagonally from the blueprint when you can't place blocks there? And the game only responds to shift and ctrl on the left side of the keyboard.

You should be able to move the green cursor block with the keyboard. 6 keys for six directions.

I found myself wishing there was some way to return to the hub from within a level.

I think it's worth continuing, but definitely make sure you add sound!

Jamesgudge responds:

Hey! Thanks for the response :) I've had a few realizations about the controls since uploading, and I'm painfully aware that the controls are complicated, that said, thanks for taking the time to play and enjoy it!

[GRAIL]

Pretty glitchy.

When you jump on top of a skeleton, it glitches because when you walk forward you'll walk on air.

Also I encountered a fatal glitch on the screen with the first save statue. If you ride the elevator off the top of the screen, you won't be able to get back down. So this game definitely needs a restart button.

Also, it would be nice if every screen was a checkpoint.

[Udom Nebdon]

My first few plays, I didn't realize I could use the mirror. After closing the eye that's hard to get to and discovering that it didn't open the door, I thought I was gonna have to quit having done all that work for nothing. But I finally discovered that there was another eye.

People are giving you a lot of grief about the controls, but I think you did the best you could. Allowing both WASD and arrow keys makes it better than a lot of games right off the bat. Maybe one of the options (e.g. WASD) could work like the tank controls and other could be fixed directions.

The camera angles change at the right times to give you plenty of warning about what's around you. The enemy AI has some good pathfinding. It's clear that you went through a lot of effort to make this as good and convenient as possible. I got a bit of a Diablo vibe with the dark temple and everything.

The most legitimate complaint is the speed, though. You should definitely move faster. You say this is a very short game, but the character speed pads the length a great deal.

I look forward to more of your work.