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Guert
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« Reply #4 on: May 06, 2007, 07:11:01 AM » |
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Hello there!
Here are a few comments about the game...
The bad:
Ok, the first thing that bugged me was the rather weird input method. During the cinematics, I'm asked to press a key to continue reading. I naturally let got of the mouse and press "enter" hinking that the game's primary input will be the keyboard. The game starts so I put my right hand on the keyboard arrows. I move and it works, but then, I try to attack but can't. I press all the possible buttons, can't find how to attack. I was about to gave up, took the mouse in my hand and moved the cursor to the top window to realize that the mouse had an input. I click and I can hit! You control should be either explain before you start playing OR make sure people will use common keyboard input. The control as it is is fantastic for a left handed but is wonky for a right handed. I say put an option to be able to use the W-A-S-D keys to move around you're character. Or make both available and the player will be able to switch to its liking without having to go in a menu.
Ok, now I know how to interact with the game correctly. I restrat the game completly. An evil egg is going my way and this time, I can hit it! Well, almost. There's a long delay before my avatar performs the task I asked it to do, which causes frustration. When I use an ability in a game, it has to be done right now. This is especialy true in action games like yours. When I click, I want that stick in the others face, not behind me swinging.
Now, I finaly timed my attack right and landed it on the egg. The other egg explodes and I get destroyed because of this. There are three things wrong with this.
-First, there are no rewards in using the attack ability. You're giving me a reward (killing the monster) and then you give me a nasty penalty from it (killing me). The penalty is too harsh compared to the reward so I might as well just walk under the bouncing egg. Less dangerous and it's faster this way.
-The second thing is that the hitting of an egge is inconsistant: the enemy egg never reacts the same when its striked. Sometimes it bounces very far, other times it just falls next to my avatar, and all of those things happenning without me controlling why. If I could I would only make the eggs go pretty far away but I can't figure out how I could do that. Now, if you want to give us a choice in terms of power of attack, give the control to us. Make the attack stronger if we hold the mouse button down. You could make very quick hits(a click) only crack the enemy and a long held attack shatter the enemy. You could make it as some enemies are too fragile so you can't hit them too hard or they'll destroy you, like what you're doing right now. The player will have to find the right amount of power to achieve it's goal. Then you can have a wide variety of enemies that require different types of attack on it.
-Third, I feel like we are too fragile compared to the enemy egg. I mean logically speaking, if it takes a swing of a bat to destroy an egg, a small piece of a shell with low velocity should not completly destroy me. I'm not saying it's a bad idea, but perhaps you should put something in the egg. When you kill it, the shell go every where and some "bullets" or "rocks" or whatever you want, could be candy, explode in every direction, damaging my avatar. An egg, although very fragile, can take an small amount of beating before it's destroyed completly.
Ok let's move on. So , I can move, I can atttack and nowm I have to jump... The jumping controls are ok, but the gaps are way too difficulty at first. Give us room to safely land. A good idea would also to make the first gaps non-lethal. If you miss it, you can climb back to where you jumped so you can try it again. Also, make your gaps at a reasonable height. Don't be too pixel-precise when you deisgn your jumping challenges. I say that one pixel precise jump is acceptable near the end of the game but that's it. The rest of the time, give us room and a safe landing. Of course, as the difficulty increases, give us less time after our landing before an enemy attacks us.
Always make sure you give the reward before you give a powerup to your reward or gives us a insight of what's going to be rewarded. In the second part of the easter forest you get chocolate bar rewards. Well, at first I was thinking "that's weird, I thought chocoloate was the worst thing in this world according to the cinematics". I picked up the bars and nothing happened. No feedback whatsoever except the fact that I picked it up (or destroyed it, I'm not sure they disapeared). Eventually, I got a gun and I found out that the bars were actually ammo. You have to tell me what I'm picking up, wheter it's good or bad. Take doom for instance. You culd pickup shotgun rounds before getting the shotgun. The game told you about what you picked up, telling you that shotguns existed and were possible rewards if you looked closely.
Now, on to the enemies. I felt like they were too generic. Instead of having swarms of bouncing eggs always spawning from god knows where, you should have less enemies and place them more precisly. I don't feel like I have accomplished something when the same enemy comes bouncing back after a second.
Also, you should place the gun in a position where we see it clearly. It blends too much in the tree artwork where we pick it up. It would be clearer if it was in fornt of the sky backdrop.
The good
On the plus side, the artwork is very nice. The colors are vibrant and very cartoony, which helps to the theme of the game.
I like how the easter bunny isportrayed as an evil character. Original.
The music also support the theme of the game. It's got a cartoony, catchy beat that fits the game like a glove.
The screenshots tell us that the game seems to have a lot of variety. I haven't experienced it but it's nice to know that there's more in the game then in the first levels.
All and all, I played and quit before reaching the end of the second level. I got too frustrated from all the things I said before. I enjoyed it but the bad things spoiled my fun...
Hope you work on this game, it looks quite promising! Or maybe a sequel?
Take care!
Guert
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