JoLiKMC's game Reviews on Newgrounds

[You Have One Box]

The game is programmed well enough and everything seems to do what it's supposed to. It could have used more variation in level design, more traps, and so forth. The concept is good and can be pretty fun, though I think something similar has been done before with stationary objects rather than a physics-based one. ("Mario & Wario" comes to mind.) It's not a bad idea, but it was poorly executed.

Of the 12 levels, I only had problems with the last. Levels 1 through 11 do a decent job of teaching you the physics of the game, but there's really no tenseness to the levels, wherein Bob is in direct danger of being killed. It's just all busy-work and timing with a whole lot of "red herring" dangers.
The game is also challenging... but it's a completely artificial difficulty. Due to how the "grab" engine was coded, when the left mouse button is held down, there's an invisible sphere of influence which pulls the box toward the mouse cursor. If you move the cursor too fast, the box leaves the sphere of influence and thus, leaves your control. The box also seems to have some collision detection issues with the walls.

The sound effects are fine, but that music is one of the more annoying things I have ever heard in ANY game. I'm VERY glad there's a mute button.

All and all, this isn't the worst thing I've ever played on Newgrounds, but it's nothing to write home about, either.

[Tower of Heaven]

Over three years later, and I still get all choked-up when I get to the end of the game. This is a work of art. And what makes it even better is the fact that it wasn't TRYING to be "art". It's just trying to be a fun little retro game.

It succeeds wholeheartedly in that regard.

[Cursors of the Future!]

Fun With Mouse Cursors 201

Cursor effects. On the front page? . . .uh, no. It's original and all that junk, but it's hardly front page material. Short review time.

The grpahics were pretty decent with no real flaws that I could see. Maybe they could've been better. The effects were nice, though.

The style wasn't very interesting. You move the cursor around the screen and that's about it.

The sound was high-quality and top-notch. It even had stereo effects.(Does not effect Overall rating.)

No violence. Unless you think trickling water and burning smoke is violent.(Does not effect Overall rating.)

Interactivity was good and all, but maybe you could've added some sort of left-click event for some(or all) of the cursors.

I guess there was some humour in there somewhere. . . I didn't pick up on any. The Caterpillar thing was a little amusing, though.(Does not effect Overall rating.)

So. . . This was cute, sure. But once you scroll through all the cursors, it kind of loses its purpose and becomes boring. Cute, but not really front page material, and DEFINATELY not much of a game.

[IM ATTACK!!]

Point-and-Click

An odd, but pointless variation on the old "Kill the Pop-Ups" game. Even the "secrets" aren't worth the time it takes to get them.(Particularly if you're not a "loyal follower of all things Cycon" like I'm not. Jazz WHO?(See Cheat Sheet.) Feh.) Though the "Session with Cycon" thing got a few laughs.

The graphics were in perfect Windows XP style from the login screen to the actual "Desktop," right down to AIM itself. Everything was done perfectly. A LOT of attention to details were paid here, as you can guess. Not all buttons work, which is a disappointment, but I'll get into that later.

Obviously, the Style score didn't hurt this Flash much, dispite the fact it's such an abysmol score. The point of the game is to close the AIM windows by clicking the X buttons. Just the same as with the "Kill the Pop-Ups" game, you can also move the windows around. Again, even with the Secrets and other things, it's not very original. . .

The sound was clear, crisp, and pretty much flawless. Can't think of a negative thing to say about it except for the fact that the quotes when closing windows don't take very long to start looping.

No violence to speak of.(Does not effect Overall score.)

Interactivity. . . Now, this is where I was going to start babbling about things.
Firstly, not all the icons are clickable. Most, but not all. And half the ones you CAN click generally turn up a Windows-style Error Message(in-game event, not a genuine error). I was hoping you could just close AIM, or minimize it, or something.(I would think closing AIM would result in say. . .a Game Over, admittedly. But still.)
The other thing that gets me is that you can't right-click and close windows that way, which is a shame. And don't tell me it's impossible to do in Flash. Take a look at that Interactive Buddy's custom right-click menu. But I guess ya can't have everything in a quick game like this.

The humour was average. Nothing special. A few chuckles here and there, perhaps. But again, what's to be expected from a quick game like this?

So. . . Several Megabytes to download and only a few moments of play involved, secrets or not. Is it worth the time it would take for those poor Dial-Up users to download? Probably not. Is it worth MOST peoples' time? Eh. . .depends on the person. I didn't really like it, myself, but someone else might. In fact, a LOT of "someone elses" apparently dig this game. Fancy that.

This review brought to you by the letter "X". You certainly can't have X-Mas without "X"! Unless you're Christian.

[Castlevania 2: Tiger DEMO]

A Very Pale Imitation Indeed

Wow. This is the absolute worst incarnation of the Tiger Electronics Castlevania II game I've ever seen. Of course. . .this is the ONLY incarnation, other than the actual handheld unit, but still. . .

First of all, the graphics are a pale imitation of the little LCD graphics. Very pale imitation. . . The graphics barely look a thing like the handheld device's graphics. If you were really trying to emulate the original graphics, the failed. By far. 3 out of 10. And this isn't even including the poor-quality scan of the unit itself, mind you. If I were counting that, I would likely knock off the other two points. . .

Now, the style flatly bombs. The movements of Simon, his Dagger tossable, and the Bone Pillars, are way too quick in comparison to the game. There's hardly any time to dodge out of the way, thanks to the fact you have to play with the mouse.(More on that later, though.) This gets a 1.

The original LCD had little bips and boops in it. Not a piece of very soft, quiet MIDI(I'm guessing) rendition of Vampire Killer in it. It had no music at all, in fact. So, in addition to the fact that this strays vastly from the original, the MIDI in the background is terrible. This also gets a 1.

The violence in this game is hardly excessive. That's just sloppy, false advertising. There is little more "violence" in this game than there is in an average Warner Bros. cartoon circa 1976. But then, the original game wasn't violent, either. So, either way, a 3 is a fair score for this one.

The controls for this game are horrendous. Unless there are some hidden keyboard controls for this game that I don't know about, anyway. Using the mouse to play an LCD game like this just does not work! Additionally, the Reset button also doesn't work at all. It's not even clickable. This drops the Interactivity down to a depressing 2.

So, let's give this the once-over, now. . . Badly-attempted graphics, no style, no sound and poor music, and very bad controls. What does that amount to? An extremely poor game. Oh, excuse me. A poor DEMO of a game. I pray you never actually make the full version of this, if this is all you can do.

Until next time,
Joseph Collins

[Xiao Xiao 9]

Xiao Xiao: The Final Fight

Pretty spiffy, Zhu. Even though you used Guy(from Final Fight, for those who don't know) as the main character for this game.