Sorry for the late review!
Level: FINALly
Creator: Regr3t (
Regr3t )
ID: 34062310
Song: DuoCore - Endorphins
www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/573010Video (Provided):
www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPQFwcxT4A8Gameplay:
The gameplay in this first ship section is alright. It isn't too fun, but not terrible, you have the player move quite a bit, which is what keeps the player interested, however, you mixed in a bit of straight(ish) fly, and it was a pretty slow section, so it became boring as it was just pretty standard gameplay. The wave section is... interesting. First of all, it's not obvious at first that it has wave compatible blocks, so it leaves the player confused for half a second, which could cause some to screw up. The gameplay isn't really fun, as you really noly have ot hold once and make sure you don't hit a small area with no wave compatible blocks at the start. The mini cube is alright, however the timings are a bit weird, as the cube doesn't fall directly on the orbs. The UFO section after is pretty boring and repetitive, try to vary up the obstacles a bit. The auto section is bad, try to always avoid putting auto sections in your level that take up more than 3% of it, however, yours isn't too bad, as it was pretty short. The ship afterwards is quite fun, the player moves around a lot and it was pretty interesting, however, right at the start it's not obvioius that you don't tap, and that can cause some unneccesary and annoying deaths. The mini wave is completely spam, which isn't fun or interesting at all. It can be pretty annoying for some people as well. Same thing with the mini cube right afterwards. The drop is where things take a turn. One important point to bring up is the difficulty balancing. At this part the difficulty makes a huge jump and doesn't offer good gameplay, and ti is very annoying for players. Try nerfing this section a bit, or buffing the parts before this. Now this gameplay is sort of fun, it's fast, and you move arund a lot, but it's mostly straight fly, which many people hate. At 75%, it starts to get better, and the difficult is more balanced with the parts before the drop. At 89%, the pink orbs are off screen, which requires fat reaction time if they haven't been to that section before and don't know what to expect.
Overall: This level has pretty decent gameplay. You could definitely work on the difficulty balancing, and removing the straight fly. 10/20, -3 for the insane spike in difficulty at the drop, -3 for all the straight fly at the drop, -2 for the spam before the drop, -2 for some boringish sections towards the beginning.
Design:
Design in this level wasn't too great. In the first section, there is only the flashing background, some arrows, and the block design, which is just standard blocks colored differently at first, not too great or original. However, the block design picked up at 7%, but it was pretty dark, so hard to see. At 13%, what you did with the blocks was interesting, I thought, but the blending was weird where they overlapped. The wave section is pretty much the same as the last, but the background is now pulsing objects. The background isn't too great, but I liked all the opacity changes at different times, that made it seem more complete. At 33%, everything was pretty empty, while it looked nice, it was pretty bland, honestly. The saws seemed weird in the spikes, and the block design was empty. Plus, the corners of the blocks are screwed up, the lighter layer doesn't connect all the way, which means you used the wrong pice for that. The mini wave is alright, but it is a bit bright, so it odesn't seem too detailed, the background is just glows as well, which doesn't look bad, but isn't good either. At the rop, it seems very messy. Block design is empty, you just use standard blocks, and there's a lot of bubbles and paticles everywhere, it's hard to see what's going on. At 75%, you added some interesting designs into the mix, but they were, again, pretty simple. The key to good block design is having a firm bse, what you have, and adding on to it so it looks filled, but neat. The colors werebright throughout, as well, which made it look worse.
Overall: I was pretty critical with this section, but there are a ton of issues, block design isn't good, you use standard blocks for it, and it looks pretty messy throughout. 9/20, -4 for the lack of good block design, -3 for the level being pretty messy, -2 for some simple custom backgrounds, -2 for it being too bright and hard to see.
Sync:
Sync in this level was really good! You synced all the portals up with the music, which is awesome, and you even used portals to sync in the first ship section, a gamemode pretty difficult to sync. At 21%, gameplay sync is very clear and done very well, and it remains that way for most of the level. Of course, the striaght fly sections weren't too well-synced, and neither was 33%, although it wasn't too bad. You had some obvious design sync mixed in with this level as well. For example, during the first ship section you had the background pulse, although, it did stop at seemingly random times, and that was pretty weird. You also had pulsing objects, which is always nice.
Overall: Very well done sync! 8.5/10, -0.5 for some straight fly sections and a normal ship section not syncing too well, -1 for some lacking design sync in the later parts of the level.
Originality: 0.9x
This level is unforunately not too original. Some effects are very unoriginal, such as the first ship's background. Also, the gameplay wasn't original either, being filled with straight fly and that spam cube section right before the drop.
Conclusion: 9.9/20 (49.5%) Decent
Overall, this level could use some work, mainly with the design. It's a bit messy and too bright, it's hard too see. Gameplay is fine, but pretty boring in sections and uses way too much straight fly. The difficulty balancing was an issue, too. Sync was pretty great overall though. Honestly, I enjoyed this level, despite the gameplay issues, and I hope to see you improve your creating for the future. Good luck!
Moving to
Decent.