Game reviews!

I play indie games and write reviews. Summer 2014, my goal is to beat and write reviews of all of nitrome's games. main blog: funklestan

[summerofnitrome]

Rush

Started- August 7 5:45-6:50 Finished- August 7 7:30-10 Time Taken- 3h 35m

Favorite Race-3-8 Least Favorite-3-5

When I first saw that I was going to be playing a racing game, I sighed. I wasn't into the previous racing games nitrome had and honestly thought they were terrible. I especially hated Tanked Up and Flipside because of the fact that all the players were on the same track at the same time and not in a 3D sort of setting that could allow better evasion of other racers. But this game was different. This time, you're on your own track. You can see shadows of the other racers, but they don't get in your way. This idea of a racer game was better executed than the other games. I loved it. The game has the function of one key which is to flip gravity for the runner. The flips have to be strategic so that you can make it to speed boosters before the others because the only interference from other players is the for a few seconds, the boosters are disabled if another uses it. This wasn't a problem if you got ahead right away. I found this game to actually be really easy to get ahead in. First off, in several rounds I had lapped the other racers. In fact, my favorite race was 3-8. I had ended up lapping the racers anyway, but they all ended up being eliminated a few seconds after I finished the race. This game is easy for a racing game. Thank God because I hate racing games and find them to be really hard, especially the aforementioned Flipside and Tanked Up. This game was definitely one of the best racing games that I have ever played. I really enjoyed the design of the game. It was sort of like a Tron like design. The racers all had little glowing suits. They also had little jet packs which I assume are what help them flip. They have lights that glow behind them. They glow green when on a power boost. I liked the designs of the levels. They were all different, unique, and required different types of strategies. It was all different and I enjoyed that. I liked the obstacles. The coolest were the electric fences. It took me a while before I knew you could flip mid air and that aided on the one level that had a long stretch of electric fences on both floors and required the strategy of jumping mid air a lot. I also liked the yellow walls that flipped the players. That was cool. The overall design was just great. It was so futuristic and totally cool. It was a different kind of game but definitely fit in with most of nitrome's games. I'm glad it wasn't a huge failure. As a digression, there's an avatar on the title screen where the racers are racing. That's a creative and different place for an avatar. This was such a well executed racing game and I'm glad I got to play it and enjoyed it. This game gets a 7.5.

A race where I lapped them all

The beautiful race in which everyone was eliminated

[summerofnitrome]

Bad Ice-Cream

Started- August 6 4:10-4:40, 5:25-5:55, 9:45-10:15 Finished- August 7 12:10-1:25 Time Taken- 2h 45m

Favorite Level-12 Least Favorite-38

Hmm.. This post is an unpopular opinion all around. I don't like this game. Flat out. I found it boring. That is why it took my so long to complete the game. I was just bashing my head out of boredom. I don't understand why people love it so much. It seemed like a rip off of Square Meal with less power to the main player. At least in Square Meal you can kill the enemies. You can't kill the enemies in this game. It's really annoying. Not to mention the enemies are uglier in this game. It was so unoriginal. I mean, the ice cream thing is cool. Why the hell is it even called Bad Ice Cream? There's no explanation as to why the ice cream is bad. Does bad refer to attitude as in a bad guy or bad as in bad tasting? Of course, I played as Mint Chocolate Chip as that is my favorite flavor of ice cream (for those who really know me) and that's not bad tasting at all. Actually, I liked the idea that you could choose your flavor. That was a cool idea. There was Vanilla, Chocolate, Strawberry, Sorbet, and Bubble gum as well as the mint. They all said their names in funny voices when chosen. I liked that whole flavor thing. That was pretty cool. In the distributable version, however, you can only chose chocolate, vanilla, or strawberry. Anyway, thats good. The levels were really boring. They all kind of blended into each other. I liked the layouts and the learning curve was fine. But it was still boring. I had to keep stopping because I couldn't pay attention. The game was probably way too easy which is why I was bored. The enemies weren't that exciting in what they did and in fact they were just plain annoying. This game is just so overrated! I don't understand why there are two sequels! I guess the people liked the game and my silly opinion doesn't matter to the rest of the players. I didn't mind the design. I thought the sorbet ice cream resembled Rosie O'Donnell a little bit. They certainly looked bad, those scoops. I liked the different enemies. The ducks were hideous. The other enemies, I didn't even know what they were but they were certainly perfect as enemies because enemies are supposed to be hideous. I liked the different kinds of fruit to be collected. My favorite fruits were the kiwis. Despite the fact they moved around, they were easier to catch than those blasted pears. The pineapple was something I wasn't a fan of either. The cherries were also a really cool idea. I liked the fruit and thought that was cool. The music was appropriate and reminded me of an Ice Cream truck. Of course, not from experience because the Ice Cream truck that drives by my neighbor plays "In The Hall of the Mountain King" and that song is in minor and sounds like the ice cream man is a pedophile or something. He also plays Christmas music even though it's the summertime. Ice cream men give me the creeps. But anyway, the designs and the music was all appropriate and that's all I have to say about it. Besides the fact that I personally didn't like the game didn't mean it was a bad game. It was a fairly good game especially according to other people that weren't me. It was just like Square Meal which was a great game and one of my favorites. So it gets a different score of 7.5. I hope the next two sequels are better than the first.

[summerofnitrome]

Super Treadmill

Started- August 3 8:35-10:20 Finished- August 6 11:10-12:15 12:50-1:30 Time Taken- 3h 30m

Sorry that it took my a long time to finish this game. I was out on account of a surgery but I am fine now and able to get back on my gaming schedule. So here I am, ready to go on an write more reviews. Super Treadmill was a game I was really excited to play. Having played Pixel Pop and found it to be well executed as a "throwback" style game, I was excited to play another throwback game. This is the first game however where the loading screen is a NES or Nitrome Enjoyment System. It made me laugh how in the loading screen for this game you hear a blowing into the cartridge. That reminds me of my good ole days of blowing into gameboy cartridges. So anyway, I was excited to play this game because of nostalgia. I was glad that it turned out to be a great game as well. This game was so much fun. It's pretty basic. Just make sure Billy stays on the treadmill and dodges all the furniture and obstacles. Speaking of furniture, how much money does Uncle Rico even have? There weren't just tons of couches, tvs, beds, bookshelves, and stuff but there were also cars, vans, army tanks, and missiles. This guy is loaded! He also has a lot of friends (the runners that interfere with Billy). There's also a pretty awesome plot. Apparently Uncle Rico has a bet on Billy losing weight on the Super Treadmill. Billy sure has one insane metabolism. He keeps gaining and losing that weight! But the end sure has a pretty great plot. Uncle Rico loses the bet and ends up having to gain three times his weight and looks like a goddamn whale. Meanwhile, Billy learns that eating healthy and regular exercise is the key to maintaining a healthy weight and in the end he ends up chasing Uncle Rico to get on the Super Treadmill. It's a great twist of events. This game sure had a pretty funny plot. I loved playing it and found it to be so much fun. The graphics of course were very nostalgic, being that it's 8bit. I liked the design of Billy. He was very funny when he was fat. I liked all the different kinds of things he had to dodge. I hated though when things went wrong right at the end of the level and I still failed and had to go all over again. I don't understand how the workout failed when he was still skinny even when he fell off the treadmill. But that's off topic. I loved designs of the objects Billy has to dodge. There are a few cameos in this game such as the Square Meal troll, Magneboy, and Skywire written on the side of a bus. I loved the cut scene designs. They tried to make them look like they were made on old film. Everything was pretty great when it came to design. I loved the whole 8bit and everything. I loved the music and I loved the game. It was just great. I love the NES games and I can't wait to play the next one. There's just so much good to say about this game. This game gets an 8.5.

[summerofnitrome]

Happy Jump Land - Enemy 585 - The Last Henchman

Started- August 3 9:10-10:45 Finished- August 3 1:45-3:30 Time Taken- 3h 20m

Favorite Level- 1-3 Least Favorite- 1-1

This was probably one of the most unique games I've ever played. I was really excited to play it. The concept is really cool. I really loved the whole idea of a classic style game from the other side. The game was a big parody of Mario from the point of view of an enemy in the game. The plot was a great part of this. The bearded hero forgets to kill one enemy and the game is 99% completed so the last enemy is left and Turner, a group of blocks, feels bad that the enemy has to go left and right for the rest of time. So the player plays as Turner and helps Enemy 585 traverse across the levels. Because Enemy 585 is a part of the final level, he has to travel forwards to level 1. The game is set up much like Super Mario Brothers 3 where there are worlds with levels within each world. There are 6 worlds with 4 levels each. The levels are really creative. There are different types of worlds like mushrooms, clouds, water, field, and snow. It was just like playing Mario but different at the same time. I loved the nostalgia it brought but also the new feelings. It was perfect. Playing the game is also different because it's not just a platform game. It's sort of like Scribble and Sandman where you have to watch the characters and make sure they don't get killed. So you have to watch them. At the same time, it's also a puzzle game because you have to figure out the proper placement of Turner in time and without killing Enemy 585. It's all about timing and problem solving. So it's a really cool puzzle platformer. The gameplay was good and it was face paced and fun but I felt like it was also too slow at the same time. It sort of equalized it all out. I enjoyed playing it a lot. Also, as a post script to this paragraph, there's an avatar to be achieved on level 6-1. It isn't hard to get and just involves perfect timing. The aesthetics of the game were impeccable. It was like going into a candy store. There were so many amazingly bright colors and such. I love the level designs because they were all different. They had pretty and appropriate colors. Like the mushroom levels had red platforms and the sky was a sort of pinkish orangey color. The levels were all so uniquely designs and I enjoyed playing the game because of all these beautiful colors. I also loved the design of the end scene. The castle was well designed. I liked the bearded man mowing the lawn and the guard dog being a yappy chihuahua and the princess in her pink track suit sipping a martini from the balcony. I always wondered what happened to Mario and Peach after the game. I thought it was great. The design was so pale and kawaii. It seemed like those aesthetic blogs you see on tumblr. I loved it. There weren't enemies I could rate because they were all dead. I just loved the general design of all the levels and everything. They were all so uniquely laid out and designed in such a pretty way. I loved it. The music was also great. The music had to be awesome. It was appropriate with the corresponding levels. Each song was different and was pretty in their own way. This game was just pure eye candy. I loved it so much. This is definitely one of the higher rated games. It deserves a 9.

[summerofnitrome]

Sky Serpents

Started- August 2 8:25 Finished- August 2 9:55 Time Taken- 1h 30m

Favorite Level-5 Least Favorite-9

I was really surprised at this game. It was a lot more than I thought it would be. At first, I thought it was just gonna be another generic action game with shooting and stuff like Bullethead ended up being. In fact, it wasn't boring at all. I loved it. It was so much fun! It was funny because this is the second serpent game I've play today, Worm Food being the other except from the perspective of the serpent. But anyway, I really liked this game and I am glad that I did. Each level was different and had so much to offer. There were fifteen different serpents that you had to destroy. Each one had unique attacks against the player but also some came back in later serpents. For example, poison gas came back often as well as spikes. I liked how many types of attacks there were as well. They were all super cool. The most important thing I have to say about gameplay is that the serpents all move in patterns. Once you learn the pattern, it is easier to defeat. All attacks and movements are the same. They all repeat. Because of this tactic, I defeated most of the levels within the first try. There were a few that took me a few times, those being 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, and 13. They all weren't that hard. I saw comments on the page about how hard people thought they game was. As my significant other would say in this situation, "psh, fucking casuals". I don't see this game hard at all. It was fun. If it was hard, I would make a short post and say nothing good about it as I usually do for games I hate that are not worth talking about. But this game had the perfect level of hardness and was great. I loved it so much. The game is unique and is something I've never seen before. I loved all the action and movements of the game. It was so unique. Another thing that was unique was the design of this game. I was unimpressed at the title screen because it was another monochromatic menu and I thought it was gonna be an entirely monochromatic game like Worm Food and Double Edged. But I was wrong again. Every level had different designs. There were different weather situations, different times of day, and different cloud thicknesses. 7 and 15 were hard because the clouds were really thick. I liked 7 though because the yellow midday design was beautiful. I loved looking at the backgrounds because they were all so well done. I liked the ones where it was raining because they even put in lightning. I liked that a lot. Once again, the little things always make the video game. The backgrounds were just so amazingly animated. Continuing, I thought each design of the serpents were all so unique. They were fitting with their backgrounds and situations. They all had fitting attacks as well. They all were majestically designed. I loved how they looked like realistic dragons despite the fact dragons do not exist. They looked so real. They were beautiful. I liked how the Ice serpent was in an icy world and so on. They were all appropriate for locations and it was all so perfect. One thing I didn't care for was the main character. I wasn't looking at him anyway but he definitely looked like a Norseman as he is. That was appropriate. Speaking of the main character; I didn't like him. He was cocky and a jerk and he totally got what he deserved in the end. I feel instead of saying 140, the father should have said 1400 because it would be easier to mix up fourteen with fourteen hundred, not fourteen with one forty. But other than that, this game was fun. It was well made and beautiful and just an overall great game. This game totally gets a high score of 9.

[summerofnitrome]

Temple Glider

Started- August 2 4:10-4:25, 4:30-5:20 Finished- August 2 5:45-6:55 Time Taken-2h 15m

Favorite Level-9 Least Favorite-18

God. This game makes me groan in frustration and disappointment. I admit I was pretty excited to play this game. My excitement was not worth it. Just by looking at the icon, I thought it was something like Temple Run. I thought it was a fast paced action game where you fly past all kinds of dangerous obstacles and collect gems and stuff. But I was wrong. It's sort of like Onekey where you can go across the level except you can control your character but also they both have "tribal" sort of themes. This game has an Egyptian style. It sort of bothered me how disappointingly inappropriate the icon is to the game to look so super actiony and exciting when the game is obnoxious. That's a good word for it. I was bored and annoyed beyond frustration. First of all, the game is so slow. Maybe it's just my ancient as hell computer or it was the game. It was slow for me. Picking up speed was hard and taking flight was hard. That made me mad. So often I would run into things like chain monsters or fall off of platforms because I was unable to make it to them because I wasn't going fast enough. but then again, there were levels like 18 where you get too much speed and end up falling through the tread blocks. It's really hard controlling the bird, in fact. The bird is so hard to control like turning around was the hardest part. It's best to turn around against the wall but you can't turn around mid air without dropping altitude and probably hitting an obstacle like spikes or something. So if you're in the middle of the level and need to turn around, you have to go back to where there's a wall so that you can turn around. Controlling the bird was just so annoying. I wish you could use the up key to control altitude. I also wish that you could use the wasd keys for walking and the arrow keys for flying. That would be easier because trying to walk without flying is really hard and is a needed skill on several levels especially with crusher blocks and tread blocks. It's a lot of work and it seems like a bunch of unnecessary fussing around. That's the most annoying thing about this damn game. The enemies were really cool in this game. I liked them, for once. They were easy to navigate past as long as the main character was cooperating with you. I really enjoyed the concept of the chain gates. Those were cool. They followed you around. That was cool. I also liked the quicksand hands. That was especially cool. They grabbed you but didn't necessarily dunk you completely into the quick sand. The fire breathing pharaoh heads were easy to navigate around as long as you had necessary momentum. I didn't mind the spikes either. But the design of the fire breathing heads was impressive. They looked very regal and looked like something you'd find on a sarcophagus or some statue in a pyramid or temple. I hated the wind and crusher blocks the most. The wind was annoying because it's already hard enough to control that bird that I don't need anymore obnoxious things preventing my control. The crusher blocks you need the right timing and often times either you're too slow or too fast. It's hard to get the right speed, and being able to stop for the right time if need be. I liked the design, which is good. I'm not one for games that aren't accurate when they're about some cultural thing like Egypt or Onekey's Aztec thing. That was a failed concept. Despite it being inaccurate, obviously, it's well designed. I liked the look of the blocks and the false heiroglyphics on them. I also liked the statues and pots as decoration on the levels. The background showed that there was an outside. The design was pretty cool. I wasn't sure about the bird. It was cute but weird. For some reason I thought it had glasses from my look at the icon. I thought it looked like Blue Max from Sky Kid (His Namco High design). I thought it was a similar design but then I saw the bird wasn't wearing glasses. That disappointed me. The bird was just interesting. Let's leave it at that. This game was just annoying, disappointing, and interesting all bundled into one. This game gets a 5.

[summerofnitrome]

Squawk

Started- August 2 3:45 Finished- August 2 3:55 Time Taken-10m

This was a fairly good game for a minigame. I was a little bored because I didn't find it too exciting, but it was better than some. I like the design, being a pirate ship and the player is playing as a parrot. I liked the set up of the game as well because it's sort of like levels but it's not levels at the same time. The board changes which is a cool idea. The controls are really confusing though. It's hard to control the parrot as you have to control it with pegs on the sides of the ship. It isn't always easy to collect all the coins on each "level". I did get bored with the game because there wasn't really much to it, but that doesn't matter because it's a mini game. It's not like I have to play this game for 1-3 hours like I do with most games. It's hard to play at first but gets easier the more you practice the controls. I also liked the music. I has accordion music and is the same feeling as Mutiny. The graphics of the pirate ship and everything was really well done. There isn't much to say besides it's better than most minigames so it deserves a 4.5.

[summerofnitrome]

Worm Food

Started- August 1 5:30-6:15, 8-8:30 Finished- August 2 8:35-9:25 Time Taken-2h 5m

Favorite Level-10 Least Favorite-11

This was a fairly good game. It wasn't too hard and wasn't too easy. I also wasn't bored at all. It was all good. The game features a worm which severely reminds me of the 80's movie Tremors feating Kevin Bacon. The movie has underground worms that go and try to destroy the small town of Perfection which has like less than 20 residents. Kevin Bacon obviously saves the day with dynamite. Maybe the rock tribe would have beaten the worm if they used dynamite, obviously. Anyway, this was a used concept but I liked the tribe idea. The rock tribe reminded of of Avatar the Last Airbender for some reason. But they were really cool and they just tried so hard to beat that worm but they kept getting eaten. Controling the worm is hard at first but in essences it's not that hard to control. It reminds me of the future nitrome game "8bit Doves". Use the left and right to steer and practice makes perfect. The more you play, the better you get at understanding the controls and how to steer without problems. So the controls aren't that bad. It's not stressful like how stressed I got when I played Ribbit which had controls that were like trying to teach a baby how to drive a semi truck. The obstacles in the game weren't that challenging either. The hardest thing I found about this game was the jumping from one floating island to another. I had a hard time on a few levels because you have to jump up and make it to the next land mass without falling to your death. The spikes and enemies the rock tribe got were no challenge. The fish and the birds and archers were no match to a giant worm. So overall, it was an easy and fun game with slight challenge; just right! The design was pretty interesting. Mostly I'd be disappointed in playing a monochromatic game, but this was different. I wasn't disappointed at all in the monochrome because it seemed to be very appropriate to the game. It worked out really well. It wasn't boring at all. But it was also supposed to be dull gray to show old times as well as a rock tribe. Rocks are gray, obviously. I liked that atmosphere the game had. The music helped carry the atmosphere as well. It had a tribal feeling but was also upbeat and syncopated. The designs of the enemies was something I liked. I liked the bird. It looked like something from day of the dead. It was like a flying skeletal bird almost. I also liked the fish. They reminded me of angler fish. The designs of the villagers were like bean people from Skywire but different. They had cool hair and faces and there were archers and witch doctors that had cool masks on. I really liked how varied all the villagers were and it was really cool. This game is a really good game. It deserves a good score of 6.5.

[summerofnitrome]

Ribbit

Started- August 1 12:45 Finished- August 1 3:20 Time Taken-2h 35m

Favorite Level-7 Least Favorite-16

This game is so stressful! I don't know what to think! At first, the game was impossible. I couldn't figure out how to control ribbit. It wasn't clear in the directions on how to steer ribbit. I spent a good 10 minutes trying to figure out how to steer. Apparently, you need to point the direction of the head. So if you want to go right, you need to land ribbit like this /. Also, I didn't realise until much much later in the game that down also wasn't just to stop but could straighten out ribbit. This was helpful for levels like 15-19 where double or triple strength jumps are mandatory. So figuring out the controls was the hardest thing. The controls are god awful even after figuring them out. Sometimes it's impossible to go the right way. Level 16 was the hardest for me because there are a few stretches were the level is completely vertical. This is the hardest part. It was ridiculous. I hated the controls so much. The levels weren't particularly hard. They were really short, which was good. If it was a normal platform game without hard controls, it would be easily beaten. I wish the game wasn't all about bouncing. However, a game needs some aspect of hardness and can't be too easy. But this was just ridiculous. I feel bad because it's the second lowest rating on Jay is Games for nitrome games. I also feel bad because the graphics and music were outstanding and I just couldn't enjoy all of it because they gameplay was ridiculous. The graphics were great. I loved everything about it. The whole world that ribbit lived in was so colorful. I liked the orange background. It was really cool. The ground had a cool pattern to it. I loved the design of the sun. It's face is funny. All of the enemies are so creative. I liked the turtarafs the most. Those are great. I liked the design of Dr. Siamese as well. I liked how he had a little bow on his single hair on the top of his head. He had a really good cartoonish design. Most of the enemies and characters in this game had a great cartoony design. The Rhino Beetle for example, was very cartoony. I liked that enemy design the most. The design was really good. I loved the color scheme and everything. The music for the title screen was really catchy. I loved that too. But I just couldn't enjoy it because the game was so annoyingly challenging. I wish I could have enjoyed it and honestly, I did enjoy some levels, but that enjoyment didn't last very long. It's better than some games, though. I feel it gets a 4.5.

[summerofnitrome]

Fault Line

Started- July 31 6:30-7 Finished- July 31 7:30-8:20 Time Taken-1h 20m

Favorite Level-27 Least Favorite-30

This game was a really great game. I liked it a lot. It's really unique and super cool. The whole idea of the game is something I've never seen before. Zapo, the main character, changes his environment by folding the walls at nodes. That's really cool. I've never seen a game where the environment is changed in a way of folding. That's really cool and new. It's probably one of the most original concepts I have ever seen in a game, ever. I loved that so much. Such an awesome concept. Once you use your brain to figure out the puzzle parts, it's really just a simple platform game. I love puzzle platformers. Those are my favorite genre. It's thinking and adventure all in one. I love it. So as I said, this game is so unique and different. I love the levels. They're all so different and fascinating. The amount of creativity to make this game is off the charts. The hazards in this game also aren't really hazards because if you think hard enough, you'll be fine. Also, you can't die, per se. You just get sent back to the beginning or the previous checkpoint. It's really cool. It's an easy game but It's not so easy that it's boring. It's the perfect level of hardness. I love it. There are also two avatars you can unlock in this game. They're easy to procure and are on levels 3 and 25. There's just so much to love about the game concept and mechanics. This game is so pretty. It's got a very cool futuristic feel to it. I love the lasers and lighting of the game. The purple shades add a very nice atmosphere as well. I dig it. The game felt like a spaceship or laboratory. It was cool to see how the levels looked. The idea sort of reminded me of Tiny Castle in the sense that the level structure changes. I liked the idea, as I said before. But the whole atmosphere and color scheme of the game was so cool. I loved it. The robot was also really well designed. It looked like a really cool robot. The purple also fit the atmosphere. Everything was just so appropriate to the point that it was stunning. The music also added to the game. It sort of reminded me of the music from Magneboy. Both games' music is soft and soothing yet futuristic and mysterious. The music is mysteriously futuristic. It's soft sounding and calming. Puzzle games really benefit from soft music because it doesn't distract you. It's hard to play puzzle games with music meant for action games that gets you pumped or adds suspense. The music was just perfect. This game was just perfect. This game gets a 10. I loved it so much and I will probably play it again in my future.

[summerofnitrome]

Bullethead

Started- July 31 2-2:20 Finished- July 31 3:55-5:30 Time Taken-1h 55m

The way I feel about Bullethead is the same way I feel about the previous game. I found it very boring. Every level seemed the same to me. There was no change in the game at all. The only change were the enemies. They weren't particularly hard to beat either. Just stay out of the way and constantly hold down your fire button. It's pretty easy. No matter how many enemies there are, just don't stop holding down the fire button and don't stop dodging the shots from the enemies. The only level that's different is the last level with the boss. That level isn't especially hard either. Every move it makes is in a pattern. When it is shooting out lazers, stay between the two rows. And later when it moves in a wave pattern, it moves in peaks and troughs. Stay under the trough and make sure not to be too close to the other side. It's really easy. This game is way too easy. It's not as easy as Chisel was, but it's still easy. I don't want it to be too hard, though. It could stand to be a little bit harder. Also, I think the game would benefit from a change in the design throughout the levels. I don't have a favorite or least favorite level because all of them blended in together. Maybe there could be a change in the daylight or the skyline. Maybe there could be changes in the terrain. I'm not sure, but I just found it to be very boring without a change in the levels. The game, as I said, needed some help in the design. The levels were boring and similar. I did like the skyline and found it to be pretty. In fact, the design reminded me a lot of Final Ninja. All the robots looked like the robots in the Final Ninja. The background looked like Final Ninja's backgorund as well. The city is much like it is in the first game. So the robots were all really cool looking and each was different. I really loved the design of the boss. That was a beautifully well done robotic dragon and I found it to be very majestic. It reminds me of the dragon from the movie Tales From Earth Sea. That was the best design in the entire game. It was such a cool boss. The robots were all different. I liked the different features they had in how they tried to kill the main character. Speaking of the main character, I found it sort of annoying that when you died, it made the sound that the main character from Glassworks made when he was injured. That same grunt or whatever does not work with this main character. It does not work at all. That's the only problem I had with sound. I liked the music and found it to be appropriate. It worked with the game's industrial atmosphere. I did enjoy the atmosphere of the game because it did fit the desolate war zone that was the whole jist of the game. The design worked well with the concept. So yes, it was all appropriate but it all just needed a little something more. This game gets an average score of 5.5.

[summerofnitrome]

Chisel

Started- July 30 10:10-11 Finished- July 31 12:15-1:30 Time Taken-2h 5m

Chisel is another game of nitrome's that gives me mixed feelings. Despite the fact that I was really bored the whole time, the levels seemed to go by rather quickly. I mean, I didn't even know I was at the end of the game or near the end because all the levels just seemed to blend into each other. That's why I don't have a favorite or least favorite level. But I was bored. The game was so monotonous. It was also very repetitive and way too easy. I am not a big fan of overly easy games. This one is an overly easy game. Thus why I was bored. The only thing that stuck out to me was the Rockitty reference. But other than that, I was bored. The gameplay is really easy. You just blast through the planet to make it smaller. There's nothing too exciting. It's just repetitive destruction that isn't even complete destruction. So it's pretty boring to me. Some people go crazy over this game, but I don't find it to be anything special. The aesthetics were pretty good, I've got to say that. I liked the pretty colors and the patterns of the planets. I liked the puzzle piece planet design as well as the one shaped like a cog because there were smaller cogs as the pattern. I liked that the most. The colors of the game are really pleasant. I wasn't too crazy about the enemies because they were really basic looking like those birds. I didn't really care about the main character either but I did, once again, like the colors. There isn't really much to say about this game. It's really boring but has a nice color scheme to it. It's overly easy. It gets a 4.5.

[summerofnitrome]

Tiny Castle

Started- July 30 1:25 Finished- July 30 2:01 Time Taken-36m

This game was really different for a nitrome game. I really liked it. Instead of having levels, the game is all one big level with 8 checkpoints that the player must reach. The player is a knight who travels through a castle to "save" a princess. The castle's layout changes every time the player reaches a checkpoint. There are so many features that change such as water flooding to help reach higher platforms, the knight set on fire to light up torches, as well as crystal balls that must be broken in a specific order. Along the way, keys are needed to unlock doors, walls can be smashed, monsters have to be killed, and chests have to be opened. It's a lot of fun travelling all over this shape changing house. I really liked that idea of it changing. It's really cool. The monsters are all unique and are something you'd expect inside a creepy old castle like rats and ghosts. In the end, you fight the Grandad who is a wizard who has been changing the whole castle in the first place. Once defeating him by hitting him three times on the head, there is a surprise plot. I'm really excited about this surprise plot because I wasn't expecting it. Apparently, the knight wasn't even there to save the princess. He was there to give her an eviction notice! That's so funny. Apparently he's mad at her because of flood and fire damage, as well as unwanted pets. That was really unexpected and it made me laugh. Such a great surprise plot. It's perfect. I mean, if one of my tenants made me fight monsters and traverse the changing surroundings just to give them an eviction notice, I'd kick them out on the spot! I just loved the concept of the plot and changing surroundings. It was perfect. Also, you can achieve an avatar in the help section which is a really good place for an avatar to be hidden. That's also really cool. The design of this game is really simple. It reminded me of Small Fry because the main character was really tiny, thus why it's called tiny castle. Everything is tiny. I didn't really care for designs except for the fact that the environment changed. That's super unique. The final form of the wizard grandad was super cool. He was a big robotic sort of thing and I liked it. There isn't much to say except for the fact that it all looks sort of retro. I thought it was pretty unique and different than most nitrome games. This game gets a big score for creativity. I give it a 7.5.

is that solaire from  dark souls in that window???

[summerofnitrome]

Blast RPG

Started- July 30 10:20 Finished- July 30 12:30 Time Taken-2h 10m

Favorite Level-4 Least Favorite-6

Blast RPG is one of the cutest games I've ever played. The game play is very similar to that of Snot Put, but with more of a challenge. For example, in Snot Put, there are no obstacles and monsters you have to kill in order to keep going. In Blast RPG, your score and distance relies on the monsters that you kill. As the boy knight is shot out of his pig cannon, he runs into monsters and has to kill them in order to get a boost to make it to the required distance of the level. I really enjoyed this game. At first, the controls were incredibly nebulous. I wasn't sure how to play. But eventually, after playing the first level several times, I figured it out. I didn't know you had to kill monsters in order to advance. I tried to avoid them as much as possible in the beginning. So always aim for monsters unless your health is low. Always aim for fairies as well. If you get through a lot of fairies, you're set for a long time. They really are one of the best boosters. This game could also count as a strategy game because you have to make sure you have the right tools on hand. Health supply, the strongest weapon available, and rocket boosters. Rocket boosters are the best. Those give you an extra boost when you slow down and haven't reached the goal. Surprisingly, I didn't use one during the last level but during level 5 I used three of them. But having items in the inventory really helps a lot. So it's sort of a pseudo-strategy game. It's also a strategy in the sense of Pokemon where using the fire, water, or grass powerups can help you to defeat stronger enemies. There are fire, water, grass, and normal type enemies. Specific elemental powerups do not help at all in the defeat of non- elemental powerups. So there's surprising a lot to this game with a simple concept. This game isn't just really unique and simply complex. It's super adorable. The boy knight is the cutest. He has braces. Some say it's his teeth and other say it's his braces and I'm on the side for the braces. His braces are super cute. He's got the cutest design. The princess he "saves" is also really cute. The monsters are totally nonthreatening. They're really cute as well. The Treants are cute despite being sort of frighteningly powerful. The Kappas also make me laugh because they're fish. The Ogres are super cute and remind me of something from an episode of Fairly Odd Parents. The cutest enemy were the slimes. The looking like porings from the MMO Ragnarok. They're really cute. Every enemy in this game is just so super cute! The backgrounds are also very adorable. I loved the little houses in 1 and 4. They looked like faces. They were so cute. I loved the backgrounds so much. The moon in level 4 is also super cute. It has a retro style design. The other cutest thing about this game besides all the super adorable designs was the music. The music is super cute. The menu music is the best. This whole game is just so damn cute. I really liked this game. It's super cute and fun but also a very good challenge, which is something I like in a game. This game gets a 7.5.

[summerofnitrome]

Skywire VIP

Started- July 29 11 Finished- July 29 11:30 Time Taken-30 m

This is a very interesting spin off from the original Skywire games. I love Skywire and it's my favorite series that nitrome has. So obviously, I had to like this game. I did like it. It was a very interesting game to plan. The game features the bean people and you have to guess which one is which. There are plenty of unique pop culture references throughout the 100 bean people/bean groups you have to guess. I loved some appearances such as The Blues Brothers, Scooby Doo, Ghostbusters, and Wallace and Gromit. There were also cleverly placed nitrome games in there such as Frost Bite, Square Meal, Dirk Valentine, and Final Ninja. Most notably there's the original Skywire characters. That is the best one, I believe. I laughed really hard when I saw that. That's such a great idea and a good test to see if people really payed attention to the first two games and their designs. The downside was that there were a few things that were way to obscure so I needed to consult the wiki. For example, who the hell is Admiral Nelson? I found Resident Evil, Street Fighter, The X Files, Laurel and Hardy, amy Winehouse, Crocodile Dundee, and Metal Gear Solid to be the hardest. Some people dont' even know those. I had no idea! Plus, the Shrek one didn't resmeble shrek. Lemmings? What reference is that? So many confusing things that I would never have gotten if I wasn't on the wiki page. There were a lot of obscure ones amongst the super easy and fun references throughout the game. Besides that, it's a pretty cool game. I think it's really unique and such a great idea especially with nitrome's unique and iconic bean people. This spin off gets a good score of 7.

[summerofnitrome]

Rubble Trouble New York

Started- July 28 6:15-7, 8:10-9:30, 10:30-11:15 Finished- July 29 8-8:35 Time Taken-2h 25m

Favorite Level-25 Least Favorite-23

Rubble Trouble is one of nitrome's most famous and popular game series. I see why. This series is supposed to be like the new Ice Breaker series. It has fun puzzles, physics, and a cool concept/design just like Ice Breaker. I find that it's not a fun and awesome as the Ice Breaker series, but it's still a really great game with a really cool concept. First of all, the concept is pretty cool. I really like the idea of the construction company that must be mindful of the buildings they destroy. You can't destroy other buildings or the boss's car. That's a big no no. You have to be careful where and what you destroy. So this is more of a strategy game but it also involves physics because you have to be able to place bombs and other weapons properly for the game to go right. Oftentimes, you have to use physics to plan out where a structure is going to fall without hitting a building that isn't meant to be destroyed. I like the concept a lot. The gameplay involves you to be very careful and strategic in your placement of weapons as I said. The weapons or tools you can use to destroy buildings are Nitro (lol), drill, cannon, wrecking ball, missile launcher, grabber, thumper, chain gun, and air strike. The easiest to use is the nitro. Nitro is short of nitroglycerine, not nitrome, silly. It's easiest to use because you place it and click and then it destroys a square. I also liked the thumper and chain gun. The thumper is really fun and is featured in it's own level, 25. That level was fun. You have to destroy the building with good timing and placement in order to make it grow shorter and shorter until it's destroyed. That one was fun. The chain gun is also tons of fun. You can just shoot with wild abandon. This was best used in level 32 where you could shoot whereever you wanted to because there were no other buildings in the way. The amount of tools to use is so cool. I loved all there was to use. It was great. This game wasn't just fun with all the tools and concept and physics, but the design was pretty cool. As I said, I really liked the whole idea of the construction men. It was really cool. I liked how their names were Barry and Garry and cousin Ivan. The boss was also funny because he got really mad when you hurt a worker (who I hope is going to get a good workers compensation for those injuries) and when you're making money, he has little dollar signs floating from his head to show how excited he is about this money he's making. He's also bought a new car so he gets really mad when the car gets destroyed. Speaking of things that can be destroyed, I liked the buildings. There were generic buildings that appeared to have what looked like dresses in the window. There was also a museum building. Boy, Old Ming Exhibition sure is happening in a lot of buildings and there sure are a lot of giant marrows in New York. The marrows were especially funny. There are also big fireworks buildings which cause a massive array of explosions if you hit them. Those were especially annoying because you had to wait until they all exploded before you could restart the level. You can't restart mid animation of those explosions either. That was really annoying. But I liked the designs of the buildings you're not supposed to destroy. A porta potty was supposed to be one of them and I wished they kept it because that is funny and a great idea. Plus, all construction areas have to have porta potties! The things you're supposed to destroy, the levels are all so different and unique. I like all the different buildings you can destroy. They're all so different and unique. I liked them all. I love games like this because the buildings are different and so creatively made. Architecture is so cool. The different buildings are so great! I also liked the background of the game as well. It had the New York City skyline (which I heard was added later when the next RT game came out). The skyline is just so cool. The lighting of the sky changes from blue to orange to show progression of daytime as well. Another design I liked was the menu because it looked like you could choose a level and each level was surrounded by streets and was a building. That was really cool. The design of this game is just so creative and unique. I liked the game's design a lot. This game is just so unique. It's fun and I can't wait to play the sequels. This game gets an 8.5.

[summerofnitrome]

Avalanche

Started- July 28 2 Finished- July 28 5:40 Time Taken-3h 40m

Favorite Level-5 Least Favorite-7

Avalanche is another game I have mixed feelings about. I first thought that this game was really cute, easy, and adorable. However, later on, I was proven wrong. The game kept up the adorable factor but was not easy at all. So game play is pretty simple. Just accelerate and jump. That's easy enough. And the game is pretty easy up until level 7. I hate level 7. It took me so long to do this damn level. My fingers were hurting because I got so mad holding down those buttons. The level was easy enough up until the very end. I hated the ending where the penguin makes it up to the steep slope. That part is insane. The slop is so steep that the avalanche starts to slowly creep up on the player. You can't build up enough momentum to just zoom right up. And once you get to the top you have to jump and hold the penguin in the air until they get to the icy slope. It's really hard and took me the majority of the time. It took me about 2 hours, actually. That's really sad. But after that, the levels were a lot easier. Level 8, theres an avatar. You must take the middle route around 580m and that will lead to the avatar. You have to jump over a snowball though, so be wary. There is a lot of obstacles you have to watch out for, but they aren't the hardest part of the game. I didn't even really care about the enemies (bears, rabbits, rocks, etc). I found the hardest thing to be is timing. Timing is what got me in level 15. Level 15 was the second hardest level and took me about 40 minutes. The timing of when to jump was really hard. I had the hardest time at the very end making sure I could even make it to the end platform or when the icy slope leads to a ramp that shoots you up to a higher platform. The timing of the jumps were the hardest part. I got really mad at the amount of trouble these levels caused me and that's why I don't like the game. Besides that, the rest of the levels were perfectly fine with medium to hard difficulty after level 7. However, I did say I thought this game had a great cuteness factor. I loved the penguin. It was so cute. I liked it's face. It was so cute. I also loved the very end when you find out that the penguin is a parent. That's super adorable. The facial expressions the penguin and others make are great. They look so shocked to see the avalanche coming. I also liked the design of the bear. It was really cute and totally non-threatening. This game is just so damn cute! That's what I liked the most. So this game is actually a pretty good game. It's just a little overwhelming. I liked it and it gets a 7.5.