Reviews

Review by SiegeLord all reviews by SiegeLord

My first impression of playing Laundry day at bananas manor was that it was just a simple platformer... that impression dissappeared along with my character in the bottomless pit after I got to experience the disaster that is jumping in this game. Classically, jumping in platformers can be split into two categories... you can either control your character's horizontal velocity after jumping like normal, or you your horizontal velocity is fixed after you jump. This game adds a novel combination of those two mechanics: you can't alter the velocity normally once you jump... you can only alter the direction. Platforming with this mechanic is incredibly difficult, as it is impossible to make small adjustments in your landing spot. Frankly, the only way I got through the game was pretending that you couldn't alter your velocity at all during the jump and setting up the jump ahead of time. I suppose this mechanic is an interesting twist to something that would otherwise be a forgettable platformer, but I don't think it's a good mechanic nevertheless.

Once you spend all your lives figuring the jumping out, you'll learn that the nice introduction sequence (which I found very nice otherwise) is unskippable... luckily you don't need to see it if you have a password. Those two issues aside, the game reasonably fun to play.

The weapon selection is varied and the level design in principle encourages using different weapons for different situations.

The graphics are inventive but a bit basic. There are sound effects but no music.

Overall, I think it could have been a very good game, but jumping just ruined it.

In terms of the TINS rules, all rules were adequately touched upon without anything extra-ordinary. Primes were implemented somewhat weakly... there's really nothing that a naive user would be able to look at in the game and confidently say that it's a prime.

Scores: Overall 3 Artistical 3 Technical 4 Genre 3

Review by elias all reviews by elias

Just a game I have to vote on but not review, but here's the notes I made while playing it anyway:

Critic points:
- intro should be skippable
- falling should be straight down not sideways - the sideways falling makes jumps unnecessarily hard (i'd say this is the biggest flaw of the game... e.g. in the darkbits entry practicing the jumps is fun, in this one it's just annoying)
- enemy bullets are too slow, a few times i just had to stand there waiting for them to pass
- level order is misleading, took me about 25 tries beating the first level before I finally gave up and did levels 2 and 3 first instead
- collision detection is faulty, e.g. in the very first level both the rifle as well as the pistol will not hit the first lightning bolt at all (and i saw projectiles pass right through monsters throughout the game)
- autofire would be nice for all weapons
- the final boss seemed a bit easy, i hardly saw him at all before he fell dead from those blue bullets... so in case he has any strategy or clever scripting, I didn't get to see any of it

Praise:
- really liked the monster design, the furry lightning bolts, the jumping springs, the bubble spider, all quite unique
- i like the graphics a lot, from the player character (with his sun glasses) to the washing machine themed monsters and level geometry
- animated level geometry is a nice touch
- quite polished, plus points for allowing changing the keys

Scores: Overall 4 Artistical 4 Technical 2 Genre 5

Review by Gassa all reviews by Gassa

----- Description -----

The game is a 2D scrolling shooter. You control a guy with a gun. There are four levels.

In the first three levels, the aim is just to move to the opposite side of the level. This involves running, jumping and dealing with simple opponents. These levels can be played in any order. Upon completing each of them, you receive an extra gun.

The last level becomes accessible once you complete the first three. It is about killing the dragon. The dragon is more tricky than opponents from previous levels, yet beatable.

If you recieve too much damage or fall down, it costs you a life. In the case there are no more lives left, you lose the game but receive a passcode which restores the state of the player character (levels and guns unlocked).

The game includes a menu allowing to change keys, animated sequences at start and end of the game, and an option to enter a passcode.

----- TINS 2012 Rules Coverage -----

[Genre: creative anachronism.]
I found some anachronism in using a slingshot along with a rocket launcher and in the look of game heroes alongside a washing machine.

[Artistic: here be dragons.]
The boss opponent is a dragon.

[Technical: record progress.]
There is a passcode system.

[Technical: parallax scrolling.]
The scrolling interior of the washing machine fits in the game niely.

[Technical: prime numbers.]
The number of lives, hit points, boss hit points, levels open at the start are all prime numbers. Primes are used in the source code as object dimensions and also in the passcode system.

----- List of Uncomfortable Bugs -----

1. The intro and outro sequences can't be skipped.

2. When you jump while moving left or right, releasing the arrow key does not stop you from moving in that direction. However, pressing the opposite direction key does change the direction. It is a bit annoying that you can fly left or right freely while jumping but you can not nullify horizontal speed in flight. Jumping would be more fun if the player character stopped moving in horizontal direction as soon as you release the key.

3. When I first tried to kill the dragon, it got stuck in the wall above the level, and I had no way to kill it and had to start playing again.

4. If you jump up to the ceiling and hold the up arrow key, the player character hangs at the ceiling, and the jumping sound is looping. You can then move left or right while still hanging at the ceiling.

5. You don't receive a pass code if you win or quit, so you can't start again from the last level then.

----- Evaluation -----

[Overall]
There are a few issues listed above. Nevertheless, the game is playable and contains enough content to be fun for the 10-30 minutes it takes to learn and complete if nothing goes too wrong.

[Artistical]
The graphics are nice, especially the in-game opponents. Animated sequences are minimalistic but fine. Level interior also fits the theme. There are sound effects for jumping and shooting, rather minimalistic though.

[Technical]
Apart from the bug list above, everything seems to work nice and smooth. The main menu, level selection and input preferences are a plus.

The game includes about 150,000 bytes of C++/Allegro4 code, half of which is library code, and a significant part of the other half is the code reused from other projects. The code is clear enough, at least for a 72-hour contest entry.

On one side, I think code reuse was fine to save some time for creating actual game content. On the other side, sticking with Allegro4 does not fit well with TINS 2012, at least as I see it.

[Genre]
The anachronism genre rule is implemented nicely: weapons, heroes and levels are obviously from different eras.

As for the 2D shooter genre, the inconvenience of jumping is an unnecessary difficulty.

Scores: Overall 4 Artistical 4 Technical 3 Genre 4