Reviews

Review by SiegeLord all reviews by SiegeLord

An interesting, Zelda-inspired game where you go on a musical rampage against plant life. The optimal strategy appears to require avoiding all of the game mechanics, and rush to collect all the bananas not bothering to dodge of kill any of the enemies.

I really liked the graphics of the game, the gradients on the walls and the flowers are very pleasing to the eye. The sound and the music fit the theme as well, it resembled a 90's platformer sound to me.

I understand that a lot of the technical aspects are recycled, but it's still pleasing to play a well-polished game. The split screen option is neat, and I always give bonus points for including key configuration.

The procedural content was implemented as random mazes constructed from pre-made rooms (as far far as I could tell). This worked okay, but the reused rooms combined with the time limit meant that it was very easy to get lost as you forgot which level you were on. There were a few too many dead ends as well. That said, it didn't feel unfair or frustrating.

The genre was implemented okay, the enemies were flowers of sorts, but aside from their superficial appearance their flower aspects were very limited.

Scores: Overall 4 Artistical 5 Technical 4 Genre 3

Review by entheh all reviews by entheh

Congratulations on this top-down banana-hunting Plants vs Rob Zombie game, or am I trying too hard with that one?

The flower theme is satisfyingly all-pervasive, with the game set in a flower garden and bringing in elements of the old-fashioned Flower Power movement. I haven't awarded 5 because I can't honestly say it defines the gameplay mechanics, but the 4 is well deserved.

Artistically speaking, my first feeling on opening it was that it was somehow unfinished. I think a few elements that may contribute to this feeling - though I'm listing them with a great deal of uncertainty - are the somewhat arbitrary screen area set aside for the game map, the faux perspective effect that doesn't have a consistent vanishing point, the presence of large, untextured areas (including black outside the map), and the use of Allegro's built-in font. That said, the artistic rule (to make fun of old-fashioned things) is covered, and there is some nice pixel art once you get into the details, so I've awarded 4 here too. I was certainly surprised when I discovered that my weapon was musical. (On that note - yes, note - a missed opportunity would be to use the current harmony in the music to inform the choice of chord.)

Successful procedural level generation as exhibited here is no walk in the park, and this easily earns you yet another 4. The text scroller is special, with coloured letters and wavy offsets, so that's covered too. I did reserve a point because the collision detection didn't convince me when I was trying to collect keys.

It's a generally solid entry and I seem to have awarded fours all round. Well done. This game will have me on all fours picking flowers. Oh dear, I'm trying too hard again.

Scores: Overall 4 Artistical 4 Technical 4 Genre 4

Review by elias all reviews by elias

Very impressive entry. It's definitely the highest production value of any games I've played so far.

Music, sound effects, lots and lots of content. There's many (procedurally generated) levels and different monsters and power-ups. I really like the graphics style and all the small details like the different notes depending on which direction you shoot or the colorful rainbow messages :)

Scores: Overall 5 Artistical 5 Technical 5 Genre 5

Review by MarkOates all reviews by MarkOates

Wow what an entry.

I had very slow framerates with the game starting in fullscreen, but I was able to toggle in and out of fullscreen to get good speeds. I appreciate the fullscreen option, which worked particularly on my display scaling the graphics up to usable levels.

This game was remarkably complete for a TINS game. I appreciated the graphics, sound effects, and gameplay in general. Mostly, I found picking up the strength and weapon enhancing items to be the most rewarding part of the game, because they were the most rare.

I also appreciated the pre-designed rooms, and variety of enemies. I feel this game has a solid foundation of an engine and with more level design expansion, weapons, enemies, boss fights and a few tweaks like power bars, could be a solid game all around.

Scores: Overall 4 Artistical 4 Technical 5 Genre 5