Crush2 by Toque
Time Played: about 3 minutes
Overall Gameplay (5 / 13 points)
- Player Experience: 3.5/10
- Mechanical Polish: 1.5/3
Comments: This game had some personality, which made it fun - it was just way too short. I only played for three minutes total, and I honestly thought the first level was the hardest. Slinging my teeth around was entertaining, but it was a really low-risk, high-reward mechanic that made it easy to just sit back and permanently pick off all the enemies in a level. Nerfing that attack in some way would've put more pressure on the player and challenged them to do more general maneuvering and evasion. Hitboxes were really unforgiving given the perspective of the game, and I didn't like the choice of the shift key as a control for the teeth attack.
Theme Inclusion (1 / 6 points)
Comments: I didn't see any theme connection here. The ending screen had a cute little quote about "feeling back in my element!", but that's not sufficient use of the theme in my opinion.
Overall Presentation (4.5 / 10 points)
- General Presentation: 2/4
- Quality of Graphics: 1.5/4
- Quality of Audio: 1/2
Comments: The backstory was a nice enhancement, but I think for a game like this, a little more visual/animated storytelling would've gone a long way. Interfaces/popups looked and felt pretty hastily put together, and I would've appreciated being able to advance through menus using the keyboard since the rest of the game worked from the keyboard. There was a consistent graphical theme, but the graphics within the gameplay in particular were somewhat unpolished and missing variance/detail. I especially would've liked better visual cues as to which walls were solid for enemies as well as players. Music and sound effects were generally good, but the introductory menus really could've used their own background music.
Final comments: I liked this game - I just needed more content! More levels, more enemies, more mechanics, more story would've been great to see.