Score: 7

"Cool Photo Effects"

submission: Goodbye Cruel World

date: July 10, 2007

I really liked the way you did the photographs. Plus, Pink Floyd is almost always a good choice.

My only real suggestion would be: When a character is interacting with something, like the dude is when he's running his fingers through his hair, I think it helps for there to be some sort of visual clue that the interaction is taking place. You know, like some of the hair would overlap the fingers, or they would move to track over the curve of the top of the head, or something. It's a minor point, I guess, but it is something I noticed.

Score: 8

"Speaking as somebody who enjoys tea..."

submission: English Tea

date: July 10, 2007

I had never heard this song before (although I do enjoy the Beatles' music). Overall, I really did enjoy this piece, although I find that I must agree with mrpersonguy on one point: the croquet scene. I didn't have any problems with the way the violence was depicted, it just seemed a little out of character with the rest of the flash. I understand that you may have included it to highlight a sort of 'otherworldly' or 'unreal' theme to the piece, but it just didn't seem to fit with the rest of it.

All in all, I really did enjoy it quite a bit. I especially liked the teacup bell in the bell tower. A nice touch. :)

Score: 10

"Follow the yellow brick road indeed..."

submission: Golden Path

date: June 8, 2007

After I watched this, I went back and re-watched some of your other work so as to be prepared to write this review. Here goes.

First off, I thought the artistic work was beautiful. I could see how you built off some of your previous ideas and designs. For example, the skeleton that puts on the mask and is covered up reminded me of some parts of 'Breath Me.' In particular, I really liked the bit where the stars coalesce to form a figure. Most cool.

The song you chose is AWESOME! I know nothing of the band, so I can't join the debate that I saw in some of the other reviews. Oh well. I'll just reiterate: The song was awesome.

In your comments, you said that you "really need to improve on your story skills." I'm not entirely sure what you meant by that, though. Were you talking about the images and the visual 'story' that accompanied the song? The only thing I noticed there that could possibly be considered a weakness was the literal interpretation of the lyrics that was going on. That's the sort of thing that can work for you or work against you. The only place it bothered me at all was when the song was talking about the words of the demon being like lava from a volcano, and a volcano rose up in the background.

Judging by the rest of your work, I don't think you really need too much help on that area. I mean, it's just a matter of listening to the song and weaving your own story to fit the theme and feel of the music. You've already shown you can do that really well, in 'Opiate,' for example, or in 'Innocent Mayhem" (still one of my favorites).

Anyway, Kudos on another awesome video! It's good to see new work from you on NG. I wish I had been lurking on the portal to help protect this one, but I'll content myself with a '5' for it after the fact.

Score: 7

"Game props"

submission: Click Crazy

date: June 8, 2007

I've always liked games with an 'exploratory' element, so I had fun finding all the things I could click on. Also, I enjoyed the sort of surreal dream quality to everything (especially the plant with the eyes and the seeds drifting in through the window). Plus, I liked how some of the elements seemed to work together when I clicked lots of things right after one another (it almost looked like the cat was lowering the rope down to the dog).

All that being said, there is a suggestion I would make. Whenever I clicked anywhere, a cloud of butterflies appeared and drifted away. While they were pretty, they also sometimes distracted me from the effects of whatever I was clicking on (I really noticed this when I clicked on the moon, for example). Not a really big deal, but I thought I'd mention it.

Anyway, nice work as always!

Score: 4

"Happy B-Day Blue Hippo!"

submission: Blue Hippo's B-Day!

date: April 8, 2007

As it so happens, April 8 is my birthday too, so I damn well better vote to protect this flash (and I did, BTW).

So...

Happy Birthday, Blue Hippo! May the awesomeness of this birthday reign supreme until it is eclipsed by the awesomeness of your next birthday.

Score: 5

"The visual style kept changing"

submission: super attack mountain

date: March 24, 2007

Not a bad movie, but I was wondering why the style kept changing. Sometimes it's like a black line sketch, and sometimes it's fully drawn with color. Is that on purpose?

Actually, I really like the 'sketchbook' drawing style. I'm just not sure that it works if you alternate back and forth between that and something that looks more 'finished' in the same cartoon.

Score: 9

"Go Luv Tank!!!"

submission: LUV Tank

date: February 27, 2007

This game was awesome! The old school video game graphics rocked, the controls were easy to use, the concept was original and fun, plus the game taught me something: Both angry terrorists and happy guys in blue sports jackets are into Radiohead! Who knew?!?

On a slightly more serious note, the enemies occasionally fall into predictable patterns, especially the final boss in the castle. Once I found that out, a lot of the challenge disappeared. Still, a fun game nonetheless!

Score: 4

"Musical difficulties"

submission: -Rebus-

date: February 25, 2007

I like word games and I enjoyed this one, but there was something that bugged me: After I read the instructions and went back to the menu, the music started over again. This would have been cool except that the music didn't stop when I left the 'instructions' screen. So the music just overlapped itself. Other than that, I thought the game was pretty cool.

Score: 6

"Nice take on a classic"

submission: Happy Tetris

date: February 22, 2007

I remember Tetris for the old school Game Boy. This really brings back memories. It's solid and easy to play, plus I really liked the background. The option to turn off the music was nice too.

Speaking of music, one of my favorite things about Tetris was the music (That annoyed me about the DS version. The original music wasn't even an option!). I really dug the remix you used. Is there an MP3 of that floating around?

Anyway, Cool game you got here! I voted to protect it.

That being said, there are two things I wanted to mention in the way of improvement. One of them is really minor and the other might be a figment of my imagination.

First off, there's no preloader. This isn't a big deal or anything, but I know folks who take off points for that sort of thing.

Second, I started to see patterns in what blocks were dropping. I'd get a whole lot of one kind five or six times in a row, or it would alternate between two blocks for a while. It might have just been a weird coincidence, but I thought I'd mention it.

Score: 8

"Really well done"

submission: Remove Police

date: February 15, 2007

Usually, when somebody writes "This is my first animation," it's two stick figures beating each other up for no reason or something like that. Even when the flash has had obvious work put into it, it generally looks like a learning experience with lots of rough edges and such. This had an extremely refined and professional look to it. And you say it's your first flash?

Anyway, I loved it, especially the "8-bit robot" segment. That reminds me: Where does this song come from? Did you create it specifically for this video? If not, who does it and where can I find it?

In closing, I'm looking foreword to this passing judgment for two reasons: 1: so I can get a protection point (All my five and some such) and 2: so I can put it in my favorites!