Review Information
Game Reviewed NewER Super Mario World (Cancelled Demo), by Quality Entertainment
Review Author Hypernova
Created Sep 23 2018, 10:48 PM

General Commentary and Game Overview
It's nice to see someone builds a game out of the engine I've made many moons ago. I had checked this out and find out how it is like. Here is my review for this game.
 
Pros + Good Music
+ Engine is okay
 
Cons - Cliche title for a game
- Broken UI
- Forced fullscreen at the start
- Clashing graphics
- Short and unappealing level
- Pressing the close button does nothing. You have press ESC to close the game
- Strange screen resolution (it's not 4:3 nor 16:9)
- Game Maker watermarks (I cannot blame too much since GM8 is no longer available to purchase at this moment)
 
Impressions
Gameplay
4 / 10
First of all, this game is built from my SMW engine. I used to be very proud of this creation but after years working with my own codes, the SMW engine is not as good as I used to think. Same for this game: it suffers poor collision detection, unnatural horizontal movement, and other weird bugs I can replicate on the game. I personally would recommend to try out a better engine and make this game better.

The level is too short to be honest, there's not enough excitement even for the first level. This is more of a nitpick but I honestly think fake collision is not an ideal set later on for a fair game. Sometimes if you hold X you can pick up a spring from the bottom of the screen at the fake collision section. After that, the rest of the level is just flat and boring. I suppose this is a placeholder and I recommend not to put blank level sections later on with the development.

I really dislike the fact that the game starts off in full screen. It would be nice to start off in windowed mode with a full screen options. As for now players have to hit F4 to go into the windowed mode. I find it strange that this game's screen ratio is neither 4:3 nor 16:9 which is commonly used for most consumer computers. At the main menu, sometimes the options doesn't work but at least there's a reset button if it fails. One last thing: I dislike the idea that pressing the close button on the windows doesn't close out the game. Especially at the last screen, most people with either reset the game or hit the X button. Some people are not aware of the ESC button and they may ends up force closing it using task manager.

I am not too fond of the built in dialogue boxes too. It would be nice if you can try to code your own dialogue boxes. You can always ask for assistance if you are not too certain with that.
 
Graphics
5 / 10
Graphics is a mixed bag. The biggest concern is that some of these graphics aren't made to fit with other graphics (to make things short, they are clashing).

The clouds are a nice touch even though they don't fit well with the SMW art style. The flip block spins too fast, you may need to slow that down. The water tileset seemed pretty unnatural, perhaps it would be a good idea to make the water animated or some sort to make it feel like water. Otherwise it looked like a decoration to some players. The HUD needs major work since in some cases it's difficult to read while it sometimes blend in with the cloud background.

I am not too fond with the stretched logo at the title screen. I wouldn't recommend to use "PRESS START" even though the ENTER key is the start button.

The last complaint is the Game Maker Lite watermark. I suppose you can't do much with that so I am not going to go into more depth about it.
 
Sound
8 / 10
Most of the audio are pretty good. I especially liked the music you have picked there. However here are some flaws I need to point out:
- Audio is not consistent, especially the coin audio is excessively loud
- Death audio is poorly compressed
 
Replay
1 / 10
Although it is a demo, it's too short for just a short level. This feels more of a concept than a prototype. There's nothing else I can find besides that unfortunately.
 
Final Words
4 / 10
It's quite interesting to see another person builds a game out of the engine I created. Although it is not really a full game, but the demo itself doesn't bring up the excitement.

But don't give up, I can see there may be potentials if you plan to change some of its flaws.

Comments
No comments have been left.
Pages: | Last Unread