Reviews for The Self-Destructive

[KBJ]

Hey, this is excellent. The learning curve is a bit steep but I suggest to anyone reading this that they should stick with it. Whereas most "art" flashes turn out to be cheap kitschy imitations of drama and always go for the easy plot device, this stuff actually has some depth to it. Well done!

Now to the logistics of the flash, I'm giving you a 5 despite the fact that it was so difficult. This is because I appreciated the story telling and thematic elements (creepy border shrinking) so much. The greatest hurdle to mastering the gameplay was that it wasn't readily apparent, at least not to me, that altering a panel will sometimes changes subsequent panels and not the preceding ones. I did play the Narcissist and the Egocentric, but I still had to resort to the walkthrough. Nevertheless the payoff is really rewarding, interesting, and bit touching what with the picture at the end, I just fear that most people (namely, the pre teens on this site) will give up rather than finish the game.

AthleticDesign responds:

Thank you! I appreciate your appraisal as it is exactly the kind of reaction we have been working for.

While The Narcissist and The Egocentric somewhat prepare for The Self-Destructive, it is still quite a leap. The next chapter in this game will probably be placed between the Egocentric and The Self Destructive to make the build up smoother.

A friend of us who has been play testing the game a lot, found all the previous chapters straightforward and he did admirably on The Self Destructive but still needed some help from us to complete it.

[Halloweenfox]

I love this game, just as much as I loved the first part of it and I was excited to see this one was finely published.

I liked how much more challenging this one was to the last, and how many different ideas there were, that there was a lot to look into and a bigger picture. I can't wait for the next one, any talks about a possible release date? (doesn't have to be exact, just wondering if you have a loose idea of when it might be ready)

AthleticDesign responds:

Thanks! It's hard to say when it will be ready. Hopefully we will get up to speed again during the summer as my brother has been busy during the terms.

Next we are pondering making a clever gimmick game for marketing purpose. Think game comic version of classic arcade games ... The next chapter in Strip 'em all will perhaps be an in-between chapter (bridging the leap between The Egocentric and The Self-Destructive) and should reuse much of the content from The Egocentric and should therefore be really quickly done.

In other words, it may be a while before the comic that is meant to succeed The self-Destrucive is ready.

[PumpkinBunch]

Great game. I love the art and the whole concept of an interactive comic book. I really hope you continue this series.

AthleticDesign responds:

Thanks, we will! Right now the work is not exactly paying off, but we hope it will in the future.

[JackofPojo]

excellent game! granted, I did have to use the walkthrough until I got the final tile set, but the resulting story was much deeper, and more interesting, I think you should do something like this again, but also have some combination of not being so stingy with the hints a reminder that (a change to panels tends to only effect panels AFTER it when I got my first black screen would have been helpful), and not hiding hit boxes in places I would not think to look (it's hard to find the switch in the dark, and although I hovered over the switch hit box with the ghost, I assumed it was part of the girl's hit box, since she was still 'in the way') I'd also suggest making the note dis-and re-appear with each flip, so that it is a bit more obvious, as opposed to possibly having always been their, but like I said, this level of puzzling, and story telling is a definite improvement over the earlier ones, needs some fine tuning, but other then that great job.

AthleticDesign responds:

Thanks! Some sound feedback that we will consider. Some of the problems you mention will be solved by making an in-between comic (between The Egocentric and The Self-Destructive) that will introduce game mechanics with a more lending hand. The helpful publish comments will probably make somewhat of a return in subsequent chapters. (It did suit the style of this chapter to leave the player all alone in despair...)

[ThetaSigma6789237467]

I've really enjoyed piecing these comics together, this one is definitely the hardest so far, probably the first one I got seriously stuck on. If it hadn't been for the walkthrough I probably wouldn't have been able to complete it.

AthleticDesign responds:

You are in good company. I highly doubt that anyone has made it without some help from the walkthrough. Our play tester nearly made it but in the end he still needed a little hint. It may be that the difficulty of this one warrants it to be the final comic/level when all the comics are made.