that wasn't bad but definitely a work in progress. you'll definitely need a story line. i was amused with the boss. lol, recognized the boss sprite from donkey kong.
Reviews for "Tales of Darkness"
The graphics are simply beautiful. The use of color, the sprites, the animation... all wonderful. I'm honestly envious. If I could animate like this, I'd have made several games by now. This truly stands out among the other games I see here on newgrounds.
Now the game itself? I'm sorry, but it's bland as hell. Slow, tedious, unexciting... But here's some thoughts that might make it better. First, I'd try to make the character feel more stable. Faster movement of the character, and less knockback, and alot less immobile time when you take a hit. I'd make the enemies faster too, cuz we don't want it to be too easy.
The attack is extremely short range, but very simple outside that context... it looks like if you just stand still and jam the attack button, you can get swarmed by bats from every side and take them out without taking damage. I'd make the attack so it's longer range, but with a smaller arc. I'd also make it much quicker to complete the swing, so you can't just leisurely tap at the button and create an impenetrable wall of damage. The quicker swing would make it so you could move sooner after hitting the attack button.
I'm a sucker for story too. Doesn't take much, but a little something to help understand what the dude is doing would probably make the game much more personal for the player. Not everyone will have played tales of eternia.
Seriously though... criticisms aside, there's real talent in the graphics here. Add a little nonlinear metroid-vania style item/ability collecting, speed up the action a bit and this could be extremely good.
Since you mentioned this is "done for my programming class" and Tales of Eternia is one of the games I have known some decades ago, I will give you several tips:
1. You seem to lock Shadow to not be able to jump when he attacks. Any reason why? If Shadow can jump while in his attacking stance, he will be a lot more fluid.
2. For a more interesting gameplay, I suggest you use the bullet behavior on the spinning blade and make it so that it is to be thrown in the direction the player pressed. Right now, the blade is very short ranged and it is very risky to go in and attack the enemies, especially the bats. But with the bullet behavior in place, this should allow the player to have "HA! IN YOUR FACE!" moment with the bats and other enemies.
3. Programming-aside, right now, the gameplay is designed more like the NES Castlevania in which the player is inferior to the enemies and should have this fear of the more intimidating faster enemies. That's why Simon is a bit slow and sluggish.
This is your choice. Do you want the player to see Shadow inferior or superior to the enemies? If you want Shadow to be cooler like he is in Tales of Eternia, I suggest you make him more superior. How do you want to portray him would be up to your gameplay design choice - how do you want the player to feel toward Shadow?
Anyway, great job. Keep up the good work.
This is good for an Alpha. With more work and polish it should be excellent.
This is great., though you need more actions and physics for your character.
Rainspark responds:
Thank you! I'll try to better implement the player controls to make it more dynamic.
Thanks for pointing that out! :D