Sonic Axiom New Year's Demo

[vexer]

Hello and happy new year to everyone. I am posting the first demo for my game. It consists of a single act from three zones. They are Stone Sea zone, Calcified Cavern Zone, and Neon Night Zone. I am sill trying to figure out how to get a rippling water effect underwater in my water level, so I left it out for now. I hope you enjoy the demo, feel free to leave feedback.

Download Axiom demo.exe from FileFactory.com

Hi sorry about the large file size. I have shrunk it down to be 40 MB. The link is below.

http://www.plunder.com/axiom-exe-download-5d824decf0.htm

[OverbounD]

I'm not going to download a 150 MB demo sorry.

[Death_Daniel]

rar/zip/7zip/compressed is you're freind!

[Sslaxx]

150MB is rather... large... for a 3 act demo, but I'm going to download this sucker anyway. Hopefully I won't regret it.

[LarkSS]

Man, either you're using the largest uncompressed images, the largest uncompressed WAVs, you left a ton of stuff in the EXE that's not included with the demo, or any combination of the three. =/

I'll download anyway though I guess.

Also, if you can get your filesize below 100MB in the future, I'd recommend a host like this:

http://upload.plunder.com/

Edit: So I finally got around to trying this.

It was kinda interesting, quite ok, somewhat refreshing.... but it suffers from countless flaws.

[RANT]

• Please, don't mix control types unless you support every type together so that the user can pick one and stick with it. By this, I mean, either you make everything controllable with the mouse in addition to the keyboard, or make the character select keyboard only.
  
• 
  The selection screen was just generally.....why. You cannot loop back to the beginning when getting to the end of the selection when going right, but you CAN go to the end from the first selecting when going left; why? You start off on a null spot that just announces that you're at a level select, and that null spot can continuously be reselected; why? I found myself going to the right, reach a dead end, accept the dead end and decide to go all the way left again just to realize it's looping around. It took me some time to find what was the first of the three stages that were actually selectable besides that null spot.
  
• 
  I start the first stage on the list. I notice Crash Bandicoot music that has a constant watery effect playing with the song, but I'm not in water; kinda strange, but I decide to put a blind eye to it for now.
  
• 
  I'm sorry, but as I got through this stage, as well as the proceeding two stages, the level design was just down-right terrible. You're flung into traps, thrown into enemies, catapulted into death pits, and then, you're forced to slow down in order to jump up some sloppily placed 'steps' that are really just several of the same bg plastered next to each other in a raising fashion; yet another 'why' situation. I didn't even get that far in the second stage before I just reset the game due to seeing no point in me struggling with the level's unforgiving design. You know there's an issue when I'm traveling at a sluggish pace in fear that yet another thing is gonna be randomly waiting in my path to send me to my grave at the bottom of the screen.
  
• 
  Why end the first stage with water partly over the ground? If it was a scenic choice, then you need to change what depth Sonic has to be in the water before he's restricted and his air flow is cut off. At that point, which should have been a clear run, my movement was deeply capped as if I was deep inside of the water, and the drowning timer went off. In fact, I drowned before my score could even count up. Yay.
  
• 
  Your backgrounds in general.... interesting, nice variety, but no sense of depth. I had trouble figuring out where the ground WAS because it had the same saturation and look as the uncollidable backgrounds. That really needs some fixing, especially since this issue is made so much worse because of how busy everything looks ( namely in the first stage; second stage I guess was more ok, but the third stage had its issues too ).
  
• 
  Normally when you can walk through a wall that looks like a normal wall, it's either a secret, or a path you're almost thrown into so you can practically guess that you need to go through it. Don't make walls that you NEED to go through that you have to FIND in order to progress. In the third stage, I encountered this part in what seemed like a pit of no return until I jumped around and suddenly noticed I was going inside of the wall. At least make it noticeable that I was supposed to do that. =/
  

[/RANT]

There is other stuff and probably more things I haven't noted, but these are the ones that come to mind most. There's no need for me to name every tiny little thing that I felt astray with your game; I believe this is plenty enough. This seems like it could turn into a rather promising game, but right now it's not enjoyable because there are too many factors bringing it down.

BTW, kind of a weird choice to show screenshots that aren't even in the demo.

[Rael0505]

I have to say I enjoyed this! Your levels are vast and have multiple branching/reconnecting paths, there are some level-specific gimmicks, and the backgrounds are extremely intricate.

There are a few notable problems though. The first is the filesize - no matter what, 150 megs is too big for a demo of three levels. I have no idea how it got that big, but I get the feeling WAV file songs have something to do with it. You should google for a free program called winlame to convert the WAV files to OGG - the quality is just as good, and the filesize is way smaller.

The next problem is the traps. Some are simply unavoidable - like the placement of pop-up spikes in areas where you know the player is going to run really fast, or pits in places that the player almost won't think to avoid. I remember in the first level there was a red spring shooting me back into spikes, and every time I replayed that part I fell for the trap again. There's a difference between making challenging aspects to your game and making parts unfairly difficult. Sometimes you cross the line with some of your traps.

The biggest issue though is, ironically, the level art I just complimented above. On the plus side, there is so much detail put into your background sets. However, the problem comes when it is difficult to tell the foreground from the background, and when one blends in with the other and it's hard to see what is solid and what is not. For the most part, the levels are definitely playable, but some of the color choices really hurt my eyes (the mostly black ground in contrast with the lighter background in the second level in particular comes to mind although it is a problem to an extent in the others too). I would suggest going back and recoloring a lot of your background pieces so they look better. You have both extremes in your level art... on one side, it seems that it's difficult to tell things apart, but on the other, some of the colors contrast with each other so harshly that it hurts my eyes. ON the bright side, at least all that's necessary to fix are the colors - the backgrounds themselves are excellent and very detailed (I love the waterfalls in the background in the first level)

I'm really liking this project though - to reiterate, my biggest issue right now is just recoloring some of the level art so it looks better. And get rid of some of those cruel traps! Looking forward to seeing future progress, keep up the good work. It's great to see a new demo from a game

edit: Oh, I wanted to mention a bug. Once you get a game over, the game resets, but the life count doesn't! Whenever I tried to pick a level from the level select screen, it just made the application reset again. It's probably an easy fix!

edit 2: Probably the worst trap you have is in the second level with the moving hanging platforms. I found it really difficult to jump from one to the other, and it's really cruel of you to put a pit beneath it. Maybe you could use it as another opportunity to put another path under the level? I had to play as Tails to get past that part.

Anyway like I said, despite some of the problems, I really enjoyed this and I can't wait to see more. I give you criticism/advice only so you can improve the weaker aspects of your game, not to try to put you down or make you feel bad about your game. I can see you've put work into this! Keep it up, and I do hope you take some of my advice into consideration

[BlazeHedgehog]

I don't have much to say here other than what's already been said. Still, I'll say it again:

Graphics are nice and detailed, but color palettes make it difficult to tell apart the foreground and background. The background should probably be a darker color than the stuff you can stand on. (the colors in Neon Night borderline on being tacky because of clashing colors, too)

Enemy movement patterns are a little too fast and erratic. Enemies since the dawn of time have been about analyzing their patterns and exploiting them. Enemies have to move in dependable/predictable ways and at speeds that the player is comfortable approaching them at. Enemies that blend in with the background are also kind of iffy (blue enemy on blue bg makes it hard to tell which is which, especially at speed)

The level design could probably use a little more polish. There are jumps in Calcified Cavern that feel like Sonic can just barely make them. Again, this does not breed a comfortable environment for the player. I actually got really frustrated at the part where you have to grab on to the monkey bars because the game gives you zero indication that they're there and jumping from monkey bar to monkey bar is tricky. You probably shouldn't introduce a new game mechanic like that in a life-or-death situation right off the bat at the start of a level.

The interface for this game is absolutely bizarre, especially for somebody like me who primarily plays these games with a gamepad (it's a Sonic game, after all). Pressing enter, clicking with the mouse, being able to scroll through the levels on my gamepad but again, having to press enter to start the level... its not a requirement to support gamepads, but it's nice. Regardless, having to use the mouse to select a character is very weird and feels out of place in a game like this.

I will say that I do like the "feel" of this game, though. I like the music and you have some nice touches here and there. It's just got this feeling of "almost, but not quite". You're on the edge of producing something great!

[Death_Daniel]

Don't know if anyone has noticed but in one of the levels, if you finish it, even though you're not in the water, I'm guessing sonicworlds uses weird collisions however you start drowning and die before the score is finished. However, I found a bubble sheild in the level somewere and that stopped it but the warning sound still played, the "DingDing!" sound.

I really enojyed the graphics however with what has been said above, I have the say with some of the graphics is extreamly blured. This ruined the titlescreen for me and It looks like you mega resized it to fit a 320x240 screen.

I really liked the music, seemed to fit well, Did you make them yourself?

The levels were quite good, you had an element of variety which is a excellent feature, however their are some things which need fixing, small little bugs and placment of objects. Sometime i can't get past a spike without hitting it.

Overall, I enjoyed this demo. It definatly has potential but it just needs a few fixes here and their, including presentation as i stated above. The Titlescreen being an example of this issue.

[Rael0505]

You're on the edge of producing something great!

QFT for this along with the rest of the post

[Death_Daniel]

By the way, the green grass on this screenshot needs to math the tree's green. I personally, think it looks rather dull with the tone of green it currently has.

[vexer]

Hi and thanks for the advice on how to improve my game. I have been reworking the color scheme in neon night zone and it is already looking a lot better. I am definitely going to work on the gameplay in calcified cavern zone starting with getting rid of the pits. Also I have already changed the grass in that screen shot. I had recently redone the background in that level and forgot to change the grass.

[Death_Daniel]

Ah, cool. Please can you also fix anything that is slightly blured make it sharp like the real games. Take the titlescreen for example.

[LarkSS]

The title screen looks fine as if the effect was on purpose; there's no reason for a game to need to be the original's clone, otherwise you could just play the original game and get the same experience.

[Death_Daniel]

It kills my eyes though and doesn't really looks right. It's like if Sonic XG's Sonic Sprites were blured. That'd put you off. *lol XG reference*

[Serephim]

Im loving the absolutely random feedback you're getting. Ill be downloading this soon.

[Death_Daniel]

I AM A COMPLETE IDIOT AND MY POSTS SUCK

-rael

[Serephim]

Yeah okay thanks daniel i know what its called.

Im referring to the wide range of negative and positive feedback he got for the game, as Lark posts a "this needs tons of work" and rael immediately afterwards posts a "wow this rocks".

Me? Played it, enjoyed it alot. The music was kinda drab for me, but i do see you were going for an ambiance kinda feeling or something i guess. That aside, the level design is pretty unique. You seem to love throwing traps everywhere, and while that isnt bad, you should try to give hints more often. Unless you're doing a kind of Megaman deal, where you throw traps in their face constantly until they learn to expect them. But keep in mind, even Megaman lets you survive a trap and see how its going to come before they kill/hit you with it.

What you SHOULD try to change, though?

1) Bottomless pits. They're annoying. On more than 3 occasions i mistook a bottomless pit opening as another path, or a means to open a locked door infront of me. If you notice the genesis games from Sonic 3 upwards, Bottomless pits were all but removed completely from the design, save for one or two stages, but in those cases falling would obviously equate to instant death. (Flying Battery outside sections, Lava Reef Act 3, and i THINK some sections of death egg had one or two, but i could be wrong.)

Nowhere in your game does falling = obvious instant death. We arent trained to look out for them, and in fact you ENCOURAGE jumping down places in alot of your level sections, so when we do it and die its pretty damn annoying.

Umm, the traps could use some toning down, but aside from that its a great game and i absolutely love your levels. They have a completed, full feeling to them. They also have that kinda old fangame feeling to them too, hard to explain, but they're definitely well done. I just grow tired of always running into invisible traps. Keep it up.

[vexer]

Thanks for the feedback Serephim, I'm glad you liked my game so far. I did not realize my traps were so hard (probably because I know where they are). I'm defiantly going to fix that problem and get rid of the pits, as well as place my enemies better.

And to Death Daniel, I never enlarged my title screen images, so I don't know why you think it's blured, it doesn't look blured to me, but I guess we just have different opinions.

[Felik]

For some reason I cannot download your demo.

Download link just says "Let's get you downloading... " and nothing happens after that.

[vexer]

I don't know why that is happening. I also don't recognize the download link in your post. If you click the second link in my original post it should work. I just tried it, and it's fine. Good luck.

[Hez]

The end of act level results screen needs to be sped up. I suggest adding up the score in icrements of 10 instead of 1, or even 100.

Also, try slowing down some of the enemys. Other than that, I enjoyed this game.

[Rael0505]

The end of act level results screen needs to be sped up. I suggest adding up the score in icrements of 10 instead of 1, or even 100.

QFT. I forgot to mention it, but it did take way too long. Maybe give the option to skip it too by pressing fire1.

Also hez you should totally show your game off here, it's looking great.