It's a fantastic webcomic. I bet if I asked you what was wrong with it you'd list things to do with the aesthetic, or not being able to understand where the humour is coming from. It's still brilliant within the context it's written. Elitists will never love it, and that's what I love about it. Only people who understand that a sense of humour isn't just what you find funny but how tolerant and open you are of other people's senses of humour will ever find it funny.
Check out my Telekinesis'em'up Thread and the ALICE Machines -
I really enjoyed this! It made me laugh out loud, and I can't remember the last time any game did that. Excellent work on the script and well-directed random humour [yes thank you Firefox, I would like to add that word to the dictionary]. The humour is, for me, the most enjoyable thing about Epicenter; even if the rest of the game was average, I'd still play through it because of this.
Fortunately, the humour isn't the only thing it's got going for it. You have some very nice gameplay elements, such as using the mouse to shoot enemies, and I had a lot of fun with the flying kick later on. Kicking kebabs in the face is the stuff of dreams.
A couple of things you could consider changing:
Overall the mouse aiming works well, but it bothers me slightly about having to hold two buttons just to fire a gun. How would it work if the crosshair was permanently visible (or hidden if the mouse was not moved for a while), rather than assigning a button to show it?
Also, the movement engine could be cleaned up a lot. Sticking to walls sometimes helped me make those bigger jumps, but it doesn't look very good. This one is important, so try not to think of reasons to dismiss the possibility of back tracking and changing your engine. Are you using the built-in platform movement?
So, kebabs and falafels.. should we open a restaurant?
Yes, I agree the gameplay is pretty average. That's mainly due to the fact that you get a lot of more interesting weapons and moves as the game goes on. The Flying Kick is loads of fun though, if I design decent levels to go around it, it'll be excellent.
The Humour is very British with a few pop culture references. I think that a lot of Americans don't really understand "Random" humour, no offense. The game is mostly about the humour.
Whenever I play games that try to have storylines, it means I have to sit through about 10 minutes of terrible dialogue about some wizard I don't care about it. The alternative is there being no story at all, which I care about even less. So I thought I'd entertain people and give them utterly ridiculous reasons to do what they're doing, which I like to call "Being honest".
I'm not sure what to do about the aiming system. There was a good reason I have the left click thing, but I can't remember. I think it's because it looks cool, the way his arm kind of moves around when he's walking. Maybe I could just detect if the mouse is moved, instead?
I'm using the Platform movement object. I haven't had any experience with clinging to walls, that's very odd. I think I might have designed some of the platforms so you can do it, not sure. The first level was just an engine test. I need to work on proper levels.
Level graphics are so hard to draw though... very time consuming. The graphics are simplistic but that means I can't cheat using lots of photoshoppy tools and photographs. Almost wonder if that's easier.
Check out my Telekinesis'em'up Thread and the ALICE Machines -
"Did you know there's a million bucks hidden in the house next door?"
"But there is no house next door?"
"No? Then let's go build one!"
DaVince This fool just HAD to have a custom rating
Registered 04/09/2004
Points 7998
2nd August, 2007 at 19:48:36 -
I didn't check out the comic, because I do not like comics that do not take care of their visual design in the least bit. If you say the humor is good, though, I might check it out.
But seriously. A text adventure would work best for something as graphically insulting as this.
EDIT: thanks to the visual style I figured this would be a thirteen in a dozen comic anyway.
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