yep. site's still cool. good to know.

THIS GAME SUCKS! I'm posting here because, deservedly, this would get deleted if I posted it in a review of the game. But for fuck sake! The music sucks, the visuals suck, the riddle sucks, everything fucking sucks!

First, it's chastisement, jackhole! You got it right in the game, how about a little effort on the fucking submission title?!

Second, would you ever think, that in order to get a necessary inventory item, you would need to use a conductor's baton - read: stick - to knock a clock off of the wall? Of course you would; IF THERE WAS SOME FUCKING CLUE TO THAT EFFECT! Instead, the designer simply planned on you mindlessly clicking on everything WITH everything in your inventory. Dammit!

Third, as with the clock, simply having a large, black square on the wall, does not exactly convey the message "Place your puzzle pieces here!" Well, not to most people, anyway. Again, It's like the designer was banking on the fact that the player would just assume that the puzzle pieces went there. And again, without ANY FUCKING CLUE.

Fourth, the fucking CHART. Holy fuck, I hate this chart. You know, I think it actually needs its own set of subsections.

----First, the instructions on the chart where you place the prisms - yes, puzzle pieces and prisms, oh boy - reads as follows: "Write the name that best describes each space figure. Then find your answer in the answer column. Write the letter of the answer in the box containing the number of the exercise." Fuck, I'm gonna need another set o' goddamn subsections.

--------First, you can't...write...ANYTHING! ALL YOU HAVE ARE FUCKING PRISMS!
--------Second, even if you could write, the game gives you the name of each prism, so what's the fucking point?!
--------Third, the placement of the prisms on the chart makes NO fucking sense; unless I'm missing some reason having to do with higher math, though I seriously doubt it with this game.

----Second, placing the prisms on the chart is a BITCH! You have to know where the prism goes, where on the screen it has to be in relation to the space it goes, and all - say it with me, class - WITHOUT ANY...FUCKING...CLUE!.

----Third, the letters the chart is referring to magically appear after you place one of the prisms. Why they couldn't just put the letter on the prism and have an 'inspect' option, I don't know. But, you'd better keep track of what letter showed up for which prism, otherwise you'll never figure out the answer to the riddle.

Fifth, the riddle. Yeah, I probably should've mentioned that gathering and assembling the nine puzzle pieces on the black space garners you a book with a single question in it: "What did the taxi driver say about his daughter?" Of course, the only way you can read this pearl of humor is by moving the book over the prism chart. Again, is it that fucking hard to incorporate an 'inspect' option in these games? I see them all the time.

Fifth.2, the answer to the riddle. I honestly don't know if the answer is a compliment or a lame insult. I've never heard the joke spoken before, and it can be taken either way. I may have found this joke amusing when I was seven, but now it elicits no response whatsoever.

So anyway, you enter the answer into the yellow boxes next to the door, it opens, and you get a paragraph of text about something; I really didn't give two hoots in hell at this point, so I don't remember what it said. Oh, and if you go one letter too far entering in the answer, have fun getting through the other 25 to get back to it.

I love point 'n' click games, and I love solving puzzles; especially ones that have abstract solutions. The key to abstract solutions, however, is to have clues so that the player can figure out the solution. Even if those clues themselves are abstract, it still keeps you from methodically going through every possible permutation of 'inventory plus screen'. It's games like these, however, that are to p'n'c games what bigots are to the southern U.S. And now that I've gotten that out of my system, I'm gonna go ease my mind with some soothing Submachine.

TNT

Since posting the following thoughts on any of the games they pertain to would most likely result in them getting deleted by the Mods, I figure it should be safe to post them here. And since these thoughts are actually multiple complaints, why not do a top five list? Here we go...

1. ENOUGH "Sneak-A-Kiss" GAMES.
Aside from the repetition, I really only have one main pain about this genre. When a game relies solely on a single action, the only thing you can really judge it on is the artwork. To this point, most of them are crappily drawn and likewise animated. It's not like you need to devote a lot of time on the one control, so try at least to make the game visually, and aurally, satisfying.

2. ENOUGH HIDDEN ALPHABET/NUMBER GAMES, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD.
Seriously, I have seen so many of these as of late, I'm starting to consider illiteracy. These games usually use stills and art from popular media, and just "cleverly" paste distorted characters all over the frame. I've seen a few that used original art, but in some cases the characters were almost unnoticeable on the background; or the game suffered from the other big fault: shit audio. I just voted 0 on one of these that had sound effects about 50% louder than the BGM. And wouldn't ya know, they were those high-pitched, glass-cracking chimes that I guess are supposed to be a reward. If the reward is eardrum trauma, then they're a success. And while I'm on the subject...

3. TEST THE VOLUME ON YOUR GAMES AND VIDEOS.
This may seem trivial to others, but when I play a flash movie or game, I don't want the volume control to be the first thing I have to click. I realise that some flash has a high volume for a reason - i.e. screamers, pranks, what-have-you - but most of the time it's just loud. What sucks is that should I decide to stop the flash I'm currently viewing, which has a moderately loud soundtrack, I can blow out my damn speakers on the next flash, because some jackhole didn't take the time to thoroughly tweak his submission. Lovely.

4. 50% SHOULD BE THE LOWEST LEVEL OF "INCOMPLETE".
You'd think this'd be a no-brainer, but it's not. So to those who don't know: 100 frames does not a flash submission make. You've all seen 'em. Short, hastily-made stickman or sprite animations that last several seconds. In order to try and cover their ass, the author usually says something to the tune of "This is my first animation, please be gentle." Guess what, little Timmy? I'm not going to be gentle. Neither is this rolling pin. Either that, or they throw out some random letters: "shdfhasdhfhuioh. vote five!1!" Sure, I'll give ya five; right across the eyes! Of course, my personal favorite is when the author asks for suggestions on what should happen in his next entry. Considering that all of the action in the entry in question consisted of a blue stickman jumping across some blocks, how about... ANYTHING! If you want to do commissions, just say so.

5. SPAM, SPAM, SPAM, SPAMMITY SPAM!
I know I'm not the first, and certainly not the last, user on here who's clicked on an interesting title, only to be blessed with loud, techno music, moving pictures of random assholes, and other assorted crap. If you'll allow me, I'd like to get a little personal with the authors of those little kernels. *ahem* THE JOKE IS FUCKING OVER! IT IS NO LONGER CUTE OR FUNNY! *ahem* Thank you. I don't usually feed trolls, but I've been wanting to get that out for a while now.

6. There is NO number 6.

Well, that's all I can think of right now. I know that some of these pertain to programming issues, and therefore the more "witty" of you will use the old "make a better one" retort. That's O.K., I've used it myself on multiple occasions. I will say, therefore, that I couldn't program a bug to move an inch if my life depended on it. Still, the fact that I can't program doesn't give others free rein to flood this site with - to be blunt - shit. I will give constructive criticism to work that I think can benefit from it, but I'm not your daddy, and you're not a 3rd grader whose science project is due tomorrow.

I look forward to y'alls' responses, including the obligatory asshole who tells me why I shouldn't do a top-five list.

So, I had my second review deletion recently. Apparently, when you try to be sarcastic in a review, it gets deleted. I believe it got deleted because it offered no constructive criticism, and it offered no tips on how to make the submission better. This is because the submission was the "Turd of the Week", and an act of the Superfriends couldn't've made it better. It was a ten second loop of three or four pictures set to loud, speaker-fuzzing techno music. Also, it was the "Turd Of The Week". Can we at least agree that it received this dubious honor by being the worst submission that managed to squeak through the screening process before dropping below the 2.0 mark? I wasn't abusive, foul-mouthed, inarticulate, or anywhere near as long-winded as I'm being here. Both the title and the body of the review were only one sentence. Now, I realize that the moderators have a job to do; but is it really delete-worthy to say "I wasn't expecting much, and you exceeded my expectations"? I don't mind being deleted if after a long night of drinking I post something that is pure spleen bile; but seriously, THAT got deleted?! I don't get it. I write a review saying the "Turd of the Week" sucks in some of the nicest possible language, and I'm the bad guy. Unbefuckinlievable.

You know what? Fine, I get it. If I don't have anything nice to say, I won't say anything at all. I'll keep from being a snarky bastard so the fragile minds that inhabit this site won't get damaged. Lord knows that if I ever start posting Flash content, I'm going to want constructive criticism, but I'm not going to care if someone reviews it and says "Dude, you suck at this.", or something to that effect. Hell, it doesn't really matter how bad it gets, because guess what? I can just ignore it. And if it gets really violent and malicious, then the moderators will delete the review and issue a warning to the reviewer; that is, if they can leave alone reviews that could be described, at best, as "catty and smarmy". Of course, my name's Mongo, so what the fuck do I know?

The hell you say... Yep, finally got access to a scanner, so I'll be posting some of my old artwork. I know this may not be sending tremors of giddy anticipation through y'alls' loins, but I'm looking forward to it. So there.

Stuart and Robinson Richmond

Just wanted to get the post about The Gun Game off my front page. Later.

While playing The Gun Game recently, the computer froze up for a couple minutes. I looked at the bottom of the window, and it said it was downloading content from ngads.com. Has this happened to you? If so, do you know how to get around it? I know that the ads are what keep this a free site, but is it my computer that causes this lag? Is there a way to maybe, not stop the ads but freeze them so they don't keep recycling? Or is it just The Gun Game?

Yippee. I'm a level 2 Civilian. I forsee many hours sitting on my ass, voting on new submissions, writing posts that no one will read, and remain technologically-inept to the point where I will most likely not be posting anything anytime soon.