Friendly reminder that you can buy Starblast Finale. I won’t hold it against you if you don’t want to buy, but if you enjoy my game and want to support me, that’s the best way to 
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Hey, it’s been a while. I haven’t touched flowlab in over a year. I go to the forums out of boredom one day and see a game that I made ~2 years ago is on this list, and I’m thankful. I’m considering going back to flowlab, maybe finishing Kid’s Quest 2 or polishing up 1.
Also I’m aware Kid’s Quest 1 and 2 are pretty broken right now. Probably has to do with flowlab updates, and a combination of horrible spaghetti code.
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can i create a game plss
- Don’t revive old topics. It makes the more important ones get lost in the forum.
- If you have any questions, plz create your own topic
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I ended up giving @Crigence his options and laser pointer while not even realizing it until just now. Lmao
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Would anyone actually be interested in seeing The Crigence Critique come back and start reviewing again in 2023?
- Yes
- No
- Do you even have to ask?
- Do whatever your heart tells you to
0 voters
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Glad to see you back!
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Yes of course! Welcome back!
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Of course! Now is the perfect time, there are no active review threads at the moment.
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I have a small game for you. I wanted to see if I could make a fun shmup. Lmk what you think.
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I’d love to review that, but the review thread isn’t quite active just yet. But as long as I’m gonna start being a tiny bit more active on Flowlab, I may as well explain the game plan:
I’m working on a Flowlab game right now. I won’t say the name, or say whether anyone’s guesses are right or wrong, but if you manage to figure out what game it is or already know: I’d appreciate if you could keep it a secret until it’s official announcement.
That game is where most my time divided to Flowlab is going, and after that, I plan to help @rcreger with Sol using my weirdly high technical expertise with Flowlab, not to mention I also have several other projects that I have running right now outside of Flowlab altogether, so… Whether I’m gonna revive The Crigence Critique for another go or not is a big decision that I’m gonna leave up in the air until I finish working on the game.
But I will note this: Every single great game that I see on modern Flowlab makes me wanna come back to reviewing more and more.
Sorry, I can’t be more specific - I wanted to be, but I also like to create intrigue, and I think that the games’ announcement is going to come as quite the pleasant surprise to everyone. But I at least felt that you all deserved to know what the current game plan is 
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Well, this is random.
Allow me to explain: During the development of Blue Sky, I as gameplay designer made the decision to playtest and playtest relatively early – Even before we had the final area working. We invited several playtesters to try out the game, one of those being @DinoDev. After a successful playtest of the game: Dino actually invited me to playtest their teams Flowjam game, Gods Of Five. This is the first time I’ve been personally invited to provide feedback on a game outside of The Crigence Critique, so naturally: It took me about 4 days to actually give feedback. But when I did, uhh, well, you can read the results of that below.
With permission: I’ve decided to publish the feedback so that others can get a perspective of how the game was like at the time of review and compare it to however it’ll be as it improves, and to hopefully give the game the attention it deserves. For the record: This is a special occurrence, and I will not start accepting reviews through personal request. Me coming back to The Crigence Critique/this thread is certainly not off the table, though! But as for the game: I would like to give a special ‘thank you’ to Arctic Alpacasaurus Games for giving me early access to the game that I then proceeded to waste, and for making an amazing game, which you can play here:
+The save slot system is actually pretty unique in Flowlab - Not a bad idea either, as implementing it encourages smarter use of save behaviors development-wise! Good idea, and I’ll assume good implementation as well
+Holy ■■■■, the cutscenes… Genuinely some of the most impressive work I’ve seen on Flowlab, even though I expect it wasn’t made in pixel art first (No shame in taking shortcuts with AI if I’m correct, by the way, I do it all the time)
+Really loving this game’s style so far!
+Being able to skip the tutorial is a nice quality-of-life feature
+What the- …That card effect is HELLA impressive! Wow!
+Certain words being colorized is actually something I almost overlooked after the card flip effect, but it’s a nice touch! Not sure how much of a pain in the ■■■ it was to implement, though
+The tutorial seems very helpful to me! Highlight certain parts of the screen, no uncertain terms, everything on display here looks like it had extensive detail put into it! Which is even more baffling to me given that it’s a FLOWJAM game!
+Actually, the cards as a whole seem pretty well-made and easy to understand! The names are a nice touch, and the pictures are shockingly pretty given how tiny they are! Love it
+The abundance of high-quality effects is really blowing me away! Wow…
+This game’s music is very well done! Only heard about 3 tracks so far, but that’s all I need to know that it’s stylish and very fitting! Well done
+The store even has tiny PREVIEW SPRITES of the cards? Holy ■■■■, fellas…
+Yeah, I can’t stop being blown away by the stuff on display here. The scroll bar is a nice touch, but being able to swap between LOADOUTS of teams? How the ■■■■ was this even managed in 2 weeks!?
+So, let me get this straight: This game has everything that I’ve already noted here and 12 AREAS? HOW?
-That weird slash over buttons means I can’t click them? I guess that works, especially since it’s temporary, but you could also just darken it as well. Eh, small nitpick either way… Unless I see this trick used outside the main menu
-Seems to me like you start off with very few cards, but I know that’s just so the player can be eased in
-[1/2] I found knowing when you can’t and can’t draw to be a tad bit unintuitive at first glance, as there’s not much obvious indication, but that’s probably down to this being a foreign genre to me, and my unfamiliarity with the format
-[2/2] Ah-ha, that’s why! My first real gripe so far: I had a hard-time telling that “Chi” and “Main/draw/start/end/jank” were both indicators and not buttons, as they feature the exact same visual stylization / language as the “FIGHT” button. I think your team is competent enough that I don’t gotta vomit out a fix suggestion here, but it’s still something that I think could be a small problem for noobs like me
-The tutorial is helpful, but just in-case the player forgets or, well, isn’t paying attention: I’d recommend adding some sort of extra visual cue indicating that clicking “heroes” swaps between the 2 menus. Another small nitpick as usual, though
-If anything in this game could be considered even slightly “”“ugly”“” it’d be the store interface, but that’s only because of the cards appears in a bit of an arbitrary location after you hover over them (I sent a screenshot of that below). You have a lot of free real estate in the section to the left that could possibly be used to give it better contrast and a more intuitive location? I dunno. Either way, another small nitpick
-“Already come across a wild bunch of goblins on your first day out…”
-The SFX for hitting enemies are very quiet and underwhelming, which has the effect of making attacks feel like light slaps. Might wanna beef those up?
-I’m finding hero positions to be a bit confusing. Like, for example: There’s a card called “Windmill.” Its description is “Move Back Hero to Front.” OK, well, I only have 2 heroes, so is that referring to the hero in the “middle” or will I just be wasting a card if I use it because I have no “back”? Just a small gripe. My only possible suggestion here would be to refer to them as “Positions 1,” “2” and “3” instead respectively, might reduce semantic problems and could make the status of middle and back heroes as backup more apparent?
*Just realized Windmill costs 0 Chi so my point is mostly null. Still worth considering, so I guess I’ll keep it
-I’m finding the amount of damage enemies deal very unpredictable. I may just be stupid, but it really doesn’t seem like there isn’t any good way to check before-hand and plan ahead? Or is that just par for the course in card games? Either way, not a big fan
-OK: The UI is VERY well made and stylish, but it’s a little confusing knowing what does what initially. I suggest adding some labels either on or below them when you’re hovered over, and that should be all you need. Ex. Buy, Team, Map, Menu.
-May be a good idea to add a “End” section for dialogue so it isn’t as confusing when you’re able to leave. Or, better you, you could try morphing the buttons at the bottom into some sort of “Continue” button? As I said, your team seems competent to me so I have no doubts that if anyone could pull that off it’d be you
-“Earth” is capatalized, as it is a proper noun. You have failed writing class. -150 social credits
-I find the indicator for the enemies having backup to be a little unintuitive, with it fading in and out and almost coming across as a blob of pixels. I think if you just attached the number of enemies up ahead to that indicator it’d be even more immediately obvious
-OK, probably my fault for not checking, but man did it make me mad just then when I did all this planning only for the enemy to ■■■■■■■ annihilate my middle hero because he was the first guy I meant to suddenly have the ability to attack middle heroes. I think you could make things like this more fair by simply having that very helpful popup that appears over enemies appear after they’re sent into the enemies’ team, if that isn’t too much trouble
-I knew that was an & symbol on the card, but for sheer readability reasons, and because it doesn’t take up THAT much more space: I’d recommend changing any instances of “&” in the cards to the actual word “And” instead
*I’ve never played any games with a card system before, primarily because they’ve never caught my interest - I’m primarily a FPS type of guy. Feel like that’s important for me to note here
*“I must go now, my planet needs me.” (Stays on-screen indefinitely)
*Flowlab’s mouse input behavior ■■■■■ and even this game isn’t immune to that fact. Ugh
*Flowlab censored “s-ck” for some reason, so let me rephrase: Flowlab’s mouse input behavior ■■■■■ ■■■■
*I KILLED THE DUMMY AND DONUTS POPPED OUT 
Scores (Scale of 1/5)
Visuals - 4.5 (Holy. ■■■■. If weren’t for some ‘meh’ bits of UI: 10/10, no notes)
Sound - 4 (Great music! Sound design could be more satisfying)
Story - 3 (Didn’t really catch my attention – Didn’t need to)
Controls - 3.5 (Not much to say here)
Difficulty - 4 (Holds few punches, but teaches the player well)
Stability - 5 (WOW. I experienced no bugs! Very impressive, ESPECIALLY for a Flowjam game!)
Final Score: 4.5/5
Amazing game! You managed to develop one of the most high-quality and smooth (AKA non-Flowlabby) Flowlab games I have ever seen! AND IN ONLY 2 WEEKS! You made a game so good that I didn’t even care about card-based games before now, and I still had fun! Incredible work here
For additional context: I decided to stop at “The Stronghold” for this review, as I had other matters that needed attending to, but I may come back for a re-review someday. If I do, it’ll likely be if/when I re-open The Crigence Critique for another go, and because one of the members of the dev team request it. Thanks for reading!
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Thanks again for the review! We are updating the game as we speak!!
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Well, I got some news relating to The Crigence Critique, which may come as a shock:
The Crigence Critique may be coming back.
To summarize why, I’ll need to give some background: I’ve been dealing with a bad case of demotivation and depression as of late, which has obstructed me from working on many of my projects. Recently, to try and solve this issue, I’ve adopted a new mentality of simply trying to enjoy life; only working on projects where I simply enjoy the process of creating them, rather than projects that I hope will get attention and pay off later.
Subsequently, my perspective on many of my projects has changed. Some I’ve lost interest in, others have been reinvigorated. The Crigence Critique is one of those that I’ve suddenly gained an interest in revisiting. Though there have been some bad times, of course, I can say that I’ve certainly had fun making these reviews, especially the more modern ones. And I simply enjoy the feeling of helping developers improve their games however I can.
TL;DR: I’m going to try getting back into reviewing on the forums. If you’re a developer reading this and you have a game that you would like honest and thoughtful criticism on: Then please submit your games here and I’ll get to you when I can. If you’re unfamiliar with my work on TCC and need a sample, I’d like to point you to my recent “review” of Gods of Five:
Anyway, that’s about all I had to say. Thank you for reading, and I hope to review some good Flowlab games again
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Awesome! Im glad to see you’re back. I may submit a game for review soon (it’s not an Ace Vanguard game, I promise) and I would appreciate your thoughts on it going into the weekend.
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As I said: Just submit the game whenever you feel it’s ready for submission, and I’ll take a look at it when I get the time
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This is it:
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Remember when I said that I wouldn’t start taking private review requests? Yeah, well, I still haven’t. But I was invited to beta-test a game called “Vehicle Battlefield 2” by @JUSTPLAINOP, and I just can’t help myself, so I gave my feedback in review format. With his permission, I decided to publish the already review-formatted feedback as feedback in the form of a review, to both keep the thread alive and drive more interest towards the game.
Keep in-mind, however, that this review was made during the game’s beta, and thus the game is subject to change, even more than the other games I’ve reviewed. In-fact, a few of my suggestions have already been implemented. Other than that, enjoy the sneaky-peeky review!
[Main menu]
+Right off the bat, I am somewhat impressed by this game’s sense of style. It’s clear to me that this game was made with a clear and strong vision. The description in-particular is certainly a highlight of the game. Good job!
+I’m not sure if the music was made exclusively for this game or not, but I still like the music choice overall! Very cinematic
[Level 1]
+I know it’s a small touch, but being able to see the trails the threads of your tank make is a really cool touch and I wanted to mention it here as a positive
+The tank itself clearly had some love put into its design, or at least I feel so. It both looks and controls well for a Flowlab tank!
+I admit, assuming you adopt a run-and-gun playstyle, this game is actually kinda fun, despite its simplicity!
+The multiple different sound-effects for firing are a very nice touch, but they all sounds so radically different that it comes across more-so as jarring than anything. Here’s some advice, fellow cheapskate free user: Discord and other such services can host MP3s for free which you can then embed in Flowlab using the box in the sound behavior.
[Level 2]
+I like the overall idea of level 2, with the space shooter gameplay fitting nicely with the themes of the game and with the tank gameplay of the previous level, but I have some gripes with how the ship controls, which you can read below
[Level 3]
+OK, admittedly, once you finally get the hang of the final fleeing segment, it’s actually pretty fun!.. But the fun ends rather abruptly. C’mon, couldn’t of at least had a large open area where we get a super cinematic fade-to-white? Disappointing.
[Main menu]
-Fullscreen in its current state is kinda useless, as it crops the edges of the screen, which I find sub-optimal, personally. I think just having it fit to the edges would be better. ■■■■, maybe the borders would actually make the game feel more cinematic?
-The controls menu broke after I tried visiting it twice, for some reason?
-I personally feel as though the music is almost overselling how boring the main menu actually is. This is just a beta, of course, but I hope that the final release will get a more lively and animated main menu. Seeing AI fight in the background would be perfect, if it could be optimized well!
-Alright, final main menu nitpick, I swear: I think the click radius on the start button is absurdly huge, given how small it looks. It almost feels as though clicking anywhere to the left of the main menu starts the game. I think it should be reduced to at least only a little over the size of the button, so that people have some breathing room to click
[Level 1]
-WOW the music is LOUD, GOOD GOD! Made me regret turning my headphones to 100% volume! I know you’re stuck with Flowlab free for the time being, but at least at some way to control the music volume - Even a mute button would suffice!
-First enemy I saw, and I wasn’t even forced into battle with it because I just shot it from behind 2 rocks. I know this seems small, and maybe outsmarting the game like this was fun, but it’s not a great first impression, ya know?
-Uhh, well, upon 5 extra minutes of gameplay, I can confirm that this is how most encounters go. At one point, I even stood still and let it hit me, and it just stared at me for about 3 seconds. Not very intimidating… But to be fair, I am only on the first level so far, soo… Fair enough
-Huh? You can click the pause button? The big one that could easily conceal an enemy? That’s not wise in a game where clicking is half the entire gameplay! Update: I was right: Fighting upwards is a nightmare
-I was about to say that the health pool is a little generous, but I am a tank, soo… Eh, I dunno, still feels excessive to me. Unless this health carries across levels, you should never need this much
-Uhh, that big blue thing that was surrounded by enemies is a teleporter? Not something I have to shoot? I think you could make that more obvious by taking a page out of DOOM (1994)'s book, and make it so projectiles get “teleported” if they go through. They don’t actually have to be teleported, mind you, they just need to visually look like they are - That would make it more obvious
-I find the destruction very underwhelming, personally. I think if there were actual sounds and more viceral feedback - Like gibs and pieces flying off targets after you hit them - combat would feel so much better. Actually, more SFX in general would be good!
-Uhh, why is there a building stacked on-top of a tree? Is it meant to be some sort of futuristic treehouse, where they run clandestine experiments on monkeys or something?
-I am a tank, and yet I have nothing else other than enemies that amount to nothing but target practice to destroy? That’s no fun! C’mon, at least give me a destructible wall, an explosive barrel, even! Anything! Update: Holy ■■■■, he actually thought of that, but only in the second level. Well-done.
-Ugh, man, given how stylish the main menu is, I’m kinda disappointed by how boring level one’s background is. I mean, the visibility is good, at least, but c’mon, you couldn’t at least put a looping grass background or something?
-OK, being able to hit enemies from off-screen is a tad bit overpowered. I know it’d reduce the “realism” factor, but maybe the missles should just explode on their own or disappear if they go too far without hitting a target, or off-screen? Anything to force the player into more intense encounters instead of just idling outside of their attack radius and sniping them with missles.
-Navigation is a bit eh so far. It’s not that big of a deal, since most of the maps are small anyway, but I think it would still be a wise idea to try and implement an arrow that points in the direction of the teleporter, or assuming that’s too technically challenging or doesn’t fit your style, just allowing the players trails to be permanent would make a big difference. They don’t seem that costly resource-wise to me, at least, so I’m sure you could afford level-fulls of them. Edit: I completely missed the navigation arrow that’s already there! I think I mistook it for a rock or something? I’m not sure
[Level 2]
-The vomit of text that appeared after I ended the level was little… Eh. I can’t believe I’m referencing this game twice now, but I think you should take a page out of DOOM (1994)'s book and at least make the text scoll onto screen, whilst being skippable the whole time, rather than just… Word vomit.
-WHAT? You expect me to fight bullet ■■■■ styled enemies while only being able to move FORWARD? WHAT? OK, I get that this does encourage fighting in barrages/bursts, but this X-wing fires WAY too slowly for that to make sense, on top of it firing only 1 bullet at a time, and the mostly static enemies don’t move nearly enough around these overly claustrophobic environments to make that any sort of fun! The current movement scheme and level layout incentivizes ignoring all the enemies and just flying straight to the end of the level, which is exactly what I did.
-The smoke trails on this X-wing don’t seem very well aligned to the ship itself. One is coming out of the wing correctly, but the other is coming out of the center?
[Level 3]
-I think I’ve been playing the game enough now that you don’t have to tell me that “W moves forewards” 
-OK, the concept of this great escape is good, but holy ■■■■ is it… something in-practice. For starters: You move LIGHTNING FAST, somehow even more extremely than level 2 it feels like. As well as this, you can’t see what’s up ahead nearly enough to actually prepare for it. I would recommend doing something similar to another Flowlab game, Bounce Jam, and offsetting the camera so that your vision is actually pointed in the direction that you need to be looking. As for the wall of… orange: I would recommend turning it into just an overlay, and then using a timer that counts up constantly subtracted by the players’ current X position to get the same effect, but much more professionally. This also allows you to add more effects!
-I liked having to actually pick up the pickups, but why do they have collision on? Kinda kills the flow, even if it’s extremely small
-Is there any reason why my cursor is dragged into a blackhole at the end of the credits sequence?
[Misc]
-After beating the game, I went back to test gamepad/controller support (I own a (bad(Rock Candy)) Xbox 360 controller), and uhh, it was certainly worth a good laugh; It’s very strange, and not very well executed. For starters, the right stick doesn’t turn the actual tank aim like how you expect it to, it moves the crosshair, which I find very unintuitive. The left stick isn’t much better off: Left or right turns you in that direction, forward moves forward. This sounds fine, until you realize that this means you can literally twirl in the tank while moving forward, which will happen, and will happen frequently and without you trying to. All this combines to make a controller playthrough of this game completely unviable for your average player.
*The game runs at an absurdly high resolution for Flowlab standards. Not a critique, mind you, just an acknowledgement.
*The game cheats having to have the tank do any fancy collisions by just making objects turn transparent when you roll over them - even trees and buildings - which I personally found a tad bit disappointing. I’m aware that other playtesters mentioned that being able to shoot the static objects was annoying (and it probably was), but I see that as a level design issue, not as an issue with the object itself. Maybe the game would benefit from more open levels? Edit: I later realized that the objects, at least in level one, are randomly placed. This explains a lot, and even though it’s somewhat impressive technically, I have mixed feelings on the feature
*It would be a cool touch if the cursor changed to red, or just had any other indicator for being over an enemy. would certainly encourage good practice from the player (that being moving whilst keeping your cursor on the enemy)
*I think ammo would be a wise idea for this game. Since ultra-fastpaced gameplay is off the table (it’s a ■■■■■■■■■■■’ tank), the next best thing would be implementing more strategic elements, such as ammo for the vehicles, or at least the tank. Or if that’s a little too-far, then at least follow my advice from the negatives section and add some more destructibles, if possible?
*I would recommend crediting Grazer as Grazer. I was very confused when I first saw his actual name being credited. Not to mention that I’m not completely sure Grazer likes being called by his real name, or at least I wouldn’t be.
Scores (Scale of 1/5)
Visuals - 2.5 (Not awful, but nothing special, either)
Sound - 2.5 (Sometimes loud, sometimes jarring, sometimes just not there, but I still think the game’s in the right direction)
Story - 3 (I’ll be honest: I didn’t care much for it. I didn’t read the description, and relied purely on the in-game text to inform me of what’s going on, and it was… Eh. Doesn’t detract from the gameplay, but doesn’t add to it, either.)
Controls - 2.5 (At least on keyboard and mouse: The tank is alright, the X-wing wasn’t much fun, and the final cutscene was passable once I got the hang of it. But controller support is very half-baked)
Difficulty - 3.5 (Ranges between “Point-and-click adventure” and “Touhou Project in space.” And I haven’t even played that game!)
Programming - 4 (The game ran fine, and there wasn’t anything game-breaking, as far as I could tell, but I have to subtract points for some of the jank)
Final Score: 3/5
I didn’t hate the game, and I don’t want to give off the impression that I did. However, the game feels very primitive in its current form, reminding me a lot of the type of Flowlab games I used to review back in 2020. But I would be remiss not to mention that the game had its moments, namely when I was forced to play confrontationally with the tank and the final level, once I got the hang of it. There’s some potential in this game, that much I can say with certainty, but as it stands, I think a 3/5 is reasonable. Thank you for letting me playtest the game
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Hello! Is this thread still active? If so, then I have a small game that I have put lots of love into, and I would love to see what you think of it!
There are two sprites in the game that are premade Flowlab sprites, but that’s only because any time I tried to remake them, I made them just look so much worse. (I’m not very good at sprites.)
If this thread is still open, I would love to see what you think of it!
The game is here:
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