The Box 3
You control a box and you try to avoid the red box that is chasing you. The red box is constantly growing and becoming faster.
Publisher: None/Unknown
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Bottom Line: Ever dream of customizing the colour of a box? Ever wish to dodge another? I didn't think so... What is the main thing a game needs? Simplicity or Potential. Even though games may be complicated, they either need to be presented in a way that is simplistic (World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy, etc) or they must have so much potential that the player is willing to overlook such complexities (Dungeons & Dragons); this is the main factor that decides the overall funativity of a game.
With that said, let us look at how this game is structured: The Instructions and 'What's New' pages are in extreme need of attention - much too complex; I'll quote the Instruction page: You are the small box (blue by default). The aim of the game? To avoid the red box at all costs! Use the arrow keys to move. You cannot escape from the screen (yeah, I fixed that bug) so try to stay out of tight places. Sounds easy? It isn't. As you run, the red box will get bigger and bigger, to the point that there will be no escaping it! You can slow down its growth by picking up the shrinking item, which makes it smaller (Now it actually works). Or, you can pick up a speed boost, which makes you move faster. Every so often , you will gain speed, even if you don't get a speed boost, because your box gets used to all the running. You can pick up items that teleport the enemy out of the screen, but he will never stop chasing you. This will only buy you some time. I took the walls out in this version. I never liked them, I never used them, and I think everybody else hated them, too. It effectively only served as a time limit, and THE BOX isn't about time limits. It's about endurance, and staying alive for as long as you can hold out for. Oh, and stay well away from the mines. They're now set off by default. I highlighted the word "endurance" because it takes a lot to simply read that crap (not really anything else you can call that, sorry). A lot of what is written would be more effective shown graphically - the other doesn't even need to be there and if kept should be shown in a developers notes of sorts (blog?). To give you an idea of how simple and effective the instructions could be: Example Instructions - left side is graphic = right side is description [x] = you As for the next part, it would be easy to show a graphic of the red box getting bigger with either an animation or arrows showing progression (like a storyboard). Please note that the "What's New" section could easily use the same treatment. Requiring such reading for such a simplistic game (no offense) is extremely unnessary. At least give me an epic RPG or something if I'm required to read such boring text... Needless to say, I opted to figure out the game instead of reading the instructions (I only actually read it as I typed it for the above quote) - it wasn't that difficult to jump into... Character Customability The character customability is almost humoring, given the nature of the character - a box. There is more than you could ask for. Any colour is possible, even hexadecimal is allowed for those that need such fine tuning to get their lucky colour; even transparency is allowed. With that know, how does this affect the gameplay? The colour is purely cosmetic - the colour only affects the player's eye coordination due to the player being able to keep track of some colours over others; it is unfortunate that the colour doesn't affect the interactions with the objects in the game. Game Options There is much unnessacry text on this page as well. All the options are self explanatory, no need for the text. The different modes of the mines is a joke, since they all are the same setting, "Kill" (except OFF): By default, the mines are disabled, but they do add a little bit more of a challenge, but if you're any good at an FPS game, it won't be too noticable (my score was 202,912 (using mines on kill setting) - I died due to the red box being 80%-ish of the screen). To conclude, this game needs a lot better presentation and an actual point for playing the game. I'm not one to care about bragging about my high-score, but being the type of game this is, displaying a high-score is all it has potential for (where is the replay value? customizing a box doesn't quite cut it, no offense). ------------------------ BUG: if mines are on kill, the player can't replay the game without refreshing the page. Learning Curve: Instant!
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