Aliens Kidnapped Betty

Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to Kongregate's newest featured game, Aliens Kidnapped Betty! It's like canabalt with more timing! It's like a generic platformer, but with a twist! Combine those and what do you get?!?!?

(A pretty awful game)

First off, let me put it out there that I am very biased here. I love platforming games, and something about removing a sense of control from a complex platforming game tears at my very being. See Meat Boy and then PETA's parody Tofu Boy for an example. The PETA devs, bless their big crazy heart, did everything right in emulating super meat boy except for the movement. The tileset layouts were the same, the sawblades, art style, everything was well above par, except the controls. Tofu boy slips around like he's made of mercury, his speed is more erratic and his horizontal jumping is too short by about a third. These small, minute differences turn two otherwise identical games into, well, a comparison of normal bacon and soy bacon. Aliens Kidnapped Betty does the same thing, it turns what would be a generic platforming game into a completely subpar experience by applying an interesting game mechanic in a place it does not belong.

That said on to the story. Betty gets kidnapped by aliens, and guess who is going to rescue her? Congratulations, you are correct, those of you who chose the obvious answer and not something ridiculous like Lisa Edelstein. You play as Mike McManly, a man with restless leg syndrome who is able to jump 8 feet high in a single bound. This comes in handy as your woman has been kidnapped by aliens who seem to not understand the danger of leaving magical doors of teleportation around town. Mike however, and full advantage of this, and uses said doors to get his woman back.

(note: none of this is actually said in the game, but I feel it was implied)

What do you do to win? press up or click.What do you do to get away from an enemy? press up or click at the right time. How about getting coins? Press up or click in the specific pattern the level designer intended. That last bit is unfortunate, because of the 16 levels I played, two of them had genuinely interesting mechanics that went along with the game. The rest were just standard platformer fare, sans everything but the jumping.

On a graphical note, I really do like the background and tileset for this game. The people look out of place, but the urban tilesets are done neatly, and the backgrounds are well done in that retro 8 bit style.

Well folks, that's my take on the game. Not one I'd recommend, but to each his own, and if it seems like something you'd like, have at it.

Embrace

Embrance is a Kongregate exclusive game by a use named Mongolish. The basic explanation of the game is that you spin an open circle with your mouse and try to get a high score. The more in depth explanation is as follows:

You have a shield with a gap in it. You get swarmed by pluses and minuses. Letting pluses through your shield gives you points and repairs your shield, while letting minuses through depletes your shield. Letting either hit your shield depletes your shield by a very small percentage.

Yep, that's really all there is to the game. Its a fun little game to play when you have ten minutes here or there, the upgrades aren't a grind and the game only stops being fun right around the time you buy all the upgrades, which is one hell of a step up from a game like Burrito Bison. While the game is not exceptional, it's everything a flash game should be, easy to pick up, pretty without being distracting, and most importantly it's fun.

No Time to Explain

There is no time for me to explain what this game is, but you must play it. Not much to review of the game since it only takes about 5-7 minutes to beat, but all in all it OH GOD MY RIBS ARE IN MY EYES

Monster Slayers

Monster slayers is a party based RPG about a group of adventurers who do the bidding of the ghost of the kingdom's king, who dies during the prologue. You start with one hero in your party, but the number will likely expand to five as the tutorial progresses. There are four basic unit types, each with 5 unique advanced classes. Like Dungeon Developer, it was created by Nerdook.

The most important part of the game it probably one you won't spend too much time on, that being the party screen. Here you hire warriors, change and upgrade your units, and equip your units with hats. The hats are the only form of equipment in the game, providing minor general stat bonuses to hp, max damage, or armor level. Every unit has the ability to upgrade and advance in class, but  each new class tier must be unlocked via the main storyline.

The game has four main types of game play modes, all of which are nearly identical. The Main story shows mini  cutscenes and sends you on a bunch of random and increasingly difficult missions that generally end with some type of boss. Bounty hunting is a mode in which you slay a stronger version of a previously defeated boss. Quests are side missions which involve a variety of tasks, but it really always has the same goal. Whether you are taking a caravan across the map, killing everything on the map, delivering an item on the other side of the map, or what have you, you are always simply walking forward, attacking, rinse, repeat. This holds true for the fourth game type, by it is still by far my favorite, the multiplayer challenge mode.

In the multiplayer mode, you select any team you want from someone else, and fight against them. The star raking shows the general ability level of the enemy team, but the value doesn't exactly always rule king. At star level 25 my team was able to successfully kill a star level 40 team, though just barely. Multiplayer battles are a fun pseudo pvp game type.

I really liked this game, and the pvp can add some additional fun to the game after it's ended, but a few design choices annoy me. Certain class branches are absolutely useless, notably anything to do with building damage. Buildings are rare, and usually the class upgrade choices are either take a unit that fires twice as many shots, or a unit that does double damage to buildings alone. Even if 50% of enemies were buildings, the building destroyers would never be the right choice, because two arrows is just as good as one double damage arrow. Another problem, which I hold it has in common with Dungeon Developer, is that you really dont have any control over the game. Being able to do something simple like set formations for your units would've made it so much better than just telling them to move forward, back up, attack, and defend as a group.