Crusher

So I was looking around for something interesting to play and I stumbled upon this. I noticed nobody has commented on it, so I decided to give my feedback. As somebody who is also trying to make games, I recognize how valuable that is.

I will start by saying that I haven’t played your game long, so these are kind of first impressions after a few minutes of play. I will break this down into the parts of the game.

–Menu–

So this is the first thing you see in the game, naturally. I think the menu look is well designed. It is simple, but that and the color schemes fit the style of the rest of the game very well.

I would say that the music, at least on my end, was pretty loud in game and on the menu. As such, it would be nice to have a volume control slider.

It would also benefit the menu to have indicators on the buttons when you are hovering over them. The menu feels very stiff and adding like a color change or outline or something would give it more of an interactive feel and remove the stiffness of the menu.

–Tutorial–

So first thing I noticed about the tutorial is that it doesn’t straight say it’s a tutorial. It’s a minor complaint, but I think the button should be changed from Info to something that more closely resembles it’s purpose.

Overall the tutorial is kind of a necessity for this game. It is a very unique game and the tutorial does a good job of explaining how to play.

The text on the tutorial can be a bit difficult to read in some places without really focusing on it. This is mostly in areas where the background is very busy, like in the first slide in the bottom left corner where the box is. I would recommend setting up some sort of light colored (possibly a white or a light grey) background behind all of the text to improve legibility.

It would also benefit the tutorial to make the boxes around components a lot more noticeable. The black kind of looks like it belongs there when it’s not being focused on it. It should be switched to a color that draws the player’s attention to it.

–Gameplay–

I was pleasantly surprised about the gameplay. I was concerned, after going through the tutorial, that the game would be hard to get used to and not “feel” right. Despite my concerns, the game feels and plays great. It was surprisingly easy to get a hang of the controls, maintaining the charge button, keeping everything operating smoothly, and crushing some boxes.

The act of crushing the boxes is satisfying overall. It has a good “punch” to it. With the screen shake really adding an extra layer to the feeling of the game. The various things that could break or stop the machine in some way are quite entertaining as well. I like the variety of them and I really appreciate that they each have a different mechanic, like how I noticed the gunk will allow you to crush a box, but won’t allow the crusher to reset. Also the different ways of dealing with each problem is quite nice as well.

I think there should be an audio cue for when the machine gets gunked up grease. Currently there is only a cue for when the grease is removed.

It would also be nice if there was some sort of objective, or thing to work towards. Either something to unlock, or even just a high score to beat. It could help this kind of game to add a leaderboard or just keep track of your personal high score in some way.

–Ending Statements–

As a total package this game is rather nice. I would think of it as a nice way of killing some time. Or… you know… crushing some boxes. The game plays smoothly and it feels good. The idea is unique and very simple, and simple is a good thing sometimes. The game looks good and the crushing FEELS good and that’s the most important thing of the game. In general, it was enjoyable. I wouldn’t mind sharing this around with some friends for sure.