Its a fucking trap, its perverted justice
Wow I have to say, this is very original! Granted, this game has a little way to go before it’s anything breathtaking, but I’m already surprised enough at the actual concept of the game. Thanks to you now we can enjoy the puzzling logic of riddles in our own homes – I can’t believe that no-one has done this before!
First off, graphics. Not too bad, but pretty bog-standard. I have to say though, I liked the cartoon style of the game, it made the game LOOK pretty when really it is supposed to be a little evil, due to the whole “is he lying?” concept. I didn’t really like the fact that the graphics were a little plain though, and at times they looked a bit MS Paint boring standard, for example you had a straight fork-road, a slight hill, grass, a mountain and that was it really. Why not add a little detail into the surroundings? You really need t bring the personality of the surrounding environment ALIVE. Put fine little blades of grass into that green, make the roads stretch away for miles in the distance, the roads could be dusty and creepy looking, a wind could blow across and the monk could stand there with a menacing look about him, rather than just standing there with an emotion-less grin. You really need to add personality into the looks of the game, to match that of the prospect you are using here, in my mind riddles always have a creepy sense about them, so you should take advantage of this and really bring it out in the flash. The other reason being there is a noticeably lack of graphics, there isn’t much thought in the surroundings and the characters are just basically developed versions of a stick figure. I got the impression that you used ready-made shape tools in Paint for most of the graphics, for example the monk’s head was just circle and completely bald, and their hands and feet were made out of plain circles and half-circles. The speech bubble of the monk talking was a cool addition, but the speech bubble already appeared before he even spoke, surely it would make more sense if you just add an animation for the speech bubble to appear when he spoke?
Next, sound. Unfortunately, I have next to nothing to say about this aspect of the flash, because there wasn’t a single sound within the game. I feel it would be fair to ask that you at least give us some background music, and if you can add sound effects of when you take the wrong path, when you talk and when the monk talks. I think that the main thing you really need to do if you make another one of these is add sound, since linked with the action of the flash what you hear AND what you see brings out the besting the game. Otherwise the action of the game feels very ‘mute’ and boring, I have to admit there were times when I forgot I was even playing this game when I minimised the window for a while.
Finally, game-play. Definitely the best aspect of the flash, but you have a little to improve next time here too. First off, I absolutely LOVE that talk bar at the bottom, It’s so original and I actually feel as if I have more control in the game! Being able to ‘virtual talk’ is a welcome addition here but it also has its limits – there were times when I thought the monk was little more than a brain dead, the AI of him wasn’t very intelligence and he said “Huh?” a lot in answer to me – even when I asked him if he was sure of his answer, obviously there’s a suggestion here. I really like this riddle style of the flash because I’m surprised it hasn’t been done before, I liked the ‘common sense’ answer at the end. I was stumped for an answer, but then when I read the solution I could have kicked myself haha. Overall, an original game, it’s just a shame it doesn’t reach as far as it could have gone. However, I loved the ‘common sense’ brain-racking style of playing this game , and I appreciate having to put as much care and logic into one game as I did with this. Well done Although I never watched it