[Editor Application] I Will Never Look At Snowmen The Same Again

Review by sivershadows on Saturday, December 3rd 2016
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Click to play 3D Islands

3D Islands is a game created by lavalinn

Yes, yes, before you say it, I know I�m reviewing another ppg. I promise I will review something else soon. For my editor app, I really wanted to find a feature worthy ppg, I feel like they are the hardest to find so I wanted a challenge. Now Lavalinn, despite having two features already, still remains a much underrated user. I think he really has some potential and he is really starting to show it. I played this game awhile back, and thought if I was to receive the editor test I would take this game into consideration. I spent about three hours yesterday searching for a game, I ended up giving up on that and took to this game. Before I start to ramble we should get into the review�


As you may notice I have previously reviewed a game by lavalinn, his games don�t have a particular style. Every game is different, that�s what I like about his games. In this game you played as two characters, a red ball and a blue ball. The blue ball was controlled by WASD and the red was with the arrow keys. Your objective was to collect coins and dodge things like cacti, snowmen and lava. I have to say some levels became quite frustrating after dying a few times but you really got a sense of victory when you finally finished a level. The one thing I despised was those sinister snowmen; they really started to get on my nerves. I�m not too sure how or why these snowmen killed me but they certainly were irritating.


So we start off with a tutorial level, which is nice, levels like these are always useful. This level introduces the two players, like most intro levels it isn�t too hard. Tutorial levels are a more fun way of telling the user how to play the game. I defiantly prefer these to a page of instructions. Usually guidance writing looks mundane and you find out that the players never read it, and then you have a page of complaints saying �too hard� and �impossible.�


If I was to tell you the game in a nutshell it would sound something like this. �You play as a ball that collects coins and what not.� Honestly if I heard that my interest would drop, but because lavalinn has added so much to the game it makes it more exciting. The graphics are beautiful and really clean. If you have played the Nintendo 3ds game �pullblox� you may have seen a link. I think the game�s visuals are really aesthetically pleasing and the colours defiantly complement each other. I�m not usually a huge fan of 3d games but Lavalinn changed my perspective with this game. But, overall amazing artwork, good job lavalinn.


The game isn�t the most difficult of games, I think what makes it hard is the slippery controls. Honestly, that did make the game a tad bit frustrating. I know most featured games have adequate controls but it isn�t too hard to alter, I�m sure if lavalinn just put motion resistance on it would solve the unnecessary drifting. That�s probably my only complaint. The thing I like about it is that the difficulty is balanced, that is something I defiantly look for in ppgs. Balanced difficulty allows the user to progress deeply into the game without coming across obstacles too early. I think this is important when it comes to feature worthy games because it allows people to critique it before it becomes too tough. Concluding this paragraph I would like to mention that I was quite happy with the game�s difficulty it wasn�t too easy or too hard, just perfect difficulty in my eyes.


Coming to the conclusion I really believe that the game makes it into the feature mark. I feel as if many editors nowadays critique ppgs with a harsh mind. I am not bashing their views in any way but I think they think a game has to be perfect to earn a feature. If all featured ppgs were perfect we would only have a few there. Ppgs are already quite tough to create, I�ve seen many been turned down in the past, mainly because of controls. But something like control issues is really easy to alter and by just changing a control malfunction the game instantly becomes worthy. I like to use my game 'bounce' as an example of this, it isn�t the most perfect game but it did really well. I think many editors expect too much from ppgs and they expect every ppg to be like �jumpie� but in reality it�s not going to be. I think we should give some more underrated users a chance of a feature.


So in conclusion this game isn�t the best game on the website but it is pretty decent, not going to lie it doesn�t give me a high wow factor but like I said before it definitely for me makes the feature mark. Now I know this isn�t like most of my reviews but I don�t think it should be. It�s more of an editor scan in review form. But thank you very much for taking your time to scan through my editor application. I really put as much effort as I could into this, I would love to achieve the badge. Thank you and goodnight.