Summer 2009 Dualstream Day of Zeux Judging Sheets:MZXGiant
1. 41817: Reconquista+Escalation 371/400 (Lite)
2. 97991: Welty Wickleson: Harbinger of Truth 320/400 (Heavy)
3. 52517: Risa 298/400 (Lite)
4. 10037: Automobile Conspiracy 251/400 (Heavy)
5. 90622: Achtung! 239/400 (Lite)
6. 40125: News First! 234/400 (Heavy)
7. 89341: California Rookie 232/400 (Lite)
8. 35285: Paranoid Heavens 226/400 (Lite)
9. 13697: Revenge of the Toaster 221/400 (Lite)
10. 92782: Jack Flaps: News Reporter 200/400 (Lite)
11. 52370: Night's Journey 172/400 (Lite)
12. 97505: Untitled, Unfinished 101/400 (Lite)
DQ 4833
10037: Automobile Conspiracy (Heavy, 251/400)
Theme 83/100
The theme felt a bit trivial for my tastes; I thought that it was interpreted at a very shallow level. However, it was well-used and fit properly with the dynamic of the game, so it's difficult to take off a lot of points for "shallow interpretation". It pretty well covered the entire game throughout, which was nice, and matched the gameplay closely in terms of purpose.
Gameplay 46/90
Gameplay, while rudimentary, seemed bug free. We started with a standard, MZX-brand Top Down Adventure, a classic. Afterwards, a brief stint with a sidescrolling jumping engine with a recharge on the tranquilizers was a good break. My biggest complaint about the gameplay was that there wasn't much of it. Altogether, we had the "map navigation" part, the "hit by a car" part, and the sidescroller part. After that, it was pretty much cutscenes to the end, so there was very little player involvement in completing the game itself. Being as this is a game competition rather than a movie competition, this was costly.
Graphics 37/70
The graphics were mostly standard MZX character set. The bit of rain at the beginning was kind of nice, and lent to the scene ambience in a very good way. I can tell that the palette was carefully chosen for its darkness, and that certainly helps the mood that is appropriate in each area. There was a bit of character editing to augment some scenes, but the biggest issue was a cousin of "big empty board syndrome" -- some things to see and do, but I found myself holding down the arrow keys for a long time to maneuver what should have been a short, easy street. I get the feeling that there was more work in that area intended but time constraints hurt that.
Technique 39/60
Similar to the gameplay, the technique was also fairly rudimentary; probably the best technique in the entire game was the title screen. (I'm surprised to hear myself say this more than once in a DoZ.) The sidescroller engine had some bugs; I was able to get stuck on top of bullets and also watch bullets hang well below where the player character was, such that I couldn’t actually get away from the tranquilizers being shot at me.
Story 23/50
The story was decent, but, tying to the implementation of the theme, it seemed very trivial and was completely theme-driven. Now that I've gotten that out of the way, the story of losing one's car seemed oddly familiar. I'm not sure what else to say; it was a story, and it was there, no matter how shallow it seemed. I guess I just really want some deep philisophical interpretation?
Sound 23/50
There weren't really a lot of sound effects, but there was music out the arse. It was even enjoyable, and they were used scene to scene, so they didn't get specifically old. I think that there was some placement for sound effects though, so I was disappointed that there weren't any.
13697: Revenge of the Toaster (Lite, 221/400)
Theme 0/20
This game, as far as I could tell, held no adherence to either theme specified, so I awarded it no points. What more is there to say? While I admire the innovation, a big part of this competition is to program around a set of rules… and that just didn’t happen.
Gameplay 68/120
The gameplay, while littered with bugs, was unique and interesting (for an MZX game). While I see very little traditional MZX gameplay from Logicow EVER, this was a new high point for him, and I can appreciate some of the little differences and ingenuity that he introduces to MegaZeuxing. Basically, you fly around in a little ship shooting at things. It's basically Asteroids for MZX, but with some obstacles.
Graphics 72/90
Graphics were really good for what logi was attempting here; the sprite movement and whatnot was quite smooth, but a lot of glitches chipped away at possible points. Also, the choppiness of the framerate on anything short of a CRAY-MP was disappointing, and while I could play it on my gaming rig desktop, I can see how the general populace would have some qualms about its execution.
Technique 73/80
Technique on the game was nothing short of amazing if only because of the complexity that logicow threw into the new technique. As I said with the graphics, there were quite a few glitches and some collision detection gremlins that dropped the score slightly, but my hat is certainly off to Logi for his continued "unique" use of Robotic.
Story 0/50
There was no perceivable story here, but I had trouble getting past the first level. That said, I had to give it a zero because there is no lead-in and no explanation at all that would have otherwise drawn me into playing the game short of "oh wow, shiny graphics". Sorry, logi-- you're a master at Robotic in my mind, but your story telling leaves a bit to be desired. No shame in that.
Sound 8/40
{{ ADD SOUND }}
35285: Paranoid Heavens (Lite, 226/400)
Theme 5/20
This was a tough one because it seemed promising until I got to the point where Goshi stopped and I realized "hey wait, there's no game left". At which point I got really sad. And docked fifty points from Gryffindor. Mwa ha ha. Anyways, theme! There was a mention of "paranoid" in both the title screen and the first cinematic. However, it didn't run much further than that. Once again, I feel the need to say "be less trivial with the theme". It certainly smacked me upside the head, but there was no evidence in here that the character was, in fact, paranoid. (Excepting the fact that "disarm traps" was a choice on every chest. Does that count? Maybe.) He has the balls to walk up to thieves and talk to them without a second thought? I dunno, not really buying it.
Gameplay 83/120
Gameplay mechanic was the standard, MZX-brand overhead. However, that's not always a bad thing. It echoed a classic inventory quest, so it made good use of board space. However, I feel like Goshi ultimately counteracted "big empty board" syndrome with "big empty board with lots of baddies". Once again, not necessarily a bad thing. It reminded me significantly of "Caverns", so it was most assuredly a throwback to the "good old days"-- it's a pity it wasn't finished, but I did go through and attempt the boss battles in the editor.
Graphics 36/90
Graphics were relatively standard. Goshi didn't do a lot of palette work as far as I can tell, and the game seemed remarkably monochromatic. There was some character editing and animation, which was well-received. I just think that more could certainly have been done with some of the areas (which seemed somewhat pointless at times, and a little flair could have helped their cause) that would have netted more points in this category.
Technique 52/80
Technique, fitting in with gameplay, was basic counter work and involved minimal creativity. It was unfinished, but bug-free as far as I could tell, so I can't dock points for glitches (unless one considers "unfinished" a glitch). Not too much to say about it; Goshi took something that worked for him and used it. However, I like to see some innovation, even in a DoZ, so I couldn't justify a higher score.
Story 27/50
Goshi seemed to try to throw a story onto the DoZ game, and he set up for it to have some potential, but since it was unfinished, it was tough to tell where it was really going. Points for the setup, though, and for actually attempting to weave a storyline into this. I kind of hope a game dump of this brings a more full version of the game with a complete storyline.
Sound 23/40
There were only a couple music pieces in the game proper, but it's not like the music was overly obtrusive. The other thing I liked about it was that it didn't change board to board when crawling the map. It seemed appropriate for the dominantly dark atmosphere, so it was well placed.
40125: News First! (Heavy, 234/400)
Theme 100/100
This story oozed "News Reporters". It was a story about news reporters, starring news reporters, reporting the news. Even the title is "News First!" So, clearly the theme was involved here. However, However, I actually quite liked the use of the theme; while it was very obvious, and some may call it trivial (as I have done in other cases), it was unusual for a Day of Zeux.
Gameplay 28/120
Gameplay was minimal, unfortunately. The game lasted all of five minutes for me after taking random wrong turns, intentionally. This made the game lose some points just because there wasn't much to do. A suggestion for the future would be to add some more routes or possibilities. An interesting little metagame in there was the rating system, which was kind of fun to mess with to see what I could get for a top score. That was about the only thing that made me play through more than once. Additionally, if that's what you were going for, you should include some sort of "Play Again?" option or something, to encourage people to try to get a top score. Perhaps say what the highest possible score is?
Graphics 36/90
The graphics were minimal; there was pretty much only one board with some changing panels for a "viewport" style view of the news studio, which I can't imagine took very long. There was some minimal character editing, but nothing specifically detailed nor eye-catching. It was certainly more effort on the text than the graphics in this one, and that was a shame. Come on, if you're going to pretend to be a visual novel, the least you could do is be visual! ;)
Techniue 16/80
Techniques used were basic; I'm attempting to avoid using the word 'minimal' again (d'oh!). It was a simple key press catch leads to another outcome, sets flags, increases ratings. Very simple tree layout for the mechanics and story structure used, and I can't help but frown upon that. While it seemed pretty difficult to have any bugs in it, it doesn't quite deserve the even mild applause that others get for being bug-free, considering the simplicity of the code involved.
Story 50/50
Full points for a story, since the whole game was clearly story-driven, despite not having much of anything else to go on. It made me smile and involved current events in a way that was clever and entertaining. Hey look, a clever story that actually does what a story is supposed to in a game! Woo hoo!
Sound 4/40
There wasn't any music that I could tell, and only one sound-- for "Game Over". In a game that bases itself entirely off text, some music or sound effects are much closer to "required" than in a game with a lot more player interaction. This was disappointing!
41817: Reconquista+Escalation (Lite, 371/400)
Theme 18/20
It's always amazing what lancer manages to churn out in a 24 hour time period. This time, it was this game, which reminded me from the start of some sort of Chrono Trigger-esque game on the GBA, dominantly because of the graphic stylings and patterns. Anyways, theme-wise, we stuck right to it with the paranoia of the angel's mind resulting in these baddies which manifest around the protagonist.
Gameplay 109/120
Gameplay is similar in concept to Taoyarin. I find myself drawing on an old adage: "If it looks like a duck…" It's not a bad thing though; lancer took a concept that worked for him and made it work for this DoZ. It's basically a calendar-based game, where on certain days, escalation events happen. It makes the game interesting and, I think, adds some replay value. The weapons are excellent, and lancer makes the smart move of taking the MZX gun system out of the equation when attacking. Also, the gameplay variation I like is in here, with both the top-down adventure type and the turn-based type. Downside to the turn- based is that I found it much easier than I would have otherwise liked. However, that may not be bad for some people.
Graphics 84/90
Graphics are exceptional, of course. The character editing is phenomenal, and lancer makes full (and utterly over-the-top) use of the pixel perfect capabilities of MZX. The palette work is dominantly monochromatic for the foreground in most of the "advanced" graphics work, but lancer more than makes up for it with his exceptional use of a stark green-base color scheme through the entirety of the top-down.
Technique 78/80
Technique-wise, the engines are varied and well-programmed. The aiming system on the handgun was an excellent touch, and I even liked the wall ricochets that happened if I was too far around the corner. The pixel-perfect work was jaw-dropping as usual, and I really think lancer outdid himself on the title screen this time around. Either way, in general, every engine seemed to be extremely well-programmed. That said, I have a sneaking suspicion that lancer has had some serious practice in some of these engines shortly before the DoZ, so a lot of it was just expelling already functional ideas and code. While that's not against the rules, it goes to show what practice can do.
Story 44/50
The story here is really quite good; I wouldn't expect anything less, since lancer modeled it after a visual novel type of setup, complete with multiple endings and the vertically scrolling white-on-black text. It's depth is fairly decent for a shotgun 24-hour storyline, and It managed to actually mix some very subtle elements in, something that's not often seen in a DoZ story.
Sound 38/40
Music in this game sounds like it was taken from a number of visual novels, so it is ambient, unobtrusive, and well-suited to the environments. The sound effects are few and far between, so that there is a very passive flavor to the overall gameplay, and it allows the whole "immersion" factor to increase, due to the well-chosen music pieces.
52370: Night's Journey (Lite, 172/400)
Theme 6/20
This pretty much seems to be a project dump, so I'll score it as it stands. Theme-wise, I can definitely see the potential for the game to match up with the paranoia theme; we see the character getting lost in what appears to be his own dreams (judging from the nightcap and whatnot), and seeing all sorts of crazy stuff that resembles some sort of bad acid trip. I think this was a really good interpretation of the theme, and had it been completed, I think it would have stood a good chance at placing very very well. However, since it wasn't… I don't see it enough.
Gameplay 51/120
The gameplay mechanic in this was a standard multicharacter sidescroller, which, for whatever reason, didn't feel totally stale to me. I think that it would have been actually pretty interesting, had it been more complete, and the little attack mechanisms were well-done and kind of off the beaten path, so to speak. Unfortunately, being that it is a project dump, it obviously doesn't have much gameplay (only a full board and a little bit).
Graphics 54/90
Graphics were quite good; the multicharacter player and enemies were well done and clean looking, but didn't so much match the background. The closest comparison I can think of is to putting SNES sprites on top of Caverns. While I understand that more probably would have been done, time or schedule permitting, the artist had/has a lot of potential to make neat things in the character editor with a bit of effort, and the background could have well-used that artistic flair as well as the characters themselves.
Technique 34/80
The technique used here was a basic, Mario-style AI where characters move along a path until they hit an obstacle, then bounce and go the other direction. Not all that creative from the enemy AI side, but I can appreciate retro sometimes. The sprite work on the main character was pretty decent and the collision detection seemed fairly well done. The jumping engine, however, left a bit to be desired, as I managed to get a few jumping-related bugs while playing.
Story 14/50
As far as I can tell, there was really no story here, other than that you're dreaming. Scary dreams. This was mostly just introduced by the first cutscene. <insert deference to obvious time/schedule problems here>
Sound 13/40
There was no sound as far as I can tell. In a platformer, there always must be sound, despite the extensive player interaction, because one engine can fit the whole game, and it seems like a cop-out to not include any music with the level design. However, pity points for not having screaming or something equally as obnoxious instead.
52517: Risa (Lite, 298/400)
Theme 12/20
Another project dump. Kind of sad; I read through this one's script and whatnot, and I really wish that this had been completed. Ah well. First of all, paranoia is rarely seen in the game itself, only in the ending scripts, with the scant exception of the description of the mother. However, I see where he was going with this, so I can't penalize him too hard.
Gameplay 78/120
The gameplay mechanic was certainly different. It was like a combination of visual novel and sidescroller which actually made it fun (though I felt, for a moment, that Lachesis was pandering to my particular brand of visual novel enjoyment ;)). The one caveat to say is that the cutscenes were very long, and with such a small textbox in the center, it made it difficult to stay awake through to the sidescroller parts. However, the sidescroller was fun, and not too difficult to complete once you got the hang of the controls, which were rather tense at times, making it tough to easily control the character.
Graphics 83/90
Graphics were beautiful. I have absolutely nothing to complain about. From the characters in the cutscenes to the actual landscapes, enemies, and animations in the side scroller portion, these were great, and it makes me want to see a lot more of what Lachesis can crank out! Points off for not increasing the size of things, though; it seemed like most everything was needlessly boxed into the center of the screen. However, I suspect that this was intentional, to reduce character set space.
Technique 61/80
The technique used varied nicely between the cutscene engine (which was reasonably impressive by itself) and the sidescroller. There were a few collision detection glitches that I noticed, most of them giving the benefit to the player. This definitely helped the difficulty curve, but it was still an issue. Otherwise, the engines were remarkably solid and I had a hard time breaking them. The code wasn't a complete mess and, when it came down to it, it was fairly easy to follow, such that I could say "Huh. I should try that sometime" without being completely tongue-in-cheek about it.
Story 36/50
The story here would have been loads better had the game been completed (duh), but reading through the scripts in the cutscenes, I was able to understand where Lachesis was going with it. I really liked the turn at the end, and thought it was well-done, if a bit cliché. Not much else to say except "wish it had been finished."
Sound 28/40
Sound was extremely good, and mixed well with the environments. A good mix of music helped propel the side scrolling scenes and alleviate boredom, but the absence of sound effects was noticable (and Lachesis comments on it on the first screen, in fact). That part was unfortunate!
89341: California Rookie (Lite, 232/400)
Theme 18/20
A cool little inventory-style quest that reminded me quite a bit of Weirdness. It was pretty nifty, despite being broken enough that I couldn't finish the game. The theme was well-used here, being that it was about a news reporter doing his job around the city, gathering evidence and information about different news stories. Not much else to say; the whole game oozed "news". After writing this many sheets about the "news reporters" topic, I question whether it was too easy!
Gameplay 78/120
Gameplay was average. It was a standard MZX top-down adventure game with an inventory quest, that was a good five-minute time killer. I would have liked to see a little variation, but I can't say emulating a good thing (what the GCS was designed for) is deserving of penalty points. There was a pretty good amount of gameplay in terms of time, but in effort it seemed to lack. It was reasonably easy to find all the hotspots to get the number of points required, and it verged on boring once I had finished. Long story short; good game, no replay value.
Graphics 42/90
Graphics were relatively standard; nooodl did quite a bit with the standard character set, but it left locations seeming blocky and obtuse, with little creativity. Room design was fairly nice and there were some character edits, but no animation (except the clouds, and that was admittedly cool).
Technique 33/80
The technique was reasonably basic, and once again, it was "just an inventory puzzle". Additionally, what really hurt the score was the fact that there was a game-stopping bug in it. Otherwise, it was a nice little time killer that didn't require too much thought outside of common sense, but with very little in the way of any advanced MZX techniques. Next time, I'd really like to see some better use of Robotic, but I can't complain too much; it was certainly a good effort, and didn't seem to me like nooodl was just half-assing it.
Story 36/50
The story here was decent, albeit minimal. It tied in well with the theme, but ultimately came down to: "Here's you. This is your job. Don't screw it up." which left a bad taste in my mouth for how the game was run. In my mind, it could have been improved by some sort of sub-plot which would have taken the otherwise mundane story and made it interesting. Perhaps the school bus accident wasn't really an accident? Perhaps the bank closing was actually some mastermind plan by the government to cut off the world cheese supply? Who knows. Most things are more interesting than what I do, Monday-Friday, 7-5.
Sound 25/40
The chiptunes used were "short and sweet", but did tend to get a bit annoying after a while. Perhaps they were just uncharacteristically happy for someone who was merely doing their job (see above). Either way, it's not like they were particularly bad, or obnoxious. Also, a lack of sound effects (perhaps the sound of a camera taking a picture?) was off-putting.
90622: Achtung! (Lite, 239/400)
Theme 6/20
The theme seemed to be barely used here; it was stated once in the beginning, once in the end, and at the game over screen. Otherwise, there's not enough time for the character to sit and think paranoid thoughts to reinforce the thematic elements throughout, because of the run-and-gun type of game that this is. I'm not totally sure that I like this style for a DoZ, because it seems to push the envelope in this and the story category (see below)
Gameplay 96/120
There was certainly a lot of gameplay, emulating old coin-op arcades (I bet I can guess whose game this is!) but it's not varied; it's consistently the same type of thing over and over again for ten levels, and once a basic strategy is found, you can keep it for the rest of the game and not have too much of a problem. I guess the short response here is; good amounts but no variation. It got boring.
Graphics 61/90
Graphics were colorful and seizure-iffic. Lots of flashing, moving things on the screen at absolutely all times, and the enemies were detailed and well done, as was the player character. The layout of the playing fields seemed uninspired though, but the size of the screen made it difficult to picture the barriers laid out in other ways. The different weapons having different spreads was also cool, though I suspect a series of color changers were sitting off-screen just continuously cycling over a pre-defined "palette" of colors.
Technique 54/80
The technique used here was pretty basic, but well-implemented. The only complaint I have (and this is purely stylistic) is that when the enemies surround you, you can easily lose track of the player character, since the enemies are on overlay and just completely cover it up. Besides that, though, the AI was decent (I got it stuck around corners, but used that to my advantage) and the different weapons that spontaneously appeared were fairly cool and varied. Also, the shotgun is awesome and everything else is utterly useless against swarming enemies. The variation in enemy looks and movement patterns was also appreciated.
Story 10/50
I'll probably get chewed out later for saying this, but there was no story. It was a first scene, saying why you're mass-murdering a bunch of random baddies, and that's about it. Now, while I know that games like this don't need/want/deserve a story to them, there are some games that got the mix just right. For instance, "Risa" took an involved story in the form of cutscenes, and split it up with a fair bit of action. Perhaps that might be a route better taken in the future to net more points in story and theme, so that the main character has some more depth than "guy with a bunch of weaponry mercilessly killing things"
Sound 12/40
There was no music, which surprised me so much that I thought my speakers were on mute. The sound effects of firing and killing enemies were okay, but got tiresome quickly, since there was such a large quantity of enemies on the board at any given time. Maybe the music just didn't get included? I don't know, but it resulted in some nasty point reductions here.
92782: Jack Flaps: News Reporter (Lite, 200/400)
Theme 14/20
Sigh, another project dump. The quantity of radically unfinished games this DoZ has made me sad. Oh well. Jack Flaps was a pretty neat concept, and was even looking reasonably good. Thematically, it was very clearly a "news reporter" game (hey look, it's in the title!) and had even the boring parts of being a reporter (such as… stamping papers, I guess? and driving…). It looked like the author was about to get into a top-down section, but ran out of time. The theme was used as best it could be, I think. Once again, it's one of those "Hey look I'm a news reporter, that's the theme see see see?" type of games, but it wasn't in particularly bad taste, nor did it seem "plugged in".
Gameplay 45/120
Gameplay probably would have been much better if there was more of it, but, to be honest, I felt like I was at work the whole time I was playing this game. C'mon, stamping papers and avoiding traffic cones? It's like driving in Rochester during construction season. Anyways, this is another one of those where I think it would have been greatly improved, if finished. The car scene was kind of cool, but for non-gameplay reasons.
Graphics 78/90
Graphics were surprisingly good. I don't know quite why it was surprising, but it may have been the underwhelming title screen. I digress. The color choices were good and reflected the appropriate moods for the area, and the character editing (specifically of the character on the top-down segment, and of the car/trees on the driving segment) was exceptional. I liked the little cartoony animation, and the layered cityscape moving at different speeds was a very nice touch.
Technique 36/80
Technique is a hard one for me, because while I liked the elements independently, they were all ultimately trivial to implement. Whether this is a good or a bad thing, I'm not sure. However, the quantity of traffic cones was angering and at times, I paused just to look and see if there was any possible route to go and there wasn't, effectively making the scene unwinnable. The stamping portion was fairly easy, but had some nice mouse work that was reminiscent of the last DoZ game I participated in (hmm…)
Story 10/50
The story in here was nonexistent, but I'm betting it was at least slightly planned. Not too much else to say here, I just wish it had panned out a bit more.
Sound 17/40
Sound was ripped from Logimad's DoZ game last time; however, it was still good. Unfortunately, save for the satisfying THUD sound when you stamped something, there was minimal music or sound effects. Once again, probably planned, and just didn't pan out. Damn shame.
98505: Untitled, Unfinished (Lite, 101/400)
Theme 4/20
Need I say it? Another project dump. Anyways, thematically, I can kind of see where this was supposed to be going, but it's tough to tell with so little game to base it off of.
Gameplay 28/120
The gameplay here was minor, but seemed like it was going to be a fairly consistent MZX top-down adventure with lots of gunplay. The first two thoughts in my mind when I messed with the only board with enemies were, first, "Heh, these guys have HP", followed by "Wait, HOW much ammo do I have?!" The difficulty level would be hair-pulling if it was complete, I'm sure.
Graphics 22/90
Graphics were basic, with the only really cool effect being on the cutscene board, and then the player direction edits. Nothing specifically mind-blowing, though it was nice to see a palette that had some colors that complemented each other well.
Technique 31/80
Technique was, as specified above, basic. Nothing really showy or spectacular here; the thing that stands out as being the most impressive relatively, is the HP of the guards.
Story 16/50
The story started off pretty well, but didn't go anywhere from there due to lack of completeness.
Sound 0/40
There was really no sound at all, and in a game that looked to be moving towards "dungeon crawler", I'd rather not have my Foo Fighters or something playing in the background. Ominous anything would be better than complete silence, or worse, my personal music collection.
98991: Welty Wickleson: Harbinger of Truth (Heavy, 320/400)
Theme 88/100
From the title screen, this game screams "Quasar". Sorry, buddy, you're just very predictable. Anyway, thematically, this game just rocks. Period, end of story, full stop. The main character is a hyper-paranoid maniac running around shouting random conspiracies at people. This differentiates from the other game the paranoid maniac searching for his car in that there is a significantly larger quantity of interactions which deepened the personality of the character to the point that I felt like "oh, yeah, he's been like this for a looong time".
Gameplay 67/90
Gameplay was pretty neat, despite being a top-down. It heavily resembled GreaseMonkey's game, what with the motion-detecting "guard"-type characters. However, like many of the others, it was predictable and monotonous at times, to the point that it began to get boring after a short while. I ultimately only played it for the quips and humor (go figure)
Graphics 61/70
Graphics here, being a Quasar game, were predictably good. It seemed minimal, for him, but the palette work was dynamic and well-received. The character editing was tastefully done and enhanced the scene appropriately without drawing too much attention. I think the palette work was sufficient, and the colors were fluid throughout each scene. Also, the actual construction of Welty's face was nothing short of "awesome" for the cutscenes.
Technique 37/60
The technique used was pretty basic, having gone with a top-down classical type of game. Admittedly, it's difficult to make anything specifically showy with that. The coolest thing that was done, though, was the "hiding" dynamic that came along with the "guard" type characters. That was a nifty way of adding some actual difficulty to the game, though I still think it was fairly easy. As a side note, the character direction editing was backwards, such that it appeared I was moonwalking the whole time. Tribute to Michael Jackson? Possibly. It's a conspiracy!
Story 41/50
Story-wise it was bland in plot but heavy in humor, which I significantly enjoyed. The story seemed a bit trivial (which is clearly the word of the DoZ for my judging), but I think the amount of pure, insane humor evened it out. Once I got to the end, I actually laughed out loud at the twist, so that was definitely a good sign for the story work.
Sound 26/30
Sound was appropriate, conforming, and didn't get obnoxious. There were some sound effects here and there (such as when being spotted), but they weren't annoying, and seemed appropriate. I think that the chiptunes reminded me sufficiently of the environments to which they were associated that I would, in my head, match the place to the song with little difficulty; definitely a sign of good music choice.