I Played YOUR Games! (Game Feedback & $500 Prize)

Of the 300,000 subscribers that I have, 98 of you submitted your game for me to play. I don't know why you guys want me to play your game and critique it publicly, but I'm going to do that. There's 98 games. I chose four. Now, obviously, guys, I'm just choosing these games based on what interests me. There's a ton of games on this list here, so I'm probably going to play a few more. If you weren't chosen to be played during the stream, just know maybe you'll get chosen for the next one. There's some incredible games here. I'm going to tell you what I love about these games, what I don't love about these games, and also at the end of this video, you're going to find out who wins out of the four, who wins the, let's call it the Thomas Brush Indie Game Award. I'll send you a badge uh that you can put on, I don't know, on your game. And then also, hey, why don't I give you 500 bucks as well, just to say thank you for submitting your game. So, one of you is going to win this award. Stick around to the end to see which game that is. All right, let's go. Hey, look at that menu. So pretty. I would argue this is the best menu I've ever seen from one of my subscribers.

Okay, so this game has vibes similar to what a developer I I know. I can't remember his name, but it it reminds me of his uh his style. In all seriousness though, I like it. It looks cool. So, one primary issue I have here is um I don't like pressing B to open things. B is to go back. So anyway, I would wish that was an X. You go to Rusty Soul. Can I slash? I can't slash inside. Uh-oh. That's That's the first thing I do when I'm playing a game with doors. I check to see if you can break it by spamming. In this case, you can. So, we want to make sure we disable the players um interactivity or interactability. Why can't I slash? I can push though. So, attack is X, but for some reason it doesn't work. There we go. Oh, okay. Very nice.

I love that music. So, one thing about the art style here, um, there's a subtle just a subtle very subtle inconsistency. This building here has a much more detailed texture than say the tree here. Um, so that's my big problem there. It looks great, really pretty. Um, but I think the textures are inconsistent in scale. Um, so I'd recommend either adding texture to the trees and just being more textural or at least lightening that texture for for the whatever that is, that pillar there. So typically with these platformers, if you hold jump, you should jump a little bit higher. So if I tap it once and then hold, it's the same. And really, you want to have a little bit more extra jump when you hold. In regard to the slicing, I think that this isn't enough. I would recommend going the Hollow Knight route and give me a giving me more visuals, a much brighter

attack uh slash kind of like when you're jumping here. Problem with the jumping is I can't do a directional hit. So really if you can't do directional it's really irritating. Um and I'm saying this from experience because with Neverong um same sort of issue. Um I I didn't have a directional hit and people were frustrated so I eventually had to add it and it was a pain but it was worth it. Let's see here. A shop. H hello shop. [Music] Oh, where's the shop owner? Come on. Put a shop owner right here. At least let me talk to him. That's a real pretty tree, though. I like that a lot. So, yeah. Like, if I if I if I do a downward smash, come on. You know, I really want to be able to smash his skull. Look, if you have something on his skull like that, look, his brain's popping out. It It looks like I should be able to downward smash, but I can't. So, it's It feels kind of unfair. Also, I'm not a

huge fan of these um enemy designs. They don't What are they? Um, I kind of wish I they were themed. So, if you're going to do a forest, do like a beetle or something like that. I would I would give them a face. Give them eyes cuz right now they look like they're just fungus and they don't have a p personality and they don't mean anything. Like give them a voice, something like that, right? The moment you kill something, it should immediately do something. You shouldn't have like a subtle animation of death. It should be a pop or an explosion or particles and screen shake, right? You should really feel that death right now. You're like, "Did I kill it? Oh, okay. I killed it." Give them as much feedback as you can. And I understand why that it's frustrating to get feedback about the enemies cuz it's so hard. It's so hard to get enemies feeling really good. Um, it takes a lot of effort. So, I would really focus on your enemies because you've got a great looking game. Gems? Nope. If you're going to put gems

in, that's a danger. They look like they're breakable, but they're not. And that's frustrating. If you're ever going to put something on the plane of the enemy of the player, you see, I should have been able to break something to get the iron ore instead of just give it to me. Um, if you're ever going to put something on the actual layer of the player, so in this case, these green and purple gems, they should probably be able to interact with it because it's so obvious and green and bright. The player is probably thinking, "Can I get that?" But I just can walk straight through it. Now, there's another problem that we just broke, and that is I can walk through those, but I can't walk through these, right? So, if you're going to put those green ones there, they need to be on the layer in the background, and I would make them faint. Very faint blue because right now, it's pretty unfair. So, your UI is really good, by the way. Yeah. Overall, really beautiful game. It looks incredible. Um, I think the enemies are your big problem. You really

need to focus on the enemies. I would I would do an alpha test and I would look at what the players are saying about your enemies. But overall, in terms of the game play, the movement, and the graphics, and the music, you're definitely there. You've got something good. All right. So, okay. We can adjust the brightness here for some reason. So, uh, let's go ahead and do that. Okay. Whoa, it's super slow on my uh Xbox controller. Let's try the mouse. So, graphically, you know, it's not the best. Uh there's a lot of assets. Um it does have a subtle charm to it, though. It it it does look kind of um I don't know. It's not the best looking game. Uh but I like I like the retro moody vibe. Um, okay. Okay. Whoa. Okay. To attack, press

the left mouse button and press the right trigger on your controller. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, like these kind of um tutorials, you don't need to write all this out. Just give me a button, an icon. That's it. And by the way, when in doubt, if you're curious about Okay, I don't know what I should do with the UI here, just look at what other games do. Oh no. Hello. What? Whoa. Get out of here. Oh, that's not Whoa. Gracious. So, here's the thing about game field. Here's the thing about game field. you want in instant reactivity. Okay, so if I press for these kind of games, right? If it's like a um more like Soulslike game, then I understand the slow moving attack, but for this speed it up, like think about

the crowbar in HalfLife. It's like one frame, right? It's really the recoil that indicates that you just swung. So, it's instant and then recoil. Okay? That's an interesting break animation. I'm I I think it's cool, but that's a lot of particles. So, I would just maybe just do a few more, few less. I mean, that's cool, I guess. Gained 15 health. Hey, check out that texture. Whoa. Okay, you kind of scared me, buddy. Oh, yeah. It's really really unreactive that the gun here. So, okay, there we go. It's kind of hard. Okay, let's see if we can reload here. Whoa. No, I just fell through the map. Okay. So, the problem here is that

um the pistol, it's almost less effective than the bat because it's so hard to aim. Um Oh, that's good blood. Very nice. Oh, this would be a great opportunity to at least change the ambience. Oh, you did. I think you did. Okay. Okay. I'm stuck. I'm stuck. I think the problem there is that the the revolver shouldn't open to the right. I think it should open to the left. Right. Got him. This is nice lighting in here. Very nice. So, yeah. The big the big primary concerns I have with this demo, let's start with what's good. I love the mood. I love the the the creepy graphics and the ambience and the sound effects. It's all really cool. Um I think the the

reactivity of the weapons hitting enemies is is is really it doesn't feel like you're actually hitting anything. Um and also the enemies just appear out of nowhere like this one. What in the world? Whoa. Whoa. That's not fair. So that's one of my big primary concerns. Um the enemies come out of nowhere. So I would I would make it so that they are pretty visible and they don't just appear behind you. And then I would also ensure that the weapons when you swing them or shoot them are pretty reactive, almost instantaneous from when you pull the trigger. Because right now it's very slow when you're uh swinging your back bat or shooting your gun. Um, other than that, I had a good time. I think it was a really beautiful ambience and atmosphere. It was creepy. It was spooky. And uh, wish you the best of

luck on on this game. Okay, let's play Manoquin. I love that shader. It's like super simple. I'm getting kind of spooked. I love the sounds. That's cool. Oh no, we got mannequins everywhere. Oh, gracious. That gives me chills. Oh no. Okay, let's keep going. What is this shader? Hey, if you're the developer watching this, tell me what that shader is in the in the comments below. I feel a little nervous. Okay, wait. Okay, locked. So, electric doors are out. Chew. Forget the master key at the desk. Oh, what? Come on. Oh, I can sprint a little bit. Oh, okay. We're good. We're good. Put our flashlight away.

Oh my goodness. What? Oh, that gave me chills. That was really cool. I really do think that this is a It's a perfect prototype. The only problem is there's no loop. So, if there was a loop, like something to do and something to accomplish, it can be scary. It can have spooky jump scares, but you're in like a store. This is what I would do. Like, if you wanted to publish this and and, you know, make a million bucks from this game, I would make various floors and you're on the top floor of this huge mall that's like 20 floors high. You'd start at the top floor and you have to make your way down. And it gets scarier and scarier and scarier. accomplishing a floor, like getting a key for the floor and going down is the loop. That's about it. Other than that, this was awesome. I think it's a really really cool prototype. I I promise you, I got chills. So, that was great. Um, let me know in the comments below, guys, what you thought about this. Let's move on to the next game.

Okay, I love it already. Frankly, I love the music, the mood, and I love the spooky ambience, and I love the pixels. Oh, it's so good. Oh, we got ourselves a little camera intro. Very, very nice. This is the one thing I can't figure out with Unity in a first-person shooter. How do you sort of get the camera to move itself into the character controller? I would love to know. Okay, I like the coloring here. I like what you did with the lighting. That's nice. All right, so first things first. I don't personally like the inconsistency in the texture resolutions. I'd really like you to try your best. If you're going to make a retro game, you got to, and I'm guilty of this, but you've got to try and be consistent with the resolution of the textures. Some of them are much more high resolution than others. Like this one is really bad, and that one is kind of bad. Just try your best. And those are stretched. And also, are they even pixelated? I don't think they are. I think there's some

anti-aliasing going on. So, consistency in in compression is a big deal, actually. I love this stuff. It's just like gives me chills. Can I flush you? Let me flush the toilet at least. Come on. Yeah, I kind of wish it wasn't F to interact with things, but E. That's just my opinion. There's a man in here. What is happening? I need a favor from you. Sure. What? The receptionist forgot my um damn order. I need to go downstairs and ask for a cheeseburger for room 105. I'm hungry here. It's already 2 p.m. and I haven't had my breakfast yet. Whoa. Oh no. Now, now get going. Okay. Um, bro. So, I would um recommend to the developer to compress down all

the textures cuz they look a little too high-res. That's a silly looking guy. What are you doing, buddy? Okay, so let's go. Oh no. It seems to be blocking the path. The wood seems old and woodly. Woodly? Is that a word? I don't know. Maybe. Okay. I can't see a thing. Okay. I love this. These kind of games just make me so excited. It's so eerie. I love this. This doesn't match much. Um, you need to make sure you compress that normal map. The normal map is still very high resolution, so it doesn't match the rest of the game. This lighting doesn't make any um sense. So, I would put something there. It's like a blue light or something. But that's okay. That's okay. I'm not being mean. Oh no, we got a person. He scared me.

Oh, hello there. This is Jack Painter. Happy to see someone normal here. My name is Jack Painter. What brings you to this crappy hotel? I'm a traveler and I got stuck in the thunderstorm. Got to go. All right, I'll see you around. What just happened? Oh no, that's okay. So, when you're making a game, you want to make sure that the walls have colliders on them. It would really be a good idea to put colliders on your walls, but but other than that, this is great. Whoa. There it is. Okay. Got him. Hey. Oh, no. That's awesome. I thought that was great. Here's the thing. Glitches are

never something that I worry about. That's never the thing that I worry about when I'm playing a game. What I worry about when I'm playing a game is, is it a good fun game? Am I interested? In this case, I'm very interested. It's very weird, very bizarre. I love the the creepy characters. I think the texturing was definitely cool in terms of the pixelated textures. I would recommend two things. First, compressing all textures, including normal maps, so that they're really chunky and crunchy. And number two, I would highly recommend using a PSX camera effect in Unity. Um, so there's some on the the Unity asset store and also on GitHub. They will make the whole game look pixelated, um, not just the textures. All right. Very cool. Well, good job. Very, very good job. All right, so who wins the Thomas Brush Indie Game Award in that 500 bucks? Well, these games were awesome, but the best one I feel like has the most potential, has the best art, the best music, the best story, the best gameplay so far. I know it's a demo. This goes to

Milo and the Elder Seed. [Music] That is the winner of the Thomas Brush Indie Game Award. So, let's give a round of applause. Leave some comments below about what you think about this game and also comments below about what you think about the other games. Overall, I think Milo and the Elder Seed has the best potential. Um, I see this game as making at least $100,000 on Steam and other platforms minimum. Um, as long as the game continues to grow, fix those enemies, um, fix the the the game feel a little bit with the hack and slash mechanics. But overall, I think this game has the most potential. Some of you might be thinking, "This looks a lot like one of my games." Um, that's not why I chose it to win. Out of the 98 games, this one seems the most polished. It seems like it has just the most potential to be a successful indie game. But that's just my opinion. What do you guys think below? Let me know. Congrats again to Milo and the Elder Seed and also just the other games that I played.

They were all really, really great. Talk to you guys later. Cheers.