SoulMaster71's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[The Love I'm Searching 4]

I wouldn't have known it was a sequel.

I see you took a new direction with this installment of the Don't Trip series, Skaijo. That's not a bad thing: I certainly liked Adam Phillips' "new direction" for Brackenwood. But, you know, somehow I just don't get the same "feel" from this as I did from Don't Trip or This Is UNMEI. Maybe it was that it starred characters that were previously in supporting roles, but I think it was more the lack of action.

PROS:
Is it a sequel to Don't Trip and This Is UNMEI, two of my favorite Flash animations of all time? Yes. Is it fairly good in its own right, without story implications? Yes. Can it be a good starting point for building Ilu as a character later? I hope so, because this animation made me like her for her dreams, even if she does bully the younger kids (or hang out with people who do). You say you did this to improve your background skills? I say you succeeded.

CONS:
The improved backgrounds do nothing to make the characters look better, and their natural scruffiness is made all the more apparent without action scenes. Much of the movie, even at the start of the day, they look kinda dirty, like they've already been through something that day. Then again, it's not as if I'm an artist at all. No, my main complaint is the feel of this movie. Sure, you wanted to make something for the series that wasn't over-the-top "Uli vs. Trip" stuff. Fine. But just having a mellow, slice-of-life-ish thing in what was previously an "action series"... It just doesn't feel right. Not too much of a negative, since I like this episode on its own, but I liked this series for its action.

OVERALL:
I liked the first two better, but that's not saying I didn't like this one. I hope you can work Ilu's character development into future episodes, while restoring some of the action.
4/5, 8/10.

Skaijo responds:

I found this review very helpful. You made a lot of sincere points. And your right on how there's a drastic change in how this story is told compared to others in the same series. Why with the lack of action, pills, or transitions to the real world/black and white world--it really does feel like a completely different animation. And I'm glad you didn't make it sound like that was all something I just accidentally forgot to add in.

I love Don't Trip and This is UNMEI too--and your familiarity with the series frightens and impresses me all the same. You don't run into many people that actually KNOW your characters' names or who can recall scenes you've animated nearly four years ago. So I appreciate these comments muchly.

Long story short, the great things about animating as a hobby is that I'm free to explore different options for each project that I have time for. That's one of the best things about this past time. To be specific, I liked Don't Trip so much that I made a continuation of it nearly two years later. I could have made a third Don't Trip all over again... it might even look less scruffy and would have had more super moves set to another Jpop soundtrack. But c'mon. :3 Then what? Make a fourth Don't Trip animation after that--this time with an orange pill and a middle-aged Uli Unmei with kids--to reflect my own future life situation? :3 Lol, you know I'm being sarcastic. I'm just saying that it takes so long to make a project--that I'd hate to spend all this time working on nothing but better graphics while animating myself into a corner. We've see that a lot.

So yeah, it's different. This is a different animation. It's certainly something that this series hasn't seen before--and with focusing on completely different aspects of the animation, I made a lot of risks as to whether or not that same demographic/viewers could appreciate. I had fun making this--while challenging myself not to make a three-quel that I knew would probably get well accepted.

My next animation will certainly have more action in it--but it'll reflect how I want to grow as an animator first and foremost. It'll be different too. I'll hope you'll enjoy watching me grow.

[Hell Yes]

Yes, good.

I've known for a while that you had some level of talent, Orangebeef. I've just wondered as long as I knew you had it, "Is he ever going to use that talent as anything but a spammer?" To be honest, I also usually wondered "What's the awesome song in the intro he uses?" And this movie answered both those questions in one single two-word answer: Hell Yes.

PROS:
It was, to say the least, shocking to see that you, a known spammer, got Daily Feature when I saw the post by P-Bot. However it wasn't quite so shocking to see that you overcame the manifest prejudice of Newgrounds users after I decided to watch the movie. Extending the Orangebeef pipe intro to include a longer part of the song and new material, this is about the best Orangebeef movie I've seen yet, and it makes me look forward to more.

CONS:
While this movie is senseless, it's a Beck song so that's to be expected. The main problem here, however, is that it's too short. It's only, what, about a minute's worth of the song? And the cliffhanger ending leaves me wondering, what did the cop do? But that's another tactic leaving me wanting more Beef.

OVERALL:
Great movie, hurt only by being a bit short.
5/5, 9/10.

Orangebeef responds:

thanks for the review

I know it's short, it's actually like exactly a minute long. it took me a long time just to animate anything as it was synced with the music and all, and I wanted to submit it on august 3rd along w/ the other orangebeef movies people were submitting, so I just ended it there

[Metropolis Schmirkit]

Short, but still funny.

Yes, I do like Metropolis Circuit. Its one of my favorite Flashes by one of my favorite authors. But, apparently unlike certain other users, I can appreciate a bit of humor poking fun at how little rtil developed the story for that little intro to Project Freetown.

PROS:
Hit rtil's animation right where it hurt: right in the weak storyline. He's going to have to make longer stories when he gets to the real thing for Freetown... Also, showed the other main points of the Flash: the generic characters, the roller skating, and the smoking.

CONS:
A bit short, and yet all too slow in comparison to the much-faster original. You also coulda showed a bit more on the smoking, since that was definitely present in the real thing.

OVERALL:
Not a bad animation at all, for the shortness of it. Had its share of humor about the original, so mission definitely accomplished on this one.
5/5, 9/10.

Cambo responds:

it was only supposed to be slow-paced to draw attention to how nothing happens - if it was faster you wouldn't be bored while it's happening and so it wouldn't really work

maybe i could have done more with the smoking but i couldn't think of anything to be honest

that's a really good review though, thanks

[Why (American)Anime Sucks]

What's this?

A legitimate Underdog? Wow, after so long of spammers stealing this with mass-reviewing, it's refreshing to see something win Underdog that the average user can actually enjoy. Now, onto the movie!

Hey, I happen to like anime. You've just watched too much Bleack and Yu-Gi-Oh and Naruto and other shitty ones, it seems. Having only seen the garbage of the anime universe, you can certainly be forgiven for this particular view of anime. But before you make comments like this, I suggest you watch some of the less-crappy stuff out there, like FLCL or Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann or The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. Just stay away from Lucky Star, mmmkay?

PROS:
Well, let's see... It was kinda funny to anyone who's seen way too many of the shitty anime in question, anime with too many spiky-haired characters in non-epic battles.

CONS:
Poor animation, and Speakonia gets on a guys nerves after a while.

OVERALL:
Meh, it's not too bad. Good enough for a passing score, especially when combined with my surprise that the spammers didn't steal this award again.
3/5, 7/10.

FazzleMan responds:

Yeah but the {DD} are still gonna be back every week with shit for turd of the week.

[Beat Back The Kitten]

Not bad, but...

There's a few factual errors here. The Kitty Krew didn't start spam, not by a long shot. Heck, spam's been around as long as the Portal has, or close enough to it. And the KK (of which I was, for a brief period, a member, though I never spammed the Portal) is no longer the main source of spam on NG. So yeah.

On the bright side, this Flash is not at all a bad one. It's fairly well animated (not Brackenwood-quality, but then again not much is), it's to the point (you don't like spam, that's obvious), and it has an explanation for those who don't "get" what you're going for.

PROS:
Fairly well animated, gets to the point, like I said above.

CONS:
A few factual errors, like I pointed out, and it's also too short. I'd like to see the cat at least try to fight back, too.

OVERALL:
OK, I guess. Not bad, but not amazing.
3/5, 6/10.

GroggyLobster responds:

yeah, you are right. i could have spend more time animating it but i wasn't trying to create an epic movie, just something to say "hello, there are rascists on this page spreading their 'gas all jews', 'f*ck da 'n*gg*rs' nonsense. DO SOMETHING AGAINST THIS!"

a word to the factual errors: you are right the KK didn't invent spamming but they put almost always a xenophobic message in their movies or adding an author's comment like "all n****rs die!". With spamming i mean these hateful contents.

thanks for your review.

[Nintendo Story ep 3]

You've improved a lot over the last year or so...

...and while my tastes in movies have changed just as drastically, and I'm not quite as "into" Mario stuff as I used to be, I still enjoyed this movie quite a bit.
PROS:
You draw and animate rather well, and I'm impressed with your improvement. What's more, for a Mario movie, a good share of this was relatively good (rather than just LOL RANDUM MARIO BLOOPERZ #426971), with Mario going on an adventure in Hard Mode, an epic fight, all that stuff, which while it's been done before, still had some feel to it, especially in FBF style and with hand-drawn rather than sprited characters.
CONS:
Mario epic fights are a dime a dozen on a site with as many Mario parodies as NG, right from SMBZ on down, and while this was separated from a good number of the rest by being drawn, it's still a Mario epic fight and thus not exactly the most original concept. Also, three of the four outtakes are the same old thing I've seen a hundred times before in the shit Mario bloopers that scores of 11-year-old boys seem to have a deep psychological need to make and put on NG. So yeah, not really all that original.
OVERALL:
Not a bad movie. Might have been better if you hadn't relied on the pre-established reputation of Mario (which is more a limiter than a builder once a movie passes a certain level of quality), but still, it's pretty good.
4/5, 8/10

Gustavos responds:

Yeah, with this being Mario, the basic concepts and even plot are overdone, and I've been very worried about that. I wanted many parts to be unique in the face of the 50 or so Mario fights but originality was against me an...goddamnit. I have to stop using that as an excuse.

With every one of my movies including Mario in them, I'm not too thrilled to be animating him anytime soon. Luckily I won't be, It's Kirby's turn. And I'd think that a Zelda fan like yourself may be a little delighted with what's coming up, but I don't want to spoil anything. It'll happen when it happens.

Thanks for the reveiw, it seems the only major problems were it being a Mario movie with unoriginal concepts.

[Mario Randomocity]

Same old, same old.

Going into this movie, I really wasn't expecting much from a Flash titled "Mario Randomocity". And it's a good thing I wasn't, else I would have been very disappointed by this stuff. The movie uses the same old Super Mario World sprites (with cameos by Knuckles, Goku, Majin Buu, and Kirby, all in a similar 16-bit look), the same old jokes about Mario getting hit by Thwomps and sitting on spiked enemies, and the same old SMBZ-inspired fight scene as quite a number of the movies in the Mario collection (which, last I checked, was the largest video game collection, and in fact one of the largest collections period). I'm sure you can do better.

As far as advice for your next movie? Maybe try thinking of your own jokes, rather than just the same video game observations made in half or more of the Video Game Parodies collection and its many subcollections. Maybe you could try drawing some of your own graphics, for example maybe drawing the backgrounds yourself instead of using the usual 16-bit fare, just to set it apart from the crowd. Maybe even changing your subject matter entirely, because there are already a lot of Mario parodies, and making and submitting yet another one is just overkill.

Overall, I'll just say this: there's a place for Mario parodies on this site, however that place has already been pretty much defined and filled by Flashes that are both better and more popular than this one. To stand out from the crowd of tributes to those parodies you would have to make something truly different and original, which you did not do at all for this one.
0/5, 1/10.

Cladicus-Claveman responds:

ouch... im getting to other stuff.. but im new to this.. sry it was so bad geez

[abscess]

It's been a while since I've seen one like this.

One as meaningful as this, abstract like this, one that satisfied my desire for a good Flash like this one. I almost felt the crowd mentality, its biases and its prejudices, ripping away the innocence of the children, as the government leads the crowd like a conductor leading an orchestra, with wars and conformist institutions as its baton. You've done a hell of a job with this one, sQueef. Keep up the good work.

The mechanics of this movie are very much what you're best with: weird, experimental stuff, people ripping out of their skins and talking heads. The sound, too, is odd, making this movie truly in the classic sQueef style. Or you can call it an "extension" of your classic style, with some stuff I haven't seen from you before. Or maybe I'm just noticing it now and it's been in there all along, I can't tell. Either way, I enjoyed watching this movie.
5/5, 10/10, Favorited.

50vmp responds:

thanks soulmaster you always leave good reviews

[Bahamut's Fav. Reviews]

As always, it was good.

I remember watching a 2002 submission where a Flash author of the early days of NG compiled his favorite reviews and what he would have responded to them. All of the reviews in that movie except maybe one were abusive, so at the very least this Flash shows how much more civilized NG has become since 2002, which from most viewpoints can be considered a good thing. But onto the movie itself!

As always, Bahamut, you've managed to put together a pretty good Flash movie. I (kinda) know 6 out of the 7 "featured" reviewers (even had RupeeClock on my Favorite Artists list at one point), and in fact many of the reviewers from the Bonus Section (including myself)... Does that mean I spend too much time here? Nonetheless, the reviews and your reactions to them were rather interesting. And I can't take points off for Speakonia usage because there was the option to skip that (and also because you didn't use the high-pitched, high-speed Speakonia voice that makes my ears bleed), a feature that I really liked, seeing as how Speakonia gets boring fast. Therefore, as usual...
5/5, 10/10

kinggila responds:

"Does that mean I spend too much time here?"

Nah, I think it means you've done a lot of exploring on this site. The amount of time you spend here doesn't matter as long as you're not on 24/7 and not having it taken over your job/education.

While many people hate Speakonia, I thought it was better for it to read out the reviews rather than myself reading them out.

[Generic Half-Assed Collab]

I said I would review this...

So here I am, reviewing!

Overall, it's pretty good. None of these movies would be much good on their own, nor would the game (which makes up a sort of "centerpiece" around which the rest of the collab revolves), but put them together like this and it's quite the Flash, truly a worthy submission to the Portal. Of special note are the game (which I reached the end of, something I couldn't seem to do before now) and 50vmp's part (classic sQueef, good art and animation). Jehosapha's and Psycho's parts were something of weak points, but overall it was a good one.
5/5, 10/10.

LordZeebmork responds:

meh, I thought jehosapha's part was good.

and the game used basically the same code as nortaneous: the game, which is probably why it's shit.

oh yeah and this one has another part (by sinitron) in case you didn't notice.