It's no secret that this fandom doesn't have game designers, so you end up with shallow games such as these short flash-based ones found on Deviantart such as...
Pipsqueak's Thunder Plunder with no gameplay and absolutely no level design. All of the games in this fandom are made in Flash, GameMaker and Unity, not the best selection you could work in. Thus nobody bothers to chat and discuss about pony games.
But then comes out a series of games such as the pony platforming project(aka ppp, 3p) which have some potential in them, but that doesn't mean they're genuinely good. If you compare it to any other sellable indie game, you'll notice how poor even the best pony games are compared to the games on Steam such as Noitu Love 2 and Freedom Planet. That's what this review is here for. Also most of the fandom just isn't into gaming at all, hence why we have 0 talented game designers, and why Megapony was forgotten immediately.
Minty Fresh Adventure was made by one
His games are created in Flash and programmed in actionscript 1 and 2, again not the best selection you could work in, especially for his big-ass metroidvania game in the works. I suggest Multimedia Fusion 2, it's compatible with Flash files. Of all the engines and editors out there, you could find at least 2 distinct ones. Have a link about game physics, again Flash is not very good at velocity physics and objects colliding.
You got past the introduction now let's dig into the game's content.
His Applejack game starts off with a simple, but fun mechanic where you kill enemies with 1 hit from Applejack's powerful buck and the owlbears knock into each other, providing a satisfying combo. You kick trees so they drop the apples and they heal you, you can also hold up or down to aim the apples at enemies, same mechanic goes for the owlbears. The level design is kinda flat, but not as flat as Pipsqueak's game. Applejack's abilities are pretty limited which makes for a boring gameplay if you keep playing over and over again. Also having to double-tap in order to run gets really tedious sometimes.
This 1hit K0 buck works perfectly for the bosses because of some good reasons: The bosses are huge, they stay in one place a lot, they don't deal damage by touching you, your attack knocks them down(pic related) so you don't have to attack and dodge at the same time like most games want you to do.
The backgrounds and foregrounds are too simplistic just like the MLP show's MSpaint artstyle, compare the game's flash graphics even to NES graphics which come off as a masterpiece of effort by comparison.
The christmas game introduces this caribou which let's you fly, unfortunately it uses Super Mario World's tricky flight controls, you have to hold pressed z,x,-> in order to fly. The level is once again short and the boss once again accomodates Applejack's Chuck Norris roundhouse kick which knocks the spectral horse boss right back where it came from. Overall the game comes off as superficially cool, as in poorly made and unimaginative because of it's giant bosses which barely do anything other than bump into you.
In the third game is where the problems start to appear.
Some hard to reach ledges and having to double tap to run aren't completely bad compared to getting your running option removed from you, one of the most basic skills of any game character and he removed it. This removal does have it's comeuppance on his game, especially on the bosses.
Colgate has a weak toothbrush attack with a very short range. She can throw it, but it costs mana which recharges very slowly. To make it even harder, her weapon also doesn't act like a versatile boomerang or bo stick or chained-weapon, it immediately resets back to her location if you try to do tricks or anything fancy with it, and she doesn't have any other viable attacks, that's the main problem. Her name is Colgate? oh just give her a tootbrush, that's all she needs, no more extra abilities to give her more dimension to her character.
Would have been much more creative if it was a surfing board tootbrush combo, if you could ride it like a flying carpet while attacking smoothly. Also the owlbears hitting-each-other combo from Applejack's game is gone in Colgate.
Mark's motivation for even starring Colgate at all in his game series explains a lot about what the fuck was going on through his head at that time. You see, it was an impulse decision, he had a tooth ache and so he decided to make a game starring Colgate the dentist pony, which pretty much just reminds him of his tooth pain. Luckily for Colgate, Mark also got inspired from a much cooler thing than his dental hygiene problems. Colgate gets an ability called clock-up, it's taken from Kamen Rider, another Power Rangers.
I did say no running had it's comeuppances. When you disable the running for the player, then you should at least know what you're doing. The bosses accomodated Applejack, but they do not accomodate Colgate.
Timberwolves pounce and Ursa Minor is a bigger version of the same pouncer. Ursa Major is a chase sequence with no running, so it only lasts like 10 seconds. Overall it seems like these bosses were thought for Applejack and not Colgate. I expected a boss with clock-up abilities just like Colgate, not another huge monster.
The more you limit a character, the more you need to take into account that you have to manage it's challenges.
While a more powerful character can handle anything you throw at him, that's why I enjoy characters with a buttload of abilities.
For example having to use your limited mana for the ranged special attack on the Ursa is a bad move, forcing you to go upclose to the ursa's claws and hit them melee, and risk getting the ursa minor to sit on you.
Also the same giant monster thing over and over again gets tiresome. Even the Ursa Minor from Ponyvania had more abilities to use in his fight.
Could have used more imagination with the blue bear, here's an idea for the boss battle; you go down in the dark caves where the bear can't see you in the dark and you bait him to crush into walls to open pathways for you. Or you use the platforms to jump all the way up to another part of the level, the ursa comes after you, Colgate uses some ice ability on a slope and makes the Ursa slip all the way down.
This is the jump which Colgate can't make without using clock-up or having the double-jump book.
The bosses were fun the first 4 times, but then it gets boring, like his latest boss in Minty's game.
It becomes too obvious that all the bosses will prioritize using their size to kill you. Same deal with Arachne.
The giant spider boss didn't use webs, poison or anything else. Also the camera didn't become bigger to let you see the whole arena, and the platforms were still rocky instead of letting you use the webs and web swinging to move around.
Could have used more Dig Dug inspiration or anything similar to that.
Land sharks are a common monster in the world of dungeons and dragons, so it isn't one-use only like queen Chrysalis and other personalities such as the Lich.
For this boss I suggest a second encounter or another bulette, where you dig through the ground and try to beat him underground with lava, dynamite, etc. ever played DigDug?
You wish you were dead after Sprague is done with you.
Hopefully they get some good abilities later in the game to make up for their background pony status.
Minty Fresh Adventure 2's inspiration is taken from a scene in Canterlot Wedding part 2, Mark enjoys sudden ideas(even though those are the least fleshed out). MFA2 wasn't even suppose to be a separate game, let alone get bigger and bigger.
He has shown interest in releasing the source files, but that's not really the problem here, the issue is actually finding talented modders which won't be lazy enough to give up when they see the spaghetti code.
Remember that this fandom has zero game designers, hence why Robin Steele The Waifu Thief has 170 downloads, but the mods still haven't appeared.
Good luck on improving this potentially good game and I hope to see a HD remake of the final version of MFA2 and hopefully it won't be forgotten in 3 days.
