Quick announcement: I've fixed up my Discord server again. To keep it short, I've had it since 2020 and it's been dormant for most of that time.

If you want to be on the know about all my latest projects, banter about overrated movies and web creations, or just talk about stuff that falls outside Newgrounds' jurisdiction, this is the place for you.

Join the Durthole!

If this is your first time seeing this: I am making a third album in the 'Dipthong' series.

Dipthong III is a 3-part megacollection of tunes from A+B loosely based on The Divine Comedy, and my own personal grudges.

30 tracks blending different genres, including rock, techno, breakbeat, ambient, chiptune, synthwave, all the other 'waves, and more!

Progress: 95% complete,

I just need to make 1 more song, polish another 3, and create 3 pieces of cover art.

Planned release: September 2024:

August if I'm lucky.

SIDE A: Crimes Against Dipthong

This soundtrack tells the tale of two oddball trespassers, Nick and McBill, as they trek their way through nine layers of the Underworld to see a fallen warrior trained in the mysterious way of the Dipthong.

TRACKLIST:

Prelude: Vestibular Cancer

Act I: Butt-Breaking Smack of Doom!

Act II: A lot of it is grey

Act III: Monster Chalk

Act IV: Ombra del Cieco

Act V: OverParty

Act VI: Can't Do Shit

Act VII: Gaius von Jakov

Act VIII: Crimes Against Dipthong (Part 1)

Act IX: Crimes Against Dipthong (Part 2)

SIDE B: Divine Tragedy

Centuries after Nick and McBill's initial visit, an unknown purple vigilante embarks on a heroic quest. What was supposed to have been a heavily cliched and typical journey, ends up becoming more than what he had originally bargained for.

TRACKLIST:

0: Divine Tragedy

1: Damp Thicks

2: Deserted Tree

3: Decayed Tungsten

4: Deputy Tusk

5: Double Tundra

6: Dwayne's Train

7: Dopamine Town

8: Dipthong 3033

9: Dysfunctional Tyrant

SIDE THREE: Partners in Brine

The hero from Side B, after completing his quest, returns to the present for a well-earned break.

Little does he know, there's a surprise waiting for him, and no it's not a force of evil.

TRACKLIST:

0: Lord Forgor (synt2.0)

1: You Bit Up The Wrong Person

2: Partners in Brine

3: Parasocial

4: Zen Gwuka (eeee)

5: 55 MPH

6: Silver Shower

7: Caroline

8: Non subtle allegory

9: Rehabilitation (Synt)

*bold indicates an A song (Anonymous-Frog)

**italics indicates a B song (BeepBoxClock)

***underline indicates direct involvement from both parties

Already Released Tracks:

If you're new, do also check out my previous albums.

thank you!

Hello! I've just come up with a quick trick to promote yourself to 1,000+ people on Newgrounds. Especially useful for creators with zero followers.

Step 1:

Find a list of users.

For this example, I've clipped some names off my own follower list, though you could also use someone else's.

TIP: If you are going through someone else's follower list, try to go for those with a similar style as yours

(eg. Krinkels).

Step 2:

Select them:

Step 3:

Paste them as plain text: Should look like this:

1rach5's icon

1rach5

3ZAVL's icon

3ZAVL

4n0nymou5's icon

4n0nymou5

50Steaks's icon

50Steaks

53xy83457's icon

53xy83457

5ug4r5w3etC4ndy's icon

5ug4r5w3etC4ndy

7henderGames's icon

7henderGames

8bitalien64's icon

8bitalien64

Aalasteir's icon

Aalasteir

accountv1's icon

accountv1

Acefent's icon

Acefent

adammonster1's icon

adammonster1

ADR3-N's icon

ADR3-N

Step 4:

Remove every odd numbered that says 's icon. These came from when you selected the list.

THEN, put an @ at the start of each name that remains. In large quantities you should be able to do it quickly and efficiently.

Should look like this:

@1rach5

@3ZAVL

@4n0nymou5

@50Steaks

@53xy83457

@5ug4r5w3etC4ndy

@7henderGames

@8bitalien64

@Aalasteir

@accountv1

@Acefent

@adammonster1

@ADR3-N

Sorry if your name started with an A. I think 14 is enough for this demonstration.

TIP: Press LEFT, then DOWN, then @

Step 5:

Make a blog post containing your list. Doesn't need to be frontpaged.

You can fit anywhere between 2000 and 4000 names if they're short enough, though realistically you can get about 1,000 if you want room to write your actual post. Don't worry, you can make multiple posts!

TIP: Claim somewhere in the post that it's a special invitation, or come up with some other gimmick, so they'll see it's legit.

Step 6:

The content of your promotion should ideally be enough to fit 5 lines of text and 1 Newgrounds submission, so make sure your promotion does that.

______YOU MUST BE THIS SHORT TO BE SEEN!

-5

-4

-3

-2

-1

---------

Step 7

Publish the blog post. It will now instantly notify everyone on your list at once, complete with a big red pop-up. They can't ignore it!

Make sure it's something important, such as the release of a new animation, game, comic, or album.

TIP: Prune out some of the bigger creators you can recognise. About 60% of them are smart enough to not give a shit, so what's the point? Not to mention they already get hundreds of these already from reviews, new followers, etc.

Congratulations! you just did some free promotion!

totally works!

tOTALLY 100% legal and not out of date

No questions asked!

Here's an honest critique of the 5 "best" movies and games of the days 18th-20th of April:

I will admit, it's already starting to get demotivating, so I skipped over two whole days. But here it is, the mega-review.

15 submissions.

April 18th

Entries thread: https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534205

Authors: @MojoMontebon @awd @El-Cid @Oswelt @SaveSlothStudios

1st: 0/3

Super low-effort.

There is very little animation, probably took about 1 week tops. It's at least a little more interesting than the previous Sonic animation, but at this point, why bother?

2nd: 0/3

Another "Keanu Reeves Shadow" animation: Again, very small and rushed out before the trend dies.

Shadow's animation is better, but it's 10 seconds long and there's no background, so there's nothing of value.

idk, just stop cutting corners and make something bigger.

3rd: 2/3

Here it is! The grand return of the one and only El-Cid, legendary animator from the golden age of Newgrounds, after almost 5 years since his last animation: The Shooting Stars - Diplomacy Mode.

And it's a bit of a disappointment:

The movie is centered around Klaus Schwab (Wikipedia), aka the 86 yo. founder of the World Economic Forum. The big punchline is that the 3 jokes he tells are very basic and unfunny.

As an animation, it's very MeatCanyon-esque. The background is most likely AI-generated (and gets very blurry up close), most of the movements are in Schwab's mouth, and not the rest of his face.

It just barely gets a 2 because TheJanitor9k and AlmightyHans are both good voice actors. But the only other difference between this movie and several other political cartoon strips satirizing the WEF and Klaus, is that this one drags out for a minute longer than it needed to.

For example: this strip by former Financial Times cartoonist Ingram Pinn.

This Simpsons clip comes to mind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llE7wT1BKt8

4th 1/3

When I saw "Animation Meme" in the title, combined with the other 2 stinkers, I had low expectations.

It looks like those two people are in love, but they just end up staring at each other.

The animation, though not my cup of tea, is still good. It uses the song "Fighter" by Jack Stauber, which is 30 seconds long, though it only uses the latter half.

The dancing Marge Simpson at the end is still cool.

5th 3/3

This is a strategy card game, made for Ludum Dare 55.

Every turn, you place up to 3 cards with varying strength levels and abilitieson the first column. When the turn ends, each card moves forward, where their strength multiplies. If they reach the castle at the end, they die.

The goal is to make sure the combined strength is higher than the castle's own health, which means you have to be careful about which cards are sacrificed, which row you place them on,

, something that took me a bit of time to understand, and a bit more time to explain in simple terms.

Presentation and theme are both good, good-fitting music, there's a story told through text and illustrations.

All in all, I ended up enjoying the whole experience twice. I only wish I could undo cards before I end my turn.

It should be noted that although this is a 72 hour game jam (ie. 3 days), I can estimate that this is equivalent to 6-10 days of regular development, given that there's 2 developers, and that you usually prepare for and spend more hours of the day if there's a strict development window.

Overall, complete rubbish. The only true saving grace here is The Royal Writ, and even then it's at the bottom.

Total Score: 6/15 (38%)

Best/Favourite:

#5: The Royal Writ

April 19th

Entries thread: https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534238

Authors: @jumpbreak96 @violxiv and co @KimiOmega @Figburn @squidly and co.

1st: 3/3

Great aesthetic, great music selection: Still kinda comes off as a demo-ey character showcase, or portfolio piece, but it's almost a minute long.

Please make a Streetdevil series or at least a short film.

PS: I also noticed a few movies, including some old realistic ones based on DOOM or Madness, have been removed. Like, can't watch them here anymore. Care to explain?

2nd: 3/3

I've seen a few teasers dating up to October, so there's a bit of hype to this, and I'd like to say it's worth it.

It starts with a 60 second training video about a pizza joint for the undead, then the rest of the movie is a confrontation with Suzie, a delivery driver, and a ghost who ends up disatisfied with his order, which ended up costing $3 ($5:62 in today's money, given that this is set in the year 1999).

I think it feels more like a short pilot and would benefit from a sequel or a full series.

3rd: 3/3

This is a fan-series based on the Kirby games, mainly . I haven't watched every single episode, but I can already tell this one good.

This episode is centered around a fight against against a giant monster (lore in the author comments). The Kirbys can't stand a chance, but Adeleine manages to kick its ass.

4th: 2/3

Animated teaser for Contract Rush DX, which is still not done yet.

The animated intro (15 secs) is very cool, and the trailer itself is well-edited, save for a lack of sounds. It does look like a lot of progress was made on the game itself.

5th: 3/3

Ludum Dare 55 entry. You must use "gachapons", ie. you pay money in select machines to unlock random fighters which automatically kill enemies like slimes, rats, and scorpions. Every minute you must pay rent that keeps increasing, money you earn by attacking and defeating enemies with your gachapons. The enemies can't attack you personally, but can kill the gachapons. You can earn medals to

IDK if this is truly endless or not, but it doesn't seem that well-polished or executed. I got up to 400K points. Please send me a video of someone.

Graphics are good, there's a great variety of gachapons, and some good original music. But there are plenty of flaws, even in version 1.2:

First, the directional controls are a bit floaty, though you can use the mouse.

Second: the voices can be annoying, and there's no way to turn them off (that I know of).

Third: a map would be nice.

That's all! Congrats to everyone involved.

Overall, I see a lot of incredible work, If you love video games, you'll love today's entries!

Total Score: 14/15 (95%)

Best/Favourite: #3, 1,#5

April 20th

Entries thread (correct link this time): https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534269

Authors: CumminHam @MD00dles @Kwing and @Cyberdevil, @remusyurov @SleP16

1st: 0/3

Puddle is an original frog character. There's quite a bit of uncanniness to this submission, both the character design itself and the lighting. This is despite the E-rating.

Given the lack of substance and the #1 spot, it doesn't deserve any points.

2nd: 1/3

Animatic + Advertisement to promote SrPelo's Spooky Month merch.

3rd: 2/3

Flash Forward Jam entry: This is a fighting game, the twist is that it's set to a rap battle between two NG users and that you gain an attack bonus if your fighter's verse plays. The battle ends when the song ends, and the winner is declared by who dealt the most damage. I don't know if it's possible to completely knock out your opponent by going all the way..

It's a bit choppy, and the visuals are jank, but I like the idea.

4th: 3/3

It's a retelling of Half Life: Alyx made using paper. I thought this would be similar to Paper Mario, but nope.

Style's good, great background art.

5th: 2/3

This is a rhythm platformer where you time your moves to the beat of the music.

First impressions: looks great.

When I got to play it: pretty confusing.

You're supposed to time your jumps and other moves to the beat to the song, but here, it just makes it difficult to control.

Left-right movement is stiff, forcing me to jump most of the way, and it's not clear on how to perform tricks.

I also couldn't get any of the other moves to work and I got stuck at a breakable wall on the first level.

Overall, yeah this selection is totally generic. Save yourself and go check out yesterday's lineup instead!

Total Score: 8/15 (53%)

Best/Favourite: #4, #3, #5

Here's an honest critique of the 5 "best" movies and games of the day.

Entries thread: https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534186

Authors: @snailpirate, @LuckoDaStars and co, @MojoMontebon @KokoroHatsaru @thesemichrist

1st: 1/3 (2025 update, forgot the link)

This is a Smiling Friends animation. Let's play a little game called: "added context three".

• First: the music used is the final boss music from Super Mario Galaxy. Good start to possibly getting it taken down in the future.
• Second, the video is 19 seconds long, a bit small, but whatever.
• Third: this video previously gained 100K views on YouTube, which could mean the audience is pulling most of the weight. Even a small fraction of that can overpower the score: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDV8P_mdysY

That being said, the animation does still match the Smiling Friends style very well. Just wish the music thing was sorted out first.

2nd: 3/3

This is an opening cutscene for a game of the same name. Animation is great, given the horsepower of the Lucko team.

However, there was one scene that had inconsistent outline thickness (~0:37). That's about it.

3rd: 0/3

Sonic says: "you....."

and then I asked "Why the big pause?"

And then he said: "You're probably thinking of Knuckles, streaming on Paramount+ next week!"

Anyway, onto the review:

Animation: Out of 34 seconds, 12 come from a basic outro, and the remaining 22 had big pauses taking up half of it. It's also a little choppy, even the lip syncing is very minimal.

Sound: Author says it sucks. I only somewhat agree.

Humor: Painfully unfunny to all but the cringiest of 13 year olds.

There's always next time!

4th 1/3

This is another promotional short for that Tsubasa Siren manga. (what does "Tsubasa" mean in English?)

It's again, very basic, just them playing Castle Crashers.

See: frogreview #22

PS: Are you familiar with Totally Spies! for some reason? Just asking.

5th 2/3

Puss in Boots animation: Audio comes from Ace Vane, a YouTuber.

Congrats on the first win though, and your first completed animation proper (at least from what I can find on NG)!

It's still a bit rough though.

Overall, still pretty decent.

Total Score: 7/15 (52%)

Best/Favourite:

#2, #4, #5, #1, in that order.

f r o g r e v i e w: d a y 28

Here's an honest critique of the 5 "best" movies and games of the day.

Entries thread: https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534160

Authors: @pollyanoid MojoMontebon @Xandrecos and @golfinho, @Guy-Unger @Orbitten and co

1st: 2/3

Pizza Tower animation.

The short itself is about 30 seconds long, not counting credits. I love the Wallace and Gromit-ish aesthetic, though the camera slow shake isn't exactly subtle.

2nd: 1/3

Genshin Impact animation: Not only is there not a lot of animation, but the joke's already a few years old by this point, so nah!

6,700 followers don't just magically come out of thin air.

3rd: 2/3

Love seeing this turn into a series. The one where a South Park character shows up in other video games (or SpongeBob).

Note the credits reference episodes that are not on Newgrounds, including one about a Sonic bootleg on the Game Boy Color: Go to golfinho's YouTube channel for those:

https://www.youtube.com/@golfinhoyurii/videos

4th: 3/3

Ludum Dare game: It's a tower defense game where worms fight against birds, combined with Wario-Ware style microgames for buffs.

For a 72 hour game jam game, there's quite a lot of variety and minigames. Arguably should've been way higher than 4th.

5th 3/3

I h*te this movie. Just kidding: You don't need to censor "hate" over here. Except I didn't say hate. I said hite, slang for "bring this movie to new heights, it's really good!". Mainly the animation is very clean

Also the villain almost looks like an Uberkid. Could be coincidence

Overall, most of today's top 5 are stacked, mostly near the bottom.

Total Score: 11/15 (74%)

Best/Favourite:

#4, #3, #1, #5, in that order.

f r o g r e v i e w: d a y 27

Here's an honest critique of the 5 "best" movies and games of the day.

This review was supposed to come out sooner, but 5th place had me delving into Ancient Egyptian history for 3 hours straight.

Entries thread: https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534102

Authors: @mukpuddy Countess-Karo @Half-Elephant @Chauder @SomeDoodles

1st: 3/3 (+1 bonus point)

This seems to be very professionally-made, almost TV quality. Well, as professional as you can with Adobe. The industry is currently shifting to Toon Boom Harmony.

Anyway, as Tony the Tiger would say: the series is grRrRRRRrreat! I haven't heard much of this one compared to other team megaprojects like Monkey Wrench or Ollie and Scoops, and I'd like to find out why.

UPDATE: Turns out the rest of the series is already on YouTube. Catch up!

https://www.youtube.com/@mukpuddy/videos

2nd: 1/3

Laugh at PINGAS as many times you want, just know that this is not TikTok.

Compared to the Kirby animation a few days prior, which is about the same length, there is quite a bit more animation, that alone I'll give a point for.

3rd: 3/3

Sprite animation, using 100% original background and sprites. And they all fit within the pixel grid.

Most sprite animations, especially from yesteryear, often rely on vanilla sprites from external sources with varying levels of modification (sometimes none), and tend to scale and rotate them, which overall cheapens the whole thing.

None of those tricks are here. It's very well-made, great style, with good music too.

4th: 0/3

LEGO animation: This is a 3D render and not stop-motion: It is a remake of a clip from a season 5 episode of The Simpsons.

Given its length, and the author's own admission that "it didn't come out the best", I unfortunately cannot score any higher. Better luck next time!

5th: 1/3

Flash Forward Jam entry. There are ten shorts, each based on the Plagues of Egypt (W), or in other words, God's response to the Ancient Egyptians who wouldn't free the Israelite slaves so they can get out of Egypt.

It's supposed to decpit them in a humourous setting, but as a daily winner, it's relatively basic, 1st place aside. The animation features the usual Flash crud, and the plagues themselves are very straightforward (especially "death of firstborn").

Plus a bunch of out-of-context historical inaccuracies that may have been overlooked:

One big thing that a lot of modern fiction always does is that most depictions Egypt are usually set in a big desert with the pyramids as a stock background element, with very few plants in sight.

Geographically, about 95% of Egypt is desert, however, most of civilization, both historically and today, tend to live closer to the Nile River, which in Ancient times, flooded every year and made the soil fertile, making it useful for agriculture (W).

The image below shows the Nile Delta, which is where the majority of the flooding took place.

This should be relevant to "Blood", which features the Nile turning to blood, and maybe also "Livestock" as well.

Some other minor nits:

1- there exists evidence that the pyramids weren't originally beige, rather they were white. The exterior was made of limestone, but over time the limestone was removed, exposing the beige we see today.

2- corn didn't exist outside the Americas until after the 1500s (Locusts)

PS: I was working on an entry myself, but I had to put it to rest. Not only was I not able to find time in between two collabs, but Flash kept crashing whenever I opened my submission for some reason.

Overall, it's a bit lacking. Not crap, but just seems small: 1st place seems to be pulling most of the weight here.

Total Score: 9/15 (61%)

Best/Favourite:

#1, #3, #5, #2, in that order:

f r o g r e v i e w: d a y 26

Here's an honest critique of the 5 "best" movies and games of the day.

Entries thread: https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534102

Authors: @BoyPorcelain VimHomeless @RoskiArt @HorseFolder @poundtoundhound

1st: 2/3

The entire movie has a really creepy feel to it. In just one shot, there's a girl in front of a TV screen, and each time she changes the channel, something else pops up. IDK if this is supposed to be a commentary on life

I loved KEY-MAN and Son of the Musk, but it seems like there's been a bigger push towards Shorts and shorter videos in general (ie. like on YouTube and Instagram). Hope you're still working on that cactus animation!

2nd: 0/3

The actual animation itself is 15 seconds: After doing a bit of digging, I've figured out it's not worth giving any points.

Moral: If the biased buttman gives it a buck, don't give a fuck.

3rd: 1/3

Castlevania fan animation: This was made for the series' 35th anniversary (a while ago). The actual animation is ~35 seconds long, not counting the outro.

The first 11 seconds is in colour, but includes some level of motion tweening, then the rest becomes black and white and significantly rougher, almost as if it's been rushed. But hey, it's the thought that counts!

4th: 2/3

This is a 3D animated short featuring the usual Loose Ends cast in a cinema watching a 2D movie. Love a little experimental retro-3D every now and then, and this is fun ride too!

However I couldn't help but notice some previous episodes being removed from Newgrounds, for some reason, including Portal ID #777777.

5th: 3/3

This is a scene for a YouTuber's Pokemon collab

Despite being ~30 seconds, it's still very clean and well-animated.

Honorable Mention: Mixed Signals (yesterday's 5th place)

STILL not on the front page

EDIT: Spoke too soon!

Overall, today's picks are mostly short, but still watchable.

Total Score: 8/15 (51%)

Best/Favourite:

#4, #1, #5, #3, in that order:

f r o g r e v i e w: d a y 25

Here's an honest critique of the 5 "best" movies and games of the day.

Entries thread: https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534051

Authors: @jonathan and co, @Roskiart Countess-Karo beenibroh and co, @AwkwardTom

1st: 3/3 (+1 bonus point)

JAY'S DAY is the 2nd episode of RATBASTERDZ. After watching UNDERGROUND, I feel like at this point it's already shaping up to become 'one of the greats' alongside Monkey Wrench etc. Keep up the good work!

2nd: 2/3

Previously covered The State Hound last week in the infamously locked P-bot thread. This one was from November 2021. It's more stylized, but it's also ~50% shorter. Still very well-animated though.

3rd: 0/3

7 seconds long, though Kirby is still very well-animated, despite the movie being better suited towards YT Shorts and not Newgrounds.

4th: 1/3

This is a trailer for a fighting game of some sort (most likely MUGEN). The intro animation reuses a lot of background assets from SpongeBob. The animation is meant to be nostalgic (ie. 2000s Flash animation), but just ends up looking amateurish by today's standards, even with Flash.

The game itself also isn't on Newgrounds, so reviewing it here would be out of my jurisdiction.

5th: 3/3 + 1 bonus point

A very well-animated 10 minute short film about robots beaming shit to each other. It's meant to represent autism...

You know what? Just watch the movie.. Not only is it well-animated, but

This is my call to put it on the front page and keep it there for at least 2 weeks! Because 5th place is no place.

Overall, today's picks are extremely mixed. On one hand, two amazing movies bordering on perfection, and one that's also good, but on the other, two (relatively speaking) stinkers.

Total Score: 11/15 (70%)

Best/Favourite:

#5 + #1 (tied), then #2, then #4, in that order:

f r o g r e v i e w: d a y 24

Here's an honest critique of the 5 "best" movies and games of the day. I might be a bit late with this one:

Entries thread: https://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/1534051

Authors: @Sexual-Lobster @JerseyHouseStudio ProsciuttoMan @WaeBakStudios @RongRong

1st: 3/3

What do you get when you cross The Witcher with The Wiggles?

ANSWER: A real bloody bang of a job by the Internet's favourite Aussie greaseball. No, not that one.

The actual short is 2 and a half minutes long: The rest is credits + original drawings of Patreon supporters.

Great job!

2nd: 3/3

This is a pro-Palestine animated short. It's a team-effort that uses a mix of 2D and 3D elements.

Politics aside, I love how Biden had to be turned around by a barrel of oil so he doesn't throw the grenade at the nukes and tanks.

PS: I gave it 4 stars.

3rd: 2/3

Graphics are nice, and a few different people designed some levels. However, it's a bit of an odd choice to make SHIFT auto-retry the level, especially when it's so close to the Z and X keys, where you might hit it by accident.

It also took a bit of time to load.

4th: 3/3

3rd episode of the series "Falling Upward". I hadn't watched the other two, but I still get where they're going with this:

Some of the shots seem a little rough and unpolished, but otherwise it's a good effort from a great team.

5th: 2/3

This is a ~7 minute Runescape parody that took over a year to animate, presumably in between other projects.

Backgrounds and VFX definitely need some improvement. A lot of things looks unpolished compared to the main character. It makes the whole thing look inconsistent. Otherwise it's a very enjoyable animation.

Overall, it all looks great. Nuff said.

Total Score: 13/15 (84%)

Best/Favourite:

#1, #4, #2, #5, #3, in that order: