Nice one!

First of all, you did a great job on the graphics, voice acting, and animation. The animation was very smooth with highly detailed drawings-- I know this must have taken quite some time and it shows! I liked that you weren’t afraid to create many, many different scenes and backgrounds for your movie. That made it feel as though I wasn’t trapped in the artist’s head, but was instead in a world created by the artist.

As far as the voice acting goes: great job on that! Thank your team for me and let them know what a great job they did on getting down inflections, emotions, and believable dialogue. It’s so rare to find an entire team of strong amateur (as in not for a wage) voice actors.

Also, great use of gradients for light effects—those are definitely my favorite in Flash and you’ve got that effect down!

As far as critiquing your work, I’ll go ahead and be up front about it. You did take many ideas and elements from Dragonball Z by Akira Toriyama. To say that you were not heavily influenced by it would be lying. In order to stop everyone else from continuously saying that you ripped it off of DBZ, I would personally put, instead of a disclaimer, a thanks to Toriyama and Dragonball Z for inspiration and ideas for your animation.

Now, you might ask why I say that you were influence by the style of DBZ, so I’ll go through the list (but let it be known that this in no way takes away from the quality art that you and your team have created):

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--The characters voices seemed to be based off of Dragonball Z characters (I don’t know if this was intentional, but nevertheless, you guys still did a great job):
1. Sonic -> Goku
2. Shadow -> Vegeta
3. Nazo -> Cooler

--The destruction of the city in the opening scene, immediately followed by news reports were in the same style as when the scenes when the androids were terrorizing the city and how they were followed by reports of the destruction

--The scene when Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles are going to fight Nazo is in the same way when Goku, Gohan, Krillin, and the others all meet-up to confront the androids when they were destroying “South City” (also like “South Island”)

--The ability of the Knuckles to sense the emeralds similar to how those of DBZ could sense the Dragonballs

--The way by which Sonic was about to die by the hands of Nazo, but then Shadow shows-up without anyone’s knowledge and blocks the attack is directly related to when Goku was going to be killed by Android 19, but Vegeta immediately steps in and stops 19’s attack. Both even have the same attitude that they don’t really care about the main character (Goku/Sonic), but just are in it to show off

--How Sonic goes “Super,” yet without turning Golden after tails (dies?) is in the same fashion of how Goku watches Krillin die and then begins thinking about his friend dying and that turns him into Super Saiyan

--The way that the characters powered-up or used powers were in the same fashion as DBZ: aura charge-up lines, ki blasts, ki boosts in flying, etc.

There is still a few more on the list, but the only reason that I bring this up is because you said that it is "not true" that “the following scenes are DBZ rip-offs.” They often directly relate to DBZ. In order to stop people from saying you are “ripping off DBZ” you should change your disclaimer and give Akira Toriyama credit for his work on Dragonball Z and give thanks for the inspiration to make this movie. After all, if you had never seen Dragonball Z, then ask yourself what your movie would have turned out like.
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Oh, and before I forget, please try to work on equalizing all of the audio. Try to get all of the volume of the Flash at around the same decibel range so that it's not too loud. To fix this is to go into Flash and to decrease the audio levels by sliding the volume level down for each clip. If you need help with this, drop me a note.

Okay, now that's over with, I'd like to commend you again on a job well done! I'd really like to see more of your work--and even in the same style.

May God bless you,
Red Phoenix

Sweetness!

Heya Kecho,

I haven't been to this website in a while, but this animation was definitely worth it! From start to finish, it felt as though I were actually in the game watching it unravel before me. It nicely followed the style of Chrono Trigger with a few surprises as well.

Also, I really enjoyed the camera work incorporated throughout the movie as well as the actual in-game music being used.

Again, great job and I look forward to your future animations!

P.S. Nice job on the scripting and the main menu! What fun!

Wow... Awesome!!!

Heya El-Cid,

When I first showed you Flash, about 4 years ago, this is what I envisioned you doing. With this animation you are truly showing the potential that I saw you had so long ago. It is such a blessing to see it manifested now some years later.

Your level of creativity and innovation is unrivaled by many. Whenever you get to doing your own thing, you explode with ideas that no one else would even begin to think of. That’s why I like the work that you have innovated.

I really liked all of the objects that you could control-- and even with multi-stages! The ambience was great for creating the living environment that the user was contained in; it felt like my own little sandbox to wreck havoc on.

Unlike any animation that I’ve ever seen or played, this was an experience!

I’d imagine that your full version will get many more viewers than even this one. If not, well then it should! Even if it doesn’t—it’s all about the Father, no? I’d imagine He got a kick out of it =). Thanks for the fun bro!

May God bless you,
Red Phoenix

***Use of Copyrighted Picture of Garnet?!?!***

This should be investigated since one of the pictures on this game is copyrighted. . . or at least so it states. It is true that often there is much copyrighted material that many flash artists use; however, if you are trying to make money (in the form of donations, etc.) off of your flash. . . It better be 100% homemade and original.

If you had permission for this picture, then I apologize for this startle.

The picture states that it has been copyrighted; however, an investigation of this level should be left to Tom Fulp and the creators of this game.

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Supposed copyrighted picture: "Garnet Til Alexandros 17th"
Original Author: Truong Sandy
E-mail of Artist: (Would have been given but withheld for sake of author’s consent, if it is needed, then I can give it to the proper authorities)
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Excellent Idea and Thorough Work!

I truly appreciate the work that you have done here. Not only did you teach about how to use Flash, but you taught about proper etiquette and how to effectively review someone's flash movie.

I also liked the intermediate and advanced tutorials (scripting) that you had in your movie! Nicely done.

Oh yeah, in your movie you had said that if you reuse sound, then it does not affect the file size. This only works if it is an event (or "start") audio type. Again great job on this tutorial!