Here are January's top 5:

1. Dont worry be happy The latest Xombie chapter. It's been a long six months since the last update. Chapter 7 pits Dirge against the Vulture, a mysterious battleship piloted by his otherworldly nemesis; the Xar-Ggothua. Great, great stuff. They are making this into an actual movie to be released on video you know. I wonder when it will be out?
2009self: They deleted the Xombie series after after "episode 5, part 2" for a new dvd version.
Series/Xombie You can watch the first 5 episodes here. It's really a great series. I'm sorry that he deleted half of it. Maybe he'll bring it back someday...

2. Salad Fingers Episode 7 Firth gets another cash award with his latest Salad Fingers. While digging SF finds the corpse of his younger brother Kenneth, who is back from the Great War. A war against the maggots eating his dead flesh one can only assume as Kenneth is long dead. So SF being the guy that he is, of course has him over for tea.

3. -Play More- Remember Play? Well, here is the sequel. The author revisited the sights and sounds from Play and this time he added 4 new animations and sounds to create an all new experience that's bigger and better than ever before!

4. PALADIN episode 4 I've looked at it before but while it;s well animated the plot and story seemed a bit cheesy to me so I never added it. However ow that the intro is out of the way this is starting to be a pretty darn good action movie. The Paladin heads to the Necromancer's castle and battles the minions that guard it.
- PALADIN episode 1 An evil necromancer uses an army if the undead to destroy a kingdom. the only survivors a priest and a baby. Hide out in an underground bunker where the baby grown into a man who will avenge the loss.
- PALADIN episode 2 The Paladin begins his revenge by killing all the zombies that lurk around the ruins
- PALADIN episode 3 Starts with an interesting prologue that gives the whole flash series a greater context. It then goes back the the Paladin who still must fight the zombies that surround his former village.

5. Another Day Seven Music video set to the song "Biography" by The Release. In it, a blue bunny travels a desolate and surreal dreamland while he sleeps.
- Series/Another Day The author has put together a whole series about the bunny. They are all music animations with little stories to tell. It has sad overtones and it very subdued. Nice effort!
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My top 30 picks for the month (which come in no particular order):

1. Dont worry be happy A silly little music animation set to the song "Don't Worry Be Happy" by Bobby McFerrin. No story, just two guys singing the song while weird stuff happens. They don't finish the tune though.

2. The HATTA's Rant FOAMY The Hatta goes on his own rant. Talks about rap, white men acting black and other such issues. I prefer Foamy, I also like his voice better then the Hatta's.

3. A visit to grandpa A simple music animation set to the Japanese song "Angel Sanctuary (also as "Cries In The Dark" by Maaya Sakamoto. A young girl goes up a mountain to pray and remember her dead grandfather and then leaves. It's a nice little tribute for her dead grandfather.

4. Behind the Scenes @LiFe.1 This is really neat. They videotaped themselves using a camcorder and then added some special effects. The superpowers they display fit in very smoothly with the actual shots and it's very fast paced and cool looking, if short. The only real problem is that the video quality is low so everything it blurry but they wanted to keep the file size down. Ah well. Anyway, Max wants to take a break from working for a moment so he goes out but Steven doesn't take kindly to slackers.

5. Mecha Duel A music video to the song 'Haruka Kanata' by Asian Kung-Fu Generation. It's a rock type song. The animation has two players who are battling it out in a video game. Player 2 wins the first round and thing rapidly escalate to absurd levels.

6. Diablo II: The Showdown The first and only good Diablo II submission I have seen on Newgrounds. The guy that posted this actually stole it, deleted the original voices, put in his own subtitles and added a weird rock song by Fatboy Slim called "Ya Mama". Dispite this, it's still good. It was also probably made before the expantion if the game of which this is based. The story is that all five original Diablo II characters travel to the Secret Cow Level for a contest to see who can kill the most cows. If your a fan if the game you will get it quite a few in jokes but if not I think you still will not feel totally left behind.
2009self: BLEH! Deleted. Demnit. If anyone can find this animation again I'd appreciate it. I tried searching the name but that only led to a blog that came back to dead link for newgrounds. :(

7. Will You be Mine? A really basic looking animation that pulls off a really cute look for Valentines Day ad the guy tries to decide if he is brave enough to hand his potential sweaty a V-Day card. It's too short though. The song "Your too good to be true" by Frankie Valli ends way, WAY early.

8. Gladiator - stone A very short fight between two super powered stick men. Newgrounds has been getting a glut of them lately. Some sort of contest thing some people cooked up. They make their own stick man and have to battle other ones and animations with highest score wins or something.

9. how to make a game! There are plenty of tutorials out there and probably many better ones then this but it's mostly dry reading with just pictures or something. This really shows you how to make a sucky game instead of just writing it which is what I look for when I read these things. This does that. IF you get the urge to try your own hand at making flash go to "http://www.macromedia.com" and then click on get free flash player.

10. If God was one of us... A silly little animation featuring a hippy talking Jesus preaching to the crowd. They don't seem to be liking his message though. Heh!

11. KAZAHANA: The Formula Another Kazahana movie. I have showcased this series before. In today's episode, a doctor is creating a formula that will give an edge to whomever uses it in the mass battle that will soon come but there is treachery afoot. First part of a new chapter of this sprawling series (only some of which appears on Newgrounds).

12. Mortales.tv: Sometimes a creepy and grisly little black and white animation about a murdeer and the goverment agent who has been assigned to the case. We arrive in the house where the case files of the past murders is being looked over...

13. Paints A Thousand Words Music video of the song "If a picture paints a thousand words" by Bread. The song itself is very mellow and smoothing while the animation plays up this tone with a series of abstract scenes that I thought looked nice and went well with the song.

14. Nimian Flyer Legends An interesting looking game. YOU are a little fire breathing dragon and you fly continuously while trying to eat bugs and things. After doing this for a few minutes you come across a boss that you have to drop bombs or set on fire using your breath. Nice 3-D environment and a fair bit of game play to it, even if it's repetitive.

15. Qi An instrumental only music animation that shows (in a very abstract way) a story of how life force or "Qi" is born, goes through phases of desire, rejection, etc. and how it continues the cycle to rebirth. It's well done and transitions well through the phases. A nice art showcase.

16. The Thwomps This is cute. The "Thwomps" ave big levitating rocks that float up to the ceiling and wait for someone to walk underneath so they can squish them. Today a very special visitor whom they have been waiting for arrives....
- The Thwomps 2 Extending the gag from the first episode, the thwomps now have arms which they use to climb up the wall to get into position. More action as they try to get their intended victim squished. Will they succeed ? Watch and find out.

17. Thou Shalt Not Steal While running away from the police a thief wanders into a church. Will his brush with God steer him to the right path?

18. Twist of Fate Do you understand what irony is? In this short, an angel places a bet with God on a man who wins a bottlecap contest.This was part of a contest.. He had to make a short film in 2 days. As part of the rules, he was given a prop to use (a bottlecap), the theme "World of Wonder," and a line of dialogue, "Wow, vetlvet really is soft." Everything had to be original and copyright free or use with permission. It's not bad at all.

19. Theatrum Mundi An interesting animation about a guy named Brad who's applying for a new job. Unfortunately something unexpected happens inbetween his first and second interviews. The ending is kind of weird but entertaining overall.

20. pretty dead things a funky looking, short animation that focuses in on two flowers and the brightly multi-colored backgrounds. It has a soothing little instrumental guitar (?) song playing to accompany it.

21. Clivo's ordeal of funnies a 34 second animation starring Clivo who has 10 seconds to be funny or else! Exceptional graphics.
2009self: this animation isn't working properly but doesn't seem to be deleted... Maybe I'll contact the author at some point and see what's up.

22. Project I.V. a somewhat shortish fight movie. A woman with some kind of metallic face mask that seems wielded to her body has to take out a room full of opponents. It's well animated but no real plot. Just a long intro and then a fight scene in a room and that's it.

23. Shadows fall Weird little game. Easy to play though. Despite the bad controls and no sound effects. It could have been better but I liked it's creepy atmosphere and spooky visuals enough to give it a pass. The music doesn't have a loop though. A shame because when it stops the game is less interesting.

24. Final Sustenance This is a really silly and short RPG in the mold of the popular Final Fantasy series. Join our hero as he goes on a search for Pop Tarts. The voices used for the characters are especially ridiculous. Heh.

25. Fireworks simulation Very pretty. This is a simulation that allows you to experiment with both color and physics to create a unique, customised fireworks show.

26. Future is wonderful ! An oddly catchy foreign song plays with a very weird and slightly disturbing animation to accompany it. Strangely compelling.

27. Goomba Vol. 3 Another Super Mario Brother's cartoon. The fight scenes are not the most exciting but it's well done and it's a change to have the lowest level enemy from the games being the hero of the movie. Anyway, Goomba is innocently taking a break from his mission, when a Toad assassin shows up at his doorstep! Goomba is thrown back into the hunt, and once again begins to pursue Princess Peach.

28. Lemon Tree Video A music video of the song "Lemon Tree" by Fool's Garden. The animation is decent enough and the it goes welll with the song.

29. The Liar A very well done animation split up into three parts. The plot is whoever can prove themselves the most outrageous liar will receive from the king a golden apple. Many come to the king and attempt to give a good lie to him.
- Liar 2 Another citizen attempts to impress the king with a lie.
- Liar 3 Finally The Liar for whom the movie is named after makes his appearance. Will he manage to get the golden apple?

30. The Mouse (true story) I found this rather amusing. A man catches a mouse that has taken up residence in his home. Once he has the rodent he decides to kill it in a manner that ends up being very unfortunate for both him... and the mouse. Is it based on true events as the title says or is it an urban legend? You decide.

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And here are 5 older flashes that are worth a look:

1. "Target Practice" This entry was submitted by Jeffrey James Weise who was a high school student of Red Lake Minnesota is responsible for the shooting deaths of his grandfather and his grandfather's partner and theRed Lake High School massacre, a school shooting in which he killed seven people and injured more than a dozen others before committing suicide. Very scary because while most violent animations are fake this guy was making something that he planned to carry out in real life.

2. -NoX- Very nice. A mysterious thief gets away with the goods in this suspenseful medieval romp!

3. The Necromancer Episode 1 This is a pretty darn good action flash series. Although the intro is a bit long and boring. There should have been a skip function. It's on every episode.The voice action and the animation isn't the best either but it has a well thought out plot and story, even if it's bare bones. It needs time to fill it out. Anyway, the Necromancer makes his entrance. He buys a horse and goes to kill a group of people who are desecrating the ruins of his fallen homeland. His quest to destroy the Madassarian Empire and to resurrect his old Parthollian Empire.
- The Necromancer Episode 2 In this episode, the Necromancer meets another mage, has an encounter with Satan and fights off a small army.
- The Necromancer Episode 3 The Necromancer is haunted by his past by a new enemy. This episode also sets up for a huge battle which will take place in the next.
- The Necromancer Episode 4 big battle royal between the Necromancer and Madassarian forces. The Necromancer heads off alone to kill the rulers of Madassarian
- The Necromancer Episode 5 The final. Will the Necromancer triumph and destroy Madassarian?

4. G.I. Joe - The Other Half Great parody of a G.I. Joe service announcement. Some kids are kicking on another child just because he wears glasses. Let Duke show explain why that isn't cool.

5. Tactics Core Demo Game! How could I have not gotten around to posting this? It's Probably the slickest tactics game ever made in Flash! you have a group of people on a board and you move them around and have them attack the computer led group. It's an RPG style and you both take turns and move one person each. I've spent a fair bit of time playing. It's not too hard to figure out and a lot of fun give it a try and here's a tip when your healer is the last person standing on your side he becomes a super powerful, if not unbeatable if sufficiently outnumbered, character.

And that's it for January. is. This is where I started tiring out on these updates. I had all the flashes but it's such a pain to organize, whittle the number down to thirty and do a write up of everything. I keep putting it off. Although I still add them, even all these years later. I keep up watching many, many, newground flashes.

Till next time.

Updated: 09/11/09 11:21 PM Log in to comment! | Share this!