Great game. I stayed up too late last night playing it.
When I got a hit that climbed to #4, I was hooked.
A few thoughts and observations:
* First off, I'd love to see a postmortem written up on
this, talking about the challenges you faced, how you
overcame them, etc.
* If you want this to go viral, I suggest you have a
"daily top 100" and an "all time top
100" because one of the most satisfying parts of the
game is watching your standing crawl up the ladder as your
skull rolls around, but after a while, no one will
experience that except with a truly exceptional hit. A
"daily top 100" will give that experience to more
people who hit the viral early.
* Another great moment in the game is when you get your
skull down to that lower level. The audio cue and the
different lighting is a fantastic touch. Rather than having
different levels, I would suggest having another drop-off in
the same place where you currently have that big flat area.
That would give *two* things to shoot for. (In fact, one of
the things that I think will help make this game viral is
the amazingly frustrating, I'm-gonna-get-it-next-time
experience when the skull stops *just short* of a dropoff.
If you can increase that experience, it will probably
increase the viral nature of the game.) If it's a problem
with polycount, I think it would be fine to narrow the
playfield in order to lengthen it.
* There appears to be an invisible barrier on the edges
of the terrain. I had a few skulls bounce off of nothing a
few times when they were getting "out of bounds".
Rather than have them bounce off of mid-air, you might as
well stick rock-wall geometry there so it doesn't look
weird. (The near invisible wall doesn't bother me, but the
far one looked strange sometimes.)
* The happy chirping birds seemed at odds with what looks
like an underground cavern, but they didn't really bother
me. Still, you might look for more appropriate ambient
noise. (Or stick in a jungle backdrop.)
* It seems to me that if you play for a long time, you'll
have a lot of skulls littering the playfield, which may, in
turn, drag down the fps. You might consider a "clear
skulls from playfield" button or something. Or maybe
just keep your top ten hits, with the others fading out
after a minute or so. (At the very least, if you explicitly
abandon a hit, you could certainly remove that one from the
playfield.)
* I'm not sure I agree with the other posters that you
should have some way of controlling the hit more than just
with a swing. If there were a way to optimize your hit
above others, then that will select against people coming
new to the game, which will make it less viral. I kind of
like the simplicity of the current setup.
* It seems like the monster should do a little happy
dance when you get on the high score board.
* I, too, experienced the issue with the monster getting
stuck in mid-swing.
* The first time I played, I had to reload the window
because it wouldn't let me type my name into the field, and
clicking "OK" wouldn't accept a blank name. I
reloaded and it worked after that, and I've been unable to
reproduce the problem.
Great work! Looking forward to the release so I can share
the link off-list. 
CC
----
CC Chamberlin
Analyst
Media Productions
University Communications and Marketing Services
New Mexico State University
505-646-3954
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