Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

OK then…well, this is an interesting idea, but I can not say that it comes out very well during play. Why? Beacuse, first of all: this level shows very little effort. Secondly, this level just is not very good. Why? There is not much eyecandy to look at. A lack of effort shows strongly. And much, much more. This level uses “fantasy world” by The Killer. It’s an OK tileset, though nothing superamazingfantasticilicious. Namely, it’s not the world’s best tileset, but not much is needed for a level like this. The tileset may be limited, but the eyecandy in the level is little more than a few pipes and some ground tile. Snore.

Other than the bleak eyecandy, there were also a few other problems. The gameplay, while certainally novel, is not anything to write home about. The idea of warping from one room or another is one of those ideas that has never been tried before because it is not that interesting.

Gameplay is hard to rate in a level like this, because of the newness. Then again, there is not much talent involved when there is such a small space. Much of it is hoping for not having a warp kill. Since many tiles only have one path to them, there are a lot of stalemates.

Aside from the warping around, there is very little to gameplay. Sure, you can get powerups using coins, but that’s not anything out of the ordinary. Put simply, this really is not a valid gametype, though it is a new idea. Worst of all, it has flag bug.

This just not is a good example of a level. It needed more time, more though, and most of all more “goodness” in order to become a nice level. Sorry GenEX, but this just is not good.

GAMEPLAY: D+
Flow: D
Layout: D+
Creativity: B+
Bugs: A-

EYECANDY: D+
Tileset use: D
Eyecandy look: D+
Creativity: D-
Bugs: B

PLACEMENT: C
Weapons: C
Bases: C
Carrots: C-

THE FINAL GRADE: D+

THE FINAL RATING: 3.7

+ PROS: Interesting idea.
- CONS: Badly done.

- Trafton

EDIT: No, I’m not. There is not enough of a tile surrounding. One is never enough. Try three. I triggered flg bug once, though I must admit it was not easy.
[This review has been edited by Trafton AT][This review has been edited by Trafton AT]

Ummm… interesting…

GAMEPLAY:

Let me just say this: it’s like one of those levels where you use tubes to go room to room but much worse. The idea in and by itself isn’t bad; it just wasn’t made too well. You could have placed the warp targets. What makes this worse than a sucker tube version is being able to shoot someone while warping, which renders that player incapable of moving and much easier to kill (ultimately a cheap move to use). So the layout lacks flow and is a little annoying trying to get around. The best part of this level has to be the balance, but that’s just because of its small size and simplicity.

EYE CANDY:

Not so good. Probably a bad choice for a tileset since you said you had trouble creating a better background. If you can’t make good eye candy with a certain tileset, you might as well use another one. Even so, I bet the eye candy could be better with that tileset.

CARROT AND AMMO PLACEMENT:

There are two +1 carrots in the middle and one in each coin warp. You might as well used a full energy carrot, although two +1 carrots right next to each other isn’t the worse thing that could have been done. The ammo placement isn’t much. The powerups are placed alright, but I don’t recommend putting powerups in a coin warp, especially one requiring as much coins.

HOST THIS OFTEN?

If you do, you must be really bored. I may have liked that other level I saw online more. I’m rating 4.7 just because.

The Edit: It’s more like a 3.5 on second thought. Feel free to blame my rating system.[This review has been edited by BlurredD]

Before I start, I would like to say I do not know what the level’s name is. It is uploaded as Warp Z0ne. The .zip file is called Warp Z00ne. The level is called Warp Zone. The filename is Warpwarpwarp. You see my problem.

TILESET/TILESET USE: The author uses (I think) “Fantasy Land” (it might be Fantasy World.. I forgot) by someone. I have no idea who. The author has used this tileset before, and while neither time was done very well, I think I liked the other use better. Not that all that much can be done with the tileset. Anyway, layer 4 consists of a bunch of Deserto pipes, and for background eyecandy there are some moving white rings. Now, layer 8 itself is not fully solid, and is partially transparent. However, this does look kind of cool, so I am willing to forgive the author as long as he doesn’t do it again without a good reason.
Pros: The background is a rather interesting effect.
Cons: The tileset doesn’t look good, and not much of it is used at all.
Rating: 5.0

WEAPON/ITEM PLACEMENT: The weapons and items are scattered among the various warp rooms, and are not in too much quantity. (there are Fastfires and Toaster) There are also a few rooms with coins in them, and some powerups which can only be obtained by paying 50 coins (both powerups cost the same, oddly enough).
Pros: Some parts show some thought.
Cons: Most of it is rather randomly done, and there isn’t all that much ammo.
Rating: 5.0

ORIGINALITY: This level is not paticularly original – a bunch of rooms connected by warps. This is done better in Onag’s Rat Race (a bunch of rooms connected by sucker tubes), and probably other places as well.
Pros: Few.
Cons: Just not very original.
Rating: 3.0

GAMEPLAY/DESIGN: The main focus of this level is Gameplay, but I’m not sure it really suceeds in giving a satisfactory type of this. Some rooms have only one way out, and since there is no electro blaster, camping is quite possible. If you try to access the powerup rooms from below, you end up in the room directly above them. And all the rooms are about the same size, so you don’t have multiple rooms to go to in the same direction from one room.
Pros: It could easily make for some interesting play.
Cons: “Interesting” does not always mean good, and a little more thought spent on this factor, in addition to all the others, would have been nice.
Rating: 6.0

REPLAY VALUE/FUN FACTOR: This level would probably not be paticularly fun until you learned it, but there aren’t too many rooms, so that shouldn’t be incredibly hard. However, the camping and lack of anything very new or interesting makes it not paticularly enjoyable.
Pros: It is different, and may appeal to the “different” crowds.
Cons: It’s “different” in the wrong way.
Rating: 4.5

OVERALL (not an average): While I like this a bit more then Trafton appears to have, it is still not a very good level and shows that beta testing might have been a good idea (though I am unable to trigger flag bug, despite not trying). Still, the author does show some promise, though I advise he makes ordinary (read: platform/tunnel based) levels until he gains more skill with JCS, and then persue the more original ideas he evidently comes up with.
Pros: The level does show some promise.
Cons: The eyecandy and lack of time spent on the level kind of cripple it.
Rating: 5.0

that’s kinda why I’m working on fixing the thing (flag bug? you got to be kidding)

I see another gameplay concept for CTF. How good is it? look at the previous and this review for yourself.

Covering the gameplay, this is very confusing and frustrating at first to play you jump into warps over and over… It’s different but not one of the most successful concepts as even when you get used to it, it’s still quite boring.

The eyecandy was a bit below average
but not the worst i’ve seen. You see bubbles floating around and plain, blue background… Thats about it.

The originality is one of the
best aspects of this level. I don’t
think i’ve ever seen the use of warps quite like this before.

Weapon and Ammo placement wasn’t too good. I found like 1 toaster pu and toaster ammo in some places. Nothing really interesting here. Carrot placement wasn’t too bad imo since it uses warps like this, however I still think 1 full NRG in the middle of the level would’ve served this level much better.

You could already see the replay value from reading this and other reviews of this. So it’s not important to discuss any further.

Overall, this level is below average and nothing really interesting.

Sorry no download reccomendation.

Also try: Double Trouble CTF by GenEx

I’m not going to type nearly as much as everyone else, but I’ll review this as I saw it in online play yesterday.

My first comment was that Onag did something very similiar to this, but I liked it better. It wasn’t so obvious about where you were going (routes) and also had more routes to choose from. Also, I find tons of warps to be annoying and Onag’s used hidden tunnels. Sorry for comparing this, if you’ve never played Onag’s. :P

I think that also you need a better reward for collecting so many coins for the coin warp. When everyone else is also getting coins, it takes a while to get that many.

Overall, 4. I wouldn’t play/host it much.