Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Introduction : YAY! It’s finally uploaded! This is a CTF pack by ChippieBW and I beta tested the levels and gave some suggestions about them. I’m glad to see it uploaded. I hope this will be the XLM release of the year, or at least one of the best XLM projects. Let’s see if it’s really true.

The Lion Sleeps Tonight

This level uses Swamps of the Sleeping Jaguar, and this is one of the best tilesets around, although I find it hard to make no bugs with it. D=. The eye candy in this level is good enough for the tileset. There is enough in all places, and there is good use of layers. Making EC in a small level ain’t that hard.

The gameplay of this level is pretty basic ; the layout is a bit closed, but it has good spring placement and flow. The layout is not squared-off at least, and the level is 100 × 50 (which isn’t very big, but ok) I don’t see any Spaz-biasing or other bad things in the layout, so I guess this is good. There are some obstacles between the bases.

The level has 2 Power-Ups, and good ammo placement. 1 Full Energy is good enough for this level, and both Power-Ups are in walls (D=) There are some nice shapes of ammo and there is enough ammo in the air and on the ground. There are some fast fires in the level too – no problem.

Rating : 8.

Tigris Caves

This level uses the Oasis tileset by Blade(who uploaded a new tileset fyi) and Chippie used this tileset well. He wanted people to modify the eye candy of a level before and I was going to do this one, but he decided that he cancels the project. The most amount of EC is in layer 5, and layer 3 and 2 have some as well. The backgrounds are good enough, and I don’t think the eye candy in the level is too unoriginal.

This level is quite big, and it’s almost symmetrical. This is a good 2v2/3v3 level, but the border might be incomplete and cause a flag bug. There are some small dead ends in the level, but I won’t take a point of the level’s rating off or so(yay) The flow in the level is again good, and the copter is quite useful. The tubes might be too long, though, and they cause a lotta camping under it or people try something else to camp. This level is more open than the first one.

The level has 3 Power-Ups. The ammo placement is again quite good and it has some good shapes of ammo again. The Power-Ups are in walls again, but this time the Power-Ups of choice were different. A Blaster, Bouncer and RF were chosen this time. The level has 3 Carrot Energy +1’s, and one of them is invisible. This ain’t a real problem, because you would notice fast. The readme about this pack lied, because I read that this level was supposed to have 1 full energy and 2 +1’s. =P. But I don’t think there are major flaws in the placement.

Rating : 7.9.

EFIL CASTEL WIT WATER LOL!!!111

This level uses the Castle 2 Eclipse tileset, but it was the Night version before. This was a good move by Chip, but now, let’s see how the eye candy in this level is. The eye candy in this level is again good enough, layer 5 has pretty basic stuff and layer 3 has some stuff I saw more times in levels with this tileset. It’s not that the EC is that unoriginal, though. The lightnings and the rain looks quite good. This tileset is used for a lotta levels already(about 4 are made by me) so that’s why I can’t say there is a lotta original eye candy in the level.

This level is 100 × 70, and the layout of it is a bit closed. The middle of the level is open, and you can fall from quite high. There aren’t many ways in the level, but it’s good enough. The level again has good spring placement, and the flow is again quite good. This level is more squared-off than the previous levels, but this tileset is more squared as well. The sucker tubes are quite useful, and there are again some good obstacles between the bases. The level is not symmetrical, but it’s balanced enough.

This level has 3 Power-Ups. These Power-Ups are unoriginal placed, and the PU’s chosen are also quite unoriginal. All Power-Ups are in walls, and the PU’s used are Bouncer, Seeker and RF. These are the 3 best PU’s in JJ2, imo. The level only has some lines as ammo shapes, but some of them are diagonal, others are horizontal, and even other groups are vertical. The level has 1 carrot, and that one is a Full Energy. There was a problem with this first, but Chip solved this quite easy. There is enough ammo on the ground and in the air.

Rating : 7.7

Quasar Quandary

ChippieBW used Odyssey 01 for this level, which is quite overused(he could pick another version of Odyssey), but this level’s eye candy is very splendour. I was surprised about the filesize when Chip sent this for the first time, and that is already a good sign. The animations are very good, and the eye candy in the other layers is just fantastic, outstanding, marvellous or however you would call it. Chip even made something original out of this tileset, although it was used alot already(like for Galactic Warfare) There is even eye candy on places you can’t come. Chip spent a long time on the EC of this level, and he also said that the EC is almost as good as E.Prime. And Chip wasn’t wrong ; the EC in the level is one of the best I ever saw.

This level is the only level of the pack that’s completely symmetrical. The layout is quite closed, and it’s pretty much one way. However, there are 2 ways to each base(one by tube and one by running) There are warps at the very left and right side, and this layout is not what you expect from Chip. There are some other tubes in the level, and some of them are hard to reach. There might be some small dead ends in the level, but that’s not really a big problem. The spring placement is quite good, but the flow ain’t the best.

This level has 3 Power-Ups(again). This time, the PU’s are NOT in walls. The Bouncer and Toaster are both at a side, and the Seeker in the top-middle. There are fast fires in the level, and some good shapes of ammo. There aren’t many big shapes of ammo. The level has 1 Full Energy. This time, it’s on the bottom-middle of the level. This level won’t bring too much camping, but it’s quite frustrating to have no ammo while playing it in a 2v2 or 3v3. You’ll get killed continously most of the time.

Rating : 8.2

Ending comments : This was a great levelpack with some interesting things in it, like the puzzle. I really liked the textstrings in the levels, you are as funny as me! =D. You didn’t mention every name in it, but if you did, it would be quite irritating =P

Bonus points :
0.2 for this being a pack.
0.1 for the puzzle I managed to solve.

Final rating : 8 + 7.9 + 7.7 + 8.2 : 4 + 0.3 = 8.25 = 8.3.

Download : Definitely.
Host : Yes, this pack consists of some good CTF levels, especially QQ.