Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Huh… I should like this, because it’s Jungle, but because it’s Jungle, I want to see it done right. And this does not even pretend to have been done right. The author’s only focus was changing the palette a few times and adding a bunch of tiles ripped from other tilesets, leaving totally aside the issue of what to do with the tiles that were already there. Jungle, beautiful as it is, suffers from a number of problems, particularly in the field of masking, and Purplejazz7 does not even try to address these. The tileset, aside from the palette and added tiles, is left exactly the way it was. This is unacceptable behavior.
The added tiles range from good additions (Diamondus trees manage to look nice, expanding the background foliage is a welcome addition) to merely okay (the water is nice but Nick would have done it better, so it’s not a convincing addition) to blah (mere ctrl+c ctrl+v stock waterfalls fail to impress me at this point, and the sucker tubes look ugly in every palette). The empty unsolid trigger scenery tile is a nice and practical addition, although I have no idea what it’s supposed to turn into, unlike its more rational appearance in Diamondus… floating totem poles?
As for the palettes, the day palette is pretty good, actually. It strongly resembles the Diamondus palette, except with brown instead of blue walls, and looks bright and cheery, although maybe a little too restricted in terms of variety. It combines with the new tiles, as seen in the example levels, to create a rather pleasant viewing experience, aside from the rain which is used poorly in the foreground but would be more usable in a farther receded layer. The other palettes, well, they try, but they’re ugly, and there’s not much more to say on that subject. I doubt they’re even tested, as the sucker tube’s flashing light fails to animate properly with the night palette.
If all you want from a tileset edit is a different palette than the same old palettes, then this is an acceptable download. If you want an alternate background for Jungle, then this is an acceptable download. If you cherish the tileset and would love to see someone make it all it deserves to be… you will be disappointed in this “conversion”‘s horrendous masking and the very thought that those sucker tubes could somehow look as if they belonged. You will hope someone else does a better job, or perhaps resolve to do better yourself, next year, when you have the time. But you are disappointed in that which adds nothing but cheer.