Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Okay I saw all the other reviews, and I gotta say, most of them seem either biased in some way, either against Dodges or with Dodges. Not that it’s a bad thing, I mean friends can be nice or mean or whatever. Anyway, I’m here to put my somewhat balanced review. You might probably totally disagree with this review as it’s kinda hasty and probably not as detailed as my other reviews. I’ve kinda left the reviewing scene lately because someone like Mike always beats me to reviewing something and then he gets a hundred people saying his review was helpful and if I review after I’d get like 1. Craig David probably prefers Mike to me eh? Stupid Craig. Craig’s supposed to be my homeboy. MINE NOT YOURS MINE. Watch your back Mike.

Anyway, seems Dodges made a duel/2v2 level, possibly 3v3. I tried a 2v2 in here, with Dodges too, and I have to say, while I liked the level in collecting ammo, my opinion totally flipsided when I played the level. That doesn’t mean the level was awful or anything, it’s just there are so many unintuitive things, or things that weren’t as well thought through as many other levels.

Note to readers: I’m changing the way I review due to me changing the way I think. Eyecandy will now be worth only 25% of the level’s rating, and gameplay will take up the rest. While I know this is somewhat unfair to a minor extent, I feel that levels made in JJ2, unless they’re made specifically to set a scene, they’re based on gameplay. Without further ado we’re off.

EYECANDY
Rating: 7.5

General appearance:
I gotta say, this level caught my eye quite a lot, mostly because of the pretty background, however it might have prospered with a better mix of colours rather than green and blue. However I have to say it looks pretty. On closer inspection however, you can realise that there wasnt much work put into the background. While the scrolling and speeds all make sense and are well done, I have a minor issue with the fact that some layers move up and down at practically the same speed. But that doesn’t really matter. More closely, to the level itself, there isn’t much eyecandy that really will make you go “wow”. It just looks like typical tileset usage if you ask me. It looks pretty basic, and standard compared to how the set should be used. I don’t know if this is a fault of the level or of the tileset, even if it does look good. One factor that always bugs me, is when people put platforms floating in the middle of nowhere. While JJ2 doesn’t really make sense, I think it looks silly when there are floating platforms, because things don’t really float when there’s gravity, at least things that you can stand on. Again, minor issues.

Theme:

The level name gave me the impression that the level would be very colourful. While it’s kinda colourful, I was just hoping to see more from the orange side of the spectrum, possibly in the sky. Either way, this theme looks very realistic and nice on the eye. I really like how the the level feels like some sort of opening, however at the same time, it doesn’t feel as open as a valley would? Again, I know this sounds totally stupid [which is why I hate rating eyecandy]. Craig David would probably look nice in this level. Craig David would look nice in any level.

Tileset usage:

Upon opening the level [and tileset] in JCS, I concluded that the set was used quite nicely, as there were no tilebugs, no overly plain areas, and tiles are obviously placed well. It seems the set was used correctly and quite nicely too, and therefore I’m giving you a thumbs up! (yeah thats all you get, so what, the world’s corrupt)

Comments:

I gotta say, the eyecandy looked good, and all that, wasn’t very varied. However I feel the level looks good enough to be a playable level, nothing gets in the way of the gameplay, and nothing distracts you or looks gutwrenchingly horrible. Maybe it sucks that there’s random floatups that have no identification of them, or warps too. The tube in the middle of the platforms may also be quite hard to spot unless you stumble into them or are told/shown that they exist. On the whole it’s good on the eyes. Oh, and I didn’t like how the bases floated rather than sat on the masks.

GAMEPLAY
Rating: 6.5

Bias:

There’s no particular bias between the rabbits, although spaz is probably favorable in this level simply because of his enhanced movement. This doesn’t mean its particularily bad to use Jazz in this level, or advantageous. I just think movement is possibly easier as spaz and quicker here. Since this level is symmetrical, there can’t be any possible bias between teams so we’ll just skip on ahead from that!

Defense/Offense:

Bases seem easy to defend when you look at the level, as its almost set out like SBv2 is, however there’s 4 possible ways they can come from, which it probably does not look like. It can be extremely easy to defend the base with a load of seekers everywhere, especially since some seekers spawn so close to the base. The real issue this creates however is that seekers become primarily the best gun. Entering from behind the bases is somewhat pointless as its obviously the slowest route in the level, and this level seems to be very fast paced and about extreme speed. This probably gives defenders one less route to worry about. On the other hand, the other two routes [from the side or above the base] seem to be quite slow too, and probably vulnerable, rendering them possibly useless routes. On the other hand, one can argue that from the top route, you can easily swarm the base with a load of bouncers, possibly clearing the base allowing for an easy capture. However, if the defender is expecting such a thing, you’re probably screwed. The final route to the bases is probably through the launchers. The launchers are leading from the red springs and they will be shot through some diagonal sucker tubes which’ll take you right onto the base. It’s fun to be launched through these, though it’s extremely fast and in some cases unnoticable and rediculously annoying, especially when trying to score. This makes defending and trying to score rediculously aggrovating, in some cases, because you could be a tile off and they’d beat you from at least 20 tiles off. I don’t know what to make of it, but it REALLY irritated me when I was about to score and such a situation happened. I guess it’s something I should have to live with.

Flow:

The level flows quite nicely, on first inspection, especially with the spring into the sucker and all of that, but after playing for a while you can soon realise that some aspects of the level are in fact more irritating than flowy. This can be for instance, the way to get the full NRG, or the way you would expect. To get the full NRG, you have to actually go up from the bottom of the level, by dropping and raising through a freezie. And then you’ll reach the carrot at the top. Alternatively, there are warps to do so too [which I’ll talk more about later]. But when you look at it, there are ledges that you’d expect to be able to jump on, and in fact, when you do, you’ll be pulled into some suckertube that takes you out in an annoying place. The warps possibly make the bottom route useless, even if it is possibly safer, unless someone camps above it with toaster or whatever through the oneway. Then you’re actually screwed because the powerup spawns there and a camper will likely have it. This makes it hard to regain health in this level, making survival even harder. Another problem with this level, is that the warps on the bottom of the level take you to the opposite side of the level, totally against expectations and “counter-intuitively”, in the words of CelL. While I think it’s not the biggest issue, it’s true that you can fall faster, and those warps you’d expect to lead you closer to the base rather than further from it. Another major problem I had with this level was the floatups sometimes just moving me around unnecessarily. I’m not the biggest fan of floatups but yah. I’ll let that go. Another thing that was annoying is that the warps near the bases, can be entered totally accidentally. When trying to score or go on the base, you’d strafe towards the base’s direction, especially from that spring. However, you cannot do this as it will warp you to the carrot, even if you don’t want to. I did this during a 2v2 and it cost like 3 points. [yeah my partner was doing that well]. Other than that, I like the movement in this level.

Layout

The layout of this level is fairly open, but not overly open. It’s kinda just a balance I guess. I feel that it’s quite a good layout, but more could have been done with it. The bases probably would have prospered in different locations, as with the powerups. This possibly could bring down the level from its current state but I think it’s for the better. The layout of this level otherwise is pretty well thought through, with good movement and clever tricks, it can be quite fun. I think it’s pretty easy to learn and get to grips with, and shares similarities with SBv2 [probably why I mentioned it earlier, the route behind the base is almost identical]. This isn’t a bad thing, just something I spotted.

Placement:

I’ll split this part in two. Starting with collectibles. The ammo is quite nicely spread and placed in this level, it’s pretty easy to get the hang of where to go for each gun, so I guess that’s a good thing. The carrot is well placed, and clearly prevents bouncer bias over RF, which I applaud greatly. However, I must say, RF isn’t as useful as bouncer is in this level, which is possibly a slight bias over one team, which ever’s closer to bouncer. Either way, I don’t like this, even if it isn’t too major.

The springs are all fairly placed in this level, and there isn’t much to say about that at all. I think the issue is the warp targets and the floatups. All I’m gonna say is that you could have use alternative transport methods in terms of placing movement events.

Tactics:

There are no major tricks that are doable in this level other than rushing points through the use of the launcher. The launcher is cool and all, but it probably doesn’t fit in this level. I honestly can’t think of anything to say here, probably other than camping the top of the level with toasters through the way up to the full NRG, which is kinda useless. Maybe moving through warps in wierd ways can confuse enemies if you’re holding flags, but I doubt it’s that useful either…

Fun-Factor:

On the whole, this level is actually quite fun to play in, and has no major flaws. I find many things annoying however, like the fact that I find it difficult to survive. This may be because Im a sucky player, but it just seems that this level is all about perfect rushed movement, if that makes any sense.

Comments:

I quite like the gameplay, but dislike it at the same time. That’s all I can think of saying.

ORIGINALITY

Nothing to give originality points for, sorry. :(

FINALLY

I like the level as a whole, it’s not bad at all, it just has clear flaws. I appreciate that you made the level fast, but you should really take your time in such a thing. It’s very difficult to play in for me.

I disagree with every review on this page, as they all have either some sort of bias, or have not played the level properly. I highly reccomend someone to download it, as it is a fun map still, probably just not my cup of tea.

CRAIG DAVID!!!

Edit: Ignore anything I said about floatups. On top of this, I misrated the level. I apologize for this.

CRAIG DAVID!!!