Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

We tried to playtest this level while we were playing CTF over the weekend. Unfortunately, players started to crash, seemingly because they used the boomerang weapon. So we weren't able to playtest the level because of the crashes.

This is a nice showcase of the new texture related features JJ2+ has to offer.
And yes, it looks like something that came out of Doom.

It's challenging to review this because it switches gameplay styles so completely, repeatedly, that it feels like several levels in one. The starting area would indeed be a dubious match for CTF, but it's fine here (though the rest of the level never manages to make Townhouse look quite so good as DanX did). Some plausible enemies, a pretty cool horizontal spring segment.

Then the level turns into trigger crate hell for much too long. Barely-visible walls block arbitrary sections of the level, and you must find trigger crates (sometimes in secret areas) and smash them in an unclear, unguided order before you can finally progress. And then you have to do that same thing again, but worse.

Then the level gets more experimental, with an airboard collectathon, some basic level design, a kind of interesting float-up area, a mandatory secret area, and an area I actually rather like, where you're on an airboard again but this time you're collecting gems as the wind moves you along. There's some confusing eyecandy in this section, and it would be nice if the camera weren't so centered on the player, but otherwise it feels fresh and fun.

Next up is a vine platforming area, and I'm a sucker for vines, although it's kind of messed up by the fact that Spaz can skip through parts of it with his double jump. Also the trigger crate hunting returns for no real reason, and there are a lot of invisible spikes.

The rest of the level is a bit cramped but notable mostly for introducing ice tiles (complete with the Slide event, I think) to Townhouse. It's okay but doesn't really play to the tileset's strengths.

Enemy placement's generally fine, nothing too out-of-keeping with the environment. There doesn't seem to be any ammo at all, though… it's generally thought to be good to give the player strategic options, not to mention it's just fun to be able to switch guns. A missed opportunity. Checkpoints feel about right, though inherently limited because of the trigger crates.

I like some parts of this level. I dislike others. Hard to get more N/A than that.

I like the basic idea here but I don't like any of the execution. There's not enough recognition that the base designs might not be perfect.

Dean Tube is just as visually confusing as ever, perhaps even moreso, but now with lots of enemies and powerups. The EB powerup makes sense because of the sparks in the walls, but after a while it's clear there are just powerups for the sake of powerups. Enemies are placed without regard for which tileset they're in—having sparks and pacman ghosts in the same level feels especially egregious. None of the original level's weirder features are normalized, there are just more events. Even the missing animated tiles aren't fixed.

Forrest Jump (I do like the name) does a bit of decent background layer work, even though it doesn't seem to understand the concept of animated tiles. It connects the last loose bit of layout to the rest of the level and adds a lot of carrots. But mostly it's barely changed. Inner wall tiles still appear freely on the sides of walls, branches still sprout into nowhere, walls are still mostly gemless.The idea of following an extremely cramped level section with an extremely open level section is kind of interesting, but little about the new area feels purposeful or elegant (especially the swinging platforms), and the way out is marked with an arrow made of pickups, but if you eat those pickups before hitting the trigger crate, what are you supposed to do?

I didn't get very far into Battery Jazz. It's a bunch of weird mechanics poorly matched to limited use of the tileset. Smart tiles would help, but besides that, most every problem in it would be solved by just making a Battery Check level instead.

Preamble (geared towards other elderly fans of JJ2):
As someone who grew up playing Jazz Jackrabbit and now rarely opens it aside from the odd Anniversary Bash, I have memories of a game that even pre-2010 seemed stretched to its limits by the community. Feeling a bit dissatisfied after barely playing in this year's Bash, I figured it was a good time to get re-introduced to all of the wonderful ways the community has expanded the game (specifically in Single Player which was always my favourite mode) while I sort of looked on from the periphery. I guessed that a recent upload from Violet would be a great starting point. It was a very, very good guess. She delivers.

That said, I don't want this review to just be gushing about how heavily (it seems to me anyway) that this level features JJ2+'s capabilities. It's just relevant for players like me who might be looking for a fix of their old favourite with a lot of the new bells and whistles to marvel at. You'll be impressed.

But as delicious as it is to encounter new enemies and use new weapons and everything, is it actually fun? Well yeah.

Weapons, Enemies, Difficulty:
As minmay said, the new elements make you approach the enemies in a fresh way that didn't get stale. Standard weapons variety is very deliberately limited, but I am not sure why. Perhaps it was done for simple thematic reasons? Custom enemies are used well and provided great novelty, although I don't know if I would say they were challenging enough a lot of the time. I probably need another play through on harder modes. The boss, however, was another story for me..

Theme, Goals, Gameplay:
So, the actual goal of the level was not clear to me for quite a while. It may have just been that I wasn't paying close enough attention initially. I wasn't sure whether I needed to collect a certain amount of skulls or coins or if I was trying to open new areas by seeking out trigger crates. To be perfectly honest, for the first few minutes I was avoiding the skulls because they seemed more like enemies. So naive of me. So innocent. Once I worked out that it was mainly about collecting coins, I enjoyed scouring areas again for something I might have missed. There were also times I would need to find how to get a coin just out of reach, which was very motivating and kept me engaged.

The custom platforming elements were very fun, except for the shooting sucker tubes over spikes which, I dunno, maybe I'm too old and I don't have the patience or reflexes anymore. I still adored the trigger crate animated vine/tree platforms and the custom twisting platforms. And who doesn't love pole dancing? Very fun!

One small issue I had was that (and I assume this is a JJ2+ problem in general?) I couldn't save. I ended up playing for much longer than I intended originally because I didn't want to start over again. I stayed engaged for it but I was rushing towards the end. So a warning: give yourself plenty of time.

Eyecandy, Music:
There are several different themes as you travel around the map. Violet's combinations of different tileset elements were sometimes a little jarring (but maybe that was a part of the point given the spooky theme?) in their contrasting vibes/styles but after a while you settle into a coherent.. setting. She also made use of the newer textured background features to really great effect.

Drastic changes in mode or theme were accompanied by music changes that were both always welcome but also soon became a touch stale as they were, again, a little jarring. And, again again again, maybe that was the point? Very spooky. Very zany. Like a deluge of bees angrily fighting over a split trash bag stuffed with sprinkles that had passed their use by date.

Overall:
A very fun, sensational level absolutely stuffed with engaging new kinds of gameplay opportunities. Definitely recommended for Single Player fans, especially those of us looking for a taste at what JJ2+ has on offer. (And I know, I promise this review isn't just about JJ2+ itself, but good god all of you guys are absolute legends <3). While I found myself a little frustrated or confused sometimes, and I didn't like that I needed to complete the level in one session, it was novel in a ton of different ways and left me smiling. Definitely have a go!

Here's some classic good Single-Player gameplay combined with small scripted twists and neat tileset mashes. Have to say that especially the Holiday Hare and Carrotus tilesets work together really well, although fixing the flawed masking of Holiday Hare requires quite some manual effort with MLLE.

Here's some good showcasing of what's possible with AngelScript when it comes to raising the intensity of typical boss fights in JJ2+. Too bad the fun is over quickly.

This was definitely an entertaining experience! The level required me multiple attempts to finish, as the gameplay is versatile and it is easy to get lost in the level on the first try. Still, all the custom enemies and approach to the available weapons is very refreshing in the modern SP scene. Download recommended!

@ShakerNL:
The webpage is supposed to refresh on a double-click at Jazz's face. However, it might not be notice-able when the webpage does refresh.

Gud SP episode; interesting story, cutscenes dun rly well. Fun lvls & bossfites. Bossfites 2 ez (in ez mode) w/ toast PU. Annoyin pits, 2 many of `em: myb mo` baddies insteada pits … Zelda-tier block puzzles; luv when blox freeze w/ ice & not defrost w/ toast. Now curious Wizard Character's full story. Imprisonment w/o explanation = hyper-realism

Pauluz is ook al oud(36) Groeten uit Eindhoven

Hi WaterRabbit! Thanks for reporting your findings!

I'm not sure what the graphical glitches could be that you are talking about. Unless it is the same case what one of my betatesters managed to trigger after dying repetitively at the final boss of the same level, in which case the layers seemed to mess up completely (but I have no idea how to reproduce that or what could be behind it), which could also be a bug with JJ2 itself. I wonder if you would be able to post a screenshot on our JJ2 Discord Server? https://discord.gg/MUqr84tp

The spring issue you mentioned in The Prisoner is almost certainly a bug with object activation/deactivation behavior in JJ2 itself. I was able to reproduce it, although it was quite random. However, I realized that it was possible to force the spring crate to spawn by going far enough to the left, so basically by climbing up the stairs and all the way to the upper fire pit and back. Anyway, I realized that not all players may realize this, so I added some extra trigger blocks to work around the issue, since I most likely don't have too much control over the object activation mechanisms.

I have only played the first few levels, but so far what I've seen has been great. The only issues I saw were minor grammatical errors and what seemed to be graphical glitches in "The Dark Land" when dying after the checkpoint with the weapon shop.

Edit: Found another bug, in "The Prisoner'. I died at one point and respawned but the box with the spring now fails to appear.

This thing plays a .GIF and nothing else. I can click all I want, nothing happens.

A decent level for a first attempt. The pits with random warps as a means to escape felt a bit strange. If it isn&amp;rsquo;t an instant-death pit, it&amp;rsquo;d be better to offer a more straightforward way to escape. Also on the subject of pits, the first part of the level has goodies placed below with little to no indication that it&amp;rsquo;s safe to go there. Then there&amp;rsquo;s some treetops that don&amp;rsquo;t make it very clear which parts are masked. A lot of the gameplay involves relatively long jumps across 1-tile wide platforms, too finicky for beginners and too basic and predictable for the JJ2 veteran. Aside from the platforming, most challenge comes from the flying enemies (both types of bee, butterfly, and dragonflies) and luckily the ammo placement to deal with them is alright. Scarce enough to not just keep firing, but enough to get the job done. There are no significant secrets aside from some partly obscured objects and a coin warp. Some crate stomping to unlock the exit and the level was over. Maybe a bit more variety, a more intuitive layout and more length can vastly improve it. But as I said earlier, it&amp;rsquo;s not bad for a first attempt, I&amp;rsquo;ve seen far worse (including my own first level).

First review in years, here we go! Bioluminescence is a fun CTF level taking place in some sort of odd jungle where super-cool-mushrooms are the focus of the level. It is incredibly platformy, and requires plenty of jumping to navigate. One of my favorite kinds of levels! My favorite part of the level is that there is an obvious path at the top of the level that takes you from base to base with no worries – but it&amp;#039;s pretty dangerous to take. You may want to reconsider that route… So to continue on our adventure, you&amp;#039;re forced to take alternative routes in this level which wind you around a maze of mushrooms. In the end, it&amp;#039;s classic fun with some cool scripting. The weapons are custom, but feel familiar. My recommendation for improvement is to put something awesome underwater. I hate going underwater in levels. I think either punishment or reward should come with it! Another suggestion is helping to differentiate one ways from regular tiles – but that&amp;#039;s a very minor thing here and there. Overall, this is a solid 8.5/10.

Thank you for sharing! Highly recommended. Sorry I didn&amp;#039;t get to play this with other people. I just played 1 player CTF. It was a good game.

Edit – PS – This is one of the most beautiful levels I&#039;ve ever seen. GREAT JOB with the background and overall eyecandy! :) :)

nice

[Not sure if you understand the rating system — 1.5 is a bad number, not a good number]

2 Town based levels that mainly follow the original JJ2 level guidelines, but more polished. Relatively scarce ammo and just a few carrots makes for a fair challenge. There are secrets and goodies everywhere, an original bonus area if you get the coins, and interesting usage of springs and collapse scenery here and there. Old but recommended!

Perfection.

Using a layout you're familiar with is a smart way to get used to a new editing tool! One thing you can try next is changing layer sizes and other layer properties, so the background sky can be the right size. You can press Ctrl+8 to edit layer 8's properties, for example. Another good thing to focus on is making sure you're using tiles that look right next to each other… most walls should look a little different on the sides than on the middle. But you've figured out how to place events and that's a good step, and the big carrots look great. I'd recommend looking through this site: https://www.ninjadodo.net/htjcs/

Also, this is a good source for JJ1 music, they're directly converted from the original files and have a much smaller filesize than mp3 versions: https://www.jazz2online.com/downloads/3151/jj1-music-pack/