Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Hmm…I pretty much know these tricks already, didn’t know the first one, but that was flawed anyway. Though i already knew about the second thing. Well, I got to it. I think Lori is pretty cool, just having the lack of a high jump can mean that she can’t pass some custom made SP levels. And some high places, in MP, will require running and jumping from somewhere, which takes more time. Copter ears aren’t generally considered as useful in MP by some people.

But, I know some more tricks!

Wallhax. Or wallkick, doesn’t really have an actual name, tiles 16 pixels wide or thinner can be kicked through with Lori, though you need to kick at a certain place. You can also kick through 1 tile warps with it too.

Also, if a thin wall has an item beside it 1 tile above, you can stand at the corner, or kick at it, and you will get the item.

If the floor isn’t too long, and a spring is blocking you in the way, you can kick through it. I actually found this out in lazily made JB levels.

EDIT: Just fixed a mistake.

I’m too lazy to properly review this, so here’s a quick rating of 7.8…that’s almost 8. It’s pretty balanced, though I find the side C’s a bit too easy to defend (in 2v2s at least), turrets almost always cause airs (and yes, I know when you put them there you didn’t know that back then). Still it’s pretty decent.

So anyway, I can’t seem to find any proper reviews on this, just at least some rather poor reviews and one with some suggestions. And I don’t wanna sound like a mod, but Kimo, was there really any point just posting a “review” of just complementing someones review? (Or by at least being sarcastic or whatever, doesn’t really matter).

Anyway, lets (I will) get to reviewing.

Layout
It’s okay… There’s some rather annoying parts in this level though, such as this. I bumped into it several times by mistake. This has not just happened to me, but others too Let me ask, why is it even there?

Also, I really think you should get rid of these “tree tunnels” and just make this part open with a spring perhaps. It just feels a bit too cramped here, you know.

Sorry about JPG, I saved in that file by mistake.
On the good side of this level, there are no deadends.
6.9/10

Gameplay
The flow itself can be a bit “stiff”, if you don’t know what I mean, it can be a little hard to move around, and is easy to get stuck on the corner when you try to get in the warp. Add two float-ups on each side of it. Hopefully you’ll know what I mean, since there’s only one warp in this lvl. There’s several other annoying little corners to get stuck on while running across that you have to jump at, which where easily float-ups could’ve just been put there. And why isn’t there a one-way here? I have to move to the right all the time…

Ammo placements are fine, though I personally find powered seekers a bit overpowering here. You could pretty much win entirely with them. Replace it with a toaster PU or something.
The float-ups near below the vines can be annoying. When I get up to the vine from the float-up, I can’t get down from it and have to move left…I don’t really understand why you only added float ups to the very right.
I’ll agree with Anubis that it would be nice to have a green spring near the blaster PU instead. Others think this would be a good idea too. I played this level in team battle twice.
6.8/10

Eyecandy
The eyecandy is pretty decent. Some layer 2 eyecandy would be nice (but remember make sure layer 2 eyecandy doesn’t cover too much of the player nor too distracting). One thing, while may not necessarily be eyecandy related, is moreof something that annoys me about the tileset pallete is that it makes hearts hard to see on the screen. Which is very important to know in gamemodes with health (which is pretty much the majority of them).
8/10

Music
Uh…sorry man, but the music doesn’t really fit the feeling of the level so much. The tune may be alright, but it can be a bit distracting at times. I was thinking maybe a kind of dramatic jungle-themed tune would fit nicely. If you could ever find one, that is.
6.5/10

Functionality
Some reviewing idea I have. Functionality doesn’t get a rating, it just tells how well I think what character works with the level. So anyway, I know by the looks of this level would probably work best with Spaz, but I was too lazy to switch and pretty much played with Lori. Her kick seems to do the job, though copter ears don’t have much use in this level. Even though I haven’t played with Jazz, I don’t really see much use with uppercut here. Ah well I barely use him as much as I used to anyway. As for Spaz, double jump probably can help to get to some places faster along with some RF trick probably (haven’t used it yet though so I can’t confirm it). For his kick…eh well nothing too special here. RF kicks are, and have always been risky anyway.

If at least some suggestions were applied to this level, I would perhaps rate this a little higher and possibly a download reccomendation. For now…I wouldn’t say it’s not not to download it but I wouldn’t recommdend to download it either. Just see for yourself I guess.

Overall rating: 7.0/10

Too lazy to proper review, but I’ll kind of agree with Minmay here…it’s very repetitive. Most of the levels feel the same too much and some last too short. It is a nice and somewhat original concept though, I might do my own one, which should hopefully be better than this. The frog filter could be better imo.

I’m going to be honest here, Narsists review isn’t very useful…so anyway I’ll try and give some useful suggestions. I know, lots of text but this may help others on making battle levels too.

Layout: It feels very boxed-in. Seems like you wasted a lot of space…more than you actually needed when you look in lvl preview. Not sure if you know this, but you can right-click, then properties to change the layer size. In this case to change layer 4 size. Try and not start a a box and instead, start making from the left/right corner or middle of the lvl. Draw the map on paper first if it helps. On the other hand, the layout feels quite empty in some places, at least there aren’t really any major deadends, but I could see a lot of improvement. This pretty much applies to the first and third lvl about the rather empty parts.
5/10

Placements: Honestly…I really see no point of those V-poles. You can easily skip over them, and are quite annoying events and should only be used for worthy items or major shortcuts. (I mean like strong PUs, gold coins, Full C’s and such, but even though there isn’t any full C’s in your lvl, just don’t use them in battle). Some of the ammo placements are okay, I see you improved the lvls a little bit by adding some more different types of ammo in previously empty areas, but the ice feels unecessary which is only worth being in levels if there’s pits or access to goodies using them. Pepper might be a better choice to replace them. But some ammo placements do feel a bit random. When placing ammo (I don’t mean the PUs yet) try and think, “If I place those, will it help according to the situation but not be too campy either?”. Lastly, as for PUs errr…I don’t know exactly what to say, though maybe having two powerful PUs would be interesting, or at least just some other kind of other useful powerup, but make sure they don’t overpower the level. The levels seem to really lack in carrots and it seems you were aiming at least one of the levels to be able to recover in, llke only one of them has like one normal C…. you’ve got to be kidding me. And it’s placed a bit too close to the seeker powerup which is one of the most powerful weapons in the game, try and make the C a little bit more difficult to get, and perhaps add another one somewhere else in the level. As for the other two levels about having no C’s, I’ll leave that to decide for yourself if you do want to add any.
4.8/10

Eyecandy: There really isn’t so much you can do with this tileset to make it look really pretty, but at the moment this level really feels like a cave. Take off a lot of those bakground (layer 5) tiles off. Maybe you could make the layer 5 tiles to look a bit more “patterned”….not so sure how to explain exactly. They could do with some foreground eyecandy too.. Layer 4 eyecandy is fine. I also spotted a tilebug at the very right corner of the third battle level.
4.5/10

Gameplay: I have to admit I haven’t really played this map yet after a bit of adding more ammo and stuff.
N/A/10

Music: It’s default castle music, nothing much else to say. Used a lot, but I’ll just leave this bit at N/A.
N/A/10

If you haven’t yet, try and look at some other “serious” battle maps out there other than b1, b2 and b3. Promise me, you’ll find much better examples of battle levels out there.

Should you download this? Meh, not really.

Well, since this level has been updated since PurpleJazz reviewed it, I think I’ll give this a proper review of my own. Yeah, I do think I kind of overrated this level myself, mind you, I was half asleep when I had given it an 8.5.

Layout:
The layout is okay, however, the flow can feel a bit strange. Let’s take the bottom area for example. I just find it a bit blocky, sometimes accidently bumping into them, or maybe I just think it looks a bit ugly, wheras it could be better off as slopes, but not too steep though. As for the top area, it’s decent, I just can’t quite put my finger on how to describe it. Personally I don’t mind open maps that much myself as long as they don’t feel like some kind of big cave.

Placements:
They’re pretty decent, I don’t think I really have anything about to complain about here, except that red gets more of an advantage of being able to get the C’s more safely. There isn’t too much or too little ammo which is a pretty good thing. Though near blue base it kind of lacks a selection in ammo.

Eyecandy:
The eyecandy is pretty functional, it has foreground and background eyecandy that isn’t really distracting. However, there’s nothing really in particular which makes it stand out from other levels which uses this tileset. Also, there’s a tilebug I thought you would’ve fixed by now.

Gameplay:
I think this is one of the more balanced vertical CTF maps out there. However, aside from what I said about the C placements, red base does have a little more defence too. Generally, this level is pretty fast paced, it can get chaotic though. I personally think this level is fine for duels and 2v2s. 3v3s can be a bit too much sometimes. The right C can be annoying when shot down to the bottom right corner, I either have to buttstomp or use toaster. Still, I find this map pretty fun.

Music:
Although it’s been used before, it still fits the level well. It can get a bit boring after hearing it a lot though.

Functionality:
While Spaz seems to work best in this level with being able to get up some parts faster, but Lori and Jazz aren’t that bad either. As for sidekick (Spaz’s or Lori’s) and uppercut, it kind of depends on the situation you’re in.

Reguarding how this was judged in the duel map contest, I think Sterile CTF (another vertical CTF map which I personally find a bit overrated) was way more red biased than this, yet that was never complained about. Also, I found it odd how it was complained about possibly being “too big” for duels…yet the 1st 2 maps that won are a bit bigger than this. I somewhat understand why it didn’t win, I didn’t completely expect for this to win anyway. I think my taste in maps have kind of changed over the many months. I can understand why people can find this map a bit annoying, but you should at least still give it a try.

Overall rating: 7.7/10

Maybe it’s just me, but I think I’ve seen this done before- no wait, it HAS. Can’t remember their name, but I do remember seeing a Super Mario tileset done before. And it’s pretty over-rated. Seems to lack in some things too. Come on I want a SR tileset convers-brick’d-.

Something seems to be annoying me lately….why is it when some unpopular level maker makes a decent level, no one reviews it. It seems like you actually have to ASK others to review your level. Then some beginner makes some crap SP level, everyone goes at it. Come on guys, start reviewing some lesser known decent levels. Then some popular level maker makes some rather average level…and quick ratings of 7 to 8 are generally given. I’ll admit I’m maybe kind of guilty of it too. But I do have a few suggestions, some flaws I found no one pointed out and some of my own personal opinions.

Out of some other custom SP levels I have played, I’ve played even worse.

Eyecandy:
I’ll agree with Minmay here, layer 4 was good, but you should’ve tried working on the rest. I mean, the BG is really boring to look at. As Sonicnathan said, it’s just one tile repeated over again.
4/10

Gameplay:

Pretty bland. Really easy to dodge the majority of enemies just by jumping over them. Only a very few enemy placements seemed alright, such as some of the bat/dragon placements. Lots of running. Sonicnathan pretty much said everything else I was going to say. Oh and you can actually reach the coin warp without coins. Just use Spaz, golden-jump, then shoot RF at the climax of your jump. I’d think I’d rather do that over collecting coins really, at least gives some kind of challenge. Err…
3/10

Layout:

It’s rather linear, you can pretty much jump over the hurt spikes easily without even going to have to go on the vine thing. And that one unecessary alternate path which leads you back to one part. What do I need this for? (I’m talking about where you buttstomp to choose your path).
3/10

Music:
It may fit, but it’s default like I hear in the other 1000 generic castle levels out there. Nothing special. One of the fewer people who isn’t so keen on the tune really. Because it’s so overused I’ll just rate this a…
4/10

Storyline:
There isnt any.
N/A/10

Anyway, I think the standard SP levels are okay, but there are probably, I mean is better examples of SP levels out there now. That to be said I’m not really a big SP person though.

Overall
3/10

Lol 9.5? No offense, but this lvl is rather over-rated. I know you “lost your motivation”, but there could’ve been much more done to make it better. You could’ve worked on it on the next few months maybe…(well, I have a battle lvl I’ve been really lazy about working on, but it’s taken sooo many months, possibly even more than 6 because I’ve been so lazy about it) The layout is fine, but ammo is seriously lacking in some places. My advice is spread out the ammo a bit more- like put some of them in a path evening out or something so you can collect them on your way, or maybe add some more around the rather empty areas.
I understand that you dislike lvls where you just shoot as much as possible, but this is seriously lacking ammo in some places…it’s not even funny and makes it look rather unfinished.
And I’m going to be honest here, but I was never really a fan of this tileset. It’s kind of hard to see what’s going on in it, and a bit too dull for my tastes, you don’t really need to change the tileset to improve it, I’d just really like it more if you added more ammo in some kind of way. As for music, the music is fine.
I’ll leave this at N/A because maybe one day you’ll finish it off. And because this wasn’t really a proper review…

EDIT: ROFL this is featured! I have better reviews out there, this one sucks compared to the most of my other reviews. Btw took out the bit on asking how to get blaster and seek PU.

This lvl is freaking bugged. And broken.
I’ve used both 1.23 and 1.24 plus, still crashes on me. I can only just play the lvl with Jazz, until i get to the upper part and jump it just crashes. Also, you forgot the music file. Random ammo placements, seriously unecessary ice PU, don’t leave the left edge of lvl open, or people can stick to the side there and cannot get shot. Really bland lvl design. Also, how the heck am I supposed to get up. I mean the upper part. Theres no spring, and if you added a warp to get up there…thats just lame. Don’t download this until it gets fixed and improved. You even made the lvl passworded which is really unecessary for battle lvls. I could’ve improved and fixed on it for you. For test and sp/coop lvls I could understand though. Who would want to steal this crap? It’s unplayable. I think you have a newer fixed version though…if you do, please upload it so I can review over this.

Wow…no wonder no one wants to review this. And it doesn’t even look like you even beta tested it yourself. I had to cheat to get past one of the warps. ALWAYS test your maps first before putting them up for download! Not to mention, I can skip a part of the level easily and the pit doesn’t even work at all.

Eyecandy: Overused tileset (that to be said it doesn’t mean it would make it any better even if you used another tileset because you don’t even know how to make a layout properly), repeating backgrounds, bad use of tiles, not to mention it just looks like those kind of levels anyone could make in 5 minutes. 1.5/10

Gameplay: Hmm…lets see, some random boulder at the start, skip a part, come across a boss, then some warps….get stuck. Great. Just great. I couldn’t even finish level, what the hell is going on? You can skip so many things…I even killed the boss, then suddenly came back to it again. It also seems to be one of those kind of bad single player levels which can be completed in 15 seconds or so, then some boss slapped in just to make it longer. Thats way too short, and adding a boss to a really short level isn’t going to make it any better. 1.5/10

Placements: I sort of said this in the gameplay. I get stuck in one of the warps, some random boulder which is super easy to avoid, then some boss you could skip with Spaz perhaps and come back to it again….wait. a moment, wouldn’t I be going through a neverending cycle of defeating the boss? Warp flaws too. There’s no ammo at all, which makes the gameplay even more bland. 1.5/10

Music: Since it’s the default music put into the tileset it has been with, it doesn’t really make the level any better. I’ll leave this part at N/A. N/A/10

Overall rating: This level has so many design flaws, it’s certainly not worth even downloading it at all. Bad layout, bad gameplay…you get the point. 2/10

Aww, I liked your remixes…would be cool if you made a funk remix of bonus3, though. But, oh well. Too lazy to properly review this. Lol I downloaded this first. I was like =DDD when I saw this showed up.

Well, it looks like we have some new JCSer here…and oh, you’re not excpecting to get high ratings from me, welcome to the world of critics – maybe you could learn something good from them. And honestly, who DOES actually like this level? You didn’t even include the tileset with the download. Sure, this may be your first level, but you should look at some other user-made battle levels that actually have a decent rating. And don’t be afraid to ask someone else who has used JCS on advice how to make the eyecandy better. That is- fixing the background.

Eyecandy: Good tileset, but not used very well. You didn’t really put much of an interesting range of the other tiles available to make it look more well thought out…5/10

Gameplay: Because I can’t host myself, I can’t exactly say what it is like to play online, but it would probably be like a total n00b battle. All you would probably need to do is run around, shooting around everywhere with a shield, and perhaps even chasing them down with them…oh but WAIT! There is LOADSA shields! Great to keep the newbs happy, because you learn no actual useful strategy whatsoever! Ohhh, it’s spaz based too (I was never a fan of Spaz bias)….but there’s nothing creative much about how the way it’s been done. Just tiles higher than usual. 2/10

Layout: What…the hell. They are seriously random, in a bad way. I could go on about them forever. And don’t add TNT in battle levels, most of the time people don’t even set TNT damage in their server, so all they do is tick people off with auto-change. Plus, there is WAYYY too many full c’s, like 3 or 4! The level isn’t even that big itself. Replace them with normal C’s, and don’t put them so close to each other in one room. And the secrets? What, oh come on, they are so easy to find, even a chimp chewing on it’s own toenails could find most of them easily. As I said there are wayy to many shields, also very easy to get, and some placed so close to each other. And an ice PU? Why two placed so close to each other? 1.5/10

Music: Ah, just a new idea which popped out of my head. The music…is pretty good but doesn’t fit the feeling of the planet Saturn. I’m sure you will find some more spacey-themed music….6/10

Overall rating: 2/10. Don’t download this, unless you want to truly discover how bad this level actually is. You would probably say just about the exact same from me if you even tried to properly review it yourself. Wasting time downloading bad levels and reviewing them before anyone else, so you don’t have to. – TreyLina