Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

I promised Scizor CT that I’d review this level and be totally honest. I warned him he might not agree with some of the points a I am about to state but thought it alright if I did. Well, here goes!

Lava Lagoon has been under construction for a while. It has been worked with on and off, according to Scizor CT. Usually this happens when one has little inspiration to start off with; the level work progress is slow, and often the level doesn’t turn out very good when done, I am not totally sure why it happens like that though.

I played here recently in a 2vs2. The gameplay here is different, not greatly original. Most of the levels gameplay seems to be inspired from BBlair and Moree Mines because the layout seems to be slightly symmetrical although there are noticable differences on each side. Scizor CT borrowed a tactic from Zaitox, he put both bases near each other but not to be reached as easily which makes it very balanced, considering the layouts weird design. A shield was added Moree Mines style, which is an…Uhm unnessecary style, but not an issue which would destroy the gameplay to some extent. All you need is one or two bomb sceneries to prevent one from using obtaining the shield by shooting it.

It is a relatively large level with plently of open space in areas. Some platforms are useless and would rarely be touched by anyone in any type situation, for instance: both platforms at the upper right and upper left sides. This is one of those levels that requires you to learn to like it as there are some areas you might find annoying until you get used to them. There is a middle area not far above each base with the two skulls on each side of the walls; Coming out of a base there you might find yourself bumping up against them, they are almost like dead ends. The areas around both bases is very interesting, but the way the lava is placed there will make your eyes hurt! >< However, the gameplay in each base area makes it so that Lava Lagoon has arguably the best base placement, ever. Mainly because of a few small platforms in each base area, they are placed in ways which makes one have to navigate around them to reach the base(s), this makes each base simple to defend, but don’t worry, if you’re attacking a base, there are two routes to choose from to escape when you have the flag. The shield offers Lava Lagoon something really nice: When you’re low on health and have the shield, there’s no need to worry if anyone is at the full nrg, the two +1 carrots, the powerups, or any important place. The +1 carrots are placed at each side of the level, you obtain them only by going through sukertubes. The full nrg placement is typical, the middle not far below the shield (It’s like Scizor CT planned its placement there, for the sake of using the shield to take the carrot without any worries of taking a risk).

I’ve already mentioned that the lava at the bottom is annoying, better use low detail. Some of the “open” areas (Check out the area with the RF powerup at 86,65) may provide a certain feel to the level but many players probably won’t notice.

The ammo placement is good enough. The ammo is organized in cliched patterns though. The powerups: Toaster, Seeker and Bouncer all require you to use electroblasters to obtain them. The levels two most essential weapons, which are Electroblasters and RFs seem to be placed in the level sufficiently.

And finally, the concept, the main feature that sets Lava Lagoon apart from any other level. Hopefully this is a concept that will catch on, maybe we will see it more in the future…Nah. The concept is blowing up walls by using RFs. The +1 carrots, the shield, and even some paths yet to be opened, all require you to use RFs to clear the way and make them accessable. Most of this concept involves just ‘chewing’ up the level by blowing out little chunks out of walls etc, the reason is making the level slightly more realistic. A lazy player can blow small pieces of a wall and leave some destructable scenery behind, which can look quite ugly.

Download Lava Lagoon and make sure you play it a few times. It may bore you at first, but it’s all about its gameplay.

-fs

Out of Scizor endlessly nagging me to review this, here I go. Quick review here.

Eyecandy – Very good
The eyecandy took more time than the actually level did. In fact, the gameplay was done about a week or so before the eyecandy was done. All 8 layers are used, and there is fog (which is nicely done). Overall, the eyecandy is great.
Pros: Nicely done fog, all layers are used, great eyecandy.
Cons: Due to the massive amount of layers used, there are no clouds in the foreground.

Layout – Good / Very good
There is nothing wrong here. It’s hard at first, but once you know the level, it’s easy to get to know. For example, it’s hard to memorize that the red base is on the left in this (the blue base is usually on the left simply because most people start building their levels from the left and to the right, and the default CTF base setting is for the blue base). Nextly, the flamingos… in case you are lost and don’t know if the fountain that takes you up to the bases is to the right or left, you just look at the handy flamingos. The flamingos always point to the fountain. Third flamingo to the right, straight on till morning! Neverland!
Pros: Nice layout.
Cons: Hard to learn at first.
Ammo placement – Good / Very good
Even though Scizor probably had a nightmare not being able to put ammo on the steady light events, thus making it impossible to make long straight lines of ammo and/or large rectangles of ammo, he somehow managed to do very well in this category.
Pros: Good ammo placement.
Cons: A lot of it is limited since there were steady light events all over the place that Scizor had to work around.

Overall: Good / Very Good
Host this often: Unfortunately, I enabled my firewall, so I can’t host anymore (I’ll disable it when I’m ready to; I have my reasons for enabling it), but if I could still host, I would host.
Download reccomendation: Indeed.[This review has been edited by labratkid]

Ah, it’s finally uploaded. I spent so much time beta testing it and at the end decided to be very cruel and pointed out bugs which you probably would’nt have noticed were there. Anyways, here goes:

Gameplay: The gameplay here pretty much rux. There is a lot of camping involved (especially at the top of that “Beam me up scotty” light in the center of the level, yes the one that you use to go up). I rarely found myself crashing into things, although I occasionally did. Anyways, its good.

Layout: The level is large, but it’s fairly easy to get to know. It looks symmetrical, and sometimes gets confusing (I sometimes got mixed up where the bases are and which way to the fountain, but that’s probably my fault). Scizor attempted to fix this by making all the flamingoes in that lake face towards the fountain, and by placing the moon glass windows on the blue side and the sun glass windows on the red, and by placing red butterflies on the red side and purple on the blue. But you probably won’t notice these things until someone tells you to look for them, or until you read this review, but still he tried. Other than that, the bases are placed at seperate top corners. To get up, you need to use the fountain placed in the center. It’ll beam you up to the top, and then you’ll go left or right to whichever base you choose to go to. It may sound like the bases are close to each other, but scizor made the doors close behind you as you approach each base, so you can’t grab the flag and quickly go the opposite way to the other one to score. I quite like the layout.

Eyecandy: In my opinion, I loved it. At first, some things looked weird, but after pointing out at least 10 eyecandy bugs (most which are very small and I was just being mean and pointing them out anyways) it looked a lot better. I really love the lighting events here, and it’s my favoritest thing in this level. Plus Scizor used all the layers, thats good. There is a great deal of original eyecandy here as well, and in conclusion I loved it.

Placement of Stuff: At first it was sparce, now there is more ammo. There are 3 powerups placed on floating platforms under the last pits on each side before the bases. Spaz needs to take the fountain up then go either left or right (left=toaster, right=RF) and fall through the pit to get them. Jazz just needs to take the fountain, and before he reaches the one way, swing right or left, and helicopter ear himself and land onto the platforms. Jazz biased? yes. But there are so few levels that are better for jazz these days, that I don’t mind. If you have a problem with this, then I suggest just to use jazz in this level. There is also a bouncer powerup, which is pretty easy to find (located top middle, right after you get thrown up by the fountain). The full energy is right in the middle, and a quick way to access it would also be through the fountain, but there is a chance you’ll miss it, which isnt good. The +1’s are at opposite sides in the suckers. You’d probably not have known this until someone would of told you or until you’d accidentally stumble onto it, since there is no way of telling they are there from looking at the suckers. In my opinion, they should of been more visible.

Overall: I really like this level, not only does it look good but it plays good as well. I had 2 2vs2’s here already and I found this level pretty good to duel in. The only nuisances/bugs are that you can easily get confused, once somehow I didn’t hit the ‘Set Light’ events when I started so the lighting was all gone for me, I’m not sure if this was a glitch in jj2 or in the level. The music also ruxed, except sometimes the tempo screwed up a bit, but then it somehow self-fixed itself.

Final Rating:
Gameplay: 8.2
Layout: 8.5
Eyecandy: 9.2
Placement of stuff: 8.
Overall: 8.7
Final rating = 8.52, rounded to an 8.5. Host this often. **** yeah. Download this? Unless you’d want to miss out on a great roxor level. Great Job, and keep up the good work, sct.

I tried something different with this review. Thus, QUICKEST REVIEW EVER.

GAMEPLAY:

Here’s a nice large level with a little originality. The balance is already taken care of with the semi-symmetrical layout. The flow is Jazz-friendly—maybe too Jazz-friendly—but it’s nothing that would make me feel the need to play as Jazz. The basic idea of the layout is that players use the fountain to be beamed up to the top of the level where they either go left or right to one of the bases. The top area is a little confusing at first, but it’s easy to get used to after a while. If this level was smaller, I wouldn’t like the layout, but it does work out as it is now. In fact, everything else works out, so I’ll just stop here.

EYE CANDY:

This level has the best eye candy with this tileset that I’ve ever seen. While it is rather laggy on my outdated computer (sometimes even with Hardware Acceleration on), and some of the eye candy may be confusing at first (e.g. vine tiles were used without the vine event), I’m not even going to consider marking the rating down for that since so much effort was put into this. The theme and the atmosphere is great, and the light beam in the center of the level is a nice touch.

CARROT AND AMMO PLACEMENT:

I can’t see anything horribly wrong about the carrot placement. There’s a full energy carrot in the center of the level. There are also a +1 carrot hidden on each side, although I would prefer if I could see them. Hidden carrots are okay, though, as long as they aren’t the main carrots (like the full energy carrot is in this level). As for ammo placement, I can’t complain about it. The ammo is distributed well, and it’s the same on each side, which adds to balance. Powerup placement is also good, with the toaster powerup on the left, the RF powerup on the right, and the bouncer powerup on the top middle. Some while ago when I was playing online, the RF powerup tended not to respawn, but hopefully that’s fixed by now. That’s all I have to say.

HOST THIS OFTEN?

A whole bunch of times. Please host this instead of the same old CTF levels and, of course, hotels. I give this an 8.2 so get hosting already.

PS: The tileset used ISN’T beach. Thank you.

The Edit: Now I can see the +1 carrots. Well, it’s not the biggest change, but it’s something. It’s not enough to make me change my rating, though, and I’ll probably use the same exact strategy as before.

Another Edit: This level tends to get a bit too laggy to play in no matter what the settings are. I like it, but the lag can sometimes be unbearable. There are probably too many events in the level. I’m revising my rating to an 8. Sorry about that.[This review has been edited by BlurredD]

Very nice level, good ammo placement, only a bit small and no eyecandy, not much

It`s a good Battle level and it is the best first level i ever seen. Great job Scizor CT and you need to download this.
My rating is 7,5

I believe this is Scizors first level. Well, this is easily the best one I’ve seen.

The layout and design of this level crushes most of it’s competetion in battle levels, it’s just the right size, not too hard to learn or confusing. Not platformy like I see in most battle levels. Even a bit of strategy is involved. In short, this level has all or most of what you’d want in a battle level, layout wise. However it doesn’t give off a good first impression, the first look at this and I thought it was just an average battle level due to the eyecandy which I’ll explain later.

Gameplay/fun factor is certainly here, and like the layout, it’s better than in most battle levels, however the gameplay does take some time to get used to, you’d easily get owned no matter how good you are at JJ2 if your new to this level with a bunch of players who know this well, how ever this is a very minor aspect of this. Carrots were done well here, with 3 perfectly placed carrots, or are they? well they are certain placed in good areas, BUT 2 are hard to find due to layer 3 use, Which is why I say it’s easy to get owned here not knowing the level, and this affects the rating a little.

The ammo and powerup placement is ok, nothing really interesting to add more fun or any problems to speak of. Lack of a seeker powerup may shock some players that rely on it’s power too much, but I’ve actually had fun without it, since it has Bouncer and RF pu’s which make the game more skill-oriented. I liked the powerup placement and choice, although that’s imo, some players may not like it at all.

The eyecandy was average, this feature was the worst here, and one of the reasons why it fails to reach 8, which I believe this level deserves. The eyecandy isn’t bad, it’s just seen that a-million-times, that is, if your familiar with colonius.

originality factor is non-existant, this is also a reason why it fails to reach 8. Nothing more to discuss.

Overall, nothing really more to say here. It plays well, it’s fun, but nothing special. I’d recommend downloading it, but only if your really into battle levels, since there’s nothing really special to see, or anything original in gameplay.

-fs [This review has been edited by Fire Sword!]

I dont have enough time for a long review so a short one will have to do:
The level is kinda nice. Layout may be a bit strange and I don’t like it all that well, and at first the powerups were very difficult for me to find, so I cant imagine a new player dueling in this level who has never seen it before. Gameplay is ok. Eyecandy is also ok, nothing very new or special about it. I would say that a person who knows this level the most would have a greater advantage in a duel, due to the fact that there are no clues to where the warps and powerups are. But the level is worth checking, and Scizor improved it a lot from its original state. You should download this to see it or try it out.

Another thing I’ve noticed is that little camping is involved. For some this may be good, but for others like me who like to camp, it isnt. Where the powerups are hidden is also a dead end. You can easily be trapped in there with another player covering the exit and shooting. Though finding all the powerups was fun, I think I would of liked it better if they were in the open. To comment more on the eyecandy, it is a bit boring. Your basic colonius eyecandy, more or less. This could of easily gotten a higher rating if the eyecandy was improved a bit. As for the ammo, I find it placed ok, I usually go for the powerups cause the one who has them has the advantage. Also, about the warps. I don’t know why they are there, and there is no hint pointing to where they are located. I would of thought of them as ok if they were more efficently placed and had some hints pointing to where they are. There are several other cons in this level, but they dont damage the rating much. The level is good for a first one, and with just a little improving you can reach an 8 or a 9 with your levels. Anyways, 7 for now, and a download reccomendation. [This review has been edited by Blackraptor]

This is a great level, which improved greatly from it’s original version.

Eyecandy: Good
The eyecandy is good, all though there are a few bugs here and there. For example, you can see the bottom of a street light in the foreground (which has no bottom, due to the making of the tileset). There are a few flaws here and there, but for the most part, the eyecandy is very… interesting, and nice.

Bugs: N/A
I think you should all ways put N/A for this section with the Colonius tileset, because of the many masking bugs with the tileset. So, because of all these bugs that weren’t Scizor’s fault, I’ll say N/A.

Ammo placement: Good
Ammo placement was very nice. There were several secrets with powerups hidden in them, and other places where the ammo was regularly scattered around the level.

Replay/ fun factor: I had a lot of fun testing this with Scizor, and I bet he’ll host it on his server a lot, which is a good thing since it’s a fun and easilly traversable level.

Gameplay: Very good
Gameplay is nice. I’m not all ways too sure what gameplay actually MEANS, but if I have the right idea, it was very nice =)

Download reccomendation.