Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

When I downloaded this level pack, I thought that some of the ideas you had for the story were quite interesting, and the pack sounded quite fun. Erupting volcanos, tornadoes, floods, fights; It sounded as if the pack had all the elements. It even has an interesting (although slightly confusing) story line. Inside there are 22 levels, so you would think that this was going to be a lengthly episode.

However, when I started playing, eveything started to get very uninteresting. Most of the levels had bugs in the gameplay, and one particular example of this was the flying rocket boss, which was extreemly fustraiting and hard to complete, and in some cases doesn’t work (although that is typical of the robot boss). Also, I was forced to cheat (yes, oh the shame!) on the first Tuf boss level because the turtle shell got stuck inside the area, doing no damage to the boss no matter how many times he touched it. Several of the levels were also linear and almost all of them were too short, so the pack didn’t flow quite so well.

Several of the levels had very poor eyecandy (the tornado ones in particular), and there were tile bugs in almost all the levels.

But enough negatives and more positives. Although they were short levels, there were one or two well made levels. The lava level had a good “fall in and die concept” which was not overused, so it wasn’t too fustraiting (unlike some of your previous levels). Also, there were some logic (although they were quite easy) puzzles in there too, which shows a variety of difficulties. I also like some of the objectives you had to achieve, such as destroying bases. Also, the whole concept of a pack that uses all of the elements is quite original I think, so you have tried to be creative.

PROS:

Creative concept
Puzzles
One or two well made levels

CONS:

Too short levels
Too fustraiting in places
Very very buggy

OVERALL: Although the idea is good, I think that there is too much room for improvement to rate this highly, so overall, it is quite average.
RATING: 6.0

DR: Maybe. If the levels were better quality and there weren’t so many bugs, I would consider giving this a reccommendation.

I would like to start of by saying that this level doesn’t require JJ2+ to play. Now let us begin:

There are some things good with this level. The length of the level is good. It isn’t too short so that you complete it in second, but also, it isn’t too long. There are a good amount of enemies and goodies (although some parts contain too many blue gems), and there is a fair amount of puzzles envolving trigger crates and stuff. The level also appears to be mostly fixed in terms of eyecandy.

However, this level has a lot of room for improvement left. The level lacks originality. There isn’t anything new about it, and infact, some of the ideas were copied from the TSF easter levels. There is nothing original about the eyecandy either, which still has a few bugs in it. I don’t think the up arrow made of sparks looks very appealing. Also, the level could be more fun with a story, otherwise, you don’t know why you are playing it. The difficulty of the puzzles and secrets could be improved. They don’t require much thought. You could still do the airboard part of the level without an airboard (and it is probably much easier). Finally, the music doesn’t really suit the level.

PROS:
+ Level is a good length
+ Nice amounts of items and enemies
+ Nice amount of puzzles
+ Mostly fixed.

IMPROVEMENTS:
X Nothing original about it
X Puzzles don’t need much thought
X Eyecandy still has bugs
X Music doesn’t suit the level
X Needs a story

FINAL RATING:
Overall, this is a pretty average level. Perhaps higher, since it is improved from the old version. Because of this, I shall give this a 6.5.

RANK: 6 OK
DOWNLOAD?: This level ranks somewhere in the middle. There are houndreds of better levels out there, but you could also do a lot worse. I guess it wouldn’t hurt to download this. Have a weak Download Recommendation :)

The name ‘Bouncin’ Around’ is so called because you can bounce off the walls in this level. This level makes good use of this concept, but what about everything else?

Well, lets start with the eyecandy. Because this is a JJ1 tileset, there isn’t going to be too much to put in the foreground. Infact, there is nothing on layers 1 and 2. For the background, everything moves with the sprite layer, which makes things look as if they are all on one layer. There are some nice things to look at in the level, such as some animating waterfalls and some animating walls and belts. Infact, there are quite a few animation tiles, which makes up for the lack of foreground eyecandy.

One improvement would be to make the eyecandy more interesting. There isn’t anything impressive to look at and nothing sticks out at you.

Now, lets move on to the gameplay. Like I said before, the level makes good use of boucing around the level, which is pretty much what the level is about. There is some creativity involved, as you need to bounce to certain areas of the level to get ammo. What the auther has tried to do is use a veriety of events, such as vines and airboards. The size of the battle arena is 67×67, a small arena that can contain about 2 or 3 players.

Unfortunately, it would be quite hard to roast someone if your bouncing around in an area with loads of springs. The only place people would get roasted would be the slower areas. Also, there are too many carrots for a battle arena which is quite small, especially near the bottom of the level. That’s bad because any one hurt could run away and heal him/herself instead of being roasted.

Any other points? Errr…not really.

RATING:
In my opinion, I think that the concept of bouncing around on walls may not be the best for a battle arena. The eyecandy seems fairly average, and the level seems like nothing too special, so I give it a…6.5.

DOWNLOAD: I’m not sure. I suppose yes if you want a battle arena with lots of carrots and really classifies as quite average. You could do much much worse, but you could also do much better.

Short Review:

This version is a lot better than the previous one. The eyecandy was far better. No pixilating blocks, but still a few bugs, for instance, level 5 had a few, and where you stomp Spaz in level 1. My only point of improvment is that now you could prehaps experiment with the foreground, since I only saw backround and a little foreground eyecandy. Otherwise, great work with the JJ1 tilesets.

Gameplay has improved also. There was more gameplay in each of the arenas. The difficulty was alright, not easy, but not completely impossible either. There were more puzzles involving trigger crates, but could use a wider variety. Puzzle is either done by stomping or shooting some blocks to find a crate. If you’ve played the Hocus Pocus episode, you would find they have done combinations things with the trigger zones.

I think my previous rating may have been a 6.5. Anyways, your rating now is…

FINAL RATING: 7.0
RANK: 7 Good
DOWNLOAD: Download this if you’ve downloaded the previous version, because this one has fewer bugs. Plus, download this if you want a reasonable Boss Rush mode.

Blah blah blah…
The Review:

TEMPLE OF KARNAK:

EYECANDY:
The backround layers may not seem so appealing. Layer 8 has been covered up and layers 7 and 6 consist only of bricks. Layer 5 is a bit more interesting. You may find some flames and some light rays. However, the backround layers sort of make the sprite look good. This may be because layers 7,6,5,3 and 2 all move with layer 4. The best bit about the eyecandy is there are different zones around the level. You may end up in a room of lava or a blue room. The bad news is that the lava obscures your view, which can make you fall into the pit (I guess thats the fun really), but thats the only real problem.

Overall, the eyecandy looks really good. But the lava obscures your view.
EYECANDY RATING: 9.2

GAMEPLAY:
The gameplay was very interesting. There were loads of platforms and vines, so that you could jump everywhere. But aside from the vines and everything, this level includes some concepts that not many other battle arenas use, such as trigger zones and pits (which may become more popular later on). One of the pits is even hidden. The level also has dead ends and areas where the player could get trapped or some kind of tactic could be used using the warps. But, there is one place where if you try really hard, you could get stuck (pos 7,51)

Overall, the level is very platformy. However, uses some origional concepts such as triggers. But there is a bug at pos 7,51.
GAMEPLAY RATING: 9.0

ITEMS:
The item placement here is mixed. It’d be OK if there were a small amount of players, but there isn’t enough ammo for more than 6. Thats bad because there is enough of everything else for 6 players. The ammo placement is slightly origional. Instead of being in clusters, 80% ammo is placed on platforms. All of the ammo is placed in groups of less than 3. Another mixed thing is that in some places, there is no ammo at all. This could provide a good game strategy, but can also make the level feel empty.

Overall, not enough ammo and ammo placement a bit dodgy.
ITEM RATING: 6.0

FINAL RATING: 8.1
RANK: 8 Very Good
DOWNLOAD: Despite the item placement, this is a really good level and should be downloaded (but get carrotade first).

I’ve noticed you have no reviews for this level, so I took liberty of posting one, so here goes:

FOREIGN COUNTRY

EYECANDY:
The eyecnady in this level was actually very good (better than a lot of recent levels). Layer 8 wasn’t a sky backround that you may find in some normal levels, it was a forest backround, which pretty much fits in with the forest/garden theme in this level. The sprite layer was full of eyecandy like trees, giant plants and other wierd garden things. The foreground was the same, and also shielded the sprite layer from all the tilebugs (as did layer 5). The masking, however, was strange. There wasn’t something right about being able to go through some of the rocks. That’s mainly due to the tileset though. I also felt that there could have been more to the backround or foreground to make it feel more lively in places.

Overall, eyecandy was very good, but even more eyecandy would have been even better. Masking could have been worked on.
EYECANDY RATING: 8.5

GAMEPLAY:
The gameplay in this level included most of the stuff you would find in a normal battle. Warps, springs and some vines. There were some places in the game that offered tactics. Some of the warps could be used as escape routes. But there weren’t many challenging spots. There were no dead ends and everything was open and you could go everywhere. If a battle arena was wide open, it would be pretty easy to escape anyone trying to trap you. However, the masking problems (mentioned before) can also play tricks on someone. This could be used as a tactic and it’s quite hard to tell whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. It is quite interesting though.

Overall, the gameplay is good, but not as good as the eyecandy because there were no traps or challenges and everything was open. The ‘going through walls’ concept is quite interesting.
GAMEPLAY RATING: 6.5

ITEMS:
The items were mainly layed along the ground, although some of them were in the air. This made them quite easy to get but I suppose it’s quite origional too, since most levels have thier items suspended in mid-air. There were 3 powerups in the game, which is enough for a battle level of that size. But, there were too many FastFires. They make the level too easy and they took up the majority of the items in the level.

Overall, the item placement was different, but quite easy. Good amount of Powerups. But, there were far to many FastFires.
ITEM RATING: 7.7

FINAL RATING: 7.6
RANK: 7 Good
DOWNLOAD: It’s worth a download. The eyecandy is rather good and there are some interesting things about this level.

The race has too many hard traps and not enough shortcuts or things that speed up the race. The race is too slow paced and if you do fall into one of the traps, you get whizzed back to the start. Also, the eyecandy could be improved a bit by scanning your levels for tilebugs and prehaps fixing them, although the backround was OK and you did use the foreground.

I won’t rate this, but I certainly don’t recommend to download this.

Another Atlantis level?! However, the review:

EYECANDY:
The eyecandy has a nice use of backround layers. Layers 5,6 and 7 look like what you would see over a river of some sort. I couldn’t see complety because the water was blurring the screen. Layer 4 was quite dull. There were just different coloured blocks. No foreground was used, which makes things even more boring. Overall, nice layers 5,6 and 7. Layer 8 was blocked by the water and restricted space on layer 4, making it pointless. Layer 4 itself was dull, and no layers 1, 2 or 3 (as far as I can see).
EYECANDY RATING: 6.0…Shamefully, this is the highest eyecandy rating i’ve given out in weeks:(

GAMEPLAY:
The level here can be described in one word, boring. The concept of the entire level being underwater is quite underused, and the very few levels that use this concept are usually not great. The exact same goes for this level. All you do for the entire level is shoot fish and bump into 1 or 2 trigger crates. At the end, there is a boss. The worst thing is that there is no explination for why you are shooting loads of fish and killing the uterus boss. Without a story, the level could have been the slightest bit fun. Overall, the underwater concept is quite origional, but it’s no good if the level isn’t fun and all you are doing is shooting fish and looking for things for no reason.
GAMEPLAY RATING: 4.4

AVERAGE RATING: 5.2
RANK: 5 Average
DOWNLOAD?: I wouldn’t recommend this as a level, since it is rather boring and pointless. However, Jazz 2 doesn’t get many decent underwater levels.

Yay, 200th review! Anyways, let’s get this review over with…

SONG ANALYSIS:
Firstly, the song is maybe one of the longest songs ever on JJ2…7 minutes 20! That’s quite a long time to sit there and listen. The song is basically the JJ1 songs of the first episode squashed up into one huge song. I was expecting a combination of the three (that would be interesting and origional), but actually, all you hear is the Diamondus theme…with no edit at all. After about 1:30, you hear some shakers…than all the patterns in MPT change to 256 rows (!!). The whole Diamondus theme starts again, but this time, it’s sped up. After 3 minutes, the song suddenly changes to Tubelectric. After you’ve finished listening to that, you then sit through the Medivo song.

I like the idea of having all 3 songs put into 1, but so far, until the new version comes, you have to live with a 7 minute song with nothing interesting changed. I suppose it eliminated having to open all 3 files.

SONG RATING: 3.5

SAMPLES:
Er…the same. We’ll have to wait for the final version.
SAMPLE RATING: N/A

FINAL RATING: 3.5
RANK: 3 Very Bad
DOWNLOAD: Since this is not a full version, i’ll leave it as an N/A, but I wouldn’t sit there for 7 minutes listening to a totally un-remixed, 3 in 1 JJ1 medly that has the same samples. I would wait if there is another version.

Also, I would actually like to see a single song with all the JJ1 elements from different songs. That’s something we’ve never seen before.

Diamonds are Rocks is basically the diamondus tune converted into a rockish sort of tune. While the title indeed states a true fact about diamonds, the song is what is about to be reviewed…

SONG ANALYSIS:
The song is basically a sample change. Eigus took the origional JJ1 diamondus song and changed the samples. For the first 6 seconds of the song, it sounds quite technoish. After pattern 0, the diamondus tune is played by some rock guitars and starts to sounds more like rock. Near the end, just the drums are left playing. Eigus didn’t do anything special with this song. Apart from changing the samples, he didn’t try to re-arrange anything, add anything in or take anything out to make the song more interesting.
SONG RATING: 2.6

SAMPLES:
At first, you only have the drums and some guitar in the backround for pattern 0. The drum samples sounded like techno drums. Its after pattern 0 where everything sounds horrible. This is mainly because the guitars are out of tune with each other, which in most songs, isn’t very good. The bass was really quiet compared to the really loud guitar tune playing the melody. By the end, just the techno drums are left playing (which is quite relieving).
SAMPLE RATING: 2.2

SUMMARY:
The remix sounded quite bad mainly because nothing fitted in with each other. The song could have used some re-arranging. However, there were a couple of pleasant things. For examples on good music files, listen to high rated music files or look around the modplug website for examples of good files.

FINAL RATING: 2.4
RANK: 2 Terrible
DOWNLOAD: Er…maybe not, there are better remixes out there.

EDIT: When I listened to it again at first it sounded like Sluggion.

Well, very quick review…

EYECANDY:
The eyecnady was OK. There weren’t many bugs in the backround. Infact, more layers were used and the backround didn’t look too bad. The sprite layer however, could use some improving. There were quite a few bugs, especially near the end. Also, use foreground layers and maybe a different tileset. Standard JJ2 ones get a bit old.
EYECANDY RATING: 4.6

GAMEPLAY:
The gameplay was fustraiting. The fake floors were a VERY annoying puzzle and so were the hidden warps. There was only one type of enemies, which was rediculous because more types of enemies provide more of a challenge. The level was very short, so there weren’t enough challenges and obstacles. The fake floors applied with secrets aswell, so that made it even less of a challenge. Good stuff should be hidden.
GAMEPLAY RATING: 2.5

AVERAGE RATING: 3.5
RANK: 3 Very Bad
DOWNLOAD: Unless you want a very short, unsecret and fustraiting level, then yes. Otherwise, no.

???

Maybe with some music, it would be quite good, but so far, this isn’t.

Ischa has released a pack called The Three Seasons. Before we get into the review, I would like to suggest providing the links or telling us where to find the music. OK, now for the review:

SUMMER FOREST:
I thought the eyecandy in this level was OK. Not great though. There weren’t any problems with the eyecandy, no bugs or mask problems. However, there weren’t any particular parts of the level that were exciting or significant. Not much to say about the eyecandy, except that it was good, but not great.

The gameplay…well, there wasn’t really a lot of gameplay in the level. There were not enough enemies to make the level harder. The were only blocks used in the level. There was one trigger event, and all that was used for is getting the only type of ammo in the entire level. There wasn’t really anything to stand in the way, except some very easy obstacles. You reach the boss at the end, but if you die, you must start the level all over again, which is fustraiting. The boss its self was made harder by those funny freeze things, which is good because Bubba is a prety easy boss. There was also a Fall down and die obstacle which is one of the most fustraiting obstacles, especially when you have to type JJK.
LEVEL RATING: 5.7

AUTUMN SWAMPS:
The eyecandy is pretty much the smae in this level. No bugs, but nothing special either, except one bit of the level, where you have to be spaz and then you find yourself running along a very long branch. That banch, however, was the most appealing of all the branches of JJ2.

The gameplay in the last level was empty, but this level is even emptier. There were even less enemies and even less ammo. There were some little wind obstacles, but they were quite easy. There area couple of parts where you have to morph characters. Overall, this level was emptier.
LEVEL RATING: 5.1

WINTER GLACIER:
The eyecandy, again, was boring. OK but nothing special.

The gameplay was alot better than the previous levels. Especially at the beginning. There were more enemies, the level was alot harder and there was a nice trigger puzzle. However, there was less ammo than before and it was the most usless kind, freezing ammo. Also, the end boss may have a bug because it took a long time to appear when I got to the end, and it suddenly appeared in the middle of the level and started attacking.
LEVEL RATING: 6.4

OTHER THINGS:
Yes. Another point is that the levels were all very short. I feel that if they were longer, more gemplay could have been included. I would decrease the rating, but because of the lack of gameplay, that may have already been achived.

AVERAGE RATING: 5.7
RANK: 5 Average
DOWNLOAD: They were some average levels, but there wasn’t really anything special in the pack.

Gus thinks this level is worth a 9. Does this level deserve a 9?

EYECANDY:
The eyecandy is somewhat average. There are loads of tilebugs and masking problems, especially in the slopes. There is a slight jolt in the stairs as you go down, causing you to ‘jump’ down them, you also tend to get stuck going down one of the diving boards in the swimming pool. The ugliest parts of the hotel is the water part which you enter from room 22, because you only ever see 3 tiles until you get to the end. Another is the test in the saloon, for the same reason. However, I think the beginning bit of the hotel (the lobby) looks quite…well…hotelish. I also think the same for the rooms in the hotel, except the corridor in level 4, which was a bit too bright.
RATING: 4.5

GAMEPLAY:
The gameplay in this ‘single player hotel’ is preety much a load of puzzles…pretty fustraiting ones. The player has room number 64, where he will find some RFs and TNT to use in the swimming pool, where he will recieve another key, directing him to another room, which gives him a clue to find yet another key to another room. It goes on like this throughout the level, with little challenges along the way, until the objective is completed. But when you get to room 24 and completed the puzzle in the water thingy, you get another key, but doesn’t tell you what it unlocks. It took some time to figure out an by the time I got to the end, I was bored. There are some nice games, such as the mini-golf, that was pleasant and the player could shoot the first two holes to cure his boredome, but to pass he needed some honor card. The difficulty of the level was very easy, which added to my boredome. There were a few enemies wich you had to shoot, but you could cure you self easily because there were carrots in your room, in everyone elses room and a billion in the hospital. You could have also added regenerating enemies along the lift and stairs for a bit more of a challenge, and it would give you something to do. Overall, gameplay was boring.
RATING: 3.0

OTHER THINGS:
I would like to comment on the music. I found it rather interesting. That doesn’t affect you rating though.

AVERAGE RATING: 3.8
RANK: 3 Very Bad
DOWNLOAD: Maybe not. This may seem like just another mediocre hotel, but converted to a boring single player level.

An updated version of the Windows 98 tileset. Has it improved?

You can still be creative with this tileset because it still has the tiles from the original Windows 98 tileset. There is now more gameplay in this tileset (shooting blocks and trigger blocks have now been added in), but its still missing vines and poles. The Tubelectric tiles are quite pointless because they don’t fit in with the rest of the tileset. Overall, the tileset has only improved because it has slightly more gameplay.

RATING: 6.7
DOWNLOAD?: I still recommend this, but its only a slight change from the original.
RANK: 6 OK

I actually quite like this. You can really be creative with this tileset and its really usefull in a computer episode or something like that. And to top it off, you have TWO backrounds that you can choose from.

However, it would have been a lot better if it had the important stuff ideal for JJ2 gameplay (eg. shooting blocks, poles and more tiles that could be animated)

RATING: 6.5
DOWNLOAD?: Usually, I would give an N/A for anythiug under a 7. But this at least deserves to be used, despite the fact its missing a lot of things.
RANK: 6 OK

I’ve never seen something so esy to install. The program is so simple, so usefull and is completely bug free. It eliminates the JJ2 music restarting bug with the samples sticking just by keeping the music playing. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out how to install, infact, even a 5-year-old would find out how to install this if he knew how to unzip files. All of this uses up only 17.5KB of your memory. So small.

It is harder to turn the program off than it is to turn it on. A 5-year-old may end up deleting the file.

I don’t usually rate utilities, but this case is an exception…

RATING: 9.8
RANK: 10 Outstanding
DOWNLOAD?: Yes

Nice sense of style with the Haunted Xmas.

A christmas version of Townhouse would have been quite cheerful.

I havn’t properly reviewed anything in a while, so here goes:

EYECANDY:
Yay, a level where everythings fixed. The backround is fixed and there is eyecandy on all 8 layers. But you’re saying the place is destroyed yet Diamondus looks quite pretty, and better than Diamondus origionally should look like. And I think there is still a lot more you could do on layer 3 and with the tileset as a whole. Be creative!
RATING: 7.5

GAMEPLAY:
I found the level quite hard because there was a few too many enemies in the level. There was a decent range of enemies, as 3 to 5 different types is enough for one level, but too many. You could have also put more creative obstacles in the level, like trigger puzzles, instead of nomal obstacles, although there were some interesting bits of gameplay in the level. Another bug is that the story wasn’t very clear. Explain why certain events happen like what was Bilsy up to and why was Diamondus destroyed?. When you reach the end after what seems like 100,000 enemies, the inevitable boss is waiting for you.
RATING: 6.6

OTHERS:
In future, do NOT call your readme ‘readme’, for I have 3 other files by that name. However, this will not affect your rating, but it is annoying.

FINAL RATING: 7.0
RANK: 7 Good
DOWNLOAD: Yes

Will not rate, but I think you’ve worked very hard on this pack and it is an OK pack.

And, Ischa could really learn from this pack (FDAD Obstacles)