Review by Lark

Posted:
4 Dec 2004, 19:46 (edited 1 Sep 07, 09:38 by Cooba)
For: FSP: Rent Collection
Level rating: 9.1
Rating
N/A

Yes, all typos made by Spotty were completely intentional. If you’ve ever talked to him on MSN, you’d know. ;-)

[test edit. ignore me. ~cooba]

Review by Lark

Posted:
3 Dec 2004, 20:25
For: Energia of Tubelectricity
Level rating: 5.8
Rating
N/A

Bjarni: To update to version 1.23, download and install this file: http://www.jazz2online.com/J2Ov2/downloads/info.php?levelID=572

I apologize for being off-topic.

RecommendedReview by Lark

Posted:
28 Nov 2004, 02:00
For: Diamondus ß
Level rating: 9.2
Rating
8.8

Time to review!

In very early versions of JJ2, even before v1.00, Diamondus looked much different. Only two screenshots of the old Diamondus have been released, as well as a portion of it left in the current version of Diamondus. Pyromanus took what little resources he had and turned them into a fully usable tileset.

This tileset includes everything the original Diamondus had to offer, and more. Some of the new stuff includes ground without grass, slopes with varying angles, easier-to-work-with cave tiles, a good amount of blocks, waterfalls, and animated gems. If that wasn’t enough, Pyro went above and beyond what most tileset makers do and made event compatibility great. (This calls for a checklist!)

Textured background in 16bit – Yes! Pyromanus created a new textured background rather than using the old one. It works flawlessly.

Textured background in 8bit – Yes! Something you don’t often see these days.

Carrotus pole – Yes! Although I probably wouldn’t want to use it. It’s dark brown colored with tannish moss.

Diamondus pole – Yes! Looks great.

Jungle pole – Yes! It’s a fairly light green color, and looks better than most jungle poles you see do.

Psych pole – Yes! Looks great.

Small tree – Yes! Looks perfect.

8bit water – Yes! Looks perfect. Pyromanus even took the extra step and made the water red in the Hell version, so it looks like lava.

Snow – No… but I suppose it gets the job done. As it was in the default Diamondus sets, the snow here is green.

500 bump – Yes! Looks great, but the 500 is kind of hard to read in the night version.

Pinball paddles – Yes! They look great.

Carrot bump – Yes! I don’t like the colors all that much, but it still works.

Moving on to the masking, it is fairly flawless. The masking on the background trees is a bit jagged at parts, but I really doubt anybody’s going to use those trees in layer four anyway, so I won’t take off any points for it. Besides, the thin parts of the trees, which were the ones I thought looked a bit jagged, are meant to be one wayed anyway, so getting stuck shouldn’t be too much of a problem.

The two most major things added are animated gem stones and waterfalls. The waterfalls look magnificent, but if I were making a level with this (which I probably will), I’d probably leave the gemstones unanimated, unless the feel of the level was cartoony, or something. Naturally, a gem stone would look much more realistic if it were not moving. Nevertheless, the extra step of adding all these animated gems can only improve your rating from me.

The example levels look good, and the tile placement is very user-friendly. Pyromanus also included several palette edits, including Gardens, Night, Midnight, and Lava. The Gardens gives the set a… well… “gardenny” feeling. (if the word gardenny didn’t exist before, it does now.) The lava edit gives the tileset a Hellish feeling, a lot like the Thermal K1 edit of Carrotus. The midnight set gargantually darkens everything including sprites, while the night version takes after the classic green-on-purple night version included in the newer version of Diamondus. Rumor has it there will be another edit released in the future, too. ;-)

I suppose that should be enough. You really ought to be downloading this tileset and making a level with it, not reading my review. But thanks for reading my review anyway, even if you just skipped everything and looked at the bottom part.

-LAbRaTkiD

Review by Lark

Posted:
25 Nov 2004, 17:25
For: The GreenLand Mix
Level rating: 6.6
Rating
N/A

Well, I don’t have time for a long review, but I’d just like to say, this remix is very good, although a bit long.

Nice instrument choice, great percussion… I highly reccomend downloading this. Good job, Danyjel. :)

Review by Lark

Posted:
28 Oct 2004, 19:13
For: Diamonous
Level rating: 3.5
Rating
N/A

Jarno, this level was created for Razz Arena, a mod for Quake III Arena. I’ll tell you a secret, though, rename the .pk3 part to .zip and you can look inside and find buried treasure!

Fearofdark: This file must be a .pk3, not a .zip, or else Quake III Arena will not recognize it as a compatible file. What I was trying to say was that .pk3 files are basically just .zip files with different file extensions. You can extract them with a program such as Winzip to view the contents. Extracting this .pk3 and trying to use it with Quake III Arena, or God forbid JJ2, isn’t reccomended.

Not recommendedReview by Lark

Posted:
10 Oct 2004, 02:26
For: ALL Jazz1 Music Ever (Correcly formatted) - s3m format [Part 1]
Level rating: N/A
Rating
N/A

You included Exoticus three times, and Candion twice. I guess this is kind of useful to have on J2O, but all these files are on Monolith’s server, anyways.

Not recommendedReview by Lark

Posted:
4 Oct 2004, 19:07
For: Sparky Mix
Level rating: 5.8
Rating
N/A

I agree with AcId, it’s a good song, but I would’ve used a larger variety of instruments so it didn’t all run together.

RecommendedReview by Lark

Posted:
13 Aug 2004, 23:40
For: Apocalyptic Afterworld
Level rating: 8.3
Rating
8.3

I beta tested this, too, face.

Apocalyptic Afterworld, by Magoo, uses Mirrow’s overlooked Wisetyness tileset. The gameplay is nice. Fairly smooth flow for the most part, and the bases seem balanced enough. Some of the springs with keep x set seem to throw the flow off a bit, though. It’s hard to set them up just right, after all. The seeker powerup annoys the hood out of me, though. More specifically the sucker tubes leading to it. They seem to take too long to get there, with the warp and all. Floatups are used to help the flow in some areas as well. There are, however, some assorted areas where jumping is required, which is always good.

As always, Magoo managed to make the level look very attractive, although I don’t like how some of the bricks are translucent. I like the ambient lighting effects a lot, and the lightning in the background is nice (Xargon style). As always, though, if you’re going to have several non-tiling animations right next to eachother, you should make an extra animation with a different sync than the ones next to it. The areas where fire is placed in a horizontal line look kind of unnatural. Layer 6 and 7.. well, confuse me. There’s some ground soil and trees in layer 6, while in layer 7, there are metal platforms which are much bigger than the soil.

The ammo placement is good enough. The thing that caught my eye about it was how Magoo made nice designs with it; for example, a cross made out of toaster ammo.

As for the other stuff in the level… well, I personally think that the music isn’t all that good, nor fitting. It also has an invalid next level setting. It tries to loop to Apocalyptic Afterworld.j2l, but there’s no such thing.

Overall, this level gets an 8.3 and a download reccomendation.

RecommendedReview by Lark

Posted:
13 Aug 2004, 21:51
For: Escape from Nippius
Level rating: 8.3
Rating
8.3

I’m just going to take my review from my newspost and put it here.

The first custom JJ1 level ever released is finally here. Violet CLM’s Escape from Nippius starts you out in a room with several other green rabbits with big guns. There are some extremely original things in this level. I’ve never seen anything like some of this. Walls that shoot blaster shots at you, birds that fly freely for eyecandy, teleporters, and more inhabit this level. There’s even a custom end boss, more specifically a snowman with jumping capabilities.

The gameplay plays a lot like the default JJ1 levels, so there aren’t too many problems here. The eyecandy is very nice as well. There are some very clever things done with it. I especially enjoyed the translucency effect with the ice crystals.

My only complaint with this level is that I would’ve liked if it were a little bit longer. I highly recommend this level to anyone with JJ1 whose looking for a new level to play. It’s well worth the download. I want to warn you, though, this level is extremely difficult. It might even be a little bit harder than Orbitus 2, or Raneforus 2. In any case, that’s the way JJ1 levels should be. The harder the better.

Review by Lark

Posted:
13 Aug 2004, 19:23
For: Green Hare Down
Level rating: 8.7
Rating
N/A

Some people got out of memory errors when beta testing, too. I never had a problem myself, though. Just close JJ2 and then open it again, and see if that works. It’s a big level – 425×64.

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: Zappo Egypt
Level rating: 1
Rating
N/A

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!!

This level has the honor of recieving my 500th review! I chose this level to review simply because I was in no mood to write out a long review. (July 4th, 2004).

Anyway, this level shows no effort whatsoever. Anyone who has played it would know. It’s a very classic level, right up there with Voldard’s Cool Treasure Jungle. Download reccomendation just to laugh at how dumb this level is. The level is simply just a bunch of random tiles put down. You get stuck a lot, and it has no signs of gameplay at all.[This review has been edited by labratkid]
(Size reduction due to table break. ~Violet)

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: DaLevel
Level rating: 6.5
Rating
6.5

NON PROOFREAD REVIEW ALERT!!!

Not a bad level at all. I’m going to mash all the reviewing areas together this time. All people usually really care about is gameplay and eyecandy, anyway.

————————————————————
Gameplay – Decent
————————————————————
Not bad at all. The flow is good enough, although there are one or two bugs here and there, and the level seems to work nicely for the most part. One of my biggest complaints is that the sucker tubes are extremely slow. It’d be nice if they were sped up a bit. I usually use a speed of 10 (or -10) minimum. Setting it to 10 makes it transport people exactly as fast as Jazz and Spaz can run at full speed. Another complaint is that the level seems very, very crampt (or is it cramped? Either way). It’s also kind of evil when you put a slope leading to a 90 degree angle (more specifically, a wall), and the wall has a floor right above it. It’d be much more convinient if you just stuck with one slope in those places, or perhaps even experimented with a floatup event. Position 45, 32 is one example of a place like this that bothers me. Another bothersome place is position 31, 28. A jagged edge like that makes you prone to getting stuck, and a one way event on the ledge hanging out there would be nice, anyway. Same with position 15, 23, but a one way event wouldn’t quite work there. Right in that area, first of all, there’s a jagged edge, and second of all, it’s very inconvinient for Jazz, who has to uppercut to get up to the ledge above there. Also, the whole bottom part of the level just annoys me. It’s confusing, evil, and it just annoys me.
————————————————————
Pros: Decent flow, gets the job done.

Cons: Not too much space, some issues, Spaz biased.
————————————————————
Eyecandy – Poor
————————————————————
The level’s appearance is lacking to begin with, but a lot of parts are just downright confusing. Some of the bricks that are meant for layer four are used in layer four, while others are used in layer five, to make up caves of some sort. While this is original and all, it’s confusing when you want to know what’s in layer four and what’s in layer five (in other words, what can be walked through and what can not). Many of the brick tiles are misused, too. Many of the edges of blocks of bricks don’t have the proper edge tiles, i.e. The waterfalls in the foreground are annoying, and get in the way. The background is very, very ugly. The level also suffers from upwards rain syndrome. When you jump, or are moving up for any other reason (sucker tubes, etc.), the rain (if it is rain) moves up as well. I’m not sure if it’s supposed to be rain, so I won’t take off anything. Oh, and I almost forgot the text events… they’re EXTREMELY annoying. Almost anywhere you go, there’s another text event that pops up on your screen. I usually limit my levels to a secret text event that says some inside joke or another, a credits text event, and a hidden text event saying who beta tested the level. I put the Vanish setting on all of them, so they can only be viewed once by each person until the level is reset.
————————————————————
Pros: I’ve seen worse.
Cons: Ugly, confusing, and full of irrelevant text events.
————————————————————
Overall – Not bad
————————————————————
This level isn’t bad at all. It’s not the best sized level there is, and it’s very ugly, but the gameplay is pretty decent. I wouldn’t host this or anything, but it’s not bad. No big download reccomendation, but it’s not something I would stay away from.
————————————————————
Pros: Decent.
Cons: Not all that good.
————————————————————[This review has been edited by labratkid]

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: 2 Unoriginal Levels
Level rating: 8
Rating
N/A

These are awesome, make more levels. My number one suggestion is to not put so much confusing eyecandy in the foreground. Some savepoints would also be nice.

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: Duke Nukem 2 (Jail tileset)
Level rating: 8.3
Rating
N/A

R3ptile, you can see the background I used in the example level several times. In the level there are occasional “splits” in the bricks where you can see layer 8 through them. Also, putting the black tiles in layer 8 would make it so they were all unmasked, and would possibly mess up the level. Feel free to look at my level in JCS if you need help; there’s no password.

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: Operation: Kick Shell MOD (use at own risk)
Level rating: N/A
Rating
N/A

Mods can not be created without a source code. This isn’t a mod.

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: Chrysilis MIDI
Level rating: 8.1
Rating
9.2

This is simply amazing… it’s seriously just about PERFECT. The only part that dissapointed me is that there are no ‘slides’ in it, but AFAIK, .mid’s can’t do slides. With that behind, this is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever heard, especially considering the author is young.

There isn’t exactly all that much to say about this, as it’s a song, and I can’t really think of anything that’s bad about it, so I’m just gonna go with a short review. This 9.2 I’m giving this might even be underrating.

Download reccomendation: You bet.

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: JJ1: Jungrock
Level rating: 8.5
Rating
N/A

Hmm… all these Crysilis requests. Spaztic wanted me to do Crisilis as well. I just might try it some time in the near future.

I’ll edit this review for commenting on future reviews on this.

Comments on Violet’s and Blacky’s reviews:
I was originally going to do the sucker tubes similar to the way CelL did them in his conversion, but I felt that if I did, it’d be way too unoriginal, so I experimenting by using simple gradients for tubes.[This review has been edited by labratkid]

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: RAWK! (JJ2 edition!)
Level rating: N/A
Rating
N/A

Take the parentheses (the (‘s and the )’s) out of the filename of this and it will be downloadable. Only use numbers and letters, just to be safe.

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: Crysilis (Sapphire Remix)
Level rating: 8.3
Rating
8

I’m just gonna write a short review due to lack of time, will, and nobody writes long reviews for music, anyway, for the most part.

Although this is more of an instrument change than a remix, it’s one of the best instrument changes I’ve ever heard and I give it a huge downloaded reccomendation.

The only part I dislike is the instrument choice for the replacement of the slapbass instrument (or whatever instrument it was). The two main melody instruments are awesome.

I plan to use this in a level some day. Extremely rux.

Edit: Aah, I didn’t notice, this is MP3 format! =| I feel bad taking off points for that, so I’ll just leave my rating how it is.[This review has been edited by labratkid]

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 20 years ago
For: Molten Meateor
Level rating: 3.5
Rating
3.5

When I first started this level, I found myself in a poorly done room with lots of text events that were hard to read. The grammar in them also needs work. For five minutes, I tried to figure out how the heck I start this level. Then I found out that there’s a warp to the right of the wind tunnel you’re spit out of when you go through a warp in the top left corner of the room you start in that you can only access by buttstomping. It’s not easy to do, either. After that, you’re taken to a foggy room that has all the powerups, a bunch of goodies (including a gem ring, which is bad), and even a light shield. They all respawn in 5 seconds.

Finally, you’re taken to the main fight room. It’s plastered with lots of shields, ammo, and things in layer 3. There are also lots of text events. I found myself putting on low detail because the eyecandy was so dense, I could barely see myself. The eyecandy isn’t all that bad, but it’ s too darn crowded.

There are so many shields in the level, I never found myself without a shield while playing this level. The level’s pretty Spaz biased, and very difficult to get around in. One good thing is that the level is big, but big isn’t always good. The layout is too poor to be able to say that this level’s size is a good thing.

I’m going to make an attempt to review ten things. I have about 490 reviews and 500 is a sxier number than 400.

My rating for this is 3.5 and no download reccomendation. Next time use an easier tileset. 7th Lava Fall is unreasonably difficult to use, and when it’s not in the hands of an expert (cough BlurredD), it probably won’t look all that good.

I always suggest to JCS beginners to use tilesets like Diamondus, Carrotus, or Castle. Tilesets that are easy to use and still look nice, basically.

Oh, and please ignore any spelling errors in my review. ;(

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