Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Another CTF level. My wish came true. Too bad it’s more like a battle level with two bases in it.

GAMEPLAY:

Basically better off as a battle level. For a CTF level, it has no balance and it lacks some flow. Hurt events in an MP level: a horrible idea. You should get rid of those, it doesn’t help the gameplay at all. In the level it says it’s not finished. I could only hope so since it could use a lot more work.

EYE CANDY:

Below average. The level looks dull, like with the lava at the bottom. Needs improvement. Use the background layers.

CARROT AND AMMO PLACEMENT:

In one word, horrible. A bunch of +1 carrots placed unevenly in the level. It’s like a Colonius Wars (capture2)nightmare. The ammo placement isn’t good for almost any level. And you used the same powerups more than once. Don’t do that. Try a more even distribution of ammo next time. And use one or two full energy carrots instead of all of those +1 carrots.

HOST THIS OFTEN?

Not unless you like playing in levels that are below average. This looks like a 5.2 to me.

One other thing: if you’re going to make a CTF level, avoid putting “battle” in the name. And don’t make levels that suppose to be playable in CTF and Battle. That’s never a good idea. Either it’s one or the other.

Unfortunately for you, I’m in a reviewing mood today. Basically not that great of a level:

GAMEPLAY:

It’s good in some areas of the level, but improvement is need in others. You put some obstacles in it; I don’t know why but it takes away from gameplay. Maybe too many springs. I don’t really know, it’s something though. Maybe get rid of the coin warp in the bouncer powerup room. Or not, it’s your choice. And is there a real purpose for using a frozen spring? It’s not really worth going out of the way to unfreeze to get some measly ammo.

EYE CANDY:

I would say it’s good, except the leaves look too squared off in places. And some of the leaves you put in the 3rd layer add some confusion. And what’s with the transparent tiles in the trees? That’s not going to help your rating. You should have just made it the way Agama did. Everything else seems OK.

CARROT AND AMMO PLACEMENT:

This is what hurts your rating the most. Is there only one carrot that I can access? It’s not even a full energy carrot. I might have missed something when I was playing in the level, but this is what seems to be true. And the ammo: small patches of ammo in almost random places. And you managed to use ice and TNT (the two least usefull weapons in most CTF levels). You probably want to stay away from those unless they’re absolutely needed in the level. I suppose you could leave the TNT in since you could use it to get the toaster powerups (you should have used just one instead of two), but that’s about it. Oh, and I hope you don’t mind that I can get the bouncer powerup without the warp, but I guess it won’t make the greatest difference.

HOST THIS OFTEN?

You decide for yourself. I probably won’t host it. I’ll give a 7.2 for the level.

One more question: Why didn’t you make the last Dark Forest level loop back to the first level? You should consider fixing that.

You said this was suppose to be like Blood Bunny’s Lair, right? It’s not as good, but it’s decent.

GAMEPLAY:

You tried modeling the level after BBlair and yet failed somewhere. It’s good enough, but still could be better. For starters BBlair had more warps in it and a little more balance. Maybe some more springs could help with the gameplay; the layout seems a little spaz-biased in places. Try avoiding long areas of flatness (like at the top), especially those without any ammo or anything. It’s almost pointless. You could have also tried checking the masks. There were a few masking errors like at 49,46 and 118,21. They’re small so I guess you could ignore them, but my advice is to always check the masking in the level.

EYE CANDY:

Average. Nothing else to say here.

CARROT AND AMMO PLACEMENT:

The carrot placement is… somewhere between good and bad. The full energy carrot near the top is placed alright, but the one near the bottom seems almost impossible for Jazz to get (except maybe with electro blaster). The ammo placement is… I don’t really know. It’s either in a rectagle shape or in a straight line. Go figure. I have just one question: Am I suppose to be able to get the toaster powerup without the coin warp? Because if I’m not, you should probably fix that.

HOST THIS OFTEN?

Maybe like once. Nothing too special. A 6.7 for this level.

I hate to have to do this, but this is definately not a 9. Here’s what I think of this pack:

GAMEPLAY:

Almost every level in this pack has either average gameplay or possibly worse. They’re all kinda boring and not too original. The levels which use Disguise’s earlier tilesets I’m not too fond of. The only level I kinda like the gameplay in is Hazardous Space, except for the turret you placed at the red base; it gets annoying. Some of these levels could be more spacious in places. Others could use fewer platforms. And some levels are confusing, like IronCTF.

Some advice: Try using faster tubes; slow tubes take away from the gameplay. And you should try to make multiple routes to and from the bases. Also, I never really thought placing one base a lot higher than the other was a good idea (since it tends to complicate gameplay), but that’s just my opinion.

EYE CANDY:

It’s alright, but not great. Stay away from excessive foreground (like in SewageCTF). Maybe you should consider using textured backgrounds in your levels in the future because it makes some levels look rather dull.

CARROT AND AMMO PLACEMENT:

Some ammo in some places: not a good combination. And I’m not too crazy about +1 carrots, but you did include full energy carrots and they have generally good placement so that’s OK.

HOST THIS OFTEN?

Nah, needs work. But has potential. I’ll give this a 7 for the effort.[This review has been edited by BlurredD]

I forgot to mention this in the description: I know they they are Ground Force levels (I forgot to credit ET for the concept, too). “Survivor” was originally suppose to be the name of the pack of Ground Force levels I made. But eventually, everyone started to call the concept Survivor and making “Survivor levels”. (I can’t help it if “Survivor” is more catchy than “Ground Force”). So technically, Survivor is the 20 Ground Force levels I made, not the name of ET’s concept.

Anyway, for those who deemed some of my levels as “unoriginal”, I couldn’t help it. For the first several levels, I was just trying to make some decent Ground Force levels. I can’t help it if each and every level I made in the pack is not completely different from another one.

I’m a little surprised by how some of you reacted to several of my levels. I probably should have explained the strategy I wanted to be used in each of them. Like with Uncharted Territory and An Insidious Illusion 2, I wanted it so that when you shoot the tiles with pepper spray, you can barely see them disappear, thus giving an opponent on top of these almost no time to react. And with Tower of Death, I had to make it the way it was because if I used too many tiles, the level wouldn’t work the way I wanted it to, plus I wanted it easy enough to get to the top when there’s a lot of people playing in it. I know you can go to the top pretty quickly, which is part of the reason I added ammo (it’s also suppose to be a distraction). I figured instead of just going to the top and waiting for others, you could just shoot tiles and make it impossible for anyone else to get all the way up.

As for other things mention, it seems that you can’t play as Lori in TSF (from my short 5-second test). And DaThunderPX, if you go to the top-left at the start too fast before you stop flashing, you won’t get the coin and/or hit the crate that closes off the room. You have to use good timing so that no one else can go there, too.[This review has been edited by BlurredD]

I generally liked this level pack, except maybe for Ext-Morse, Deep-Rage, and ForceDraw. Some of the eye-candy is mediocre, but most of it is good. I think I like ShockWave and 12 hour Tea (even though the BG sux in 8-bit; I play that w/o a textured BG) the most. IMO, I think you should make more levels that are like Slab Ratz.

This perhaps is not what I expected, but it’s still good and worth a download.

I still haven’t officially released my Odyssey tileset, so why is it being used? This is the second time I’m finding my tileset being used (assuming that there aren’t any other levels using it) so I can’t emphasize this enough: DON’T RELEASE LEVELS USING MY TILESET. The tileset isn’t finished yet and I rearranged the tiles in it.

I still don’t care if you make levels with my tileset, just don’t release them.

This level would seem to be fun to play in (I still haven’t got a chance to really play it yet). It has nice flow, good weapon placement, and the eye candy is alright (but that’s just because I don’t like some of the tiles in the tileset). Everything is good, thus making this a good level.

So go download this and play it online now.

Not bad for your 1st CTF level, but it needs a lot of work…

In the level, the eye-candy is decent, the bases are placed a little too close to one another, too much ammo is used, and there are too many powerups at easy access. I would advise not to put powerups so close to the shortest routes from base to base.
The level doesn’t have much good gameplay, so finding good strategies might be hard. The best thing in this level IMO is the carrot placed near the top, since you have to go out of your way to get it. Everything else needs much more work for a higher rating.[This review has been edited by BlurredD]

A semi-quick, but half-decent refixed review.

Winterland Wonder: Probably the best winter-based tileset I’ve ever seen. The different types of snow tiles could come in handy when making eye candy with this set.

Space Warbase: Slowly becoming an overused theme, but one of my favorite space sets. This set is currently the most used tileset from this pack. It has several types of tiles and a few really nice features, including the meteoroid and the turrets.

Townsville ][: It has a decent theme, though it seemed too happy at first. It offers a few choices in tiles to use, but it’s not the easiest to make great eye candy with.

Unreal Imagination: Cool idea, but the tileset itself isn’t flattering. I dislike the red and blue theme.

Raging Inferno: Looked nice at first. Then I realized the entire set basically looks the same.

Tarzan’s Treetops: I could imagine it would be hard to make a good level with this set. I’m not crazy about the leaves, either.

Overall: I probably won’t use every one of these tilesets, especially the last three I mentioned above, but they aren’t bad. Wisety definitely put a good deal of effort into making these sets. However, quantity alone won’t make me give this a high rating. It’s not that they look bad, but some of these sets don’t have what I find most useful in a tileset: variety in types of tiles to allow for more possibilities with eye candy and atmosphere. I mean types of tiles as in mud tiles, brick tiles, metal tiles, etc. Variety like that is what I desire the most in a set, especially if it works out in a particular theme. Those are my reasons. Therefore, 8.7 is my new rating.[This review has been edited by BlurredD]

This is yet another fun level created by EvilMike. It’s a good example of how a CTF should be made. Simple routes between each base on the bottom, good placement of the powerups, and a full energy carrot near the top make this a great level to play. The weapons were placed well and eye-candy is good. I like the music that’s been selected, and this level uses an underused custom tileset (extra points).

So if you haven’t downloaded it already, go download it now. Then go host it online and play it constantly.

It’s better now, but there are still bugs. Like the next level setting CelLctf17 doesn’t work. And there are still those glitches in “In the glue Factory” (the ACCESS GRANTED typo and the sucker tube glitch at 52,16) and “The CelLlevator” (the invisble tile in the blaster powerup room) and some other bugs.

I’m gonna give this an 8.5 since the levels are good, but could be better: the eyecandy was well made, the gameplay is alright, and ammo placement is decent, though some levels have bugs in them. So in all, this CTF pack is worth a download, especially if you hate downloading levels one by one.

The Edit: I recall looking at this pack recently and not liking a lot of these levels. The gameplay just doesn’t seem as good as when I first played these levels. Of course, standards were different then. But then again, several levels made way back when had some good gameplay, and people still play them today. Anyway, I dislike the layout and question the balance in most of these levels, which is why my rating is now an 8 instead. That’s still something.[This review has been edited by BlurredD]

Needs custom music, even if it’s in another zip file…

I’m not too crazy about all of the choices in this pack… Maybe too many repeats? I never was too crazy about some of these levels. Perhaps this past year had the fewest good levels produced. I dunno, it could just be me. I’ll probably still play in the Bash server, but it just won’t seem the same without the proper music for each level.[This review has been edited by BlurredD]

And this is TSF…

This is interesting, because Blade wanted Cell to re-upload his CTF pack, and now Cell wants Blade to re-upload his SP pack.

Do me a favor and re-upload your stuff because I still can’t download Cell’s Evil CTF pack beta 2 v0.87 and now I’m missing music from Blade’s SP pack!

Another good level by EvilMike. It’s not one of my favs, but it’s still good nonetheless. The gameplay is good, has nice weapon layout, and the tileset was used well. The only thing I really didn’t like about this was the music choice. I don’t think the Jungle music fits here entirely. Other than that, it’s worth your download.

I believe Overlord’s patch is meant to convert 1.24 levels to 1.23 levels. Perhaps this could be very useful to those who have TSF but can’t make levels for 1.23. Too bad those who have TSF don’t have 1.23 JCS so that they could use this patch, but at least those who have 1.23 JCS can convert TSF levels to 1.23 (something’s better than nothing, isn’t it?).

Hmmmmm… not a 7.7, but not an 8.2…

An 8 seems suitable :P. Lemme explain:

It’s not a 7.7 because it has a lot of good tiles in it (almost agama-like). And it’s not an 8.2 because the tiles may have been made slightly better, the bones aren’t masked perfectly, and the mountains in the BG look almost horrendeos. But it’s still a pretty good tileset. So download it and make some levels with it.

Decent, but not outstanding. It has pretty much everything an average level would have with this tileset. Though there were some details I didn’t like, like that vine-like things you just used for a floor, and maybe the spikes you placed in the 3rd layer. It’s pretty average after that, and it may be worth a download.

Not bad for a race level. Actually, I kinda liked it. It flows well with a slight challenge, uses decent eye-candy, and is a kinda fun to play in. I wouldn’t really know about the ammo and all (maybe needs more?). It looks good enough for a download if you like race levels.