Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Nice one, fun tho play too even, trying to kill each other with ice.

Art levels appear very rarely and usually are in no way similar to this one. Afaik it’s the first one of its kind and mainly because of that deserves attention. The level is nothing special when it comes to gameplay, but the idea is really awesome and well executed.

Haha, this is awesome! Very creative.

Has to be a quick review and my opinion isn’t as worthy since I haven’t properly duelled in TRF yet.

TRF provides fun and original gameplay possibilities and a great style of a level. The other level seems a lot more party based, and while easily criticizable, boasts rather fun and quirky gameplay too. Worth checking out.

Haha, when I was hosting this, I thought that Tyuka’s Realm Forsaken was a battle level. I see where the bases are now. I like the idea in both levels. In this level I like the bases placement, and in another one I like the Inside-Outside system.

FFS, how to review this.

First, I’ll say that I’ve played both of these levels online using the ingame download function everybody knows (I did not download it at J2O). I’ve duelled Jake at TRF and it was quite an intense duel (lost 6-10 btw). I played the other level in some open servers recently.

Tyuka’s Realm Forsaken:

Music:
Sheer awesomeness. I’ve no other words for it.
10/10

Eyecandy:
It is great, almost flawless while unique. It goes very well with the music, even better than most other levels.
10/10
_________Gameplay:
Layout: Quite balanced and the base concept works. There aren’t any campy places and this level is, due to the relatively fast carrot respawn and the fact there are two small carrots, a very aggressive one… camping means your opponent regains health, and both C’s are in uncampy area’s. It is however, possible to camp the RFPU, though it isn’t useful in duels.
There are two RFjumps, one of them is avoidable with a Lizard Copter (while not too difficult), and one of them is almost impossible with Jazz/Lori and still hard with Spaz.
9,5/10

Pickup placement:
Almost perfect, though Bouncers/Seekers are laggy weapons, if this is played on ZD. There is a Bouncy PU, which might lag if shot in the tube, but otherwise Bouncers are very useful in this level. There is a patch of Seekers in the upper left corner (no PU, which is a good thing). The main downside but also upside is that ammunition is very grouped: usually there is only one place in the level to get a certain kind of ammunition. This could be horrible, but in this case it doesn’t matter: The level is small and very uncampy (though the RFPU is campable if the other player has no RF PU, but you might end up being blown up in some cases)
9,5/10

Replay Value:
Hm, what to say… Seeing the level made me speechless, playing it was awesome. It is certainly one of the best levels I’ve ever seen.
10/10

49/50

Penalties: Zero

9,8/10

The other level? If you insist. In terms of liking it/disliking it, this level is totally opposite to the previous one. So here it goes, for ASH or whatever it is called.

Music: Not so awesome, and a sheer contrast with TRF.
It hurts enough to mute it, something I hardly ever do…
5/10

Eyecandy: The tileset chosen made me refuse to take this actually even serious. Feels pretty bland, even worse than the Forest tileset for example because of lack of detailing in the tileset (and being downright unnatural)
5/10.

_________Gameplay
Flow: It works, but the base placement makes this a VERY rushy level, especially taking the two Spaz-only RFjumps into account. It makes the PU’s bloody useless being too far from the bases, (takes too much time to get them)… I actually think it is impossible to retake control back if you lost it. It might also end up in a cat-and-mouse game in the outer circle of the map…
4/10

Pickup placement:
You don’t need them with the bases so damn close to eachother… the PU’s are placed close to eachother but one camper is enough to kill you if you want to get back to the base area.
4/10

Replay value:
Playing a serious round here is a total fluke…
4/10

22/50

Penalties: none.

4,4/10

9,8 + 4,4 = 14,2 = 7,1

DR: Yes, the first level is downright awesome… without a doubt. It is a great level to play at, especially in duels and I think it is the best entry to the duel level tournament until now.
I’ve heard the second one can be either found great or be disliked, with me being in the second group of disliking it. Therefore, you might like the second level WAAAAY more than I did.
On the otherhand, you might find it pretty dissappointing or downright horrible like I did.

FS should definitely keep making levels (especially ctf), because all his levels are of high quality.
This level is pretty open and the layout is generally quite generic, but it has some neat elements to it, that — along with the placement — make it quite interesting and fun to play.
The size / layout-style make this good for 6 players and up.

A JDC classic. Featuring a simple but effective two levels of height design, this is a versatile level that works in all game sizes. The middle section connects the two levels well and provides plenty of entertainment. However, this level is pretty bland looking by today’s standards, although many will enjoy the miminalist feel of the level. B+

I like these levels. They are so fun to play,they have great eyecandy and good gameplay.

I had the honour of betatesting this one.

Gameplay

This level contains unique paths, the ways to get somewhere are mostly different than normal. If you want to get to the bottom of the level, it is way quicker to use the warp on the top, than to fall down. The warps add to that feature. When first encoutering them I was confused but if one plays this level for some minutes they will get used to it. The left side of the level has a nice flow and is also a good battle area, therefore I met most enemies in that area, while testing. The right side of the level isn’t as good as the left side in my opinion. The upper right side is just a huge empty space. Below that is an area that can only be left through tunnels to the downside or a copter to the upside. The tunnels, however, meet the path of the copter after a short while, which means the right side can only be entered through the top of the level, while the left side is connected with not only the bottom of the level, but also with several warps. Yes, the left part of the level is bigger, but the right part could have been connected better to the rest of the level. The top of the level is a huge building with a carrot on top. It has been built nicely and it is possible to have a ‘king of the hill’ battle over here, meaning the one taking the top could have an advantage, which adds to the quality of battles fought in this level.

Eyecandy

The colours of this tileset are quite the same. Still you managed to add some more colour by adding a lot of trees and plants. Also the night level has a nice red glow behind the buildings on the background. When jumping in the bottom of the level, the buildings look a bit weird, being so long and the same everywhere. Maybe you could have added another layer of buildings to the background.

Originality

As I mentioned before, this level contains unique pathways, which is mostly what this level is about. If someone uses the paths to his advantage, he is on his way to making a lot of kills in this level by beating his enemies with speed and traps. Clearly the originality of this level is in the layout, the layer 4 eyecandy is of high quality and the background is allright.

Gameplay: 9
Eyecandy: 8
Originality: 8

Final Grade: 8,3

Don’t expect too much from this review, I’m not in the mood to write anythig too detailed and I usually rate my levels on a simple principle ol like/dislike.

This one is most definitely a like. So much so, I think we could/should be seeing a 2nd battle level in a row to win the nomination for featured download of the fortnight.

FS showed us the level the other day and I had a helluva time.
This review will most definitely be biased as I was, for a time at least, leading the game which means I must have enjoyed myself:)

Anyway, I love the warp system and the spring system which basically adds to a multifaceted system of transport in this suburbian warfare zone. It gives one options, and in my opinion makes the level great.

Another thing which I like, is the flow of the level. Sure it isn’t as open as say, JE (I know JE is ctf and I shouldn’t be mixing apples and oranges, but like I said, don’t expect too much from me) but it isn’t closed up either. You have a level with enough space, with just the right amount of obstacles (poor phrasing) on the one hand, and an abundance of crazy jj2 speed. JJ2 is about speed and this level delivers. it’s cray fun to play in. I’ve always liked FS’s battle levels (or the one I remember anyway, being the 1st featured battle level download) and I seem to have always done well on them in open games (which are to me at least, the most fun, till this day) and I always loved, how the levels had a nice combination of freedom of movement, but not too much so. I don’t know whether this is reffered to as flow, I’ve always thought of it as such and for me the flow of the level is more or less everything.

Are there any camp spots? Well if you’re urbs, there are. For example at the RF pu. God I love being there and hearing the explosions of my powered up RF’s. Magice pure magic, and I know that I dont have FS to thank for those sweet sweet sounds, I will thank him for them nonetheless.

The level has great weapon placement and I love the fact pu’s are easily reachable (other than pu4 which is a bit secluded, but which I approve of anyway).

I saw snz use jazz on this level and I have to say it looked like a good idea. I remember him hitting me with powered up bouncies whilst hovering above my Spaztic avatar – it was death from the skies my friends.
I think I have used all 3 of the powerups quite a lot, but would add here that I tried to intentionally not use seekers, because the game was SO fun without them. I just enjoyed firing those RF’s around the place and delving blows from the heavens above to the rabbit-infested platforms beneath me. I felt not like a warrior, but instead like a poet; t’was pure beauty my friends, oh that you could see it!

Using gun 2 and being above your enemies on this map is insanely fun, in spite of the fact that your enemies will most likely be finished of by a clever FS, snz or sj with accurate bursts of seeks and rf’s. But who cares?! I had my fun.

Now I didn’t quite follow the discussion between FS and SJ, but I think eye candy came up? Well like I said, I’m not one to talk about eye candy, but this level seems to use the tileset brilliantly.
It’s very imporatant that the tilest and the level somehow come together and this really beautiful and underused tileset was chose brilliantly by FS.

Another brilliant level from a truly brilliant leveldesigner! All hail!

Nay – all download!

Why 10? Well because I know a lot of people will pick and poke and just be far too critical of FS’s creation, so I thought why not give him a boost. And that is not to say it got a 10 out of pity mind you! I just have a different philosophy as opposed to some other reviewers around here.

I had fun.More fun on this level playing with a spectacular bunch of people than I’ve had on any ladder since becoming a bit more active. And you can’t buy that. It was FS’s gift to me and to all of us.

EDIT: oh and, I have no idea which one of those I played. Definitely not the blue-ish one. I prefer to do my roasting by day thank you very much!

Contrary to White Rabbit’s review: The right side has a higher gem amount than the left if you count the gem barrels and gem deposit, as mentioned in CCRead.

Good eyecandy and level structure. Good for long battles. I like it

I like this level, it have got good eyecandy, nice gameplay and all of the pick ups is good placed. This idea, that the level looks like a big golem is great too.

A very uniquely designed level. Powerups and carrots are superbly placed. Perhaps the level’s most unusual feature is the area at the top, somewhat isolated from the rest of the level; it contains a lot of RF ammo and (of course) a seeker powerup.
It’s unfortunate that there are so many easily campable areas, however.

Good concept, nice tileset, i wanna say RARE tileset… XD lol…

Cool!

BG is nice!

XD good idea

The best level by FS so far in my opinion. Awesome music choice. :D

Cool concept, great execution. The layout was a bit confusing at first for me (maybe that was because i forgot about the copters?), but after learning it the level becomes very fun to play, I liked how the bases were placed. The tranquil, dreamy atmosphere is another thing which makes this level great. Overall, an awesome level. Download away!

This is practically a very versatile CTF-level in a while from FireSworD and OLC. This goes well for duels, but also a 3vs3 which I played here once, went smoothly. What can you expect? No disappointment at least.

The atmosphere is ambient, calm, and tranquil. What you see here is a fairly bleached mass of soil covered with moss just like a stone golem could be. The edges of the level that aren’t parts of the golem look a bit bland though. This Carrotus/Easter-edit fits really well for a concept like this. If it only had those top/bottom edges of background caves fixed, it would be perfect. This level is one of those few ones that generally look better in 8-bit rather than 16-bit colour, at least for me. 8-bit mode makes things look more transparent in a neat way and gives you a more lighter background.

What I find the most exotic about this level is the base placement. Your base is located on one of the golem’s hands, and you should attack the opposite hand. Golem’s solid body however, is there between the hands, as obvious. So, you should find a way to either go round the body, or cut through it. The warp on your hand is one of the possibilities. It takes you below the golem’s body, so that you are able to cut through it’s feet to the opponent’s side. Another option is to cut through the golem’s shoulders. You will need a copter or ice-ammo for this though to get through the ceiling springs. Generally the layout is limiting, and I like it that way. It is not a level with a dozen of small passages and mazes. Instead, you have lots of space to move around, the layout is simple enough to be learned fast, and yet you can still survive in bigger games if you know how.
The bases are kinda easy to defend, as well, you can hold flag ready for a score for a really long time against weak attackers, since you have a minor healing carrot right above your base, thus you can keep healing yourself all the time, as long as you keep getting only minimal damage. The flipper pads work great on the hands, so that you can quickly jump away if needed. If you suddenly get a critical hit, you can also go for the full energy carrot at the bottom-middle of the level, which can be very unsafe though. This was very well thought out.
There is also a half-secret shield, though getting it is really…hard. The idea is practically that you can be lucky and abuse a warp exit while an opponent player is camping the exit with seeker-ammo. If you are lucky, and your opponent is dumb, you may try to abuse the seekers so that they push you up to the shield-room. Reaching the warps themselves is already really hard though, since you require a copter for that, again. What is even harder,(barely possible) is trying to reach the shield-room straight with the copter. I managed with this once so far, but it really requires perfect timing and handling of the copter, as well a double-jump of Spaz. Now the problem with this is, that if you get in there with the flag, is that you can just never come down again and thus freeze the game. While it would make sense only if it was a time-based game where you are having the lead, it is still sort of lame, as really nothing can make you fall down, and no opponent is likely able to enter there. Good idea otherwise, though.

If this was all I had to say about the level, I would rate it really high. However, there are still some bad things as well that are mattering me. Unfortunately I’m not sure is it wise to try to fix them without a major change in gameplay.

One is that there is basically very few ammo. You must gain your ammunition mainly from PowerUps. If you try to charge into opponent base to kill the enemy flagholder without any ammo, you’ll be most likely dead very quick.
Another thing are the dead ends. Luckily they are small and contain PowerUps, so they aren’t just useless areas.
The level is also fairly Spaz-biased. Although who am I to care about that, since I am a Spaz-player?
The cut through the ceiling-springs isn’t after all as useful as it could be, because the warp-shortcuts are a bit too fast.
I’m not very sure if I find Powered up seekers fitting well for a level of this kind. They can cause much airhits in such and open level.

In overall this is a really decent, interesting and enjoyable level for everyone. It just could have been very awesome if it didn’t have those minor flaws in it. The layout is strategic, and you need it to master the level, but also you require much endurance to be faster to reach things before your enemy. I recommend this download for everyone, and hope to see it played in both Bash12 and JDC18 duels/2on2’s/events. Thank you FireSworD.

Edit: Thanks for the fixes. With them this level deserves a bit more.

SJ

This review has gone through many revisions, but finally I feel it’s ready to be submitted. Also, trying a slightly different approach to my usual reviewing style.

Anyone who knows FireSworD knows that does not just build levels by conventional standards. Looking at his past work, we can see that he thought outside the box and always brought something new and exciting to his levels. Jungle’s Edge and Termite Haven both had very creative visual designs, while Jungle’s Edge has gone on to be one of the most popular CTF levels ever (even if not the best quality). Moving on a short while later, his creations include levels such as Medieval Skyscrapers with its innovative y-axis gameplay with fly carrots, and One Spot with its totally new base system, which wasn’t exactly a huge success but is still remembered for how creative the level was. A few years later FS entered R3ptiles’ Original CTF Contest, getting a very well deserved 1st place with Unconventional Coffee, which had a unique structure in its layout and was also one of the first CTF levels to feature pits. Just under a year ago, FS created the battle level called Enter the Chaos. This level was totally different to anything that had been made beforehand that year. It featured what was basically a “screw the rules I have money” concept, which was despised by some, but for others, it made the level incredibly addictive. I personally saw it as great that he tried something like that as very few people would have the guts to have such an evil concept in a level.

Without further ado, I’ll now talk about the level I’m supposed to be reviewing!

Golem Landscapes uses the rather pretty looking IC – Easterius2 tileset; that is an edit of an edit of Carrotus (the most overused and boring tileset in existence). However, FS still manages to break the “all Carrotus levels look the same” rule and creates something that has a unique appearance – a rock golem, in which the level is built around. While a similar concept was thought of in a level by Sacrush known as Extraterrestrials, where the level featured a giant alien to walk on, Golem Landscapes executes the idea even better as the tileset fits the idea perfectly – the colour of the soil makes it look like stone, while the foliage is used well and clearly shows that this golem belongs to nature. Despite being “man made”, the golem itself feels very organic and fits like a glove with the rest of the level. The atmosphere feels lush, aided by the very well fitting music by Starsky Partridge, which gives the level a very calm and isolated feeling, giving the impression that no man has set foot in this area for some time. The golem structure itself is well designed and although looks “flat” when zoomed out in JCS, that can’t be helped due to being a 2D game and is probably the very best that could be made with JJ2’s limitations.

While the theme of the level is amazing, the real important question about this level is – does it play as great? The answer to that question can be said briefly in one word: yes.

Despite being perfectly symmetrical, given the fact this that this level is designed on a golem combined with some interesting design choices, this level has a unique layout. The base areas are fairly close together, yet movement between them is still not too fast. There are two main routes between the bases: using the warps situated just above the bases, warping you to the central room with an RF PU and tubes which take you to either team’s side. While the distance you travel is very short, the tubes pull you through fairly slowly so this is balanced out. This route is the most frequently used during games, however it’s the most risky as the place you emerge from the tubes is easily camp-able, giving the enemy a guaranteed hit on you if they do so. Thankfully, you can alternatively go around your base and on top of the golem with a copter, falling through the “spring hole” to reach the other team’s base area. Taking this area comes with benefits, as you pass a Bouncer PU and a Seeker PU, as well as an EB PU on top of the golem’s shoulders. However, this route is a few seconds longer than the warp/tube route and you have to wait for the copter to spawn in order to take it, which could waste precious seconds. This level offers choice despite the somewhat “limiting” layout; there is always a backup plan if one plan fails. One of the great things about the design is the shortcut that can be taken only if you have ice ammo on you. It involves freezing the springs in the “spring hole”, which gives you immediate access to the top of the level. This is by far the fastest route in the level; although what’s great is that you can’t always take it – rather, stock up on ice ammo and use it to your advantage while you’re doing well. Basically, you can’t just take it straight away after spawning.

Another possible route is to go under the bases along the long tunnel where the Full NRG is situated, which is the longest route but has some advantages, as it is less predictable unless you have the flag. Be careful though, RF shots are very hard to avoid here.
The base areas themselves present interesting gameplay. While they’re fairly easy to attack, they’re also just as easy to defend. It all depends on how you play around them. Generally, the best way to attack the bases is from above with bouncer rains. Just above the bases is a good area for being RTS in this aspect as unless attackers go to the base from above through the “spring hole”, it’s generally very hard to attack someone who is camping there. If someone is camping directly on the base itself, you can “snipe” them by hitting them through the thin wall with either Bouncer of EB. There are 2 +1s, one just above each base, which although can’t be totally provided on, give you a little life support while trying to stay at the base. This level doesn’t have many areas you can hide in at 1h, so you have to keep on the move. There is however a very evil secret that is very hard to reach, but if you find it you’ll be greatly rewarded (I won’t reveal what it is, but someone probably would have found it by now :P). This level is perfect for 2vs2/3vs3, although duels can work out too.

In general, this is one of the best CTF levels that FS has released so far. I can imagine it getting a lot of attention over the following months and possibly even years. You’d be a fool to ignore this, so if you haven’t downloaded it already go ahead and do so! This gets a well earned 8.6, my seal of approval and a download reccomendation.

Grade: A