Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

As I’ve promised yesterday, I’ll do a review for this interesting new CTF level as soon as it find it’s way to J2O. So ehh, here it is! And yeah, I’ve heard the pretty damn cool music file now :P. Makes me enjoy summer even with the bad weather outside hmm.. But enough of this, let’s begin reviewing!

GAMEPLAY
It think when people look at the screenshots, the first impression they’ll get from this level is the huge amont of paths crossing each other. Well, after some of Faw’s instruction and a little test run on this level, the gameplay indeed proves to be the strongest part. I’ve already played this level in an early testing state and even at that time many interesting spring, tube, and secret paths were done and working well. Although I don’t mind death ends in CTF levels that much, in this level there always is a way to go, thus some exploring is recommended before playing duels/clanwars in this! Overally seen, the gamplay is not as over-the-top as in levels like Nightfall in Noobland, but the many minor and major tricks and pathways (especially the ‘secret’ paths involving the pillars) makes this level interesting to explore, game, and master!

EYECANDY
It has been long ago since I’ve played a new level using the Persian Paradise tileset. I do remember some great classics using this Disguise set though. The set has a good bunch of eyecandy tiles, including some stuff not to be used too often. But ey, it’s about how the level makes use of it, and that’s pretty much alright. I haven’t seen any tilebugs or layer3 errors and whatever. And probably because of the months of work spend on this, every area in this level looks clean to the eye (well NOT including Mario’s face :P)!

EVENT PLACEMENT
Let’s begin with the weapons, as stated in the level description, there are 5 powerups. With the Seeker and Bouncer probably being the strongest (Seeker is always strong and bouncers are handy in the smaller tunnels in this level). Normal weapon pickups are alright aswell, as I’ve never experienced a moment without any usefull weapon. Another interesting pickup is the Full Carrot placed somewhere near the middle of the level, with more pathways leading to it, try to keep that one safe for your damaged teammate in busy games :P. Envoirement events are just as they should, I don’t really give much for lightning effects lol. But generally, I don’t see any factor of events that has to be changed.

RATING
With Sultans GunPalace (still a weird name but I guess that makes it original), you have a huge, balanced, hardcore styled level, in my opinion best played with 2v2 or especially 3v3 games. Duels should be fun aswell if you don’t mind the size. You should first explore some pathways or even open it with JCS if you’re lazy :P. And at last, I recommend download and give a 9.0 for a challenging CTF experience without any gameplay crap that’s trying to be original. See ya in JJ2! ;)

EDIT: The 9 I gave for this level wasn’t meant to be a ‘overrated’, how could it be, cause it’s based on my personal opinion on your level.. I could have given it a much lower score if things like eyecandy or text strings bothered me aswell, but it didn’t. Yeah I’m no expert at level creation, but my score and opinion remains, this level is one of the few I’ve ‘tested’ this year, and it gave me that awesome ‘CTF’ feeling again. :p ;)

Gameplay

Well, I must say this level has a good flow, it has no dead ends and no irritating things you bump into all the time. However, there are too many things which make you move, like sucer tubes, warps and poles. Too many warps cause that few people know where they are all leading to. You have to know this level well to get the maximum out of it, which is also a good point. Especially in the middle there are some floating platforms, you should have tried to stay to the pattern of the sides and attach more platforms to eachother to form bigger ones. Those were all the negative parts. The open spaces were nicely dealt with so that they did not form any problem.

Eyecandy

This level has great eyecandy, especially for a nature level. You gave it a lot of colours and movement, There are many things to see, also on the foreground, ammo is placed in nice shapes and layer four is also nicely decorated. You must have had a lot of work on the eyecandy.

Originality

In the bottom of the level are some gaps, you decided to not place pits there but to make sucer tubes which hold you down for a few seconds and then blow you up. Also there are falling apples in the top corners of the level and there are some nice ‘freeze enemy/sucer tube combinations’ which bump you all over the level and must have been made by a smart person.

Gameplay: 7.5
Eyecandy: 8.5
Originality: 8.5

Final Grade: 8.2

Welcome to xlm fawfull.

Anyways, This is an interesting symetrical ctf level by fawfull, which uses BlurredD’s new tileset, desolation. The level has three powerups, the seeker, the bouncer, and the toaster all placed in similar box type things, which unfortunately promote camping, as they are easily defend-able with the powerups inside of them. The Full energy carrot’s placement promotes more camping unfortunately, as it is right ontop of the seeker powerup. Despite the campability of this level, the gameplay is still rather sound. The author makes use of a rather large sucker tube for transportation from one side of the level to the other; a novel idea, but it can be somewhat confusing at times. The amount of ammo in this level was fine, but the proportions were abit off. There was an unfortunate lack of toaster ammo, making it slightly biased against the red team. Another issue with the ammo was the excess of RF ammo; due to the design of the level RFs become somewhat useless in most of the level. Visually the level is okay, in some places such as the bottom area it gets rather bland. The center and sides of the level could also use more variation. This level does show that the tileset is indeed a very difficult one to master.

All in all this level is just an average ctf level, worth an occasional play.

Very good level Faw for a such little time.

[Review changed to quick review. For more information, see \Review Rules\. – Cooba]

Ok, Ill review it:P

Gameplay

This level has a nice flow mostly thanks to the tubes and warps which meet you mostly when you need them. In this level, you can’t possibly get from the bottom to the top of the levels without going with the tubes which are at both sides of the level. This way it is more difficult for a CTF level to get where you want to get, which is mostly a base or an enemy flagholder. I think therefore this level would have been better if it’s gametype was battle.

Eyecandy

The eyecandy is the best bit of your level but there are some black parts at the bottom which make it very dark there. You have used this tileset well even in the time you had. You used many different titles in your level which makes some parts nicely colored.

Originality

You put all the power ups and all bases in a diamond shaped thing, which also drops powerups when you pass them. Your tube system has also got a very strong mind as creator, in other words: It is brilliant. Unfortioniatly, when I passed the bouncher power up once (offline) I saw 2 bouncher powerups on top of eachother.

Gameplay: 6.5
Eyecandy: 8
Originality: 7

Final Grade: 7.2

Aaaaand, Fawful asked me to review this. Here it comes.

H A R D W A R E D A T A B A S E

ABOUT

A Battle level using Mez03 B. I thought it would be an average 6.5-7.0er, but, oh, no way. It’s fun.

MUSIC

Ahhh, Purple Motion’s I think greatest track. <3, <3 and once more <3. Anyway, fits.

EYECANDY

Yeah, it’s nice! Layer 8 is kind of original. 6 and 7 are used nicely. However I think there could be more stuff on layer 5. Oh well, wait, it has speed 1.1. Rest is fun too. Yah, it uses all layers. (whoo) So…

What looks fun:

- Texture bg. Perrty original I think.

What could be better:

- (shoo, nothing here).

GAMEPLAY

You might think – it’s your typical battle level. Placement of stuff good, etc.

Ah.

I played many others and this level is plainly fun even if there’s a ppl overload (I played it in Fawful’s server when there was over 12 ppl in it), and you kinda don’t get bored by it (at least I didn’t get bored by it). Also there’s a nifty spot below a suckertube. Easy roasts. :X

LOLOL! IT’S FUN!

Types of players I saw:

Fastfire man: gets fastfires and stuff and goes on a (jumpin’ usually) kill frenzy. I tend to be a fastfire man. :P

OVERALL – Pretty good, very fun.

I guess I’ll end tha review ‘ere. Best thing – it’s really fun. I think I start to overuse ‘it’s fun’, so let’s end with a rating.

Rating: 7.5
Download Reccomendation: Yes
Host This Often?: Yes
Bonuses and BOO!nuses: ‘It’s fun’ – +0.2
Final Rating: 7.7

~*Eigus*RR of LCL

He probably means medium, I wouldn’t mind it if I was you. Now lets review.

Gameplay

I think I played in your old version of this level before. It was bald with a huge gap in the middle. You did a great job rebuilding it. This level is flowing as most levels are supposed to: simple, with some little obstacles. There is only one thing I’m not statisfied with. You put all warps in the bottom of the level, which makes the bottom far more actractive with a lot of weapons in reach , which is attacking power, also with a lot of warps and tubes which gives a lot of evasion and defensive power.

Eyecandy

You also did this job well. I couldn’t find any title bugs and you used a lot of background titles, which gave the level a nice spfere. I would have liked some more foreground titles, which could’ve made your level look even more proffesional. For your first real level posted here, the eyecandy is really sufficient though. I would like to see, if you have the power to improve and learn from what you did.

Originality

Especially for a first level, this level is quite original. You’re really showing where the power ups are, but if you haven’t been downstairs, you don’t know how to get them. What I’ve allready mensioned is that your warps were all down in your level. You could have spread them more to create a better flow.

Gameplay: 7,3
Eyecandy: 7,2
Originality: 7,1

Final Grade: 7,2

Edit
You changed your level. Good job, you did everything I asked for. You added some foreground, which is really hard to add. Also you improved some parts and made a warp upstars too.
These are you new grades:

Gameplay: 8,5
Eyecandy: 8,1
Originality: 7,4

Final Grade: 8

level is tedium