Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Unfortunately, this level has quite a few things which could be improved significantly.

First of all, when uploading a level, make sure you fill out the details about your upload correctly. This was created with TSF, but says its 1.23 compatible. (But hey, at least it gave me reason to use Zaps’ level convertor http://www.jazz2online.com/J2Ov2/downloads/info.php?levelID=5368) In addition, it seems to be designed as a single player level, but is labeled as other. Although these are not major issues, and don’t affect the value of the upload, they are somewhat annoying, and annoying the people who download the rate your levels is never really a good idea.

The level itself could be improved greatly. First of all, the background has transparency, which is almost always a bad idea, as it makes ugly trails behind sprites. The ground in layer 4 also has holes in it, which make it look very unnatural. There are also only 4 events in the entire level.

Anyway, I could go on about every little specific flaw in the level, but I feel the best thing I could say is this: Don’t upload what you wouldn’t want to download. Poppst him/her-self admitted that it was “very bad!” You could create a much nicer level if you spent more time working on it before uploading. If you feel that you still haven’t created a worthwhile level, there are many resources you can find on this, and other Jazz-Related websites that would help you. For example, JCS.Ref can be found at http://www.jazz2online.com/jcsref/, and contains lots of useful advice for creating better levels. I would also recommend joining the community fourums (at http://www.jazz2online.com/jcf/). There you would have the chance to talk to other Jazz fans, who could give you advice and help. For example, some people might be willing to beta-test any levels you create before you upload, and offer constructive criticism.

The tileset can be opened easily with 1.24’s JCS under the name setol, although the example level is saved in such a way that it tries to open the tileset with the old name, and crashes. The example level also has no Jazz start, so by clicking save and run, you get stuck in a wall when you spawn. However, this upload is about the tileset, not the example level, so it will not be included in the rating.

Eyecandy: 5/10
What this set has is quite nice looking. The massive amounts of pink and green could get boring pretty fast, but all of the skeletons and flowers look very nice. The set’s main problem is its small size. It has nothing at all for layers 1,2,5,6, or 7. Layer 8 does have several options, but a textured background would be a great addition. There is only one basic pink tile, that has been copied and drawn on, which makes walls a bit boring. Just having two or three of these that could be alternated would allow way more combinations. The other problem with the tileset is that it tends to be much too square. The edges of platforms are simply straight lines, and gives the level a very artificial feeling. Jagged tiles that could be used as walls and ceilings would allow a level maker to create a much more natural looking setting.

Usability: 8/10
The set is small and well organized, so any tile can be found with ease. Levels could be made quite quickly and easily with this set. The masks were good too. The most important types of tiles are here too. However, it does lack some potentially useful tiles, such as destruct tiles for other guns, and something to explain warping.

Originality: 7/10
I have not seen any other set with this concept before. However, none of the individual parts are that unique. Buried bones have appeared in tilesets before, as do flowers, grass, a tree, etc.

Misc:
Contains readme and screenshots +1
ReadMe is named Readme, so it tries to overwrite Jazz’s standard readme. -1

Total Score: 20/30 = 66.7% = 6.7

The set is fairly nice, and proves that Bartek has the potential to create something amazing. However, I do not expect this particular tileset to be widely used.

jjlover001 has once again provided a fun single player pack, although once again has provided few major unique points.

Gameplay: 6/10
This is again a bit too easy. The carrots are somewhat more reasonable than jjlover’s previous pack, although there is still too much ammo, and the sheilds seem a bit unnessecary. Please don’t make the carrots generators though, and maybe make the enemies generators, especially in the parts of the levels that you have to visit multiple times due to triggers. A couple places also are just a bit akward. For example, a low ceiling with hurt events on the ground, or a place where you get chucked straight into some spikes automatically. The biggest problem here is the fact that there are so many lives and save points. Since events reappear whenever you die, a 1up anywhere near a savepoint means there’s practially no way to lose. However, the gameplay is consistantly nice, albeit easy. The events are placed well, although there are a few too many enemies. Since killing enemies can create events such as gems, carrots, or fastfires, having enemies in simple places can make the game easier, not harder. I like the fact that he chose fairly difficult enemies, such as monkeys and bees, as themes for his levels. When you do things like this, and add quality, no quantity when it comes to enemies, your levels can be quite fun. Hurts and rocks are also good, and jjlover did use these well. The gameplay could also be improved by adding unique stuff. The platforms place was kind of unique, although there were so many diffrent platforms that it was hard not to land on them. The catepilar was also a nice touch, although it did not effect any difficult sections of the level. The witch also was fairly neat. The End boss was also a bit of a let down, as I was able to kill it using only my blaster and not losing any health. Add a couple enemies in the final boss section, and maybe some spikes on the ground or something.

Eyecandy: 7/10
It’s good, but bland. The same tileset is used throughout the entire set, which begins to feel a bit monotonous by the end, although it’s not too bad because it gives a unified feel to the set. Biggest place that could be improved here is reason. The platforms are frequently just floating in the air, and there are a few sucker tubes in the middle of nowhere. If you can make it so the platforms look like part of the environment that naturally occured, and belongs where it is, it will look a lot more impressive than if the platform seems to be there for the sole purpose of gameplay.

Buglessness: 5/5
I encountered no problems. Only comment here is that gun 2 can be shot through walls if you run fast enough, so its possible to get some power-ups, birds, or shields without figuring out the actual secret. There are ways to prevent this, which you should be able to find if you look around other people’s levels.

Notes: I like that there is somewhat of a plot, although it would be much more interesting if you developed it more, instead of just saying, go here, fight this bad guy. Anyway, far too many people don’t even try adding a plot, which can make playing through the levels somewhat pointless. Your english is fine.

Overall: 18/25
18/25=72.0%=7.2/10

Keep up the good work. Your level are quite nice, and if you add any kind of unique features, you could become a truly great level maker.

Gameplay: 4/10
The levels are very open, and there are tons of paths. This is a very nice feature to have, but unfortunantely, it’s overdone in this pack. Almost every level can be beaten mainly by holding down run, jump, and shoot. It’s fun to explore the levels and find the massive amounts of secrets, but there is very little point if you just want to finish. There are more carrots than could possibly be needed. (I think there were 8 1+ carrots right next to each other at one point) Power-ups are also too easy to get. There was a rocket turtle, but he can be ignored, because there is no need to fight him. He merely leads you to the end of the level. Also, the last level just ends. No boss. Which is kind of a let down. The one cool gameplay moment was a fight against a Bilsy and two stand monkies, which was surprisingly challenging compared to the rest of the levels. The secret level is also very good, because you have to find coins, which gave you reason to look around and appreciate all the little nuances of the level. If the other levels were more like this, and there were less goodies, gameplay could rock.

Eyecandy: 8/10
Not too much to mention here. The tileset choices were good, and eyecandy was nice with being particularly outstanding. There were a few small places where things seemed too square, or ended to abruptly, giving the level and artifical feeling. I also noticed that at position (78,51) on Lv5, there’s a six-legged jaguar. I nearly blew by it when playing, but something looked out of place, so I stopped and examined it closer. The extra legs fit surprisingly well, and, although I’m not sure if jjlover intended for it, it’s pretty cool.

Buglessness: 4/5
When I first tried to open the level through home-cooked levels, I got an error about running out of animations, and the game crashed. Not sure if this is just me, but opening through JCS fixed it anyway. Also, in the last level, there’s a bird morph. If you die while you are a bird (kinda hard with the full health carrot) You can respawn as a bird, and have to redo the start of the level as a bird. This will also prevent you from collecting two power-ups, which can be frustrating.

Total: 16/25
16/25=64.0%=6.4/10

If you take the time to appreciate these levels, they are a great download. However, they offer little in the way of unique features or interesting gameplay.

plunK showed me this level after a couple hours of work when only a couple platforms were created, and later again in the late stages of beta-testing. It’s a nice, symetrical level with a fairly dark atmosphere.

Gameplay: 8.5/10
This level has a set of powerups that can be accessed only through shooting certain tiles. The triggers are global, which means everyone gains access to the powerups at the same time. This gives the fighting a cool, dynamic aspect. There are a few little places where the tunnels feel a bit constricted, and the level doesn’t flow perfectly in a couple places. Overall, this would definetely be a fun level to host, probably with about four to eight players.

Eyecandy: 9/10
This level has a very good atmosphere, and lots of nice details. It even looks like an eye on JCS when zoomed out. The only reason I don’t give it a perfect ten for eyecandy is that in a few places, walls or platforms can almost blend into the background.

Bug-Free-ness: 5/5
I didn’t find any bugs. There could be some, but everything looks good to me.

Event-Placement: 8/10
The powerups are at the center-top and center-bottom of the level, and cannot be accessed immediately. The rest of the level has a few carrots, and ammo scattered about. The ammo is fairly sparse, which can be a good thing, because people will have to conserve their ammo, adding an extra factor of strategy. The carrots are maybe a hair too easy to access, although with enough players, this wouldn’t be a problem. The biggest potential problem I see is that the blaster powerup is right next to a pile of fastfires. Since the other ammo may be hard to conserve, whoever got this powerup could dominate for a while. However, once one person can get the powerup, so can everyone else, which should cancel this out by the end of a battle.

Total: 8.7/10

This is a very cool level, and definitely should be downloaded and hosted frequently.

This was a very cool little set of levels. The first is a tad annoying, because some crates can trap you and force you to die without much warning. But after a few frustrating tries, its a cool level. The eyecandy is very good, and this continues throughout all the levels. The second level takes some imagination because everything falls at exactly the same speed, which looks a bit funny, but it works well. The ending of this level is very cool. It took a bit longer than I expected, and thought maybe I was doing something wrong at first, and the when I did get the end text at first, I fell back to the start, which also prevented the game from sending me to the next level. However, if you listen to the text through the level, and make sure that you fall onto a box when you get the end text, you will get to the finish. The third level is based on an interesting concept, and works well since you can’t shoot and fly upwards at the same time. However, the enemies are practically invincible because float lizards which fall will respawn as flying lizards if they get too far from Jazz, which can be a bit frustrating. The last level is a boss level, and is very cool because you are on an airboard. The music is also a cool bonus. I would definitely suggest downloading.

This is a fun little quiz. It’s just about the right level of difficulty, with enough easy questions that everyone should be able to answer some, but enough tough questions that only experts could answer them all without cheating. There is also a healthy dose of humor in some of the questions. There are maybe one or two questions that could possibly be rephrased to be a bit more clear, but none have any problems where they can’t be understood at all.

This is an enjoyable little single player level. You attempt to enter some type of temple, and have to fight your way in. The plot is a bit simple, and there’s no explanation as to why you want to enter the temple, which gives the feeling that this level belongs as part of a larger pack. However, this does not detract from the overall value of the level. The eyecandy is nice, and I didn’t experience any bugs, although in one point, a few more One Way events could have been used. The gameplay was qutie good in some places, like the first spikeboll maze. The only problem I had was that a few places were quite frustrating. In the very beginning of the level I fell to my death without warning, and did the same thing again just before the airboard. Also, some of the puzzles had me stumped until I looked in JCS and realized that a block I thought would have trigger scenery actually had a destruct scenery event, or that shooting some random tile in the ceiling was the only way to continue. The enemy, goodie, and food placement were excellent, with one exception. On Hard mode, more enemies were just placed in the same spot. This makes some parts a tad boring, because they just invovle tapping shoot a ton of times, and no skill. I’m sorry if this review seems to have a negative tone, because the level was quite good overall. I would have loved to see more, and think the biggest improvement Gus could make would just be increasing the size of the pack.