Tileset conversion, by 
First of all, I would like to congratulate Spaztic on being the 10 million, seven hundred sixty second thousand, eight hundred third person to create a conversion of the classic Super Mario Brothers 3 game. I am sure this will not soon be forgotten. And, while your princess may be in another castle, this is probably a superior version compared to even the best Marionic offerings out there, even though it has been some time since I last played a level featuring Hellraiser’s current Mario Brothers 3 standard set. Even though I have not exactly played every single little part of Super Mario Brothers 3, I have a general idea of it. And I know that this is missing Giant World or whatever, which is pretty much the only thing that it is missing. Still, this is one of the best Mario sets out there.
THEME: Well, uh, let us see…Mario is the theme. Wow. There is not much more to say here. It is the Mario games in a tileset. The theme is Mario, and the entire set is Mario. Specifically, if I was to classify this beyond “Mario,” it would probably be as a platformer-based 8-bit tileset. Graphics quality is not great, but that is no fault of Spaztic.
Pros: One minute into testing: It’s Mario!
Cons: Ten minutes into testing: Oh. It’s Mario.
Rating: N/A.
GRAPHICS: The graphics are, to put it nicely, not the focus of this tileset. Then again, they do not necessarily need to be. This is, pure and simple, a base conversion. I will evaluate for my final score the quality of graphics compared to the original, but for this, I unfortunately have to make due with what it offers compared to other tilesets. And that is not much. While everything looks passable, it is all really low-color and bad. Just like the original game is. Oh well.
Pros: Good for a Mario conversion.
Cons: Bad for nearly everything else.
Rating: 6.7
INVENTORY: This is a conversion. As a conversion, it lacks most of the things that Jazz 2 needs but Mario does not have. This includes, but is not limited to, hooks, sucker tubes, and the like. I suppose you could use those flower tubes for sucker tubes, but for the rest of everything else, you are pretty much stuck. There is not much added by the conversion – little more than the author’s name.
Pros: Everything that was in Mario that is relevant is here. And Spaztic’s name, here, for you freaky Spaztic cult people.
Cons: If something was not in the original Mario, you are out of luck.
Rating: 7.0
ORIGINALITY: To be honest, there is really very little that is all that original about the tileset. It is a Mario set and by nature, turns out looking a bit ugh. At least it covers many areas that the other various Mario tilesets do not. That is the main thing that saves it from a low score here.
Pros: N/A
Cons: N/A
Rating: 7.5
COMPETITION: Hellraiser’s Mario tileset was also pretty good, although not as good as this.
Rating: 8.5
EASE OF USE: This is really, really, really, really easy to use. After all, it is a Mario tileset. How can you get any more simple? There are a few small inconsistincies, and many of the things are difficult to use without looking tacky, but mostly everything is both easy to use and nicely done. This tileset is quite easy to use, and often is very hard to make look bad. As such, it is great for teaching new people how to use JCS.
Pros: Really easy to use.
Cons: Does nothing to make the tileset any easy to use than it already is, not that this is a huge downfall, since only people without opposable thumbs will have problems using this tileset.
Rating: 8.5
MASKING: Generally good. There were a few small things that I noticed, but not enough to detract from the score all that much. Jaggies are not a major problem, although a minority of the tiles do suffer from small little holes in the mask that could theoretically cause a few insignificant problems. It was difficult to get stuck during testing.
Pros: Few, if any, errors.
Cons: None to mention.
Rating: 8.2
OVERALL (not an average): Overall, this tileset’s scores do average out to something significantly lower than my final rating. Why did this happen? Because this is a conversion. Unfortunately, little was done to improve the conversion beyond baseline importing of the tiles and the addition, of course, of a graphic featuring the author’s name. It would have been nice to see such things as poles, hooks, and the like, but this is good enough. I am sure that anyone who is even half a Mario fan will be all over this one. It is a tough choice between this tileset and Hellraiser’s, but so far, without extended road testing, it does appear like this one is in the lead. Well done, Spaztic face.
Pros: Very good.
Cons: Adds no new tiles, which could be a major problem down the road.
Rating: 8.2
SCORECARD
Bugs: A
Eyecandy: A
Background Eyecandy: A
Foreground Eyecandy: A -
Masking: A
Tile Variaty: A
Tiles Included: A -
Added Tiles: B+
Quality: A -
Conversion Strength: A
OVERALL: B+
Pros: Very good.
Cons: Poor graphics quality. Not that that is Spaztic face’s fault.
FINAL SCORE: 8.2
- Trafton
EDIT: My mistake. Hooks and everything are in there.[This review has been edited by Trafton AT]
