Battle, by 
Christmax
Another Christmas-based level, yay! This time it’s a special one: The first level to be released in a while by Olsen and also the first one to be released for him inside the Xtreme Level Makers department. I wonder if XLM improved his level creating skills. By the way, this will be the first review in which I combine the factors gameplay and structure to one factor, since I never really had to say much about the gameplay alone. Also, the category AMMO is replaced for PLACEMENT since I now also cover carrots and PU’s with it. Well, here goes.
EYECANDY: 2.0 out of 2.5
Ah, another level with the Diamondus β tileset series. This time the night version was used, for the second time in six days (I used it too in Bay Of Diamonds which I uploaded Sunday) I can see you looked to the eyecandy in my level since I recognise certain parts of it, but it’s still different. For example, layer 5 wasn’t used for caves/waterfalls but for trees, which is a decent thing. I couldn’t find any tiling errors in the level (bravo) and overall the eyecandy looked very good. Not as good as FireSworD’s level by far, but I think it’s about the same as my level. Some parts are a little bit empty though, but I can’t directly figure out a way to solve this. The snow effects work nice with this set.
PLACEMENT: 1.7 out of 2.5
Now on with the ammo and other pickup stuff. There are some things to say about the ammo here: first of all, the kinds of ammo that are placed are allright: you have all sorts of weapons (seekers, toaster, bouncie, pepperspray, RF and electroblaster) and there are two Powerups (Seeker and Toaster, which are only reachable with EB) Apparently one +1 carrot seems to be enough for the whole level, some more in other corners would be nice. I also think that some parts of the level are a little bit too empty, you could have add ammo to those places to make them more useful.
STRUCTURE & GAMEPLAY 3.9 out of 5.0
Now on with structure/gameplay, for the first time combined into one. The structure here is typical for a battle level and it has a really good flow to move yourself around. Also, many forms of structure are used (vines, sucker tubes, springs, etc.) which entertains me. I’m a huge fan of useless text strings (like in EvilMike’s levels) and I like them especially when my name is in it, although I didn’t notice it during beta-testing. I like the slope part with the holes in it, this is truly a good thing. The warps however seem a little bit useless in my opinion, since the level is quite small and they aren’t really necessary. The same thing goes for the water (you can’t really swim in this level, but it looks good with the eyecandy however) I liked the music file used a lot.
RATINGS:
XLM seems to have a positive influence on you since this level is better than everything you’ve uploaded to J2O before. The eyecandy is just allright, the ammo placement is fine and the structure and game are both good. I like to see this level hosted during the Christmas server, and probably even more. You’ve got a 7.6 from me for this level, and a download recommendation. Good Job!
Score: 2.0+1.7+3.9 = 7.6
Download: Yeah, it’s a funny level.
Host: Sometimes, at least during the Christmas server.
Greetings,
- ChippieBW
