Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Reviews and comments

Slaz 21 Jun 2008, 10:13

8

I haven’t reviewed in full form for a long time since the Quick review function came to the site, but somehow this morning I am in for some writing how lolling it sounds.. So well here is my review for this level using the original Castle tileset including the great Jazz3 castle song.

GAMEPLAY
The first expression I got when entering this level in JJ2 was the ‘classic’ feeling it has from the start. The overall gameplay, tileset, and level design reminded me of the level ‘Rux0riffic (or something)’ by one of the Jazz2 developers. You basically walk through corridors and towers shooting enemies and looking for secret doors and paths. It also has some gameplay parts inspired by other classic levels, like the rather simple ‘warp puzzle’ and the fact that you must collect coins to continue the last part of the level (like in Hot Cross Bunnies), failing to collect 100 will result in warping to the start of the level. This will however force you to look for the secret paths which is a good thing. The gameplay is almost flawless, other than some small bugs like getting stuck for a while between a spring and a ‘pillar’ wall tile and falling into the spikes automaticly after crossing an ‘already collapsed’ pole bridge after using the warp above coin bunny to go to the start of the level.

EYECANDY
The castle tileset, as proven by the original Jazz2 levels from Episode1, is one of the few original Jazz2 tilesets that (in my opinion) had enough eyecandy tiles and background tiles to create a rather attracting atmosphere. And this level is using just as many eyecandy as the original Castle levels, and at some places even more. At some locations in the level, the dynamic lightning is set pretty dark which makes the level more stylish and chalenging aswell. I haven’t noticed any real eyecandy bugs in this level.

EVENT PLACEMENT
The events placed in this level match correctly with the gameplay style. Like there are enough sorts of enemies (like bees lol) and some extra enemies just for the hard mode. There aren’t that much carrots, which is a good thing because that is one of the things that made the original levels too easy. Weapon placement is alright, as the prevered weapons for the placed enemies are there and there is a room with powerups to upgrade them. Text events are there aswell, but more for some laugh than real hints (which aren’t really required for this kind of gameplay). The animated fire tiles are marked correctly with an ambient sound, and all spikes and other special tiles are wokring. Food and savepoints are placed too. There are no events placed that involve any bad gameplay, only some extra events placed in crates are a little overdoing.

RATING
This level is nothing new to Jazz2 level creation, but it is a present from heaven for those who prefer the ‘classic’ Jazz2 gameplay over the newer things found possible with the game. So if your mind is blowed after playing episode4 of EvilMike’s Devres series, you defenitely like to escape the hounted castle in this level for a ‘relaxing’ moment. I suppose I’ll give this an 8.0 for the effort given to this level, but not higher just for the fact that it’s 1 level and nothing too new for the communities standard. Download recommended.



sonicnathan 1 29 Jun 2008, 23:24 (edited 12 May 09, 19:09)

8

This is a copy and paste of the my last review for your download.

If this is you’re first time making levels let me say good job! This is above average by far. I also played this in medium.

Eyecandey:
Great. You used a background similar to the official levels so it has tilebugs in them. But other then that no tilebugs! Everything fits together. The background looks good and you even used the foreground. (Which looks very good)The bricks look good and I like the tileset usage. The eyecandey can look repetitive in some areas but considering you don’t have much to chose in castle, it looks good. I liked it, good tileset usage, low tilebugs. Great eyecandey. I’d give it a higher rating if you used windows in the floor. (The bar ones)
7/10

Gameplay:
I don’t know why but I got hooked. I had fun with the level. I have no clue why but I got hooked. There were some nice puzzles but they were to easy to solve. Enough enemies to make me die, and interesting concepts like invisible poles. (I like the idea as it looks good.)I’d give the gameplay a 8 if there wasn’t for one thing. The warp. If you haven’t collected 100 coins by the time you get to the warp your have to restart the entire level and with the re-generating enemies,, the lack of carrots becuase you used 70% of them alreaty and because it takes another 4 minutes to reach the warp again makes it very annoying. You should have placed it closer. The level is about 7-8 minutes long. So I’ll give you an 8 for puzzle usage, the fact I got hooked and because I love the text strings.
7/10

Enemy placement:
Great. Enough to kill me even with all the carrots. Half of them re-generate with can get annoying but it adds a challenge if you don’t get all the coins. A wide variety was used and they all fit in. (Except the bees) So I’ll give you a 8 just because there are to many re-generating enemies which can get annoying.
8/10
pickup placement:
Good. The coins were well hidden, good ammo placement, extra lives were to easy to get. Also there is this one area that has 3 power ups and you have to go though there. Don’t do that! There’s also way to much food. I got 2 sugar rushes! Nice us bombs though. Considering all the enemies I think the carrot placement was great.
7/10

*Final Score:28/40 *
Total:7.7
Rank: b good
D/R? Yes. The gameplay is just fun and addicting. even if this pack is short lived while it does, it’s fun! Download this one right away



n00b 23 Jun 2008, 22:37

Collecting coins is classic JJ2 level design? What game did I play?

Anyways, Chazz- are there any core differences between this and your older version of this upload aside from the music? I want to know if I can just copy and paste over my old review.