Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

I’m not sure what you were thinking making this level so dark. As you can see from the screenshots, this level is so dark that it’s virtually unplayable with ambient lighting on; even worse, it has pits that are easy to fall in regardless.

Absolutely essential for modern JJ2 level design.

Superb pack! I really like it.

10/10 HYPE

By the way, I inserted dragon explosion sample in code of Guardian level. Now I know how to insert custom sounds in JJ2 using AngelScript.

funny level and nice boss, I personally enjoyed it

Your Levels Remastered is Interesting, Great job!

Btw can’t loaded on JCS.

The AngelScript usage in the cinematic intro here is pretty impressive. The threatening red text, the sprite manipulations, the ‘acting’ rabbits. All convincingly good stuff.

Although there isn’t a lot of finished gameplay in here (yet), being able to play as Devan briefly while you storm the castle felt powerful for the most part. Maybe his gun and fireball attack (while transformed) felt a little slow and I’m not sure if Spaz’s double jump fits him.

For an actual review this would need more gameplay, but for now my (imaginative) hat’s off to the effortful visuals that went into this. I recommend this to everyone even though seeing it obviously makes you prolong for more!

This intro really is pretty damn impressive. There’s only one bug in saldr5 where you can move (as your default character), but it doesn’t actually change anything.

I like how you presented the whole war thing between Devan’s minions and the rabbits, the atmosphere in general is simply brilliant.

I like the playable (tutorial?) level as well. Makes me wonder how levels with this gameplay style may look like.

I hope you finish this.

The majority of gameplay here feels like a test level mixed with the early years of JJ2, all while it wants to surprise the player and doesn’t abide to logic and let’s things happen just because they do. Maybe the swinging spikeballs section and sudden tube events with varying speeds can be a bit tedious when enemies are nearby.

The highlight sure is the bossfight, although at first I didn’t exactly know what to hit in order to progress, with my seekers homing into the cow. It was nice to have a fight without buttstomping for once.

The level may be on the short side, and the tileset still has unused potential with additional characters like the superhero cows. But it still manages to feel fun and fresh for what it is, and I recommend this level if you’re in the mooooooooooood for a laugh.

Got MooGoo?

This level is really quite charming in its own way. It captures a lot of what it was like to play JJ2 back when it was a new game: It’s zany and random, it has whimsical music, and puzzles that are slightly frustrating – but somehow in the end the experience is fun and addicting. It also has some nice scripting, including a custom cow oriented boss. Who can complain about that?

Okay, it’s not going to blow you away with it’s level design or fancy graphics, but I don’t think that’s what this level is trying to do anyway. And in what it wants to do, it succeeds.

This level was rather interesting. It felt partly like an Earthworm Jim level, and also like a joke WAD in Doom. The swirling background could give some motion sickness, especially when you get shot around all over the place. I did really like the boss and thought that having waves of enemies be the boss was a neat idea. I’d say it’s worth a shot.

its here :D

[Please provide more support for your rating. For more information on writing a proper review, see the review rules.

Probably one of the best Medivo remixes out there, if not the best.

I love both the remix and the poster. Seems like their author is a multitalented person! Is Sidnify an artist as well?

It’s a rather nice level, as vanilla as it gets but still competently made. It felt almost like a secret level from the official episode 4 (exiting to Hell2 made this feeling stronger), but one that made better use of the ideas in Hell1.

I wasn’t too crazy about some things, like needing to find every single coin for the bonus warp, some blind falls onto spikes, and some eyecandy errors, but I enjoyed it anyway. And I have to give you props for using Inferno!

This one is still really cool.

Seems like I’m a slowpoke as I’m a little bit late with this review – most of pros and cons have already been described, but, WOW, this experience was amazing!

What I liked
As I’m a big fan of traditional JJ2 gameplay, I always wanted to see more content – more enemies, more mechanics, ect, though I wanted them to fit the original gameplay and Stadler’s drawing style. Among my favorite mechanics of this pack I can name the presents that open only after hitting the ground, ice blocks that break with a sound of broken ice, enemies sitting on moving plates, infinite corridor and some new mechanics of old enemies, especially the one of floating suckers. This levelpack is a good example of common work’s effectiviness. The work of programmers is obviously skillful. Skripting is probably the strongest point of the pack.

What I… Er… Not disliked, but my inner perfectionist makes me mention that.
There are some new enemies (or better to say, our old acquaintances from JJ1) – the only thing I don’t like within them is the fact that their grafics differ from later Nick Stadler’s works. Enemies and tilesets of JJ1 and JJ2 don’t fit each other. The dragon boss is a masterpiece, thow his drawing style is also different. These small style discrepancies slightly damage the harmony of the level sequence. Gameplay also vary from level to level, but it’s not a problem since each level was made by different author.

My game crushed at “Bah, humbirds” level, but when I was replaying it, everything was OK. Most likely, crush was a result of my own PC issues.

I strongly recommend this episode to all SP fans! Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all of you!

Burrrrrp thanks morty xD tttimeee to get *urrrp schwifty up in here!

[Rating (5.0) clearance. No meme reviews please. ~PurpleJazz]

I agree with AvalancheMaster and PJ. I’d just like to whine a little bit more about graphics and gameplay.

Whining about grafics.
I highly appreciate the ideas of writing a proper storyline and creating brand-new tileset conversions, but the realisation of the last isn’t that good. The quality of graphic inclusions is far inferior than of the original Nick Stadler’s masterpieces. I think it would be much better just to combine original tilesets with each other – remember Rage of Aquarius or Scorpio Key? They are so harmonic! It would be really great if the inclusions fit the original drawing style but they don’t. And the quality of the recolors isn’t the best I’ve ever seen.

Whining about gameplay.
When I started playing the episode, my first reaction was like “WOW! What a great and original piece of work it is! I wonder why its rating is so low?” However the more I played the more I felt bored and the more I agreed with the rating. After 10th level or so I couldn’t help typing “JJNEXT” just in order to have a glimpse of all of the levels. How many of them you’ve made? 50? Oh, God. Sorry. It’s obvious that you’ve put a lot of effort in them, but the repetiveness kills all the gameplay. It’s simply tedious. Making true single player Jazzers endure this gameplay is like making Usein Bolt search for a lost sock in each of 50 huge and messy rooms. JJ2 is supposed to be a fast paced game, isn’t it?

P.S. It’s not easy to rate this episode as a higher rating could sometimes be given to a small level wich was done in one evening. And you’ve put so much effort in your work. I appreciate your enthusiasm, creativity and diligence!

I agree that the level design is often rather laborious gameplaywise, and visually uneven (some colour mismatching, and that has to be the worst rain effect I’ve ever seen in JJ2). However, I enjoyed the variety of areas and the effort that went into visual storytelling, and I love the Arabius and Tibetius tilesets; alone they’re worth a download.

Any new Single Player levels 20 years after the release of Jazz Jackrabbit 2 are great news. Even more unique is when you get a release so big, it ranks among the biggest Single Player mission packs ever.

However, big is rarely equal to better, and this release is a great example of that. Mystery of the Four Artifacts contains more than 28 missions, and 50 different levels, but the vast majority of it is repetitive and cliched.

STORY

The story hits the same old tropes—Jazz and Eva are married, but Devan has escaped, and now Jazz must once again go back in time to serve justice. This time Jazz and Eva’s daughter has been murdered by the turtleous goon, but this element is just a poor hare’s McGuffin. Anyway, the story is rarely the reason why one plays JJ2, so cliche doesn’t bring down the quality of the levels—but it doesn’t help either. Still, the character of Bonus, Merlin’s ward, is quite original and refreshing.

GAMEPLAY

Most of the missions revolve around finding numerous trigger crates/areas/coins, and unlocking subsequent sections of the level. Unfortunately, this gets tedious over that many levels, and has been overdone to death even before the release of this mission pack.

The same old enemies have been used, with adequate placement that doesn’t bring anything new to the table. The gameplay is way too easy, except when it is not—and when it is not, it provides no challenge but plenty of frustration. Some of the enemies respawn far too quickly, some of the choke points require pixel hunting, and some of the obstacles are way too annoying. Every time I finished one of those difficult sections, I didn’t feel satisfaction but relief—relief that the boring part of the level is over.

There isn’t any proper direction in most of the levels, feeling more like an aimless maze than a puzzle or a platformer. I spent more time trying to find my way than actually playing this level pack.

The boss fights don’t seem to have any resemblance of a pattern. The perfect example is the final boss fight against Devan Shell, in which you battle the evil turtle in a really small room, with no platforms or hiding spots. To make it worse, Tuff Turtles randomly spawn on top of you, and no Carrots appear, even on Easy.

Still, there are some nice moments that feel original and inspired. 12 years later, chandie hasn’t lost his touch for Frog-centric levels, and the small section where you get to play as the Frog feels just right.

There aren’t any awful or unplayable sections in those levels either, so don’t expect any glaring shifts in level design that just don’t make sense. There’s plenty of jump and gunning to do, the problem is that it is too much and too repetitive.

EYECANDY AND MUSIC

Where the gameplay falters, the eyecandy glaringly succeeds. The main advantage of Mystery of the Four Artifacts is its custom-made tileset conversions, each of which blends several classic tilesets with new and edited tiles, as well as an edited Palette, to provide for environments that simultaneously feel completely new and pleasantly familiar. Tibet, the Arabic world, the Aztec Empire, and more are beautifully represented in a true-to-Jazz-Jackrabbit style. I hope those tilesets get used in the future for new Single and Multiplayer levels.

What chandie did with those tilesets is impressive as well. The eyecandy isn’t too obvious and doesn’t distract from the gameplay, but feels natural. The music included in the pack has also been properly picked to complement the atmosphere without distracting.

FINAL VERDICT

While the gameplay is repetitive and uninspired, the new environments provide great eyecandy that is worth experiencing. There are no strictly awful sections in this mission pack, but one can’t help but wonder if it wouldn’t be far more enjoyable if it was 70% smaller.