Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

If there’s one thing I’m mostly relible for, it’s reviewing SP packs. And if theres one thing those level packs are relible for, it’s bland, repetive gameplay and horrible level design. Ok, so that’s two things. Anyways, the thing that makes this pack unique is that despite being tedious, the gameplay isn’t anything like most SP uploads I’ve reviewed recently.
System Crash answers the question: What if by some odd chance Jazz accidently broke through those gray lines that form a protective case around him?
The answer is flip switches, find root keys, and stop viruses.
When you first enter the realm outside JJ2, you find yourself in a Recycle bin.
From there you collect a program, and learn that the blue bars of each program is ussually climbable. From there you go from one place to the next flipping triggers and stopping the occansional enemy.
It’s a unique idea, but after the first few switch flippings, the format wears thin. “Flip switch, enter program, return to main hub” Is mainly what you do for all of the first level. As I said, it becomes repetive fast, and the level rarely tells you where to go, forcing you to remember the state of each ‘utility’ in the Control Panel so that way you’ll know which switch to flip next. But don’t worry, if you dont get confused on where to go, the level will be over fast.
The second level introduces a bit of a storyline, the virus S474N has entered the computer. ‘S474N’ is just a bubba boss, and you even have a sheild to fight him off with. Anything before the boss is not worth talking about.
The last level is a contination from the second(lots of packs are doing this now.) You enter the control program for the virus, and will need to uninstall it. This mixes the now bland trigger flipping of the first level, with some enemies tossed in. Some areas in the control room are a waste of time and health, and I don’t see why they were included other than to have more things to shut down. Once you get to the uninstall console, uninstalling is as easy as Stomping and then jumping.Which then returns you to the original area which then loops you back to the first level.
Other than a few 1ups, there are no secrets so replaying it is really worthless.
The tileset has some major masking problems that got Jazz stuck in various areas he couldn’t get out of, otherwise it’s one of the best windows conversions you can use.
Final Thoughts: This pack seems unique and innovative at first, but after a while it starts to feel the same. It’s worth one play through since it’s a great break from the usual SP packs uploaded. The tileset is a wonderful Windows XP conversion, but theres some masking problems that can limit it’s use. The boss fight felt way to easy, and the arena could’ve deffently have been improved.
Bleh that’s one of my worst reviews. Next review goes back to the old format, be there!
Final Information:
Download Reccomendation?: Yes, it’s only 3 short levels so playing through all of it isn’t going to be a huge waste of time. Plus despite some masking errors, the OS tileset is better than the Windows 98 tileset here at J2O. And the music files aren’t too bad either.
Final Score- 5.3 Despite the fact it was monotinus, it’s charm and erm, differentness from most recent JJ2 levels, gives it a boost in score.

This is a nice level! It is made with the d*mn tileset, and contains about 150 gems (i think) making it idial for two player treasure hunt. The level contains some helmuts and demons, but there aren’t annoying much of them. I also found a masking mistake, at the higest platform at the far left of the level, but this isn’t that bad. The gems are nice placed, but the background eyecandy (stalagmites) doesn’t move up or down (y-speed = 0) making it a bit lame. Maybe you should try a little out with y-speeds like 0,05 or 0,1. This usually doesn’t give much trouble, but it still looks a lot better. Btw there’s a mistake in the layer 8 background as well.

Bla

Fun: 4/6
Eyecandy: 3/6
Gameplay: 4/6
Event Placement: 5/6

This makes your rating (calculator): 7.0

Nice job

Download? If you like 2 player Treasure Hunt: Yes

I like this onehttp://img323.imageshack.us/my.php?image=prereleasescreenshot14xl.jpg
and the lava nahh that isnt right….

I LOVE THEM ALL
wow great

Eyecandy 9.8 Better Isnt Possible
nahh yeah it is but thats hard to get
BUT ITS GREAT

Diamonds 9.9
Better is inpossible
thy are much better than the orginal diamondus!!!

_Jarno

_{Go Pyro!}

I don’t feel I can make a good rating, so I wont try, but I feel like commenting a little on this.

Eyecandy
I dont really care, but atleast it isnt disturbingly ugly. Colors looks nice together, and all.

Gameplay, Pickups, Layout, and pretty much everything else
My first thought was “Oh, he made notsbv2 with another tileset”, since the areas around bases are made sort of the same way, which isnt a bad thing at all :) Coming to think of it… sort of reminds me of jungle’s edge too – with the placement of carrot and bases.
I like the way coins are used, its nice to have a golden coin, which draws lots of attention in a semi-dead end, (only 2 small ways out of there), however that place could be a way too easy stayalive-spot in a teamgame.
The RF-powerup’s placement is great. If you try to take it you will most likely get killed, but if you in some way manages to take it, you will have an easier time hunting your enemy.
Same thing with the areas under bases, very easy staying alive-spots…Could be good, could be bad ;p
Something that disturbs me is how the coins are placed so you have to jump to get them, and the fact that the text-string above the coinwarp is unreadable (due to the scoreing-count). Overall a nice level.

Anyways, 2v2 here, anyone?

If you like it so much, why did you give it a low rating?

This thing is hideously overrated. The most important tiles, the ones which form the platforms you’ll probably walk on, look like some quick 10 second Paint job. They come in two flavours: tiles with an ugly funky multicoloured stone texture and tiles with some strange red and yellow texture. Both offer very little variationa and will look horrible when used to create big structures.

The eyecandy tiles generally look a little better. Some of them are even shaded (I like the Roman-style collumns), and offer sufficient possiblities to make your level look better. Too bad some of it has that same 10-second-point-job look as the platform tiles, because your level simply doesn’t look good when half of it has been made with shaded decent-looking tiles and the other half was made with tiles that look like they were copied from a first-generation set. When it looks good, it’s not always usable: too many of those funny balloons, for example, make your level look very repetitive.

On the contrary, the layer 6/7 eyecandy looks pretty good. There’s a mountain scene with tower castles showing behind it, and a simple 3D water scene, which does its job. You can easily make a level look like if it’s situated in a lake surrounded by castles and mountains, or something. There are some original fireworks animations to place above the castles, too.

Apart from the basic platform and eyecandy tiles, this tileset contains a lot of text. The quality of those tiles matches the eyecandy’s: it varies. Some text is shaded and looks good, some text looks like unedited cursive Arial, and like one third of it can only be used to say you’re a JSZ member or the tileset was created by a JSZ member or whatever.

I normally don’t care about the “event compatibility” other reviewers seem to value highly, but I think this tileset receives some extra attention for it ;). All palette-specific events seem to work, and there are even tiles to place those poles on. All destruct scenery is there too: even the ice blocks. The belts are animated and look pretty good, though they don’t really fit in with the platforms because those are 2D and the belts are semi-isometric-3D.

If I understood correctly, this set uses 920 tiles instead of 1020 because it would contain so much animations. And indeed it does. However, those have the same problem as almost all other types of tiles: some look bad, some look good. The spinning plates with the Jackabbrit family’s heads on it look quirky, but the fireworks look decent. Overall, it’s nothing special and some of the animations could well have been left out in favour of some more useful tiles.

So, this tileset is not as good as you may conclude out of Avarte’s review. It has a lot of tiles, sure, and some look pretty good, but there are too many badly-looking or not really useful tiles in the tileset and the platforms, as I said the most important part of your level, look horrible. However, where this set misses out on platform element completeness it compensates with its massive amount of event-specific tiles (tubes, blocks and the rest). I wouldn’t recommend downloading it, though: I don’t think anyone would use this for a level while there are so many betetr sets out there. If you really insist on giving your level a “casino”-look, use Chiyu’s set.

OK. My review. Here it is:

GAMEPLAY
Very short, -2. Short Battle levels are BAD.
Surprises! 3!
Just a few too many warp spots…0.

MUSIC
Um, the pre-historic Carrotus music? Really, you should of just used someone elses and given credit. -2.
It matches. 1.

TILESET
Just an edited Jazz 2 one. And it even uses the Diamondus trees! -2
The colors go funny underwater. -1

OTHER RANDOM STUFF
Ha ha, found the Seeker Powerup too easily. 0.
Spaz only? Bow bow. Big disapointment to Jazz users. -0.5
Good use of the tube sucking effect, 2!
NO BUBBLES. >:( -5. Actually cross that out. -1
Good ammo placing. 3.
Fantasic colour editing! 4!
I ADORE the background. 3.

Overall: 3+1+3+4+3=14. 14 -2 -2 -1 -2 -1 -0.5 -1 =4.5. Sorry, it’s the way it was!

DOWNLOAD RECOMMENDATION: No. Not to sure if it’s even good enough to be considered as a battle level.
PLAYERS: 2-5. It’s too small for anything over 5.

There is no my work, btw…

This tileset are wonderful! Many of colors, atractions and eye candy. In Addition to this, it looks realy cool. However, it can by beter, because background and rest of are not good and many of tiles looks like from paint :P

Introduction:
Totally Insane Music Makers presents three music files that will eat your soul. And not in a good way.

Music Analysis:
I’ll be blunt. The only good song out of these three is Deckstar. And even it is no good. The only reason I specifically mention it is because it sounds like a half-arsed rendition of a generic 80’s song. Scraparap is a close second only because it’s quiet and mellow. Crysilis sounds like you got bored and decided to play with pitch bends and volume bends.

Sample Analysis:
The samples tend to clash worst of all in Crysilis and, for the most part, don’t seem to be anything other than the original Jazz Jackrabbit samples thrown in a blender. Again, not a good thing.

Final Analysis:
Overall, these songs sound like you all tried way the Hell too hard to make something work. Three times. And failed each time. They just plain don’t seem to work.
It might just be the pitches of the notes, or it might just be the weakness of each song. I don’t know. In any case, while being vaugely original in each instance, these songs are clearly nothing to write home about. These may have been better left under the couch cushions on a couple of 3.5-inch floppies.

Recommendation?:
No recommendation. Seriously. I’ve heard better things from VG Music.com circa 1996.

————————————————

The “Simon Cowell” of Jazz 2 Online‘s Music Scene. . . Joseph Collins
“Dr Lithius” or “LithiuServer” on Jazz 2

Introduction:
Boredom forged in the facade of re-arranging music spawned this. But how does it stand up to the original pieces? Let’s find out.

Music Analysis:
For the most part, channels were added to each and every Module to give it more echoes, range, and the sort. Some timing and pitch bends were also fiddled with here and there. However, some of the music sounds almost entirely unchanged. . .and some, like the Boss theme, actually sounds worse!(In this particular instance, the Boss theme is hollowed out a little. Quieter.) This is mostly due to what I’ll be samples, however. . .

Sample Analysis:
. . .some of which were changed, not for the better, but for the worse. Samples like hi-hats and some of the other things are of lower quality than the original overall(even if they’re of higher bit-rate). In fact, a couple sound like they came right from the Sound Blaster Live! v5.1 SynthWave SoundBank. However, some of the samples, however, sound quite a bit better than the originals. There’s a few songs where the samples fit all the better.

Final Analysis:
Don’t get me wrong. Some of the songs truly do sound better than their original incarnations. Labratkid obviously tried to do this as best as he could. He wasn’t aiming for remixes. Just slight alterations. . .re-arrangements. . .things like that.(Like that Medivo thing I did a while back.)
I’d say overall, he did an acceptable job, but it’s not quite as nice as it could theoretically be. Maybe try using better samples, or at least different ones. Perhaps don’t rely so heavily on just adding channels and echos. Trying adding in some of that originality we’ve come to expect from you, LaRK. For example, with the sample you chose for the “Jingle Bells” thing in Holidaius, might I suggest pitch-bends instead of just jumping from note-to-note? Also, change the snare drum back to a “machine crash” in Scraparap. . . That song is so nothing without that. Use the one from Final Fantasy VI if you have to. Just change it back.

Recommendation?:
Sure. Why not? Nothing here is damaged or anything. For the most part, it sounds just as good as the originals, and in a lot of cases, slightly better. Exoticus sounds absolutely marvelous with the new xylophone samples, for example. Technoir sounds fairly decent, too.

————————————————

The “Simon Cowell” of Jazz 2 Online‘s Music Scene. . . Joseph Collins
“Dr Lithius” or “LithiuServer” on Jazz 2

And also If he did it * in i dont say he did * it was deleted a long time ago!

A war tileset :)

Ok what i mainly like about this tileset, is that you have a clear topic, and you have two site , unlike the usual blue/red you have spain with the brown basics and the war green for france(I suppose). I also like your color selection for the tiles not too funky rather settled pastel.
The masks works fine with me and i definitely like the spaz/jazz warriors :D nice job.

What you clearly miss out is the optimisation of the palette see layer 8(ask other ppl(notme) for some help if you have problems :) cough*disguise&toxicbunny*cough). Moreover does the tileset lack in eyecandy you have some detailed eyecandy part in which u certainly put some effort in, but they can’t fill a whole level. You are missing out layer 1,2 6,7 in my opinion.

Finally, I think your idea for this tileset is good and you have creativity, just get a bit more into those points i mention above.

The eyecandy here does the work well. Unlike many of the levels using this tileset, this level really feels like set in a hot environment. Sprite/foresprite layers look really good. The walls are all detailed and give this level a semi-3Dish feel. Layer 5 is used to help out the sprite eyecandy, and it does the job. Lots of Flicker Light events make in front of the lavafalls make up for a very well created effect. However, the background layers suffer from lack of originality. The same background has been used to death, and the moving lava on layer 6 doesn’t really help it out. Satan planned something to move across the lava (the bubble animation?), but that was deleted and remnants of the planned layer can be seen in its properties.

This level finds the happy medium between two kinds of bad flow. You can’t really say whether do you have to jump a lot in this level or not, it’s all very well balanced. The layout also works. It’s mostly enclosed, albeit there’s enough space for the players to move around without bringing on the chaos. Also this level is rather small, and thus not reccomended for a bigger group of people. 3 players will be sufficient.

The placement is alright. The ammo is spread out fairly, and in some nice ammo patterns as well. There are also a few fastfires to help out the Blaster PU, and rather scarce seekers. The two latter powerups are harder to get, as the Bouncer PU requires some RF climbing, and the RF PU is hidden somewhere too (not telling you where >D). Also if you’re low on ammo, you can get to an ammo barrel and get some ammo. This level has also two carrots (like Satan pointed out) and they’re also placed fairly well. Nothing extraordinary, though, and none of them is hidden (I couldn’t find the upper one though). Their respawn time is also alright.

• Well done eyecandy
• Smooth gameplay
• Original layout
• Enough ammo
• Sufficient number of carrots, considering the fact that two of the three powerups are hidden

• Rather small

Overall

This is a well done battle level. It was approved by CelL and FS who organised Anniversary Bash 7, and that should be enough of proof (aside from my review). IMO this is one of the better levels of this year, so download. OR I BAN.

I’ll review this level by level.

Dad! Come to see here!:
Gameplay:
Classic find something to win. Quite challenging. I missed some coins and cheated to win.
3/10

Placement:
Enemy placement is so-so. Most of them can’t move, which makes them easy targets. The goodies are placed pretty well, except the ungettable ones on the very left.
3/10

Eyecandy:
Alright. Not much in terms of layering, and some of the eyecandy you can get stuck on. Okay though. Not sore on the eyes.
2/10

Originality:
I haven’t seen many of these yet.
4/10

Overall for level:
3/10

Burg des grauens:
The second level.

Gameplay:
You must defeat the scwartzengaurd. Reminds me of Carrotus. Not to hard, yet fair.
4/10

Placement:
Better enemy and goodie placement. None of the previous problems. Only know, there are too many badguys.
4/10

Eyecandy:
Definantly not sore on the eyes. Still the sam layering problems, but at least you don’t get stuck on stuff. Gets better near the end.
4/10

Originality:
None really.
1/10

Overall:
3.9/10

Reich der Affen:

Gameplay:
Uhg. I spent 5 minutes going in the wrong direction. This level can be beaten in 30 seconds.
0/10

Placement:
Not good. The layout can be very annoying, cause you don’t know where to go!
1/10

Eyecandy:
Good. About the only good thing in this level.
4/10

Originality:
None whatsoever.
0/10

Overall:
2/10

Grand Overall:
3/10

Download Reccomendation: Yes.
But make sure you know the file names so you can delete it when you are done.

Its just a drop and a bunch of text wich you cant read :P
anyways something with no efort already exists :P its called 0 effort CTF i beleive its a whole CTF where the level does all the work for you

Okay. This was entertaining for a few minutes.

Gameplay:
Actually tricky at some parts. Mainly because of lack of directions. And It is possible to win before you go throgh the whole thing.
1/10

Placement:
Enemies are in bad posistions. Fish out of water? Not enough of them. No bonus items like berries or soda.
0/10

Eyecandy:
No layers, lack of directios, and the level was not built to look good.
0.5/10 (For the effort)

Originality:
None.
0/10

Overall:
0.75/10. But since it is the first, 1/10.

Theming and Eyecandy – 2 out of 5

I ran down the first level in the pack and suddenly was utterly dismayed. It suffers from the same problem as Epic’s levels kind of do – while it’s supposed to be a cave, why does it look so darn open?! There’s something unrealistic floating in the background too, making it look like the place is actually a lush grassland dubbed as a cave because instead of sky you see a giant drab wall. Violet’s example level showed a cave-like environment, and that is where the standard was set. As soon as I got past level one, I got to the second one. My Spaz started in a cavelike thing again (which looked way better than the first level overall), and then he proceeded to the surface. I was immediately dismayed (again \\o/) to see that there is nothing in the background! Just the sun floating below the sky and something supposed to be large tree branches to help out the trees on layer 4. Putting a few mountains in the background would be a way better thing to do, and Littlefreak could even try to make the building you approach in another level out of some tiles. The aforementioned trees look kind of dead too, as for the most part they’re devoid of any kind of leaves. Are the trees dead for a reason or another? Anyway, I found my way out of the dead tree canopy and approached the building, even though nothing in level 2 looked like one. SURPRISE! Level 3 suffers from the same problem as 1 does! LF barely used any of the cool possible effects WSF features, and the eyecandy turns out being worse than in the example levels again. On the contrary to the first three levels, level 4 actually uses background eyecandy. The problem is, they have been borrowed from Mike’s battle level! Bah. Other than that it looked just like level 3, maybe except for the sewer environment, which was kind of original and is the one of the few things saving the eyecandy from getting the lowest score possible.

Gameplay – 2 out of 5

The gameplay in those 4 levels wasn’t really any better. They were all rather short and easy (I played on Hard). And yet again, the most disappointing level is level 1! Considering the open structure of that level, I just jumped above most of the enemies and dodged the rest of them. Blah! No challenge at all. On the contrary, the latter levels were pretty challenging, but not because they had some extremely well done traps. Level 2 is evil because lots of the branches in the dismal tree canopy are on layer 5 and thus it takes you a while to climb up after you crashed a certain trigger crate (why would anyone leave a switch opening the door of a fortress in all open?). Then you fight the Tuf Turtle Boss (no real challenge either) and approach level 3. In one certain spot, there’s a row of doors and you need to do a certain thing to open/destroy them. The problem is, you are supposed to figure out what do you need to do, and it obviously takes a while and is rather tedious. After that you must destroy a crate with a frog (why with a frog? =( ), and then face a few demons in a small room with collapsing scenery. Fun? Not really. Then comes the rather tedious as well level 4. You need to figure out what to shoot in order to proceed a few times, destroy a few crates, and approach the sewer. The sewer is probably the coolest part of the whole levelpack. You fall into something like acid, and must quickly get out. Then your character gets dizzy and sees himself on an airboard (coincidientally enough, I felt rather dizzy on that certain part as well ;D), and gets out. If the sewer part wasn’t this short, the gameplay itself would get a 3 instead of a 2. However, it’s extremely short for one reason or another. Anyway, your character exits the sewer, passes a collapsing bridge and fights something supposed to be a blur wannabe (As if me and Defost weren’t enough.) and looking like an Uterus boss. The arena was barely challenging at all, so the boss died and everyone lived happily ever after. Blah. Uninteresting gameplay.

Eventing – 2 out of 5

The eventing was also floppy. Most of the ammo was just scattered around in some random forms, and so were the coins. All the bonuses require 20 coins (more variety required =( ) and often they’re overpowered. Level 1 lets you choose between a Bouncer PU or a Toaster PU, Seeker PU in level 3 and Bouncer PU again in level 4. So if you pick Toaster PU in level 1, you will get Bouncer in level 4 anyway, so what’s the point of choosing one over another one?

• A few original things in level 4…

• Basically the rest.

Overall
This wasn’t all that good. Doesn’t really apply to today’s standards, and most of it is rather evil and tedious. The level 4 is semi-cool as it has an original part, which is the sewers. Unfortunately, not much else is original here, so…

EDIT: This was kind of too harsh.

I refuse to review this due to the fact that it has exactly the same flaws as the Ice Episode. There is no need to review this again, if the author doesn’t do anything to improve his levels.

Shadow rabbit: Thats a CTF level, you need to play it in CTF mode for it to work(Capture the flag ot CTF is in Party Mode.)