Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

This review is just as rare as an upload by Blade ;)

Let me give you a first impression. “Islands in the sapphire sea”, which I will call “island” from now on, is a very detailed tileset with as main theme a carribean pirate island, it seems. The “feeling” of the tileset is exactly like it should be: Piratey! It has all that stuff you always used while playing pirate in your youth, plus more. Barrels full of fruits, rum (or some other liquid), and treasure, cannons, skulls, and SWORDS. Everything looks like it has some kind of cell shading, which gives a very “relaxed” feel to the tileset, especially in combination with the blue background.

As you can see in the beginning of the example level, it’s possible to create some “depth” in the level, as if it’s semi-3D. As Blade mentioned, you have to know the tricks of JCS to create those great effects in the example level, but it’s certainly possible.
Unlike in many other isometric tilesets, the objects in “Island” actually cast a shadow on the ground. This looks so leet that I hereby decalre this my new standard for 8+ ratings >8)
So the main feature of the tileset is the absoultely breathtaking 3D-like graphical quality. The drawings itself are nothing revolutionary, but combined with the perpsective Blade put into the tileset the tileset becomes a masterpiece.

So is it really worth a 10, you may ask? No, as you may know if you read my other reviews, I always keep my critics for the last part. While the tileset contains a great deal of objects like treasure or guns, the most important part of a genuine pirate island is missing: the pirates and the buildings they live in. If Blade combined the buildings of Oasis (redawn, ofcourse) and the amount of objects and detail in Island, this would certainly be worth a 10*. Another set of tiles that’s missing are the water tiles. Ofcourse, there are water tiles for the background and you can create small ponds. But there are no tiles to create the coast of an island, or tiles for underwater enviroments. Surely you can use the water level event to create underwater level parts, but it always looks sort of artificial if you use land tiles to create underwater stuff.
There’s no textured background either. The background provided in the set looks really nice, with clouds, a sun, a ship and island in the background, but some level creators will undoubtly want to use a textured background. Always try to please the masses if you want a good rating ;)

Alright, time for a verdict. I really like this set, but it misses some parts that would make the tileset so much better. The provided tiles offer a really really really one of the best-drawn JJ2 game enviroments ever (did I mention I like the anti-aliasing? Well, I do) and you can create a really versatile and detailed level with it, but this certainly needs a sequel. Grab it now!

^{(*) Yes, a 10. I never rate downloads or games like school work, where perfection exists. You’ll probably agree with me that creating the perfect tileset is impossible: yet there’s a “10” rating. When I consider a tileset really really great and one of the best tilesets ever, I won’t hesitate to give it a 10.}

I’m still waiting for ThunderPX’s upload to be removed. A fair amount of bugfixes were made after his/her upload. (And at least then, any changes I’ll add to this zip, save me time scrambling around for seperate MIDI’s)

Danyjel: No actually, this project was started 12 months ago from now. You probably don’t like MIDI’s in general and I can understand that. They’re an underestimated music format, and many people have to put up with the terrible soft-synthesizer most computers have called the Microsft® GS Wavetable Synth™.

Let’s review it…

It has nice melody. That’s everything.

It uses one stupid piano sample, no rhythm. 43 seconds long. Maybe it could be good, at least listenable, if author used more than one sample, gave rhythm, etc. Now, it’s the worst tune at whole J2O, and that’s unfair. Cause that should be good, after big improvements.

(+) Nice melody
(-) which can’t be well heard because of stupid sample
(-) One sample used
(-) 43 second long
(-) No rhythm

So, if someone is looking for something to remix, this should be good. Else not.

What’s so cool on converting music to midi format? What’s better on MIDI than any module? Is there any fun on doing that? Or what is reason to do that?

Actually, it would have been better to upload just the Castle MIDIs alone, because the rest has already been uploaded once. We’re very sensitive about double uploads because we want to keep our bandwidth usage to a minimum. Hope you understand.

- JelZe GoldRabbit =:3

They have been build by somebody called: MATT

What. The. Hell.

Whatever you may think, Battlea is NOT a secret level. Moreso, Battle4 is a level which came with v1.00g. However, the edit itself is awful enough to blissfully ignore that Battle4 has been done. Hurt events. Lighting Shield. Ultimate Weapon of Doom accessible via a coin warp. Invincibility carrot kept. And many more poorly overlooked flaws.

Far Out has been edited so badly that I just can’t explain how badly is that done. Zapper apparently has no clue how to make foreground layers move, so he puts there various loads of junk hoping that someone (maybe Jarno?) could find it nice. The way to access the level itself is also bad. Crash a crate and get a secret!!1

Anyway, as Zapper has informed me, I shouldnt rate it because it’s not a level pack, but a patch (tisk tisk). gg.

Yo Zapper for Battle4 please update the tileset of it please thnx

a really nice level i allready fell in love with it
(Unsupported rating removal. ~Violet)

Reupload the old file..

Wow, Blast, You have been busy! :) Tilesets IMO are somwhat hard to create (Artistic side of me has low power)

I would not recommend doing anything with the pallettes until you know what you are doing. most do not like color changes.

Starting Comments:

We’ll see.

Played with: Lori
On difficulty: Medium
Playing time: 1 minute

Playability:

The level consists of finding some random crates, kill a bunch of ravens and find the exit. It took me 1 minute to complete, which is definately too short. There were no pickups at all.

Score: 1.5

Balance:

Very easy. Finding the crates is not all that hard, and the clumped together ravens can be easily killed. Needs improvement.

Score: 1.5

Creativity:

At least it was not a simple “find the exit” level, but it was just too short to call it creative. Maybe some obstacles which prevent you from getting the crates or something would’ve made this a lot better.

Score: 2.0

Eyecandy:

Sux. Lots of tilebugs, and no proper use of the tileset. There were some ladders which looked not bad though.

Score: 1.5

Fun Factor:

As it’s too short and too easy I did not find this fun to play at all.

Score: 1.5

Overall:

A very short and easy level. The eyecandy sucks, and it is not really worth the download.

Overall Score: 1.5

Fragile Existance – By Fawriel
Time Started to play level: 3:14 pm (15:14) – Time Finished Level: 3:50pm (15:50).

Over half an hour it took me to beat it O.o.

To start the review:

Firstly, I’ve enjoyed this level from the point where I betatested and gave suggestions upon it during the active times of Project Alpha, and I still enjoy it now. This is undoubtedly one of the hardest levels I’ve played – not only in the fact that I’ve died/been near death so many times I’ve lost count, but also the mind-boggling puzzles. This level not only testes your quick reactions and awareness, but also your ability to solve puzzles and think.

The eyecandy in this level is for the most part, beautiful. The atmosphere is good (it does look like a deep cave). There is eyecandy everywhere. There are a bunch of eyecandy bugs, but they’re barely noticable unless you go hunting for them. The level is fairly long and difficult, but also fun. Lots of pickups and secrets nearly everywhere. The only annoyances where that bees and dragons got too annoying and hard to kill with the bumpy terrain, as with the bats hidden behind or near layer 3 that you can barely spot. Music choice was great. Overall, this is a really awesome single player level. You’ll definately have to spend effort and time beating it. It’s too bad that Faw doesn’t make many other levels, though =\. Lots of original and fun effects in this level too, so its definately worth a check!

Rating:
Layout/Gameplay: 8.2 (long and challenging, but often confusing and prone to get you stuck in the ceiling sometimes)
Eyecandy: 8.5 (some places could’ve used more, but it was generally good).
Placement: 8 (enemies got annoying when they were placed in unavoidable areas)
Originality: 8.5 (lots of cool stuff, despite the level being several years old)
Overall (not average): 8.5 (Imho this is a really good and challenging level. Needs some things to get fixed though).

Final Rating: 8.34 ~ 8.3 (would be 8.2 if it weren’t for textbox ratings).

This is a great level Faw, too bad you don’t make much more levels anymore. This gets a download reccomendation and a pat on the back from me =P.

Bass and lead could be better… Other is good, I like main background sample.
Weirdly, it has all minuses of MIDI files…

If this is an update, please use the re-upload button.

You should read the upload rules.

Cool
(Unsupported rating (10) removal. ~Violet)

Introduction : A CTF level by Snooze. I’m glad to see a level he made. This is a XLM level, using a JJ1 tileset.

Starting with the eye candy, Snooze used a JJ1 tileset for this level. Most JJ1 tilesets don’t have alot of eye candy in it, but this one has enough. The level has nice animations, and I like the background as well. When I played this level in SJ’s server, it had flying moons in layer 6. This looked weird. So Snooze removed them. =P I like the stuff in layer 3, especially the things that are for example at 17,43. Snooze also made some original eye candy in this level ; like the animating tiles on the slopes. The sprite layer eye candy is the best part of the eye candy in the level. Some good light effects were used. Nice job.

The layout of this level is quite open. The level is 160 × 47, but it ain’t using alot of tiles of it. This is no big problem, though. I prefer that a level is bigger in width than in height. The level is not symmetrical, but it’s balanced enough. A 2v2 in this level won’t be a very bad idea. The level has some good spring placement and float ups. The level has some good obstacles, but it’s easy to move in the level with jumping. If you run left or right, you can’t get the flag without jumping or braking from running. The platform that ends at 84,31 should be one tile longer, so I can get on it after taking the tube at the right side. The level has some Spaz biasing in it, but it’s not a big problem. There are 2 ways to each base.

The placement is quite good. There are 3 PU’s in the level. The Seek PU is the main PU and is placed in the middle. The Toasty PU is placed at 40,33 and is in a wall. The Bouncy PU is placed at 121,33 and is also in a wall. The level has some fast fires, that’s a good thing. There are 2 carrots in the level. Both are +1. The left carrot didn’t respawn in the match I played, but I have that problem multiple times. The carrots are placed before a tube, and that’s fine. Some good shapes of ammo are in the level. Some ammo is on the ground, other ammo is in the air. You need to get Gun9 to get the Toasty and Bouncy PU’s. It’s slightly harder to get them this time compared with other levels(not all)

This level isn’t very unoriginal. I needed to download this to get the music for this level. The music fits the level fine. The level has some original eye candy, and I never saw this version of Scraparap. The gun9 idea is old, but I’m not someone that cares that much about it. Oh, you made a spelling error in the textstring. (Expect instead of except)=P. This ain’t a real Snooze layout level, and Snooze told me that he was trying to do another style of layout. I can say that he succeeded with this, so gj.

Ratings :
Eye candy : 8
Gameplay : 7.5
Placement : 7.5
Originality : 7.5

Final rating : 8 + 7.5 + 7.5 + 7.5 : 4 = 7.625 = 7.6. Good job. If I were Chip, I would give you a higher rating in XLM. =P

Download : Yes, this is some new Snooze level you have to check out.

Host : Sometimes.

-DarkSonic[si]

I played this level for myself and in R3p’s server. And I’ll post a review for this level.

Introduction : a level by LaBRaTKiD of OLC. He used his own tileset for this level. Let’s hope it will be a good level with his own tileset.

The eye candy looks good in first place. This tileset doesn’t offer too much eye candy, but LRK did a good job, especially for a level with a size like this. The background looks good, and the rain ain’t a problem. Layer 5 has enough eye candy, but the level looks terrible with low detail on. (not that someone would play with it) There are good light effects in the level. Layer 3 has enough eye candy as well. I can say I like the eye candy in this level.

The layout is quite simple. You run a straight and very long way to the base. The level has a high width, but it’s not big in height. This is expected with a level by LRK. This level’s layout is almost symmetrical. The flow is quite good. You really fly through the level while running left or right. Both sides have vines above the base. At least this is not something about springs. The destruct sceneries are original, but can be annoying when you need to get through something ;P I am glad that they work only one time, because they can be annoying if they regenerate all the time. Almost everybody has it’s own layout style, and this level proves that, because it’s a typical-LRK layout. There aren’t many platforms in the level. So the layout is very solid. The layout is quite open in some places, but is closed as well. There are 2 ways to each base, which is good. It’s not that hard to defend the bases, but it’s possible to kill a defender easily. A 3v3 would be possible easily here. The border ain’t complete, though.

The placement is a bit strange. There is alot of gun8 in some places, and there are too many crates. There is only 1 carrot in this level. There could be at least 1 +1 carrot in it. There are 3 Power-Ups. (No Seeker, yay) Toaster, Bouncer and RF. You do not use Gun9 to get the RF PU, but Bouncies. Unfortunately, there is no fast fire in this level. Some interesting and nice shapes were used. The big group of gun8 is something that lowers the rating, but it wouldn’t be needed if there was no ammo near it. I couldn’t find the Bouncy and Toast PU’s at first, but at least I found them. 1 PU in a level of this size is a bit too… few =P

This level isn’t unoriginal. This is the first level with the tileset used, and it has a good music file. I haven’t seen many levels with this size, and some good light effects were used. Some interesting shapes of ammo were original, and the level as a open and also closed layout. Good use of vines, etc.

Ratings :
Eye candy : 8.
Gameplay : 7.9
Placement : 7.7
Originality : 7.7
Final rating : 8 + 7.9 + 7.7 + 7.7 : 4 = 7.825 = 7.8.

Download : Yes.
Host : Sometimes. Not too many times, but it’s better hosting this than hosting the old levels I get sick of.

-DarkSonic[si]

nice story but i got 3 times an error that the templete is not there… Very anoying… Is this just me? it is not in the folder…
(Unsupported rating (8.7) removal. Do you mean “tileset”, by the way? In any case, the bulk of your rating still seems to come down to “nice story”, which could use some explanation, especially as you don’t seem to be rating the levels themselves. Try harder. ~Violet)

(and they told me converted midi’s weren’t allowed to be rated. :( )

Like in your Chrysillis MIDI, there’s a note-release artifact; this time with the Choir Aahs. (It’s stuck holding till the end.)
Notation is correct, but the strings could use some triad notes under it, just so it sounds accurate.
This deserves an 8.