Review by MoonBlazE

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Odyssey
Level rating: 9.1
Rating
9.2

BlurredD’s Odyssey is one of the best tilesets ever imo. Throught it’s abit flat, it’s quality and possibilitys are great.
The set isn’t very userfriendly, you should take a close look before starting up with it.
Download recommed.

Review by American

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Kinky City
Level rating: 7.6
Rating
7.7

This is a strangely-named level, but nonetheless a quality one. The only fault I may find with it is that it is perhaps too easy. I beat it quite easily, and did not die even once. Still, that is not of as much importance as the overall quality of level is, so I will dwell on that no longer.

This level uses “7th Lava Fall” by Dethman. This tileset is indeed quite good and well-done, and this trancends into the level’s overall eyecandy. Eyecandy in general looks nice and shows some degree of though in addition to the normal plain everyday tiles. The eyecandy is not spectacular, but is still very well-done.

As I said earlier, the gameplay of this level is perhaps a bit too easy for most. That is not necessarily a bad thing, but in this case, it may be a bit offputting for those who are significantly experienced at Jazz Jackrabbit 2. There are not too many enemies and there are many oppurtunities in which to heal. Still, gameplay is alright and enjoyable in most cases.

Weapon and enemy placement was sufficiently adaquete. Aside from perhaps having too few enemies, there is not much to notate in this section of the rating. The placement of weapons is also nicely done.

What to make of this level? It is indeed a good single player level that will probably be enjoyable to play. While some may dislike the fact that it is, in fact, quite an easy level, if you get past that, it turns into a fun game. There are some oddly-placed warps that make it less fun, too. However, overall, this is still a nice level and worth your playing. As always, happy levelmaking.

- Trafton

Review by American

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: DaCastle
Level rating: 4.8
Rating
4.5

This level indeed is alright for a first level. Regardless, I refuse to rate higher just because it is a first level. After all, that would be absurdly unfair to anyone who made such a level as a second level. Level quality does not change simply depending on when a level is uploaded and what level number the level is for the author.

This level uses the classic “Carrotus” tileset by the Epic team in some more or less intriguing yet simplistic ways. Eyecandy is probably one of the better parts of this level, but not by any weight or measure of significance.

The gameplay in this level is simplistic at best and tedious at worst. In practice, the level was enjoyable at times but suffered from an overall air of mediocrity that can only be described as moderately offputting and more or less morbid.

Weapon placement was perhaps the most guilty section of this area. Weapon placement was generic, boring, and weapons were often all clumped together in one area, which definitely hurt gameplay.

So, what of this level? Overall, this is probably below average. I can not find any time in which I would be able to recommend this, but some might like it. My final score is a 4.5. Good luck with future levelmaking. This level does offer some interesting points, but there is a lot to be wanted that is not in this level. A lot. And, if you wish to improve your levelmaking, I recommend you look after these sorts of things. Regardless, this is not bad, and is worth a download. Good luck with future levelmaking.

- Trafton

Review by mikeejimbo

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Roman Sewers v1.1
Level rating: 8.2
Rating
7.7

Pretty good.

TILESET USE/EYE CANDY: Good. All the tiles fit together, I thought there was enough eye candy. There could have been more though, and it would have been just as good. Still, an 8 isn’t bad.
8/10

GAMEPLAY: The flow of the level was ok, but I think that the entrances to the sewers should have been farther on the left and right. I like battle levels to be circular.
8/10

ITEM/WEAPON PLACEMENT: I don’t understand the food, and wherever you have weapons, I think you have too many in one place. Also, I think you have too many rapid fires. On the plus side, the respawn times are good.
7/10

ORIGINALITY: Really, it’s just a battle level, but the sewers are neat, so you get a 7.
7/10

REPLAY VALUE: This seems fine. I think replay would be more if it were larger, or more secrets, so an 8.
8/10

OVERALL (An average): I like math, so my overalls are average. (My overalls are average? I don’t wear overalls.)
7.6, rounded up to 7.7.

PS (Trafton, I hope I did better on this review)

Review by Stilettø

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Jetpack
Level rating: 6.8
Rating
6

Just a Basic Tileset Nothing Special.
i would suggest that you add some other things to get a Higher Rating

(Character/Background etc)

Review by Roseta

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Weapon Regenerator
Level rating: 8.2
Rating
N/A

Yes Great idea, does it regenerate the copter in battle 1? ;)

And Taz, there is a bug where sometimes it automatically doubles reviews.

Review by Art Rabbit

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Jazz 1 Music Collection
Level rating: N/A
Rating
N/A

This was a great Idea!
But no diamonds Music!

Review by 007

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Jetpack
Level rating: 6.8
Rating
N/A

First I have this game on my computer

Lets rate

Its Bad the tiles are to big and a strange backround
I give this a 2 Because some things are funny :)

(Rating removal. -Trafton)[This review has been edited by Trafton AT]

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: The Kingdom Of Bilsy
Level rating: 8.5
Rating
N/A

Wha-what? What tilesets? What music? The only file with Bilsy in it on J2O is this one… this is 5 levels.

Review by raptor

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Dynamite Diamonds
Level rating: 8
Rating
N/A

I re-uploaded the level to make it available in the JJ2 Home Cooked section…people were asking me about that.

Happy Easter to all.

Review by Lark

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Dynamite Diamonds
Level rating: 8
Rating
8

Very nice… I played this level in it’s early stages, and gave raptor some pointers on how to make it a little better… and well, it’s better!

EYECANDY: 8.0
——————-
The eyecandy was very nice, but one of the background layers with the trees looked a little funny because of the X-SPEED setting… it moved a little weird, but there were no other problems with the eyecandy, all though nothing was extraordinary.

WEAPONS AND AMMO: 7.0
——————————-
There weren’t too many weapons and powerups compared to the old version, but that’s all right. For some reason, I didn’t think the placement of the ammo was all that amazing, though. Still good.

BUGS: 9.0
————-
Well, there were a couple secret areas that used to be there that had, for example, airboards in them, that had nothing in them now, but that’s not much of a bug. Also, in the old version, there were ‘wind tunnels’ under water, that you could only go through one way. I got stuck in them a lot, but fortunately, they are gone now.

CREATIVITY: 8.0
———————-
Nothing new about the eyecandy, but I’ve never seen water in a Diamondus level, and there were tons of secret places.

Now, my little sister is pressuring me into hunting for Easter eggs around the house, and all though I really don’t want to, I’m gonna. I’ll pretend Jazz hid them, that’ll be more fun, right? Lemme average this together quick…

Okay, 8.0! Great job raptor, if you ever make a future update, my recomendation (I can never spell that word, it’s probably spelled wrong, right?) is to fix up the ammo placement a bit, and get rid of empty secret areas!

Good job, keep up the good work.

(yay, my longest review ever, and it’s short, too!)

Review by spazz

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Anniversary Bash 4 level pack
Level rating: N/A
Rating
N/A


Originally posted by URJazzCC:
Most of these levels are pretty good aside from a few. But there could have been some others in here. Overall, it’s a pretty good pack for AB4, and especially if you like CTF/

EvilMike: Review edited to N/A.[This review has been edited by EvilMike]

I thought that donwloads on J2O were supposed to be rated. I know for a fact that they are. And I figure that this isn’t different from any other battle/ctf/level pack.

I quote, from Fquist “levels should be rated for their quality and not for their goal, as it would mess up the site forever.” And I believed that you could just put levels up for N/A purpose before. But I also found out that I was wrong when people started to rate a level that I posted, even though I asked them not too.

I’m sorry if I didn’t understand the rules or something, but as far as I know, you are supposed to rate items posted on the J2O.[This review has been edited by URJazzCC]


Good work EvilMike, this level is just a collection of CTF levels, if you did’nt notist.

Review by chandie

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: devil traps2 deel2
Level rating: 2.5
Rating
2

According to your level, there’s a good idea. The enemy placement was good also. There were few bad points that:
*The first level hasn’t got an ‘Area End Of Level’ event.
*In the first level, there’s a warp, which sends you to an area that has no way out. Also, there’s a trigger crate, which doesn’t have a trigger ID.
An 2.0 is good for the gameplay and enemies.

Review by chandie

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Rabbitaria
Level rating: 6.9
Rating
6.5

Hey! I have the same idea with raptor. It’s so annoying. There are warps thar send you to the spikes that you cannot escape (without cheating). So pay attention while you’re trying to build a hard level. Except this, the gameplay was great. The balance of the goodies and baddies were good. The beginning of the level was interesting. (Like travelling with the sýcker tube, and see the enemies that you will fight.
Generally, this level was good. I n my opinnion it colud be better for you to re-upload this level and remove these annoying warps. If you do, there can be a very good gameplay and fun. Trust me!:p

Review by Snowball

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: The Nothing In Particular Pack (NIP)
Level rating: 9
Rating
9

were you having fun writing the readme file?

well, nice levels, I won’t make long reviews as Trafton and Voilet.
never.
a 8.9 (rounded up to 9.0) for this excellent level pack.

Review by raptor

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Rabbitaria
Level rating: 6.9
Rating
7

Hard and annoying. It’s gonna make you go crazy. I suggest that everyone plays it. :)

Review by American

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Medivo Battle
Level rating: 2.8
Rating
3.5

“Medivo Battle” is a minibattle level. In fact, at 50×40 (and not much of that used), it is quite mini. Most minibattle levels feature a moderate amount of powerups and are well-fitted for a lot of people. While this level does fit the criterea, it suffers from an overdose of powerups, a lack of interesting eyecandy, and a way-too-easy to get coin warp. This level probably does not have that much effort put into it, but shows some skill. Everything is placed together in a way that demonstrates some knowledge of JCS. However, after that, there are some major problems with this level that definitely need attention before it can be any good.

TILESET/TILESET USE: The “JJ1: Medivo” conversion is used in this level. Unfortunately, it is not used very much. Most of this level consists of being in the air, so there is not much eyecandy for a lot of it. It would have been nice to at least see background eyecandy in the areas in which you were in the air, but there was very little if any. The areas on the ground demonstrated acceptable eyecandy, and although they were not amazingly good or flashy, they were good enough.
Pros: The areas on the ground have acceptable eyecandy.
Cons: The part of the level which takes place in the air has very little eyecandy.
Rating: 3.7

WEAPON/ITEM/ENEMY PLACEMENT: If there is one place in which this level fails, it is weapon and item placement. There are simply too many weapons and items. Powerup overdose is a big problem here. There are almost ten powerups in total within this level. That makes one powerup per about 20 square tiles, which is pretty overdone. You might think that in such a small level, this would make it really easy to be killed. Not so. This level balances out the amount of weapons with invincibility carrots. This is, however, where the level makes a big overestimation. It makes this overestimation in the fact that the carrots have way too long of an effect. The player who gets it is invincible for 15 seconds, while they can go around and kill and heal. This is way too long. While this would be acceptable if there were a lot of players in the game at once, this is not necessarily always what happens. It needs work in this category.
Pros: Not as bad as it could be.
Cons: Overestimation on amount of powerups versus carrots.
Rating: 2.5

ORIGINALITY: The idea of minibattle levels are nothing new to say the least. However, they are somewhat original. Though that does not necessarily mean the level is original. I doubt this level was intended to be micro, and it has nothing that shows that it is in the microbattle format, so it is nothing but a really small battle level. Sigh.
Rating: N/A

GAMEPLAY/DESIGN: The gameplay falls short, much like a lot of other things in this level. This is mostly because of the problem I mentioned early with the carrots and powerups. It is true that this is a seperate category. However, it is badly affected by this, and therefore that deserves mention. The rest of the non-related category is not exactly very good either. For instance, the level’s layout is awful. The level flows badly, and collisions are extremely likely. This category is not so good.
Pros: A few interesting places.
Cons: Not many. Masking issues. Not ver interesting gameplay. The carrot/ammo problem.
Rating: 3.2

REPLAY VALUE/FUN FACTOR: There is not much replay to this, unless you are in a server with a lot of people. I suppose in that case it might be mildly interesting, but probably not interesting enough to keep interest. Wow, that was redundant.
Pros: N/A.
Cons: N/A.
Rating: 3.2

OVERALL (not an average): I think the rest of this review pretty much sums up this level. Too small, not of good quality, and generally not worth it. Sorry, and while this does show effort, I’m afraid that it is too small to be worth anything more than the 3.5 I am getting it. Perhaps consider making a bigger level next time and spending more time on it.
Pros: Eyecandy could be worse.
Cons: And everything including it could be better. Much, much better.
Rating: 3.5

GAMEPLAY: D
Flow: D -
Layout: D -
Creativity: C -
Bugs: D+

EYECANDY: C -
Tileset use: D+
Eyecandy look: C -
Creativity: C -
Bugs: C -

PLACEMENT: D -
Weapons: D -

THE FINAL GRADE: D

THE FINAL RATING: 3.5

Pros: Eyecandy could be worse.
Cons: And everything including it could be better. Much, much better.

- Trafton

Review by American

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: HangingWires
Level rating: 6.1
Rating
5.7

I’m afraid that there are two things wrong with that statement. The first is that this is your level, and you should not rate it. We do. The second is that there is no such rating as 7.9, and even if there was, I would definitely not rate it that. Here is my original review for the beta, which I did while I thought it was battle:

Well, the first thing I have to say (this is a standard thing), is that the general rule is that betas should not be uploaded. They sort of mess up the review system, as technically they have to get low ratings, as we rate what is there, not what could be there. And, as such, this level will get a low rating. But it still shows some degree of promise, although it does half several very major problems, such as how it just stops mid-level. It is small in its current form, although there are a few things that I will point out that definitely show quite a bit of promise. So let’s start the review.

TILESET/TILESET USE: I am honestly not sure what exactly to make of this tileset use. In parts, tileset use is mainly dull and uninteresting for the most part, but in other parts the eyecandy is quite good. What balance is there? Well, there is some. Throughout the level, there are annoying foreground things which go by way too fast and do not exactly fit. However, in many places, the layer 4 eyecandy is actually quite nice. It is too early in this level’s creation (yet again, the beta problem) in order to tell how well it will turn out, but for now, it is actually above average. Nice job, especially for a first level.
Pros: Everything seems to fit together, and some looks quite nice.
Cons: Nothing amazing. Foreground annoyances. Some areas are dull.
Rating: 5.7

WEAPON/ITEM/ENEMY PLACEMENT: This part of the level definitely needs work. The main problem with the entire thing is that there are no generators on the items (click on “Create a generator for this event” when choosing the event from the events list and then specify a delay in order to do this). Therefore, once someone gets the ammo, it is gone for good. Unlike many first levels, ammo is surprisingly sparce. There is only a bit of somewhat useless ice at the beginning and some RF ammo in a secret area. There are no powerups or anything, and since nothing regenerates, most of the time the player is stuck simply using blaster and sidekicks. Generators are definitely needed, and more ammo would be nice, too.
Pros: Not as bad as it could be.
Cons: No generators.
Rating: 2.5

ORIGINALITY: This level is not all that original. But, then again, originality is not expected on a first level. There are indeed a few elements of this creation that are fairly original. Tubes are used fairly well, although the entire design is more or less linear. And then there are springs in the middle of a walkway, Battle2 style. I’m still not sure how hot I am on this. It stops you from being able to go through quickly, although it does fill in space. The float ups are nice, and it is rare to see a lot of these advanced concepts in a first level. The thing about this level is, although it does get a low rating, it shows a lot of promise. The techniques used in this level are generally not the sort of thing most levelmakers use until the first or second level. If this was completed and everything was filled in/fixed, it would probably get more than a 6. Which is, all things considered, very high for a first level. Add more eyecandy, fix the generators, and make the level a lot bigger, and you have yourself here a solid level indeed.
Rating: N/A

GAMEPLAY/DESIGN: This rating gets quite a bit of a hit because this level allows the player to just fall off a cliff. This is not really acceptable, and should have been fixed before uploading if not anything. Other than that, this level has an okay flow. For some reason, this level bares resemblance to both the race and battle levels that use Tubeelectric (the placement of the ice and the springs that bounce you back towards the wall remind me of the race level, and the springs the battle). Whatever, this level has an okay layout other than the whole falling off a cliff thing. Too early to decide, however, whether or not it is really good. Keep on working, though – it is promising.
Pros: Some areas are very nicely done, and if compled, it will probably be good.
Cons: The falling off the cliff thing and size.
Rating: 2.2

REPLAY VALUE/FUN FACTOR: Not much to say here. It’s a beta, and therefore not much fun and fairly buggy.
Pros: N/A.
Cons: N/A.
Rating: N/A.

OVERALL (not an average): This level shows a lot of promise. And I mean quite a bit. However, it is too early to pass much judgement. This beta does get a low rating from me because of the bugs and size, but it still shows good promise and you are on the right track. I would recommend adding generators and such in addition to more ammo and probably more eyecandy. Still, you are definitely on the right track, especially for a first level. Nicely done so far. Keep up the work.
Pros: Shows promise. Not bad gameplay.
Cons: Still needs some work. Small. You can fall off the platform.
Rating: 3.0

GAMEPLAY: D -
Flow: C
Layout: C+
Creativity: B -
Bugs: F

EYECANDY: B+
Tileset use: B+
Eyecandy look: B+
Creativity: B+
Bugs: B -

PLACEMENT: D -
Weapons: D -

THE FINAL GRADE: D+

THE FINAL RATING: 3.0

+ PROS: So far, fairly good and promising. Keep working on this level.
- CONS: Still needs some work. Small. You can fall off the platform.

- Trafton

EDIT: Generally demos are not allowed and I do tend to rate everything. However, I will leave this unrated upon your request. Just remember in the future that demos probably are a bad idea to upload. Sorry if I hurt your feelings. :)

And here is my review for the final. What all has changed? Not a huge amount. It is still a good level with a few problems. But it is now bigger, and there are now a few more eyecandy problems, and a few more gameplay problems. Let’s review, shall we?

TILESET/TILESET USE: I am honestly not sure what exactly to make of this tileset use. In parts, tileset use is mainly dull and uninteresting for the most part, but in other parts the eyecandy is quite good. What balance is there? Well, there is some. Throughout the level, there are annoying foreground things which go by way too fast and do not exactly fit. However, in many places, the layer 4 eyecandy is actually quite nice. It is too early in this level’s creation (yet again, the beta problem) in order to tell how well it will turn out, but for now, it is actually above average. Nice job, especially for a first level.
THIS TIME AROUND: Well, there has been a lot of stuff added. Most of the eyecandy is alright, although there are some fairly major annoyances. The entire level looks okay, although there are destruct block portions that are, for all intents and purposes, ugly. Everything looks like it would work one way, yet works another.
Pros: Everything seems to fit together, and some looks quite nice.
Cons: Nothing amazing. Foreground annoyances. Some areas are dull.
Rating: 5.5

WEAPON/ITEM/ENEMY PLACEMENT: This part of the level definitely needs work. The main problem with the entire thing is that there are no generators on the items (click on “Create a generator for this event” when choosing the event from the events list and then specify a delay in order to do this). Therefore, once someone gets the ammo, it is gone for good. Unlike many first levels, ammo is surprisingly sparce. There is only a bit of somewhat useless ice at the beginning and some RF ammo in a secret area. There are no powerups or anything, and since nothing regenerates, most of the time the player is stuck simply using blaster and sidekicks. Generators are definitely needed, and more ammo would be nice, too.
THIS TIME AROUND: There are still a little too few ammos, but now that I know this is single player (sheepish smile), that is not such of a big problem. Rating raised accordingly. However, there is one problem – the enemies, they are often right below you when you exit the suckers. There is no way to avoid this. Better placement would have been nice.
Pros: Not as bad as it could be.
Cons: Enemy placement needs work.
Rating: 5.2

ORIGINALITY: This level is not all that original. But, then again, originality is not expected on a first level. There are indeed a few elements of this creation that are fairly original. Tubes are used fairly well, although the entire design is more or less linear. And then there are springs in the middle of a walkway, Battle2 style. I’m still not sure how hot I am on this. It stops you from being able to go through quickly, although it does fill in space. The float ups are nice, and it is rare to see a lot of these advanced concepts in a first level. The thing about this level is, although it does get a low rating, it shows a lot of promise. The techniques used in this level are generally not the sort of thing most levelmakers use until the first or second level. If this was completed and everything was filled in/fixed, it would probably get more than a 6. Which is, all things considered, very high for a first level. Add more eyecandy, fix the generators, and make the level a lot bigger, and you have yourself here a solid level indeed.
THIS TIME AROUND: Nothing much to add.
Rating: N/A

GAMEPLAY/DESIGN: This rating gets quite a bit of a hit because this level allows the player to just fall off a cliff. This is not really acceptable, and should have been fixed before uploading if not anything. Other than that, this level has an okay flow. For some reason, this level bares resemblance to both the race and battle levels that use Tubeelectric (the placement of the ice and the springs that bounce you back towards the wall remind me of the race level, and the springs the battle). Whatever, this level has an okay layout other than the whole falling off a cliff thing. Too early to decide, however, whether or not it is really good. Keep on working, though – it is promising.
THIS TIME AROUND: The gameplay is more or less the same as I previously said, minus the falling off the cliffs thing.
Pros: Some areas are very nicely done, and if compled, it will probably be good.
Cons: The falling off the cliff thing and size.
Rating: 5.5

REPLAY VALUE/FUN FACTOR: Not much to say here. It’s a beta, and therefore not much fun and fairly buggy.
THIS TIME AROUND: Not much more to add, although it is no longer buggy. Yay.
Pros: N/A.
Cons: N/A.
Rating: N/A.

OVERALL (not an average): This level shows a lot of promise. And I mean quite a bit. However, it is too early to pass much judgement. This beta does get a low rating from me because of the bugs and size, but it still shows good promise and you are on the right track. I would recommend adding generators and such in addition to more ammo and probably more eyecandy. Still, you are definitely on the right track, especially for a first level. Nicely done so far. Keep up the work.
THIS TIME AROUND: It is finished and thus vastly improved. However, it still needs some work. Good job so far, although you may be a little too proud of your work. I hope you will not act like others and only look at the negative things I say and the rating instead of the positives. No one can be good so early in and while having a competitive additude is good, become egotistical is not. Not that you have, but just something to keep a look out for. It is easy to slip into.
Pros: Shows promise. Not bad gameplay.
Cons: Still needs some work. Small. A little easy.
Rating: 5.7

GAMEPLAY: B -
Flow: C+
Layout: C+
Creativity: B
Bugs: B

EYECANDY: C
Tileset use: C
Eyecandy look: C
Creativity: C+
Bugs: C

PLACEMENT: C
Weapons: C+
Enemies: C -

THE FINAL GRADE: C+

THE FINAL RATING: 5.7

+ PROS: So far, fairly good and promising. Keep working on this level.
- CONS: Still needs some work. Small. Enemies are placed annoyingly.

- Trafton

Review by progenitor_caretaker

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: HangingWires
Level rating: 6.1
Rating
N/A

Y’know what this level REALLY has? Instead of just saying it’s good or bad, which is different wit other people’s opinions, I’ll tell you the strong points and the low points.

HIGH Points

1.The title lives up to it’s name, hanging wires inside the blocks?!
2.Light values change the way you play this level.
3.I got an exellent “jupiter trails” music track, thx to whoever made it…
4.PINBAL!!
5.Good use of enemies, sorta…
6.SUCKER TUBES DOMINATE!
7.Warps that can save your ass…
8.BACKROUND THAT WAS WORTH MAKING

LOW Points

1.Maybe too many enemies…
2.I made it in spanish mode, so that might of screwd some parts up (jkz)
3.Some say not enough weapons, but if you are a real JJ player, you can survive here.
4.A bit short :(

OVERALL: I’d give it a 7.7, but it’s stupid to rate your own levels.

Oh yeah, and thx for taking your review and rating it even lower. It REALLY makes me happy to know that there are terrible people who do that.[This review has been edited by progenitor_caretaker]

Review by American

Posted:
Posted more than 21 years ago
For: Sunshine Walking
Level rating: 5.5
Rating
4.5

“Sunshine Walking” is an interesting idea. It is not often that new level makers use their own tileset in a early level and it does not work very badly. While I can not say that this is my favorite tileset by any measurement at all, it does offer some eyecandy, there are other problems. The gameplay was not exactly amazing, either. And a lot of this can be traced back to one thing – the tileset. The tileset’s mask is one of the major faults of this piece. The tileset often caused me to get stuck and because of poor masking on the diagonal surfaces, the level flowed badly. It is also fairly small and there is not all that much to bring the level’s quality back up. At least for a while after first using JCS, I recommend people use other’s tilesets. Building your own tileset and then using it in a level is definitely a challenge, and perhaps one that this amount of experience does not allow for.

TILESET/TILESET USE: It is often hard to compare the quality of new tileset-using levels, as no other level has used them before. But there is one thing which is definitely obvious what sort of quality the tileset is of, and the tileset use. While it is apparent that the author did attempt to make the best use of his (I think) first tileset, it is also apparent that the tileset is not exactly ready. The masking, if anything, is at the most fault here. There are a lot of jaggies throughout the level that the player can get stuck on, which not only reduces flow, but also proves troublesome and makes the level look bad. The eyecandy itself is not wonderous either. The entire level was indeed quite bland. Overall, not a good job here.
Pros: It is nice to see that the author went to the trouble of creating a tileset for this level. And then it is obvious some effort was put in.
Cons: None of this was enough to save the level from having bad eyecandy.
Rating: 4.0

WEAPON/ITEM/ENEMY PLACEMENT: Here is yet another area in this level that needs some serious work before being good enough to be even average. First of all, the level has very little ammo. Most of the ammo is more or less easy to get, though, and the lack of ammo is not that bad, considering how short the level is. Still, it does not look as if much thought was put into the selection of where to put all this ammo. The same goes for enemies. Enemies are placed in some interesting areas, but everything seems to not have been thought through well enough. The enemies are placed in areas which are inconvinient and downright hard to get to, therefore making the player go out of his or her way simply to kill one, when they could just be evaded just as easily.
Pros: Not as bad as it could be.
Cons: Bad placement all around.
Rating: 4.5

ORIGINALITY: The idea of this level is not that original at all. However, there are a few parts of this level that are more or less interesting, although none of them are used very well. The first thing is that this level uses the author’s presumably first tileset (at least first publically released tileset, I think.) The tileset does not exactly look very good and functions poorly, but does provide some originality to this level. The second thing that you somewhat rarely see is the warps in areas in which the player could simply fall to the ground – they warp you back to start. These warps, however, are annoying and quickly become more of a burden than an interesting part of gameplay. They are easily avoidable, though, if you are actually trying. Good examples of somewhat original concepts used badly.
Rating: N/A

GAMEPLAY/DESIGN: When I first saw the areas in which there was no floor in the level, I was sort of expecting that I would be able to just fall through them. Fortunately, the author decided to place warps down there. This did not add all that much to gameplay, but was better than just getting stuck down there and being unable to get up. The rest of the level fared similarly. Nothing was as bad as it possibly could be, but nothing was very good, either. The masking of the tileset, yet again, was this level’s biggest problem. Flow and everything was hurt by this. It was difficult to smoothly navigate the level. This level simply does not play very well. Oh, yes, and this level is too easy and short.
Pros: A few interesting places.
Cons: Not many. Masking issues
Rating: 4.5

REPLAY VALUE/FUN FACTOR: I obviously do not like this level as much as the previous reviewers. It was not fun to play more than once, in my opinion. In fact, it was not all that fun to play the first time.
Pros: N/A.
Cons: N/A.
Rating: 4.2

OVERALL (not an average): It is apparent that the author did put some degree of effort into this level. Unfortunately, that effort was brought down by the poor tileset. It probably would be a better idea to use someone else’s tileset until you can get both a good hang of how to use JCS very well and a good hang of how to make tilesets. Still, this level is not all that bad, and while it is below average, there are much worse. Continue making levels with others’ tilesets. This does show promise, although it also needs definite work.
Pros: Shows promise. Uses authors’ own tileset. Shows effort.
Cons: The tileset is badly done and masked.
Rating: 4.5

GAMEPLAY: C -
Flow: D+
Layout: C
Creativity: C
Bugs: C -

EYECANDY: C -
Tileset use: C+
Eyecandy look: D
Creativity: C
Bugs: D

PLACEMENT: C
Weapons: C

THE FINAL GRADE: C -

THE FINAL RATING: 4.5

+ PROS: Does show effort, and the author did use his own tileset.
- CONS: Major masking issues. Not good gameplay. Too short.

- Trafton

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