Jazz Jackrabbit 2 Online

Christmas are coming, and so do christmas levels. I’m not against it, I even made a christmas level myself, but not only some are below average, but also a few have nothing to do with christmas except for the name.

When I saw the title, I thought it will be a snowy battle level with xmas music. However, I was wrong – for unknown reason (originality, maybe) Jarno Vos decided to use Carrotus Night and add some snow – and you must know this snow is purple. Still optimistic (as I am), I continued playing the level. Boy, I could’ve stop at the very first look…

Panic
The level is heavily vertical. It’s only a bit widhter than the game window, but the height is like, hmmm, maybe 5 or 6 screens. So there’s this shaft, and there are some airboards. The autor predicts they are necessary, and basically they are (fall to the bottom and you have no chances of going back up), but then why we can avoid them? If the player is fast enough he can move above them and continue the play on his own feet. Of course, he wouldn’t want to, but still it’s bad. Especially since walking players are faster than airboarding ones.

‘Cause it’s an unfriendly place
The ammo placement is quite like plants on a desert – not much of them, and they always stick together (that’s called oasis). On the top there’s TNT, in the middle there are Frostbiter, Seeker and Bouncer. There’s not much on the bottom (some coins and a carrot, which isn’t something great – I’ll explain that later), until you go to bonus. Wait wait, bonus? Oh yeah, sure there is one. You could guess that looking at the coins. If you were lucky enough – they don’t respawn! And more than that, you need to get them all if you want the bonus. And even if you got them all, you’ll spend a while finding it. I think I can tell that it’s the arrow on the right wall, especially since the bonus isn’t quite worthy the trick. What you get is some Toaster ammo and entrance to the room on the very bottom. It contains a bit of Fast Fire, 2 carrots (once again I’ll get back on that later) and… spikes! Iiiiingeeeenouuuuus. It’s so easy to touch them, that I begin to wonder – does this room help or actually acts fully opposite? Hard to guess, especially since the spikes are in the normal part, too. Lots of. Argh!

You’ll run back…
Back to the ammo, at first I didn’t understand why Frostbiter ammo is placed in such obscure place. This still is strange, when bouncer and TNT are easy to get, just like the Blaster power-up (TOO easy on this one, I say), and Forstbiter isn’t more powerful or at least as powerful as them. Soon I found a wicked passage in the wall near Frostbiter ammo, which led to a text saying “SHOOT!” I did what it wanted me to do, and so I got a fire shield. Yay, it’s hidden enough! One good thing so far. If there only was a quicker way than going all the way back to get out…

…and forth
While the level is quite small (which I don’t count as bad, I like small battle levels – of course 1 screen size level is breaking the line), it contains whole 9 carrots! To make it even worse, in almost all appearances they come in groups of two. Maybe it’s to give a chance of entering the bonus? Maybe that’s the christmas gift? Anyway, that’s another wrong thing. I was coming to this one from a while in this review – carrots on this level are done horrible! There’s barely a chance to roast someone, even with the Blaster PU.

You call that christmas?!
The last on the long list of cons comes eyecandy – or should I say it crawls, because it’s barely noticable. There’s NO background and foreground eyecandy (the lake on bottom has the same movement speed as sprite layer) and the layer 4 eyecandy is very poor. A few flowers, carrots (one badly done), caverns on the left (I named them so, but only because I couldn’t find a better word – they make no actual caverns at all) and a few unnatural pumpkin vines. Oh well, at least it’s better than nothing – and believe me, I saw many levels with really zero eyecandy. Maybe you did, too.

No way!
This level has barely anything to do with christmas, as well as with joy (the basis of christmas IMHO). No recommendation, really. When I looked into the readme file, it was clearly saying that the author is 8 years old – but that doesn’t change the fact that the level is bad. Jarno vos, maybe you should train a bit with more skilled levelmakers – I’m sure you’ll find someone who will want to teach you levelmaking basics – or at least check out JCSref or a proper article. Meanwhile, I cannot give this level anything over 2.2.

Finally cloud maded SP-episode

DESERT DREAM: Gameplay::Not bad…for beginner. Eyecandy:Not bad Event placment:Very bad Enemy placment:Good Tileset used:Your own tileset:P Overall:4.5 UNTITLED: Gameplay:Bad Eyecandy:AAAARRRGGHHH!!!!!!!!!! Event placment:Not bad Enemy placment:Not bad Tileset used:Your own tileset:P Overall:3.2 UNTITLED: Gameplay:Very short level but good.Boss is very cool. Eyecandy:Good I think Event placment:Baaaaaad Enemy placment:Not bad Tileset used:Wow, a spaceship tileset (By cloud:p) Overall:4.5 Untitled: Gameplay:Not bad Eyecandy:Bad Event placment:Not bad Enemy placment.Not bad Tileset used.Made By Cloud Overall:4.5 OVERALL: 4.2 (I think)

Ehh WAZ You Made The Tileset!:P

I noticed some of the tiles are not in there, such as the inside of the cavwe houses. You did do two seperate tileset for the inside of the cave, and the outside. Plus, when I played commander keen 4, i found a green slime pool in the 2nd pyrimid.

Appart from that, everything is OK.

(Please do not suggest that people use illegal software. -Trafton)

Hhhmm.. I think that THIS IS YOUR BEST TILESET DISGUISE!!!
Graphics are very cool.
Background rocks!!
There is many eyecandy tiles.
Background mountains are very good.
Trees are very cool.
Download recommendation:Of course
Overall:9.2

Wadledee use Captin Cook

It’s a really good level, nice paths, and suckers…
So let me review!

EYECANDY

Like the others sayd, no tilebugs! But the standard Carrottus eyecandy may had to be something more… Like green plants and plants in walls.
Really good, but i know Dx makes levels for long :-)

EVENT PLACEMENT

The ammo placement is good, but some of the powerups are placed right before flag bases and i not really like that, just place them in some small rooms or places you never find easely. And the snow event is nice but sometimes if you are roasted it dissepears :-(
Still good event placement!

GAMEPLAY

There are nice paths, the sucker tubes behind the flag bases are cool, no deathends, all the stuff for a good CTF game!
Just very good, not many more to say about this…

RATING

Well, another good Dx CTF level, this time not with all those iritating moving backgrounds (there is one, but that’s not too many :P), i will give a 7.5 for ya (download reccomed)!

Can’t play the level. However, i’ll give you a few tips:

1. NEVER password your levels. It really makes it annoying for reviewers.

2. If you’re using an ‘offical’ tileset, don’t include it. It just inflates file space.

3. From the looks of it, it sounds like you didn’t make the airboards spawn. Airboard battles are bad enough, but non-spawning airboard battles? puke

4. “Have You Played This In Battle Mode Cooba???”

Ðx really overrated this level; I will post my review and tell what I think about this level. This will be a review like I don’t do many times. So, behold!

Introduction to Wonderful Waterfalls: this level was made by Satan. Created for XLM, the level group I’m in too. He said this will be his best level, and I will find out if it’s really true. This level is using JJ1 Jungrock LRK, which isn’t used much. This is the first big level with it I believe.

One thing I want to tell when reviewing the gameplay is that the level is flipped. I saw that when SJ was reviewing this level in his server, because this level is for my own contest. This is another symmetrical level, last time many un-symmetrical/semi-symmetrical levels are released(like some levels by me). The layout in the level is pretty good, but there are some flaws here and there. There is a thing I don’t like. When you’re at the place with the Full Energy, it’s not very easy to escape because I think the way to the tube is pretty long. Ppl could kill you with RF if they’re fast enough. I don’t like the sucker tubes that start at 31,55 and 123,55; they’re only one way and I don’t like that alot, because you have to run from somewhere else to get to the flag. There are about 3 ways to get to the base. I don’t like the triggers in this level. It’s very evil if you don’t have 20 coins yet, because you’re almost chanceless if someone else has entered the bonus and can reach many places. Some good things about the gameplay: some springs are good placed and the tubes prevent a dead end near the base. The balance in the level is good, but I can’t say the flow is very nice. I also saw some slope errors, if you use a tileset with a corner of 30 degrees, always use it at the start and the end of a platform.

About the eye candy, I believe the eye candy is the best aspect of the level. The tileset provides enough eye candy. There are some good animations, and I like the waterfalls here. The level has enough stuff in the layers; no real problem here. What I would like to say is that the rain looks interesting. It’s pretty fun to see that it sometimes rains and then it doesn’t. The backgrounds of the level are pretty basic, but they’re still good. Every layer is used, which will increase the rating of the eye candy too(I will rate every aspect again)

About the placement in this level, some things are very interesting. You need 20 coins to get to the bonus that will let you reach more places, one of that places is that you get the Seeker power-up. The other power-ups are at the left and right side. It’s not very easy to get them, but it’s also pretty fun to fall down there and trying to get them with something. You need some speed and accuracy for this. The coins that are in the level are good placed, it’s fair for the teams. The level has a Full Energy placed above some springs, in the air. You can shoot it down to get it easier, but others can be faster there. So you need to be faster to get it if you have 1h. The ammo placement in the level is good, there are no real flaws in it. I’d like to see some fast fires here, and maybe a +1 Carrot at each side, or above the Seek power-up.

About the originality of the level, this level was made for an original level contest, and I can’t say this level is unoriginal. The trigger idea was a good thought. How you should get the power-ups at a side is a pretty original idea. Not many people used this tileset for a big level, so you succeeded in that. The rain idea in the level was another original point of the level. A bad thing about the originality is that some ammo groups are a bit boring in form, like the bouncer groups around 44,53 and 110,53.

Ratings:
Gameplay: 7.0
Eye candy: 8.2
Placement: 7.7
Originality: 7.9

7 + 8.2 + 7.7 + 7.9 : 4 makes the rating of this level a 7.7. Good job, and download recommendation for this level. You could host this level some times, but don’t overhost it.

Yay!
Your Hocus pocus conversion episode is better…
But this one is very good too.
Placment of events is not perfect.
Eyecandy is good.
Gameplay rocks!!!
Overall:8.5

I think he have. Have you jarno vos?

Have You Played This In Battle Mode Cooba???

Eyecandy
Blandest level I have seen for ages. No background eyecandy, barely any sprite layer eyecandy, no foreground; there isn’t much, and what is there, is ugly, like the snow.

Gameplay
You did a good job on providing hurt events. Never put hurt events in multiplayer levels. I’m going to take 0.5 point off the rating because of that. The layout, being also bad (lots of dead ends, don’t put dead ends in the way you did.) downmarks this level a lot.

Eventing
If a player is lucky enough, he will not touch an airboard, and thus he will be more swift. Player must be forced to touch it. Otherwise, he will fall down to the bottom of this level, and he will be stuck. Also I’d take out the Airboards and replace them with Fly Carrot MCEs.

@ Nobody: Look at the Single player archive: There are plenty of high rated nonTSF SP things there, or if you want something new, play FSP: Rent Collection.

Review for Desert Adventure:

Playability:
In the first level you wander through a hot desert with some old buildings you must get through and some evil animals. The buildings have no windows and are therefore very dark, but too dark in my opinion. If you’re in a dark room you can still see a little bit. So the lighting should be a bit higher, making it a bit less unfair. After some time aliens beamed me up to their spaceship and the level ended. After that my JJ2 crashed because the next level seems not to be included at all.

Creativity:
The level is not all that creative, wether gameplay-, nor eyecandywise. The dark rooms spend the player a bit different, but that’s all. I liked how the UFO beamed me up at the end though, which was well done.

Balance:
On the outside the level is fairly easy, while the dark parts are unfair, because you can’t see anything. Made me die once.

Eyecandy:
The eyecandy is fairly dull. The tileset used seems to be from the same author as the level, but it’s not very good at all. There are some tiny 2D graphics, a weird looking background, and that was it. Really needs some work.

Story:
There’s no story at all, there’s no reason why the player is in a desert and so you go on, until aliens capture you. Needs work too.

Overall:
Overall this level pack is first of all not fully playable, because the author forgot to put in the second level. What I’ve played was fairly dull, reasons for that are found in the above sections.

As only the first level is playable and the rest isn’t, I must sadly give this a 2.5

I’d like to point first that the snow event only works in sp. In mp, only the host can see the snow.

The gameplay is kind of random. The bridges do not properly connect to the platforms so you gotta run really fast or you’ll get stuck (either use float ups are make sure you place the bridge correctly). There are many 1-tile wide openings, which also slows down gameplay. The springs are well-placed, however, and so are many of the platforms. The problem is just that the whole lvl seems a bit crammed, which limits the use of most weapons except for seekers because they can head in any direction as long as they have a target.

The eyecandy is fine but the lvl actually looks better without snow and ambient lightning. :-P The whole lvl is a bit too bright and it seems that it’s a Carrotus heatwave, hehe. Most tiles in the tileset have been used and there are not many tilebugs (tilebugs seem unavoidable in Carrotus – it’s the way the tileset was drawn). Not many foreground layes are used but enough to satisfy so you won’t be confused. The snow should melt any time now…

The weapons placement is pretty average and there is nothing there that hasn’t been done before although each team has a pu RIGHT at their base. A RF for blue team and a bouncer for red team. I’m not quite sure which weapon is more powerful in this lvl so I guess that the team’s arsenals are quite balanced although the seeker pu is in the middle and red team can access it faster.

This lvl is nothing special, really, and it feels slightly old when it comes to lvl design and gameplay. There are better CTF lvls out there. Despite a 7, a download recommendation would be too much because this lvl has hardly got anything that is worth looking at, it’s just well-made, without originality.

EDIT: And don’t bother pointing out to me that I previously wrote ‘I give download recommendations to all levels rated 7 or above’. :-P

Good tileset!
I like that Alien.
Graphics are very good.
Only bad thing is that background.
It’s not work in texture mode.
Destructable(Did I writed it right?)blocks are very cool.
Rocks are cool.

Do you know anyone who makes v1.23 single player level packs? I can’t find a place to buy TSF version of JJ2

Another CTF review. I beta tested this level, and gave Ðx some suggestions about it. I see some things were changed, but I also said there is one carrot too much. Oh well. Just let me review this level.

Introduction: Ðx made this level for his pack, but he released it as a Christmas level. The level has a feeling that it’s almost Christmas, but I will tell about the level itself. Here goes.

Starting with the gameplay, I didn’t have many problems getting around the level, except for the spring that’s under the carrot that’s in the center of the level. This isn’t a big flaw though, but there can be campers that are fast enough to hit you from there. The level isn’t too big, but the layout is pretty good. The level has some platforms in it creating space between the platforms to move in. It’s a bit like my layouts. Some nice one ways used, the same for the sucker tubes near the base(which I couldn’t find directly when beta testing the level.). I noticed that you didn’t change what I suggested(placing the platform that’s right from the Full Energy one to the left, so I can run over it without falling.) It would be nice if there was also a tube that went from the right of the carrot to another place. But it’s not really bad, because you used a spring for that. Fine. The bridges can help me getting around, like when I’m jumping from pos 37,76. This level is not symmetrical, but symmetrical levels don’t get the highest ratings. The other springs are good placed.

I can’t say alot about the eye candy in this level. The snow give you a feeling it’s almost X-Mas(I haven’t seen snow in my country yet, though). It’s a bit strange that it snows in Carrottus, because it’s not a tileset based on snow. The other eye candy is very good, and the Light effects are wicked. I can’t imagine how it would be in real life if I was in this level, it’s a bit strange that it snows when it’s light. The background is nice. Almost all layers are used, only 1 isn’t. Layer 5 and 6 have cave tiles that are traditional in Carrottus levels. Layer 2 and 3 have trees, plants and stuff.

About the placement in this level, the ammo placement is pretty fine. But I think you get too many ammo without jumping. The PU placement is, how I did in my level I made for my pack, but Ðx send me this level and he did the same as me and uploaded the level, argh. I haven’t seen any level with this power-up placement(1 PU at each base), and there is a Seek PU in the bottom-middle. There are 4(!) carrots, which are too many in a level of this size.(although Dirty Laundry has 3 Full Energies and is smaller than this level.) On the bottom-left, bottom-right and around the top-middle you will find +1 Carrots. The Full Energy is in the bottom-middle, above the Seek PU. This isn’t a major flaw, but it’s taking off the rating a bit.

The level is pretty original, because there is snow in it, and it has light effects. These 2 don’t fit too well together, though. It’s a good example of how you should make a Carrottus level, because you need to try to make an original level with a default tileset. Well, you succeeded with this.

Others: this is just a nice level by Ðx(I think this is his best CTF level). So I can only say, gj. I give this level a nice 7.7 and a download recommendation.
Host: you can, but don’t host it in summer =P
Edit: maybe this level wasn’t so good as I first thought, but the level is still good and worth downloading. So I will change the rating of this level to 7.5.

Orbitus, Megaairbase and Lagunicus conversions rocks!!!
Orbitus is kinda funny.
Megairbase’s tank boss is funny.
Lagu nicus is easy to use!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
MUST DOWNLOAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.

[Inappropiate rating (10) removal. You haven’t given any proper reason for your rating. Try to explain what you think of the tileset conversions’ quality, functionality, etc. Saying they are funny is not enough. – FQuist]