Now that I’ve played all of the single player maps to completion. Having explored the entire level, to the best of my knowledge, and gotten all emblems available in the level, if there are any (barring perfect bonuses and devtime emblems as some crazy people implemented) it’s time to do some reviews and general commentary. No numbered scores because I always hated giving those out, trying to put a numerical value on my opinions is silly.
Floral Road review
This is a very average map, and honestly, I’m okay with that. I had a lot of fun playing through this and I appreciate the effort you’ve put into it by including emblems and record attack bonuses too.
With regards to your stat buff gauge you’re using, it doesn’t add much to this level but I assume you plan on using through all of New Horizons, it would be ideal if you could come up with a few areas and gimmicks in future levels that made good use of it. For example, a path only Sonic can access when his speed his boosted, things like that.
You have a good grasp on how large to make the rooms in your maps now too, there’s a lot of room for exploration and I fully approve of that.
When time attacking for the time emblem, I also liked the clever placing of the two speed shoe monitors.
Overall, I’d say this map is well designed but doesn’t bring much new to the game that the player hasn’t already seen by playing through SRB2’s vanilla campaign. But you are definitely improving and I’d love to see you make more levels!
also this
Sacred Woodland
The first thing that grabbed me with this level was how it is very atmospheric, you were going all out with your forest temple inspirations in the theming and level design. A notable area where I liked the visuals was on the long bridge leading up the temple, having the area get darker towards the sky was great.
For these lilly pads near the start, try making them separate FOFs rather than sharing the same control sector, so they bob independently of each other.
The spikeballs in this room need to be clearer, they’re very difficult to make out until you’re almost on top of them because the room is so dark, and they’re black objects against a grey background. Either using different hazards (or new spike ball sprites that stand out more) would have been better.
The dark tunnels should be more seamless if you plan on using them as teleporters like that, you can achieve this by making the exit fade to the light just as the entrances faded to the darkness and tick effect 4 on the linedef so the player retains their speed and momentum going through the tunnel.
SUDDENLY BRAK WOAH WHAT. While I like Brak as a boss, I don’t think he added anything to the level. Also his inclusion was completely out of tone to the rest of the map, as was the method of getting to the arena. A more organic way to enter rather than a high-tech teleporter in this collapsing woodland temple would have been nice. Incidentally, the music doesn’t reset when the player dies during the Brak fight.
Overall, I’d say that this level has had a lot of effort put into it with regards to the theme, visuals and atmosphere. But I think it’s quite lacking in the gameplay department. There’s a lot of interesting ideas to be had, but the low light level obscuring platforms and hazards combined with the large amount of empty space on display (most notably on the bridge to the temple, it looked pretty but offered nothing gameplay wise) was a disappointment, sorry.
Glacier Gear Zone
HEY I REMEMBER WHEN YOU RELEASED THIS IN 2.0 AND IT WAS MERELY OKAY
Now it’s really good, fantastic in fact. I absolutely love the wacky workbench bouncy floors and walls and I was delighted to see how much mileage you got out of them by coming up with new ways to implement them. How the bouncy walls reminded me a bit of the bounce gel in Portal 2 as well, which is pretty neat. I also liked how you took the new THZ slime and found some amusing ways to combine them with the bouncy pads. (If you make an act 2 though, I’d love to see a bouncy ceiling used to launch the player deep under the slime).
Regarding the penguins, I’m perfectly okay with them being as tough as they are to fight directly, but I felt their range was a little too long. It was rather frustrating getting sniped from huge distances away by their super fast sweeping laser.
Visually this stage looked pretty damn good too, the purple rocks did a good job of making the blue ice easier on the eyes and the darker colour tone of the factory areas contrasted nicely with the surrounding area.
Overall, I love this level a lot. It was hella fun to play through initially, then just as fun to replay to hunt down the emblems and record attack it. You’ve done good, and I’d love to see you make more levels in future if you’re up for it!
Also lol that hidden boss, thank you for putting all those crawlas there to make record attack possible :V fighting a box in a boxing ring to get an xbox emblem was silly.
Clock Towers
This is a technical achievement and a half, my word. Axis2D is a fantastic idea and this level is a wonderful proof of concept (and an enjoyable level on top of that!) I’m looking forward to seeing what the community can do with Axis2D that’s for sure.
I especially loved how you explored the interesting ideas for unconventional exploration and breaking the level that Axis2D provides, looping around structures to grab monitors, that kind of thing. Or even leaping onto an alternate path on the wrong axis to find secrets, that was great.
First of all, because this baffles me, why did you use Egg Guards in a 2D level? The only way to beat them is to jump straight at them and hope you get lucky and catch them with their back turned to you in their erratic movement patterns, which is clearly not designed to handled 2D gameplay. (Although I seem to be in the minority that the Robo-Hoods weren’t a bother for me. Although I did find it funny that I finally took damage from a Robo-Hood jumping in this map)
The bouncy chains were a really fun gimmick, although I keep expecting to be able to use a characters ability while bouncing because it retains the character spinning animation and that killed me a few times. It might be an idea just to force the player into the spring up frames to keep it clear that abilities cannot be used when bouncing.
I also found that half way through the level there was a huge difference in terms of path difficulty and reward. Where the player can either enter a building from the top, or head downwards to take a windowsill platforming section. The lower path is far far more punishing but provides the same reward, a few rings.
It’s worth pointing out that I had some trouble figuring out where to go on my first playthrough. I entered this room from the top path, saw the downward pit of spikes and assumed that must have been the exit of an alternate path I missed, and I wound up backtracking through the outside the building path.
Visually I’d say this level was okay, I’m not a fan of the grey and brown colour scheme myself, but the gears stood out as particularly fantastic looking.
Overall, this is level is a phenomenal proof of concept for Axis2D and you deserve a massive round of applause for the idea. The level itself is good, make no mistake, but it’s just not as good to play as some of the other levels in this OLDC, which says more about the competition really.
Emerald Lake Zone 2
This level is nothing too special, really. It is larger than I initially expected on my first time through though, I kept finding new paths and routes over several playthroughs so that was pretty fun, the level is rather expansive.
The scenery fish at the start who don’t move rather bother me, because I initially mistook them for enemies until I got closer and saw that they weren’t moving at all.
Regarding your emblem radar, it’s a nice idea but I’m worried about players finding it after they find all the red rings in the level, which would make it pointless.
About the slopes, they work alright as far as I can tell, but you don’t use them for anything interesting beyond some decoration and a small obstacle at the end of the level. I suggest trying to come up with ways to use them in combination with platforming or hazards for your next level, for example enemies which are dangerous to spindash into at the top of the slope, or a jump that’s difficult to reach because the slope is slowing your momentum.
Sorry this review is a bit short, but I don’t have much to say on this level. It’s fairly large and it’s okay, but there’s just not much going on in it.
Midnight Caves
Honestly, kind of empty and uninteresting. I’m sorry, but the simple design and overabundance of Crawlas as decoration rather than hazards reminds me of 1.09.4 levels and that is not a good thing.
This room here was a bit of a cheap shot, there’s nothing to indicate the floor will collapse under the players feet and instantly kill them until they walk into the trap for the first time.
The spike balls used in the water slide section are pretty hard to see and react to, I’m not a fan of them being used as a hazard with their default sprites under any circumstances really.
You’re using invisible walls to block the player from jumping off of the intended path and onto a different alternate route. Honestly, this actually hurts the level, because you would have nothing to lose in opening the route up for players willing to leap off of the path and explore. But if you really wanted to block the player, then finding a different way such as stone bars to provide a visible block would be better.
The three floor glass room was pretty cool though, I love the concept and how the player could clearly see their progress through that area of the level as they made their way down. I did feel that the glass was a little odd thematically when compared to the rest of the level though, it seems a bit too advanced when surrounded by stone firelit structures.
Sand Valley Zone
Yooo, someone remembered Knuckles exists and made a Knuckles only path. Not only that, but the Knuckles path was absolutely glorious. I loved it.
My initial hype on being pleasantly surprised by that really good Knuckles path on my first playthrough aside, I really enjoyed this map. I felt that the entire product came together very well. The gimmicks were lovely and (for the most part) I enjoyed how you remembered to place badniks strategically so they were a hazard. The only time the badnik placement annoyed me were the ones on Knuckles’ path when you also need to avoid the timed sand falls. That felt cheap, because damned if I jump damned if I don’t.
It was nice to see the new and improved sand physics at work and I felt that they worked out pretty nicely here too. Take advantage of the odd quirks of Quicksand movement was certainly an experience. Although regarding the brown quicksand, I’m okay with having to deal with it as a time wasting punishment for making mistakes, but I feel it’s a non-threat when you’re in it. Because it’s so easy to bash jump to escape.
I’ve never been a fan of spin to rise elevators either, in any map, simply because it doesn’t feel like a logical connection is in place. There’s no mechanism on the lift that requires spinning, maybe if there was a wheel the player could turn by spinning it would be more intuitive. Right now it’s just “try everything, hope something works because there is no sign how to operate the lift”
New spikeballs are neat, especially after I complained about the default spikeballs in my previous reviews :V thank you for using them, much easier to see.
Also, the Minus’ don’t work on quicksand. They just remain stationary.
and this monitor was a 1-up and Armageddon shield in one, looks like you accidentally placed them on top of each other.
Egg Outposts Zone
There was a lot wrong with this map, but this is a really good attempt for your first submitted level! And really a lot of the mistakes you made are things people learn to avoid through experience, so those mistakes are perfectly okay. You took quite a few risks in designing this level and some ideas worked better than others.
For the large blocks of lasers you use, I would recommend using damaging fogblocks rather than flashing lasers. It’s easier on the eyes and they’re much easier to see at low frame rates.
The music felt a bit too dramatic for the theme, tunes 24 would be something more suited for something more grand, such as a Death Egg themed level or the end of a level pack. I can’t think of any tunes in SRB2 that would fit though, so finding a new song is a good idea if you’re interested in changing the music.
The dark area was really bad. It’s a nice idea but platforming like that really strains my eyes, not to mention getting hit by crawlas I couldn’t see. I know that a dark room with guiding lights can work well,
Lightless Labyrinth is a good example of this.
Your use of detons is very hit and miss, I disliked them for the most part but the area near the end with all of the opening doors and hazards to avoid was fantastic.
I also quite enjoyed the tall room where you have to push a button to turn on the lasers and make progress. However, you do have a few issues with pointing the player in the right direction here. I think next time you attempt an area like this, make sure the player can see cause and effect of pushing a button themselves so they know where in the room the event is happening. For example, it would have been nice if the player could have seen the blue laser turn off through a window rather than a cutscene.
Generally a respectable attempt, and I did enjoy playing through it despite its flaws. I’d love to see what you design if you make more maps in future!
Seraphic Skylands
Oh my oh my, this level is absolutely gorgeous, beautiful even. I think this is the most visually impressive level I’ve ever played in SRB2.
I cannot stress how much I love this effect, having the level get brighter towards the bottom of the cave is such a lovely touch.
There was a ridiculous amount of hidden areas and little secrets to explore and that was fantastic. I did attempt to get a perfect bonus on this level, but I only found 846 rings in the end. How close was I?
This level plays very well, I initially thought that the 2:10 requirement for time attack was insane, because of how long I felt the level was at my normal slow pace. But I found it was quite manageable with a little planning.
This level is pretty easy, but that’s fine, especially as the penalty for failure can be pretty high in the outside areas of the level. Also I know a few other people have criticised the map for not having any badniks, but I’m okay with that, I don’t think any of SRB2’s current enemies would have fit the level, honestly it was really nice to just explore these floating ruins, like they were a lost sanctuary Robotnik hasn’t found yet. I understand you’re interested in having custom enemies for the level though, and that would be pretty great.
This spike pit, I think the damaging FOF is a little too high, because it’s possible to run into the pit and be blocked by air. Also trying to jump it a little too close means you lose all momentum and as such probably take damage, assuming the player doesn’t use an ability.
I found this level to be nothing short of incredible. However, I put it as second place because I enjoyed playing through and interacting with the gimmicks in glacier gear more. But as an art piece, a level I got immersed in so thoroughly I missed a few phone calls without realising, you achieved that flawlessly. Very good job indeed.
Please make more! Although no rush, maps this pretty take time after all.