[Open Assets] Forest Fortress Zone (scr_forestfortresszone.wad)

It's an age-old single-player level of mine from the v1.09.4 days. It's one of my first (and few) completed levels. It has fifty-three hidden items to find. Act 2 has been started, but hasn't seen progress in almost a year due to a lack of level design ideas.
It's pretty flat and gimmick-less, but here you go:




I give thanks to KO.T.E., for allowing me to use his custom scenery Things in my level.

You might want to compress those screenshots, they're 2 MB each.

I have no idea how you got those PNGs to be so large, but I fixed them for you. Did you possibly shrink them in MS Paint or Photoshop? Anyway, I haven't tried the wad yet, so I don't have comments about it right now.

What, no comments on this? I'd really like it if I could get some constructive criticism on this level.

Well, from the screenshots it looks like a pretty good level, except that it's a bit too expansive; scale it down a bit, maybe.

I disagree, I think the level was very great. The level had alot of multiple paths and had nice deatils. I dont see much wrong at all with the level. (If I remember playing this from a few weeks ago.)

I only meant a tiny bit, not much scaling down.

Well, I just played it and I actually liked it.

The Good:
-The level was large and didn't feel cramped at all. The detail was uniform and great throughout the entire level. It felt very good to play and there were plenty of hidden paths and items to find. Chances are I probably didn't even find everything in there. The texture choices were alright, and there were no really frustrating parts.

The Bad:
-That one hallway in the castle (forgot to take a picture; it's the one that leads to the crushers) felt really empty and bland. There should be more detail there. The enemy placement in said hallway was really overshot; I don't there should ever be so many crawla commanders and jettysyn gunners in one room. There was no real element of gameplay in there, but I guess most of those ideas would have gone into the second act.

Those are my thoughts. The level was good, but didn't really stand out from others. However, the many multiple paths and hidden items, give it a large amount of replay value, which is most of what makes it memorable.

4/5 from me...mostly because of the replayability.

The graphics are IMPRESSIVE!!! The whole level for the most part feels beautiful. This is one of the most breathtaking levels I've seen. This would make an excellent first stage since the difficulty is pretty easy. Not only are the graphics great, For the most part, Going through the level felt like an actual Sonic level (Going fast and only fast). The only part of the level where I had to stop was the crushers near the end.

I do have some issues though. I saw a set of steps on one of the paths, and they took me right to the previous checkpoint. Make that section a little more obvious as to where to go. I also feel that the water coming out of the waterfalls would look better if there was a current coming out of it.

Score: 8/10

Well, I'm not saying anything that people here haven't already said, but your zone was visually beautiful and showcases the "broad and open" school of SBR2 level design level well. Kudos also on the interconnected multiple paths and the use of Spring Hill's BGM. That said, here are my critical observations.

First, why all the Jetty-Syns and Crawla Commanders? The primary purpose of Forest Fortress Zone, looking at the level design, is to run through it as fast as possible. Why risk having the player run into a flying enemy or one of their attacks, killing their momentum as they're forced to stop and possibly fight (and we all know how tedious it is to fend off Jetty-Syns amd Crawla Commanders)? The Crawlas are fine though. If you want some sort of aerial threat so the player doesn't get careless, I'd recommend Gold Buzzes. This is an issue I notice on a lot of custom maps.

I'd also advise getting rid of the sinkhole traps near the end, and especially the one with spikes underneath. I hate gimmicks that punish the player due to unforeseeable hazards. Such level design depends more upon dumb luck than it does authentic skill.

Finally, here's a harmless glitch you may not know about yet...



Sonic jumped out of the right window of the castle containing the seated Crawlas, and is just kind of chilling in mid-air. Sonic can get back into the stage, though I haven't tried jumping through the window on the other side and back yet.

Well, that's that. Good job Kyasarin. I hadn't played SRB2 for about two months, and I'm glad I did tonight.

This level is very awkward to describe. On the one hand, yes, it's "good." It has that flow stuff, alternate routes, and a few gimmicks. On the other, this is the same old song and dance we've seen 'round here since THZ1. On top of that, it has too much content to get lost in. None of it really feels unique, especially when the sections of the level are compared against each other.