Koopa Garrison Zone by Fawfulfan - B
The level has a lot of lag on my laptop, from a combination of the atrociously-optimized skybox and having a lot of sprites on screen in some places. (I think the overuse of small walls might have something to do with this. Also, please try to avoid spamming tiny FOFs, especially for things like the pipes. Those harm framerate and almost never look good.) Blue springs are used in some places as no more than a cheap way to avoid adding a stepping stone somewhere in a level; never use them above water.
There are a few jumps that are rather hard to make as Sonic, even with the elemental shield protecting the player from fire-based hazards, because of the relative smallness of the platform for the distance the player has to travel. Speaking of which, don't place an elemental shield so early on into the level when half of your hazards are fire-based, as it ends up trivializing a lot of the level. You should also be careful about the placement of spinning flamethrowers, as not only do they lag the game quite a bit, but some of the placement was also somewhat cheap, particularly in the room with said elemental shield and long jumps. I also hate cannonball launchers just as a general game mechanic, since they usually just mean randomly getting hit if you don't move in a certain way to avoid them. Finally, ax the entire tower climbing segment at the end; it's tedious, unfun and just looks sloppy. It's by far the most amateurish part of the level.
Now, with all that said, the actual level was pretty fun, with some interesting platforming (though I'm not a fan of rooms that make you redo a large chunk of platforming if you fall off somewhere). I enjoyed the abundance of secrets throughout the map, even if most of them just amounted to a boring square room with some rings or a life box. The use of thwomps as stepping stones was really creative and I greatly enjoyed their implementation. The gargoyle puzzles were also interesting, even if you used trapgoyles for some of them for no good reason. Graphics were acceptable, though could stand to be improved quite a bit by using some custom textures and a few visual tricks.
Cloud Convoy Zone by toaster - B+
I really like the concept of autoscroller levels, and this generally works pretty well. The main flaw is that depth perception in this game is horrible, especially from far away, and it harms the level tremendously. Any point where you need to be lined up vertically to make a jump will result in a lot of missed jumps and death the first time, and hitting specific things like buttons is almost impossible. I really wish you would've played around with lighting a bit to try and help that like I'd suggested to you while you were working on the map! This, combined with the lack of easier jumping to get used to the controls with, leads to the level being a lot harder than it really needs to be.
However, aside from that the level's great. There's some fun and challenging platforming in here, and the level doesn't overstay its welcome. Graphically it's as good as a level about planes could possibly be in SRB2's mostly boxy level format. The boss was pretty fun, though I will say that it seemed to drag on after a while, and cutting off ring supply entirely for the last three hits when recollecting dropped rings is impossible throughout the boss feels a bit mean.
Quickman by Zipper - B-
Let me preface this by saying that I hate the Mega Man style of gameplay. Also FIX THE CAMERA
That said, I enjoyed the main level. Even with the minimal path divergence, the placement of a few health FIX THE CAMERA bonuses out of the way was a nice incentive to look around, and the enemies were a legitimate challenge. FIX THE CAMERA I didn't mind having to get a running start for a few of the jumps, since it makes the gameplay more interesting and I wish the old MM FIX THE CAMERA games did it. The lasers also helped keep gameplay interesting, even if they made it multiplayer-unfriendly. Definitely look into doing FIX THE CAMERA something about that in the future.
The bosses were love-and-hate. (Also note that I haven't legitimately beat either FIX THE CAMERA one yet.) Quickman himself I didn't much care for; teleporting around everywhere and shooting lasers with lightning quick reactions wasn't FIX THE CAMERA a whole lot of fun to fight against. The secret toehoe boss was more fun; I liked the variety in FIX THE CAMERA attacks and how each one was adequately telegraphed, although I'm not a huge fan of the smaller straight-shot stars at the same time as the arced ones. The extra attack in the pinch FIX THE CAMERA phase was also wonderful. That said, I couldn't beat either, so I'm a bit salty about that. Give the players more FIX THE CAMERA lives next time pls.
Now, the main level did have a few issues. FIX THE CAMERA Namely that there were a lot of blind jumps, including FIX THE CAMERA at the very start. A lot of these could actually be FIX THE CAMERA solved without touching the level design, if you zoomed FIX THE CAMERA the camera out to match normal 2D mode's FIX THE CAMERA camera, though a few might still need FIX THE CAMERA tweaked. A few of the popup enemies were also placed in bad FIX THE CAMERA spots, making it impossible to get past them FIX THE CAMERA without taking a hit. FIX THE CAMERA It'd also be nice if they popped up from FIX THE CAMERA a bit farther away, so you can shoot them without FIX THE CAMFIX THE CAMERAERFFIX FIX THE CAMERATHE CAMERAIX THE CAMERAA immediately getting hit back.
Also SRB1 Remake race with Megaman and friendlyfire is fun lol
Autumn Valley Zone by Root - D
The alternate path was really silly, but I liked the thought of it. That said, the level's... pretty bad. There's only the most basic first-level-esque platforming to be found, and the teleporter was unnecessary. I think there are a few good ideas here, but there's a definite lack of experience evident here. Just keep mapping and you'll improve.
The custom textures weren't the ugliest thing I've ever seen, I suppose. also why no axis2d :'c
Phantom Gadget Zone by CoatRack - C+
First things first: I'm disappointed in your use of the generators. I was hoping you'd be using them to light up some of the map so I could actually see where I was going, but instead they were just... kind of there. There'd be one that just opened a door, and one that just raised a couple of platforms, but they didn't feel like they were used effectively. They could've been especially fun if powering them up caused some otherwise non-lethal floors to start sparking with electricity, but nope.
Second of all, that super-dark room wasn't fun. A lot of the dark rooms had issues, but the one that I swear had 0 lighting is the worst. Bumping into walls trying just to see where I'm going isn't very fun, and I had to bump my game up to the brightest gamma settings just to play it.
Third, that room where the lights come on and the platforms pop up out of the ground didn't work in co-op. That was super confusing when I played it in a netgame with some friends.
That said, I liked how badnik placement was an actual hazard. Except those crayon minuses. Those don't work in a dark setting. The room where you had to wade through water was also nice, as was the last room (I wish more of the level was like that). The level was also pretty nice graphically, when it was possible to see a thing. But those big three things I pointed out drag down the map's entertainment value significantly.
Shadow Castle Zone by Yacker and MudkipYeah! - C
This level would have been solid by 1.09.4 standards. There's no sense of misdirection, any challenges are made apparent on sight, and unobtrusive object placement keeps frustration down to a minimum. That said, there are a few issues here, that generally point to inexperienced mappers that will likely improve over time and become very good mappers very soon!
The level is generally pretty bland graphically, feeling more like an obstacle course than a real place. All this really means is you need to work on some more sector-based scenery, and go for large wall-spanning decoration as opposed to the small things and tombstones and such you have now. The platforming in general was good, though there were a few jumps that I had to twist my camera awkwardly to see; usually these were small platforms behind the platform you were currently on that you had to jump down to. Some other jumps felt kind of awkward to execute, whether they were just high enough to reach (Sonic can reach about 112 units in a jump, but it's uncomfortable; try to limit most jumps to 64 unless you're specifically blocking Knuckles off) or in a somewhat disorienting pattern. The latter isn't a huge issue, but it does feel somewhat amateurish.
The biggest problems were made apparent in the second half of the level. There was a 2D path that lasted all of three seconds and is very possible to get stuck in, feeling more like a waste of time than anything else (though I'll admit that secret in there was clever). The invisible path idea was good, but then you had a room with invisible walls arbitrarily forcing you to follow the twisting path, which is very bad execution. Finally, a lot of the gravity flipping felt like it was there to pad out for time, with no challenge to the level other than running down a path to find the next switch point. This is the perfect gimmick to make gravity puzzles with and it felt squandered.
Gravity Garden Zone by EvilEnternity3000 - A-
Really good. The lone issue I had with it is that sometimes getting out of certain pits meant searching for the lone spring to escape with. I also got stuck in one part that didn't have an escape spring. (Sorry for being so lazy with this review but I'm rushing to finish reviews and I don't feel a need to go on about how I loved the map :C)
