Level Name: Puzzle Map II
Level Creator:
unnnLevel ID: 34634438
Level Difficulty: Demon 10*
Level Song and Author: Punyaso - Popcorn (colBreakz remix)
Collaboration / Solo Level : Solo Level
Gameplay:
The gameplay in this level has a great deal of issues. First of all, let's take it to the very beginning. The intro is way to long. It's a whole 15 seconds! Now, I've built a level with a long intro before, and I know that as the creator, it doesn't seem like too much of an issue when you do it, but you gotta put yourself in the player's shoes. If someone finds your level, and decides to play it, they are going to be sitting there for 15 seconds before the level actually starts. Every single time they die, they then have to sit through it again. After a couple of attempts, they aren't even going to want to play the level anymore. What's worse is that this level is a pretty difficult demon. So if someone were to complete it, I bet a large portion of their tome playing would just be sitting through that intro. It would be nice if there was at least a tiny bit of gameplay in that section. Let's move on to the first seciton. Now, right off the bat, there is moving gameplay. Let me tell you, moving gameplay is often frowned upon in levels. It reduces the fun of the actual level and makes it buggy and annoying. If you were around in early 2.0, you should probably get what I'm saying. The bad thing about this is that it gives you no warning whatsoever as to when it's going to move. And, since the spikes are so close, you barely have any time to react. Now, it was enough time for me as I quickly got used to it, but I bet many people wouldn't. The real issue in this level is that moving gameplay takes up 60% of the level. Now, I get that this is a puzzle level, but there are ways to make puzzle-like gamelay without moving objects, and there are even ways to make moving gameplay actually fun, however it is quite difficult (that's an understatement) and it certainly wasn't done in this level. Now, let's get back on track. When you grab the potion in the first section, it is supposed to stop the bats form shooting the fireballs, however,t he first time I collected it I still died, however, I didn't even see the fireballs, now, they are normally pretty faint, so I might have not noticed them, but that either means theres a bug in the triggers, or there's an invisible object somehwere that killed me. The rotating blocks right after is actually pretty cool. It never caused any gameplay issues for me. However, there is another bug related to it. If I do not collect the potion, I am able to fit through the fireballs and manouver around them to get to the next section, which is an issue. Also, when I was testing this out, I died multiple times on some invisible objects, so I think you should look through this first part once more and keep on the lookout for invisible objects, as they caused me a lot of trouble. Wen you have to fly around the sideways pillars at the end of this section, the spikes are a bit hard to see, and this gameplay isn't really fun either, mostly because the speed is different from the moving objects. Now, this next section caused me a ton of trouble. Now, I get that it's supposed to be a puzzle map, but this was just filled with annoying gameplay and bugs. First of all, the 2-player concept is interesting, but on PC, it can be annyoing. I'm used to playing with my mouse, however, I don't use mouse for two-player mode as it has to be on a certain side of the screen, and I keep my cursor invisible. This means I have to switch during the short transition, which can screw me up early on, and I will get confused which side does which. I know that many peoiple prefer to play with the mouse, so I can see this as being an issue for many, but not all people. The whole gameplay in general is confusing and difficult, it is way harder than the first seciton and definitely the hardest part of the whole level. This whole concept is confusing. It is very buggy, as well, there were some parts where I was able to get across red blocks, and one part I wouldn't have been able to do a jump if it wasn't for the bug. At 21%, somehow I was able to use the green orb to get underneath the blocks, allowing me to walk on reds, and get to the end. However, this bug ended up killing me, so it doesn't cause a secret way, but it can be an issue because I somehow was able to do it accidentally, and I don't even know how I did it when watching the video. Okay, time for the next section. The rotating speed is way too fast, and the ball is way to small, that it just doesn't give enough time to react, and it creates very hard gameplay, harder than the first section, but easier than the last. The hitboxes are also slightly messed up in some places due to the rotation. This section's gameplay is just bad, I would suggest making the circle touch the edges of the screen while going at the same speed to make it somewhat decent. This next moving section is the same as the first. Moving gameplay is not fun, it doesn't give you enough time to react, and this time, it makes the player go backwards, which is even harder and buggier. Also, at 66%, I was able to teleport up int he spider and do the last stage of gameplay. This ended up killing me, though, but should be noted. Also, the portals moving at normal speed is an interesting idea, but it uffers gameplay-wise and aesthetic-wise. The next section is the same as the first, except this time, it has invisible portals, which offers even worse gameplay. How the portals should be for both sections is scaled down small, in the correct place, and moves with the other gameplay if you want to do this section correctly. Since this section is mostly the same as the other tow, I won't go into detail ,but I will list an issue I found. At 76%, I am able to go down to the secret coin path instead of up, and survive for quite a while, but this does not create a secret way. The bossfight certainly has better gameplay than the rest of the sections, but it is still quite bad. The lasers move, and at the same time there is precise timings. The gameplay suffers as a result, and isn't too fun. Also, I don't get how this section is a puzzle. It seems like every section in this level has a different difficulty, you need work on difficulty balancing a whole lot.
Overall: Moving gameplay is not fun, and it is 60% of the level in this case. The puzzles are very difficult and annoying. You also have to work a lot on difficulty balancing. Make sure to fix the bugs as well. 1/10, -2 for buggy gameplay, -2 for difficulty matching, -3 for primarily moving gameplay, and backwards movment. -2 for other issues like the long issue, and other sections giving you little time to react. Left you with a point for the attempted 2-player concept and almost decent gameplay at the end combined.
Decoration/Block Design:
Let's start off with block design this time. This is a major flaw in the level, as there is nonce, except for one section. In the first section, you just used the standard crystal blocks. Second section, you used waterfalls, now, waterfalls aren't block designs, they are meant for decoration. It's alright if you incorporate them into your block design, but not use them alone. Third section, just used plain black blocks. After that, you make pixelated objects, presumably grass, which is cool, not complex or anything, but fits with the theme and can be considered a design. After that, you only have low opacity blocks and fades, none of which are block designs. You need to work on block designs a lot for this level. They are a huge part and every level must have them. Let's move on to decoration and custom backgrounds. Now, they aren't really original, but we'll save that for the originality section. The equalizer at the beginning needs to be improved. All it is is different pillars and different heights all pulsing to the music at the same time. Have some go different heights, and others pulse at different beats, mix it up a bit. The normal background for the first section isn't too good, not because it's unoriginal, but it is just uninteresting, it should be used as a background of the background, add things on top. Also when it fades, you can clearly see each piece, to make it fade without showing each piece, put a black screen over it, and then raise its opacity to fase it out, then lower it to fase it back in. In the first section, it is all primarily one color, it is quite monotonous, even though it changes through the colors. The grass and lasers do not change, however, which means, that they don't go together well often with the main color, making it look bad. There is absolutely no air deco, as well. The second section's background is alright. However, you can clearly see every glow pice in the circles, making it look sloppy. The purple layers in the background is a good concept, except it doesn't really look that good static. If it's static, it has to be fully gradient, I would suggest making each one wave up and down, in a staggered manner. You have the pulsing stars for air deco, but it's not really good as it doesn't really catch your attention. You need to have enough air deco to be noticable and catch your attention, but not distract you. The bubbles on the top and bottom are not noticable, and really does nothing to the design for me, although it's better than having nothing, but try to add more to look at. For the next section, the spinning glows are an interesting concept, and they look quite nice, but not too amazing. The background is alright, but needa a it more too it than just some shades of a color moving in a pattern. The real issue in this section is that there are rally only 2 colors at the same time, excluding different shades. This section does not have any air deco or any other decoration, as a matter of fact, excluding the ater at the bottom. The moving section is based around pixels, so there can't really be any air deco, but that means you gotta be exceptional with everything else, however you did not. You added a background, but there was barely anything to it, and the spikes were all just red, nothing else. However, this did have a variety in colors, which I liked. I noticed how you used complementary colors for this section. Normally, when people try to use them, they mess up on the shadings slighly and it looks atrocious, but this seemed to be just right shade so it does not look horrible, and it worked decently well. The next moving section had a cool background. Pretty simple, but I like the checkerboard pattern for the sky, and having the sun set was a nice touch. Although, it looked kind of messy having it move up with the screen, as it never fits perfectly and looks bad in the transitions. There still isn't any air deco in this section! This last section didn't really hae anything visually appealing. Custom background was just different shades of the same color with some slanted pillars, now, it isn't neccisarily bad, but it's just very empty, these sort of backgrounds worked well in early simplistic levels, when it fit the theme and was actually original. There's still no air deco for this section. The boss looks simple, but somewhat cool to me, although, I don't understand what it's supposed to be. The lasers are just the standard 2.1 lasers with glow, try to make some original, complex lasers, and actually have them come off the boss, or it just looks weird and lazy.
Overall: Block design was a major issue, you need way more decoration, there is barely any, and add some more stuff to the custom backgrounds! 2.5/10, -4 for missed block designs (Block Designs count for half, you only had one in the level), +1 for that pretty cool mountain background and +0.5 for some other decent parts in others. Missed out on 3.5 points for decoration and missed elements in the backgrounds collectively.
Sync:
There wasn't much gameplay sync, it synced at 24%, and in many parts of the section afterwards. The bossfight surprisingly didn't sync too well, even though it would seem like an easy section to sync. All the portals synced to the music though, which is very important. There wasn't really any effect or decoration sync, apart from the equalizer at the beginning, although you need to do the equalizer correctly for that amazing sync, and the glow spiral effect at 28%.
Overall: 1.5/5 due to missed gameplay sync and not much effect or decoration sync. Half a point for the gameplay sync and a full point for one effect syncing, and another attempting to sync well.
Originality: 0.7x
Now, this is another big issue the level has. It has almost no originality. The very first background is extremely overused. The equalizer is an old 2.0 effect. Even the gameplay concept has been overused back in 2.0. The wole concept of a puzzle map is unoriginal as well. The rotating ball gameplay is extremely unoriginal. It was cool back in the first week of 2.1. There is one big thing about this level I've noticed. It has a couple big similarities with 12th Dimesnion by DarwinGD. First of all, the rotating ball gameplay at 28%, at 13%, the glowing circle effect at the bottom is the same as the one in the ship section of his level, and even the song is the same. (Although the song being the same is not really something I should lower the score for) Honestly, I can't really find a moment of originality in this level, so the multiplier is going to be at 0.7.
Overall: 1.4/10 (14%) Needs Improvement
Gameplay was a killer here, as well as originality, if the gameplay was done better it could end up in decent, but when you pick apart this level, there are so many issues.
Wow, this review is long. I really didn't expect to write so much about this level.
Sorry for any typos as well, I'm a fast typer and notepad doesn't let me know if I misspelled anything.
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