(Note: This is the original version, not one of the expansion-packs)
I have a policy against reviewing new releases but I don't think any review of mine will ever illustrate this more appropriately than this one will.
Jazz Jackrabbit 2 was released for the PC over a decade ago and I can't imagine there's many people, even here on The Escapist, who've played it. All the reason for me to write a review about the world most infamous bandana-wearing, green-furred rabbit so without further ado, let's hop right to it. *Punches self in face for that truly awful pun*
I'd like to start this review with my biggest complaint: the writing.
The two most important aspects of any game are the gameplay and the writing and the extreme contrast between the two in Jazz 2 is rather jarring. You see, I dislike games where the story is uncomfortably wedged in when the gameplay is a lot more important anyway.
I also dislike game with just badly written stories and games where the story is essentially non-existent.
Jazz 2 deserves some kind of reward for managing to combine those three into a single horrific monster.
The story, which is explained in the fucking manual of all places, is about how the bad guy (whose name is never mentioned in-game) steals the wedding ring of Jazz his fiancee (whose name is also never mentioned in-game) to use as a powersource (how is never told) for a machine (the origin of which is unknown) of unknown use or purpose but which will presumably (never told for sure) bring about the end of the world (a world that we're never properly introduced to and which we know jack-shit about anyway).
The story is just the antithesis of good writing; a confused, jumbled mess of half-baked facts thrown into a blender and awkwardly mixed together before being poured down the front of your shorts in one big hose.
Now to be fair, while the main story is pretty terrible, there are lots of gags and easter eggs, the most abundant of which being the many signs posted in each level where the designers post random gibberish and take the piss at each other. "Craig is still a doofus.", "Cheese is green on tuesday." and "Send Tim new socks." are good examples. The game also parodies quite a lot of material, but seeing as it's so old, I imagine not everybody catches every reference.
For a game released in 1998, Jazz 2 actually holds up surprisingly well graphics-wise.
Seriously, I played this on a 22' monitor and there was hardly any pixelization or eye-fucking to be had. Now of course, when compared to modern 2-D platformers, Jazz 2 looks like ass. What I'm trying to say here is that ass isn't really all that much of an issue, provided that the jeans are tight enough.
The art-style is cartoony without being minimalistic, making for really catchy levels and enemies without needing dual-core processing.
Each area consists of two levels, the first being a lighter introductory version of the darker and more difficult second level. The level-design is extremely varied: there's gothic dungeons, savage jungles, blue oceans, two levels that can only be described as Alice In Wonderland on LSD and even Hell itself makes an appearance.
The majority of enemies are drawn from the animal kingdom though there are exceptions, such as one of the later levels which is mostly inhabited by ghosts and Marvin The Martian lookalikes. Bosses are also very original and imaginative but there's only five in the entire game so that's kind of a missed oppurtunity there.
The designers constantly ribbing one another and the homely art-style give Jazz 2 a very relatable, almost fan-made feel.
The one area where it always felt professional, however, is the music.
The music here is extremely well-done, and as varied as the levels it accompanies.
There's dark organs for the dungeons, drums and bagpipes for the jungle and of course Hell is accompanied by some nice metal.
The combination of homegrown graphics and professional music is an unusual one but works suprisingly well.
There's no voice-acting in the game except for a single line in the ending-cutscene (also the only one in the entire game) and to be honest I'm glad there isn't any more because A) There's no need for more, and B) that one line is terrible.
Now, as you may have gathered from the screenshots, Jazz 2 is an old-school 2-D platformer a la the original Sonic games.
In fact, the green rabbit is about as close as you can get to the blue hedgehog without infringing copyrights.
The controls are simple and intuitive: arrow-keys to walk, shift to run, control to jump and space to fire, that's it.
And before you ask, yes, space to fire. Jazz defeats enemies and bosses not by jumping on them or using items but by using actual weapons.
There's nine of these spread out over the course of the game (with both a regular version and an upgrade hidden somewhere) and they range from really handy to absolutely bloody useless. Okay, okay, okay, I won't beat around the bush: except for the basic gun, the homing rockets, flamethrower and bombs, you'll only be using the other weapons in very specific circumstances.
And you'll never ever use the nail-gun.
You can collect fast-fire power-ups which upgrade your rate of fire from the starting-point of one shot every second to heavy machine gun-level but the rate of fire resets if you die so you have to be careful. The levels are short, there are multiple checkpoints in each one and the game doesn't have to load or wait to respawn which keeps the gameflow going quite nicely.
You can play the game as one of two characters: the titular Jazz or his somewhat more deranged little brother Spazz (que endless stream of jokes about Spazz his name). They generally have different routes and starting points for certain levels but truth be told there really isn't much difference between the two. The principal differences are their jumps and special attacks. Jazz can jump once and then hover for a bit while Spazz can double-jump. In terms of actual maneuverability though, there isn't much difference and there's precious few places Spazz can go that Jazz can't.
As for the special attacks; each level has certain special blocks (a clear indicator of just how old-school this game really is) of certain types. Some you shoot once, some you shoot a little bit more, some can only be shot with a certain weapon. But there are also certain blocks that have to be broken with special attacks, either by buttstomping it from above (which both brothers can do), uppercutting it from below (which is Jazz-only), or by karate-kicking it from the side (an exclusively Spazz move). This might sound like an interesting split of playing-style between the two characters but the whole issue becomes moot once you get the bombs (weapon #7) which can pretty much destroy every block in the game. From that point on, character-selection becomes more a matter of esthetics than anything else.
And of course, what would a 2-D platformer be without a highscore?
Your score increases by defeating enemies and bosses and collecting coins, carrots, gems, ammo and snacks and there's plenty of everything. Try and get 2 million points!
All in all, the game plays really fast and smooth with a real rollercoaster feel to it, which more than makes up for the abysmal writing.
My second and only other real complaint about Jazz 2 , apart from the writing, is the length of the game.
There's five chapters, each consisting of 3 area's with two levels each, and while that may sound impressive, you can get through them all in about 3 hours or so. There's three different difficulty settings, two different characters and the game is fun enough to warrant several replays but the fact just remains that in terms of time the game doesn't really give you enough bang for your buck. And considering the fact that the game is out of print and the remaining copies on Ebay cost more than 30 bucks, that goes doubly so. What little there is is rather excellent but just a few more chapters could have made the difference between a good game and a great one.
One element that does add something to the lifeline of the game is the multiplayer which can be played over a LAN and there's even the option of two players playing on a single keyboard. The game is also the only one of it's kind (that I know of) to feature online multiplayer, even if that seems to have burned out in recent years. The multiplayer has the option of playing the entire story-mode co-op but also features vs modes such as Battle, Race, Treasure Hunt and Capture The Flag. These are all great fun if you've got a mate around but if you're by your lonesome then they're pretty useless.
One last honorable mention goes out to the Jazz Creation Station, which lets you construct your own levels for new multiplayer experiences.
This is a lot of fun and actually acts as a pretty effective life-support for the multiplayer, but it's not enough to save the game from an inevitable sense of repetition. It's a neat little tool, but that's all it is.
That just leaves the ultimate question: Is Jazz Jackrabbit 2 a good game?
All in all, yes it is, but it's not without it's faults and I strongly suggest "alternative means of acquisition" rather than paying thirty bucks for it on Ebay. It's short and the writing sucks but the gameplay is solid and the designers obviously had a lot of fun with it so all in all, I definetly recommend Jazz Jackrabbit 2.
I have a policy against reviewing new releases but I don't think any review of mine will ever illustrate this more appropriately than this one will.
Jazz Jackrabbit 2 was released for the PC over a decade ago and I can't imagine there's many people, even here on The Escapist, who've played it. All the reason for me to write a review about the world most infamous bandana-wearing, green-furred rabbit so without further ado, let's hop right to it. *Punches self in face for that truly awful pun*
I'd like to start this review with my biggest complaint: the writing.
The two most important aspects of any game are the gameplay and the writing and the extreme contrast between the two in Jazz 2 is rather jarring. You see, I dislike games where the story is uncomfortably wedged in when the gameplay is a lot more important anyway.
I also dislike game with just badly written stories and games where the story is essentially non-existent.
Jazz 2 deserves some kind of reward for managing to combine those three into a single horrific monster.
The story, which is explained in the fucking manual of all places, is about how the bad guy (whose name is never mentioned in-game) steals the wedding ring of Jazz his fiancee (whose name is also never mentioned in-game) to use as a powersource (how is never told) for a machine (the origin of which is unknown) of unknown use or purpose but which will presumably (never told for sure) bring about the end of the world (a world that we're never properly introduced to and which we know jack-shit about anyway).
The story is just the antithesis of good writing; a confused, jumbled mess of half-baked facts thrown into a blender and awkwardly mixed together before being poured down the front of your shorts in one big hose.
Now to be fair, while the main story is pretty terrible, there are lots of gags and easter eggs, the most abundant of which being the many signs posted in each level where the designers post random gibberish and take the piss at each other. "Craig is still a doofus.", "Cheese is green on tuesday." and "Send Tim new socks." are good examples. The game also parodies quite a lot of material, but seeing as it's so old, I imagine not everybody catches every reference.
For a game released in 1998, Jazz 2 actually holds up surprisingly well graphics-wise.
Seriously, I played this on a 22' monitor and there was hardly any pixelization or eye-fucking to be had. Now of course, when compared to modern 2-D platformers, Jazz 2 looks like ass. What I'm trying to say here is that ass isn't really all that much of an issue, provided that the jeans are tight enough.
The art-style is cartoony without being minimalistic, making for really catchy levels and enemies without needing dual-core processing.
Each area consists of two levels, the first being a lighter introductory version of the darker and more difficult second level. The level-design is extremely varied: there's gothic dungeons, savage jungles, blue oceans, two levels that can only be described as Alice In Wonderland on LSD and even Hell itself makes an appearance.
The majority of enemies are drawn from the animal kingdom though there are exceptions, such as one of the later levels which is mostly inhabited by ghosts and Marvin The Martian lookalikes. Bosses are also very original and imaginative but there's only five in the entire game so that's kind of a missed oppurtunity there.
The designers constantly ribbing one another and the homely art-style give Jazz 2 a very relatable, almost fan-made feel.
The one area where it always felt professional, however, is the music.
The music here is extremely well-done, and as varied as the levels it accompanies.
There's dark organs for the dungeons, drums and bagpipes for the jungle and of course Hell is accompanied by some nice metal.
The combination of homegrown graphics and professional music is an unusual one but works suprisingly well.
There's no voice-acting in the game except for a single line in the ending-cutscene (also the only one in the entire game) and to be honest I'm glad there isn't any more because A) There's no need for more, and B) that one line is terrible.
Now, as you may have gathered from the screenshots, Jazz 2 is an old-school 2-D platformer a la the original Sonic games.
In fact, the green rabbit is about as close as you can get to the blue hedgehog without infringing copyrights.
The controls are simple and intuitive: arrow-keys to walk, shift to run, control to jump and space to fire, that's it.
And before you ask, yes, space to fire. Jazz defeats enemies and bosses not by jumping on them or using items but by using actual weapons.
There's nine of these spread out over the course of the game (with both a regular version and an upgrade hidden somewhere) and they range from really handy to absolutely bloody useless. Okay, okay, okay, I won't beat around the bush: except for the basic gun, the homing rockets, flamethrower and bombs, you'll only be using the other weapons in very specific circumstances.
And you'll never ever use the nail-gun.
You can collect fast-fire power-ups which upgrade your rate of fire from the starting-point of one shot every second to heavy machine gun-level but the rate of fire resets if you die so you have to be careful. The levels are short, there are multiple checkpoints in each one and the game doesn't have to load or wait to respawn which keeps the gameflow going quite nicely.
You can play the game as one of two characters: the titular Jazz or his somewhat more deranged little brother Spazz (que endless stream of jokes about Spazz his name). They generally have different routes and starting points for certain levels but truth be told there really isn't much difference between the two. The principal differences are their jumps and special attacks. Jazz can jump once and then hover for a bit while Spazz can double-jump. In terms of actual maneuverability though, there isn't much difference and there's precious few places Spazz can go that Jazz can't.
As for the special attacks; each level has certain special blocks (a clear indicator of just how old-school this game really is) of certain types. Some you shoot once, some you shoot a little bit more, some can only be shot with a certain weapon. But there are also certain blocks that have to be broken with special attacks, either by buttstomping it from above (which both brothers can do), uppercutting it from below (which is Jazz-only), or by karate-kicking it from the side (an exclusively Spazz move). This might sound like an interesting split of playing-style between the two characters but the whole issue becomes moot once you get the bombs (weapon #7) which can pretty much destroy every block in the game. From that point on, character-selection becomes more a matter of esthetics than anything else.
And of course, what would a 2-D platformer be without a highscore?
Your score increases by defeating enemies and bosses and collecting coins, carrots, gems, ammo and snacks and there's plenty of everything. Try and get 2 million points!
All in all, the game plays really fast and smooth with a real rollercoaster feel to it, which more than makes up for the abysmal writing.
My second and only other real complaint about Jazz 2 , apart from the writing, is the length of the game.
There's five chapters, each consisting of 3 area's with two levels each, and while that may sound impressive, you can get through them all in about 3 hours or so. There's three different difficulty settings, two different characters and the game is fun enough to warrant several replays but the fact just remains that in terms of time the game doesn't really give you enough bang for your buck. And considering the fact that the game is out of print and the remaining copies on Ebay cost more than 30 bucks, that goes doubly so. What little there is is rather excellent but just a few more chapters could have made the difference between a good game and a great one.
One element that does add something to the lifeline of the game is the multiplayer which can be played over a LAN and there's even the option of two players playing on a single keyboard. The game is also the only one of it's kind (that I know of) to feature online multiplayer, even if that seems to have burned out in recent years. The multiplayer has the option of playing the entire story-mode co-op but also features vs modes such as Battle, Race, Treasure Hunt and Capture The Flag. These are all great fun if you've got a mate around but if you're by your lonesome then they're pretty useless.
One last honorable mention goes out to the Jazz Creation Station, which lets you construct your own levels for new multiplayer experiences.
This is a lot of fun and actually acts as a pretty effective life-support for the multiplayer, but it's not enough to save the game from an inevitable sense of repetition. It's a neat little tool, but that's all it is.
That just leaves the ultimate question: Is Jazz Jackrabbit 2 a good game?
All in all, yes it is, but it's not without it's faults and I strongly suggest "alternative means of acquisition" rather than paying thirty bucks for it on Ebay. It's short and the writing sucks but the gameplay is solid and the designers obviously had a lot of fun with it so all in all, I definetly recommend Jazz Jackrabbit 2.
Like any game worth it's salt, Jazz 2 has got several cheats waiting to be activated.
These can be activated at any in-game moment, simply by typing in the following (no need to press shift or Caps lock).
JJGOD - Invulnerability and all weapons immediately unlocked with full ammo, in their upgraded modes.
(Note: The invulnerability wears off if you grab a carrot, use the cheat again or use a special attack)
JJAMMO - Full ammo replenish for all currently available weapons.
JJFLY - Once to fly like you would if you pick up a Flying Carrot, once again to fly like you would if you pick up a Hoverboard, and once more to get back on your feet.
JJSHIELD - Once for the fire shield, twice for the water shield, thrice for the lightning shield, quadrice for the Ultima shield.
(Note: Ultima shield can only be gotten using this cheat, it doesn't normally appear in the game)
JJK - Kill yourself and go back to the last checkpoint.
(Note: Why you'd want to do this, I don't know, but it works)
JJFAST - Increase firing speed like you would if you picked up a fast-fire power-up.
(Note: This cheat allows a much higher rate of fire than the game normally does, to a somewhat ridiculous level)
JJRUSH - For 20 seconds, any enemies you touch are instantly killed, you run faster and jump higher, and you're invulnerable.
JJMORPH - Switch between Jazz, Spazz, a bird and a frog.
JJNOWALLS - Turn on No-Clip.
(Note: This combines well with JJFLY)
EDIT: BONUS CHEAT.
JJBIRD - Summon a bird that follows you around and acts as a gun-turret.
These can be activated at any in-game moment, simply by typing in the following (no need to press shift or Caps lock).
JJGOD - Invulnerability and all weapons immediately unlocked with full ammo, in their upgraded modes.
(Note: The invulnerability wears off if you grab a carrot, use the cheat again or use a special attack)
JJAMMO - Full ammo replenish for all currently available weapons.
JJFLY - Once to fly like you would if you pick up a Flying Carrot, once again to fly like you would if you pick up a Hoverboard, and once more to get back on your feet.
JJSHIELD - Once for the fire shield, twice for the water shield, thrice for the lightning shield, quadrice for the Ultima shield.
(Note: Ultima shield can only be gotten using this cheat, it doesn't normally appear in the game)
JJK - Kill yourself and go back to the last checkpoint.
(Note: Why you'd want to do this, I don't know, but it works)
JJFAST - Increase firing speed like you would if you picked up a fast-fire power-up.
(Note: This cheat allows a much higher rate of fire than the game normally does, to a somewhat ridiculous level)
JJRUSH - For 20 seconds, any enemies you touch are instantly killed, you run faster and jump higher, and you're invulnerable.
JJMORPH - Switch between Jazz, Spazz, a bird and a frog.
JJNOWALLS - Turn on No-Clip.
(Note: This combines well with JJFLY)
EDIT: BONUS CHEAT.
JJBIRD - Summon a bird that follows you around and acts as a gun-turret.
