Luta

Posted: 2002-07-13 9:13 a.m.   Report Abuse Well, it was a good first try. I'll admit, some of the rock cleaving was done nicely. But other than that... Lets just say that it really doesn't have what it takes. Its a start though. Keep trying!

-Xak

Posted: 2002-07-13 12:38 p.m.   Report Abuse _SL_Kyle, thank you for making this contribution. I offer some constructive criticisms for your future editing endeavors, of which I hope there will be many.

AESTHETICS
Architecture:
Boxy rooms, and illogical or weak cleaves hurt some. I do believe that _SL_Kyle knows what he's doing, when it comes to cleaving. Some sector cleaves were made very nicely, and the cliffs made from them add a unique twinge of character to this level.

Texturing:
Texturing appears to be pretty solid. I didn't see much need for stitching, nor did I see any issues about completely tasteless mats put down where they don't belong (although some textures may not have been chosen with the greatest judgment). I saw two issues that did pertain to texturing. One concerns colormaps -- they are the reason why wall-break shards are purple. The other concerns the use of horizon sky in one of the secret areas. Horizon sky really didn't do much for the view, and it made my system slow down.

Lighting:
Default lighting was used. I feel that a cavern-ish level such as Luta deserves more artistic display of light. (At least there can be no complaints about being in the dark.)

Dynamics:
The extent of cog usage was not necessarily bad. In fact, the idea for shattering walls made me smile with surprise. It was a fine idea. The door cogs could have been better-selected...a Massassi tutorial guides editors to use 00_Door.cog...which is fine, I guess, but 00_Door.cog employs no coding for sound. I think _SL_Kyle used this cog. Therefore, some doors were mute -- or, if I'm dead wrong, I just could not hear the doors because of low volume. Other doors operated just fine.

GAMEPLAY
Item Placement:
Whenever a level uses the heavy powerups, such as revive, super shield, etc., you will have to worry about players hovering about one specific area. As this level is given to being more "closed off" than others, it's not always likely that anyone can be stopped or hindered from camping. The main powerups are concentrated in the lower level of Luta, and they are hidden. However, I believe they can be found without great difficulty.

Flow:
Many areas of this level appear to meander off into nowhere (in some instances, while underwater), which leaves them to be overlooked. Gameplay should not often wander beyond the immediate premises, however.

Playability:
Playable? Yes. Sometimes the level will not feel compelled to agree with its players, but it is a fine environment for a quick full-force lightsabers/guns battle, or even a no-force lightsabers/guns battle. It also contains many components of an RPG level.

OTHER
I feel like this level was hastily submitted before the author was truly finished.
There are some sectors in which water flags are not switched off after leaving the water.
It appears as though walkways were somewhat of an excuse to patch up what cleaves couldn't be made.
Background sounds could have had more presence.

Final comments:
With a few more weeks' work, this level could have been very very nice. _SL_Kyle is a newer editor to the Massassi community, and this is his debut -- albeit, this is not the only level he has ever made. It is not a bad job at all. However, I think it is an incomplete job...as though a student only answered 70% of the questions on a test, and left the other 30% blank. The rating of 5 contends that much work was needed to bring it up to an average rating (6 or 7), but also holds that there was considerable material already present.

I hope that you stick with editing JK for a time, _SL_Kyle. Your work yet again confirms that the JK editing community is not lost. Thank you.

Posted: 2002-07-13 11:57 p.m.   Report Abuse AHHHH i was clicking on recent files and this Jedi Knight 1 file came up yes its recent but the graphix hurt! lol j/k it looks fairly good from the screen shots but cuz im not playing JK ne more and have movde on to bigger and better things JK2 i have not rated this :)

Posted: 2003-08-05 1:20 p.m.   Report Abuse This is level is not that bad at all, considering it was made in JkEdit. JkEdit, though powerful, is hard to master and I applaud that. The cleaving is very nice, although the rooms are pretty boxy. Of course, this isn't as good as the SE version of this level. Go download Luta SE, which is improved of pretty much everything.