[singing beautifully] Your levels reviewed real good!
Levels showing exemplar level design!
575gjlr | “Tree Tree Tree Death” by stofSt0rm | Quick, Package Jump, Panic Moments
This has got to be my favorite package jump level, for a number of reasons. It is short, achievable and generous with checkpoints. It has a theme instead of being pure spikes, and it makes good use of jems and at least one hidden area.
I can wholeheartedly give this the Popdonk Recommends badge!
lvkjrxb | “Eye Switch Fortress Explore!” by ZLDFN101 @yhn3lg | Clever, Long, Casual
This level is AMAZINGLY well done. Without a doubt it earns the Popdonk Recommends badge!
This level is beautiful. It make used of varied terrain, blending and backdrop to create a cohesive whole. It has separate rooms or sections with their own theme and vibe. It is generous with checkpoints. This creates a smooth and easy pace.
So many of the pieces of this level is brilliant. The flapjack puzzle is easy, but time consuming, building a sense of tension as you try to move the pieces just right.
The tiptoe puzzle is challenging and utterly thematic. The use of hidden space and blopfish paths makes it challenging but enjoyable.The infinite checkpoints makes the challenge tolerable.
The puzzle with the blopfish and the saws feels chaotic and nervewracking. Very well done.
This level took me 17 minutes to beat (10 minutes more than the baseline) and it was quite a joy.
The single change I would recommend would be to have one or two more switches in the forest puzzle plainly visible. I hit the first switch and thought I was done until I came back to it on top of the puzzle!
d7061lq | “Just Move The Flyblock” by Misery @5djb5j | Puzzling, Complex, Switch-Heavy
This level is a phenomenal example of the single-screen puzzle genre. The creator makes good use of blending and backdrop to make it visually appealing. The puzzling overall is enjoyable and challenging.
The single screen forces creators to be quite creative with the limited space, and this is no exception. Even more impressive, is that this level uses just a few types of pieces. This makes it seem easy, but this puzzle is devilishly hard. I have yet to beat it, but I can wholeheartedly give it the Popodonk Reccomends badge. I would love to see more levels like this, especially some that I can beat 😉
dhfvgrq | “The Peaceful Castle” by PureKnickers @ref0kg | Secrets, Casual
https://lvlhd.co/+dhfvgrq
This level is a great example of a beautiful level. The interweaving of different types of tiles and backdrop is just gorgeous. This level does a great job of taking a single mechanic, the sky wigglers, and introducing them to what might be a casual or new player. The jems are well placed in a way that guides the player and are fun to collect. They also allow for players to choose to speedrun the level or explore and seek jems.
It is incredibly rare to see a cakewalk level of such high quality and effort. The only change I would consider is how many of the vacrats are on a single space and can’t move. If this was done to to reduce difficulty, then perfect, leave it alone. If it was an accident, then it can be a bit akward to have these immobile bad guys throughout the level
This level unabashedly gets the Popdonk Recommends badge!
1vf1z1v | “Tree Top Hop” by Sjosz @rswljz | Traps, Precise
This level gets the Popdonk Recommends badge for sheer hilarity alone.
It starts off simple enough. The rain, the trees, the spike here or there, the spike dropper nearly hitting you, all of it creates this ambiance of this dangerous forest. And yet at the same time it lulls you into a false sense of security. The spikes are rare. The flapjacks are dumb. The spike droppers never hit you.
And then you get the package, AND GIANT SAWS COME OUT. And now what was a cakewalk, is suddenly a challenging level. On top of all that, I enjoyed the little caches of jems to cater to the score hunters as well as the speed runners.
Overall another great level.
0wmrrtw | “Through The Whatever!!” by Retro Banana Man NL @kdkswt | Clever, Quick
Through The Whatever is a great example of what an engaging beginner level should look like. It provides a direct route for speed runners, it provides lots of jems for high score seekers, and it provide plenty of checkpoints for casual players. It’s short, but engaging with interesting puzzles. For me it took 75 seconds the first time exploring, and 33 second speedrunning it.
I really liked the surprises and exploration aspect. Players are encouraged to jump off a cliff into the unknown. There is a mega jem just barely poking out. There is a hidden cache of explosives. All of these things encourages players to explore, gives the non-speedrunner somthing to do, and they all make the player feel smart.
Other brilliant touches is the use of multiple paths in the first puzzle, forcing players to cover the same physical space in multiple ways. I love that there is multiple ways to deal with the flipwip enemies, providing a way to explode them, fight them directly, or completely avoid them.
Another smart piece is the gating mechanism. Retro Banana man uses a package cam to lock the player into the last section of the map. This is great for subtly guiding new players.
Overall, a fun level that meets the needs of multiple audiences. A concise example of good level design. Popdonk Recommends!
52d6kj4 | “Bomb Away! Bomb Away!” by Ps7cho @xppvz7 | Bombs, Paths, Clever
This is an incredible engaging, inventive and challenging level. It feels like you are in charge of this little ship trying to fire at all the enemy combatants. It’s easy to start, with but quite difficult to get all of the bad guys. I also enjoyed the ending for how you get out of your ship.
My only recommendation for improvement would be to have a monster gate or two in visible range at the beginning. I assumed I needed to kill all the bad guys, but wasn’t entirely sure until the end.
dqwcqs7 | “Box Befuddlement” by Cammymoop @cgm03g | Puzzling, Casual
This is by far one of the funniest levels I’ve ever played. You start out with this big warehouse of boxes and think “Do I need all of these……?” The rest of the level is a fun series of puzzles involving boxes. I found it challenging without being overwhelming. Really great level. My only recommendation would be to add some backdrop and decorations to make the level feel more cohesive.
059634d | “Hello, Meet Spike Chainer!” by Bmiclock @smqp4f | Quick, Intense, Panic Moments
Short, sweet and fun. Challenging without being punishing. Forgiving use of checkpoints. Great overall, no recommended changes.
Popdonk Reccomends.
z4n2f75 | “Popjaw, Help!” by Cammymoop @cgm03g | Zipper, Chase, Simple
This is a really inventive level. I always love it when a creator takes one of the bad guys in the game and forces your to corral them. It usually presents an interesting challenge. It takes even more effort to integrate the Zipper powerup, since it’s so easy to cheese a level with that. The level is definitely challenging and forces you to think. I’m stuck right now right before the first checkpoint, but I absolutely can recommend this level.
