I'm not surprised that many people see my posts and skip over the content. The purpose of them is to advise and help the creator, not so much the people who are playing the map. That said, if you've read as far as this, I would highly recommend you play these games.
And now onto you, Chuppy. You may recall that I played part one and left you a bit of a text-bomb about what I personally thought worked, what didn't work and how it could be improved. I am a little dubious about playing sequels because that can hang over my head in the sense that, if you make the same sort of mistakes does that mean my feedback isn't regarded or perhaps not even read at all. Would this post end up bringing up the same errors I noticed in the first part showing while you've worked hard, you're still not doing so well in some areas. It's up in the air, that is for sure.
But I'll say one something with absolute certainty. This adventure map has a lot of adventure! Not only that, but it's blended together really well too. If I were asked to pick what works with the whole thing, I'd not be able to say. I thought about it and the reason for this is simply because the whole thing works for a lot of little reasons. Turns out, if you get a lot of those little reasons in the right places, they turn into a much bigger, more solid reason to play and enjoy this game. Not a lot of people I've met can actually pull that off, well done.
What inevitably happens though is I will have to compare this to the first part both positively and negatively. Reason being, people are going to play this one after the other and if the next in the sequence is worse, why should they bother? It's not all going to be about replicating the bad stuff though. Part one had some amazing events and whether or not you can replicate -those- while maintaining a sense of originality over repetition is what is going to be a deal breaker here.
And it actually works out more beneficially to you. The spawning issues were fine, there were no inventory mis-haps. Even through the game I pretty much had what I needed with no clutter and mess trying to trick or dissuade me into thinking about other things. There was no confusion here either. The signs were nicer, though there were a few typos on one or two of them (Dugeon over Dungeon, for example) and we fall back to my comment about double-checking. As a minor issue, it's not so bad though.
I spent more time exploring actual areas than getting lost on the path from A to B, and with the multiple ways of getting from A to B involving a boat ride, minecarts as well as running. There was a nice mix-up in presentation as well, with each area being new to view and fun to explore. I found each location either large nor small, but focused and directed to the player as well. The starting area alone was a nice mesh of exploration and item gathering instead of just giving each player their stuff and saying 'There you go'.
Another thing that jumped out at me was the originality of puzzles. Not just in what they were, but in how they were presented. The dungeons in the first game felt like a little side-track something to do, yet, in this game because of how the experience was staggered out, felt more like the optional quests that they were. The beauty of it was each challenge within them wasn't anything special or new. While that may have been a bad thing to some, I actually liked it. What you're doing is giving people a -choice- to do things, and if it's a puzzle they're familiar with, then not only are they more likely to do it, they're also going to be confident in that choice as well.
I did have an idea when I came across these that you were using more tried and tested puzzles in optional dungeons because you could then keep the more original and new puzzle event ideas to the main storyline. I was half-right with this, because that vertical wall jumping was the first I've seen, and the Dungeon of Accuracy actually made me laugh. Original and cleverly put into place.
While I'm on the topic of puzzles I'd just like to say that with the lava-jumping ones I had an issue with before, it's nice to see you taking heed of the criticism. Usually people would implement the checkpoint beds or the powered storage carts to ferry items from one place to another. You actually pushed the boat out and worked in not only a new method I'd not seen before, but one that actually works so simply I could not believe it. Take about user-friendly! I was very pleased with the results. Another thing with the inclusion of puzzles was that the adventure never really seemed about the puzzles and that is a very clever thing to accomplish. The focus was the journey, the plot, going from A to B and the puzzles were obstacles in the way towards solving it. Never did it feel like I had to do a puzzle for the sake of doing a puzzle.
There are a few issues with a couple of them though, spoiler tagged because the map is relatively new and I want people to not get any preconceptions about what they might face:
So when it comes down to it, do I think this map is better than the first one? Yes, I do. The story is more appealing, the maps are more luscious, the puzzles are more original and it comes down to being an all-round better player experience. Improvements on 95% of the current game is fantastic. This becomes even more apparent when you realise the first game isn't even that bad to begin with. A steady progression of goodness overall.
Well done for this. It's not perfect, but it's certainly not a disappointment. It kept me captivated from start to finish and though I finished it in one sitting, it was about 30 to 40 minutes of enjoyment. Once again, you should certainly play these games. Good luck with part three as well. Raising the bar for yourself means you'll have to really give the users a conclusion that has both impact and more fun than the previous two!