Level reviews

"I had been avoiding this release based on its sheer length alone and I wasn't wrong. I'm currently on paid time off so I figured this might be the best opportunity to tackle this, and I wasn't wrong. It took me nearly 10 days, playing about two hours each, to see this through to the end — and that's with G&D's amazing and thorough guidance! I don't think anyone can fare well trying to fly this one solo because it's massive and the amount of times you go back and forth is insane, it gets especially bad in the (several) London levels because those are truly a never ending multidimensional maze of sorts. I took a few notes along the journey, while also playing a few shorter pieces on the side so I wouldn't lose my "momentum". There are several unique touches peppered throughout these levels, but some things (like placing a bottle on an umarked table, or a jumpswitch disguised as a chandelier) are far from intuitive. Sometimes the objects get in the way due to poor collision (especially noticeable in the last level), and some of the trap setups will require many quickloads to get across — at this, it's anything but fun, such as a timed run through a series of gaps with flame emitters later on. The stealth bit in the office still makes no sense, the guard spotted me everytime I tried crawling or walking behind the desk, but when I finally gave up on that idea and just darted across he didn't even flinch. Now and then the author places rats in the crawlspaces (by the way, expect a lot of crawling), and in one of the levels there were multiple torches in a crawlspace. Getting one and trying to throw it out would make it bounce on the other torches and not leave its place, but I learned that if you're crouched with a torch in hand, you can "pick" the other ones up and make them disappear lol. That was the only way to get by, luckily I never needed a spare torch because otherwise I'd be stuck. The best levels in this release are the ones that leave London (the one in Egypt in particular, but also the last one was fun). The author has cleverly made a hodge-podge of areas from several different official levels (like combining Opera House and Thames Wharf, among many other such examples) and then built on top of that, so now and then you get this strange feeling of deja vu because of the geometry but the way things play out is usually very different — this is a cool concept and one I meant to chase when I was entertaining the idea of building again. The final level does the same but with areas inspired by AOD, the areas feel familiar enough even though they've been done in TRLE, so the author's definitely done a good job. All in all, these are great levels, but I'm afraid it falls into the trap of being too long for its own good. 9h40min, 45 secrets. 03/26" - Treeble

"When I finished this adventure, I asked myself: "How could this adventure have scores so low?" While levels ending in 20 minutes have higher scores. I played this adventure with 2 impressions! I'm not a fan of city levels (London in this case) and there were a lot of city levels (too much for me), with lots of research, going back and forth, so you had to remember all the places visited . The last level city included the hallow church which reminded me of good memories. But in this adventure, there are 3 magnificent levels that convinced me of the excellence of this adventure. I really liked "xiaolin monastery", "Cleopatra's necropolis", and "League of the dragons". These 3 levels are above the others and are very pleasant to do. Of course, it is an adventure that is not easy (many timeruns), especially in the last level where you have to go back several times in the smoky room or in the windy room where it is difficult to cross. Adventure ended on one last and difficult fight. Congratulations to the author for this long and very complex adventure !!" - Drakan

"This builder knows how to use the level editor to create an amazing adventure, and I recognize there's a lot of work behind this one. As usual I can't give an approved 'cause I was not able to finish it by myself. First give many thanks to G&D Productions for the fantastic walkthrough and also for the savegames; without them I should never finish, I had to use many of the provided savegames. But even so this adventure is worth to play, so take a try. There are several very large levels and another short levels. The first two in the city were the worst, with a terrible backtracking and the most difficult timed runs I've ever seen in custom levels. The London levels were bad too; all that four levels with a lot of backtracking and excessive buttons/switches to pull and few puzzles. The best levels for me and which I really enjoyed were "El Dorado", "Xiaolin Monastery" and, of course, the final level with great details like the wind room or the final battle with the demon (I think too hard to kill, even with all that provided ammo). Really only for expert players as I saw in the readme file, but also with enjoyable parts you can try thanks to the walkthrough and the savegames. Impressive." - Jose

"Extraordinary adventure! I enjoyed it so much, despite getting stuck multiple times in the first two levels and in the London levels due to some very well hidden switches and objects, and the many sequences of backtracking involved. The levels are really large, but not once did I find myself boring or wanting it to end, on the contrary, whenever I got stuck I just wanted to know how to proceed so I could continue playing. I liked the soundtracks as well, they were very innovative. You're provided with a great arsenal and the secrets are quite generous (and very well hidden too). I recommend it for expert players, but even so, you should play it with the walkthrough on hand, because it's very likely you get stuck, especially in the second level where there is a key that is almost invisible and one unrecognizable jump switch." - Feder

"The Square: A London/city setting to start us off, utilising objects and textures from Trix's "A Time Odyssey". Gameplay involves pushing a lot of buttons, avoiding traps and shooting a few dogs and guards.
Dasmore's Apartment: Continuing the city theme, Lara reaches her friend's residence and let's herself in. A bit more varied gameplay in this level, with a code pad puzzle as well as finding sand, fire and water for the element puzzle at the end.
Eldorado: Quite the change of setting here, to rich blue, red and gold colours as well as Golden Mask textures. Not much puzzling here, although I enjoyed the combat sequences as well as the hunt for the two gold stones.
London's Building: Dashes of familiarity here, as a couple of the areas look suspiciously like the City Level from TR3. Lots of buttons here, as well as using the Shotgun to blow apart grates to the lack of Revolver and Sight. A bit too much backtracking for my liking here, IMO.
The Labs: A short VCI transition level here, shooting robots and finding fuses, with a block puzzle and a boss fight with Sophia.
Cleopatra's Necropolis: Definitely a high point, and a vast improvement on the previous sections. The blue colour scheme and the flybys were well done. The gameplay is more engaging with a hunt for four beetles, a few demigods to fight and good use of the Mechanical Beetle.
Xiaolin Monastery: Another great level. Some of the textures and background music seems to be from Titak's Himalayan Mysteries, which worked well. I liked the five levers puzzle and the torch jumping puzzle.
Industrial Zone: A bit of a let down after the brilliant previous levels. Back to the grey colour scheme of London. For some reason, this level reminded me of Thames Wharf, Opera House and Lud's Gate. The only real high points were a couple of timed runs (one of which proved quite difficult).
League of the Dragons: Quite a finale, with a couple of hub rooms to work from, as well as a nasty dragon to avoid while performing various tasks. A double boss battle suitably ended the game and the credits roll.
Overall, this was an enjoyable game and I enjoyed the puzzle based levels most. I wouldn't have located all of the secrets without the walkthrough. I do think that the opening levels could have more puzzles and less backtracking, but it is well worth playing. My total time: 12 hours 20 minutes with 47 secrets found." - Ryan

"I know the builder's style so I kept this away for long. Indeed Raidermatty is a master of confusion, quite imperfect but still one of my favourite authors I wish I could remember like all interactive spots and routes to them he requires. Many initial interactions are unique but sometimes located in passable rooms where loads of other things draw attention away. (Still this time I just overlooked one - the switch Mr. Borrut was fair enough to hint, a small difference which took me two hours here.) Then it goes to keyholes and switches in London chapter which should be just shorter, and sometimes you revisit so much it gets tiring. Still I can see the amount of backtracking is diminished in comparison to previous releases, and the shortcuts to evade passage repetition are occasionally provided. Minor fixes could further reduce redundant runtime like renaming a "bunch of keys" to "statue room key", pointing camera on the trapdoor from below instead from above, or opening a gate in the SW corner of the kiosk square (all examples from the first level), or rethinking shortcut to the golden gem receptacles so it works regardless from room order taken (in the American location). I noticed some remake zones but cleverly hidden, and while I normally think it's not enough to take resources from master builders to recapture their atmosphere, here it sometimes happens in the Square and Tibet episodes. What is really good is only few authors bothered to fix the NG chase camera distance, and nicely surprising this is one of them. What is missing is transitions from one episode to another, as while playable segments are sometimes too long, the written cuts are too fast, feeling like a lazy substitute for missing cutscenes, especially when Ireland is mentioned but never pictured ingame, the jump straight to base/lab done instead. The Lab core is possibly the most interesting location, and its revolver secret is wonderful, both hinting the reward content and satisfying with much better robot fight efficiency. SUMMARY: This surpasses anything the author has ever made, though it leans from underdone to overdone. Redundancy should just be shortened or dropped, while more uniqueness should exist instead. The author hasn't yet reached his peak so I hope this one will be followed." - DJ Full

"The Square (8/9/9/8, 5 secrets, 80 min): I played this as part of the full series and the dramatic opening flyby and scrolling storyline text already hints at something epic and that is exactly what you get. The first level alone takes you from City to sewer to Home to Factory & Warehouse type environments. It is quite heavy on levers and buttons, with only a few push puzzles and an occasional timed run thrown in, but still works quite nicely in that way. You get to battle plenty of dogs, rats and workers and five partly very sneaky secrets. I wasted a whole lot of medipacks due to those swinging things that were quite tough to get past without being hit, but maybe I just did not have enough patience to time these moves right.
Dasmore Apartment (8/9/9/9, 6 secrets, 95 min): Very much a continuation of the first level in terms of overall setting, so at times it does get a bit lengthy with the many buttons to find and push and it is also quite heavy on the slow duct crawling. There are still many rats and dogs, but the worker enemies have been replaced by a bunch of tougher baddies to kill. On the plus side though, there is some nice use of more complex objects like the distillery and object driven gameplay as you collect the items for the final elements puzzle. There are a few shorter timed runs, none of which are too hard; a tricky (but fun) slide, jump, shoot task and a flood & drain exercise to spice things up as well. A downside are a few actions that few (if any) players will figure out by themselves (like the chandelier jump switch or the placement of the wine bottle - despite the camera hint). I really liked the design of the whole wine cellar area near the end for a bit of a change of looks.
Eldorado (7/9/8/8, 7 secrets, 65 min): A refreshing change of locale with stronger colors in gold and blue that I rather liked. Always fun to explore and jump around rivers (gold and water both present here) and the traps encountered are rather mild (a few boulders and blades). Safe for a few slightly tricky jumps the overall gameplay is quite tame and humble to the extent that it is missing something special or extra, so for me it was the variety of enemies and the hunt for the secrets that kept this one entertaining, but it did feel a bit uninspired in terms of agility or puzzle ideas.
London Building (7/9/8/8, 7 secrets, 90 min): Again I played this previous demo release as part of the full Dragon series and I only had a dim recollection of the previous smaller demo played years before. You get a City setting here with plenty of agility actions between the high buildings and around the roofs which is kind of fun. There are a few timed activities near the beginning but then it turns more and more into the usual find button for next door gameplay. This is also a level that utilizes elements that only more experienced players will easily manage, such as a few banana jumps and aiming with the shotgung to shoot grates. Other downsides include some rather substantial backtracking, often repeating the very same path back and forth a few times which is rather tedious and also a phase where the otherwise helpful camera hints are completely absent. Enemies are a dozen or so thugs and some dogs, crows and rats again. The brief stealth scene was an interesting element and I really liked how several of the secrets here did indeed require some unusual and creative moves to get to them.
The Labs (7/8/8/8, 1 secret, 25 min): Somwhat an intermediate level in the series, in TR5 style and with a (fairly easy) boos fight included. Battle a few dogs, thugs and those funny androids, solve a quick push box puzzle and master a timed run and you are out of here to move on to Egypt.
Cleopatras Nercopolis (8/9/9/9, 3 secrets, 50 min): For me actaully the most enjoyable level of the set so far. It is up a notch in terms of look and feel with really decent texturing and lighting that conveys a great atmosphere and it has a much better balance in terms of gameplay and duration, generally using a hub room concept twice, for the level as a whole and then for the four beetles for the pyramid quest again. Quite a breadth of enemies throughout with panthers, demigods, big scoprions, crocs, horsemen and a bunch of blue lizards. The final cave room looks most impressive indeed and was well designed with the change of deadly water into blue. Well rounded and good looking - a highlight of the series.
Xiaolin Monastery (9/9/9/9, 6 secrets, 80 min): And it gets better and better. This oriental level was truly fun to play, despite a lot of the usual push-button-to-open-door or push-a-few-blocks-around gameplay. There is quite a bit of battle going on with monks, thugs, dogs and even a few aliens along the way and a nice little boss fight at the end. The looks and overall setting are rather well done and gameplay picks up a notch with some nice torch jump puzzle, a 5 lever puzzle with a clue and the general set up of the quest for the four elements. The buddha statue looked great too. A definite highlight of the series!
Industrial Zone (7/8/8/7, 5 secrets, 110 min): Now that was a bit of a drag. After the previous rather refreshing levels, this one gets you back to where you started. The dark and grey/brown city settings of London - and even the long and nice intro flyby did not manage to lift my spirits. This particular level did indeed outstay its welcome a bit and less could have been more here. The usual many buttons and doors, many long ladders to climb, the usual enemies and many of them (I counted 25 or so bad guys and a variety of wildlife - crows, rats, dogs and crocs). The only thing that saves this level a little is the fact that you have a brief and well done transition part through a museum and then get into, around and below the cathedral. And the few gameplay highlights of course: A timed run that needs quite a bit of preparation and a timed swim/run that is challenging mainly because it is very long and includes many different moves and jumps. Nonetheless, I was really glad when this part was finally done with.
League of the Dragons (8/9/9/9, 7 secrets, 90 min): Always good to end on a high note, and this certainly is one for this massive adventure. The sandy cave leading into the castle type setting is a pleasing environment for the final showdown. And you will be busy again doing lots of different things to progress, some maybe a bit too repetitive as the builders lets you complete very similar tasks often 2 to 4 times in a row, but overall rather varied enough to be fun. You get a timed run at the start, plenty of enemies to battle (a dozen lizards and poisonous dragons as well as a bunch of knights) and I particularly enjoyed the three level theme area at the end with the wind, lava and toxic rooms and their related tasks to manage. It all culminates in a two stage boss battle that is actually not too hard but still a suitable climax before the end credits roll.
Summary: It has been quite a while since I have tackled such a long adventure and Raidermatty can certainly be very proud of having put together such a massive set of levels. I had many moments of great entertainment here, but also many periods where I just wanted it to end or at least move on to the next stage quicker than it did. A little less of London and a bit more of Egypt, Oriental and Castle settings would have made this more balanced for my own taste. Still, if you want to put your teeth into some adventure for quite a bit of time, you can do much worse than this one, so give it a go. My final stats: 11 hours 23 minutes 47 secrets..." - MichaelP

"Although I do love a long adventure (this one has 9 levels) as well as the variety of settings (this one for sure fits that bill) I regrettably I didn't enjoy myself that much. There were too many awkward bugs (not the one described in the readme) like seeing a door opening and finally getting there, the door is shut. So apiece of advice: do save at strategic points and do save often. There is so much running back and fro which might have been not so bad but then you had to do the same traps again. I just don't like that. There are two fiendish timed runs that I couldn't make and this time Scotty came to the rescue. Lara has the wrong animation for picking up stuff, throwing the torch from its hiding place was also very buggy at my end. The collision of lots of objects were not up to par. A bit more camera work would be nice as half the time I had no idea what that level did. A pity that Lara didn't have the new moves, would be quite handy with all the crawling one had to do. On the other hand you find enough flares and other pick-ups so you can finally slay the end bosses (yes plural). I found all the secrets though and for that I have to thank Dutchy. So if you have a lot of time at your hands, do play this level set, there are some interesting things to see as well as a lot to solve before you get to the end." - Gerty

"Whew, after 26 hours I finally finished this massive level set! This is a very complicated and at times highly challenging set of levels, but definitely worth the time. I can tell that the author spent a ridiculous amount of time working on this and it shows. This one needed the walkthrough like no other. Others have noted the faults, but I am going to say, despite the faults, this is a great game. I always take way more time than most, but if you have a lot of time to spend on one set of levels, this is worth your time." - Shandroid

"Very big and very long adventure. I loved the levels on London and the monastery. Really beautiful adventure, long and complex. congratulations" - Minox

"It has taken me more than a month to get through this gargantuan release, which makes it difficult to prepare a comprehensive review of the complete package (as the early portions have faded in my memory). But I can recall enough to give this game an unqualified recommendation, both in terms of gameplay and variety. My game clock showed a whopping total of nearly 17 hours at the end, and when you consider that there are only 9 levels here, you can do the math and conclude that all of the levels are complex and player-intensive. In his walkthrough, Dutchy says that these levels are for experts only, but since I got through okay I'm evidence enough that the game can be enjoyed by most of us average players. And while I'm thinking about it, I never cease to be amazed by Dutchy's ability to figure out these levels, down to every last secret no less, and to document everything so quickly (in this case, less than two weeks after release, as I recall) in a concise, flowing manner in his walkthroughs. I could never play the more complicated levels without his help. I know some of us resist the temptation to award higher scores to the multi-level releases for that reason alone, but I feel that this builder has put extraordinary effort into planning and executing League of the Dragons. Most of all, I found it highly entertaining, which is primarily why I play Tomb Raider in the first place." - Phil

"i played this level around a month and i didn't had the chance of review it until now. it was very good to see some remakes of certain areas of TR3 london but this was someway frustrated by the long backtracking.in fact i almost lost my patience on the fourth level also, some areas are really big and confusing and the ending was a little disapointing for me but overall was still a good level." - janachorider

"I found 41 secrets, is that good enough for a non-hunter? Anyway, my feelings regarding this long set of levels are somewhat mixed. Sometimes, depending on what there is on offer, a lot is too much and less could be better - that's my main impression. That and that Raidermatty can be the master of confusion, most especially in the second level if I'm not mistaken, but not only. All in all, I'd say it's well done but too many tasks in each level (except for one which is quick and simple) make it a tad tiring. The idea of totally reworking a few official levels is interesting, as happens in the London levels, for instance, despite the existence of too many staircases, switches and buttons, etc. It's rather classic. I preferred the last levels even though they suffer from the same too much - too many condition, not because I could sense I was finally nearing the end but because they were probably actually better in gameplay terms. The wrong animations are a minor flaw. Recommended but not unmissable." - Jorge22

"The author declares that it's a game for experts - and so it is, but only in the athletic sense: there are some difficult jumps and passages by nasty blades, and at least two very difficult timed runs/swims; but the majority of the puzzles are easy to solve, and definitely not for experts, unless we can consider as puzzles some confusing passages where Lara can easily lose herself in mazy places and greatly similar rooms. The game has strong and weak points - as everything. Some weak ones are: the London levels, full of backtracks, where part of the gameplay was not based in TR3, but copied from it; the boringly difficult jumps (I almost despaired with one of them, from a tight cubicle to a laser crawlspace, that had to be done 3 - yes, three - times); the extremely similar rooms of Dasmore's Apartment; the somewhat repetitive actions found in almost all levels. And some strong points are: this same level, Dasmore's Apartment, really rich in camera hints, with its inspired sequence for fuel production; the lighting of the whole game; the clever use of the TR2 Monastery (the Barkhang level was always my favourite), and the golden river places of TR2 Gold, as basis for totally different and interesting games - this was not a copy, was quite creative; the last level, League of the Dragons, and also the Cleopatra one; and, last but not least... the music. I simply loved to find the second part of the C Major Mozart's piano concert in a custom game, and I consider the game's music, as a whole, one of its strong points. In resume, PLAY IT." - Josey

"If you've played this builder's previous levels, a couple of the sections in this game will be familiar to you and I personally enjoyed revisiting the London based section in particular. This is quite a long game and you should be prepared to set several days aside to complete it. Parts of it undoubtedly work better than others and, stripping aside the nostalgia factor, there are many times when the gameplay feels 'throw a switch to access a room to throw a switch etc, etc'. I certainly feel the whole thing would have benefited greatly from more careful editing and a general tightening up of the gameplay. Having said that, there is still a great deal of pleasure to be had here. You get to visit some nicely made favourite locations and there are excellent puzzles, agility tests (some quite challenging) and enemy moments along the way. If you can forgive the occasional longueurs then this is well worth playing. Also, there are a whopping 47 secrets to find and if you manage to find them all you can feel justifiably smug. I refuse to embarrass myself by owning up to how many I missed!" - Jay

"At first of all I must say that on one side this was a nice TR adventure but on the other side I expected more from Raidermatty! I played his previous game The Golden Christmas Tree and I must admit that it impressed me a little bit more than League of the Dragons. This game is quite long what means that it took me several days to finish it (14h 20min net play) and I enjoyed it well. But saddly it has many weak points of which the weakest one is gameplay! Some moments were quite boring examples: very easy pushblock puzzles, pushing many buttons which opens door where there is another button which opens the door with another button, not much creativity in tasks puzzles and progression, and too many backtracking in which you must always avoid the same annoying trap or climb ladder or going through long crawlspaces or long ways platforming. I love challenge in TR but in here some ideas were quite unfair example: to hide something important in a room in which you think you solved everything because you can go out and you have access to the whole level and now you are stuck so you need to explore whole level just to find something almost unnoticeable! In terms of atmosphere nice looking levels but some areas looked unrealistic. Perhaps it is because of overuse of objects and not the best fitting objects for example: furnace in a pool room? Also some constructions and areas seemed uninspired. Textures and lighting are nicely applied but it could have been better. Next big weak point is music, but this is rather an opinion of my taste. Well, I know I already mentioned it in many other reviews but I mention it here as well: I prefer ambience background sound instead of some music, soundtrack or whatever playing as background if it`s not some special situation or action! Now about the strongest point in this adventure: secrets! I have found 32/47 and those I`ve found were really excellently hidden. All in all: A nice exciting adventure with author`s potencial and talent in 9 levels of various locations and different atmosphere. Well I didn`t gain any experience in this TR but nevertheless I can surely recommend it. There are many interesting moments with some nice puzzles, tasks, traps, enemies, difficult jump sequences, timed sequences, exploration and storytelling. Perhaps this game is little bit far from masterpiece but I am sure Raidermatty will bring us one someday! 7/9/7/8" - OverRaider

"These nine levels are providing a good (though, as descriebed later, not overly large) variety of settings, despite not being totally unique (many textures, wads and even architecture are taken from other official or custom levels, and two earlier levels of the builder are also put into this pack) they definately put a breath of fresh air into some familiar settings, though the more modern settings are more attractive.
The Square (9-9-9-10): Basically the same as the builder's first Easter level (so look for a more detailed review there), but I still liked this level a lot even the second time I played through it. The slicers still might be annoying but it's still possible to not lose any health on them. Only thing I don't like (a general complaint of mine in this game) is the pickup animation which is not correctly tuned with the vanishing of the item. 65 minutes.
Dasmore's Apartment (7-9-9-9): A continuation of the first level, with mostly the same textures and objects. While the general progression and opening up of the map is partly quite ingenious, there were way too many situations where I ran around headlessly without knowing what to do, since the map is nothing but huge, there are way too many junctions and crawlspaces and too well hidden things (I never would have guessed that chandelier is a jumpswitch), so it might turn into a nightmare for some players, though it is quite solid otherwise; I had to chuckle about the wine cellar and the room behind the XXX door. Thought the enemy placement was pretty effective in this level. 95 minutes.
Eldorado (7-7-8-7): This level might be my least favourite of the whole set. I simply did not warm up in this level, for me the whole setting felt too sterile with a few misplaced textures and a few wallpaper effects, a bit of a simplistic architecture and less efforts put into the object design than in the other levels. At points, the gameplay felt rather dull with too easy progression and uninspired platforming, at points it was more entertaining, especially in the flooding/draining puzzles. 55 minutes.
London's Building (8-8-9-8): This is another older level of the builder so if needed look for the review there. At first I was a bit surprised to see the classic TR 3 London textures since the first two levels with different visuals are also set in this city, but I got used to this oddity. The backtracking apparently was reduced a bit release so it should be more entertaining to play through versus the demo release. 70 minutes.
The Labs (6-7-8-7): A shorter level and the continuation of the last one. I felt like the lever pushing being prominent throughout the whole set was a bit of too much here and if not for the interesting box puzzle/timed run I wouldn't have enjoyed the gameplay in this level a bit. I liked the look of multi-stage room where most of the gameplay takes place, but there were a few more apparent texture mistakes here; Sophia at the end looked rather ugly but that's a minor complaint. 25 minutes.
Cleopatra's Necropolis (7-8-9-9): Visually this level is on par with the first two levels, with a decent atmosphere and pretty looking modern Egyptian textures, but I found the gameplay to be a bit boring again, not overly inspired and since this game lasted about six hours at that time a few more serious puzzles or inspired tasks should have been provided, since the elseway decent gameplay elements felt a bit tiresome after a while since the variety of tasks doesn't increase much; the lever puzzle at the end where each lever deactivates one fire could've easily be replaced by a challenging timed run across the fires, for example. 60 minutes.
Xiaolin Monastery (8-8-9-9): One of the better levels of this set, and definately another step upwards compared to the last, Egyptian, level. The monastery setting is very well set in scene and the whole alien part is nicely enhancing the atmosphere; lighting and texturing are very solid with only a few cracks here and there. The gameplay also is enjoyable here, with a few nice timed runs and block puzzles (I don't understand though why the two block puzzles above the pool room were exactly symmetrical - that's fairly boring!) and in general the task to find the four "ingredients" was fun. The boss fight at the end was rather nicely done, though I don't know the sense of lower stage with several lizards, because it's not needed to get down there at all. 70 minutes.
Industrial Zone (7-8-8-7): Beware - this is inspired from most areas of Thames Wharf, Lud's Gate and All Hallows (with the start surprisingly also reminding on Opera House) - packed into one level! Though it's far from a close remake, it definately is a too large level for its own good and the size should have been halved, especially since the London setting is definately worn-out in this game (after all it's the fifth level set in here!). While definately with good moments (my favourite being the timed run that first needs to be prepared by three block puzzles), the fun was comparatively lower than it would have been if this one was placed as one of the first levels. There also were a few rather glaring texturing mistakes in here and a few possible end-of-the-world moments. 95 minutes (much less than I thought).
League of the Dragons (6-8-9-9): Tedium is the first word that comes to my mind here. Nearly every task in this level is spoilt by either a) too long tasks (like the way too long ladder climbs) or b) tasks that have to be repeated in a way - e.g. pushing four knights onto their corresponding places to use a crowbar lever afterwards in exactly the same way, or the same door/monkeyswing setup to get up to the next stage of the high tower (a nice idea though which could have been so much more inspired), or the two symmetrical tasks in the poison room (also falls in the last category) or c) annoying tasks like using three underwater levers and eventually running out of air, or always having to return to the exit in the poison room. At the end some good things about this level: the timed run at the start, the AOD inspired setting, the cheeky enemy placement (at parts a bit annoying though; I also never could kill that nasty dragon) and the good boss ending where much, though less than I had approved, ammo was needed. 80 minutes.
Summary: A levelset with ups and downs in nearly every category, maybe not the most polished and the ideas are mainly far from being ingenious. For myself I missed the latter a lot, since this game lasted above 10 hours. If a level is short, I can forgive the gameplay to be not highly involved, but if that's the case in longer levels boredom kicks in after a while and that's the worst thing that can happen in a game, not any bugs and not overly challenging tasks (they are a good tool against tedium in fact). But this level is not as bad as you may think reading this, it's a good game in fact and all that with a good story and a lot of atmospheric levels, and I appreciate the amount of time and the work the builder has spent for this level. Other players might be able to enjoy it more than me. Found 46 secrets and still miss one from the monastery level." - manarch2