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Messages - Nepster

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1321
Closed / Re: [DATABASE] [DISCUSSION] Let's discuss a content database
« on: February 29, 2016, 04:55:50 PM »
Quote
Another idea that came up on #neolemmix earlier was to allow - as an opt-in feature - automatically sending replays of your solutions to the pack's creator, to help them weed out backroutes.
Then a good method has to be found to bundle all the replays and then to notify the level pack creator. E.g. getting an email or PM for every replay someone uploads will be extremely annoying. Same goes for having to download every single replay on its own.

1322
Closed / Re: [DATABASE] [DISCUSSION] Let's discuss a content database
« on: February 29, 2016, 04:40:23 PM »
Additional features when uploading level packs:
- Let level designers upload intended solutions. Then make them available for all players to download.
- Let level designers select a few levels that are displayed as preview images.
- Let level designers add a few short comments (as in Mindless' database).
- Let level designers fill in a "Thank you..." box.
- Let level designers add a link to the corresponding forum thread.

Even better - but I'm not sure that I have the skills to do this anytime soon - would be if content can also be submitted directly from NeoLemmix and its associated tools, although I'm not sure how exactly this should work - for example, should the Flexi Toolkit submit packs, or should this be something the player itself handles (as that's where the user is more likely to be after testing a pack)? What about graphic sets - should the graphic set tool submit these? Or perhaps, should there be a dedicated seperate (but bundled) application for it?
What is wrong with going to the webpage of the database and uploading the content there manually, similar to the Mindless' Lemmix pack database? As a level designer, I test level packs first. So they I don't have the Toolkit open when being ready to upload the level pack.
Moreover downloading stuff happens much more often, so it's probably Ok, if uploading level packs/graphic sets/... is slightly more work.

Should we have some kind of rating feature for content, and how should it work (in particular, I'm thinking if we do, there should be two seperate ratings - one for quality, and one for difficulty).
We have such a rating system for Lemmix level packs, but barely anyone is using it. Is there any reason to believe that people vote more on NeoLemmix content?

1323
NeoLemmix Main / Re: Nothing NeoLemmix-related working on my computer
« on: February 26, 2016, 07:23:12 AM »
Just one more thought: Every time I start a downloaded .exe for the first time, my virus checker wants to upload the file to some cloud to check it in more details. With my computer this takes about 30sec. before starting NeoLemmix. However my virus checker displays some info window stating that, so there should be some bigger visible change than just the waiting cursor.

1324
In Development / Re: Update database Lemmix levels to NeoLemmix?
« on: February 25, 2016, 08:37:10 PM »
For packs that have different authors for each level like this one and this one, what should we do with them? Should we just create one NXP for each compilation pack? Also, in that link, Sculpture Maze already appears in one of Tumble Weed's packs, so I'm not even sure if we should leave that there. Training Course by Conway, I'm not sure if that appears in any other pack.
My plan was to have one .nxp collecting all the contest levels and community packs. I think we can have an exception to the rule here and update even levels of people that are still active. Of course I will get their OK first before releasing the .nxp.
And I see no problem in having a few levels in two level packs. People who want to play contest levels might not be people who want to play Ben Conway's levels, and if they do they can simply skip the levels that are already known to them.

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What should we do with the two levels by unknwon authors?
Updating them with level author=unknown. Why do you think they need special treatment?

1325
Added the levels of Caleb Thiessen and DragonsLover.

Updated the existing level packs such that the levels
- do not rely on solid edges (though some still rely on a solid ceiling),
- do not rely on direct drops to the exit,
- do not rely on building stairs within terrain.
I might have missed one or two such levels though. So please report them, if you find such a level.

1326
In Development / Re: Update database Lemmix levels to NeoLemmix?
« on: February 25, 2016, 02:42:00 PM »
I am finished with the rest of the CHRISFN levels now and would like to create the level pack. Has anyone made progress with the two levels attached to the previous post? If not, I will probably remove these two levels.

1327
Closed / Re: [DISCUSSION] [PLAYER] Gimmicks and secret levels cull?
« on: February 24, 2016, 05:51:36 PM »
Two gimmicks were not yet discussed: Zombies/Ghosts on Death (as seen in Doomsday Lemmings II)
They are pretty new, so I don't know how many uses they will have. But compared to other gimmicks these gimmicks have some advantages:
1) The horror style has terrain pieces that indicate whether this gimmick is turned on or not. Actually I would make these visual indicators obligatory: One turns this gimmick on by placing the corresponding terrain piece (which maybe can be turned into objects if this is more convenient) in the level.
2) They do not drastically change the game mechanics, but rather combine existing mechanics. As the transition living being -> ghost/zombie is common in fictional settings, this gimmick would not totally surprising to players and can be easily understood.
3) They do not require a great amount of source code (at least I think so).

1328
Closed / Re: [DISCUSSION] [PLAYER] Sides of levels?
« on: February 24, 2016, 05:30:54 PM »
I like this idea, but maybe in some tilesets it can look kinda unusual ("Outdoor" or "Dirt" with laser beams ;P). Maybe match the color of the tileset (or builders) with them.

EDIT: Maybe the deadly edges option adds 8 pixels of map to each side and puts a laser beam in there automatically -----> lesser hassel for designers
Adding 8 pixels ouside the level area completely unnecessarily turns lots of levels into ones with vertical scrolling. Adding them inside reduces the level area. So a big NO to the suggestion in the edit.
And I would be careful to match the colors to the style: E.g. this made the pickup-skills very hard to distinguish in the rock style.

My Feeling: open edges > steel > electric fence.
[...]
Once again. The edges aren't an electric fence. When edges are deadly, the lemmings get lost in the void outside of the level. The edges do as little as possible!
Interesting that you care so much more about the fluff explanations than about the actual game mechanics. I agree that thinking about the edges as an electric fence is unnatural, gut game-wise the only difference is whether the burning animation is displayed or not.
I prefer open edges as well, but ultimately it is pretty irrelevant to me how the death of a lemming is displayed, as long as the cause is clear.

The per-level option is not as bad as it is now, should the boundaries get visual hints.
What visual hints do you propose?
a) Do colored edges of the minimap suffice in your opinion (as I suggested some posts ago)?
b) Do you want visual hints directly in the level screen? If yes, then how does this differ from placing laser traps at the border of the level?

I could live with deadly edges, but I have to strictly veto against a deadly ceiling
I could live with a solid ceiling as well. Solid ceilings tend to create far less backroutes than solid edges, so turning deadly ceilings solid will not break many levels.
From a purely game mechanics point of view, this might work pretty well. However the explanation of this behavior would become even more problematic: Consider a dirt level. Why should the (empty) sky be solid, but not the edges?
Additionally it still does not solve the issue how to tell the player which sides are deadly and which are solid.

1329
Closed / Re: [DISCUSSION] [PLAYER] Sides of levels?
« on: February 23, 2016, 06:43:12 PM »
I know a level from PimoLems ("Lemesis") which would need a steel ceiling. ("Going Up" from the original could also be a canidate).
Do they really need steel at the top? Would not adding some usual terrain wall of 7 pixels work as well and look much better?

The few deadly pixels overhang is sth which also bothers me. The deadly edges function as I understand them that  the outter ~8 pixels will be deadly instead of just the last one. It is still weird as hell in general seeing Lemmings get burned when they got near the edge.
I agree with everyone that deadly sides should only kill lemmings once they really hit the edge of the level and not before that.


And here is just another suggestion how to deal with this problem: Add to every style some kind of continuous trap like the vertical and horizontal red laser traps in Lix (found in geoo/construction). Then level designers who want deadly sides may frame their levels with this trap. It wouldn't be the the nicest-looking option, but at least this makes the deadly sides visible to players, does not require new options and uses only existing object types.

1330
NeoLemmix Levels / Re: NepsterLems - Release thread
« on: February 23, 2016, 05:42:14 PM »
Regarding the recent changes in game mechanics: I am fairly sure all levels remain solvable in V1.43, but I haven't yet confirmed this by updating all ~60 broken replays. As removing the deadly sides gimmick without replacement would force major backroute-fixes, I plan to check everything only after all currently discussed changes are either decided upon and (when applicable) implemented.

1331
Closed / Re: [DISCUSSION] [PLAYER] Sides of levels?
« on: February 23, 2016, 05:23:27 PM »
Well to simulate deadly sides: Simply increase the level size so you have bigger gaps at the edges.
And I must say sometimes big steel edges look just plain bad especially if you have "regular size" levels and you have to add vertical scrolling just for a steel ceiling.
If you have a big level, adding some empty space to both sides is totally fine and fits. But if you have a level fitting within one screen (i.e. 320x160px), adding 90 pixels of empty space to both sides is just wrong: Now over one third of the level is just there to keep the player away from the steel edges. Take as an example "Everclimbing Lemming" (Black Hole 17) from NepsterLems.
Some other like "Small Steps for Lemkind" (Comet 7) would need walls of continuous traps on both sides to prevent building to one side, blocking and then building back. Granted, this might fall under "bad level design", but it shows that increasing the size is not always the solution.

Regarding your second point: Steel borders need not look bad (depending on the level), usual terrain suffices most of the time and quite often you don't need to cover the whole border with terrain (just the relevant parts).
And I have yet to see a level where you have to add vertical scrolling and steel at the ceiling to make the level work.

Likewise, even if we have deadly edges, instead of relying on them, we should enlarge the level or put a trap.
If you really thinks so, quite a few levels in the Lix lemforum level pack need to be modified. Quickly skimming through Hopeless I see like 6-7 levels where solid edges can be used to backroute levels or at least simplify the solution.


I support the suggestions from Gronkling and ccexplore to make this an option. But I would make it an option in the Flexi Toolkit allowing to fix one behavior for a whole level pack, instead of a per-level basis. This way players can rely at least on some consistency.
As an in-game way to show the boundary behavior, why not color the edges of the minimap green if the edge is solid and red if the edge is void (or deadly)? Alternatively one might change the backgound color of the minimap for those parts outside of the actual level.

1332
Closed / Re: [DISCUSSION] [PLAYER] Sides of levels?
« on: February 22, 2016, 11:34:00 PM »
If we wouldn't already have lots of levels for NeoLemmix, I would argue as follows: There is no inherent reason any side should be solid or non-solid.
With the same reason as for the sides, one might argue that the bottom should be steel as well, because just why should it be any different than any other side? If one wants it deadly one could just place water there.
On the other hand, one might argue, that there is no reason why any of the sides should be walls: The lemmings world might just continue there are the lemmings are just wandering outside the reach of the player.

Considering practical aspects: It is much easier to add steel sides (which would even be directly visible to the player!) than adding traps on all sides, which in the case of the gimmick is not even obvious to the player.

But given that currently most levels use solid sides as default, I see how it might be a huge amount of work to adapt all of them (though I wonder how many of them make actually use of solid sides?). This might be the strongest argument for keeping the sides solid.

And for the record: I find solid sides highly irritating ;). They are only another way backroutes may sneak in.

1333
Closed / Re: [DISCUSSION] [PLAYER] Gimmicks and secret levels cull?
« on: February 22, 2016, 11:17:23 PM »
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Zombies/Ghosts: With the recent changes, these gimmicks disable the ability to place zombies/ghosts in the level! So a huge CULL here.

There has been no change in that regard. The only change is that they're turned on by default (since turning them on but not placing any zombie / ghost lemmings has no effect, and if any are placed, generally the creator wants them to work) in the editor. So I assume you're meaning keep zombies / ghosts?
Thanks for the clarification: Yes, I want to keep ghosts (and zombies proved useful in many levels too). But I would still cull these gimmick options and allow placing zombies/ghosts in every level. As far as I remember, there is just one oddtabled level from you that explicitely needs turning the zombie gimmick off. This might not be enough reason to keep these as extra options.

1334
Closed / Re: [DISCUSSION] [PLAYER] Gimmicks and secret levels cull?
« on: February 22, 2016, 10:55:12 PM »
Secret levels: Cull. People I want to play all the levels, not have to search for them first.

Gimmicks (same color code as Gronkling used):
  • Karoshi: Fun idea.
  • No Gravity: Interesting idea, but getting lemmings down is so incredibly hard that all levels seem to center on this one problem. So I am not sure whether this allows for a great variety of interesting levels.
  • Backwards Lemmings: This is completely unintuitive to the player, hence tends to be annoying. But it might allow for quite a few interesting levels.
  • Horizontal/Vertical Wrap: This needs far better handling both in the player and in the editor to be worth keeping. The main problem is that the borders of the level still act as borders for the screen position. In the editor this makes it hard to get fitting terrain pieces at the edges and in the player it makes it hard to keep track of the lemmings and estimate where they will appear on the other side.
  • Deadly sides: On the one hand this is a great solution to a (in my opinion) big misdesign in NeoLemmix: That the left and right side are solid (and steel). On the other hand it makes the upmost 8 (or so) pixels deadly, which might unexpectedly kill lemmings.
  • Zombies/Ghosts: With the recent changes, these gimmicks disable the ability to place zombies/ghosts in the level! So a huge CULL here.
  • Clock Gimmick: This is the worst gimmick of all! It displays different levels depending on the time one plays the gimmick! CULL, CULL, CULL!
All others can be culled.

1335
In Development / Re: Update database Lemmix levels to NeoLemmix?
« on: February 22, 2016, 08:10:22 PM »
I am currently updating the CHRISFN??.dat level packs. There are two levels that I have no clue how they can be solvable in either Lemmix or NeoLemmix. See attached levels. The first two digits give the level pack and the last two digits the level within the level pack, if anyone wants to check them out in the original .dat.
Does anyone have solutions to either one?

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