After playing through and thoroughly enjoying Lemmings Migration a few years ago, I thought it was time to revisit Destination! This pack represents a significant step up in difficulty from Migration and the last time I attempted it (probably a year or so ago), I gave up about half way through the Argon rank but this time around, I stuck with it and managed to complete the pack. It's taken the best part of a week, on and off, but I got there!

Not gonna post detailed feedback because Nessy doesn't seem to be active any more, but I will just say I really like Nessy's approach to level design. Almost without exception, these levels are about hard problem-solving and not pixel-perfect, precise execution, 99 RR headaches or crazy time limits. So very much my bag!

Having now finished the pack, I would say that the first half of the Radon rank is about on a par with Xenon in terms of difficulty, but from Radon 11 onwards, things definitely reach a new level. Synthetic (assorted Contest levels) doesn't really offer much respite and is about as hard as the Radon rank I would say.

Lots of really clever design here, so it's challenging to pick out favourites; there're just so many great brain-teasers throughout the last three ranks, all of which have relatively long solve times. I will pick out what I thought were the hardest levels though:

Xenon 2 (Megablast... sorry, Snow Patrol)
Xenon 10 (Time For A Factory Reset)
Radon 3 (The Hanger)
Radon 11 (Wanderlust)
Radon 19 (Eulogy Of Surrealism)
Synthetic 6 (How To Self-Destruct A Factory)
Synthetic 10 (Built To Rule The World)

Basically, the entirety of Radon 11 - 20 were really tough, but the ones above took several visits to finally crack!

Just on Radon 19...

Spoiler

Reading kaywhyn's feedback, I think we both hit on the exact same method of uber fiddly basher and blocker manipulation, but I just couldn't see any other way of doing it. Also watched Icho's replay and yeah, I gotta be honest, I never would have thought of that in a month of Lemming Sundays! If that's the intended solution, and I guess it is, it just never would have occurred to me. I'll have to stow it away in the bag of tricks... a last minute nuke where one blocker frees the blocker above that relies on nuke timing mechanics. I've seen such a thing done with a regular bomber before, but not a nuke.

Probably quite a few backroutes, but my replays attached.

Hi - I've noticed this happening on and off before but in Retrolemmini 3.0 there seems to be a bit of an issue with lemmings getting trapped at the top of the terrain even when their feet are still visible. I've just been trying to complete Gigalems 'into the furnace' and I have been having some issues with it because of this. I've attached my replay.

It could be that this is part of the game but I don't remember it happening before if so? Would anyone be able to take a look?

Hi Simon,

thank you very much for the detailed feedback. This is exactly the kind of perspective I was hoping to get from people who know this genre deeply.

The input model is indeed intentional at the moment: Fizzles uses creature-first, then skill. The main reason is the mobile-first direction. On touch devices, selecting a creature first and then choosing an available action felt more natural than selecting a skill first and then targeting a moving creature. That said, your first instinct to click the skill icon is very useful feedback. It shows that the demo should explain the interaction more clearly, especially for players coming from Lemmings-style skill-first controls.

The question of execution difficulty versus puzzle difficulty is also important. My current goal is to keep Fizzles more on the puzzle-readable side, not turn it into a high-dexterity game. The current pace may be too fast for more complex levels, so I will keep that in mind during level design and testing. A pause feature or a more forgiving assignment flow is something I will need to consider carefully.

Your suggestions about small timing buffers are interesting, especially around wall turns, cliff edges, and landing. I do not want to add heavy input tools too early, but small readability or forgiveness improvements may fit the mobile-first design very well.

The digger tunnel visibility is a very concrete point, and I agree. The tunnel needs to stand out more clearly against the earth. I will put that on the improvement list.

The horizontal movement during falling is currently part of the movement behavior. I had mostly treated it as natural motion, but your observation that it can become a deliberate level design element is interesting. The case where Fizzles can fall past the pole if digging too far left is also useful to know.

About the name: yes, the "fizzle out" connotation is something I am aware of now. The name was chosen because it feels small, round, light and playful, but I understand the double meaning in English.

Thanks again for taking the time to test the demo and write such a detailed response. This gives me several concrete things to think about for the next development phase.

I have played a bit of this fun pack, but must say I am a bit confused about its actual content. To my knowledge, different things exist and I'm not sure which is which :

1) Reverse Lemmings by Colorful Arty, old format NL. Released in 2016 and discussed in this thread
https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=2762.0

2) Reverse Lemmings by Colorful Arty, updated for new format NL. Released in 2020 and discussed in this thread https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=4700.0
Arty presents this one as improvment of the 1), with a new challenge.

3) Reverse Lemmings Classic Edition included in The Complete Reverse Lemmings pack discussed here.

4) Oh No! More Reverse Lemmings.


Now my main question is : 3)=1), or 3)=2) ?


I'm also wondering if the Present and Sunsoft ranks included in the 16 bit console version of Lemmings have been reversed too ? If not and if people think this could be nice to have, I can try to start working on reversing those levels.

Welcome to the forums!

Random assortment of observations, feel free to drill into whatever interests you.

Instinctively, I clicked on the digger icon in the panel. This click has no effect. Then I remembered how Lemmings's skill-then-lemming (= skill-first) deviates from many games' object-then-operation (lemming-first). The next attempt was to click on one of the blue walking fizzles and see if that selects, and yes, it selects and offers the only existing skill. I understood that it was lemming-then-skill.

Clones (clonesgame.com, played with mouse and keyboard) has lemming-first, too. For its slower singleplayer puzzles, it's a matter of taste whether you prefer lemming-then-skill or skill-then-lemming. For real-time multiplayer, geoo and I recommended the Clones devs to implement skill-first in 2011 as an alternative. For the record: The strongest Clones player, rt, plays multiplayer with the originally implemented lemming-first.

By 2011, geoo and I had already played Lix multiplayer for a few years. Lix offers only skill-first. I have never gotten a bug report for Lix that wished for lemming-first. Lix has dexterity-free singleplayer (unlimited rewind, inserting skills into history, ..., effectively TAS) and real-time multiplayer. In multiplayer, it's more important to mine rightward immediately with some lemming than it is to mine with a given lemming that might even turn leftward before we finish assigning miner. In practice: We begin moving the mouse toward the assignee, we press the miner keyboard hotkey, we start holding the filter-right hotkey, and by now the mouse cursor has arrived on the (single, or bunch of several) lix and we click.

Neon Arcade (only multiplayer) has skill-first.

On mobile, you don't have the luxury of mouse and keyboard. Maybe lemming-first is optimal on mobile? I can't tell. At best, I can dig deeper into the design history of the real-time modes of Lix and Clones.

---

Fizzles's overall pace feels fast. This is fine as long as you remember it during level design. Even easy tasks carry unremovable execution cost. Playtest with people who haven't played multiplayer in Lemmings 1, Lix, Clones. See what kinds of mistakes people make on more complex levels at this pace. If you see, e.g., playtesters assigning too late and bashing into the wrong direction, consider other fixes than heavy-duty input tools: Should you remember every basher assignment until the assignee is in front of a wall? Should lemmings stop for a split-second before turning at a wall? Before falling off a cliff? Before walking onward after landing?

It's also a design choice. Do you want execution difficulty and puzzle difficulty? Or do you want only puzzle difficulty? What kind of pause feature are you going to offer?

The digger tunnel is hard to see against the earth.

Fallers maintain some horizontal speed. This is interesting. Lemmings 2 had it for runners, but it's novel to have it for every faller. You can even design levels around this. On your only level, I managed to kill some lemmings by digging as far left as possible. Some fell leftward past the pole and walked into the abbyss.

The name Fizzles has odd connotation: If it fizzles, there won't be Fizzles.

-- Simon

Hi everyone,

I'd like to share Fizzles, an original puzzle rescue game I'm developing under HPWsoft.

Fizzles is inspired by classic guide-and-rescue puzzle mechanics, but it does not use any Lemmings, Pingus or other existing game assets, characters, levels or code. The goal is to build something clearly independent, with its own tiny round creatures, visual style, abilities and mobile-first interface.

The first level is already playable. It includes animated Fizzles, music, sound effects, HUD, a digging mechanic, and a complete flow from entrance to exit.

Playable Level 1 demo:
https://hpwsoft.itch.io/fizzles

Kickstarter campaign:
https://kickstarter.com/projects/hpwsoft/fizzles-a-cute-puzzle-rescue-game

The campaign funds the next development phase: additional handcrafted levels and content, new shared Fizzle abilities, UI/onboarding polish, mobile testing, audio/presentation improvements, and preparation for a first public release.

Additional handcrafted levels are planned, but I am not promising a fixed total number of levels at this stage. The campaign is focused on funding the next development phase of Fizzles rather than overpromising a specific level count too early.

I'd be especially interested in feedback from people who enjoy this kind of puzzle rescue gameplay:

- Is the basic idea clear from the demo?
- Does the tap/select ability approach feel understandable?
- Does the digging mechanic feel readable?
- What would you expect from later levels and abilities?

Thanks for taking a look.

@Guigui

Hey, thanks for playing this pack!   This pack and my very first pack consist of some of my earliest creations, so I'm not very proud of the quality of those levels. Still, I'm happy to hear that you had a great time playing them anyway! I also had fun looking through my old levels and your replays!

Your solutions are all intended solutions or slight variations. Since you mentioned that you've seen a screenshot of Swerdis's playthrough of this pack, I confirmed that Swerdis's solutions are all intended, so you can check them if you feel like some of your solutions seem fishy or unintended.(Or there's my own replay pack in the main topic! )

It looks like the ray_snow graphic set got some physics updates but wasn't included in the NL style library. So I had to download the style manually to check your solutions.(My replay pack I mentioned above should only work with the ray_snow graphic you can download via the style manager.)

I could update some levels using that style to fix the issue, but then people using the style manager to download the style would run into issues instead. It'd just be the other way around. So I'll leave the levels as they are unless the updated style gets included in the NL style library.

Here are some comments on individual replays!

Spoiler

Avant-Garde 2 – While having a conversation with Namida on Discord in the past, I realized that Christmas comes during summer in the Southern Hemisphere, so there's no snow, which I'd never thought about before. (Namida is from New Zealand. ) I found that funny, so I made a level called "Meanwhile in Namidaland" without any snow pieces, using only green terrain pieces!

Avant-Garde 9 – Slightly different from my own solution, but your solution has the core idea: extending the fencer with several well-placed stackers.

Avant-Garde 10 – I'm pretty sure everybody's first skill assignment on their first attempt at this level is filling the gap with a stoner!

Avant-Garde 12 – I generally tried to add pick-up skills only if they serve as a puzzle element in the level usually by making them expensive to reach or by providing multiple ways to get them so you have to make a choice. Sometimes getting them is bait from the start, like in this level.

Bonus 1 – Yeah, intended! The pick-up skills are there for symmetry, you don't actually need to collect them all to solve the level!

Bonus 2 – As long as you make separate paths for both groups, your solution is perfectly fine!

Thank you both! 

This is the version of Tier Drops from Lemmings Cranium that fixes the backroute in a similar way.

Here are my solutions. 

I think the pack went a bit under my radar when it released. 

Thanks to JawaJuice for making me realise that I skipped this one!

I noticed that levels 3 + 13 and 8 + 18 have the same level-ID and therefore the mass replay checker went a bit crazy.