To give a bit of a backstory, in the early level design contents the goal was to make hard levels (rather than popular levels). The main aim was to solve as many levels as possible, so getting a hard level in gives you the edge over other players. I designed Stroke at Retirement Age with the aim that nobody could solve it, and while execution difficulty wasn't the goal it was a necessary evil I was willing to accept (especially after a few backroutes forced me to make the timing tighter). I didn't fully succeed as ccexplore managed to solve the level, but if I remember correctly it was still the level with the fewest solves in the content. Here's the old contest thread (as you can see it scored pretty low on the fun scale).

So congrats to you two for solving this one! I've always wondered how hard to figure out the level really is if you take away the execution difficulty. I feel like a lot of placements are forced, and the key novelty is the flow control which is complex but falls into place once you know when to place the key skill. Would be curious to hear your opinion.

The title was meant to be a clue to help with execution:

Spoiler

You assign the miner when there are 66 lemmings out of the hatch -- this is one of the statistics displayed in the original game and early Lemmix, I'm not sure if NeoLemmix still displays it.

In the Lix version, I could ease things up a bit by setting a fixed spawn interval to make the chain of lemmings longer, which should disadvantage the backroutes and thus allow me to give more wiggle room to the intended solution. Knowing the timing hint from the title I managed to execute the solution within 5 minutes, but I wonder how bad it is if you don't realize what it means.

The level design culture (and also my philosophy) certainly has evolved since then...

Quote from: WillLem on December 22, 2025, 10:50:10 PM

Quote from: hrb264 on December 22, 2025, 04:22:44 PMHow do you use the arrow keys? ... I never knew you could choose the exact lemming

When you hover over a group of lemmings with the cursor, you can use the left and right arrow keys to select a lemming facing in that direction. Great for isolating a left/right-facing lemming from within a crowd, but also useful for any situation when you need to make sure that the lemming you assign a skill to is facing a certain way.

Quote from: hrb264 on December 22, 2025, 10:04:48 PMI've just done it with 100%! Finally

Well done! Keep going

I've just seen that you all create custom levels? Can I run these on Windows Lemmings or do I have to install another programme for it?

Stroke at Retirement Age is geeo's levels are never a cakewalk, but that was one of the hardest I've come across so far in my ongoing playthrough of the LDC pack! Certainly the hardest of the Early Contests; I've rarely come across such a precision/timing-heavy level. Wasn't a fan, if I'm honest!

If we're talking immediate turn-offs, I'm not keen on 99 RR and levels where your immediate task is making sure too many lemmings don't die before you can even think about the big picture. Frenetic, fiddly, execution-heavy levels where the difficulty stems from the precision required rather than raw problem-solving are a turn-off for me. For my money, with the best designed levels, you're not under any particular pressure and yet it's still very hard to see a path to safety. Another thing I don't particularly like is when a level relies on one or more really obscure tricks to be able to finish them - I feel this becomes more like 'do you know this trick?', rather than a test of one's problem-solving ability and logical reasoning. This is even more true when said trick could almost be described as a bug or glitch. Also: very tight time limits (time limits in general tbh), completely unintuitive/borderline illogical solutions, anything involving sliders and/or masses of teleporters Not massively keen on levels with neutrals or zombies either, but that's probably just me!

Though not a turn off in themselves, I would say that levels where you're allowed or at least expected to lose a number of lemmings I find the hardest since you're not sure where you have to sacrifice them.  One example that springs to mind is "Stroke at Retirement Age" by geoo, where you are allowed to lose 4 lemmings but only have one Bomber and Blocker (and it's very obvious where you have to use the Blocker).  On top of being very precise it's very hard to know where you can and should make sacrifice.

Sometimes though, sacrifices are the name of the game, like with the aforementioned Cascade (I'm pretty sure the developers were aware of being able to save 100% or at least more than 10 because of being able to dig through the steps to make a wall, even if a few slip through into the abyss.  I myself have taken advantage of mass death in some of my own levels, my most famous probably being "Mincemeat" (go to 1:59):

I really don't like geek4 nor geek5, I don't think they fit in with all of the other Lemojis, I'd really rather you added geek2/3, FWIW

Here are my replays for the updated levels only in V6. Good job The Tomato Watcher 

Spoiler

Now I got Sour 5 more easily with the blocker turning a miner part, just needed to set the miner upper thatn what I did before. Also nice job on the new way the stairs are set near the exit, it enforced me to espace another lemmings from the crowd with 2 jumpers to finish making the path for the crowd. It is sweet to see 2 workers making the path one after the other.

Sour 2 with a single place to compress has a more obvious solution for sure. It remains a very good level to crack with the exact count of Lemmings, and the part where you have to bash in a very specific place to escape another worker from the crowd.

EDIT : now joining actual replays.

The santa hat is already pulling its weight several times over.

The geek will go in as soon as I have time within the holidays. Presumably geek4 will go in, as :geek:. It looks pretty clear to me now, thanks. And the shrugging will also go in, probably as it is, as :shrug:.

-- Simon

I gave the pack a try and I had a lot of fun playing through it!
My favorite levels are Sweet6 and Sour6.
Sweet6 gives me a mobile Lemmings game vibe: the portals on the wall and the 1:1.6 screen resolution! Using a locked exit to give the pioneer lemming time to build a path is very clever.

Hello!

Sorry to bother you during Christmas, but I've found some bugs in RetroLemmini.

First, every time I start the program, it only shows the default player, even though the players I create are already in the players directory. The problem is solved by creating a player with the same name that already exists in that directory... but when I restart the program, it disappears again.

Second, I've discovered that in Lemmings Plus I, there are several levels where the house the Lemmings are supposed to come out of isn't shown. This doesn't happen in SuperLemmini Too. Specifically, this happens in all the levels of "No Salvation," as well as in "Overheat" (Wimpy 26) (screenshots attached) and Medi 28 ("Way Up High")

I used the Lemmings Plus level version posted here:

https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5620.msg92258#msg92258

It may happen with other levels, but I haven't advance much far nor test thoroughly every level I have in my collection.

Thanks in advance!

Your solution to Sour 2 is very similar to mine, @kaywhyn, so that gives me faith that I finally got the intended solution this time round after backrouting it with blockers and RR shenanigans previously!

Spoiler

Maybe a bit tighter with where you deploy the delaying basher, but I think it's just a pretty tight level now, generally.