(I don't think a pack topic is the right place for this kind of discussion, so WillLem, let us know if you'd like the posts about hidden traps to be moved to a Level Design topic.)
I'm happy for the discussion to remain here, since it's relevant to the pack. But, if mods want to move it for the sake of site-wide consistency, then of course that's OK.
no-one here actually thinks that all levels should be solvable just by looking at them
The impression I get is that this is
absolutely the case (i.e. that a lot of people think they should be solvable on sight alone).
Maybe it's more "everything in the level should be clear just by looking at it" - and OK, I can agree with this to some extent. However, I still think that since video games offer the possibility for this not to be the case, then it is acceptable to occasionally not adhere to this. "Everything is not as it seems"-type levels
can be fun, if done carefully and not to the point of outright trollishness.
and why your "picture puzzle" label is so irksome
I call it like I see it. Whilst I love both engines, many of the player-assist tools in NeoLemmix and Lix essentially reduce the vast majority of levels to puzzles which can be solved just by looking at an image of the level and knowing its skillset and other stats. The only 2 factors which can affect this are time limits and variable release rate, the former of which is expected to be justifiable
if used at all, and the latter of which has been removed from Lix altogether.
and then you find that a designer has put a hidden trap in just to say "I don't want you to do that"
I'm not sure that this is correct. In my experience, the exact opposite is true of most hidden trap usages; they are usually placed along the route that's
supposed to be taken (examples:
Compression Method 1,
Rendezvous,
Tubular Lemmings, plus my own levels
Sprint The Nessy and
Godspeed, Ms. Lemmina) so the challenge becomes a) remembering its location, and b) finding some method of traversal.
The assumption that designers use hidden traps as a way of preventing a certain route from being possible is therefore not entirely sound; in most cases, the trap is hidden on the
only possible route, and becomes a feature of the level which must be navigated somehow. It would be more correct to say that the designer is thinking "find a way around this", which is in keeping with the intention of most levels that aren't intended to troll the player.
thinking about "how will this come across to someone seeing it for the first time?" is such an important part of game design -- for any kind of game
I did think about that. I personally enjoy the occasional level with hidden elements, so I hope that others will also enjoy it. I
wouldn't enjoy a pack which overused these things to the point of outright trolling the player, so I don't do this. There is definitely a grey area, and many of us draw the line in different places, hence the discussion.
That's because the game let you know that hidden traps would be a regular part of it, by including them from the outset, in the 20-of-everything levels where hitting a hidden trap didn't matter at all because you could just send in another worker lemming. In a game like SuperLemmini or NeoLemmix where hidden traps go against the expectations that have been built up, you have to work a lot harder to justify them.
It's possible in both SuperLemmini and NeoLemmix to create packs similar to L1 and ONML, i.e. which offer the player a set of 20-of-everything levels to get to know what's in store for the rest of the pack. So, I'm not sure how these are any different in this particular regard. Perhaps you're referring more to the forum culture and schools of thought which have developed as a result of playing Lemmings on these engines.
As far as SuperLemmini is concerned, hidden traps are still possible and the engine retains a lot of the execution-based gameplay style offered by L1 and ONML. Therefore, the "expectations" around hidden elements seem to be that they are still an acceptable part of the Lemmings game (although I can see that even here, they still divide opinion).
NeoLemmix has, on the other hand, mostly removed the possibility to completely hide something within a level, and even where hidden elements
are used, they are rendered irrelevant by its various player-assists. Here, your statement about player expectations stands up a lot better, although it still doesn't speak for every person that chooses to play Lemmings on this engine.
Finally, speaking as someone who mostly designs open-ended levels, I strongly disagree with your equation of "open-ended" and "exploration-focused". Open-ended just means that instead of a unique solution, the challenge comes from not having enough resources to brute-force your way to the exit, and having to strategise about how to make the most of the resources you have.
I'm not sure how this is a disagreement
Strategising use of resources is an important (if not vital) part of exploration, and vice versa.