As much as I would like Shimmier going around corners, using Jumpers to do it sounds counterintuitive to me: When I try to assign a Jumper to a Shimmier, if it works at all, I would expect the lemming to perform a regular Jumper animation.

And that could e.g. be used if the Shimmier has reached a gap and needs to jump in order to get to the other side, where he can either climb or continue shimmying (since Jumpers should be able to transition into Shimmiers as well, like in L2, where the Shimmier performs a standard Jumper animation before grabbing the ceiling).

With the Slider, in contrast, I would expect a) turning around and b) dangling, both of which are required for transitioning from a Shimmier into a Climber.


EDIT: Copied from the post with the experimental release of the Jumper:

5) Another thing that didn't come to my mind until just now: How should Jumpers respond to splat pads?
Shimmiers die when failing to reach for a ceiling, because they transition back into a Faller.
Jumpers will obviously also die if a platform with a splat pad is 1 pixel lower than the platform they started jumping from, because they will transition to a Faller after the jumping arc is completed, and therefore splat.
But what about a Jumper landing straight on a splat pad at the end of or even earlier during his jump (e.g. when jumping onto a platform higher than the one he started from)?

Splat pads seem like a great way to make certain paths "Jumper-proof". We have a new skill, that means we also need to consider new potential backroutes.

I'm just not sure whether it would be counter-intuitive as far as mechanics are concerned, because the Jumper wouldn't transition into a Faller before hitting the splat pad and splatting. But they still "land on it", so that would make the player expect them to splat again...

Just for everyone's information: Currently, Jumpers don't splat when landing on a splat pad within the course of their arc (=meaning the only splat if they become a regular Faller after the jump).

Just to understand Proxima's suggestion clearly:

Do you suggest the Shimmier should be able to jump from the end of a ceiling across a gap, to hold on to a wall on the other side of said gap? I can see that being useful, it's just questionable whether it would make sense for a Shimmier to be able to do such a "swing" across a gap using only the strength of his arms, because he has no ground under his feet to jump from.

Or do you suggest this assignment should flip the Shimmier around the corner of the ceiling is already attached to, i.e. to then climb up at a 90 degree angle to the ceiling he shimmied along, like in the examples from Lemmings 2 I mentioned?


Anyways, thank you very, very much for the release candidate, namida! I'll check it out later this evening!

A very welcome surprise, now that many of us are stuck at home! Even though I can occupy myself by making music, Eurovision (the focus of my YouTube channel) has been cancelled, so the season kind of ended prematurely and it doesn't really make much sense to cover many more songs from this year. I originally thought I would get back to working on Lemmings Hall of Fame in May, when Eurovision would have been over and the Jumper is officially released. Now I can start a little earlier!

Of course, I know that I shouldn't rely too heavily on the way the Jumper behaves in a release candidate (rather than a stable version). But at least knowing things such as both Jumper-Climber and Climber-Jumper transitions both being the possible is already immensely valuable! If e.g. the exact width and height a Jumper can cover should still be modified, I have no issues adapting my levels to that later on.

Thanks a lot for the link, Proxima!

In fact, I just realised that just today, I created a level that would be totally broken - or at least significantly simplified - if Shimmiers could actually go around corners in NeoLemmix. I attached it (together with a replay) for demonstration purposes; basically, the core trick at the end is only necessary precisely because Shimmiers can't go around corners.

I also envisioned some more landscapes in my head which could be covered by repeated Shimmier-Climber-Shimmier-Climber transitions, and I agree that this could quickly go unchecked.

BUT: I think there is a way to actually make this possible in a controlled (=not overpowered) manner WITHOUT having to modify the Shimmier's behaviour at all! More so, it could happen in the context of this new 20th skill, if that skill ends up being the Slider indeed!

Basically, while Climbers don't "dangle" in NeoLemmix as they do in L2, the Slider would pretty much have to do so. Because otherwise, at the very last frame of him being a regular Slider, he would still probably not be low enough beneath the ceiling to seamlessly transition into a Shimmier.

Thus, if dangling is a specific property of a Slider, a lemming could only do it if he is a Slider.

Since Sliders can transition into Shimmiers, the opposite transition should also be possible.

Meaning
a) a Shimmier reaches a wall and slides down ("inside" corner)
b) a Shimmier reaches the end of a ceiling, turns around and dangles from it (Slider), and from that position he could then climb up ("outside" corner)

The common and intuitive rule here would be "a Slider always turns in such a way that he faces the wall". If he approaches a wall from the inside, then after shimmying, he would dangle from the ceiling shortly and then slide down the wall. If however he approaches a wall from below / the outside, he would have to turn around to hold on to that wall above him - and then it would be possible for him to climb from there.

In other words, Shimmier-Climber transitions still wouldn't be possible (no breaking levels / overpowered Shimmiers), but Shimmier--> Slider --> Climber transitions would be.

This would reduce the required skill count in the example I cited above from five different types to at least just three (Shimmier, Slider, Climber).

Of course, the issue here is: How do you tell the Slider to start climbing up again? This behaviour can't generalise too much, because otherwise, every Slider reaching the bottom end of a wall would climb up that wall again immediately if he's also a Climber.

But just like we need to prevent a Slider from immediately climbing up a wall again after having touched the ground (which is a special case), one could surely also make this behaviour specific to the situation when a Slider dangles after shimmying, rather than dangling after a regular slide.

...and fittingly, nin10doadict has just converted his pack CasuaLemmings to New Formats . This pack, if my memory serves me correctly, includes a rank called "Troll" as the final one. Repetitive skill spamming is one of the main trademarks of that rank.

Meaning, you should probably give this rank a try as a player before you create similar levels for InfiniLems . See how you like it in practice first; if you find that you still enjoy this type of level, feel free to go ahead and make as many of them as you like...

I bypassed this 2400 pixel restriction with "The Grand Puzzle" (which is 4000 pixels wide), the last level from Lemmings World Tour - but that was only possible because I created the level in Old Formats and then converted it directly (with the pack converter / cleanse levels inside the New-Formats NeoLemmix player) without opening and saving it in the new editor.

Thanks to the Cleanse-Levels feature, I guess it would still be possible to create levels wider than 2400 pixels in the Old Editor and then convert them inside the New-Formats player... That doesn't mean you should do it, though. I've just shown you the door, but I advise you not to walk through it...

EDIT: And as namida said below, performance is definitely an issue with such a level width. I switched off the high-quality minimap for "The Grand Puzzle", and I would definitely not advise anyone to play it in high-res mode. Since you like high-res mode, being its main creator, you will probably have to pick and choose between stable, smoothly-running high-res levels and very wide levels .

Btw just curious, in NeoLemmix, if a shimmying climber reaches the end of a platform (i.e. a corner with a wall facing up like below), does it climb up the wall? I assume not?

Just to quickly clarify this: No, it does not. The Shimmier stops as soon as it detects an altitude increase of 2 pixels or more over just 1 pixels in width. It also doesn't turn around.

The shape of terrain you describe, though very common, can't even be handled by a Rock Climber in Lemmings 2. A Rock Climber could only handle a 45 ° slope followed by a straight wall (something the Shimmier can't do, since it can only do the reverse option, i.e. first a wall, then a slope or ceiling).

The only L2 skill that would be able to go from a ceiling around a corner and up a wall (rather than down like a Slider) would be the Magno Booter. But namida has already ruled out that one for complexity of coding.

If a wall the lemming jumps to tops out in a ceiling, it will still slide down afterwards. The reverse wouldn't work.)

Since all level edges are deadly in New Formats, we would have to assume a solid ceiling of terrain at the top of that climb, therefore also solid ground at the bottom for this comparison.

And in that case, once the Slider touches solid ground, he will look towards the wall, i.e. immediately start climbing up again. So the reverse would indeed work, wouldn't it?

This is precisely what I meant about a permanent Climber-Slider trapping himself in a loop where he repeatedly goes up and down the same wall without ever turning around.

A regular Slider would of course turn around on the wall he slid down immediately after completing his slide, but a Climber-Slider wouldn't.

And here are two more: English and Arab! (Also, I'm using high-res mode this time...)

The Arab lemmings are my first attempt at recolouring the X-Mas sprites. I tried to create some Star Wars Jawas with it (with brown robes and black faces), only to find out you can't actually recolour the seam of the robes (it always remains white).

Notice how the regular Arab lemmings are in white (sheikhs), the neutral Arab lemmings are in black (women in Nikabs). Athletes still wear green, because... well, that's just the colour of Islam.

Yet, for some strange reason, the Digger still gets recoloured to standard x-mas red (see below, the picture with the pyramid)?

I can't see where to specify that, unfortunately... after all, it's not a permanent skill...

I would definitely argue against Climber and Slider being mutually exclusive, simply because of the interesting paths both can create in conjunction: A lemming can climb up a wall on the right, turn into a Shimmier to go to the left, slide down a wall on the left, and then at the bottom of that slide go back around the corner by transitioning back into a Shimmier. Combine this with the 2-way Jumper-Climber interactions and you can easily create paths that "skilled" lemmings can follow but the crowd can't.

And that is basically the point of a lot of levels. While I still get the feeling that "pioneer" is somewhat of a negative term here (because it has the connotation of the entire complexity of a level being reduced down to the actions of a single lemming while everyone else is contained safely), even a lot of the more challenging levels still require 2-4 "worker" lemmings, often in conjunction. And the fact that these workers can often take completely different paths than the crowd is what makes these levels significantly more interesting; because another thing that tends to make "pioneer" levels boring is if they're just carving out the exact same path the crowd will take later on.

One-way arrows, Swimmers, Gliders, Floaters, Shimmiers, all of these are common ways to allow worker lemmings to approach an obstacle from the opposite side, in order to create a path that the crowd couldn't create by themselves, even with enough distance between the lemmings - because the terrain simply isn't shaped in a regular lemming's favour.

Climbers and Sliders would provide many further such interesting interactions with each other, and those would only get extended even further by the combination with Jumpers and Shimmiers.

As far as L2 goes, if I remember correctly, the transition to sliding only happens at the point the lemming walked past the edge.  Basically instead of transitioning from walking to falling, it would transition to sliding.  Jumping a slider against the wall will not allow it to start sliding.

Ah, okay, thanks a lot for the information!

In other words: It's the "wall-jumping" part that's creating the problem, or, more accurately: The ambition to have Sliders interact with Jumpers as well, not just Climbers. For Climbers, it's pretty much a given at this point that they are going to interact with Jumpers both ways.

Personally, I quite like the idea of having to e.g. jump across a gap in order to reach a wall a lemming can hold on to that allows him to slide down an otherwise lethal drop safely.

That said, if we had to "ban" one interaction and I had to choose between Jumper-Slider and Slider-Climber (the latter by making both of these permanent skills mutually exclusive), I would probably rather stick to the L2 behaviour and sacrifice the Jumper-Slider interaction:
a) For consistency with L2 (for players switching from Kieran et al.'s custom L2 content to NeoLemmix, this can indeed be relevant!), but more importantly
b) because the Slider-Shimmier interaction is more important and revolutionary to me. Since the other main skill that interacts with Shimmiers is the Climber, I don't want to be forced to choose whether I can have only Climber-Shimmier- or Slider-Shimmier interactions with a given lemming.

But I think the case of the Slider being a temporary "movement" skill, like the Jumper and Shimmier as well (and the Walker, technically, counts too), can also be made, and actually only becomes stronger by going through these examples.

Much like the Jumper assigned to a Climber doesn't stop the lemming from being a Climber, but merely tells him "stop doing what your new default state tells you to do, and do this now instead!",
a Slider would tell him "stop climbing for now and slide down instead, but once you reach the next wall, you'll climb up as usual / once you reach the next straight drop, you fall looking forward, like a regular Faller".

In other words, the Slider would become the logical extension to the Jumper, in that both of these skills would be the only non-lethal skills you could assign to a climbing Climber.

As it currently stands, the Jumper is the only non-lethal skill that can be assigned to a Climber. But with that skill already being a precedent, there is nothing stopping other "movement skills" from behaving the same way.

If the Slider became such a non-permanent "movement skill", just like with Shimmiers, I think it should still be possible to have pre-placed Sliders in a level, as well.

Thanks for the explanation. Did any of the other people who downloaded the Trump sprites (as well as the others) experience these problems? So far it says each sprite type has been downloaded 4 times, so I assume by four different people.