This topic should have it own board (seriously). It should ideally be the first thing Forum users see.

A quick suggestion for the OP whilst I'm here:

In the SuperLemmix section:

Change this:

"A fork of NeoLemmix tailored towards those who prefer a more traditional gameplay style"

To this:

"A fork of NeoLemmix featuring a Classic Mode, making it suitable for those who prefer a more traditional gameplay style"

Quote from: weirdzod on August 12, 2026, 09:21:42 PMHi WillLem, first of all, I wanted to thank you for your work in the Lemmings community.

Hi wierdzod, thank you for your kind words. It's my pleasure to contribute to this community and it's always good to hear from new players.

Quote from: weirdzod on August 12, 2026, 09:21:42 PMI realized that SuperLemmix is actually the best way to play these levels ... Perhaps it should be suggested somewhere prominent that SuperLemmix is a better option for playing the DMA levels.

As Proxima mentioned, this topic features SuperLemmix quite near the top. The topic should be way more prominent on the Forums, though. It should arguably have its own board!

Regarding SuperLemmix, I haven't actually done anything with it for quite a while now. I certainly will come back to it at some point though. It's by no means perfect but it's tons of fun. Meanwhile, if you're after a truly OG experience with only a handful of modern features and a polished UI, RetroLemmini is also worth a look. It's the only engine I use to actually play Lemmings (as opposed to create levels or experiment with solutions: NeoLemmix/SuperLemmix is better for both).

Quote from: weirdzod on August 12, 2026, 09:21:42 PMOff-topic: The PS3 Lemmings version has a broken music index file, so the music doesn't play... and in one of the packs I mentioned earlier, the *Shadow of the Beast* Mega Drive level plays random music... at least from what I've seen so far.

Thanks for mentioning this. I've put it on the to-do list to get sorted.

Quote from: Simon on August 10, 2026, 06:50:30 AMIt's normal to not have yet met the save requirement. Keep it green, it shouldn't stand out.

I hadn't thought of it that way, but you're absolutely right. In fact, making it green when the SR is met is a reversion to 'default green', which doesn't seem right. So - agreed, let's make it green for 'not met' and change it (and/or use icons) when it's 'met'.

Quote from: Simon on August 10, 2026, 06:50:30 AMI value non-screaming panel colors more than avoiding such a clash.

As well as improving the colour scheme, we could also add an option ('Use colour scheme for panel text' or something). Unchecking it keeps everything green. We make sure that symbols, icons, and the text itself conveys all the important stuff (which it mostly already does).

Do we think such an option is necessary? Or would improving the colour scheme to be 'quieter' be sufficient?

Quote from: Simon on August 13, 2026, 04:38:41 AMOvertime is one case of having insufficient time to win.

I disagree. Overtime is not so much 'you don't have enough time left to win' as it is 'the game is already over'. It's a subtle but important distinction that I don't think red text would convey as clearly as something a bit more neutral (like purple/blue).

Overtime in NL serves 2 primary purposes:

1) Allow the player to continue exploring the level

2) Allow the player to rewind into 'playable' time

In either case, we need to let the player know that they are in Overtime. Purple/blue does this without conveying urgency (which red arguably does more so) or normality (for which we are using green).

Quote from: Simon on August 10, 2026, 06:50:30 AMFix the design bug where the engine guesses that 15 seconds is somehow an important threshold. Ditch the entire threshold feature. Zero is the important threshold. Either you can win (depending on other things) or you can't win. When you can't win anymore based on the clock alone, you have a reason to recolor from yellow to red.

It's a fairly standard design practice for a descending timer to change to red, or orange, or some other 'urgent' colour, when time is close to running out, but not actually fully run out yet. Another design choice I've seen is to make the timer flash, but - let's not do that!

15 seconds is somewhat arbitrary, agreed, but we do need to provide the player with some visual feedback that the timer is close to running out, especially since time limits only tend to be used in custom levels when they're an actual feature of the level - most levels use infinite time. The player therefore needs to be reminded that the time limit (a) exists - the icons do this, and (b) is critical - if not with colour, and definitely not with flashing, then... what would you suggest?

Quote from: Simon on August 10, 2026, 06:50:30 AM#3 But what is confusing with this?
yellow > 0 seconds
red < 0 seconds

If I see a timer turn red, I'm more likely to think 'time is about to run out' rather than 'I'm out of time'. Indeed, most games just end when time is up (the only other video game (than NeoLemmix) that I can think of that uses Overtime is Tetris!).

Also, the use of red arguably conveys urgency, as previously mentioned. There is nothing necessarily urgent about the 'Overtime' state. Quite the contrary: the timer no longer matters once it's run out. This is why purple/blue is better.

Quote from: Simon on August 10, 2026, 06:50:30 AMPrint a minus sign!

IMHO, this is more visually noisy than colour. I'd honestly rather not do this if we don't absolutely need to.

We need others to chime in.

Thanks to those who attended the meetup. It was great to see everyone again, even if the group was a bit smaller than usual.

Perhaps we could arrange another one for the Autumn, somewhere further south (someone mentioned Bristol which I think would be a great place to meet) so that it's a bit more central for everyone to travel to.

I'll post a topic for it soon (or, anyone else is of course free to create one in the meantime).

This bug has arisen again. The newly-implemented check is in the correct place, but didn't account for 2px vertical movement at frame 0*. This has now been fixed.

Fixed in RLPlayer commit bd398f8.

*Note to self: Why is the Miner moved 2px downwards at frame 0?

Hi all, I'll probably be arriving at around 12:30. No need to wait at the station for me, I'll text Flopsy when I arrive and can go to wherever you are.

See you there!

Just a heads up, it's going to be a record-breaking 34 degrees and very humid in Leeds on Thursday 13th.

I'm still happy to go ahead, but wanted to float the option of rescheduling for the following week if people would prefer slightly cooler weather. Friday 21st and Saturday 22nd are supposed to be sunny and 23 degrees, a bit more manageable for those who struggle with hot weather.

If nobody replies, we can assume we're still on for Thursday 13th.

In the interests of keeping the original levels readily available for all new users, CE will ship with this version of the compilation from now on.

I'll send some updates to Proxima for review in due course, ensuring that the following have been done:

1) Restore Call in the Bomb Squad and Save Me decorative terrain
2) Special windows/exits for A Beast of a Level and co.
3) Add numbering to the .nxlv files
4) Include the edited version of PoP YoR ToP!!! from my previous post (above)

Pending approval from Proxima, I'll ship this version with the next CE update.

Quote from: namida on August 08, 2026, 11:58:41 PMKeep new (non-12.14) characters in a seperate file

This is probably the cleanest way to do it for panel characters/icons.

I've now reverted 'panel_font.png' and 'panel_icons.png' to their NL 12.14 counterparts. Custom .pngs will load exactly as before.

Meanwhile, the new characters are included in a new 'ce-panel_chars.png' sheet, which will ship with CE.

Fixed in NLCEPlayer commit 9a6c403.

After a cup of tea and a think, here's a suggested scheme:

GREEN = State is OK / Normal

Use this for: hatch count, there are regular lemmings in the level, save requirement is met, time limit is infinite


TEAL or CYAN = Pay attention!

Use this for: cut future replay actions warning (the recently-added 'CUT N TASKS'), only Neutrals remain, save requirement is not met but there are enough lemmings remaining to be able to meet it, time limit is finite

 
RED = State is critical

Use this for: there are not enough lemmings remaining to meet the save requirement, time limit is about to run out (15 seconds is good for this)


BLUE = Information only

Use this for: lemming actions when hovering over a lem, panel button hints, overtime


No other colours.

---

The only issue I can see with the above is that { lemming actions when hovering over a lem } is currently Green, and this is what people are used to. We could also do with differentiating it from { panel button hints }, as both could be - for example - 'BASHER' (the former for a lemming performing the Basher action, and the latter for the Basher skill button).

We could either:

a) Use Purple (or some other colour) for one or the other

b) Continue to use Green for { lemming actions when hovering over a lem } and accept the slight inconsistency in the proposed scheme

c) Some other suggestion (please post if you have one!)

Agreed, this should be shown.

Try this:

If you playtest a level in CE 1.1.2 from the Editor (using F12), it will show a clickable text 'Show Skills Used', which opens a dialog showing the exact skills used in the most recent playthrough. This is primarily a level creation tool, but could be carried over to gameplay as well.

Would you prefer the clickable text for normal gameplay, or is just the 'total skills used' count sufficient? Thinking about it, we could show the 'total skills used' count and make it clickable anyway.

Quote from: Simon on August 04, 2026, 08:18:26 PMClock turns red at arbitrary time (1 minute? 15 seconds?) and turns purple when it's not sufficient for winning. Instead, ditch the arbitrary threshold. On different maps, different thresholds will feel like too short anyway. Consistently use red for insufficiency.

Purple is essentially 'overtime' as opposed to 'insufficient time to win'. It's only there because gameplay doesn't end when time is up, and it might be useful for the player to know by how much their attempted solution exceeds the time limit. Red could be confusing here, especially since the timer counts upwards at this point.

Instead, red is used to mean 'time is nearly up'. We could adjust when this happens depending on the total time limit, but it seems better to keep it consistent for all levels.

Quote from: Simon on August 04, 2026, 08:18:26 PMSave requirement is printed in blue ... This removes the meaning of other colors

Save count is printed in blue until it is met, then it changes to green. Yellow probably makes a bit more sense but then visually blends with the time limit counter when it is yellow. Could we try teal instead?

Quote from: Simon on August 04, 2026, 08:18:26 PMLemming count is yellow when there are neutral lemmings. Why is this important? Why do we have to pay attention? I would understand it becoming yellow when there are only neutral lemmings left.

Agreed, this has never fully made sense to me either. Let's make it change only when neutrals are left.

Quote from: Simon on August 04, 2026, 08:18:26 PMLemming count also becomes cyan in some cases? When and why?

This is when there are only neutrals left (I think...?).

---

Bottom line: agreed, we can look again at the panel's colour scheme.

@Proxima - I'll probably start including your compilation with CE, after making the updates you've suggested in your OP.

Every now and then, someone asks about the OG levels. Many people probably don't ask, but still want them. Let's just provide them once and for all.

The strongest likelihood is that those packs include a version of 'panel_font.png' which is missing the '+' symbol (which was recently added in CE).

If you go to the root folder of the pack in 'levels', check to see if there is a copy of 'panel_font.png' and, for now, either delete it or rename it to something else. That should fix the issue.

I can't think of a sensible way to deal with this engine-side tbh. CE could perhaps see if the target .png is the same width as the one it expects, and - if it isn't - load the default instead. There might be a better way.

OK, we have this working quite well. Up to 20 levels can be saved in the list.

I've followed the usual blueprint: the first 9 items are '&indexed' so that they can be opened using 1-9 keys, and I've added a 'Clear' menu item as well so that the list can easily be cleared.

We can give this a test run in the next release.

Implemented in NLEditor commit 8907017.