This is unrelated to the recent issues. The monthly limit for the email provider the site uses has been reached; seems there was a sudden spike yesterday / overnight. I'm not sure at this stage whether it's just a spike in genuine emails, something fishy, or (most likely) emails sent during the course of me working on the 2.1 upgrade on a local server.

I won't get a chance to investigate this until later today. In the meantime, keep an eye on your PMs and watched topics manually, and if anyone is trying to register and not able to verify, contact an admin via Discord or IRC and we can activate your account for you.

EDIT: The upgrade is now live. Please report any issues (including oddities with the themes) in this topic.

Known issues:
- General instability. Might be fixed now, I'm monitoring it.
- Error being generated in logs (more detail in Staff Discussion), seems harmless but would be good to fix
- Slow loading of main page
- Color of mouseovered entries in Who's Online is bad on Lemmings Dark theme
- Color of some text in admin panel is bad on Lemmings Dark theme
- Color of "loading" type popups at top of screen (eg. when clicking Quick Edit) is bad on Lemmings Dark theme

---

So, it's come up a few times that the site should really be upgraded to SMF 2.1. I've finally begun working on this.

There's been many customizations to the site - some with addons (which have varying levels of support for SMF 2.1), some custom. Here's a list of what needs to be replicated on SMF 2.1 (struck out ones are already done):

PM attachments
> PM attachment plain text file bug fix
> Download links for PM attachments in emails
Spoiler tag
> Stripping spoilers from PM email notifications
Custom smileys
Custom themes
ReCAPTCHA or another strong CAPTCHA provider
Topic creator in emails

I expect it'll be at least a few days (more likely a couple of weeks), at least, before the update is ready to go live. Some downtime (likely 30mins - 1hr) will be necessary for the switchover.

Lemmings Forums (as well as the NeoLemmix website) were down from about 01:30 UTC today (EDIT: looking at Discord, it may have been slightly earlier than this - first mention of it was at 01:20). The NeoLemmix website was restored at 03:10, and Lemmings Forums at 04:00, making this probably the longest downtime during the time I've hosted the site.

The downtime was caused by system updates failing, which in turn caused Apache (the web server) to refuse to load after a reboot. This meant that none of the websites hosted on the server were accessible. Fortunately the back-end remained accessible, so I was able to perform full backups of the sites in their current state - therefore, outside of cases like "posts that weren't yet posted before the site went down", no data should have been lost.

This issue could have taken a significant amount of time to investigate, diagnose and repair, so instead - I decided to create a new server and migrate the sites onto it. This is also why the sites didn't come back online at the same time - the NeoLemmix website has much less data (the backup was half the size), as well as being less reliant on specific versions of PHP. (This is another matter - the site needs to be updated to SMF 2.0.19 at least, so that it's PHP 8.0 compatible, and from there to SMF 2.1.X if possible. I'll worry about this once I've got the current version fully working again, and likely more a "tomorrow / next week" task.)

At the time of this post, core functionality is restored but some specific things - namely, emails sent from the site (registration confirmations and PM notifications) are likely not functional at the moment UPDATE: confirmed they're working, and I'm not sure whether other admins will still be able to access the back-end stuff - please get in touch if not. (Note that the IP address has changed; all those with access should know how to find it from the domain name.)

As I work on these matters, it's possible that the site may have brief outages, if any reboots are necessary. No further downtime is expected.

More than three years after the last major stable version updated, the next one is finally here!

The main attraction of course is the new object types:
- Portals - Like teleporters, but bidirectional and not rate-limited
- Skill Assigners - A lemming passing through one of these will gain a permanent skill
- Skill Removers - A lemming passing through one of these will lose all his permanent skills
- Neutralizers - A lemming passing through one of these will become a neutral lemming
- Deneutralizer - A neutral lemming passing through one of these will revert to a regular lemming

Aside from this, there's a big bunch of physics bugfixes. This will be the last big batch of physics fixes; it's possible we might see one or two more small ones in the future (especially if they relate to the new objects).

Changelog, V12.12.5 -> V12.13.0

########
# Misc #
########
> Now being compiled with Delphi 11.3 and using Graphics32 V3.

################
# New Features #
################
> Added five new object types:
--- Portals: These are like teleporters, but constant rather than triggered (think fire vs trap) and bidirectional.
--- Assigners: These assign a permanent skill to any lemming that passes through the trigger area (including neutrals / zombies).
--- Deassigners: These remove all permanent skills from any lemming that passes through the trigger area (including neutrals / zombies).
--- Neutralizer: These turn any regular lemming that passes through the trigger area into a neutral lemming.
--- Deneutralizer: These turn any neutral lemming that passes through the trigger area into a regular lemming.
> Added an option to disable music when testplaying levels from the editor.
> Added support for a "max N skill types" talisman.
> Record for fewest different skill types is now tracked. (Quantity only; it does not and will not track which combinations were used.)
> Replay files store the frame on which they are expected to complete, and mass replay check makes use of this to reduce the chance of "undetermined" outcome.
> You can now configure what the game does when you run out of lemmings (exit to postview vs freeze and allow you to rewind); thanks to WillLem and Simon for contributing this feature.

###################
# Fixes - Physics #
###################
> Fixed bug: A basher who is also a slider will continue for more strokes than he should if reaching an edge while bashing.
> Fixed bug: A builder cannot be assigned when the lemming's Y coordinate is 1 (ie: the highest position it can be without being considered outside the level).
> Fixed bug: A climber who falls after hitting his head on an overhang, where the fall height is exactly the minimum fall distance that is not survivable, may survive the fall if they started climbing from higher or lower than the floor they land on (due to terrain alterations while he's climbing or wall-grabbing as a Jumper).
> Fixed bug: A lemming moving multiple pixels in one frame may pass through thin trigger areas without being affected.
> Fixed bug: An ascender can get stuck in terrain (which he may then be able to step up through if thin enough) under certain circumstances.
> Fixed bug: A setup involving blockers or one way fields, stackers, and walkers could be used to move a lemming through walls.
> Fixed bug: A slider could be assigned a shimmier as they reach the bottom of a wall and turn around.
> Fixed bug: A slider, in certain setups, may land on a pixel behind him (and turn around) even when no wall is present to prevent him walking the way he's already facing.
> Fixed bug: Blockers' detection of other blockers when assigning was slightly incorrect and could lead to valid assignments being prevented in some cases.
> Fixed bug: Builders and platformers going through a teleporter cannot always be followed by other lemmings.
> Fixed bug: Some object checks don't behave as they should immediately after teleporting.
> Fixed bug: Some Slider behaviors that should also be applied to the Dehoister weren't.
> Fixed bug: Stoner-Ohnoers can enter exits without having ground underneath them.
> Fixed bug: A jumper going through a teleporter crashes the game.

#################
# Fixes - Other #
#################
> Fixed bug: Autosave replay filename setting may get wiped when modifying settings unless it's a preset.
> Fixed bug: Update Check and Autosave Replay Filename are enabled when first entering the config menu even if the respective options they need (online features / autosave replays) are turned off.
> Fixed bug: If the selected skill / etc graphic is semitransparent, it gets redrawn over the pause icon when backwards framestepping, effectively becoming more opaque each time.
> Fixed bug: Laserer's laser remains visible if the lemming is removed (eg. by a trap) or teleports while lasering.
> Fixed bug: Level version numbers are saved to cleansed level files / replay files in decimal, whereas the editor saves them as hexidecimal. They are now saved as hexidecimal by the game too (older files with decimal values will still function correctly, as the file format allows any numeric value to be stored in either decimal or hex and always has done so).
> Fixed bug: "Don't replay after backwards frameskip" setting not written to the config file.
> Fixed bug: Mass Replay Check may cause data loss if the Move option is selected and multiple input files end up with the same output filename.

Download: https://www.neolemmix.com/download.php?id=592 (permalink to V12.13.0)
Styles: https://www.neolemmix.com/download.php?program=52 (link will always point to the latest styles download)
Editor: https://www.neolemmix.com/download.php?id=591 (permalink to V1.42)

You do not need to download the styles here - you can download them as needed in-game instead. This link is provided for the convenience of users who wish to download all styles in one go and/or do not wish to enable online features in NeoLemmix.

Game source code (Delphi): https://bitbucket.org/namida42/neolemmixplayer/
Editor source code (C#): https://bitbucket.org/namida42/neolemmixeditor/

If you are upgrading from V12.12.X or earlier, please set up in a new folder (you can copy over your Levels and Settings folders). If you are upgrading from V12.13.0-RC builds, you can just extract over the top of it.

What do I need to do with my existing content?

As is always the case with a major version update, you should run a mass replay check on your levels to verify that your solutions still work, and fix any replays (or levels, if necessary) that have broken. This update in particular contains a LOT of physics fixes, so this step is especially important for this update.

Custom styles should not need any special attention for this update.

So, similar to NeoLemmix, I haven't had so much interest in Loap lately. On top of that, unlike NeoLemmix, there's also relatively little community interest in Loap at the moment.

With this in mind, I don't see much point in further development of Loap. The current version, while it does have some minor issues, is completely usable and allows playing all existing L3D content, and is compatible with user-made content via L3DEdit. And it's open source, so if the interest is there, anyone can pick up and take over development of it - and I fully encourage anyone with the interest and skills, to do so.

Otherwise, if 0.0.28.0 remains the "final"version of Loap - then it still means we have a perfectly viable way to play Lemmings 3D on modern hardware and OS, with some modern NL-like features, in higher resolution than the DOS game. That's still a pretty good result.

The release candidate build for V12.13.0 is here. WIP changelog here: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5674.0
If you are looking for the stable version of NeoLemmix, you're after 12.12.5: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5673.0

Known Issues

> Further feedback on the sound effects for the new objects is welcome.

Changelog from RC1 -> RC2

> Added some extra logging for when PNG files fail to load.
> Added some recent contributors to the credits in the scrolling text.
> Fixed bug: Laserer laser remains visible (but non-functional) if a laserer is killed by a trap / etc or begins teleporting while lasering.
> Fixed bug: The move/copy options in the mass replay checker may overwrite files if multiple inputs end up with the same output filename. (A number will now be appended to the subsequent ones' filenames.)
> Fixed bug: When in fullscreen mode, the start bar doesn't hide and NL doesn't quite cover the entire screen, if OS scaling is set to any value other than 100%. (This bug is exclusive to 12.13.0-RC1 and does not occur in 12.12.X.)
> Updated the version of GR32v3, which may fix some issues (in particular the issue with saving level images).

Changelog from RC2 -> RC3

> Updated the version of GR32 used, which should fix issues with NeoLemmix failing to load on systems set to languages that don't use the Latin alphabet.

Download (V12.13.0-RC3, editor included): https://www.neolemmix.com/download.php?id=590

This download only includes the Orig and OhNo styles, plus "default", "xmas" and "special", as well as "namida_systemtest" for (functional but not ideal visually) objects of the new types. You can use the in-game Style Manager (in the Settings) to download other styles, or you can download styles manually:
- All styles: https://www.neolemmix.com/download.php?program=52
- Any individual style: https://www.neolemmix.com/styles/12.11/XXXXXXXX.zip (replace XXXXXXXX with the style's name, eg: https://www.neolemmix.com/styles/12.11/orig_fire.zip for orig_fire - and no, "12.11" in the link is not a typo)

Aside from namida_systemtest, you can also find a Portal object in namida_lab. As far as I am aware, no other objects of the new types have been created so far.

As always, it is recommended you install the RC build to a new folder, rather than trying to use it in the same folder as your existing version of NeoLemmix. You can copy across your hotkeys file (from the Settings folder) after running the RC build for the first time.

You can find some levels using the new objects here: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5872.0 (Please read the rules of that topic before posting in it!)

Please report any bugs relating to the new objects on the New Objects bugs & suggestions board.

What is a Release Candidate build in the context of NeoLemmix?

A release candidate build could be thought of as a pre-release version of an upcoming release. The idea is that except for bugfixes, or issues that were specifically noted as "should be tested during the RC phase before deciding", there won't be changes between it and the stable version, and thus it can be used to start updating content, as well as for ironing out last-minute bugs. Content specifically targetting it should not be released, though styles targetting it can be submitted for the next styles download.

What do I need to do with my existing content?

12.13 contains a lot of physics bug fixes and as such, a mass replay check should be run on all your levels (as is always the case with a major update, but especially so for this one). Please report any breakages in case they are bugs. You should not need to make any alterations to your styles, other than adding objects of the new types if you wish.

Given that not much interest is coming with them simply being in an experimental phase, and that it's desirable to move towards a release, I'm going to go ahead with the objects in their current state (and rely on "hopefully users will create the objects later"). If bugs arise, they can be fixed later (and an RC phase will still happen, of course). It's simply going to be over to the community to establish the standard on how they should look etc. Sounds can be changed in a later update if desired.

If I remember correctly there were a few remaining matters I needed to look at before going RC, but I'll no longer delay that on the basis of wanting more feedback for the new objects.

Just to be very clear, this is NOT saying "the new objects are not going to happen". They are. It's just saying I'm not going to hold things up any longer on the grounds of that there's still room for more feedback - the RC phase and 12.14 will be the avenues for addressing this if necessary.

Hi everyone,

So, a couple of our staff members have not been active on the site in quite some time now (ccexplore, Nessy, Akseli, as well as a few board-specific moderators). Purely to avoid any potential security risks relating to inactive accounts having mod / admin access, they have been removed as staff. (As this is the sole reason for it, I will be more than happy to give them back these positions if they return in the future.)

As such, I would like to look at making one or maybe two established members of the community moderator positions. Moderators are not expected (or able) to get involved in technical aspects of running the site; if your technical ability is good enough to register and post on the site, it's enough to carry out the moderator role. The main things you'd be doing are removing spam posts (or theoretically, other unsuitable posts, but that's a very rare occurence here) and organisational matters like moving posts in the wrong board to the correct one.

No hard and fast rule about how long anyone needs to have been here. If you're well known in the community and don't have a bad reputation, I'll consider you if you're interested. I'm only after one or two people, so if you don't get picked it doesn't necesserially mean you're "not well known" or have a bad reputation, and you can ask again next time we're looking.

Was making a solution replay for Mayhem 20 of LP3D, encountered some cases where the alive lemming count went down after backwards framestepping (then come right after further steps). I suspect some of the "checkpoint" save states aren't being erased correctly but haven't looked into it yet.

Using the latest source at the time, which has a few changes from 0.0.25.0.

Not sure when this happened, but it's not meant to. Haven't looked into it beyond noticing it happens yet.

So while I've ruled out any possibility of a full VR mode for Loap due to the complexity that'd be involved, I am open to the idea of supporting stereoscopic 3D - basically, the kind of thing you'd get from a 3D TV or a Nintendo 3DS. I'm wondering how many people with interest in Loap would (a) be interested in such a feature, and (b) actually have a means of using it (a 3D TV / monitor or a VR headset).

This should be relatively simple to implement - a slight caveat being I don't have a 3D TV, so I can't actually test that option of using it; I do have a VR headset so can test that.

If a miner mines into a 45 degree slope (going downwards from the miner's point of view), the miner should stop if during his walking phase, he walks down the slope. This does not happen; he keeps mining once he reaches the next block edge.

EDIT: Confirmed this happens for bashers too... although I do need to double check if that actually happens in DOS L3D. With that being said, it kinda feels like something I should fix either way.

EDIT: I have now confirmed this does happen in DOS L3D. I still feel like it should be fixed though; especially for miners (bashers are a bit more ambiguous; we allow them to move down slopes and continue bashing in 2D, but a miner must always follow his tunnel exactly; on the other hand, the exact workings in 3D differ in other ways too, in particular the use of a walker state between the equivalent of strokes).

EDIT: A video to show what I'm meaning: https://youtu.be/lXd7yrJZz0s

I've been thinking about this as an idea - instead of making a new editor for Loap, making a fork of L3DEdit that edits Loap levels rather than DOS L3D ones.

Many of the things Loap would need, would be fairly trivial to add to L3DEdit. (Many. Not all.)

Downside is this would mean having only an isometric view while level editing. There are a few things that would be hard to visualize in this view, in particular default camera angles. There's also the issue of what happens if Loap in the future supports 3D models for interactive / decorative objects; supporting these in L3DEdit would not be easy.

A bigger downside also is that L3DEdit is not as easily cross-platform. Although it can be (and has been) built for non-Windows OSes, it doesn't perform nearly as well on these platforms, due to using Lazarus rather than Delphi to compile on them. (The worse performance also occurs in Lazarus-built Windows builds, but on Windows the option of using Delphi is there.) I believe L3DEdit runs fine under WINE so this isn't too bad for Linux, but it will leave Mac out.

One reason for this is effort - there hasn't been much interest in making L3D custom content so far, so I'm not sure if it's worth the effort of a full new editor for Loap. Using L3DEdit as a base removes a lot of the required effort.

The suggestion of a clear physics mode similar to what NL has, has come up a few times. I'm wondering what people think - is it necessary? L3D doesn't have the same proliferation of different styles, graphics, etc that NeoLemmix has to deal with, and realistically, it probably never will. On the other hand, there are things that are inconsistent especially in the official levels - are static objects solid, are they climbable, what's steel and what isn't, exactly how many blocks/slabs tall is a fall - so perhaps it's still a good idea to have this.

If it does happen, it probably won't be as thorough as NL's, but at least a basic form of CPM should be viable.

DireKrow mentioned a while back on Discord that a replay insert mode and a replay editor, similar to what NL has, would be good features.

A replay editor probably won't happen. Implementing this while in-game, without Windows forms as an option (due to Loap being at least theoretically cross-platform - I intend to make Linux builds once it goes stable, and it should also be possible to build for Mac), is going to be trickier than I think is worthwhile.

Replay insert mode is definitely something that can and should happen. To cover the main important functionality of the replay editor (removing actions without erasing later actions), I was considering a "replay suspend" mode - where you can press, or perhaps hold, a hotkey to ignore any replay actions temporarily (and thus remove them from the replay), while any actions that come after you switch back out of this mode would still replay as normal, at least to the extent they can.

Loap supports configurable hotkeys, but at present these must be manually edited via the INI file. It would be good to implement a menu where these can be configured.

One complication is modifier keys (ie: like holding Shift + pressing a key, instead of just pressing the key). Loap supports designating keys as modifier keys, and any key can be designated as such. This needs to be factored into the hotkey configuation menu - including that a hotkey may ignore modifier keys, or specifically require no modifier keys are pressed, or require a combination of them rather than just one.

Another, likely much less troublesome issue, is that Loap does not prevent having multiple functions for the same key. It will generally just do both things if a key configured this way is pressed, if possible.

So, I haven't really been getting much work done on NeoLemmix in the past year and a half or so. A bit here and there, but not nearly enough to really keep the project going.

NeoLemmix is, overall, in a good state. Sure, there are some UI bugs that would be nice to get rid of, some room for better QOL features, etc, but overall, it's the most popular engine for a reason - because it's in good shape, it does what's needed, it isn't overly bloated with features, etc.

I had already decided to work towards a final version as a vague goal, but I have made the decision that I'm going to move very quickly towards that now. Most proposed features / suggestions are not going to happen, and likewise for minor fixes.

I do intend to do one more major update in the traditional sense (ie: an update that brings significant new features), with possibly one more "major" version after that for bugfixing purposes, in particular for any bugs that are introduced in the next update. This is because of the new objects - they are very close to ready, and it doesn't make sense to throw that work away at this point when not much further effort is needed to get it ready for release.

However, other proposed features - such as an improved replay editor - are going to be discarded, so that things can be wrapped up. I am also going to discontinue any further work on the editor, except for what is necessary to properly support the new objects (most of which is already implemented in the codebase and released in experimental form alongside the new objects experimental player).

I realise this might not be the news some people wanted to hear, but it had pretty much de-facto become the situation anyway - all I'm really doing here is making it official.

To address this before anyone suggests it - no, I do not want to hand further development of the game over to someone else. With that being said, NeoLemmix is open source, and anyone who wants to do so is welcome to fork it to create a new engine - SuperLemmix is already a case of this, though it may be that someone wants to create a fork that retains the NeoLemmix philosophies but continues to add / improve new features within that. It would then be for content creators and players to decide whether to adopt the fork or stick with NL's final version. Likewise, anyone who wants to create their own editor (either using the existing one as a basis, or an entirely new one) is of course free to do so. NeoLemmix and its tools will remain open source and free for anyone who wishes to fork, to do so.

While watching Ryemanni play through LP3D in Loap, he ran into a case where in an enclosed level he moved a camera into a tunnel created by a basher, then rewound gameplay. The result was that this camera was stuck in the tunnel, which caused issues that I can't go into detail without spoiling the level.

Loap does have a means of moving the camera through walls, but this may feel a bit cheaty for some players. A way to reset the cameras to their original positions seems worthwhile.

Important context: Much like how NL doesn't treat the scrolling as part of the replay, Loap doesn't treat camera movements as part of it, so rewinding does not undo camera movement.

So yeah, it's probably time to start thinking about the visual side of things.

Normally, I'd come up with something, use it in one of my new styles, and see where things go from there. But, I don't have anything ready to release any time soon. I could add them to some existing styles, I guess... either way though, some discussion needs to be had about what these will look like.

Portals - the idea of swirling vortices seems popular. This could be in some kind of frame similar to teleporter designs, but with a constant vortex animation in the "doorway"; or could simply be a portal sitting out in the open.

Assigners, Deassigners - first I'll note, Assigners are capable of (and should be) using the same functionality as pickup skills do, in order to show the skill they assign. The rest of the design needs to be clearly different, though. Clear physics mode can reveal the skill in the case that a graphic doesn't, but this is a failsafe, not the intended way of telling the player the skill they give. Following on from this, I feel the standard for deassigners should be similar to the same style's assigner (same shape, possibly different colors or minor details), perhaps with a red X where the skill icon would go on an assigner?

Neutralizers, Deneutralizers - I don't really have any good starting points on these ones, aside from that again they should look similar to each other, and we should probably settle on some universal indication of which is which (similar to the "In" and "Out" on teleporters and receivers).

Well, timed bombers have been a constant request from new players in particular. Even some experienced players have occasionally had a very strong desire for them.

Bomber timing was removed from NeoLemmix because all it does is add execution difficulty that becomes almost meaningless in the face of NeoLemmix's framestepping and other advanced features. The bomber is actually a very versatile skill when the ability to use it precisely is there, but bomber timing made this very frustrating in practice.

However, NeoLemmix has indeed changed even further since then. In particular, we now have skill shadows, which would serve as an alternative means of assisting precise bombing. In light of this, I feel timed bombers could be reintroduced.

I know this will cause issues for existing content that relies on bombers in the first 5 seconds; this will break some of my levels too. But like many physics changes before, content will be able to adapt to this.

I guess it really came to this because the frequent requests, and the existence of a fork that originated with a goal of reading timed bombers, makes it clear. When it comes to timed bombers, there are people who are quite simply never gonna give it up, never gonna let it down, never gonna run around and desert it, never gonna make it cry, never gonna say goodbye, never gonna tell a lie and hurt it. April fools, y'all. Nothing is changing.