In this topic, an image was posted showing regular lemmings, neutrals and zombies in CPM. It occurs to me: the zombies are hard to distinguish from regular lemmings. I would suggest making them green (dark for without permanent skills, light for with). Green tends to be associated with poison and infection in video games.

After a recent discussion that I won't link to since it involved several different threads and was partly on discord, I am taking over maintenance of the NeoLemmix versions of official levels.

I have attached a zip of the current levelpacks, in the last version offered by namida. I am designating this version 0.1.0 going forward.

Please note that, for challenge purposes, this is a work in progress. I expect that I will only be making cosmetic changes that won't affect gameplay much, if at all. However, if using these levels for challenges, be aware that at the moment, I consider the packs to be a work in progress, and future changes may possibly invalidate results. When I consider the packs to be finished, I'll show that by moving the version number to 1.0.0.

Changes I definitely intend to make:

* Restoring the decorative terrain to "Call in the bomb squad" and "Save Me" (and maybe other levels, but these two stand out);
* Adding WillLem's conversions of the special graphics entrances/exits to the special graphics levels;
* Adding other official levels, where NL conversions exist (L2 Classic tribe, and NES/ZX Spectrum levels);
* Splitting the "Extra Levels" pack into separate packs for 2P, Genesis, PSP, and others.

I will also look through the packs to see if there are other changes that I feel need to be made, or changes namida has made that I disagree with If there are, I'll post about any changes I intend to make so that the community can give feedback.

TMChallenge is a pack that mobius and I made back in the Lemmix days, and was included in Nepster's updates of Lemmix packs to (old-formats) NL. Thanks to namida's new tool, I have converted the pack to new-formats at last.

I'm going to work on converting more of the packs from Nepster's topic, but there are a lot of levels, many of which I haven't seen or solved before, so please be patient -- it's going to be a long haul.

TMChallenge contains 10 levels, all taken from original Lemmings with exits (and sometimes trapdoors) moved into the decorative terrain. The original skillsets were unchanged, but (I believe) all levels are still solvable. The one level I haven't been able to confirm as solvable is "Forgive Me", which was originally intended to require steel glitches, but Clam was able to solve it (in Lemmix) without glitches, so this solution might work in NL. Please let me know if you are able to solve this level (Confirmed by namida -- thank you!)

As seen in Roundthewheel's LP of Lemmings Redux, part 32, at 11:32, he saved 15 on a level requiring 16/20, and got "A little more practice on the level is definitely recommended".

Being 1 short of the target should always give the "OH NO, So near and yet so far" failure message.

According to the NeoLemmix tutorials, "For the most part the priority is 'the later it is in the file, the higher priority it has', but there are a few special cases." Redux has the same postview.nxmi as Original Lemmings, in which the "OH NO" message is indeed later than "A little more practice...", so either something's up or else this is one of those "special cases". If the latter, could the tutorial explain the special cases so that I know how to fix the postview.nxmi file?

We have a separate discussion thread for each of the other skills under consideration, so the bazooker/mortar should have its own one as well

First, I want to list some of the decisions that could go one way or the other, so as to make clearer the range of possibilities we are talking about.

* The projectile could be fired horizontally (L2's Bazooker) or in an arc (L2's Mortar). Of course, we don't have to keep the L2 names in either case. The projectile could also be fired straight upwards or in a diagonal line, but I don't think those are under serious consideration; they seem to be strictly less versatile than either of the main options.

* For the Mortar, we'd have to decide on the size of its arc. Strato Incendus seems to envisage the Mortar having a Jumper-sized arc (roughly 18 pixels up, 36 across), but I think at minimum it should be double this, maybe even larger (such as 64/128). (Remember that skill shadows will aid with placement, so this should not be much of a consideration.) I don't know what the arc size is in L2.

* The explosion could kill zombies, or all lemmings. (The explosion having a flinging effect as in L2 is not under consideration.)

* The explosion crater could be differently shaped or sized, compared to the bomber's crater.

* The projectile itself, while in motion, is a unique object whose interactions should be considered. Does it explode when it hits a lemming or another projectile? Can it teleport? Does it bounce off one-way fields?

I want to talk about splat and danger hatches, but first let's be clear about terminology. By a "splat hatch" I mean one that's an unsafe distance above terrain so the lemmings immediately splat on landing, as in Bitter Lemming and Poor Wee Creatures. By a "danger hatch" I mean one above a deadly object (water, fire, or the bottom edge) so that its lemmings don't land on terrain at all. I am not considering levels like Mary Poppins' Land where the lemmings drop onto terrain above a deadly fall; these can be similar to splat hatch levels in many ways, but they are really a very different kettle of fish because it's usually possible to trap the crowd on the terrain while waiting for a landing platform to be ready.

The two types are very different in the original game, since a danger hatch must be rescued by a lemming from another hatch, but in NeoLemmix that's not true (gliders, swimmers if the hatch is above water) so a danger hatch can be approached like a splat hatch, as well as vice versa.

Before discussing these levels in general, I think it's helpful to consider the various possible types of level that can be made with these hatches. There are borderline cases, and maybe some types I haven't thought of, but I think they can be roughly classified as follows:

(1) No issue: You can make the hatch safe with a Stoner.

(2) Floater frenzy: You have enough floaters/gliders for every lemming.

(3) Fun-type level: You have lots of skills and a low save requirement. Usually, it's possible to save 100% by continually assigning floaters until a landing platform is ready, but you don't have to do this to pass the level.

(4) High save: The level is a puzzle where you have to work out how to build a landing platform in time, with a limited skillset. There is a high save requirement so you have to keep assigning floaters until the landing platform is ready.

(5) Low save: Also a puzzle level, but now you just get one or two floaters and have to allow lemmings to die until the landing platform is ready.

(6) Rescue by lemmings from another hatch: Almost always goes with the "low save" type.

(7) No Problemming: the splat/danger hatch is a red herring and all its lemmings should be allowed to die.

* * *

So, I want to ask: are splat and danger hatches always bad, or are some of the types acceptable? Which ones are sometimes bad or always bad?

When I was putting this list together, I thought the "no issue" type was rather pointless -- why not just put regular terrain and have one less Stoner? -- but I realised that the Stoner allows for some very interesting puzzles where you have to decide whether or not to use the Stoner in this way. Sure, that's a very powerful way to use it, but it's a very useful skill and you might need it elsewhere!

Levels where you just have to assign a lot of floaters/gliders are boring, and when you have to do that before starting the real puzzle (as on With a twist of lemming, please) then it's tedious busywork, but I don't think "floater frenzy" levels should be entirely dismissed. For one thing, it can make a difference which lemmings are assigned floaters and which gliders (or gliders versus swimmers with a hatch over water), so it could be part of a puzzle to work this out. When you assign the floaters/gliders can also make a difference.

The "low save" type (exemplified by classic levels like Poor Wee Creatures and No hurry, relax) is definitely my favourite, and for me, the strongest reason for accepting splat hatch levels as a valid part of the game. For one thing, it's a way to enforce getting a task done in time without using a time limit. I'm not dead against time limits like some people but a splat hatch is a cleaner enforcement mechanism because it measures speed in more discrete chunks, so you're never in the position of being just a few frames short. Also, being faster than required results in saving more lemmings, which is a lot more satisfying than just improving a time record.

This means I have to be okay with levels where a lot of lemmings die. (On original Lemmings, Poor Wee Creatures is the only level where more than 5 die in the max saved solution. Similarly, No hurry, relax has the highest loss on Genesis Lemmings.) For whatever reason, I have always been okay with that. Some lemmings dying to save others is just part of the game, so it isn't a big deal that some levels require more losses than others. Of course, while there are none in the original game, custom packs often include nuke levels, which tend to have much higher losses than splat hatch levels. (I don't like nuke levels much, just because except in the very simplest cases, you can never be sure when you've saved the maximum possible. With splat hatch levels, it's harder to be sure, but you can investigate through various possibilities, as we've done in the "skills you can't live without" challenge, and end up with a reasonably firm result.)

I was always under the impression that splat hatch levels were generally felt to be acceptable, but I have seen a bit of grumbling against them lately, so I felt I should ask: how does everyone else feel? (This is an issue of some importance to me, because in the reboot of GemLems, I intend to choose just 10 of the 20 skills as the skill pool for the entire pack. As I said in the "classic 10 skills" thread, floater would just edge a place on my top 10 skills, because it enables this type of puzzle. If they really are generally disliked, then I could change my mind about that.)

No, I'm not re-opening the rejected suggestion to combine multiple lemming types on one level. But with the recent explosion of variety of lemming (and lemmina) sprites available, it makes no sense to keep this chained to theme selection. Especially because that forces every lemming sprite type to be installed as a separate style.

This has happened to me a couple of times recently -- most recently on Lemmings Recurring, Fun 6. I completed the level, but the postview screen said "You rescued 99 / You needed 99 / Your record 0" (normally a successful completion would replace a previous record, so it should have said 99). NL didn't save a replay (I have automatic replay saving on), the level wasn't marked as complete nor the talisman as obtained. I later solved the same level again and everything was okay and it completed normally.

At the moment I don't know what triggers this bug, but I'll keep an eye out for if it happens again so that we can look for common features.