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Messages - kaywhyn

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1441
In Development / Re: Lemmings Open Air [117/120 levels completed]
« on: September 27, 2020, 02:40:56 AM »
Just writing to let you know that this is the very first time I have ever downloaded this pack, and so I can't confirm if the Burning the Witches level was missing before from the Heavy rank. It's there now, though. Love the level previews in your most recent post, I'm definitely hyped up and excited to try out this pack when I get to it AND when it's done ;)

1442
Confirmed. Now it's only this topic ;)

1443
NeoLemmix Main / Re: NeoLemmix Old Formats Installer Files?
« on: September 26, 2020, 06:43:04 PM »
Wow, talk about bad karma with being so close to finishing a level pack in development. What kind of laptop did you end up buying? What about your previous one? If you're not already doing it, I would also recommend getting an external hard drive and backing up your files to it in addition to backing up to Dropbox. At least in this way, the advantage is that no internet connection is required to access the backup files on the external hard drive. Nowadays, external hard drives tend to be quite cheap as compared in years before. If your budget can allow it, you can get an external SSD drive for faster backing up. I remember back in 2008 while I was in college my laptop had to be reformatted due to being infected by a virus, and I felt so glad that I had been backing up my files on a weekly basis and was able to restore all my files.

I think you're already getting the Old Formats NL versions correctly by downloading them from the NL website, as that is how I got v1.43 and v10.13 as well. I just checked my NL directories for both, and the other folders you mentioned, eg, sketches, gfx, etc, weren't included, just the .exe file. Still, the level packs loaded just fine, as long as the level pack and any associated styles and other relevant files were extracted to the right folders in the NL directory.

1444
Levels for v10 or older / Re: [NeoLemmix] Pit Lems
« on: September 26, 2020, 03:47:00 PM »
Yesum. And although I had Paralems replays turned green already from other peoples posted ones, I still downloaded yours and even watched your already too.

Cheers, sir! :thumbsup: No worries if you didn't, just that I know you love getting them from me. Since my replays are fresh and I can obviously verify they all work, a mass replay check isn't needed. The purpose of it is to simply and quickly verify which ones still work (passed), which ones broke (failed), and which ones may or may not have been broken (undetermined). 

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EDIT: And even when the Mass replay checker says they pass, I still have to watch them, because sometimes people(especially Joshcue18) never wants to Nuke his blocker if needed at the end of levels.
So if that happens I fix them so the blockers(or unsaved lemmings get nuked). Joshcue18 never seems to do this in any of his replays even for other packs. and it's annoying.

To be fair, nuking remaining lemmings at the end when the save requirement has been met or exceeded isn't necessary, especially since the main parts of the solution has already been seen, and so really nuking is simply at the player's discretion. If the replays work, then it doesn't matter if the person decides to nuke or not. Therefore, unless the nuke IS required in the solution (there are some great levels out there that require nuking as part of the solution), most of the time it isn't integral to the solution at all. Not to mention that it's always faster to simply exit the level via the esc key. I understand your frustration with those that don't nuke at the end, though, but it should just be a minor point. When it comes to nuking, it kind of grew out of habit for me. Especially since it's really fun to hear the "Oh no's" and the resulting popping explosion sound and see the resulting fireworks display on screen.


1445
Levels for v10 or older / Re: [NeoLemmix] Pit Lems
« on: September 26, 2020, 11:07:54 AM »
You're welcome. It's a much shorter pack and so I'm breezing through it rather quickly and might be able to finish it later on today despite how it's a lot harder than Paralems. I assume you also got my replays for that pack?

1446
Levels for v10 or older / Re: [NeoLemmix] Pit Lems
« on: September 26, 2020, 09:55:18 AM »
Just started playing this pack yesterday, and I managed to finish the first 3 ranks in about 3-4 hours. Instead of wait until I finish the pack first before sending replays, I'm going to send my replays now just because I don't want to waste 6 hours of my day writing feedback like I did with Paralems. So, here are my replays for the LOL, ROFL, and the WTF ranks.

My thoughts on the pack so far:

Wow, this pack is a lot better and considerably harder than Paralems, similar to how ONML is an expansion pack to the original Lemmings and is much harder. Just like nin10doadict said, Pit Lems immediately starts really hard, so that the LOL rank reminded me of the Basic rank of Lemmicks, where these two ranks are still no pushovers despite being the first ranks. However, Lemmicks was released after Pit Lems, and so the Basic rank was more well done, especially with the pre-texts. Here, the pre-texts are not as detailed, but being a way more puzzily pack than Paralems, I can understand why you did that. There were still occasional breather levels in the ranks, but for the most part the levels are quite challenging and difficult. The pack has definitely lived up to its expectations of being very fair with a lot of great puzzles that I absolutely enjoyed. So far, I haven't been bored or annoyed with the pack at all, both of which I found myself a lot with Paralems, so that's a really good sign that Pit Lems is considerably better than Paralems. Practically all the levels I have played so far have been quite excellent and have given me quite a good challenge in a really good way. Makes me all the more glad that I decided to take on the pack after all ;)

Now on to feedback for the individual ranks.

LOL rank (click to show/hide)


ROFL rank (click to show/hide)

WTF rank (click to show/hide)

Took me about 3 hours this time to write the feedback. That's about half the time it took me to write the feedback for Paralems, so it's certainly an improvement from sending just a few ranks this time as compared to waiting until I finish the pack before giving feedback. Perhaps I can cut down the time even more by not giving feedback for every single level, as you know I'm very detail-oriented, so even if I skip some feedback for some levels it's still going to take me a while.

2 ranks left, 40 levels to go! I'll likely be able to finish off the rest of the pack later on today Then that will make two packs of yours that I have finished within a week ;) 

1447
josh was one of the pre-testers of the pack, and they pretty much just PMed their solutions to Icho. In any case, it's quite easy to see why the update for Neutrality 17 was needed.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

As for your third set of replays, it's likely namida's.

1448
Thanks to Kaywhyn for giving me the zip file for this pack, which includes the styles and levels.

You're welcome.

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Finally, the reason I'm doing these conversions is so more packs for Superlemmini will be availiable for people to play as there were only limited amount of ones listed before.

So now we not only have original game packs and extra level ones(see my original game remakes in the "Levels for Other engines" to find them)
but also some more custom ones listed under Superlemmini's board(in addition to the one's that were already for Superlemmini(ie: Sublems, Colorful Arty's Reverse lemming,etc)
there are also now my conversion ones from Lemmini to Superlemmini(ie: Lemmings Reunion, Dovelems, Pimolems, Mobillems, Dodo's Special pack(cachapack, dodopack), and Franlems)

That's why I appreciate all the conversions you've done and so there's way more packs available for Superlemmini now :)

1449
Lemmini / Re: Turrican's Superlemmini projects
« on: September 25, 2020, 10:38:28 AM »
The reason that the replay broke in the non-fixed version of the level , is because the opening hatch was 1 pixel higher than it's intended position!

Interesting that that one pixel difference is enough to affect and break the replay. I'm guessing the skill assignments were therefore at least a frame too late then?

1450
Levels for v10 or older / Re: [NeoLemmix] Paralems
« on: September 25, 2020, 10:02:21 AM »
All rightie, as promised here is my entire set of replays for Paralems.

Remarks About the Pack

Overall, I didn't really feel any significant challenge with the pack, so it was definitely a nice break from all the very difficult levels I've been playing for the last several months. In particular, I felt no real challenge until I got to the Disgusting rank, although there was one pretty difficult level in the Disturbing rank, Disturbing 12 - We'll have to make up for those. Although the pack mostly strays away from the NL philosophy of being puzzly, there were definitely some really nice puzzles in each rank. I thought it was really cool revisiting some of the levels from the original Lemmings throughout the pack and having to solve them in a slightly different way with NL skills. Some of them were quite enjoyable, but others not so much or they didn't add much more of a challenge. Others I didn't enjoy as much. In particular, I thought I wouldn't mind the levels that had so much repetitive skill assigning. I was wrong. If anything, I found it very annoying to assign 40 or more of the same skill to each individual lemming. Yet, I endured all of these levels and made it through them.

There were some really nice looking levels in this pack. My favorite ones visually were Harmless 19 - Death Titan, Harmless 20 - Treasure Island, Disturbing 24 - Face the Hydra, Disgusting 18 - In Memory of Steve Irwin, and Demented 28 - Dark Fate of Atlantis.

Finally, I don't mind hidden traps in general, although here it was more of didn't mind at first, but after a certain point it was overdone to death and then I started getting annoyed. Even then, I assure you I didn't use CPM on any of the levels of this pack except for Demented 28, but only because I thought the exit trigger was busted when the lemmings wouldn't exit. Of course, you did warn in the release post that with "animals things aren't always what they appear to be," so to experience this and see if it can tick me off, I avoided using CPM in the pack. Luckily, it wasn't too bad, although probably the biggest reason I wasn't as annoyed with them is probably because I ended up backrouting some of them. Having only played through the entire pack once so far, I'll probably won't remember the majority of levels that have them.

Now feedback on the individual ranks. I'm going to follow a similar structure as I did when I gave you feedback for Lemmicks.

Harmless Rank (click to show/hide)

Disturbing Rank (click to show/hide)

Disgusting rank (click to show/hide)

Abhorrent rank (click to show/hide)

Demented rank (click to show/hide)

Wow, it took me a very long time to write all of this feedback, I beliee a total of 6 hours or more. I certainly have my detail-oriented mindset to blame, as well as how I had to take the time to look through the levels in the NL player and let some of the replays play out so that I can remember what I wanted to say/write. Not to mention that I decided to wait until I finished the entire pack before sending replays and my feedback. Well, I think when I do Pit Lems I'm going to avoid this by probably sending feedback after a rank or two rather than complete the pack first and doing what I did with Paralems.

Anyway, if you ever decide to look at my replays and feedback, I hope you find both useful. I'm definitely looking forward to your new packs.

1451
Level Design / Re: [DON'T] Binary win conditions
« on: September 24, 2020, 11:07:11 PM »
I don't necessarily think the first part is particularly special about you; that should be any Lemmings player's default state. :P At least particularly in NeoLemmix, where figuring out the puzzle usually is the sole challenge, and its practical implementation / execution is entirely non-challenging.

Watching replays, from a player's standpoint (not a level creator's standpoint), is really just for when you're absolutely stuck. Even then, I usually just watch up to a point where I can derive a first hint from the replay, and then stop watching so that I can still figure out the rest of it myself.

Ok, I agree with you about players using replays when they're stuck. However, what sets us even further apart is this: I don't watch replays, even when I'm stuck :P I only watch after I solve the level myself first, and so really at that point I'm simply comparing my solution to that of another player(s) or, if available, the intended solution from the pack author. Also, I prefer to not ask for hints if I can, but I have done that plenty of times for United. Even then, this is different, as the hints I've been given are vague enough so that they allow me to think and still allow me to figure out the solution for myself. This is exactly what I appreciate, as my system of giving hints to help other players is the same, as my goal is to help players improve their critical thinking and solving ability while preventing spoiling of one's enjoyment of figuring out the solution. With a replay, however, I can simply interrupt it or imitate where to place the skills to solve the level, which in my opinion isn't fun for me at all, as the solution has now been spoiled but in visual form, and I prefer the satisfaction of figuring out the solutions for myself. Thus, I don't ever watch replays to levels, even when I'm stuck. I only watch after I have solved the level to compare solutions.

It's like you said in your Paralems topic: "You can't un-see what you have seen."

1452
Lemmini / Re: Turrican's Superlemmini projects
« on: September 24, 2020, 08:17:44 PM »
I wasn't concerned about the ini file vs lvl file. Rather, what I was curious about was why the replay broke for you while it was fine for Turrican and me, especially since there seems to be no real reason that it should due to the levels looking exactly the same. It's probably due to assignments being assigned just a frame or a few too early or a frame or a few too late, or just how SL seems to interpret the files differently from one another and so it gets confused or something. In any case, my point about interrupting the replay to fix it still stands. You can let it run up to the the points where the replay appears to have messed up and then interrupt it so you can take control to fix it. The intended solution is still the same, as it's the exact same level regardless of file extension name.

1453
Level Design / Re: [DON'T] Binary win conditions
« on: September 24, 2020, 07:06:35 PM »
I've been noticing a pattern recently across various games that seems to spark frustration in players, both in me and others. Once I had become aware of this, I started thinking back whether I had encountered it in Lemmings level as well - and yes, I did. It just didn't occur to me back then that this design choice might be a general flaw, if not to say a cardinal sin of game design, instead of something specific to (custom) Lemmings packs.

Thus, most of my "ranting" in this thread will refer to other games than Lemmings ;) . And I'm not planning to hit on any specific custom level pack here. I'm just sure that we all can think of levels where we encountered this type of obstacle.

I'm talking about what I've heard being described as "binary win conditions".
A case in which the difference between success and failure comes down to a single aspect that also happens to be hard to control.
Consequently, the chance of hit or miss basically amounts to the toss of a coin. In other words: It's random. ;) As a result, frustration arises with both outcomes.
- In case of failure, the player is frustrated because they feel there is little they can control to improve the outcome. All they can do is try again and hope for the best.
- In case of success, the player can't really attribute it to their own skill, because (unless they're extremely lucky and succeed on the first attempt) through the previous failures they know the outcome is basically random. Meaning, they externalise their success as "I've just been lucky this time". They will be glad it's over, yes, but it's not something they will enjoy looking back on as a proud achievement.

This is interesting. Certainly I myself can think of several examples from video games other than Lemmings. The biggest offender to me that I'm also currently playing myself is Candy Crush Saga. Yes, I'm still playing it and I'm all caught up with the most recent episode releases. In the very recent episode releases, the levels themselves have been beyond frustrating due to absurdly low number of moves AND the random candy generator, where you have absolutely no control over what color candy will spawn to take the place of the candies that got removed through matching and setting off of special candies and hence the levels have felt extremely luck based rather than the player needs to rely on skill to pass them. Consequently, I think what King is really trying to do is make people buy boosters to pass the levels, but the thing about them is that even when you do have them, they're still no guarantee that you'll win the level. As a result, I have plenty of boosters all stocked up, mainly because I refuse to use any to pass them and will still sit through each level and fail them repeatedly until the game decides to be nice enough and allow me to pass.

Sounds just like how I am with Lemmings, where I'm willing to sit through long and difficult levels and solve them. Now you know why I don't like viewing solutions before I have solved the level myself first and how I just have a high level of patience when it comes to solving levels in Lemmings. ;)

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In original Lemmings, the classical example of a binary win condition is the aptly named Mayhem level "All or nothing":

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Partly correct. In Dos, it's not possible to select skills with the mouse while the game is paused, but you can still select skills via the F3 - F9 keys. Although, as you correctly stated, in this level you're only given bashers AND the RR is already 99, and so it's not possible to select anything else in the skill panel even with the Fn keys. And yea, at least much of the rage in the level is eliminated by how it's a very short level and is over quickly despite having to bash in the correct direction 3 times in a row.

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"I have a cunning plan" is the worse offender here, because it's really just about knowing or not knowing the trick. There is an alternative solution, the one that I've been using at a kid. But it basically just requires you to have knowledge of the "No added colours or Lemmings" trick at this earlier level, plus it's much harder to execute:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I too also used this solution as a kid. I don't think I used a pass-through blocker, though. Instead, I blocked the first lemming that came back to the left and then did the exact same thing as you did in releasing it, except this time I now have two lemmings to contend with to build and make them turn back towards to the exit. Also, from what I understand, the last lemming out is the one that gets prioritized when it comes to assigning a skill in the crowd, and so I think assigning a miner to release the blocker is all down to luck because there's still a lot of lemmings that need to come out of the entrance by the time it comes to releasing the blocker. Of course, nowadays you can make it easier by simply waiting for all lemmings to come out and then build with one of the last few lemmings to turn around. Or, just delay a few lemmings and simply let the first two bash. As others have mentioned, this level does a very poor job of requiring the builder wall, as well as no level in the game requires this trick. Now that I mentioned it, I'm not sure how I found out about this builder wall trick. Might had been a video I saw on Youtube, or, more likely, I probably just stumbled upon it by accident in a custom level by experimenting.

1454
NeoLemmix Levels / Re: [NeoLemmix] Lemmings Halloween 2017
« on: September 24, 2020, 01:53:25 PM »
Hey Ryemanni, I've noticed that the download link for this pack in the OP is broken. Would you by any chance have a working download link for it? I would like to download and play this pack, as it looks nice and pretty cool. If not, no worries.

1455
In Development / Re: Lemmings Open Air [111/120 levels completed]
« on: September 24, 2020, 10:37:05 AM »
Oh, really? ;) Thanks, maybe I've overread that. Especially because I didn't put too much effort into those particular levels ("Nuclear waste disposal" and "Reach for the stars"). Maybe the solutions you found to them were much better than the intended ones? :D

Just really good, easy puzzles with really nice solutions! Although, the former has a very precise stacker assignment, and the area around the exit can be quite fiddly as well.

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So you and kaywhyn are definitely going to be the first ones to receive the complete first draft of 120 levels once they are ready! :thumbsup: Let's see how far I can get this weekend...

Sounds good! :thumbsup:

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