I'm making progress in fixing the first batch of backroutes for the Gold and Platinum rank - only a few more Platinum levels left to go before I can send another version to kaywhyn.

So far, the levels didn't turn out as backroute-prone as I feared - and for the few glaring ones I left open, the fixes were usually the easiest (just some extra steel / one-way arrows). For one particular level, a trap did the trick by blocking off a route. Since this was a Shadow level, I didn't want to use one of the standard L2 Shadow stompers here (the ones with the red exclamation marks), since the top part always looks like a walkable steel square. Normally, these traps go on top of terrain - having one just by itself, without actual steel under the red exclamation mark, would be confusing. Hence, I went with the red-eyes trap from L2 Cavelem instead, which does seem to go along with the L2 Shadow tileset quite nicely.

Ghosts could be assigned skills in 1.43, otherwise they would have been pretty useless.

I agree that pre-placed invincible lemmings should be possible. The closest thing we have to an invincible lemming thus far is the Disarmer - specifically, a multi-athlete that can survive falls (Floater / Glider / Slider) and can survive traps by being a Disarmer. This is a commonly required setup for any level where you want to force the player to get a specific lemming from A to B:

If the required skills are available on the panel or as pickup skills, it's easy to circumvent the intended solution by just having a different lemming do the job.
However, if the required skills (in this case, invincibility) exist only one one specific lemming from the beginning of the level, this can be vital for enforcing solutions which would otherwise be impossible to enforce (=always result in backroutes).

Neat! I somehow remember the "R" icon that grows and shrinks, but I don't know from where. Was that a SuperLemmix feature? Or from SuperLemmini?

Also, I see you were having fun toying around with the new skills on "The Grand Puzzle" from Lemmings World Tour... (I assume you took the level file from the unofficial conversion by jkapp, since there is no official release for SuperLemmix yet...)

Yes, I've just stopped after 5 levels so far, due to the anticipation of changing physics. For example, I just noticed one of my replays broke due to the introduction of the "Looker / Dangler" state for the Slider. (No problem, I just had to redo the last two assignments - a Basher was now being assigned slightly too late, only after a lemming had turned around.)

As long as only few levels are affected, these things are easy fixes; they become much more annoying however if they need to applied to an entire pack retro-actively.

Hence, I'll continue to focus on NeoLemmix for the time being - specifically, Lemmings: Hall of Fame. The successor to that (working title "Lemmings Band Camp") will then be started officially once you announce a somewhat stable state for SuperLemmix.

In the meantime, feel free to try out different physics for whatever you like. For blocking Swimmers, for example, I can imagine lots of potential uses - also lots of potential backroutes for existing levels.

This is where I agree that, especially when it comes to the development of a new engine, existing levels should receive a lower priority. Since what's possible in the future shouldn't be hindered by what has been done in the past, especially if the primary argument for the past behaviour is just "this is the way we've always done things, now it's too late to change it". Such as the Stoner being a suboptimal skill when compared to the Freezer. (Added side benefit, "Slowfreeze" in SuperLemmix makes much more sense when it actually turns the lemming into a Freezer, rather than a Stoner ).
So I guess Nepster's statement that existing levels were flat-out "unimportant" came off as just a little too radical, since it implies the relevance of existing content is 0, rather than, say, 50% to 70% of the relevance of potential new packs, which would then be created specifically for SuperLemmix.

QuoteSo, my current stance is still to prioritise ideas and development, but take each idea on its own merit in terms of how much it might impact existing content. With something like culling an existing feature, if I get even a small amount of pushback I won't go ahead with it.

Sounds reasonable. The primary thing that will take time when converting any pack from NeoLemmix to SuperLemmix is checking any instaces of Stoners in the NL version, and recreating the solution with Freezers.

The Freezer is a perfect example - because while I ultimately agree it's the superior skill to the Stoner, it's specifically a challenge for pack conversion from NL to SLX (especially for levels involving Stoner-Stacker interactions, which are not possible with the Freezer - rather than the more "standard" application of using a Stoner/Freezer to break a fall, which works pretty much the same way).

QuoteI feel object removal is gonna require telling that you can't convert levels from NLX to SLX, Since a few of those objects were in Neolemmix for years already, and I feel if you wanted to keep NLX to SLX conversion, you're gonna have to keep those objects. If you want to remove any of those, just say that NLX conversion will no longer be supported due to many factors breaking levels.

This. I can understand the thought process on a theoretical level — but in practice, it reminds me of the discussion we had about culling the Fencer, due to the Laserer supposedly being able to replace it.

But I'm glad to hear you, WillLem, immediately accepted GigaLem's comment and Splitters and Teleporters appear to be safe now.

If player criticism had always been heard this readily, perhaps Radiation and Slowfreeze would never have been culled from NeoLemmix in the first place — which would have saved everyone the effort of re-implementing them (you on the programming side, and level designers from adjusting their levels again during conversion from NL to SLX). Especially now that WillLem has also taken over some responsibility for NeoLemmix, as far as I've understood it?



WillLem wasn't here during the Culling Frenzy, but that memory is a reason why I continue to be this allergic against any proposition of culls. To relate this to GigaLem's comment, back during the Culling Frenzy, the developer literally said: "Existing levels are unimportant".

One of the statements which got the strongest backlash. Because at least when it comes to changes from NeoLemmix to SuperLemmix, they would only hinder conversion, but the NeoLemmix levels would remain intact.

Within NeoLemmix itself, however, culls would render existing levels unplayable — unless the pack creator stuck to Old Formats. Which is precisely what I did for a long time, and presumably also why quite a few other NeoLemmix packs, including highlights like Lemmings Stampede, remain unconverted to this day. (Unless somebody has taken it upon them to convert these packs recently, without me being aware of it... )

Not necessarily because of Radiation and Slowfreeze themselves — rather, I assume it was because of the uncertainty about what would happen to NeoLemmix. And now, with several versions of New Formats in between, and conversion of Old Formats levels being difficult to impossible without going through multiple interim versions of New Formats, the likelihood of seeing some of these Old-Formats packs converted seems to decrease by the day.

In short: I'm glad I converted Lemmings World Tour to New Formats when I did — and saved all the levels required for Pit Lems Remastered when I did. Even though I still haven't had the time to adapt the latter into a releasable state.


As for backgrounds, I hope these remain available as they are - I haven't experimented with "paint" or any other such features yet. The thing about backgrounds is that not only do some packs rely on them for aesthetics; some tilesets actually rely on backgrounds to be functional. For example, L2 Shadow (which is a nightmare to use in Very-Old Formats 1.43, where the background was the standard black, rather than the dark blue from L2) or Arty's Silhouette tileset.

The latter I intentionally put against a black background for a somewhat troll-y tutorial level in Lemmings, Drugs, and Rock 'n Roll, which is supposed to teach you about clear-physics mode and thus, much like the levels for Highlight Lemming or Virtual Lemming in Lemmings 3D, forces you to use clear-physics mode by making the terrain invisible against the background.

I am planning to eventually create a pack similar to Lemmings: Hall of Fame, given all the SuperLemmix features that would allow me to make such a pack even more similar to Lemmings 2: The Tribes. Most notably, the Spearer and Grenader skills.

However, of course I should prioritise releasing Lemmings: Hall of Fame for NeoLemmix itself.

Once SuperLemmix reaches a stable version, with the stream of new features slowing down a bit, I could continue working on the conversion of Lemmings World Tour. I think I stopped somewhere on the Professional rank, when WillLem warned that some skill behaviours might still change (e.g., the ability to assign Blockers to Swimmers was being discussed back then — I don't know if that's still a thing at the moment or not. I admit I kind of lost track, since I haven't been on the forums a lot lately, and it seems like a bunch of new features are being introduced in parallel... ).

Reminds me of the joke skill I once suggested called "The Tank". Basically a combination of things that were last seen in NeoLemmix 1.43: Ghosts (ignoring objects) and non-lethal Bombers; I think I also recall an "Invincibility" gimmick that had many of these effects (for example, as far as I recall, it also made Stoners non-lethal, i.e. would now apply to Freezers). I'm not sure, though, since I didn't dedicate an entire rank in "Lemmicks" to the Invincibility gimmick, but only a few levels on the Bedlam rank.

QuoteThis will probably give him good reason to check my Lemmings: Hall of Fame replays for the final two ranks, as the plan is for me to do a few more rounds of resolving before he releases the pack sometime later in the year.

I just thought of that today on my way home, hoping the Easter break will finally give me the time to.

Me thinking of this as Swerdis started playing Lemmings Open Air is just coincidence, though.

I don't think there should be a transition animation , and I also don't think Lemmings 2 ever had one. The Shimmiers just transition into Climbers right away. Hence, there are also no sprites for such a state.

If it's already in the stable version as it is, and there's never been a precedent for such a transition state (from Lemmings 2 or otherwise), this sounds like needless extra work for everyone (you, level creators, and players for having their replays broken).

Yes, they were never removed from the Old-Formats version. "Pit Lems Remastered" will eventually come out for New Formats, all the levels that are supposed to go in it have been converted to New Formats a long time ago. I just haven't gotten down to adapting the solutions for the levels with Radiation and Slowfreeze to New Formats yet.

For SuperLemmix, however, I have already re-added Radiation and Slowfreeze to these select few levels, taking the New-Formats conversions as a basis, and then placing the objects in the required spots. My replays are from a time period when the countdown for Radiation and Slowfreeze in SuperLemmix was still at 10, though, so I may have to redo them - which can be somewhat annoying, with execution-heavy tools like Radiation and Slowfreeze. Unless of course resetting the countdown to 9 may now allow me to run my original Old-Formats replays on these SuperLemmix levels. I haven't tried that out yet.

Thanks, @kaywhyn! I'll try to at least take a look at your replays soon.

So, in case anyone is wondering what's going on with Lemmings: Hall of Fame, I'm currently in the process of moving house, but more in a "piece-by-piece" manner that will likely take until March.
@kaywhyn, I haven't forgotten about your replays. I'm just mainly spending my weekends setting up furniture at the moment.
I'll try to watch them all soon, but it will take a while until I have the time to edit the levels of the final two ranks accordingly.

Lemmings: Hall of Fame will still happen, but most likely later this year. I was shooting for a release at the beginning of the year; but then, I found the new apartment in autumn, and have only had access to it since once week before Christmas. March is when the living-room furniture arrives, so at that point it will be a lot more hospitable.

QuoteRadiation lems will have a red countdown, Slowfreeze lems will have a blue countdown.

Nice, simple, and straightforward idea! Had never thought of that before.

Now I have to edit my World-Tour levels back to the 9-seconds countdown, after already having adapted two to the 10-seconds countdown. But it will be worth it in the end, because they will finally be consistent with the Old-Formats version again.

Quote from: WillLem on November 29, 2023, 10:23:10 PM

Quote from: Strato Incendus on November 29, 2023, 09:14:11 PM
I just noticed something that I hadn't realised during testing of SuperLemmix 2.6 - because the release candidate didn't come with all the styles, there was one L2 Space level I had created earlier which I couldn't open in the RC version yet.

You could always have added it to the styles yourself for testing purposes

I wasn't sure whether the styles from 2.5 would still be compatible with 2.6.
Also, namida once deliberately omitted the majority of the styles for a release candidate, to disincentivise people from creating level packs for non-stable versions of NeoLemmix.

Quote from: WillLem

Quote from: Strato Incendus on November 29, 2023, 09:14:11 PM
a sloped ceiling, like the 45° angle created by the Laserer, obviously only has one pixel at the top

What do you mean by "at the top" here? Can you provide a visual example? It would make discussion of this somewhat easier, as I'm not 100% sure what the issue is here.

All I meant is that Laserers created 45-degree slopes, too. Thus, if you laser through a rectangular block of terrain, the ceiling of the Laserer tunnel will always end in a triangle, just like the triangular slopes from any of the polygon-based Lemmings 2: The Tribes tilesets.

Quote from: WillLem

Quote from: Strato Incendus on November 29, 2023, 09:14:11 PM
A Shimmier will only transition into a Climber (and turn around in the process) if, at the end of the shimmy-able celing, there is a straight wall above it of at least two pixels.

Correct, well spotted. This is so that Shimmiers don't immediately transition to Climbers when Shimmying up a 45-degree tunnel.

Ah, that was the information I needed, thanks a lot! This makes perfect sense, and even suggests there is no other way of doing this.
Otherwise, the Shimmier would turn around on each pixel of a 45-degree tunnel.

I guess the reason this doesn't come up in Lemmings 2: The Tribes is because Shimmiers there can't shimmy up 45-degree ceilings to begin with; instead, that is the Rock Climber's purpose. A Shimmier who is also a Rock Climber will probably turn around immediately upon encountering a 45-degree ceiling in Lemmings 2: The Tribes — if that slope points upwards. If the slope is tilted downwards, an L2 Shimmier will probably just fall down.

But I haven't tried this out yet in the Lemmings 2 engine; if I recall correctly, it's not too easy to find a spot in any of the four practice levels where one could try out this specific sequence of skills. (I remember toying around in the Egyptian practice level, trying to test out all of these interactions; but it's hard to find a suitable spot, and secondly, get a lemming to that spot, too.)