Hello all, I need a little bit of help.

[Belmont]

Hello all Lemmings lovers! I need some of your help!

I'm currently preparing a very special surprise for one of my side projects, I am a coder for a fighting game engine and I'm planning to add a surprise Lemmings level to one of my creations (it's weird, I know).

While I could choose an existing Lemmings level everyone could pretty much google for it and just find a solution, it wouldn't be fun.

Due to engine limitations I'd probably like to keep the MAX Lemming count to at least less than 10, so I don't eat too many resources when running the level.

My question is, what level would be perfect for the job? Something challenging, almost rage inducing but not impossible.

Maybe a challenge setup for a previous level?

I'm not a Lemmings expert, so I hope you guys can help me out!

I will show you all the result when it's done, of course.

[ccexplore]

Sounds like you either want a custom level that people can't easily google for solutions, or an official level with modifications to skills etc. so that it enforces a challenge solution instead of the regular solution.  And no more than 10 lemmings.

I dunno, I guess I can browse through existing custom levels, as well as the challenge threads on this board, and come up with a list of possibilities.  I'm not sure though whether challenge setups are appropriate for your situation, since if we're talking about a fighting game, we're not expecting a lot of Lemmings super-experts, so we probably don't want something too challenging.  There's also the fact that many challenge solutions posted on this board tend to rely on glitches, details of timing, and pixel precision that might not replicate in your own Lemmings game engine (in fact, some such solutions might not even work on a different official port of the game, like using Amiga Lemmings instead of DOS Lemmings).

[ccexplore]

Ok, here's one suggestion for you to consider.  Take level Taxing 18 from Lemmings (titled "Tribute to M.C. Escher"), and make the following stat changes:

- reduce number of lemmings to 10 (optional but that's what you want anyway)
- require 100% save (ie. no lemming can die)
- remove the 15 bombers given (optional since level now requires 100% anyway, but I'm guessing you won't mind not having to implement bombers)
- remove the basher (required to make the level challenging)
- if your game will display the name of the level, rename it to something else (optional, but makes sense to change the name as we're deviating from the original level anyhow)

The result is a pretty challenging level (especially compared with what you get from the official levels, even the ones rated "Mayhem") that nevertheless does not require glitches, timing nor super-pixel-precise moves to solve.  I've attached screenshots here showing what the solution looks like from start to finish.  PM me if there are still things about the solution that you still don't quite understand from looking at the screenshots alone.

Here are some cons I can think of for using this level:
  1) perhaps the solution is too challenging for the audience of your game?
  2) it's a little tedious (takes a bit of time) to execute, due to all that building you'll have to do
  3) it only features 2 skill types, builders and floaters.  But then again, that may be a pro since it also means you won't need to implement the other 6 skill types in your game.

[edit: in case you're worried about somebody stumbling onto this forum and therefore this post via Google, I can always remove the attachment with the screenshots from this post after you decide to take this suggested level for your game]

[ccexplore]

Another suggestion.  Take level Mayhem 17 ("Stepping Stones"), and change the level by, well, removing the two tiny rectangular pieces of terrain that are the stepping stones.  (For obvious reasons, together with the terrain change, you'll probably want to retitle the level as well, if it's going to be displayed in your game.)

The resulting level isn't that much more challenging (that is, it still feels like something that can reasonably belong in the Mayhem rating in the official Lemmings game), but the typical Googled solution most definitely no longer works.

Again, I think you really need to clarify on the kind of difficulty you are targeting for.  Now that you have two level suggestions, let us know if you want something as difficult as my Taxing 18 variation, or something more like the Mayhem 17 variation, or maybe something in between?