New unofficial online Lemmings game...

[bombsite]

I've created a new online Lemmings game.  I was originally just going to post the original DHTML Lemmings on my website, but upon playing it and reading through the code I noticed there was an extremely large amount of bugs in it, and it went really slowly on my 8 year old computer, so I rewrote it.

I've added HTML5 audio, improved the speed and made the timer more accurate, added a leaderboard (must be logged in via Facebook to add your scores currently), fixed loads of bugs which made some levels impossible to complete, removed the need for level codes (it remembers what levels you've unlocked) and lots more which I can't think of at the moment!

It also features Tim Wright's original Amiga music, which I have his permission to use!

Please feel free to try it out at http://bombsite.org/jslems/ and let me know if any levels don't work as they should, or if there are any improvements you'd like to see.

[Ron_Stard]

It works fine and fluent  . But the Change Level button seems to not work properly, and I have some confusion about which task is selected. And in Level 8, the shelter seems to be affected by excavations. I would also suggest the possibility of activate the Pause with keyboard, and allow to select tasks within Pause time. But the rest of the game I have tested seems to work OK. 

[bombsite]

Thanks for the feedback Ron.  In what way does the Change Level button not work for you?  Is it an intermittent problem?

When you select a task the background turns light green - is this happening in your browser?  Should I change the highlight colour?

I'm currently working on that level 8 issue.

You can now activate pause by pressing 'p' as in the original Lemmings game, and you can now select tasks whilst paused.

Keep the suggestions coming!

[DragonsLover]

Wow! Nice job here! However:

- Pressing "Esc" causes all object animations to freeze and if we select "Pause", all object animations are still animating.
- Also, I was wondering, why not using the official Lemmings sound effects? I'm talking about these on the Amiga or on the Windows version.
- I got a problem on Level 9: if you somewhat miss to give a Basher to the first lemming, it becomes almost impossible to make a right-way Lemming to bash through the column in the crowd.
- The digger animation is a bit weird as he moves sideways while digging.
- Changing release rate can causes weird release rate speed
- The "3 last blocks" sound effect of a builder plays a bit too early.
- I got a builder to build over another Lemmings stair and he turned around instead of keeping building up.
- At a few occasions, you think you have clicked on a Lemming, when it's not.
- Basher keeps bashing the first row of pixels on the floor while the others above are free.
- A splatting Lemming will blow up if the bomber counter comes to 0.
- You cannot increase or decrease release rate while paused.

Keep up the great work!

[bombsite]

Thanks DragonsLover.  Your suggestions will take a bit longer to implement than Ron_Stard's, but I'll try my best!

1. That's a common problem with animated GIFs, but pressing ESC should only freeze the animations if they haven't fully downloaded yet.   I was thinking of changing the way the animations are done as animated GIFs don't work on all platforms.  I'll keep you posted!
2. Well, I have got the Windows SFX, but I wanted to keep the number of copyrighted elements to a minimum so I created my own!  I've got permission from Tim Wright to use the music, but he didn't do the SFX unfortunately.
3. Like in the original game, you can make sure you're selecting a right-facing Lemming by holding down the right arrow key whilst hovering over the Lemmings.
4. Yes, the digger animation was a bit weird!  It's fixed now.
5. I tried to get the release rate matched to that of the real game - is there a specific level where you noticed this?
6. The 'last 3 blocks' sound effect seems to be exactly on cue on my computer - what browser are you using?
7. I'll look into the builder problem - probably just over-zealous collision detection!
8. There is now a short sound to confirm you have clicked on a Lemming.
9. Again, collision detection!  I'll look into it.
10. What level did you manage to do this on, so I can try and replicate it?
11. You can now change release rate when the game is paused!

[Ron_Stard]

Thanks for the feedback Ron.  In what way does the Change Level button not work for you?  Is it an intermittent problem?

When you select a task the background turns light green - is this happening in your browser?  Should I change the highlight colour?

I'm currently working on that level 8 issue.

You can now activate pause by pressing 'p' as in the original Lemmings game, and you can now select tasks whilst paused.

Keep the suggestions coming!

Thank you for the improvements! My major complain about selection is that in the task bar there are both concave and convex icons, and they don't change its form, being selected or not. I think they all should be convex; the green colour is a nice idea, but the convex/concave sutff I have mention can easily confuse the players (or at least, it confuses me).

About the Change Level, well, it doesn't show a list of levels, allowing you to choose wathever you want. instead, it takes you to play the same level you were playing.

I have detected another bug: when a lemming walks by a bridge, and you order him to build over that bridge, he hardly can pile one or two blocks, and then he turn back, due to collision against the blocks of the bridge already built.

Oh, and another suggestion: to control the release rate with the + & - keys, just like in MS-DOS (sorry, I'm a nostalgic =))

Nice work, keep it up!

[bombsite]

You can now control the release with + and - on the numeric keypad 

I see what you mean about the icons, I'll get those fixed shortly.

I'm looking into that bridge bug at the moment - seems to be some over-zealous collision detection!

[Clam]

Good effort! I noticed a few bugs that haven't been mentioned yet:

- Can't assign climbers or bombers to falling lemmings
- There doesn't seem to be a quick way to restart a level. Nuking is a bit slow for my liking
- Directional select isn't working for me (making Fun 9 difficult as mentioned above)
- Lemmings mine/bash too far into steel. Lemmings walking into partly destroyed steel seem to walk on it as if the steel was still there, instead of following the apparent shape of the terrain.

[bombsite]

Thanks Clam Spammer!

You can now no longer assign anything to falling lemmings (as per the Windows version of the game).

Re directional select, when you press the left or right arrow keys whilst hovering over a group of lemmings, does an arrow appear above the target/crosshair?

I've just made it so if you double-click the nuke icon when it's already selected it will end the game straight away, although I think I'll make it so that triple-clicking will have the same effect.

I'm looking into the 'hole making' function - it amends the actual level map in the correct way, it just occasionally displays it inaccurately!

[ccexplore]

You can now no longer assign anything to falling lemmings (as per the Windows version of the game).

Wait, did I read the above correctly?  I didn't realize the Windows version is this retarded.  I'm not aware of any other versions where you can't assign climbers or bombers to falling lemmings, and certainly not being able to assign floaters to falling lemmings would be ridiculous since some levels depend on it (eg. the fall off the starting entrance is already fatal).

I'm not at home right now but I'm definitely going to see if I can verify your claim above about the Windows version, it's pretty shocking to me.

[ccexplore]

My brief adventure with your game so far came to an unexpected halt at Fun 5.  I'm not sure what happened, but while nuking after getting enough lemmings into the exit, I somehow got the game into a berserk state where number of lemmings out decrements continuously below 0 and into negative.  It keeps going until all lemmings have exited, at which point the level does not exit however.  So I wait until the timer reaches 0:00, but even after that, the level still doesn't exit.  Now I think I'm stuck. [edit: I guess I can just refresh the page, although now I have to replay that level again.  Maybe later tonight.]

I was clicking on the nuke button quite a bit, and the game may or may not be on fast forward when I was nuking, unfortunately I don't remember precisely what happened and can't guarantee you'll get same results or not.

[edit: additional note of interest--come to think of it, I don't think I remember (not 100% sure though) seeing any of the lemmings actually exploding after repeated clicking of nuke button.  I think something went very very wrong in the game when I attempted to nuke]

See attached screenshot.

Pretty fun though otherwise, although I need to try it out on a browser that has better HTML5/js support, or a faster machine to begin with.

[finlay]

The sounds are very annoying, particularly the little screaming noise they make when they're exiting the level, and the release rate is all wrong – they're far too far apart for a 50 release rate in the first couple of levels.

Also, trying to integrate facebook is the most annoying thing ever in the entire world.

And on the level info/select screen, instead of "Click here to play", it should really be click anywhere to play. Mainly this is because my instinctive reaction is to click on the thumbnail of the level, and when this doesn't work I get confused.

Levels 4 and 5 are missing some terrain pieces, incidentally; the water on level 4 just cuts out in mid air...

And yeah, not being able to assign climber, floater and bomber during a fall is quite a serious omission and is guaranteed not the way it is on the Windows version given that, as the others say, some levels such as Tricky 12 require you to assign floaters to lemmings falling out of the trapdoor. A famous Lemmings trick is to assign a floater close to the floor in order to speed up a fall (because floaters fall slower than fallers) but still be able to land safely.

As for selection criteria, the most basic one that you should get into the program is that the lemming who was released most recently from the trapdoor is selected first – this will solve the Fun 9 problem for example. Another problem I found while doing Fun 9 is that I couldn't select a digger over the same spot as a blocker, but that's a bit of a niche problem, perhaps.

And as for the trapdoor, what happened to "Let's go!" and the trapdoor opening at the beginning of the level? 

(But I think it's cool that you've done this, at least! I'm just being nitpicky really...)

[ccexplore]

Mainly this is because my instinctive reaction is to click on the thumbnail of the level, and when this doesn't work I get confused.

Just so you know, I hit the exact same thing you did when I started playing for very first time.   Took me a while too to figure out the "click here to play" link.  Would be better if it actually looks like a typical link on the webpage.  But yeah, click anywhere would be preferable and closer to how it is in most ports of Lemmings.

As for facebook integration, I'm not crazy about it but I don't care too much one way or another.  I have sounds turned off because I'm not at home.

[ccexplore]

I hit this in Fun 3 with blockers not quite working as expected.

I first set the left one at the bottom, when that didn't do it, I tried setting another one to the right of it.  I know that doesn't actually help me solve the level but I did at least expected the remaining lemmings to be trapped between those 2, but they actually walk through both of them which is certainly not what I expected.

Then again, no idea what the Windows behavior is for blockers.  In DOS you can't even overlap blockers but I think (?) you can in Windows, so I expect you could run into more unexpected behaviors with Windows behavior for blockers.  Still, the blockers don't look like they were overlapping in this particular case anyway.

==============

I also hit the "negative number of lemmings" issue again while playing Fun 3.  I still can't repro it consistently but since I've hit it twice within the hour, it shouldn't be that hard to repro.  Try some combination of the following:

1) set RR to 99
2) turn on FF
3) click on the nuke button many times quickly, especially while the closely spaced RR-99 stream of lemmings have started going into the exit

[bombsite]

Thanks for the feedback everyone.  Yes, you're right, you can assign tasks to fallers in the Windows version - I just tried it again and it works.  I did have to click a few times to get the task to assign correctly though (maybe my computer's just slow?!).  This has now been put back into my version.

I think I've fixed the nuke/negative number of lemmings bug - let me know if anyone manages to replicate it again.

I decided to add the option for FB integration so I didn't have to create a login system, and also to make it easier to share the game with friends.  It is entirely optional though.

I have now included the sound effects from the Windows version.

I've improved the release rate algorithm to match that of the Windows version (this is the version I'm basing this on: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dice-8715686005134-Lemmings-for-Windows/dp/B00005Q5EY/ref=dp_cp_ob_vg_h__title_1)