SEGA Master System level modifying

[Pooty]

Well it's about time there's a hard level on there.

But yeah, I was worried that might happen. There's a trick I use to assign tasks as soon as possible, and that's by holding the 2 button down before the lemming arrives. As soon as the lemming hits the crosshairs (or as soon as the lemming lands from a fall), you'll use whatever skill you've selected on him.

I've also updated the program to fix a bug that prevented grass-type levels from being converted.

[Edit] The steel digging bug doesn't work. The game refuses to edit tiles that are flagged as steel.

[Adam]

You use the same trick that I use, Pooty!

I'll upload the map files, if you like - <minirant> I can't really distribute the ROM because it's apparently illegal, even though a quick Google search gets you the ROM instantly, and I'm sure Sony aren't planning on raking in on the Master System port of Lemmings, but I don't want to get sued. </minirant>

Steel is indestructable on the Master System version - nothing can destroy it, although you *can* get trapped in it.

How are you finding the embedding of YouTube videos? All you need to do is link to a video and it becomes embedded.

[Adam]

I'm loving my double-posts tonight, but sometimes, they've gotta be done.

I've messed about with Save Me, and have found a pretty easy way to separate the Lemmings so the final part is easy. Unfortunately, the backroute over the water is going to eliminate a lot of the difficulty.

[ccexplore]

Given that some versions like the PC also has that kind of backroute (though obviously through different means), one can argue that it's not a big deal.  But if it is for you, I guess you can always kill it for sure by adding some steel blocks to completely block the way going left.

[Pooty]

Yeah. The only fix I can think of is getting rid of the water. It might make the level look a bit bland, though. :/

I've had a quick scan of the ROM, and the game seems to modify the following levels in some way. Hard to say what the changes are exactly until I investigate further. There may be one or two false alarms, and some levels could be missing, just to wind you (and me) up.

Fun 9, 15, 17, 20, 21, 26
Tricky 4, 7, 21, 25, 26, 28
Taxing 1, 2, 6, 7, 11, 12, 13, 21, 24, 29
Mayhem 3, 9, 12, 13, 18, 23, 26, 28

[Edit: Removed Mayhem 27.]
[Edit 2: Added Fun 9 and Tricky 26]

[Adam]

I'm pretty sure Fun 15, 17, 20, 21, 26; Tricky 25; Taxing 1, 2, 6, 11, 21; Mayhem 9, 12, 13, 18 and 26 are all trap modifications.

And, I think that Tricky 4, 21; Taxing 7; Mayhem 3 and 13 are all terrain modifications which are fairly well-known.

Tricky 7 and Taxing 11 shove the furthest right pillar further right by 1 tile.

Tricky 28 has no exit without the modifications.

Taxing 12 shoves the first block right by 1 tile.

Taxing 13 changes the terrain to the left of the one-way wall:


Taxing 24 reduces the three-tile gap between the steel before the exit and the platform above the exit to a one-tile gap.

Taxing 29 completely flattens the right-hand wall after the water.

Mayhem 28 modifies the terrain in three places:

[Pooty]

Nice work! 

I also noticed that Mayhem 23 moves the island the lemmings land on (after bashing through the long wall) to the right by two tiles.

Mayhem 27 was an accidental inclusion after I forgot to add the 1 to make it 28 (then I added Mayhem 28 after a double check >.<). That means all listed levels are accounted for.

[namida]

You can't dig if you're touching any part of a steel tile.

[ccexplore]

Still haven't downloaded SMS emulator/ROM yet, or even mappy (though I visited its webpage), but I did have a quick look at your program's readme etc.

Wow, you really mean it when you said tileset.  It's really just a set of the 8x8 tiles.   Makes it all the more amazing that Adam manages to put together so much so quickly (though I imagine Mappy probably has some features that really help in this regard, like cut and paste, and possibly creating "assemblies" of tiles so you can add something more akin to whole objects than individual tiles?)

One thought I have is that, if you can convert from mappy back to ROM format, seems like you should also be able to extract a level stored in ROM and convert it into mappy format?  Perhaps not a big deal right now, but it could be useful to be able to start in mappy with the map of an existing level, instead of from scratch.

[Pooty]

That's one way of doing it. Unfortunately, the Mappy binary exported format isn't suitable for importing back into Mappy. Daft, I know.

However, I've just realised that Mappy supports Lua scripts, so I'm going to write two functions for it; one to save the file into the format the Master System uses, and the other to load such files into Mappy. You'll still have to load the tileset image into Mappy, mind you, but that shouldn't be a problem.

So my current plan is to write the two functions out, update my program so that it can use these new files, and then extract the levels from the ROM. It should be done by the end of the day.

[Adam]

That's one way of doing it. Unfortunately, the Mappy binary exported format isn't suitable for importing back into Mappy. Daft, I know.

I'm able to import the binary files exported from Mappy. :\

[Pooty]

Oh right. When I try it, it appears all garbaged by shifting the tile numbers up by 1.

[Adam]

Oh right. When I try it, it appears all garbaged by shifting the tile numbers up by 1.

I import, then shift the values down by 1 - it's worked so far!

[Pooty]

Oh, I see what's happening. I have to import the tileset first before importing. Doing it the other way around produces unpredictable effects.

I've updated again. There's a new file format in use, called .mlm (Master [System] Lemmings Map). The data contained is exactly the same as the map data used in the game, making it easier to import and export maps.

Well, I say "easier", but there is some setup involved. The zip file contains two Lua scripts that you need to copy to the luascr folder where you installed Mappy. You then need to edit the MAPWIN.INI as described in the readme; or if you're feeling lazy, you can overwrite the original because I've included one in the zip file.

I'll begin extracting the map files from the ROM, and post them up as a separate download when they're ready.

[Adam]

Thanks Pooty!

On a slightly unrelated note.. I've just made a hideous looking conversion of Lemmings' Ark. I'll release this if there is demand, but I will warn you in advance, it will make you vomit whilst playing.