Lemmings Plus IV - Development Topic (Release in ~5 minutes!)

[namida]

The only object types used that haven't been used before (either due to being Cheapo conversions or entirely new) are the moving backgrounds, single-use traps, splat pads and antisplat pads. There's also no slowfreeze (but there are radiation objects in two graphic sets). Of course, if I come up with a level design that would need slowfreeze, there's no reason I can't add it to one of the graphic sets. I may also consider adding a few more object types to some graphic sets before releasing them for general use, even if I don't use them myself. (They already all contain secret level triggers, even though I don't plan to make use of them.)

[namida]

So, unless I do come up with another idea for a VGASPEC, as well as a sufficiently challenging level to go with it, it looks like we're done for VGASPECs (as I mentioned before; Insane probably won't have one. However, if I come up with another one that's at least Twisted-worthy, the current Twisted one could be worthy of a position in early-Insane if I put it between two hard levels; and VGASPEC levels have generally been easier than others around them anyway). But I did decide in the end to give them custom musics.

The latest one re-uses a trick that appeared in one of the Moonwalk levels of LPIII Bonus Pack; I quite like this trick and those who don't like (or couldn't solve) gimmick levels won't have seen it there, so now it's being used in a non-gimmick level. Slightly different execution, of course; but the same basic idea. (The trick isn't the whole level; just a small part of it.)

[namida]

After more consideration, I did decide to move the Twisted VGASPEC level to Insane. Not so much because of it itself; but because the Bumpy one I felt was too hard for Bumpy, so I moved that to Twisted. The one that was in Twisted is still harder, so moving it to Bumpy wouldn't've made much sense, thus it ended up in Insane. So, end result; every rank will have one, and Bumpy doesn't have one yet. Also, Bumpy's fallen back below the 15-levels-complete mark, while Insane is now a level closer to completion (and packs always seem to come along faster when the later ranks are more complete ).

Interestingly, both Twisted and Insane's VGASPEC levels are at the same level number. No, they're not. My bad; I was confusing where one used to be with where it is now.

As a point of interest, the current unfilled level slots now are:
Smooth: 3, 6, 9, 13, 16
Bumpy: 2, 5, 11, 12, 14, 17
Twisted: 9, 17
Insane: 10, 12, 15, 17

Current graphic set counts are:
Candy: 16
Space: 17
Clockwork: 15
Wasteland: 15

Of the VGASPEC levels so far, two use the Wasteland graphic set for objects, while one uses Clockwork. Wouldn't be able to say what the fourth is going to use, though it will most likely be one of those two (due to their smaller exits than Space and Candy). The once-per-rank level is a Space level, which may be one reason why it's in the lead.

Aside from those unfilled level slots, there are currently two three levels that have backroutes I'm aware of, both of which are in Insane; as well as one minor graphical issue on one level (also in Insane). There's one further Insane level where I found a different solution from my intended one, but I feel it's similar in complexity so I'm happy to keep both provided no other backroutes show up that can't be fixed without also breaking the second solution here.

[namida]

Just like to put out the call for those who are interested in pre-release testing again. I'll go through my PMs to double-check if I've forgotten any, but off the top of my head, I remember two people offering. While obviously that's better than zero - and both have tested past packs of mine so I know they do a great job - it'd be nice to have more. Drop me a PM, or post here, if you're interested. I would actually like, if possible, to get at least one person who hasn't tested any past Lemmings Plus packs, to see if their approaches and/or opinions on difficulty differ from those who are more used to my style of level design.

If you're wondering what'd be involved, it's basically that I ask you to play part of the game (generally, one difficulty rank, or possibly the second half of one rank and the first half of the following one), and send me replays of your solution (or best attempt) at each level, as well as some feedback on how difficult you found each level. Of course, you're perfectly welcome to play other parts of the game too, so in some ways one benefit is getting earlier access than everyone else.

[namida]

So, here's a level I just made for late-Insane. Those of you who are fairly familiar with the previous Lemmings Plus packs might be able to guess the stats and skillset for this one.

EDIT: So, we're now at the point where Twisted is only one level away from completion. Always problematic when the second-highest rank is the one that gets finished first, because that means I've now got to try and make all levels either ultra-hard or a bit on the easy side. As a saving grace, there are a few levels in Twisted that could go either way, so can always be bumped up to Insane if I make another level that clearly belongs in Twisted and nowhere else. (This would require moving some of the early-Insane levels to later in the rank most likely, but likewise, there's a few there that could possibly be moved to a later position if need be.)

EDIT: Also, past the 90% mark now!!! Came up with another Insane level. One more Twisted and two more Insane to go, then it's just easy / semi-easy levels (which aren't too difficult to make). And, one more VGASPEC level, since I still don't have one for Bumpy...

One thing that does bother me a bit is that out of the entire pack so far, there's only a single level that uses the Disarmer (formerly Mechanic) skill, and it's very close to the end... :/ I guess I'll have to come up with a few more levels using it; I don't want to have it in just a single level, but even more so I don't want to get rid of that level as IMO it's one of the best levels in the pack, and it would not work at all without the Disarmer.

[GigaLem]

so whats this "Testers wanted" thing about?

[namida]

It's explained literally two posts above your message...

[namida]

So, I've kept count of the graphic set usage across the whole game for quite a while now, but I only just now checked their usage within each rank seperately. Turns out that so far, Smooth and Insane are fairly balanced, while Twisted is a bit skewed against the Candy set, and Bumpy has almost as many Candy levels as every other graphic set combined. O_O Overall for the whole game, at this point there's 18 levels in each graphic set, except for Wasteland which has 16.

Anyway, at this point, it looks like the testing phase will begin within the next day or two. Only need one more level each for Twisted and Insane now (of which I have an idea for the Insane one, and if nessecary, a level in Bumpy that can be moved to Twisted, so less pressure to make a hard one), then all that's left is filling out the lower ranks, plus a couple of fixes to backroutes I'm aware of.

EDIT: AAAAND Insane is complete!

Also, I've got four people who've offered to test, which I think will be enough.

EDIT: Twisted is now finished too, and Bumpy is only one level away from being finished. Still need 4 more for Smooth, but I can easily pump out 4 lowest-difficulty levels in virtually no time at all.

[namida]

AAAND development is finished!

The four volunteers for testing have now been sent the test copy of LPIV, and the testing phase has officially begun! Of course I'll be testing levels throughout this time too; on top of that I do still have to come up with talismans for LPIV.

I still won't set a release date at this point (apart from "pretty soon"), since there was quite some variation in the testing phases for previous packs - LPIII's was fairly short, while LP Omega's lasted quite a while IIRC. But yes - for those who volunteered for testing, check your PMs for your copies of the game, and for everyone else, it's not long to go now! While you're waiting, if you haven't played Lemmings Plus recently, why not refresh yourself on my level design tactics by playing Lemmings Plus Flashbacks? (A small collection pack of 32 of the best levels from LPI, LPII and LPIII). It's also worth noting that LPIV does use the new NeoLemmix skills, so if you're not familiar with them, you may want to play through the NeoLemmix Skills Tutorial Pack (a NeoCustLemmix level pack) and/or the first 7 levels of Lemmings Plus Omega to familiarize yourself with them.

I've put up a poll to ask which graphic set people would like to have released next (for general use by anyone). I'll release the winning graphic set for NeoLemmix Editor / NeoCustLemmix at the same time that LPIV is publicly released. The other two will come a bit later.

Look through the topic if you'd like to see what they're like. From my understanding, the general consensus is that Clockwork is the most popular in terms of visuals, but the Wasteland has a few object types that are new (Space also has one new object type, but it's purely decorative). But, we'll let the poll decide which one comes out.

[namida]

Some updates on how it's going -

So far, I haven't fixed any levels. A bit busy this week; I've been able to view the replays and give feedback but haven't got around to doing fixes yet.

Backroutes have been found in a total of 25 levels so far. Of these, 5 have multiple backroutes. One further one has one definite backroute and one solution I'm undecided about fixing. Apart from these 25, there's one more level that has a solution I'm undecided about. The only level that hasn't yet been solved is Insane 20, though this is including backroutes as "solved". Additionally, Insane 11 was solved in the demo (it was the extra Insane level in the contest-exclusive demo), but has been slightly changed since then and the new version hasn't been solved; but the difference is fairly minor and probably wouldn't take long to solve for someone who found the solution that was found to the previous version.

As far as difficulty feedback goes, most of it relates to Smooth and Bumpy. The testers seem to feel a lot of the levels in those two ranks are poorly placed - mostly either their position in the rank, or they should be in the other one out of those two. There's far less mention of poor ordering for Twisted and Insane.

EDIT: Had a few more replays come in; these have added two more levels to the backrouted list, and moved 5 of them from "has one backroute" to "has multiple backroutes". There's also one level that wasn't backrouted as such, but was solved (by more than one person) by waiting extremely long times for a lemming to go away and then return, when the intention is for timing to be used to solve it in a single go. As such, I'm considering adding a time limit to the level in question here.

[namida]

So, Insane 20 has finally fallen. The new-version Insane 11 has also been solved. No backroute fixes have been done yet, though.

[namida]

I've finished the major uni assignment which was leaving me unable to work too much on LPIV. After I view a few more replays that have come in, I'm going to finally start on backroute fixes.

EDIT: Sent out the backroute fixes for Smooth and Bumpy. Haven't done them for the other ranks yet, but will do them later today most likely.

[namida]

I've just rolled out to the testers some re-fixes for Smooth and Bumpy, as well as backroute fixes for Twisted. Unless (or more likely, "until") new backroutes show up on these fixes, there's 12 remaining unfixed levels, 1 uncertain as to whether I'll fix it or not (but the more I think about it, the more I'm leaning towards "yes, fix it"), and 1 that doesn't have a backroute as such but allows for a lot of excessive stalling and as such probably needs a time limit added.

Once I get through the first wave of Insane fixes, I'm going to start looking at level reordering too.

EDIT: About half of the Insane levels that had backroutes have been patched, now. Specifically, I did all those that only had a single backroute. Including the undecided one, there's six levels left to patch, not including any new backroutes that may (ie: probably will) show up.

[namida]

I ultimately decided against fixing that level, more due to the difficulty of doing so rather than accepting the solution. Anyway, at this point all backroutes that are currently known to me have been fixed. I'm waiting on some feedback from testers before I start reordering anything; once reordering is sorted, the only thing left to do before release (aside from shooting down any new backroutes that pop up) is implementing talismans - I do already have several ideas for them, but I'm waiting on implementing them until the level order is more or less finalized.


Got a new set of replays for almost all levels that were fixed in the latest set of updates. Only 5 backrouted levels (so far), which is a huge reduction from previous numbers.

EDIT: And, fixes for those have been sent out. I've also contacted the testers with a preliminary suggestion of how I may reorder the levels. You can probably start expecting a public release within the next week or so at the most.

[namida]

Okay, so the first proposal for re-ordering has been actually made (instead of just a list written out) and sent out. Backroutes are also getting rarer and rarer; there's a few levels that I've decided I really can't be bothered attempting any more fixes and might just move them to easier positions. At this point, I'm putting less focus on backroutes (though there are a few levels I'll probably fight to the death to rid of backroutes - Insane 14 in particular is one such level, as I absolutely love the intended solution to this one!), and more on level ordering. Once the level ordering seems fairly solid, it'll be time to put together some talismans, and then at last LPIV can be released.

As far as talismans go, I'm aiming for either 15 or 20 total, and have 6 so far, of which 1 is silver and 1 is gold. (...yes, the gold is the standard "beat the final level" one xD)