Author Topic: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE  (Read 48617 times)

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Offline Strato Incendus

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #60 on: May 19, 2020, 08:55:02 PM »
Wow, thanks a lot for playing, kaywhyn - I think this is the most extensive and detailed feedback I have received on any of my packs so far! :thumbsup: And actually I do believe nobody has gotten deeper into Lemmicks than you at this point.

It will certainly take me some time to go through all your replays. Since you said you don't have any for the first two ranks, did you play those with automatic replay saving disabled? ;)

I'm happy to hear that you didn't find this pack nearly as difficult as other people. The Basic rank was indeed intended to just provide some generally good puzzles while familiarizing the player with solid level sides. It was never intended as a beginner rank, and Lemmicks definitely is not a beginner pack. That said, even some advanced players can get caught off-guard by the changed physics, especially solid level sides, and I guess that's how Basic earned its reputation of being so difficult.

I did make sure to stress any physics changes in pre-level text - but, as IchoTolot once warned me, a lot of people don't read those :P . As evident by the fact that e.g. you didn't know the gimmick on the Moist rank until you reached "Need a lift?"

I am aware of the annoyance potential of the Hasty rank, and there is one particularly obnoxious level on the Bedlam rank called "So much to do, so little time" for which I'm considering to remove the Superlemming and Frenzy gimmick, so that it's only instant pickups. Having these three gimmicks combined on one level was how the Hasty rank was originally designed to be. But I've realized that they serve opposite purposes: Instant pickups make for great puzzles, especially when having to circumvent badly-placed pickups that almost act like traps; Frenzy and Superlemming, in contrast, only add execution difficulty.


Detailed feedback on your replays coming later! ;)
My packs so far:
Lemmings World Tour (New & Old Formats), my music-themed flagship pack, 320 levels - Let's Played by Colorful Arty
Lemmings Open Air, my newest release and follow-up to World Tour, 120 levels
Paralems (Old Formats), a more flavour-driven one, 150 levels
Pit Lems (Old Formats), a more puzzly one, 100 levels - Let's Played by nin10doadict
Lemmicks, a pack for (very old) NeoLemmix 1.43 full of gimmicks, 170 levels

Offline WillLem

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #61 on: May 20, 2020, 12:51:09 AM »
The Basic rank was indeed intended to just provide some generally good puzzles while familiarizing the player with solid level sides. It was never intended as a beginner rank, and Lemmicks definitely is not a beginner pack. That said, even some advanced players can get caught off-guard by the changed physics, especially solid level sides, and I guess that's how Basic earned its reputation of being so difficult.

To be quite honest, the solid sides had nothing to do with why I found it difficult - I just couldn't solve a lot of the puzzles generally! Mind you, that's not really saying much because my solving skills are probably average at best. :forehead:

I think what I was hoping for when I first played Lemmicks were some more Fun-style levels where the player can simply experience the gimmicks in a relatively puzzle-free environment to begin with, before building up to the more difficult levels later on once the gimmicks become second nature. As mentioned previously, this would be my strongest suggestion for Lemmicks 2.

Offline mantha16

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #62 on: May 20, 2020, 01:54:28 AM »
can i just say it was the old version of the NL player that put me off not the level design

Offline Strato Incendus

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #63 on: May 20, 2020, 12:49:28 PM »
Quote
I think what I was hoping for when I first played Lemmicks were some more Fun-style levels where the player can simply experience the gimmicks in a relatively puzzle-free environment to begin with, before building up to the more difficult levels later on once the gimmicks become second nature. As mentioned previously, this would be my strongest suggestion for Lemmicks 2.

Well, fun is in the eye of the beholder, as we've established, and while I know that what you find fun might differ from what the NeoLemmix puzzle-die-hards like ;) , you may have misunderstood the original intention of this pack there. As far as I remember I've always made Lemmicks's goal clear right from the start: To showcase how the gimmicks - which, as the community told me, "were culled for good reason" - could actually be used for clever and fair puzzle design.

I don't know whether gimmicks necessarily had a bad reputation before that - a lot of people still seemed to be happy I brought them back. But I think it's fair to say that most packs I could still get my hands on which had made use of gimmicks did so in a surprising manner. Meaning not only was the gimmick not announced by the rank name (as it is done in Lemmicks, except for the Bedlam rank), but also you had to explore everything for yourself and figure out by-doing how the changed rules worked.

In other words, what WillLem proposes kind of already existed to some extent ;) , and was seen by some as unfair and nasty surprises. I wanted to show that gimmicks can be used for more than that, so by definition that necessitated a puzzle focus.

I'm open to working on another gimmick pack that has easier puzzles - though it should probably not be named "Lemmicks 2" then, because who would play the second version of a pack before the first one? ;) And that's kind of what players would be advised to do with an easier gimmick pack.

However, we first need to agree on a selection of gimmicks that seem worthwhile. And the fact that WillLem brought up not only one, but two ranks of Frenzy levels (the second one with SuperLemming on top of that) - when this is clearly the least popular rank in Lemmicks, to put it politely - makes me wonder whether our design philosophies are "compatible" in that regard. ;)

I guess my level design philosophy and WillLem's are more compatible than between WillLem and a lot of other level designers, because we both enjoy occasional "troll" or "unfair" elements if they have redeeming qualities like aesthetics.

However, where I'm probably on my own is that I'm not a huge fan of free, open-ended "explorer" levels (like X-of-everything levels, or, in this case "just toy around with this gimmick" levels).

And finally, there's this issue:

Quote
can i just say it was the old version of the NL player that put me off not the level design

This seems to be the main obstacle stopping people from giving Lemmicks a try. Not the difficulty, not the mere idea of "it's outdated and therefore you should not use it", but simply the fact that outdated versions do indeed have their legitimate downsides.

I was planning to open a thread for a potential Lemmicks 2 anyway, due to recent activity in this thread, and I think now I have a reason to ;) . So that we can also separate all discussions about level design in a possible second gimmick pack from feedback regarding the levels in Lemmicks.


We should definitely test the waters, though, a) whether there is a demand / interest for further (easier) gimmick levels in the first place, and b) if so, which gimmicks people like and don't like. I don't think we can really afford just picking gimmicks by our own taste alone, because the number of potential players is already severely reduced by the fact that it's NeoLemmix 1.43, and every further turn-off will drive more players away.
My packs so far:
Lemmings World Tour (New & Old Formats), my music-themed flagship pack, 320 levels - Let's Played by Colorful Arty
Lemmings Open Air, my newest release and follow-up to World Tour, 120 levels
Paralems (Old Formats), a more flavour-driven one, 150 levels
Pit Lems (Old Formats), a more puzzly one, 100 levels - Let's Played by nin10doadict
Lemmicks, a pack for (very old) NeoLemmix 1.43 full of gimmicks, 170 levels

Offline kaywhyn

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #64 on: May 20, 2020, 07:02:44 PM »
can i just say it was the old version of the NL player that put me off not the level design

YMMV, as I did mention that I'm finding v.1.43 not as bad as I thought, though it's kind of helped by the fact that I had previously played through Giga's packs a month or two prior to taking on Lemmicks. But yes, you previously did mention that it's the lack of features in v1.43 that's preventing you from getting further with Lemmicks, and it's pretty much been established that that this is the main reason people haven't played through the pack and not the difficulty. I completely agree with the latter, as up until Circumvent Their Stupidity in the Hasty rank (the 9th rank out of 13) the levels aren't over the top hard. Before this level, the longest I've been stuck on an individual level in the pack was about 20 or so minutes, while the Hasty rank level I just mentioned I was stuck on for almost 2 days! In general, I'm a huge lemmings fan, and despite some of the inconveniences of v1.43 my high praise for the pack, along with my love of the game, have overshadowed my annoyances with the fiddly v1.43 player and helped keep me engaged in the pack tremendously, as IMHO nearly all of the levels I've played so far in the pack are excellent levels. Needless to say, the benefits of the pack through the high quality levels and puzzles far outweigh the negatives of the v1.43 player here in my eyes.

Since you said you don't have any for the first two ranks, did you play those with automatic replay saving disabled? ;)

You are correct. It was kind of both intentional and unintentional on my part. I was aware that the feature isn't enabled by default, but at the same time I didn't really think the Basic and Moist rank would be the problematic ranks. In addition, I enabled the feature starting at Circular 2, so Circular 1 is missing, but it's a very easy level anyway. However, since it sounds like you do want replays for Basic and Moist, I'll be more than happy to replay those ranks once I get through the entire pack and send you them.

I did make sure to stress any physics changes in pre-level text - but, as IchoTolot once warned me, a lot of people don't read those :P . As evident by the fact that e.g. you didn't know the gimmick on the Moist rank until you reached "Need a lift?"

Actually, I was aware of the rising water gimmick being active in the Moist rank

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Whereas for my progress, I'm currently up at Bedlam 15. 35 levels to go! So, I'm probably not that far from that Bedlam level Strato mentioned with the combined Frenzy + Superlemming + instant pickups gimmicks. I'll let you know how that goes when I get there, although I've already encountered one such level in the rank called ADHD that also has the lazy lemmings gimmick active. That one was an easy level, as it only took me about a minute to see the solution, just annoying that I had to keep pounding the reset hotkey just before the trapdoor opens.

More detailed feedback to come soon when I send my remaining replays! ;)
« Last Edit: May 20, 2020, 09:18:44 PM by kaywhyn »
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPMqwuqZ206rBWJrUC6wkrA - My YouTube channel and you can also find my playlists of Lemmings level packs that I have LPed
kaywhyn's blog: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5363.0

Offline Strato Incendus

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #65 on: May 20, 2020, 10:56:05 PM »
Quote
Actually, I was aware of the rising water gimmick being active in the Moist rank

Ah, sorry, then I misunderstood this sentence of yours ;) :

Quote
when it dawned on me that the gimmick active for this rank is rising water

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Quote
In general, I'm a huge lemmings fan, and despite some of the inconveniences of v1.43 my high praise for the pack, along with my love of the game, have overshadowed my annoyances with the fiddly v1.43 player and helped keep me engaged in the pack tremendously, as IMHO nearly all of the levels I've played so far in the pack are excellent levels. Needless to say, the benefits of the pack through the high quality levels and puzzles far outweigh the negatives of the v1.43 player here in my eyes.

Thanks a lot for your kind words! :thumbsup:

I really had a hard time judging the quality of the levels so far, given that they defy any standard rules of what counts as "challenging", "fair", "puzzling" etc. I couldn't really compare them to anything other level designers had made. Judging my progress just in comparison to my former self (intra-individual comparison), though, I did have the feeling they were more challenging and overall "better" than what I had come up with for Pit Lems.

No idea whether Lemmicks or Lemmings World Tour has overall better puzzles, though. 8-) I guess Lemmings World Tour might be more enjoyable for the average player, especially with all the modern conveniences (in both Old- and New Formats), while Lemmicks might be more frustrating, and if it's just for the Hasty rank. :evil:

So I'm glad you've powered through any inconveniences (minor or major) the pack or old engine might have thrown at you! ;) Knowing you're already that far into the pack, I think I'll leave the level "So much to do, so little time" as it is for right now, to give it at least one shot. If you're already used to spamming the rewind key, the post-level text even says "your minus key will never be the same again" :devil: .

Also, I'm kind of curious what WillLem thinks of that level, given that he wanted to put Frenzy and Superlemming into one and the same rank in the second gimmick pack. :P (Granted, not with instant pickups, which "So much to do, so little time" has on top of that.)

If you're looking for it, it's Bedlam 35, right after "These stairs of mine", which is my absolute favourite level in the pack. So you could kind of say the worst level comes after the coolest level. 8-)
My packs so far:
Lemmings World Tour (New & Old Formats), my music-themed flagship pack, 320 levels - Let's Played by Colorful Arty
Lemmings Open Air, my newest release and follow-up to World Tour, 120 levels
Paralems (Old Formats), a more flavour-driven one, 150 levels
Pit Lems (Old Formats), a more puzzly one, 100 levels - Let's Played by nin10doadict
Lemmicks, a pack for (very old) NeoLemmix 1.43 full of gimmicks, 170 levels

Offline WillLem

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #66 on: May 21, 2020, 03:30:10 AM »
you may have misunderstood the original intention of this pack there.... To showcase how the gimmicks... could actually be used for clever and fair puzzle design.

In this regard, I'd say the pack was a success, then!

I guess I'm not taking into account the fact that most players would have been familiar with most of the gimmicks by the time this pack was released, so introductory levels may not have been necessary.

However, since they've currently not been around for a while, maybe a few easier/more open-ended levels for the proposed sequel would not go amiss, and there's no reason at all for such levels to detract from your original goal for Lemmicks (i.e. fair and interesting puzzles), if done tastefully.

In other words, what WillLem proposes kind of already existed to some extent ;) , and was seen by some as unfair and nasty surprises.

I'm proposing that the gimmicks be introduced gradually, fairly and in the context of easier, open-ended levels. I'm not sure how that would constitute a "nasty surprise." ??? The gimmicks would be made clear at the start of the rank, as they were in original Lemmicks, and then the player would have the opportunity to experience them in a safe environment.

I am not, and never have been, in favour of "trolling" players unnecessarily. I simply believe that the occasional unexpected element, if used sparingly, carefully and tastefully, can enhance certain levels. Just wanted to make that clear! :lemcat:
« Last Edit: May 21, 2020, 03:35:58 AM by WillLem »

Offline Strato Incendus

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #67 on: May 21, 2020, 08:58:55 AM »
Yes indeed, I didn't want to misrepresent you here; I'm aware that you want to stick to the "fair gimmick-per-rank" structure.

The fact that the gimmicks were in more recent memory when Lemmicks was released is a fair point! ;) Indeed a lot of new members have joined in the meantime that have only ever known New Formats.

Quote
I am not, and never have been, in favour of "trolling" players unnecessarily. I simply believe that the occasional unexpected element, if used sparingly, carefully and tastefully, can enhance certain levels. Just wanted to make that clear!

I know you always have good intentions about this ;) . This is just a labelling issue. The "unexpected" part is what proponents of strictly-fair and predictable puzzle gameplay would often already consider as trolling, even though the level designer may not at all have intended for it to be a troll level.

Interestingly, though, also one of my strictly-fair puzzle levels, which was deliberately designed in-style of Nepster ("You had it coming" from Pit Lems), was called a troll level by nin10doadict during his Let's Play, because the surrounding levels happened to be much easier. So the sudden (but unintended) spike in difficulty was "unexpected" ;) , one could say... :evil:
My packs so far:
Lemmings World Tour (New & Old Formats), my music-themed flagship pack, 320 levels - Let's Played by Colorful Arty
Lemmings Open Air, my newest release and follow-up to World Tour, 120 levels
Paralems (Old Formats), a more flavour-driven one, 150 levels
Pit Lems (Old Formats), a more puzzly one, 100 levels - Let's Played by nin10doadict
Lemmicks, a pack for (very old) NeoLemmix 1.43 full of gimmicks, 170 levels

Offline kaywhyn

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #68 on: May 21, 2020, 08:03:52 PM »
And, pack is done! Wow, just wow. It was an amazing pack from start to finish. I'll send the replays and give even more detailed feedback after I go back and replay the Basic and Moist ranks for the rest of the replays, as well as Circular 1 if you would like that one too. Aside from Hasty 6, I say the difficult mind-bending puzzles were the Bedlam levels, since most of the levels combined at least 2 or more gimmicks from the previous ranks together, as well as introduced ones that weren't in any of the earlier ones. I guess you can say that Bedlam IS the pack itself, particularly since a lot of the difficult levels are here IMO. Where all the previous ranks were warm-up ranks for Bedlam that generally introduced one gimmick at a time, Bedlam really puts the gimmicks to the test by combining them together, creating really difficult levels. I honestly would place a lot of the Bedlam levels at ONML difficulty, because they definitely felt like they were really up there with ONML in terms of difficulty. Some Bedlam levels I say are worthy of the Havoc difficulty! The other ranks I would say were Mayhem at best or lower. Especially since Bedlam has the most levels at 40, it slowed my progress tremendously, but I made it through the rank and had a huge feeling of satisfaction of beating the entire rank and now the entire pack. I guess I'm honored to be the very first person to officially complete the pack, and 3-4 years since its release too!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

As I mentioned in the feedback for this level, which is now Moist 6, I didn't think it was hard at all.
 
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I really had a hard time judging the quality of the levels so far, given that they defy any standard rules of what counts as "challenging", "fair", "puzzling" etc. I couldn't really compare them to anything other level designers had made. Judging my progress just in comparison to my former self (intra-individual comparison), though, I did have the feeling they were more challenging and overall "better" than what I had come up with for Pit Lems.

Now that I've played through the entire pack, IMO there's no unfair levels in there at all. Even the ones with the combined Frenzy and Superlemming gimmicks in the Hasty and Bedlam ranks and possibly some other gimmicks active weren't unfair. At worst, they were just simply annoying. I also agree with your assessment that the two former gimmicks made the execution difficult, but the puzzles themselves were easy. There's definitely challenging puzzles in Lemmicks, and though there was usually a difficult level or two in the ranks before Bedlam, Bedlam I say has a lot of difficult levels. I think I also say this a lot, but once you know the solution then they're easy.

If you're looking for it, it's Bedlam 35, right after "These stairs of mine", which is my absolute favourite level in the pack. So you could kind of say the worst level comes after the coolest level. 8-)

Bedlam 35 was actually really easy! Just like ADHD, it only took me 1-2 minutes to see the solution. However, I do have a lot of skills leftover, so it might be a backroute. I'll let you decide when I send the replay. Whereas for Bedlam 34, I too like the concept used in the level. Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to set up correctly. Out of all the levels in the pack, this level had me rage the most. It's a great level, as the solution is easy. The execution, though :evil:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Anyway, I'll send all the replays once I go back and replay the Basic and Moist ranks and Circular 1, along with detailed feedback. Great job on an awesome pack!
« Last Edit: May 22, 2020, 02:54:04 AM by kaywhyn »
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPMqwuqZ206rBWJrUC6wkrA - My YouTube channel and you can also find my playlists of Lemmings level packs that I have LPed
kaywhyn's blog: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5363.0

Offline Strato Incendus

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #69 on: May 22, 2020, 06:40:24 PM »
Thanks a lot for your praise of the pack, kaywhyn! :) Indeed, it's been a couple of years, but now you're officially the first person to have completed Lemmicks! Congratulations! :thumbsup:

I'm relieved to hear you still consider levels with an easy-to-see solution that might not be that easy to execute great levels. In my estimation, a lot of other forum members would consider these levels pointlessly annoying (because the puzzle challenge is minor while the execution difficulty makes them "unnecessarily" harder).

Quote
Bedlam 35 was actually really easy! Just like ADHD, it only took me 1-2 minutes to see the solution. However, I do have a lot of skills leftover, so it might be a backroute. I'll let you decide when I send the replay. Whereas for Bedlam 34, I too like the concept used in the level. Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to set up correctly. Out of all the levels in the pack, this level had me rage the most. It's a great level, as the solution is easy. The execution, though :evil:

Good to know; I'll leave Bedlam 35 as it is, then, at least for the time being (unless I find out you severely backrouted it :P ), and if it's just for WillLem to enjoy Frenzy and Superlemming in comparison! :D

Bedlam 34 of course is precise to pull off. That's why I have provided Blockers and Walkers to facilitate the correct exact timing. This is a general problem with pretty much any level that involves relative timing between two lemmings (classical case: turning a Builder around mid-performance with a Blocker). But in this case, because it's such a unique thing that's only possible with the Hardworkers gimmick and looks so cool when it finally works out, I think it's worth the hassle. :D

I've tried to create a comparable level for my upcoming pack Lemmings Open Air ("Paid in full", using my money tileset, on the Heavy rank). But it's still not quite the same.

Quote
I think I also say this a lot, but once you know the solution then they're easy.

...and this, in turn, is probably the NeoLemmix ideal: Figuring out the solution itself is the hard part. Once you have figured it out, the implementation should be straightforward. I'm glad you still found a lot of those levels on the Bedlam rank, since I think these are the types of levels also the majority of other forum members will enjoy! ;)

Regarding the difficulty of "Here comes the flood"...
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
My packs so far:
Lemmings World Tour (New & Old Formats), my music-themed flagship pack, 320 levels - Let's Played by Colorful Arty
Lemmings Open Air, my newest release and follow-up to World Tour, 120 levels
Paralems (Old Formats), a more flavour-driven one, 150 levels
Pit Lems (Old Formats), a more puzzly one, 100 levels - Let's Played by nin10doadict
Lemmicks, a pack for (very old) NeoLemmix 1.43 full of gimmicks, 170 levels

Offline kaywhyn

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #70 on: May 23, 2020, 07:35:53 PM »
As promised, here are the rest of the replays, including Basic and Moist. I've already sent feedback from Basic through Hasty (see reply #59), so I'm just going to do feedback from Cosmic through Nostalgia. However, there is one thing I would like to add for Basic, and that is

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Now for feedback for the rest of the pack.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Indeed, it's been a couple of years, but now you're officially the first person to have completed Lemmicks! Congratulations! :thumbsup:

Thank you so much, Strato. This means a lot :thumbsup: I apparently overestimated the age of this pack when I said 4-5 years. I think what was going through my mind at the time was that because this pack is for v1.43, I thought Lemmicks would be old, especially since Giga's packs I've played through are around 4-5 years old themselves and are only compatible with v1.43. However, all I had to do to see that Lemmicks is only about 2 years old was check your first post in this thread and see that it's dated 2018. Because Lemmicks is now around 2 years old, did you ever give up hope that someone out there would ever finish your pack to the end? I'm glad that the v1.43 player is still around in case people ever want to take up the task of beating this pack, like I just did.

With this, great job on a very well-done high quality pack! For all the others, if you haven't done so yet, I highly recommend giving this pack a go! It doesn't disappoint at all. Rest assured that after having played through and beaten all the levels there's absolutely nothing unfair about this pack. There are a few levels with very pixel precise assignments, but these levels were simply challenging puzzles that were very enjoyable for me. Same thing with most of the other levels that don't have very precise assignments. Finally, there was pretty much only about 1 or 2 difficult levels per rank, but even then they're not over-the-top hard. The biggest exception is Bedlam, which has several hard ones and many that I would definitely place at ONML difficulty, but they're not too overly difficult. Just need to have knowledge of how the mechanics work when several gimmicks are active. You're welcome, Strato ;)
« Last Edit: May 25, 2020, 11:46:19 AM by kaywhyn »
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPMqwuqZ206rBWJrUC6wkrA - My YouTube channel and you can also find my playlists of Lemmings level packs that I have LPed
kaywhyn's blog: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5363.0

Offline Strato Incendus

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #71 on: May 24, 2020, 09:25:09 AM »
Thank you very much, kaywhyn! For playing, for your high praise of the pack, and for taking the time to write such an extensive feedback to almost each of the remaining levels! :thumbsup:

Somehow I can't open your replay folders. I do have win.rar, not just win.zip, but it tells me the archive is damaged / corrupted, or used an unknown file format. ??? Maybe you can try putting them into a zip-file instead?


Regarding your questions:

1) Stoertebeker was a German pirate who, as legend has it, was sentenced to death by beheading, but tried to free his crew by running past them while they were standing in line. Every crewmember he could run past before collapsing would be liberated, that was the deal. Supposedly he made it past 11 pirates before the cutioner tripped him. Yet, these 11 were executed together with everyone else. A pretty pointless legend, somehow. :evil:
In the level, in contrast, some lemmings will inevitably make it into the teleporters that lead them to the exit, i.e. be saved, even though you are in the cutioner's position due to the Karoshi gimmick being active, so you wouldn't want them to. ;)

2) On pre-assigned Swimmers: Haha, looks like this is the second half to the "Skies aflame" story :D : My first pack, Paralems, had a level called "Skies aflame" (re-appearing on the Groupie rank of Lemmings World Tour) which several forum members deemed impossible, due to them not being able to tell that the lemmings were pre-assigned Swimmers. They tried to solve the level in their minds before the hatch even opened, so they couldn't tell.

This was when I first heard about the NeoLemmix custom of labelling hatches that have pre-assigned skills with pickup skills. Back in Old Formats, hatches didn't gain these labels automatically, as they do in New Formats. I was somewhat resistant to accepting this custom, because I thought precisely what you did: That the labelling pickup skill could be confused for one you could actually collect. Now I can say: q.e.d.! ;)

This issue is of course smaller with regular pickup skills, because usually, when you have e.g. pre-assigned Swimmers, there's no need to place Swimmer pickups in the level because they wouldn't be of any incremental use. In NeoLemmix 1.43 however, where you can also have instant pickup skills, the fact that a skill doesn't appear on your skill panel is not necessarily indicative of a pickup skill in a level being useless.

To prevent players from trying to collect the pickup skill that was just intended to label a hatch, Old Formats had the option of making objects fake. This is also the trick I used to reverse hatch and exit on one of the levels you mentioned. :P This option has been removed from New Formats for its trolling potential, which is why it appears on the Nostalgic rank, alongside everything else that has been removed.

Meanwhile, two levels from Nostalgic are technically no longer warranted, because both the VGA specs (like the troll graphic from "Don't feed the Lem") and anti-splat pads have been re-added to New-Formats. (VGA specs is a tileset of its own in New Formats that also includes e.g. the Awesome, Menacing, and the two Beast levels as complete landscapes).


3) I had totally forgotten about Climbers not being able to use the ceilings of Miner tunnels to go down with the No-Gravity gimmick being active. :forehead: By that I mean "forgotten in the meantime"; I'm pretty sure I knew it back when designing the pack. :D This might have made for some interesting Bedlam puzzles where both No Gravity from the Cosmic rank and the Non-Permanent Skills gimmick from the Ephemeral rank could have been active. This would have allowed a Climber to go up somewhere and then still use a Miner tunnel to go down later.

I only used the "forget you were a Climber" trick on one Ephemeral level to enable the double-Miner turnaround, i.e. one Miner cancelling a Miner in the opposite direction. Climbers have a hard time doing this trick, because they spend the crucial moment "hugging" the end of the mine shaft, as nin10doadict called it while let's-playing Pit Lems, after I had told him. ;) Later on I found out that Climbers can actually still perform this trick, it's just even harder to time correctly.


4) I do have Warcraft 3 and the expansion on my games shelf right here, but I never played it that much, so "The dead shall serve" wasn't an intentional reference. ;) I had a friend at school who was playing a lot of World of Warcraft back in the day and kept telling me about in-game anecdotes non-stop, until at one point I understood most of the jokes. So maybe it's on a subconscious level :D ...

5) Thanks for your suggestion regarding the Basic rank! I think I'll have to see your replay for "Why did you doubt?" to know exactly what you mean, but as I said, so far the .rar folders don't seem to be working on my PC, for some reason. ???



Overall, while I'm glad you still found the Cosmic rank to contain some great puzzles, in total I hear you weren't much of a fan of this gimmick either, as it is true for most of the other players. ;)

Thus, I think the majority vote is in on this, so that the second gimmick pack WillLem and I are contemplating should probably not include the No-Gravity gimmick. At least there shouldn't be a dedicated rank for it, like Cosmic in Lemmicks. I doubt anyone would have issues with it occasionally showing up on a mixed Bedlam-style rank.
« Last Edit: May 24, 2020, 10:52:10 AM by Strato Incendus »
My packs so far:
Lemmings World Tour (New & Old Formats), my music-themed flagship pack, 320 levels - Let's Played by Colorful Arty
Lemmings Open Air, my newest release and follow-up to World Tour, 120 levels
Paralems (Old Formats), a more flavour-driven one, 150 levels
Pit Lems (Old Formats), a more puzzly one, 100 levels - Let's Played by nin10doadict
Lemmicks, a pack for (very old) NeoLemmix 1.43 full of gimmicks, 170 levels

Offline kaywhyn

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #72 on: May 24, 2020, 09:51:11 AM »
Somehow I can't open your replay folders. I do have win.rar, not just win.zip, but it tells me the archive is damaged / corrupted, or used an unknown file format. ??? Maybe you can try putting them into a zip-file instead?

That is strange. They work perfectly fine on my end. Anyway, I removed the old rar attachment and reattached the rar file that's supposedly repaired, as well as a zip file (see post above this one). Let me know if either of them work. Regardless of whether the rar file works, I'll remove it once you confirm with me that it's either working or not but the zip file will remain.
« Last Edit: May 24, 2020, 07:09:28 PM by kaywhyn »
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPMqwuqZ206rBWJrUC6wkrA - My YouTube channel and you can also find my playlists of Lemmings level packs that I have LPed
kaywhyn's blog: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5363.0

Offline Strato Incendus

  • The King of Shimmiers (crowned by Flopsy ;D )
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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #73 on: May 25, 2020, 10:40:56 AM »
Yep, the zip file works for me! :thumbsup: Thank you, kaywhyn, looks like I've got quite a lot to watch now! ;)
My packs so far:
Lemmings World Tour (New & Old Formats), my music-themed flagship pack, 320 levels - Let's Played by Colorful Arty
Lemmings Open Air, my newest release and follow-up to World Tour, 120 levels
Paralems (Old Formats), a more flavour-driven one, 150 levels
Pit Lems (Old Formats), a more puzzly one, 100 levels - Let's Played by nin10doadict
Lemmicks, a pack for (very old) NeoLemmix 1.43 full of gimmicks, 170 levels

Offline kaywhyn

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Re: [NeoLemmix 1.43] Lemmicks - Lemmings with gimmicks! ANOTHER UPDATE
« Reply #74 on: May 25, 2020, 11:52:18 AM »
Thanks for letting me know, Strato. I went ahead and removed the rar file. Did the new rar file work too, btw? Looking forward to the feedback on the replays. Next pack of yours I'll try will either be LWT or Pitlems/Paralems. For the former, I think I'll try it in both Old Formats and New Formats and see how well-done the radiation/slowfreeze levels were. In all likelihood, I'll probably start with the latter ones since they're much smaller packs than LWT, and even when combined is still only about half LWT's total number of levels.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPMqwuqZ206rBWJrUC6wkrA - My YouTube channel and you can also find my playlists of Lemmings level packs that I have LPed
kaywhyn's blog: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5363.0