How difficult could Lemmings get?

[Shmoley]

A question I’ve wondered about especially recently after I’ve beaten Sublems which had some hard levels (At least for my skill level) made me wonder: How hard could lemmings get? Like.. let’s say if you made the hardest level ever. Is it possible that there could be creation of one even harder or is there a limit to how hard Lemmings can be? If so, I want to know where that limit is and if one day someone could actually reach it. There are factors to answering this question though. For example: Different people see levels in different ways. Some could see the solution quicker than others. It’s about every individual person’s perspective on how they see the level, and that would cause them to do things differently. Actually a good example of this is my experience with Sandopolis Act 2 from  Sublems it took me like a month to see the solution but that was only because my perspective was set on something, when the solution was something completely different. So, in short, perspective is probably one of the hardest factors to get around when it comes to answering the question.

[ericderkovits]

In theory there is no limit, i guess, since maps can be huge too, both horizontally and vertically (take icho's united levels, he has some huge levels both horizontally and vertically, so I guess his
tricks can be used almost at every turn, so he could even make harder levels that he already has in United. Also I noticed in some of his levels he has numerous pickup skills. I think using numerous
pickup skills can make levels even harder, because one doesn't know when to use them or maybe one puts them in their as decoys as Namida mentioned about 1 of his LP packs. Also making levels
harder are when execution and precision of skills is required(ie: within a pixel) And I guess one can make a level so hard that 100% of skill placement is required.
also as mentioned before crossing of destructive can make levels hard too(ie sublems and pimolems). Kaywhyn mentioned Icho doesnt care for this, as his reunion pack really doesn't have
crosssing of destructive skills as mentioned by Kaywhyn when I was converting Reunion.

[LemSteven]

The answer depends somewhat on the type of difficulty you're going for.  Some solutions can be tough to find, but relatively easy to execute (e.g. Mayhem 3), while for others the route is obvious, but tough to execute (e.g. Tricky 26).  As far as execution goes, there is a finite limit of how many skill frame-precise skill assignments you can do in a given amount of time; you're only allowed one skill assignment per frame of animation.  A more practical limit may be how tough a solution can be to execute while still being fun to play.  I don't see much value in designing a level that requires 1,000 consecutive frame-precise skill assignments, because nobody would ever want to play it.

How hard a solution is to find is a lot more subjective, and tough to quantify.  Different people think differently, so what is tough for one person may be a piece of cake of another.  And of course, there's the "Why didn't I think of that earlier" moment that happens all too frequently.  Sometimes it all depends on the frame of mind you're in when you're trying to solve the level.

[kaywhyn]

This is a really interesting question. I'm not certain that I have a good answer for the question, but I believe the opposite, where I think there's an eventual limit on the difficulty. Level difficulty is one of those things that's very subjective. When it comes to describing the general difficulty of a level, everyone's views will differ. I'll take United as an example. So far, only two people, Armani and me, have completed the pack in its entirety, where I recently finished it. He and I have differing views on levels that we thought were difficult. In particular, it seemed that Armani found Genocide 37 and Genocide 41 to be really hard, which I agree to an extent, but I didn't think either one were THAT hard. Sure, they still took me a while, but I was able to solve them somewhat fairly quick. In contrast, even though I figured out some things really quickly in Genocide 39, I struggled a lot with it and found it pretty difficult while he didn't. As these examples show, levels that some people found hard may be easy for others, or vice versa. However, if most people found a particular level hard, then it's generally seen as a hard level, even if some found it easy, or vice versa.

There are some people who have most of the solution to a level, but they are missing one very important key element that is preventing them from solving the level. Generally, these are levels requiring a certain trick and can either be difficult because the person doesn't know about it already, or they can be really easy because the person already knows the trick needed. A really good example is Tension 34 from United. Before when I didn't know the trick, it was a really hard level and was a roadblock for me for a few weeks. However, once I discovered it, then it's a very easy level. It's possibly one of the easiest levels in the entire pack even though it's near the end of the third rank. Levels that require glitches can be seen in the same way, where the level is easy if you already know about the glitch needed but impossible otherwise if you don't know about it. I'm kind of indifferent about glitches, but I'm more towards the I don't like those kinds of levels, because in my view, the behavior of the skills should be predictable, not produce unexpected results.

Now, why do I believe there's an eventual limit on how hard a level can get? Because I feel like in levels where once you've seen a particular trick a few times, then you generally won't forget it and can more easily apply them in situations wherever they are applicable in hard levels. Also, this is where playing a lot of level packs really helps. Before I started playing custom level packs, I was able to beat the original games (Lemmings, ONML, and Holiday Lemmings 93 and 94). I first started playing custom level packs on Dos near the end of my high school career. At the time, I was able to complete most of the packs that I downloaded, but there were some that I wasn't able to until I eventually came back to them a few years later. Then, a couple of years after I finished college, I discovered a custom pack on Youtube, Dovelems. It was an intro video where rtw mentioned that the pack was for Lemmini, and the thing that really drew me to it was how it has directional select, i.e, hold down the left/right arrow keys so that you only assign the skill to a lemming facing left/right, respectively. After Dovelems, Pimolems was next, which is definitely harder than Dovelems. A level early in the Hurricane rank had me give up in frustration and so it was left in limbo for a couple of years. When I did come back to the pack a few years later, I was able to get past the level and proceeded to beat the entire pack.

After Pimolems, I decided to take on Lemmings Reunion by Icho. Along with working a job, it took me 3 months to complete. At the time, it was the hardest and largest level pack I had ever completed. Now both go to United as being the hardest and largest level pack I have finished. There were other packs that I took on before I decided to give United a try last year. Needless to say, I don't mind the difficult level packs, but as I have played almost nothing but United for the last several months, which I finally just finished a few days ago, I am completely burned out from all the very hard levels. So, I'm taking a temporary break from the pack before I will come back and resolve the remaining 7 levels that have been patched up by Icho. Around the time when I was finally on the final main rank of the pack, I had a lot of fears that eventually the pack would become too hard for me and therefore beat me, but because I managed to finish supposedly the hardest level pack there currently is, that's another reason why I think there's an upper limit on how hard a level can get.

So after all the United madness, I decided to take up Nepsterlems again, which is another really hard pack that's probably pretty close and up there along with United. Probably after if I do finish the pack, I will take on namida's Alpha Plus, which again is another very hard pack. Just when I thought I was going to just play packs on the easier side after being burned out by United. Guess I just want to get the hard packs out of the way first.

Ultimately, I'm also in a way a natural born puzzle solver. In particular, I'm a math puzzle kind of person. So, along with how I have gained so much experience from playing many level packs, these two combined is why I believe I'm able to take on hard packs that many people will otherwise not be able to complete. Generally, the most difficult part of hard levels is just finding the solution. Once found, then it's just a matter of carrying it out. While the solution may be difficult, the execution might not be or vice versa.     

[Shmoley]

Here’s another thought.. if there was no limit and difficulty could go up infinitely, would that mean we would continue to make harder and harder levels to a point where packs such as United would be considered easy? That would be weird. If this was the case I can imagine 10 years from now people being like: Remember when (Insert pack here) used to be considered hard? But I personally believe there is a limit. Why? Simply because the lemmings skills can do a lot. But they have their limitations, so how could levels not have a difficulty limit if the skills have a limit on what they can do?

[Armani]

I personally agree on your thought as long as there are some kind of limits. (eg. Maximum size of the level, maximum total number of skills, time limit etc.)
But if we don't have any limit on the level, surely the difficulty can go to infinity.

[kaywhyn]

Here’s another thought.. if there was no limit and difficulty could go up infinitely, would that mean we would continue to make harder and harder levels to a point where packs such as United would be considered easy?

Making a level pack that is much harder than United will be very interesting indeed. It's definitely going to be quite a task and very difficult to do, though it's not impossible. Who knows? It might happen. Still, I'm looking forward to taking on Lemmings Uncharted by Armani when he releases it.

Speaking of which, I recently completed namida's Lemmings Plus Alpha, which is a very hard pack he says was designed for the highly skilled players. Now that I managed to beat the pack, it's nowhere near as brutal as United, so even though it's a hard pack, I'm really saying that LPA is by far much easier compared to United. There were only 2-3 really hard levels in each of the 3 ranks, but I think ultimately why the levels are easier is due to how a lot of the levels were small in size and the skillsets were extremely limited. Compared to United, where there were plenty of levels that were both huge in size AND a skillset that seems very generous but in actuality was extremely tight on resources. Most importantly, often it was not very obvious where the skills were needed, which makes United many times harder.

I'm currently playing through Nepsterlems, which is another very difficult pack and am stuck on the very first level of Black Hole, the final rank. Looks like I was right in that it'll be amazing if I manage to solve even one level in the Black Hole rank. In contrast to LPA, which I breezed through quite easily once I got myself unstuck on the second level of the pack, and the only reason I was stuck on it was because I was dumb and didn't pay attention to the save requirement (I kept thinking everyone needed to be saved, including the cloners), I'm struggling way more with Nepsterlems despite the fact that Nepsterlems sticks only to the 8 classical skills. The levels in here are generally also very small in size just like LPA, but I think the reason why I feel Nepsterlems is harder than LPA is because the solutions are much better hidden. Still, Nepsterlems is quite tame compared to United, and so United still trumps these two packs in difficulty by a longshot. I'm still remaining hopeful that I can beat Nepsterlems, though, considering that I've already beaten both United and LPA.

In summary, by what I described, in order of difficulty from easiest to hardest: LPA => Nepsterlems => United. Oh hey, that leaves the middleman pack that I need to finish lol.