NotaLems Level pack

[Nota_Steve]

Hi everyone.
I've been using NeoLemmix for a good while now, very much still enjoying it with all the map packs that are out there.

A while ago, approx. 6 or 7 years ago, I decided to try get my friends (most of them American) to play Lemmings as many of them had never even heard of it, no less understood it. So I created a map pack for them.
This map pack is designed to help explain the original skills and how they can be used in many different situations, then moving up in rank to more difficult levels (difficult for a non Lemmings Veteran).
I have since revisited the level pack and ironed out some of the kinks.

The reason I am posting this is because I would love for some of you to try out my level pack and offer me some feedback (good or bad), find unintended solutions and generally give it a go, as I intend on creating a new one with the newer skills soon. I would love to hear from an experienced Lemmings player how they found it and also from newer players to contrast.

In my humble opinion, I think this level pack is slightly builder heavy in a couple of cases (I was not as creative 7 years ago), but it did it's job as a few of my friends now enjoy Lemmings.

Please let me know! If you have a favourite or a least favourite level, I would love to hear any feedback.

Quick edit: Tough 20 - The Arches has a backroute that I discovered, I have recently fixed it, please replace Tough 20 with the re-edited version located below.

mod edit: Download the Lemmings Reunion music pack from here:

https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=2175.0

Many thanks,
Steve
x

[kaywhyn]

Hello Nota_Steve,

I've moved this to the NeoLemmix Levels board, as from the looks of things this is a complete level pack. A couple of things I've noticed:

For the levels document that tells you the order of the ranks, you have the wrong extension. It should be named levels.nxmi, not levels.txt. I have fixed that for you and I reattached your level pack with the correct filename

Also, I took a quick glance and haven't checked all the levels, but I've noticed a lot of the levels have preassigned Lemmings Reunion music tracks. So, you might want to put the Lemmings Reunion music pack in the OP alongside the pack download. Or, at least put a link where users can download the Reunion music tracks, which would be from here:

https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=2175.0

I've also put the link for the music pack in the OP.

Anyway, I'll give your pack a look whenever I'm able to!  

[Proxima]

Replays for the Easy rank attached.

For the most part, I enjoyed this and it seems suitable to newer players. A couple of points, though:

Some levels are slightly above 160 pixels tall, meaning they scroll vertically at default zoom. There's nothing wrong with tall levels when the concept needs the level to be tall, but if it's just above 160 then the level probably doesn't need the extra height, so it would be player-friendly to keep it to 160.

Starting with Builders is an unusual choice because it's the most complicated skill. The Level 1 introduction text suggests it's aimed at players completely new to Lemmings, but doesn't tell the player what the objective is or how to assign skills.

Level 4: The background could be confused with terrain. It would be helpful for the introduction text to mention skill shadows.

Level 9: One-way walls and mining into steel appear with no introduction.

Level 10: This is one of a few levels that have an unnecessary number of lemmings -- and you haven't introduced release rate yet, so a new player will be waiting a long time.

Level 11: Clicking on 99 lemmings is really tedious. "Traps only kill one lemming at a time" could be shown with a much smaller number. (Easily the worst level in the rank.)

Level 12: Since climb-bombing is explicitly taught later, I guess you wanted the player to figure out reverse mining here. In the original game, this is first seen in "Postcard from Lemmingland", the 49th level, and is usually considered a difficulty spike even that late in!

Level 21: "These are neutral lemmings" is not very helpful; how does the player know what "these" refers to? Better to say that grey lemmings are neutral, and the diamond shows a neutral trapdoor. The solution is not very interesting.

Level 23: Typo in level title. This is indeed tough, partly because of figuring out the use of a basher to break ceilings, but the placement of the bottom basher is unnecessarily tight (you have to avoid splatting and have a lemming far enough in front to build over the gap).

Level 25: Once the route is complete, the player has to mindlessly click floaters for a while longer. Locked release rate appears without being explained. Finally, this isn't even a good illustration of "pause can be helpful" because the level is quite easy to complete without pausing!

Level 27: This has a problem spot in that if you are not careful, lemmings will turn around during the climb-bomb. This feels a bit too tough for beginners, but then, so do the levels that come after it.

Level 30: Given the title, I was expecting the right side to have to help out the left and was a little disappointed when it didn't happen.

[Nota_Steve]

Hello Nota_Steve,

I've moved this to the NeoLemmix Levels board, as from the looks of things this is a complete level pack. A couple of things I've noticed:

For the levels document that tells you the order of the ranks, you have the wrong extension. It should be named levels.nxmi, not levels.txt. I have fixed that for you and I reattached your level pack with the correct filename

Also, I took a quick glance and haven't checked all the levels, but I've noticed a lot of the levels have preassigned Lemmings Reunion music tracks. So, you might want to put the Lemmings Reunion music pack in the OP alongside the pack download. Or, at least put a link where users can download the Reunion music tracks, which would be from here:

https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=2175.0

I've also put the link for the music pack in the OP.

Anyway, I'll give your pack a look whenever I'm able to!  

Hi Kay,

You are an icon, thank you very much!

[Nota_Steve]

Replays for the Easy rank attached.

For the most part, I enjoyed this and it seems suitable to newer players. A couple of points, though:

Some levels are slightly above 160 pixels tall, meaning they scroll vertically at default zoom. There's nothing wrong with tall levels when the concept needs the level to be tall, but if it's just above 160 then the level probably doesn't need the extra height, so it would be player-friendly to keep it to 160.

Starting with Builders is an unusual choice because it's the most complicated skill. The Level 1 introduction text suggests it's aimed at players completely new to Lemmings, but doesn't tell the player what the objective is or how to assign skills.

Level 4: The background could be confused with terrain. It would be helpful for the introduction text to mention skill shadows.

Level 9: One-way walls and mining into steel appear with no introduction.

Level 10: This is one of a few levels that have an unnecessary number of lemmings -- and you haven't introduced release rate yet, so a new player will be waiting a long time.

Level 11: Clicking on 99 lemmings is really tedious. "Traps only kill one lemming at a time" could be shown with a much smaller number. (Easily the worst level in the rank.)

Level 12: Since climb-bombing is explicitly taught later, I guess you wanted the player to figure out reverse mining here. In the original game, this is first seen in "Postcard from Lemmingland", the 49th level, and is usually considered a difficulty spike even that late in!

Level 21: "These are neutral lemmings" is not very helpful; how does the player know what "these" refers to? Better to say that grey lemmings are neutral, and the diamond shows a neutral trapdoor. The solution is not very interesting.

Level 23: Typo in level title. This is indeed tough, partly because of figuring out the use of a basher to break ceilings, but the placement of the bottom basher is unnecessarily tight (you have to avoid splatting and have a lemming far enough in front to build over the gap).

Level 25: Once the route is complete, the player has to mindlessly click floaters for a while longer. Locked release rate appears without being explained. Finally, this isn't even a good illustration of "pause can be helpful" because the level is quite easy to complete without pausing!

Level 27: This has a problem spot in that if you are not careful, lemmings will turn around during the climb-bomb. This feels a bit too tough for beginners, but then, so do the levels that come after it.

Level 30: Given the title, I was expecting the right side to have to help out the left and was a little disappointed when it didn't happen.

This is really good and helpful feedback Proxima. Thank you for taking the time and trying out!

[JawaJuice]

Hi Steve,

Thanks very much for this pack - it's always great to have a new one to play!

I've enjoyed the first rank (Easy) and attach replays, talisman solutions also included. I won't give feedback on every level, as I'd just be re-iterating the useful feedback Proxima has already provided for the most part. Overall, I think it's a good introductory rank, with good bits of info for a new player, although perhaps sometimes the intro text is a little vague. Anyway, I'll give you the notes I had:

Level 4 - Already quite a tricky level compared with the others around it, if a player's goal is to save 100% (mine usually is). That's on the player though I guess, since the actual save requirement is only 50%.

Level 11 - As Proxima said above, very tireseome to have do so much assignment clicking. Of course, it's limited somewhat by the fact that you only need to assign to lemmings who have passed through the traps. It could be made more interesting by having a high entrance and using floater compression to get more lemmings through traps but I guess that's something else entirely and not the point of this level. I would just reduce the number of lemmings to avoid so much clicking!

Level 13 - Most of my solutions in this rank I don't think would be considered backroutes as levels are generally open-ended with x-of-everything skill sets but I suspect this one might be. I'm guessing with the low save requirement, you're expecting a lot of lemmings to die in the suction traps up top, but they're easily avoided altogether.

Level 23 - Comfortably the hardest of the rank for my money, and the only one that gave me significant pause for thought. I'm not sure if it's just down to how I went about it, but I got the talisman first go without even checking what the requirement was! Still, I'd say this level is pretty hard for beginners - the thing about 'exploiting' bashers is a bit vague for new players to get your gist, I think.

Level 30 - Again, to echo Proxima, the title implied co-operation on each side to me, but none is required.

Anyway, I really enjoyed playing through this rank and look forward to tackling Medium next, and Tough if I can make it that far!

[kaywhyn]

Reattached your level pack with the new Tough 20. Keep in mind that you can simply edit your own post and reattach the zip file by including the new level(s) that have changed. In addition, it's perfectly fine to simply attach the level itself rather than put it in a zip file first, though if you've included the level(s) that have changed in the pack download then it's not necessary to attach the level files themselves I've put that in the OP and you can choose whether or not to remove the second zip file

Hi Kay,

You are an icon, thank you very much!

I completely missed this, as I thought you simply only replied to Proxima. It's a problem where when navigating to a topic it shows the most recent post and hence I didn't think that there might had been further replies because I didn't bother to scroll up!

Anyway, you didn't yet know this about me, but the correct way to refer to me online is by the full username that you see displayed for me, which is kaywhyn. I have a girl cousin with the shortened name you used to reply to me, while for myself my actual name is really close to it but not quite Hence I tell people to refer to me as kaywhyn online  

[JawaJuice]

Medium rank cleared. Definitely a step up in difficulty, though still nothing brain-melting! On the whole, I'd say the pack has a fairly smooth difficulty curve. Notes on individual levels:

Level 8 - Another level that's simply tedious, with the same skill assigned 40 times. Admittedly, 'Endurance Test' is in the title, but is this really necessary? I've seen almost the exact same level in at least a couple of other packs. I feel like there should be some variant to make it interesting.

Level 9 - Almost certainly a backroute. Would be resolved by having the OWD section go right down to the bottom of the screen.

Level 14 - The first really tricky level of the pack imo. Took a bit of working out, this one, as well as a bit of RR fiddling!

Level 15 - Not as hard as it looked like it was going to be, mainly due to the minimum RR.

Level 22 - Seems a bit easy and uninvolved for this point of the pack.

Level 23 - Really nice level that necessitates the use of every single skill, which is usually a sign of good design in my book!

Level 24 - The hardest yet! I tried lots of different approaches with nothing working for quite a long time until I hit on a solution. The difficulty of the rank peaks with this level though; it's downhill from here - not in terms of good levels, but definitely in terms of how challenging they are.

Replays attached.

[Nota_Steve]

Medium rank cleared. Definitely a step up in difficulty, though still nothing brain-melting! On the whole, I'd say the pack has a fairly smooth difficulty curve. Notes on individual levels:

Level 8 - Another level that's simply tedious, with the same skill assigned 40 times. Admittedly, 'Endurance Test' is in the title, but is this really necessary? I've seen almost the exact same level in at least a couple of other packs. I feel like there should be some variant to make it interesting.

Level 9 - Almost certainly a backroute. Would be resolved by having the OWD section go right down to the bottom of the screen.

Level 14 - The first really tricky level of the pack imo. Took a bit of working out, this one, as well as a bit of RR fiddling!

Level 15 - Not as hard as it looked like it was going to be, mainly due to the minimum RR.

Level 22 - Seems a bit easy and uninvolved for this point of the pack.

Level 23 - Really nice level that necessitates the use of every single skill, which is usually a sign of good design in my book!

Level 24 - The hardest yet! I tried lots of different approaches with nothing working for quite a long time until I hit on a solution. The difficulty of the rank peaks with this level though; it's downhill from here - not in terms of good levels, but definitely in terms of how challenging they are.

Replays attached.

Hiya Jawa,

I really appreciate you playing through my level pack, and your feedback on both Easy and Medium is really appreciated.

I've watched through the replays, and many of the levels were designed in a way to have multiple solutions, however you appear to have found a couple more which I'm happy about, my concern with some of them is that they were slightly too difficult and you've alleviated that concern.
I've also noticed a few back routes other than Medium 9 which I will address when I have the time to, but for the most part it looks like the pack is as I intended.

In regards to the easy rank, I agree that the tutorials seem a little out of place, in future level packs I will take more time to explain a little more.

When I uploaded this pack I knew of of them would be tedious, as I'm sure you can tell, Steve from 7 years ago just wanted to fill the void of needed some extra levels in there, hence why the Endurance test is there. I apologise on behalf of past Steve for the tedious levels.

Very well played and I look forward to hearing further feedback! 

[Nota_Steve]

Reattached your level pack with the new Tough 20. Keep in mind that you can simply edit your own post and reattach the zip file by including the new level(s) that have changed. In addition, it's perfectly fine to simply attach the level itself rather than put it in a zip file first, though if you've included the level(s) that have changed in the pack download then it's not necessary to attach the level files themselves I've put that in the OP and you can choose whether or not to remove the second zip file

Hi Kay,

You are an icon, thank you very much!

I completely missed this, as I thought you simply only replied to Proxima. It's a problem where when navigating to a topic it shows the most recent post and hence I didn't think that there might had been further replies because I didn't bother to scroll up!

Anyway, you didn't yet know this about me, but the correct way to refer to me online is by the full username that you see displayed for me, which is kaywhyn. I have a girl cousin with the shortened name you used to reply to me, while for myself my actual name is really close to it but not quite Hence I tell people to refer to me as kaywhyn online  

I apologise for that Kaywhyn hahaha, I hope I didn't offend by calling you the wrong name.

Thank you for all your help, I'm somewhat new to uploading these things. 

[JawaJuice]

I really appreciate you playing through my level pack, and your feedback on both Easy and Medium is really appreciated.

My pleasure! I've really enjoyed the play through so far

I've watched through the replays, and many of the levels were designed in a way to have multiple solutions, however you appear to have found a couple more which I'm happy about, my concern with some of them is that they were slightly too difficult and you've alleviated that concern.

Yeah, the difficulty curve is generally quite smooth, so nicely judged on your part! Don't worry though, Tough rank is plenty hard

I've also noticed a few back routes other than Medium 9 which I will address when I have the time to, but for the most part it looks like the pack is as I intended.

Good stuff! Always happy to play any updates you have when you get around to it.  

Very well played and I look forward to hearing further feedback! 

Cheers! My solve time has already gone up considerably just a couple of levels into Tough. I think it's going to be quite a while until I crack this rank, if at all! Interestingly, level 4, which is another repeat (several in this pack, but that's standard), does actually introduce that element of necessary co-operation that was missing in its earlier incarnation. Tough level - I might have been being dumb (entirely possible! XD), but it took me about half an hour to finally find a solution there. If that's indicative of how this rank's gonna go, I'm in for a long ride! Nothing rage-inducing so far though, it's all just difficult puzzle-solving rather than horrifically precise execution and timing - definitely a good thing in my book.

[kaywhyn]

Completed both the Easy and Medium ranks, so attaching my replays for them.

Also, link to my LP of your pack:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbp2m4KlFpJvLuYyA-gcPde2-ovtF0d3j

Enjoy!

General Feedback

NotaLems is a custom level pack by Nota_Steve, a user who hasn't been on for quite some time but made a reappearance recently, with their level pack in hand. They worked on it a long time ago but recently revisited the pack to finish it up to post and release to the Lemmings community to play.

The pack consists of 3 ranks of 30 levels each, similar to L1 but with one less rank. The three ranks, in order, are Easy, Medium, and Tough. In a way, the rank names remind me of Duuddu's packs, as the rank names there, in order, are Easy, Normal, and Hard, respectively. Hence, don't be fooled by even the first rank levels, as even some of those are more difficult than your usual affair.

Regarding the rank names, is it intentional that the sign rank graphics have a different name from the intended rank names? Currently, the Easy rank has a rank sign name of Fun, the Medium rank has a rank sign name of Tricky, and finally the Tough rank has a rank sign name of Mayhem, respectively. Level pack authors usually match the name of the graphic with their intended rank names by the way

As mentioned in a previous post of mine, some of the levels use Lemmings Reunion music tracks. However, upon closer inspection during my LP, I've noticed the only Reunion tracks that are used for the pack are the ones you hear from the official Lemmings games. In particular, I have forgotten some of them are L2 music tracks. It does make sense, considering that the pack also uses L1 and ONML music tracks in addition to Lemmings Reunion. If so, it might be possible to pack the music tracks with the pack download in one attachment. I'll have see about that

Easy Rank Feedback

Being the first rank, these are the easiest levels of the pack, with most of the levels being a tutorial of some kind in order to teach newcomers of the game what the skills do and also a few more advanced concepts, such as compression to minimize losses to traps. However, as some others have noted, including myself, some of the levels could be modified to better teach the concepts they're supposed to teach players, along with it being written out in the pre-text. In addition, some rearranging of level order of these so-called tutorials can do, as some of these can appear earlier rather than later. Other than that, these levels appear to be mostly open-ended ones to give players freedom to come up with their own solutions and hence don't have a single solution or intended way to do them.

My thoughts:

Easy 1 - Building Bridges Completely agree with Proxima that this is an unusual level to have as the first one, as the builder skill is a complicated skill relative to the other 7 classic ones. Also as was pointed out, the pre-text doesn't say or explain how to assign skills to the Lemmings. That can be added in for sure.

Easy 4 - Egyptian Excavation Somewhat a huge step up in difficulty, though the quite lenient save requirement kind of reduces the difficulty. Also yea, the background can potentially be confused with terrain.

Easy 7 - For the Greater Good I would definitely have a pre-text that explains that unlike the original game, bombers are untimed in NL and hence makes levels that originally relied on timed bombers a lot easier since you don't need to time them to explode in the right spot after 5 seconds.

Easy 8 - Now combine skills..... Ok talisman tutorial which is quite easy to obtain it. Here, I would definitely have a pre-text that explains what that question mark is in the level preview, which is a talisman. It's essentially akin to Steam achievements and can be thought of as an optional challenge that players may go for if they wish. I myself personally don't really care for talismans in the game of NL and hence generally don't go for them, but for your pack I made an exception

Easy 9 - Tightrope Artist The Lemming that's already pre-placed in the level is a pre-placed Lemming. Tanking on steel to turn around is introduced here but there's no pre-text explaining that for beginners

Easy 10 - Noughts and Crosses Yea, there's no reason for the Lemming count to be so high on this level. Levels that employ such are quite rare, but generally the ones I have seen that do have a high count tend to use it well. As was explained by Proxima, the release rate hasn't been taught or explained in any pre-text yet up to this point, but it is in Easy 22 (see below for my comments on it).

Easy 11 - Unavoidable Way too many repeated skill assignments! I tend to not be a fan of such levels, especially ones where you need to spam the same skill quickly in a short amount of time. Also no reason for the Lemming count to be so high here. It can definitely be done with a small Lemming count. The level can also definitely be changed to teach the player compression better to minimize losses against traps. Currently the floaters are only used to survive the fall before the exit. Perhaps have the Lemmings drop into a pit or as JawaJuice suggested maybe have the fall from the entrance be splat height in order for the floaters to serve a purpose of having the players achieve better compression to be able to save as much as possible.

Easy 13 - Pipeline Pathway This seems to be a level where the player is supposed to use compression to go through the traps with minimal losses due to the unusually low save requirement, except that it's possible to completely bypass all the traps and hence avoid any losses whatsoever

Easy 15 - Balls Great talisman and maybe could do as the introduction level to talismans instead. Here we have a different kind, where instead of it being a save requirement one, this one is a total skill limit one. Hence, you could explain in the pre-text that there are different talisman types, as well as how there's 3 different colors for them: Bronze, silver, and gold, with generally the bronze ones being easiest out of either silver and gold, with the silver ones generally easier than gold.

Easy 21 - Lazy Lemmings Yea, "these" in the pre-text isn't very descriptive or helpful when trying to explain neutrals. The hatch that spawns neutrals is indicated by a diamond, and they're Lemmings that are gray in color that cannot be assigned skills but can still be rescued and are subject to the same object effects as regular Lemmings, such as they can die to traps.

Easy 22 - Quick Release Bridge Now this is a good RR introduction level and could appear earlier in the rank, perhaps around or even replacing Easy 10 itself. This is also the most common use of the RR, which is to max it out early so as to not run out of time on levels with a very strict time limit. There's definitely far better uses and puzzles that make good use of RR manipulation.

Easy 23 - Intemediate skill knowledge Completely agree with this level being quite hard for beginners and can potentially trip up even veterans. However, I didn't run into any problems with the timing being too tight with splat height or finishing the bridge to get across the gap on time I honestly think this is a great level!

Easy 25 - Pausing can help I didn't try it myself in the LP, but I take Proxima's word that this can still be easily done pause-free. Perhaps a better way to have players make use of pause is to increase the RR, like maybe to 95 or so, as well as possibly require the level to be a save all rather than you can lose up to 10 Also as was mentioned there's no explanation of the locked RR and what it means (the player cannot adjust the RR at any time during the level).

Easy 26 - Creating your own "steps" Another climber bombing level, though this seemed to have been taught first in Easy 20, with each one being a different application of it. In the latter, it's to prevent making a hole in the floor.

Easy 27 - No Building or Blocking allowed One of the best levels of the rank IMO! I love builderless levels in general. At the same time, I kind of agree with the difficulty being a bit high since you do need to spam bashers as the bomber is the only loss you can afford here. You can't afford to have anyone turn around at the start, and also you need to have them avoid walking up to fall into the water at the top.

Easy 28 - Leaves Quite possibly the hardest level in the rank IMO, especially when trying to go for the save all. At least the hardest part for me was to figure out how to contain the crowd. Still, a decent and nice challenging level!

Easy 29 - Underground Tunnels of the Scarab King Wow, excellent level and talisman! It's obvious what needs to be done in the solution, but to solve the level along with getting the talisman isn't easy at all to achieve.

Easy 30 - Unselfishness Ok, I apparently missed the clue that the title possibly hints at interaction of the entrances, but as some others have pointed out that's not needed at all. Nice level to finish off the rank!

Medium Rank Feedback

Harder levels here, being the second rank, with plenty of these taking me quite a while before I was able to solve them. There's still some excellent gems in this rank!

Spoiler

Medium 1 - The Blocker Lives! New concept taught here that blockers can be freed by removing the ground underneath them, though this is a technique that wasn't officially taught in L1 until Mayhem 20. There was no prior introduction for this in the Easy rank. I think the same with falls of a certain distance being fatal wasn't taught in the previous rank either, other than that trap compression level with the fall before the exit being fatal.

Medium 2 - Ruins of Palmyra Now this does make use of floaters to survive the fall, though it's only necessary for the workers on both sides that turn around. The rest of the floaters aren't needed

Medium 3 - No Safety net One of the best levels of the rank along with an excellent talisman to boot! I think I later realized that I could had had all 12 bash at the same spot and hence I was a big dummy on getting the talisman!

Medium 4 - Elephants graveyard The area to the right of the exit is probably a little too small and tight to get up there comfortably, though I acknowledge that I might had simply built in a suboptimal spot for that Ok level otherwise.

Medium 5 - The Chain Great level and not too hard despite appearances and the strict time limit. I had some skills leftover and just let one splat, so I'm not sure if my solution is intended.

Medium 6 - Snake Pit Nice snake pit, though it's quite difficult to tell where the trap triggers are in it without turning on CPM to check. Other than that, great level! Nice challenge to figure out how to build from both sides of the gap at the top.

Medium 7 - Nightboat to Cairo Seems all 4 bombers are needed and hence on can't do any better than that

Medium 8 - Turn Around! (Endurance Test) Seems you got inspiration from "Everybody, turn left" from the Genesis/Mega Drive port of the game Yea, too excessive on the repeated miner assignments for my liking.

Medium 9 - The Pillars of Positivity and Negativity Introduction to up and down OWAs, though there was no proper introduction for this in the previous rank and hence can be a huge step up in difficulty for newcomers, especially as these arrows didn't exist in the original game. Nice challenge if going for the save all the intended way!

Medium 10 - They're everywhere! Ack, more excessive and repetitive skill assignments in a short amount of time Though this is only necessary if one wants to save everyone, which is still easy to do here.

Medium 11 - A series of fortunate events Another excellent level! Very nice solution and great use of climber bombing the thin pole at the start. I also love the gotcha of if you bash the barrel with the climber from the left side after mining then you don't have the level solved due to him climbing up, falling down and splatting on the far right later on

Medium 12 - Wee Nessy! Second excellent level in a row! I especially like the basher on the Nessy to delay the others in order to give the leader enough time to plug up the small gap on the far right. Another one where a splatform is required, which I don't think was taught in the previous rank.

Medium 13 - Nothings changed Talisman requires good timing to stop the miner going to the right, but it fortunately isn't super tight or very strict and hence is still easy to obtain despite the fiddliness of cancelling the miner with another one going in the opposite direction.

Medium 14 - Pendulum Ok, this one managed to stump me for a while, though I didn't need to resort to RR fiddling like JawaJuice did. Good to know I wasn't the only dummy on this level. Then again, I haven't checked their solution yet Great level here that manages to be tough!

Medium 15 - Hazardous Work Environment Once again, spamming the same skill repeatedly to keep everyone alive, though luckily this is alleviated by the very slow 1 RR. One can also make things easier by making a builder wall to stop anyone from getting into danger in case they turn back to the left.

Medium 16 - Million Dollar Lemming Another difficult one for me, though that's because I tried some wrong stuff for quite a while and didn't think to simply dig all of the OWW at the start away. Great level though!

Medium 17 - What lurks beyond Ugh, this level is made all the more painful with the locked RR forcing you to just wait and hence it takes a while for everyone to drop out of the hatches. Seems the degree of fiddliness will vary, especially when you're trying to avoid anyone falling out to the left once through to the bottom. Again, I think I brought this on myself and hence made it harder than it needed to be. The Lemming count could certainly be much lower here.

Medium 18 - The Once-Mighty Oak Great level, though I find the penultimate builder a bit annoying to get right since he may not be able to build a full length bridge after mining through.

Medium 19 - Where there's a will... I was a bit of a dummy here and kept thinking of ways of getting the Lemmings through the wall before the exit, when in fact I simply overlooked the simple build to get over the wall I blame being sleepy and sleep-deprived during my LP!

Medium 20 - Bash at the Beach Great level and definitely reminds me of some Lemmings Reunion levels where the builder needs time to finish building to the exit before the others arrive. It most certainly reminds me of Crazy 4 from ONML as well!

Medium 21 - You were warned, blockers are a luxury The hardest part here is to prevent anyone from slipping out to the left in the upper part of the level, but once you achieve that then the level is simple afterwards. Nice level!

Medium 22 - The High Dive Quite easy for its position when most of the levels around it are much harder. With that being said, I probably backrouted it

Medium 23 - The Pool Hall Challenging level, especially with figuring out the best way to get the bottom entrances up to the exit. My solution at least seems to be quite tight in getting the miner in the right spot to get the bottom left entrance out since I would had ran out of builders otherwise if the miner didn't get low enough for them. Maybe this is a case of I made the solution harder than it needs to be though

Medium 24 -Our Little Brothers Keepers Can be challenging but this one wasn't as bad as I thought. I'm not sure if digging away the trap trigger is intended.

Medium 25 - The grass is greener Nice level, though the second blocker to turn the builder can be frustrating to get right since you need the right timing and spacing to do so as you can't afford to have anyone to get past it. At the same time, I spared the digger, so maybe that's to ease the solution execution a bit?

Medium 26 - Caustic Chasm Hard one for me, though mostly because I was confused as to how to do the building. Didn't think to build shortly after going down the triangle so that it's possible to build back up to the crowd and then to the exit and finally to bash the blocker free with the worker. Excellent level and solution!

Medium 27 - Inferno Room Ok, this one was a much quicker solve for me and IMO is quite easy for its position. Can easily be earlier in the rank.

Medium 28 - Potholing Quite possibly the hardest for me in the entire rank. I struggled to think about how to get everyone down to the exit for a long time, especially with wondering whether to go out the left or to the right. The solution I eventually found is likely far more complicated than it needs to be. Great level, but wow, really hard.

Medium 29 - Sandcastle Competition Much easier, though the final builder to reach the exit is a bit annoying and seems to require good precision.

Medium 30 - Under the Highlands Also an easy one just like the previous level. Pretty much a standard puzzle here.     

Other than the suggestions I gave for the Easy rank, I'm enjoying the pack a lot! Definitely far harder than ScottyLems. So far, I've solved the first 6 levels of the Tough rank and yup, it's aptly named! I don't expect to get through them very quickly, if the fact I struggled a lot with the Medium rank is any indication So far, Tough 4 is the hardest IMO, as that one took me a while. Seems like I'm in good company there. A few breathers here and there, but yea, I think it's going to take time to get through the rest of the pack.

I apologise for that Kaywhyn hahaha, I hope I didn't offend by calling you the wrong name.

Of course I was, given that I'm one of the staff of the site! Joking of course, though again you didn't know that about me. As it's your post, you can edit and correct my name. Or I can, though I generally give the user the opportunity to edit typos of my username rather than do it myself. Seems to have worked well so far

Thank you for all your help, I'm somewhat new to uploading these things. 

You're welcome, always happy to help!

               

[kaywhyn]

Tough rank finished and hence I have solved all of the pack! Replays attached and of course more feedback

Tough Rank Feedback

The third and final rank of the pack, the Tough rank offers the hardest levels. Indeed, as I previously mentioned, the Tough rank is aptly named, though I managed to pick up significant speed with a large amount of levels in the middle. Even then, there's still plenty of difficult nuts to crack here! Of course, there's still some significant gems in the rank as well.

Spoiler

Tough 1 - The Flagpole and the Box Great level to start the rank. Not too hard of a level, though the hardest part here was getting a Lemming to turn around at the very end of the basher tunnel in order to dig so that he gets low enough to mine the bottom entrance out. Thankfully, the player can better get this via the RR.

Tough 2 - Rope Swing Looks daunting and difficult, but it's not too bad despite appearances. Once you realize the way to keep the second Lemming safe is to have him dig all the way down at the start and then you can release him from the pit with the climber skill, then the rest of the solution should come easily. It might still be difficult to find the best way through the ropes, though. You're pretty much given exactly the bare minimum of what you need to solve the level, so you can't waste any builders whatsoever.

Tough 3 - Catacombs Pretty much a breather level for the most part, especially as it's quite obvious that you can't go through the bottom entirely and that you must go over the top. This is pretty much the hard part, knowing where to build to get everyone up. I finish the level with a lot of miners to spare, so I don't know what those others are for. Even then, there doesn't seem to be any harm in keeping them in, especially as I don't see how the level can be cheesed with them

Tough 4 - No Justice Quite possibly the hardest level in the entire rank TBH. For the most part, I kept wondering if the level is even solvable with the given skillset, as it always looks as if you're a digging destructive skill short. In the end, after a long struggle, the solution I found requires a lot of pixel precision, particularly the second climber to stop the first one who digs, as well as a very precise bomber to get the left entrance out and into the miner tunnel from the first climber. If this is intended, then I suggest heavily reducing the precision needed and/or eliminating it. Levels that require a lot of pixel precise skill assignments in the solution aren't good design IMO. It's one of those things that just because you can doesn't mean you should. At least when I test my levels, if too much precision is needed, then I like to help the player out by either reducing it or just outright eliminating it. I don't like players failing my levels because of pixels. I want them to fail because of the puzzle!

Tough 5 - Jenga Another hard level IMO. A lot of my attempts failed because I couldn't find a way to keep the neutrals safe while one of the regular Lemmings builds to get to the exit. Turns out I simply needed to realize to use a builder to make a splatform first before building to the exit. I don't think there's really a way to delay the neutrals further, at least without them climbing into danger later on as a result, such as into a bear trap or falling into the acid.

Tough 6 - Iron Gate Nice level even though this isn't the intended way that you need to do the final level for this particular mini-level! Isolating the first two Lemmings from the rest of the crowd while one of the two pioneers bombs through the OWW and then builds across the gap and also over the ketchup wheel trap and then the crowd can release themselves by bashing. It's still a much faster solve than either of the two previous levels, so it's definitely much easier than them.

Tough 7 - Crystal Clear? Quite possibly the easiest level in the entire rank because this level literally took me no time at all to get solved, and so yes, I would agree that the level is indeed "crystal clear"

Tough 8 - One Minute, One Of Each Skill Nice level and a tad bit harder than the previous one, with probably the hardest and trickiest part being just a bit before the exit. I don't know if my solution is intended though. It's always nice to see a level made with Gronkling's Menacing tileset. I'll be honest, and that is I was amazed at this special graphics level of L1 as a kid, rather than freaked out by the blood and strains. Good music as well.

Tough 9 - Z Cave Another easy one, as it's obvious that the miner needs to bounce off two blockers. The only hard part here is preventing the other entrances from dying to the deadly sides.

Tough 10 - Pair of Aces I love the design of the level here which is meant to depict playing cards. In this case, Ace of Spades and Ace of Diamonds. Hard level here, as even with a lot of builders available it's not easy to determine the best route through the playing cards, especially the latter. I must say, that hidden steel in the middle is pretty evil. I think you may be aware as well, but deceiving players like that tends to be a big no-no in the NL community. Most players agree that all information to solve the level should be visible from the get-go and not hidden. Of course, if one wants to during play, CPM can be activated ahead of time to know that the middle part is steel and not destructible terrain like I thought it was. So, I brought that on myself, but in general I usually don't use CPM in my live LPs Overall, nice challenging level!

Tough 11 - Spectacular Pretty much the best level of the entire rank IMO! The hardest to see in the solution is the user of the bomber, but that realization didn't take too long for me as I kept trying to fiddle around with not using too many builders to build across the gap at the bottom. Certainly the hardest part afterwards was releasing the top entrances while making sure to have enough builders to do so and to get up the miner tunnels, though that would leave you a builder short if you do the latter. The alternative, then, is to get the middle entrance down by having them mine out so that they will come back up the side of the level to reach the exit. I really enjoyed figuring out this level. Well done, though I have a builder to spare

Tough 12 - Wind Tunnel Ah, so the level from the Easy rank does get repeated here, which we all thought you meant to have the player solve via compression through the traps. Nah, this is the level, the repeat, that players do it on, so I guess that renders what we said about the level in the Easy rank moot That's certainly not the hardest part but rather how to achieve the compression and then be able to release everyone to go towards the traps at the end, except for the worker who did the bridges.

Tough 13 - Desert Island Night Rescue Team Pretty much a breather as well, as it's the rare level where one can simply use the standard two blocker trap to hold back the crowd while one Lemming goes on ahead to make the route for them. Also, as long as you realize that you can only save 3 of the 2-neutral groups, then this level isn't a problem in any way. I did think that maybe the intention is to make bridges that span across so that you can free all the neutrals with one of the bashers, but thankfully that's not required, as you are allowed to lose both the blockers and two of the neturals which can't be freed.

Tough 14 - Multi-tasking Looks daunting and hard but it's not that bad at all. Pretty much the only hard part is making the splatform to save the right entrance, but you do have plenty of floaters to spare so luckily it's not too tight. Perhaps keeping the left entrance safe is the harder part of the level. I do have plenty of skills to spare, but maybe it's supposed to be an open-ended level. Decent and somewhat challenging level here.

Tough 15 - Crosses and Noughts Sorry, not a fan of this level at all! Way too many repeated bomber and builder assignments make this really boring and not fun to play. Sure, it's a breather, considering the lenient save requirement and all, but didn't find this fun in any way.

Tough 16 - The Sands of Time Also a breather IMO, with probably the only hard part is to have one Lemming turn around after going down a level so that he can prepare the rest of the way for the others before too many get into danger due to turning around. I used the final 3 builders to turn the 3 back towards the exit while the basher was still going. Not sure if this is intended.

Tough 17 - Derelict Staircase Looks difficult, and indeed it does seem to be the case, especially if the intended solution is enforced. This seems to be a backroute I found. I'm not sure if digging to avoid the trap is intended here. I expected them to get killed on the other side if doing that, but apparently there's a wall there that prevents them from reaching the other side.

Tough 18 - Cave Explorer Sorry, not a fan of this level either. It's quite obvious what you need to do here, but way too much bridge building for my liking. This does remind me of an L2 Outdoor level that has something very similar, though I can't remember if you're given anything else other than just builders and diggers. This level does seem to be inspired by that.

Tough 19 - The Chains That Bind Nice challenging level! Don't be fooled by what seems like a lot of builders and miners. At least in my solution, I ended up using all of them. Certainly not easy to find the correct route through the level while making your way to release the neutrals. The 99RR makes the start difficult, though because the start is all steel and you don't have bombers, then it's clear that to release the crowd later on you need to block on a built staircase to release both the blocker and crowd later on. I kind of enjoyed this level, though some parts were a bit fiddly to do, especially when building and then mining while not turning around and/or the staircase gets chipped off so that the Lemmings will slip through from the other side.

Tough 20 - The Arches Still seems to be a backroute here, so looks like it needs further fixing still I'm guessing the titular arches are used in the intended way as indicated by the level title.

Tough 21 - Oh Balls! Another excellent level and definitely far harder than the original in the Easy rank. I especially love the extending the basher part of the solution, though I would say it's probably also the hardest to see in the solution. Well done, and the time attack talisman is certainly not hard to obtain at all, especially as long as you bash at pretty much the first opportunity you get, before the builder gets put in place for it to keep going

Tough 22 - Looks Simple..... This one also seems to be a bit inspired by an L2 level, this time in the Classic Pillar set. I think it was called "Mr. Lemmy Doesn't Live Here Anymore" or something like that. Kind of a breather, though probably the hardest part is figuring out how to get someone to come back to the crowd to mine the crowd free. Here, it seems climber bombing is the most logical choice to get through after building across the gap, but bashing it away instead occurred to me a bit later. It's a bit unfortunate that the climber who mines the crowd out isn't able to reach the exit on time, but oh well, sometimes that's the way it goes

Tough 23 - NuMaCaBaBaB I'm guessing that's a lyric to a song or possibly even the name of a song? Pretty much a remake of "Now use miners and climbers"/No added colours or lemmings," just with two steel walls instead. The solution is pretty much what you expect it to be, with probably the only hard part is building over the gap before anyone arrives and falls in and is trapped there. Nice level nevertheless.

Tough 24 - Crocodilopolis Wow, excellent level here! I really enjoyed solving this one. One of the hardest levels of the rank for sure but one which feels to be the right difficulty. I think the solutions can easily swap sides here. Got the gist of the solution fairly quick, though took me a while to figure out to dig and then the next Lemming from one entrance builds to be delayed so that the other Lemmings who spawn from it can survive the fall into the pit. I really love how there's the mining through the bridge to release the ones trapped in the pit by climbing solution element of "no added colours or lemmings" level here. Well done!

Tough 25 - Fort William Somewhat of a breather this late in the game. Not really hard in any way, especially with plenty of climbers to keep the bottom entrance safe. It can be a bit chaotic keeping track of everything. Probably the only hard part is getting the bottom entrance up, similar to Tough 3. Otherwise, nice level which I kind of enjoyed playing and solving

Tough 26 - One Floater, One Climber, keep moving... Looks to be quite daunting and challenging, though my solution is probably a slight backroute. The solution does seem to get the three move involved in cooperating with one another so that one of them keeps the other two safe throughout the entire level. This level kind of reminds me of a level from Lemmings Reunion, which I believe is called "Den of evil" or something like that. Similar concept, where one is a floater, another a climber, and the other one is neither one and just a regular Lemming.

Tough 27 - Clam Dune Probably a bit harder than the previous level, especially with the 99RR and multiple entrances to deal with. A few skills I spared so maybe a backroute as well? I love all the clams you put on the sandy dune! Very nice background which goes really well with the L2 graphic set.

Tough 28 - The Red Room This level doesn't too difficult at first glance but there's still some gotchas to watch out for. I think the hardest part for me here was figuring out how to get two Lemmings to go on ahead, one of which bashes the final wall while the other one turns around to build the splatform. I'm not sure if the spot where I built in the solution is required so that if you bash at the right spot then the crowd doesn't get released. If that is intended, then that's certainly the hardest thing to spot in the solution! Very nice! Probably about the same difficulty as the previous two levels.

Tough 29 - It Burns! Sorry, another one I wasn't a fan of. Way too much repeated building and blocking on the left side to reach the exit and is way too fiddly to execute. Granted, there might had been some things I could had done to make it a bit easier, but for the most part it's really annoying to do. Quite possibly the worst level of the pack IMO. Probably the biggest improvement might be to leave more wiggle room with the flamethrowers on the building up side. This level does seem to be inspired by I believe it's called "Blood Furnace" by Crane, only this one has a bit more than that.

Tough 30 - The Last Level: A trip down memory lane I like how this is 5 levels rolled in one where you essentially just repeat the solutions to them for the most part! Now I definitely know I didn't do the Brick level the intended way. Pretty much the Bubble and L2 CaveLem levels both have a slight modification to the solution from the originals. My failures came about due to doing them incorrectly and sub-optimally at first. I think the rest of the solution came easily once I realized why the great number of losses you're allowed which will come in the Bubble level. It's not easy to see how to release the neutrals in it while not using too many builders. I think luckily needing to climb back up to the neutrals to release the blocker in the L2 CaveLem level came quickly as I got close to getting the level solved, as you really don't have any other options with the skills you have left for it, if you did the other mini-levels correctly. A great level to finish off the pack on for which the AWESOME music track plays! I believe Lemmings Rundown by LemFan does this as well, with the AWESOME music track also playing on the final level.         

Overall, while there's room for improvement, especially in the Easy rank, as well as some levels which I wasn't a fan of, this is a quite decent first attempt at a level pack. I did enjoy the level pack from start to finish, though it's quite difficult in many places, with the difficulty jumping all over the place and hence it's very erratic. Still, I applaud you for your efforts and work over a period of several years. I look forward to future levels/level packs from you!

Hope the replays and feedback is helpful and that the LP is enjoyable, if you've been watching it    

[JawaJuice]

I also finished the Tough rank. As kaywhyn said, a few tough nuts in there for sure. I'm going to give you my feedback on certain levels (trying to be quite generalized, spoiler-free) then I'll compare notes!

Level 1 - Already a step up in difficulty and a sign of things to come for this rank. Resource management is the hardest thing here, with the limited skill set.
Level 4 - As previously mentioned, this one is a real tough nut! Probably ended up being in the top 5 hardest levels of the rank for me (#5 I'd say!). It's a repeat that's a lot more challenging than its first incarnation - the difficulty comes from needing to save both sides with again, a pretty limited skill set.
Level 9 - Requires precise placement but it will be a familiar puzzle to any experienced Lemmings player!
Level 10 - Slightly harder than 4 imo, mainly due to the extremely tight time limit where quite a lot has to be done to create a safe path for the crowd. The number of builders is its saving grace, but I needed every one of them!
Level 12 - Another repeat that's much harder than its first incarnation and actually does utilize the mechanic I expected the first one to - in this case, compression! Would be tricky for a beginner I think!
Level 13 - I really like the look of this level! Tropical Hot Dog Nights to quote Captain Beefheart ;-)
Level 19 - Made hard by the 99 RR, as so many levels are. Definitely needed more thinking time than the previous few levels.
Level 21 - Quite a difficult level/talisman, but your options are severely limited, which makes it easier in a way I suppose.
Level 22 - Looks simple... and is! I clocked the solution almost immediately; the hard thing was the execution and completing within the time limit. 4 minutes sounds like a lot, but there's much ground to cover and a fair bit to do.
Level 23 - Seemed uncharacteristically easy for its position in the rank, but I don't mind a breather!
Level 24 - Another problem of resource management. Tricky, but not so bad.
Level 25 - The most difficult thing here was the containment of the crowd at the start but I may well have over-complicated my solution in this instance.
Level 28 - The hardest level of the pack to this point imo. Extreme resource management and timing challenges. Longest solve time so far, eclipsing 4 and 10.
Level 29 - I can tell you, there's no backrouting this level, at least as far as I can see; I tried for a while to do the coward's solution, building over the left fire pit to the exit, lowering the terrain first, but you've clearly thought of that. In the end, I knuckled down to taking the long route! Maybe not quite as difficult as 28, but it's up there.
Level 30 - Wow, you weren't kidding about this being a hard level! The only level in the pack that took me a couple of hours to complete, I don't mind telling you! It's how a pack finale should be though: save the toughest for last! Really clever how you've incorporated four earlier levels into one, re-contextualizing them, by also adding the contained neutrals in each. For the longest time, I just kept ending up a skill short (usually a builder!) but somehow eventually managed to finish with a builder to spare and 2 lemmings more than the requirement saved!

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this pack I would probably place its overall difficulty at Easy-Medium, though there are certainly a few levels in the last rank that would fall into the 'Hard' category. You also save the hardest three levels for the end of the rank in my book, so I think you've gauged the difficulty curve well. There are maybe a few things that could be improved in the Easy rank especially, but I would say it's a worthy pack! Probably a bit tough for beginners in its final rank, if that is the intention, but you could say the same thing about Icho's NeoLemmix Introduction Pack.

Replays attached, including talisman solutions.