Phenomenal stuff. Wow!

Quote from: GreyMongoose on May 04, 2024, 08:34:51 AM
Potential bug report:

In the first level of the Sports tribe, several animations are invisible, such as the swinging of the rock climber or the shrug of the platformer. But how would a level file affect those shared animations?

My understanding of how it woks is as follows, it's just a guess based on observations, I don't know the exact specifics:

Each skill consumes some amount of "sprite memory". The game is very old and could only allocate so much space for animations in memory at a time. If you go over the allotted space, some animations will not show up, so the lemming will be invisible when those animations would play. Shruggers and danglers always seemed to be the first ones to drop for some reason, maybe they were always allocated last, perhaps trying to save on space by checking if any skills that need those are being used, and so only adding them once?

When you play in practice mode you can see that when you pick some skills, others are disabled. It's always the most sprite-intensive ones that are disabled first. It seems the developers were aware of this limitation and so stopped you picking skill combinations that would send you over the limit, and they avoided those in their official levels. The editing tools for custom levels don't stop us going over the limit, and so we see the consequences of that.

Skills with lots of rotations, like rock climber and superlem, eat up a lot of memory. So do ones with long animations like kayaker and pole vaulter. Meanwhile skills like jumper barely make a dent.

The bug is happening because the level has too many sprite-hungry skills available.

As the resident Lemmings 3 guy, who likes the game enough to learn to code to finish a level editor for it then design an entire replacement set of levels, do I like the game?

No. It's bad.

Alright, it's not all bad. The music is pretty good, and it looks great. It tried something different, and I give it some credit for that. However the game has a ton of unrealised potential in amongst the major design errors it made.

Detrimental inheritance of now irrelevant gameplay mechanics
In Lemmings 3 you collect tool boxes and then have to get that Lemming to the right place to use that tool, and they can only carry one type of tool at a time. In the original Lemmings, owned skills are "global" and can be used on anyone. To deal with this significant restriction on which Lemming can use what skill, you get a lot more control over the movement of the Lemming, but you get so much control that the Lemmings might as well not move on their own. With unlimited walkers, blockers and jumpers, why do the Lemmings pace around? It's just really annoying to control. There has always been a timing element to assigning skills in Lemmings, but in Lemmings 3 with all the control it feels like a waste of time. Missed an assignment? Just turn the Lemming around and try again, or at worst you have to restart. But what if the Lemming just didn't walk on its own? It would be a lot easier.

I've said before that Lemmings 3 should instead be a variant of The Lost Vikings. You get like 3 Lemmings and you have full control of them, and each one could have their own gimmick (e.g. maybe only one of them can jump) but even that's unnecessary as the single tool box carrying restriction provides opportunity for differences. They stand still when you aren't directly controlling one of them with the arrow keys or whatever. The automatic moving of the Lemmings just means you have to mash the pause hotkey constantly. Ducks was a better Lemmings 3.

It also carries over total Lemmings like in Lemmings 2, however the game can't handle that many Lemmings on screen at once because they are much bigger and more complex, so instead they came up with this idiotic reserve system where if a Lemming dies a new one falls from the trapdoor, but often that just means he's dead too because you bricked off the way forward or he is stuck at the same trap. And when this doesn't happen, maybe you lost a key Lemming so you have to restart anyway. Either way, losing a Lemming is a no go in this game, they should have just restricted the number of Lemmings the player has and set it on a case by case basis.

The level design is poor
The fact that each Lemming can only hold one type of tool is neither here nor there, the game would work either way with a different set of positives or negatives to each approach. However they chose to go with the most restrictive option. Unfortunately, the level design never realises any of the puzzle potential of this. The vast majority of the levels are just "here is a tool, use it here to reach the next tool, which you use in the location where you collected it". I would argue there is probably only a single digit number of levels in the original game that I would consider good. It has 90 levels.

Because the use of skills is so restrictive, you are most of the time always sending just one Lemming ahead. I refer to Lemmings 3 as Worker Lemming Deluxe, a damning commentary on the gameplay of the official levels. Although I also refer to some of my own levels as Super Box Shuffler, so I'm not really one to talk here.

I think this is the real setback of the game. I had fun creating new levels for it, there are things you can do with the mechanics. Yes, my levels are a very puzzley affair that isn't necessarily in the spirit of the official levels in the any of the original series, but the nature of the new mechanics basically demands this, as what other interaction do you have? The original levels are just so much garbage filler.

The game is a slave to its animation system
I'll say it again, Lemmings 3 is gorgeous. It looks phenomenal. Full credit where it is due. Something that I think people don't pay enough attention to, is just how smooth the animations are. The Lemmings actually have a lot of sprites. Loads of them. Different walk animations up and down different step heights. And almost every state has transitional frames from one to another. The only states I can think of that are allowed to "snap" from one animation to another is when you use a tool that is directional, and even then the lemming will slide into the direction selection sprites, and when you use a walker on a Lemmming already turning around, in which case the animation plays back in reverse to still make the turn around look smooth.

The problem with this incredibly smooth system is that everything else in the game takes a back seat to ensuring that things animate properly. Here's a simple example: collect a group of lemmings in a thin pit with the shovel, then dig out the floor. Like so: https://youtu.be/-2Ku5FC6Srs?t=78 Notice anything weird?

Notice that the Lemmings don't actually fall at the same time! They aren't allowed to fall until they reach the correct part of their individual animation cycle where they are allowed to transition into being a faller. Absolutely everything in the game is a slave to these keyframes. If a Lemming isn't in the correct spot at the correct point of their animation, you have to wait until they finish, and this includes gravity.

Some animations have more keyframes so you don't notice as much. Walking on flat ground has a keyframe aligned to the grid but also halfway between grid squares so using the walker feels responsive. But if they are walking down a step, you have to wait for them to finish stepping down. Monsters similarly have to wait and align themselves. The potato beast will wait still for the lemming to enter exactly the correct place to execute a kill. The psycho buzzard is particularly bad for this, and the dive is buggy and exploitable.

It sure looks good though.

The interface is given a hard (but smoothly animated) kick in the balls by the animation system
Lemmings 3 is notorious for being unresponsive. You ever tries to make a Lemming jump and he walks off the edge? Instant rage.

Most of the time when playing a game, you interact with the game and it responds immediately to your input. Press the jump button in a Mario game and he will immediately change to a jump animation and sail into the air. It doesn't matter if there's no real transitional frame, you asked him to jump so he better well jump right now. Not Lemmings 3, when you click a Lemming he queues up the action until the correct position and keyframe.

Sometimes this isn't so bad. It's a grid based game, so it makes sense, and it only takes a few frames. I'm happy to give some leeway here. And the directional tools that are extremely grid based have an exception built in where the Lemming will snap out of its animation and slide forwards or backwards quickly so it responds appropriately, so they did try in some places.

But when it goes wrong its unacceptable. There's a problem with the Jumper in particular. It's like the queued up flag gets immediately forgotten so if the Lemming isn't in exactly the right place, it simply won't jump. And there's no "coyote time". In platformers, it's a widely known industry secret that the player should still be allowed to jump after they've fallen off a ledge a few frames ago because our reaction times aren't instant. But only the directional tools are allowed to miss the assignment being before the centre of the grid square to get the slide back to position, jumping doesn't. Clicked a little too late? The Lemming isn't allowed to cancel finishing walking out of the current grid square and off a ledge, because the jump must be from the correct place so it looks good. You have to queue up really early, but not too early or it forgets about it. There's only one solution, hammer the mouse button like a mad man.

Even the directional tools don't get a full pass though because of another animation-based oopsie. I said they will slide backwards and forwards to the nearest grid square centre, but not all grid squares are the same. You often want to use bricks and shovels right next to walls, but unfortunately to make the animation smooth, Lemmings will barely step into these squares so they turn around before hitting the wall, so the timing allowed on these most important squares is very tight. You may have noticed its way harder to assign a tool use right next to a wall. I would recommend jumping into the wall so the Lemming properly aligns with it first, if jumping wasn't even worse.

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Looks like Simon posted while I was typing this and made more points more succinctly including some I forgot about, like how using the replay feature makes the solve not count (why oh why did they do this? Idiots), so I'll end this here.

After watching kaywhyn's solutions again on his youtube channel, I figured I really did want to have a stab at fixing Final Resting Place after all, so I uploaded a v3. The tweaks also necessitated a new official solution, so that's uploaded too. While at it, I spotted that in Abseiling the exit terrain was off by 1 pixel which looks like a clear mistake by past me so I tweaked it, but this doesn't impact solutions.

Welcome to Kieran's Increasingly Less Abandoned Zone.

Thanks for playing kaywhyn, your demos and feedback are fun to watch and read as always. I appreciate them.

My comments on your solutions:

Spoiler

• Abandoned 2 - Low Tide : I think this level is stupid so whatever. Your solution is fine.
• Abandoned 3 - Stepping Stones : LOL, just jumping up to the last crowd from the exit, of course, it's so simple, and of course you can just cancel miners with jumpers. Yeah, some silly oversights in my design from not being used to these skills. If I wanted to fix these its doable, but would have to rework some parts of the level. Not majorly.
• Abandoned 6 - Climbing the Castle : While not totally intended I'm happy with your solution, it hits all the main points. Glad you didn't break the major idea which is bombing out the crowd with the falling climber.
• Abandoned 7 - Roofer Madness : Nice idea of freeing a blocker with a digger falling out the trapdoor as a way to delay. It's heavier on diggers than my solution so if I cared to make it more like mine I could restrict the spare skills, but I don't feel any need to do so, as I like your solution.
• Abandoned 8 - Sink Holes : Yeah, just loads of ways to cause havoc with the intended solution by saving builders, the two traps at the bottom are very expensive in the intended solution but there's no need for it, this one would need some revamping of the bottom section, which I'm just not going to do.
• Abandoned 9 - Final Resting Place : If any level would cause me to make an update just to fix backroutes it would be this one. I could steel up some areas a bit more. I dunno, maybe I will.
• Abandoned 10 - The Ultimate Quest, Take 5 : The main thing for me to change here if I wanted to do so would be a terrain change to make not having the builder turn around not be pixel perfect, but making the layout different to the other levels ruins the main gimmick. Also I think there may have been a reason not to do that thinking about it now, something to do with the height of the ceiling and the heights of the icicle holes to make other things work, maybe. You've reminded me this area was a problem, maybe that was why I swapped this one for another in QFK after all.

Well isn't that typical. After I posted this I suddenly had a thought that Climbing the Castle had a backroute, and yep, there it was. Well I thought it would be a shame if this was left in a broken state forever so soon after posting it, so I made a change. I then checked the other levels, and made changes to Letting You Down Gently and Final Resting Place too. I've uploaded a v2 of the pack and solutions to the original post. Sorry about that!

Sometime in the 4 year gap when Quest From Kieran was abandoned before I came back and finished it, I had apparently started another pack with more of a focus on Neolemmix features like new skills and styles, talismans, and taller levels rather than the purely vanilla affair of QFK. I found these levels earlier today, and so have transferred them over to Neolemmix v12.12.5 and released them now as a tiny pack, because I feel certain that I will never come back and turn these into a full pack.

The levels all use Lemmings 2 styles and music from Jazz Jackrabbit. There are 9 of these levels, that I've ordered into what I think is the proper difficulty order. The levels are much easier than QFK, at least at first, with spare skills and excess save requirements. Perhaps this was a rebellion against my own usual very hard and specific level design, I feel like the first 5 levels are a fine difficulty for most people here, nothing too challenging, with the latter half being the usual Kieran Millar fare.

As a bonus, there is a 10th level at the end of the rank that will look familiar to QFK players, yes, it's another one of those levels, this is one I had replaced with an alternative before anyone else got to see it. Looking back at it, I think it got replaced for either being too precise (sorry in advance) or maybe not distinct enough in its solution from some of the other levels that made it, but well, for whatever reason I replaced it you get to see it now for the first time, another hard QFK level. It also has a unique music track by the same author as the music used in QFK, yes, another distinct variation of this same music piece, he made a lot of these.

I've decided to provide the official solution replays in advance, as I have abandoned these levels and am not interested in making backroute fixes.

Here is some of my own commentary on each level looking back after all this time. Not spoilery but if you want to avoid spoilers at all costs maybe don't read this anyway

Spoiler

• Letting You Down Gently - It's fine? Very straightforward in my opinion and just the most basic way to use these skills, I dunno, clearly my attempt at designing for beginners, and that's fine.
• Low Tide - Alright this level is dumb trash and in a full pack I'd have probably replaced it.
• Stepping Stones - I think this really demonstrates how nice it is to have talismans available, for making nice simple levels a bit more challenging, which I think is good for my content that's usually too hard. A simple but fun level I really like.
• Abseiling - For some reason I feel like this is the first of these levels I made but can barely remember so I might be wrong. But to me it's clear where this level took very hard turn away from the design I'd been doing in the QFK series. A great level.
• Tartan Stack - Eh, it's fine.
• Climbing the Castle - OK, this level right here? A certified Kieran Millar Classic™. Just a really really good level in my opinion.
• Roofer Madness - I really like how the solution that is most obvious to me, that does not get the talisman, plays very differently to the talisman solution in some key ways. Another reason why the talisman feature is great.
• Sink Holes - Bleh. Probably riddled with backroutes, and honestly I don't care if it is. Only OK.
• Final Resting Place - Now this one is a chef's kiss and I really really hope it isn't filled with backroutes. I think this one is phenomenal, just a brilliant level all around. Quite challenging if you don't break it for sure.
• The Ultimate Quest, Take 5 - Yes, I made 5 of these damn levels. Nothing to add I didn't say in the above section outside of this spoiler. I had to update it with various tweaks I made to the landscape for backroute fixes for the QFK levels, but fortunately they didn't change the solution here.

How to Install

Extract the contents of the zip file into Neolemmix's levels folder. Then inside Neolemmix, press F2 to select the level pack you wish to play. If you want the music, extract the files into Neolemmix's music folder, keeping them inside the KAZ folder rather than the music folder root.

It's been a while and there's an LP now. So if anybody is curious as to the official solutions, here's an official solution replay pack.

I recommend only watching these after your own solve, but of course you can do whatever you like. Be warned: once seen, a solution can never be unseen.

Thanks for the kind words all.

Hard to say how it compares difficulty-wise to the other entries in the QFK series. Im very bad at guaging the difficulty of my own stuff. This one at least has the benefit of everyone being familiar with all the mechanics, so it may feel easier for that reason maybe.

And that's a wrap. See you all on the main board here: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=6184.0

No levels changed from the final upload here to the main release, but it got a logo graphic and credits, so you should grab the main download from the release thread anyway.

Welcome to Quest From Kieran, the prequel to Quest From Kieran 2!

This is a 60 level pack for Neolemmix v12.12.5 or later. Like the other entries to the QFK series, it tries to maintain the traditional Lemmings style, so only the original 8 skills, no levels taller than the original height, only levels styles from the original game and Oh No, that sort of thing, but the levels are significantly more puzzle focused than the original games.

The music is songs made by classic British demoscene musician 4mat, specifically tracks from a Jet Set Willy remake. You should be fine with regards to e.g. copyright on Youtube playthroughs. I came up with my own names for the tracks, there were no official names.

Difficulty is probably Medium to Very Hard, but I'm quite bad at properly gauging the difficulty of my levels. I hope you enjoy!

Special thanks to Armani and Akseli for comprehensive testing, and Wafflem, Ste Woz Ere, ericdekovits and WillLem for additional testing and comments.

The Ranks

Fun
I thought it made no sense why only the original game gets to have a rank that states the levels are fun. I want my levels to be fun too! So I named this rank Fun. Hah! Take that!

Investing in Infrastructure

Also Fun
What, you thought only the first few levels in a level pack are allowed to be fun? Well not this time! These levels are a bit harder, but they're still fun!

Frozen Arches

Hard But Still Fun
Levels don't have to be easy to be fun. Even my hard levels are fun!

Pillars of the Community

Not Fun
Well I guess they can't all be winners.

The High Ground

How to Install

Extract the contents of the zip file into Neolemmix's levels folder. Then inside Neolemmix, press F2 to select the level pack you wish to play. If you want the music, extract the files into Neolemmix's music folder.

🎉 Yep that's exactly it. We're done now for the levels. Hooray! Again, thanks so much for all the testing, it helped so much. All I can think of left to do is a logo, if I can be bothered.

If anybody else is still testing, let me know, otherwise I'll release in a couple of days. I like to try and draw a line on updating level packs after a certain point, and the release feels like a good time to make that cutoff, so once its released, its not changing, and any further backroutes will just be there forever.

Great, down to one level now. Your solution to Lemming Sorting Factory is more similar to my original intended solution so I'm cool with it.

I suspected these kinds of routes would be tried first with Down the Tubes and I couldn't get it to work myself, so I had some fixes planned if needed. This is the one I prefer most, and maybe will need to resort to plan B, but will be a bit upset if it still gets backrouted after Plan B. Your solution 2 is very cool though.

v22 changelog:

Spoiler

Not Fun
8 - Down the Tubes - Spread out some terrain plus other very minor terrain tweaks

Alright Armani, you did it, you bested me on Drifting Away. There is one change I could make that would stop all those solutions, but I really don't want to do it, so I've jotted down a note to revisit the idea another day, and I'm just going to accept Drifting Away as a multi-solution level.

Getting even closer to the end now.

v21 changelog:

Spoiler

Not Fun
8 - Down the Tubes - Completely new level
12 - Lemming Sorting Factory - Terrain changes near main trapdoor, reduced release rate

Thanks again.

I consider your solutions to Star Trek and Joint Construction to be acceptable, neither are exact but you hit the main points now and so I'm OK with them. Joint Construction, not my greatest work, I actually could make a change that forces something a little bit more intended but I don't think it's a level where trying to reach that solution would necessarily be more fun to solve so I'll leave it as is.

Down the Tubes, I'm beginning to think this particular level layout is not going to touch the main points I'm trying to enforce and all the fixes feel gimmicky and bad to me now, so this one's back to the drawing board, will find time to rework it over the coming week.

In the meantime, here's fixes for the other two levels. It's good that the list is shrinking at least. I was going to have trouble fixing Pain Factory but then discovered an optimization in my previous official solution that shaved off a builder and then my backroute fixing worked. Hooray. Oh yeah, I renamed this level too, not enough pain being produced to justify the name.

v20 changelog:

Spoiler

Hard But Still Fun
10 - Drifting away - Add terrain next to exit

Not Fun
12 - Pain Factory - Made level wider, added 2 Builders, terrain changes, and renamed to Lemming Sorting Factory