Bizarre Custlemm/nocdlem Problem

[Jazzem]

I've come across a game-ruining problem that seems to have started today, and I have no idea why it's doing it. Whenever a lemming walks into an interactive object (Level exit, lava, trap etc), it'll simply ignore it and act as if it wasn't there (So if you have lava at the bottom of the level, the lemming will fall through it and die because of falling through the bottomless gap, not because of the lava). It also means I cannot complete levels, as the lemmings do not react to the exit.

Does anyone know why it's happening, and could explain how to stop it? All help appreciated.

[Shvegait]

Not really bizarre, limitations perhaps.

Make sure your interactive objects (traps, exits) line up at a Y value divisible by 4 (Edited for accuracy).

Make sure your Z-order of traps and exits is 14 (15?) or less. Higher Z than this will make the trap/exit "fake" (useful if you need fake exits (or traps), as in one of the Holiday Lemmings levels.)

Also, if the lava is at the very bottom of the screen, it might not be able to affect lemmings anyway, so raise it up a little. ccexplore has said something about how the trigger region for some traps, etc. is not necessarily exactly where you expect, and can be cut off completely.

[Jazzem]

Wow, it was just the Z-variables then. Thank you!

[ccexplore]

Make sure your interactive objects (traps, exits) line up at a Y value divisible by 8 (I think it's 8, anyway).

4, actually.  (Of course, 8 would work too)

Make sure your Z-order of traps and exits is 14 (15?) or less.

15

Incidentally, since entrances don't work the same way as traps, you can set your entrances' z-orders to 16 and above to free up slots for traps.  Ditto for decorative objects that have no effect on Lemmings.

[JM]

I sometimes have trouble with some objects not working in my levels. I hate most of my levels because most of them have objects not working but I love my newest packs. I don't have trouble with Custlemm in XP as I run Custlemm in XP.

[Leviathan]

I noticed that the acid in the pink brick set has a faulty trigger area...
The lemming drowns 2 or 3 pixels above the acid surface.

When you want exits to work where they don't work,you can try to put a smal (invisible) terrain piece right below the exit.
If you look closely to my "need any help from above" levels you'll notice what I mean

[geoo]

I think (but don't know) it depends on the Y-position of the object.

If it's divisible by 4, then the area should be where the object's graphics let suppose.
If not, the area is shifted a little.

[JM]

I noticed that invisible terrain in Custlemm is shown as plain grey terrain when you run Custlemm in EGA mode. One small problem is the water on A BeastII of a level does not always work wherever you place it. I also noticed that some exits do not work where they are placed. Mostly in graphic sets 3-9. If you lower them into terrain they sometimes work.

[ccexplore]

Let me re-quote what Shvegait already said, in case people weren't listening:

Make sure your interactive objects (traps, exits) line up at a Y value divisible by 4

If you don't, the game will still align the trigger area to the nearest lower multiple of 4 anyway, so you end up with the trigger area shifted slightly from where the object's graphics is being drawn.

[JM]

When the music plays on nocdlem when I play on the levels that use special graphics why do the songs for the special graphics not play?

[ccexplore]

The original CustLemm plays specific tracks from some CD, and it only does exactly 6 tracks it seems.  Nocdlem changes it to play the original music, but still uses the same 6 numbers CustLemm was using for the CD music.

And those 6 numbers apparently don't include any of the special graphics level music.

Once I figure out how the original game handles music selection maybe I can review Nocdlem to behave more like the original game.  But even so, it might not work.  For example, the special graphics level music might be tied in to specific level numbers in the game, rather than actually checking whether the level uses VGASPEC graphics.  It also begs the quesiton of what to do with something like geoo89's level 7, which uses VGASPEC4, which doesn't exist in the original game.

[ccexplore]

I wanted to add that I had some plans in mind for allowing the level designer to select which music to use for each of the 10 levels, but I've been neglecting the project at this point, I'll get back to it at the soonest convenient time.

[JM]

I played Geoo89's level 7 in the original game and it had no music track it was blank.

[ccexplore]

Hmm interesting, maybe the original game does have logic to detect a level as using special graphics.

Of course, what I need is for CustLemm has the same logic.  It might not.  It's still unclear how CustLemm originated and how much hacking occurred to the program.

I still think the best solution would be an update to nocdlem and nocdlem2 to accept music that can be specified by the level designer directly in the .DAT file.  I'll get to that this weekend or something.

[JM]

Good idea
I want to hear songs for A Beast of a level etc in Custlemm