Real Level Design

[Luis]

When you are making a level, do you ever try to make it look like a real level, as if it was made by a game developer and not too messy? Or do you only care about the level objective itself? What I mean by mess is a level with terrains that are all over the place and are not even connected to each other right. But even though the level looks like a total mess, it's still possible to beat it because the person that made the level didn't bother trying to make it look nice. I remember seeing a lot of levels like this in Lemmings PSP online. Most of them looked bad but still beatable. They also made me loose interest in playing those levels. I wanna feel like I'm playing an actual level like the ones in Lemmings SNES/PSP that are good looking. But I know the level objective is more important than putting well placed terrains that will catch people's eyes and say it's a pretty looking level.

I always try to make my levels look nice but when I'm making it look good, I need to remember to make the objective hard too.

[Clam]

Definitely important to make your levels look good. It shows you care about your work. I can't stand seeing water in mid-air, mass copy/pasted chunks, and the flags (not sure if the PSP version has those - the Amiga version uses them for 2 player levels, and they were left in the DOS version). Minimalism for effect can work - for instance, I made a level with just three tiny bricks, plus the entrance and exit - but when every level is made of random floating blocks, it gets tiresome.

Though my experience with custom levels is that messy levels generally aren't up to much as puzzles either http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/tongue.gif" alt=":P" title="Tongue" class="smiley" />. I don't have a PSP, maybe it's different in that version.

[Luis]

There's no flags in the PSP Lemmings. Making a level look nice can take a long time to make, so I think people didn't feel like spending hours trying to make it look decent, just so they play their levels already and upload them.

[ccexplore]

and the flags

I'll admit that they generally do look somewhat out of place, but surely there are ways to utilize them as decorations that will still look okay in a custom level?  (maybe to decorate the top of terrain that looks like a castle, say?)

I will have to admit I haven't actually played too many custom levels for PC Lemmings, but are there really that many with "water in mid-air" and "mass copy/pasted chunks"http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/huh.gif" alt="???" title="Huh?" class="smiley" />  (Okay, the latter I guess I can believe.)  Am I being more optimistic about the abilities of the general level designer than is reality? http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/huh.gif" alt="???" title="Huh?" class="smiley" /> http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/shocked.gif" alt=":o" title="Shocked" class="smiley" /> http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/undecided.gif" alt=":-\" title="Undecided" class="smiley" />

[ccexplore]

But I know the level objective is more important than putting well placed terrains that will catch people's eyes and say it's a pretty looking level.

I'm surprised you stand by that, I would've kinda guess that with something like PSP, the online community would place more emphasis on eye-catching levels than hard/interesting level objectives, but what do I know about the PSP Lemmings community? http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/wink.gif" alt=";)" title="Wink" class="smiley" /> http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/laugh.gif" alt=":D" title="Laugh" class="smiley" />

I can somewhat appreciate this though, the fact is I find it extremely difficult to create really good-looking levels.  I don't think that many people actually has the right combination of left-brain and right-brain skills to make levels that are both challenging and looks stunning.  I do think though that most people are competent enough to at least not make their level look like a total eyesore, but beyond that, I can sympathize.  People are only going to make their levels up to the point of their mental capabilities in terms of puzzle and visuals; once they hit their natural mental limits at it, to shoot for anything significantly beyond will likely tax their brain too much, and then the whole level creation thing becomes an unfun and discouraging chore.

[Clam]

I will have to admit I haven't actually played too many custom levels for PC Lemmings, but are there really that many with "water in mid-air" and "mass copy/pasted chunks"http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/huh.gif" alt="???" title="Huh?" class="smiley" />  (Okay, the latter I guess I can believe.)  Am I being more optimistic about the abilities of the general level designer than is reality? http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/huh.gif" alt="???" title="Huh?" class="smiley" /> http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/shocked.gif" alt=":o" title="Shocked" class="smiley" /> http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/undecided.gif" alt=":-\" title="Undecided" class="smiley" />

Maybe I'm emphasising this too much, since there are only one or two designers that I know of who actually do this. The vast majority of levels on the DOS levelpack archive are at least reasonably well put together. Again, I don't know how bad the PSP levels are in that regard - do they have anything as bad as what I suggested (floating water etc)?

[Luis]

Maybe I'm emphasising this too much, since there are only one or two designers that I know of who actually do this. The vast majority of levels on the DOS levelpack archive are at least reasonably well put together. Again, I don't know how bad the PSP levels are in that regard - do they have anything as bad as what I suggested (floating water etc)?

I do remember seeing floating water from the PSP online levels and one terrain that was overused in one area and many floating terrains too. Right now the server for the Lemmings PSP wifi is shut down so nobody can download or upload levels anymore.

Another weird thing is that Lemmings PSP allows you put any terrains from any theme and put them all together. Just imagine an Egypt pillar in a Hell theme level. Even though the game allows me to do that, I still make levels the original way with Egypt terrains goes in a Egypt level and Roman terrains belongs in Roman levels. Now in the online levels, there were many terrains from different themes in one level.

[Dullstar]

I remember once i made a level that looked awful.  I saw that and called it PILLARS IN SPACE!  How'd it get so messy?  It was originally in a different tileset. http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/smiley.gif" alt=":)" title="Smiley" class="smiley" />