Cameos and References

[Prob Lem]

Being such a popular game, Lemmings landed itself quite a few cameos and references in numerous other games. Back then, such cameos were almost a matter of policy for the game's publisher, Psygnosis, and many of their titles featured cameos from others that they published and/or created (something that was even evidenced by DMA Design's inclusion of the Special Graphics Levels in the original Lemmings). It was therefore only natural that there were Lemmings references in several other Psygnosis titles.

Also due to that same popularity, Lemmings has been referenced in other people's products, too.

This thread is here for the purpose of trying to create a list of these cameos and references, as it's pretty interesting to see Lemmings' cultural impact. Here's what I have so far - please add more if you know of them!

Official Cameos and References

Leander (Amiga) / The Legend of Galahad (Mega Drive) - Towards the end of the game (despite the two names, these two titles are the same game, with minimal differences between them), in World 3-3, there are prisoners who need to be freed from a particular area. These prisoners turn out to be lemmings, and Leander/Galahad must clear a path for them to reach the exit, before leaving via the same exit, himself.

The Misadventures of Flink (Mega CD; Mega Drive; Amiga CD32) - Mixing magic spells incorrectly will occasionally result in a Lemmings cameo.

Wiz 'n' Liz (Mega Drive; Amiga) - Mixing magic spells incorrectly can apparently occasionally produce lemmings.


Unofficial Cameos and References

Discworld - Interesting Times (Novel) - In this book, there are golems who are commanded using an interface similar to that of Lemmings. When asked about this, the book's author Terry Pratchett remarked, "Merely because the red army can fight, dig, march and climb and is controlled by little icons? Can't imagine how anyone thought that... Not only did I wipe Lemmings from my hard disk, I overwrote it so's I couldn't get it back.".

[namida]

A well known one - I don't remember the full details off hand, but in one of the Grand Theft Auto games, if you go to a certain place and look at a certain angle, you see a queue of people continuously jump off a building. This would almost seem more like a glitch than an intentional lemmings reference, except for the fact that GTA is made by Rockstar North - which was originally known as "DMA Design".

[Leo]

 Benefactor (Amiga - Psygnosis), World 2 (Tombs of Egypt), Level 7 (Lemmings?)
They are not really Lemmings, they are Merry men, but they act like the Lemmings. Background music of that level is variation of the Lemmings tune and there are pictures of the Lemmings on the walls. And of course, even the name of that level is "Lemmings?". So it's clearly Lemmings cameo.

http://youtu.be/jjlo6l8NzR0?t=1h3m55s

[Prob Lem]

Oh wow! Whilst I knew of the Grand Theft Auto claims (unfortunately, I've seen a video showing some evidence that it may only be a glitch, but of course that doesn't rule out it being left unfixed in order to make a reference - after all, it's not exactly a non-obvious issue ), I didn't know that Benefactor contained one of the official Lemmings cameos.

[Clam]

Minecraft: Kinda Like Lemmings!



This is one of hundreds of "splashes" that can appear on the title screen.

(It's really nothing like Lemmings )

[Prob Lem]

It does have some distinct structural similarities to Lemmings 3D, though!

[Proxima]

DROD 5: The Second Sky has a level using DROD elements to create (somewhat) Lemmings-like gameplay:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTUqrBjkyIo

(Another DROD/Lemmings connection is that Kieran Millar, one of the new architects who joined and started releasing custom levels this year, is the same person as the boy who wrote a fan letter to the makers of Lemmings when he was ill, and had the level "Quest for Kieran" in Holiday Lemmings named after him. )

[Akseli]

This topic is pretty much exactly what I meant with this topic, here. (Hmh I had to modify the post to get the links and images to work there.  ) In my opinion this is pretty much an obligatory topic in the forum, really nice Prob Lem that you brought out this again! It's great to get all the Lemmings references in the same place.

[Clam]

Civilization IV has a "Lemming" unit AI that blindly attacks a target even if it means certain death

You can set AI-controlled units to Lemmings using the in-game map editor: