Maximum Lemmings Saved Records

[namida]

Tricky 7 "Follow The Yellow Brick Road" improved to 35/40.

This is just a variation on my 2-turners, no-bashers, no-diggers solution from the skills you can't live without challenge, that replaces a bomber with a very well-timed digger to save an extra lemming. I've added details on how to achieve save-35 with this solution, to that post; or alternatively, replay attached.

EDIT: And now 36, although Pooty beat me to it by a few minutes (as mentioned on Discord).

Spoiler

This is done by turning before the wall, instead of after it. You use a third turner to compress the crowd, and timing to sort everything else out. The last part of the puzzle is saving the climber who builds the splatform - this is done by bashing into the end of the yellow brick road.

[Pooty]

3D Lemmings: Tricky 7 (Level 27: Follow the Yellow Brick Road) improved to 36/40. The solution is complex, so a replay is attached.

Spoiler

Get the first 4 lemmings out as quickly as you can. First two lemmings turn right then left so that they are aligned with the exit. The next 2 lemmings are to be assigned climbers, and the two after that to be athletes. Get the 2nd athlete to start building up to the top with exactly 3 builders, making sure to take as much time as possible. As that is happening, make the next lemming turn towards the 2nd turner so that all the other lemmings group up into one bunch. As soon as the builder has completed the first bridge, bomb the turner that's keeping the other lemmings contained. When the builder has completed the bridge, use a digger to get the other lemmings to jump-glitch to the top.

Meanwhile, make the first 2 lemmings floaters as soon as they are close to falling to their deaths. The first lemming blocks so that the second one can build a safety bridge of 5 steps. If everything is timed right, all of the lemmings will land safely. Bash through the end of the yellow brick road to save the lemming that made the safety bridge, and bomb the blocker.

[WillLem]

Just thought I'd share a few of my 100% replays! Lemme know what you think!

Lemmings Tricky 25 - Cascade 100%
Lemmings Mayhem 7 - Poles Apart 100%
Oh No! More Lemmings Crazy 19 - DON'T PANIC 100%
Oh No! More Lemmings Wicked 17 - Down the tube 100%
Oh No! More Lemmings Havoc 7 - Creature Discomforts 100%

- WillLem

[namida]

Just thought I'd share a few of my 100% replays! Lemme know what you think!

Lemmings Tricky 25 - Cascade 100%
Lemmings Mayhem 7 - Poles Apart 100%
Oh No! More Lemmings Crazy 19 - DON'T PANIC 100%
Oh No! More Lemmings Wicked 17 - Down the tube 100%
Oh No! More Lemmings Havoc 7 - Creature Discomforts 100%

- WillLem

We don't use clone engines for these challenge topics, only the official games. (The one exception is Lemmix, which we allow due to the fact that it - by design - has identical gameplay physics to DOS version, even down to the really fine details and glitches. And to be clear - that's regular vanilla Lemmix only; not NeoLemmix.) EDIT: To be clear, use of framestep / etc features in Lemmix is considered acceptable, because they don't allow you to do anything you couldn't theoretically do in the legitimate DOS game, they just make it a whole lot easier to do it. However, if some Lemmix-exclusive glitch were to show up, use of it would not be considered acceptable.

A challenge topic relating specifically to clone engines (or rather, to be fair, I'd think it would have to be limited to one specific clone engine - and in turn, I suspect that unless that engine is NeoLemmix, there wouldn't be much interest) could absolutely be started if you like, but yeah, it would need to be kept separate for the sake of fairness.

[Minim]

Thanks for clearing that up, namida. It's nice to see someone taking an interest in this board though, but still, it really does need an update which will hopefully help any more new users fully understand what this board is all about. I'll send a PM.

[WillLem]

We don't use clone engines for these challenge topics, only the official games. (The one exception is Lemmix, which we allow due to the fact that it - by design - has identical gameplay physics to DOS version, even down to the really fine details and glitches. And to be clear - that's regular vanilla Lemmix only; not NeoLemmix.)

A challenge topic relating specifically to clone engines (or rather, to be fair, I'd think it would have to be limited to one specific clone engine - and in turn, I suspect that unless that engine is NeoLemmix, there wouldn't be much interest) could absolutely be started if you like, but yeah, it would need to be kept separate for the sake of fairness.

Understood. I'll bet that the solutions shows in my replays would work in the original games though... I'll have to test it out!

Edit - when you say "original games", do you mean any of the DOS, Amiga, SNES, etc ports? Just to clarify.

[Proxima]

All topics on Challenges except this one refer to the DOS version, and only the DOS version. (Unless another version is explicitly named in the topic title -- and there are even a couple for NeoLemmix.) That's because for most challenges, discovering the minimum number of skills, minimum types of skill and so forth is interesting enough to do once, but not interesting enough to maintain records for each version separately. (And merging results from different versions doesn't seem fair, since some of them have quite drastic gameplay differences.)

As for why the DOS version has primacy: DOS is one of the original versions (alongside Amiga); it's a version many of our members are more familiar with; and it's easier to test and share results for DOS thanks to the existence of Lemmix.

However, for this topic only, we track records for every version that we have information about, and we're happy to add results from another port if anyone posts them. That's because saving a certain number of lemmings is the main goal of the game, and seeing how many can be saved the most interesting challenge. The possibilities vary quite a bit between versions (e.g. Tricky 15 and 16 and Mayhem 26 on the Mac, thanks to the high-res graphics), so it makes sense to maintain a list for each version.

[ccexplore]

Nice way to kick off a new decade (2020) with a new record--on original DOS Lemmings no less! Didn't think there'd be any more of those to beat.

Thanks to MASTER-88 who alerted me of an alleged new record of lose 2 on Mayhem 19 ("Time to Get Up!") someone reported for Genesis Lemming.  Initial skepticism (as there was no proof provided other than a poorly cropped post-level screenshot) gave way to further thoughts, and within the hour I realized how we sadly have all managed to have overlooked a way to use rather well-understood stuck climber mechanics to get a lemming far enough inside the wall, to allow the first obstacle be breached by only one bomber.

I've now confirmed on Lemmix that lose 2 is possible, replay attached.  It's possible the replay can be further improved skill-wise to use 1 or 2 less builders, will test that later today.  This should work on a number of other ports that follow the same mechanics for stuck climbers.

A few other ports listed here (eg. Mac Lemmings, Genesis Lemmings) have the exact same level, and it's likely that lose 2 are also possible on them, but I'll leave it to others to confirm.  For now I've added a "(48/50 pending confirmation)" kind of notice for the results reported here for those ports.

[Proxima]

To put this into perspective, here are the most recent previous improvements for each set of levels:

Original Lemmings - Mayhem 29 by LemSteven, 28 January 2006
Oh No! More Lemmings - Wicked 9 by alfonz1986, 17 August 2011
Holiday Lemmings - Hail 6 by ccexplore, 18 June 2009
Genesis Lemmings - Present 2 by Proxima, 10 September 2012

Clam's response to the Hail 6 result is worth quoting:

This really is a momentous occasion - but a sad one as well...

Will we ever rescue another lemming?

[LemSteven]

Well done!

I saw MASTER-88's post and had similar skepticism -- I thought maybe the Genesis version had a slightly narrower wall, or a different size bomber crater, or slightly different physics that made 48/50 possible.  I didn't think the stuck climber trick was a possibility because I didn't see a way to get the climber into the wall in the first place.  But when I saw ccexplore mention the climber backing 2 pixels away from a wall after hitting a ceiling, I knew what had to be done.

I can now confirm the result in DOSBox.

[EricLang]

@ccexplore: I downloaded the Maygem 19. Nice!
And nice to see Lemmix still lives.
Currently I am working on a "random level generator for viewing pleasure and inspiration".
It uses the 9 graphic sets in the high-resolution version.
The first 5 are the ones from the mac, which I got long time ago from ccexplore.
The last 4 I am currently using are from Lemmini.
When finished I will anounce the github link.

[MASTER-88]

I think we can add SNES lemmings in this list. Every videos is my topic and confirmed

Lemmings SNES
(100% unless noted)

Fun 3: 47/50
Fun 6: 48/50
Fun 18: 65/70
Tricky 15: 7/10
Tricky 16: 46/50
Tricky 17: 48/50
Tricky 18: 9/10
Tricky 23: 99/100
Taxing 7: 99/100
Taxing 19: 65/70
Taxing 27: 97/100
Taxing 28: 90/100
Mayhem 5: 76/80
Mayhem 10: 73/75
Mayhem 19: 48/50
Mayhem 26: 95/100
Mayhem 29: 97/100
Sunsoft 1: 1/4

Played and confirmed
https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=4539.0

[Minim]

Does anyone have confirmation of Frost 14's 45/50 solution? I thought I found it in a post here but it got deleted.

Only asking because I'm trying to tidy up one of my very old challenge threads: Max release rate for certain levels.

Edit: It's OK. Managed to solve it after having another look. Here's my replay.

[WillLem]

I'd be happy to add my results for Amiga Lemmings if anyone's still updating the OP on this?

[Proxima]

As a moderator, I can update the OP of any topic in Challenges.

As far as I know, all glitches relevant to maximum saved are the same between DOS and Amiga, so most results should be the same as regards number lost. (Some levels have a higher number of lemmings, e.g. Taxing 7 will be 99/100 instead of 79/80.)

The one result that will be different is "The Steel Mines of Kessel", since DOS has 20 of each skill, Amiga only 10. Therefore the Amiga result should be lose-5, the same as SNES.

Of course, it would be nice to have definite confirmation of these results, so if you can help with that, go ahead