[Lemmini/Lemmix] Revenge of the Lemmings!

[Crane]

Personally I'm not a huge fan of the Bonus rating because of how cheesy it is in places (although Clay Man got a laugh from a friend when I first showed him the Digger/Blocker trick!).

I definitely support the idea of a difficulty rating between Picnic and Hootenanny, maybe named "Devious".  Heck, maybe "Lemming Cathodes" can demand 100% again if placed there!

It is definitely an option to add easier versions of harder levels to fill spaces, as DMA did it with the original game, although we shouldn't overdo it.  I think GARJEN04.DAT of my levels were Fun/Tricky-rated so you might find some things in there.  I vaguely remember "Element" being a fairly tricky level because, besides having 10 of everything, you have to do some awkward building and bashing between some curving pillars.

Or we can have a voting contest again on what to put in Picnic and Devious.

Regarding "Clonic Inferno", I made mention of the backroute because Pieuw made the comment that it's way too easy to be the last level of Frenzy.

[Proxima]

But which solution did Pieuw find when he said it was too easy? I would put it the other way round -- IchoTolot's solution is conceptually more complex and elegant, whereas yours is maybe too simple for this level's place. I'm not sure about a good way to fix it, though  http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/sad.gif" alt=":(" title="Sad" class="smiley" />

[IchoTolot]

"Devious" sounds a bit hard for a second rating, maybe something like "Cheeky".

[Wafflem]

There is already a fangame that uses "Cheeky" as the second rating, so I'm not too sure about using that for this one. Perhaps Devious can come after Hootenanny.

I also strongly support the idea of another rank, especially since I found some of the levels to be tricky/hard in Picnic and Hootenanny such as Picnic 9, "Play Bridge", Picnic 24 "The Endless Steps" and Hootenanny 1 "Rhapsody". Should the Picnic levels be moved to Hootenanny and the Hootenanny levels to Devious?

Also, should other levels also be considered (i.e. those that haven't been nominated yet)? I've made a topic that consists of many levelpacks that have been spread all over the internet (including the VTM), but ultimately saved by me into the Database, and those are tons of very good levels I added. Maybe those can go into consideration.

One other thing to point out in the Lemmix version is that the Bonus rating should be Lemmini-exclusive only, since many of the levels there obviously don't work under Lemmix mechanics. (EDIT: Though that rating could be used for Lemmix-exclusive levels like Lemmix-related glitches) Also, GLITCHSPACE (Bonus 18) uses a special VGASPEC that will never work in Lemmix because it has more than seven colors.

Also, if people want to use CheatCodes to access the Hootenanny and Armageddon levels, this is impossible due to the two difficulty names filling up the 10-character limit for passwords.

[Crane]

Simply moving Picnic to Hootenanny, and Hootenanny to Devious, is likely oversimplistic.  After all, the first two levels of Picnic are very much on par with Fun and Tricky in the original, but then takes a giant leap in Level 3.  Similarly, the last level of Picnic, "The Final Countdown", I think is right for the difficulty (I'd estimate it to be early Taxing), since it's a taste of things to come in regards to puzzle solving, plus the name really suits it as a final level.  "Guns Blazing" feels right as Picnic 29 too.

It's mostly a matter of filling the empty slots and rearranging levels that are possibly too easy or too hard for the difficulty rating that they are in.

[mobius]

OK, here's what I think we should do:
I'll update the Lemmini pack with the fixes Crane just gave me and maybe any other necessary current fixes (Proxima's music) and keep that as the "Lemmini version"

Then we'll work on the SuperLemmini version which will;
-remove the bonus rating and replace it with an easier rating and move that to the beginning. I don't intend to simply move everything up. I will rearrange the levels accordingly.
Also note that some levels from the bonus rating I will be keeping [they aren't all glitch levels].

Also, should other levels also be considered (i.e. those that haven't been nominated yet)? I've made a topic that consists of many levelpacks that have been spread all over the internet (including the VTM), but ultimately saved by me into the Database, and those are tons of very good levels I added. Maybe those can go into consideration.

One other thing to point out in the Lemmix version is that the Bonus rating should be Lemmini-exclusive only, since many of the levels there obviously don't work under Lemmix mechanics. (EDIT: Though that rating could be used for Lemmix-exclusive levels like Lemmix-related glitches) Also, GLITCHSPACE (Bonus 18) uses a special VGASPEC that will never work in Lemmix because it has more than seven colors.

Also, if people want to use CheatCodes to access the Hootenanny and Armageddon levels, this is impossible due to the two difficulty names filling up the 10-character limit for passwords.

thanks for that about the codes. I had no idea  http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/undecided.gif" alt=":-\" title="Undecided" class="smiley" /> I'd like to fix that. I'll accept suggestions for another title in place of Hootenanny, I really like Armageddon tho, is there a shortened form of Armageddon somehow? Devious sounds good as somewhere in the middle.

If you'd like to recommend levels from that new batch you posted (or any) you can do so here.
I'd prefer not recomending any levels from Cheapo. There are so many there that's its really possible to make a whole new levelpack from just that and that would work better in Lix.

[namida]

Also, GLITCHSPACE (Bonus 18) uses a special VGASPEC that will never work in Lemmix because it has more than seven colors.

Actually, VGASPECs with more than 7 colors have been supported for quite some time now (yes, it was originally a NeoLemmix feature, but I've long since added support for it to traditional Lemmix too).

[Wafflem]

Thanks for pointing this out. I wasn't sure about that since the Traditional players runs mostly on DOS features.

thanks for that about the codes. I had no idea  http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/undecided.gif" alt=":-\" title="Undecided" class="smiley" /> I'd like to fix that. I'll accept suggestions for another title in place of Hootenanny, I really like Armageddon tho, is there a shortened form of Armageddon somehow? Devious sounds good as somewhere in the middle.

If you'd like to recommend levels from that new batch you posted (or any) you can do so here.
I'd prefer not recomending any levels from Cheapo. There are so many there that's its really possible to make a whole new levelpack from just that and that would work better in Lix.

Well, the best thing I can think of is Armagedn. Alternatively, perhaps namida can find a way to make it so all you need to do is type a rank number and level number (e.g. Hootenanny 27 is 0227, very much like LookforLVLFiles). This won't ruin the rank names, and it makes accessing levels a lot easier. This feature was already done in NeoLemmix.

Another issue to point out with the Lemmix version is that some objects, if they are over the upper or lower boundaries, tend to disappear. I've attached a picture of Pain 27 for example. Picnic 14 and Armageddon 1 have it even worse, because the former's entrance on the top left is gone, and the latter's exit completely disappears.

I'll go over the levelpacks and see which ones work great for this pack. Admittedly, I haven't really played the levels yet, but I know that other people have and really enjoyed them based on discussion in older forums. I'll go over the VTM packs first and see which ones work very well for inclusion. I also remember that Tumble Weed had a lot of very good and well-designed levels; the best place to start would be his hand-picked best levels in twbestof.dat. t3tesla also posted his review of the game here; his old level pack that he uploaded in an older version of the Garjen site is also in the database.

Should uci's Christmas 2013 level be included? This is partly because the pack is lacking in Christmas levels, and partly because the level is actually very good and works very well as a Picnic or Hootenanny level.

[namida]

I'll make sure to add that feature (shortened cheatcodes) to the next update, and fix the Y<0 bug (actually, if I'm not mistaken, the correct DOS behaviour for an object with a Y coordinate less than zero is to draw it correctly, but treat it as fake? I'll have to investigate that; whatever DOS does is what I'll make traditional Lemmix do). http://www.lemmingsforums.com/Smileys/lemmings/smiley.gif" alt=":)" title="Smiley" class="smiley" />


Off the top of my head, NeoLemmix features that ARE supported in Traditional Lemmix (there might be a couple more):
- 32-color graphic sets
- Full-color VGASPECs
- NeoLemmix-style oddtabling
- Specifying music tracks for a level
- In-game / preview screen image saving
- Dumping LVL files (though of course, traditional dumps them in traditional LVL format)

Additionally, dumping images of all levels is on the todo list; I just haven't implemented it *yet*.

[t3tesla]

-How many people are in favor of the bonus rating?

Bonus rating is a nice idea.
When I can't solve a level, I like to know if I have to search again a 'normal' solution, with tools I already know.
It's painful when I search, stuck, give up, and note that the solution is based on an 'irregular' trick.
With the bonus rating, I know I have to explore all the specificities of the game, I have to search clues in the "Glitches in Lemmings/Lemini" topic,...

The problem is how can you define what is a "regular trick" and what is an "irregular trick" ;-)

[Wafflem]

Just a thought, but before we nominate new levels, should we nominate first which levels should be removed from the game?

[Crane]

I'm a bit worried about removing levels unless they're universally hated and the designer has already been given a chance to improve them, although of course, it's not my call.  Which levels did you have in mind?

[Wafflem]

I have no levels in mind yet; it's just a suggestion.

[mobius]

Here is my list. Blue levels are those which I think should probably be moved for difficulty reasons. Orange are ones which I've thought about removing. Note: This is only for consideration, I haven't made up my mind on these yet. Some I really want to keep.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/72760678/RevengeList - New.xlsx" class="bbc_link" target="_blank">https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/72760678/RevengeList%20-%20New.xlsx

[Crane]

It's tricky, because some levels are loved by some and hated by others.  Make sure to take a look a Pieuw's list as well, as it contains some interesting insight.