[OLD] Editor Bugs / Suggestions

[namida]

Do you mean as in a mixed graphic set, along the lines of the "Epic" Lemmini set? You can VERY easily make this yourself with the graphic set editor - yes, it will take some time, but you aren't going to need to use anything other than the graphic set editor itself, you aren't going to have to work out any coordinates (just use the data that's already there), etc. If you can't be bothered to do this yourself, then please don't assume someone who isn't even interested in using such a tileset is going to do it on your behalf; it's different when you're having difficulty with something, but since this is pretty much a matter of "save image, take note of properties, import image into new graphic set, enter identical properties", I find it very difficult to believe you'd have any trouble for any reason other than that you aren't trying.

[namida]

Because of the plans to make a new editor for V2.00n, I'm going to put the editor (and all tools, for that matter) under the same status as the main game. In other words;

- Generally, there won't be any updates just to add new features or optimize how things work.
- Any game tool-breaking bugs can have updates to fix them. This can apply even in cases where "it doesn't quite work as it should, although a workaround does exist", especially if doing things in the "normal" way can cause issues that aren't immediately noticable.
- Less-severe bugs will not get dedicated updates just to fix them, but may be fixed alongside more significant ones if there's an update anyway.

[Proxima]

> Quicker changing of terrain piece / object types

IIRC, Mobius suggested this one. So, Mobius - or anyone else - what would you like to see in this regard? I'm happy to look into it, but I'd like to know what exactly you'd like to see.

What I hope to see for the 2.0 editor is something closer to Lix or Cheapo, where the available terrain pieces are presented in a grid and you can immediately click on any desired piece. The Lemmix editor's terrain selection is a huge hassle to use, which is a big disappointment when NeoLemmix has improved on Lemmix in so many other regards. If we got an improved editor, I would definitely be looking forward to having a go at making a NeoLemmix pack when 2.0 comes out.

The other big problem with the editor is that only the top half of the screen is used, so you can't see what a level looks like as a whole unless you zoom really far out -- which is not a convenient mode for placing further pieces.

[ccexplore]

What I hope to see for the 2.0 editor is something closer to Lix or Cheapo, where the available terrain pieces are presented in a grid and you can immediately click on any desired piece. The Lemmix editor's terrain selection is a huge hassle to use, which is a big disappointment when NeoLemmix has improved on Lemmix in so many other regards. If we got an improved editor, I would definitely be looking forward to having a go at making a NeoLemmix pack when 2.0 comes out.

So to be clear, the problem was mainly that the current selection UI is using a vertical single-column list instead of a multi-column grid, or is it other factors?  One thing I remember people complaining about the Lemmix (not NeoLemmix) editor was the "insert terrain" command not directly bringing you to the selection screen to let you pick the terrain you want to insert.  Then again maybe that's only for Lemmix editor and was already fixed in the NeoLemmix editor.

The other big problem with the editor is that only the top half of the screen is used, so you can't see what a level looks like as a whole unless you zoom really far out -- which is not a convenient mode for placing further pieces.

So basically sounds like you want a minimap in the editor.  That's a pretty good idea considering that most levels are probably much longer than they are tall, so most of time some vertical portions of the screen will be left unused.  I guess this suggestion could also apply to Lix's editor?

An alternate solution could be a special zoom-out button/hotkey that immediately zooms out far enough to fit the entire level on the screen, then invoking button/hotkey again will restore the previous zoom level.  So you can quickly glance at level-as-a-whole and then just as quickly go back to where you were before.

[Nepster]

Simon has vented his rage on the NeoLemmix player, so I may have my own little rant about the NeoLemmix editor .

1) Missing documentation
There is no readme file coming with the editor, explaining all the buttons, menus, ... (and I don't know whether one actually exists). Some examples, what should be explained even for people that know the original Lemmix:
- All options in File-Settings
- There is a unlabeled box under "Index" in the Inspector menu.
- What are "S Val" and "L Val"? What "Reset ID"?
- There is a drop-down menu at the bottom right of the Inspector menu. What does it do?
- System.Dat Editor? Huge pile of options and only some are self-explanatory. For a new user, it is not even clear what this whole editor can be used for! And isn't there a barely visible textbox at the very bottom?
- "Help" does not help, but gives the credits. Perhaps give some in-editor help/explanations here?
- What does "Validate Level" do exactly? How does it fix which issue?
- There are some grey boxes in the lower half of the editor. What are they there for?
- ...
(many of them are rhetorical questions for me, because of dedicated experimentation - so no need to answer them here)

2) Remove "Selection" from the top bar and replace it by "Windows" (or something similar)
I rarely need the "align" function, but frequently want to open the skill window, inspector window, ... So I would prefer moving the "align" functions to the bottom of "Edit" and move all the windows to a separate drop-down menu. Then the "View" menu would be much smaller.
On a related note:
- Why is "Dos Levelpack Editor" under "View" and not under "Tools"?
- Is "Align to grid used by Dos" really needed anymore? You cannot save levels in the old Lemmix format anymore, can you?
- Minor point: The order of the window options and view options does not coincide with the order of the FX-keys. Perhaps they can be ordered within the drop-down menu to reflect the order of the FX-keys (though the pairing between options and FX-keys should be kept).

3) Revamp Skillset window
- Currently some of the less used skills are quite at the top of the window (like disarmer, swimmer and stoner), white important ones are at the bottom. The ordering possibly reflects the ordering in the skill panel later on, but here it is more important to find much-used skills easily.
- The miner is far away from basher/digger and floater/glider could be next to each other as well. You probably intended this window to be read horizontally, but with the clear separation into two colums, I always read it vertically.
- Minor issue: Could you fix the internal order of the boxes. Hitting tab gives a random walk around this window . At least all the boxes with the number of skills should be consecutive when hitting tab.

4) Revamp Gimmick window
- About half of the space is taken up by two gimmicks that are rarely used (and that I did not even know about before seeing them here). This space could be used much better by displaying a short description of the current gimmick. If one selects the clock gimmick or bait-and-switch then it may still display the additional options, but otherwise it is simply uninteresting.
- The drop-down menu to select the gimmick shown only 8 out of 44(?) gimmicks in total. It would be better to show a larger number of gimmicks at once.

[mobius]

-whatever you do, please don't get rid of the align function; I use that quite a bit.

-how about the option to have all of the menu windows [like skill menu, stats, terrain selection] appear automatically when you open the program. Currently; every time I open the editor I press the F7-F10 or whatever to make them all appear and re-arrange them in the bottom bar.

-I don't think you need a "windows" menu, just eliminate the "selection" menu altogether and put the align function in either EDIT or TOOLS.

Just a reminder of some issues which aren't exactly issues anymore but could be something to keep in mind when you're working on it;

-the copy/paste bug which apparently only I have..
-the bug which makes keyboard buttons stop functioning in the editor when you re-arrange the sizes of the bottom panels.

[namida]

Since I'm planning to do a new editor with V2.00n, I'm not going to make any major changes, but I can take into account some of the minor ones (and your suggestion for more documentation - actually, there's some on the NeoLemmix website, though it's very out of date at this point). Many of these complaints are simply stuff that was never changed from the standard Lemmix editor.

- Is "Align to grid used by Dos" really needed anymore? You cannot save levels in the old Lemmix format anymore, can you?

Yes, you can. Choose the "CustLemm" style instead of the "NeoCustLemmix" style when picking graphic sets. It automatically decides based on the style whether to save as NeoLemmix LVL or DOS / Lemmix LVL.

- Minor issue: Could you fix the internal order of the boxes. Hitting tab gives a random walk around this window . At least all the boxes with the number of skills should be consecutive when hitting tab.

A lot of sections have unpredictability when the tab key is involved. This is because many of them are very difficult to make modifications to (basically, all has to be done by editing a text file, rather than the GUI form designer) due to them using components that exist in the editor's source code, but the Delphi IDE has no knowledge of. I have no idea why EricLang decided to do this when designing the editor; perhaps he designs all his forms by text rather than through the IDE (in which case it wouldn't matter too much).

[Nepster]

Since I'm planning to do a new editor with V2.00n, I'm not going to make any major changes, ...

Sounds sensible.

... but I can take into account some of the minor ones (and your suggestion for more documentation)

Currently there seems to be no link to your help page on the forum. So I would suggest:
- Adding a link to the help page to the "NeoLemmix Info, Downloads, Etc" topic.
- Making a .txt or .pdf-file with all the documentation and adding it to the dropbox folder with all the editors. Alternatively zip it to the .exe of the editor.
Of course all of this can wait until you have the V2.00 editor, if that saves you work.
As a user I prefer documentations that are stored locally on my computer to ones that on the web (especially if I have to search for them each time).

-how about the option to have all of the menu windows [like skill menu, stats, terrain selection] appear automatically when you open the program. Currently; every time I open the editor I press the F7-F10 or whatever to make them all appear and re-arrange them in the bottom bar.

Not too fond of this suggestion, due to my different style: I usually have one big window displaying the level (with the grey boxes at the bottom reduced to minimum size) and only the inspector window open as a separate window. Having more windows open would only require screen space that has better uses.

[bsmith]

I don't use the three docks for the windows.  I like to work at a 1 to 1 display when making levels and use almost all the vertical space available in the main window for the level.  Usually I have the inspector, level properties, and skill set windows open and off to the right of the main editor window.  I would like to be able to dock the smaller windows to the left or right of the editing area, instead of what I do now which is having them float off to the side.

[mobius]

-how about the option to have all of the menu windows [like skill menu, stats, terrain selection] appear automatically when you open the program. Currently; every time I open the editor I press the F7-F10 or whatever to make them all appear and re-arrange them in the bottom bar.

Not too fond of this suggestion, due to my different style: I usually have one big window displaying the level (with the grey boxes at the bottom reduced to minimum size) and only the inspector window open as a separate window. Having more windows open would only require screen space that has better uses.

I meant to have the menus appear IN the grey boxes at the bottom. I always put them in there; it's convenient; there are out of the way. I never have them as separate windows. The grey boxes make the whole screen space work very nice for me, I'm frankly surprised that apparently not many other people use them? There is still plenty of space above for the picture of the level.

Granted it works nicely if you're only making mostly horizontal levels like Traditional Lemmings. On that note: I've never been a huge fan of vertical or huge levels. I've liked a small few but I just prefer the classic style.

[Nepster]

IchoTolot and GigaLems have additional styles (L2/L3 resp. Epic) for NeoLemmix. Why aren't these automatically included in the CustLemmixNeo download (assuming that IchoTolot and GigaLems are fine with it)?
(Less work for user to download, ... = more chance for users to use it)

Edit: Remembered that styles come with the player, not editor. @namida: Could you please move this to the player suggestion thread? Thanks.

[namida]

They actually have to currently be included with both (the editor's copy is only useful to the player if manually copied/pasted to it, or when using playtest mode). I shall take into account the suggestion of including them all by default and, assuming there's no significant objections, do so from the next update.

EDIT: Got the okay from DynaLem to include his ones. Just waiting on IchoTolot's.

[GigaLem]

Have you ever thought of Traps that activate in the water
Another friend of mine is making a tileset for me to use, and has an idea for a trap for water, and has made a few sprites for it
Hopefully this is possible for for neolemmix and its editor to have a trap that will kill lemmings if they try to swim through it
As for the WIP here is what it looks like
and of mock up of what is could look like in action

[IchoTolot]

Have you ever thought of Traps that activate in the water
Another friend of mine is making a tileset for me to use, and has an idea for a trap for water, and has made a few sprites for it
Hopefully this is possible for for neolemmix and its editor to have a trap that will kill lemmings if they try to swim through it
As for the WIP here is what it looks like
and of mock up of what is could look like in action

Good idea , but: The trap must be visible! Like a little hand looking out of the water.

[namida]

It doesn't need a special object type. Just make it a trap, as usual. It will work.