NeoLemmix V1.47n Update Released (Player V1.47n-D update released)

[namida]

Current Sub-versions
Player: V1.47n-D
Editor: V1.47n
Flexi: V1.47n-C
GSTool: V1.47n

(Note that the NL website's Flexi tutorial doesn't yet contain any info on the new Replay Manager. Aside from that, it's updated to reflect the new version.)

If you need help with upgrading existing content to V1.47n, please see this topic, and if you have any questions, post 'em there.



Features, Changes, Etc

After one of the longest time periods between stable versions in NeoLemmix history, we finally have a new update. As you'd expect from the time between V1.43n-F and this version (and the fact that a few numbers have been skipped; these numbers were used for development / experimental releases only), this is also one of the largest updates in a long time. It'd be simply impossible (and by "impossible", I mean "would take a huge amount of effort") to list everything that's changed, so I'll just list some of the more interesting points:

Less variation between packs
Previous versions were already heading strongly in the direction of "the same set of rules for every pack", but V1.47n goes even further. In every pack you play, all levels will be unlocked from the start. In every pack you play, you'll get warned about replays that may be for a different level. You only need to know the rules of NeoLemmix; not the rules of the individual pack.

Most elements outside of the core concept removed
Remember those gimmick levels, the hunt for secret levels, and so on? They're mostly a thing of the past - Zombies have been made into a core feature rather than a gimmick (although it's still expected that the majority of levels won't use them - but they're there for those levels that do want to), but the rest of the gimmicks have been stripped out. Secret levels are also a thing of the past. Talismans are still there, but the only purpose they serve is to give extra challenges to the player; you no longer need to think "If I don't unlock this talisman, I might miss out on some of the content".

A level selection menu
Since there's no secret levels, and all normal levels are unlocked from the beginning, there's no real need for level codes anymore, right? Indeed. And as such, the level code menu has been replaced with a level select menu that actually lists the levels and you can pick which one you want to play. On top of that, this menu will also show you which levels you have or haven't beaten, by putting a tick next to those you've completed.

Perfomance improvements
V1.43n-F's performance often suffered on levels that had a high number of objects. Changes in the rendering for V1.47n have greatly improved this - of course, if you have a weak machine you might still get sluggish framerates especially in fast forward, but it's a huge improvement over before. This isn't just limited to gameplay; as an example, the mass replay checker is a lot faster now too (although it's still a snail compared to Lix's...).

Support for custom backgrounds
In V1.43n-F, people often achieved custom backgrounds by making a huge object to be used as the background. While this worked, this tended to cause extreme performance issues - even if the background was as simple as a solid color other than the usual black. That's no longer an issue; as V1.47n has proper support for backgrounds - whether full-blown images, or just a color. This improves performance on such levels even beyond what's simply achieved with the new way object rendering is handled.

Skill shadows
You know how it is - you're about to use a builder, but you aren't sure exactly where to place him to get where you need to go. In the past, you'd try repeatedly until you got it right. Of course if you were one pixel off, you'd know "I just need to go back, and assign him one frame later"; but this could still be frustrating. That's where the new shadows come in - select the builder skill, mouseover a lemming, and you'll see a shadow of where the builder bridge will go. Similar shadows also exist for other constructive skills, destructive skills, and gliders. While these are not nessecerially always perfect (eg. they don't take into account some of the less-common edge cases, such as bouncing off blockers), they're a huge help nonetheless!

Attention-grabbing lemming recoloring
Don't you wish there was a way to identify athletes apart from regular lemmings at a glance? Now there is; lemmings with permanent skills will change color so that they stand out. And if you're mousing over a lemming, the moused-over lemming will also change to a different color again, so you know exactly which lemming you're selecting.

Object information
Are you wondering "which receiver does this teleporter link to"? Just hover your mouse over a teleporter or receiver, and a letter will display above it; find the teleporter / receiver with the matching letter, and you've found the connected pair! Similarly, if you want to know if an entrance spawns permanent skill lemmings, or which direction the lemmings come out of it, just mouseover it and popup icons will tell you what you want to know.

Text-based replay format
The old binary blob LRB files are a thing of the past; this update uses the new NXRP replay format (one of the new formats to be introduced in the major format overhaul; this one was ready to go now, so it's being introduced early). For some people, this won't make any difference at all. For more advanced users, this could be a huge help - a text-based format means you can manually edit it to correct errors, you can easily analyze a replay or a replay collection for whatever data you might want to pull out of it, and so on. (Don't worry, you can still watch your old LRB replays on this new version!)

Mixing graphic sets
Yes, that's right! You no longer need to make custom merged sets or use an all-in-one set like Epic when you want to use multiple sets in one level; you can now simply mix-and-match pieces from different sets together at will!

Physics fixes
It'd probably be possible to write an entire book on this section alone, if I were so inclined. There's been too many improvements to physics to count, thanks to Nepster's work.



There's more too; so the best way is to simply try out the new version and see for yourself.



Compatibility of existing content

The majority of existing content will work on NeoLemmix V1.47n, although there may be cases where physics changes render levels / talisman challenges impossible. Any content that hasn't been rebuilt with the new Flexi Toolkit version will display a compatibility warning, but if all else is fine, it will still allow you to play.

Note that in some cases, old content might not work properly. This would generally be because it uses either gimmicks, no-longer-supported object types (such as two-way teleporters), or oddtabling.

You can identify content that has been specifically updated to work with V1.47n (or at least, its author claims that it has been) by the lack of a compatibility warning when starting up the NXP. Note that some NXPs, for example Lemmings Plus V, are "dual-compatible" - that is, they've been marked as compatible with both V1.43n-F and V1.47n and (at least hopefully) properly tested against both. Others (for example, the updated NeoLemmix Introduction Pack) are only compatible with V1.47n; these will give a compatibility warning when attempted to load on V1.43n-F.

I fully encourage content creators to, for the near future, identify when posting packs which NeoLemmix versions it's compatible with. To help with this, I've added these new "emoticons" which can be used to quickly identify in a way that's universal and stands out in a post. The codes to type for them are listed here; they also appear under the "More" link next to the quick-insert.


Write: :compat-143:
Indicates: This pack is only guaranteed compatible with V1.43n-F.


Write: :compat-147:
Indicates: This pack is only guaranteed compatible with V1.47n.


Write: :compat-dual:
Indicates: This pack is compatible with both V1.43n-F and V1.47n.

If you need a copy of V1.43n-F, check its release topic.



Download Links

Editor, Flexi and GSTool removed due to V1.48 update.

If you need a copy of the V1.47n-D player for content that hasn't yet been upgraded, you can download it here: http://neolemmix.com/old/NeoLemmix147D.exe

Please note: Player V1.47n CANNOT be used for playtest mode with an older editor version. You'll need the new editor version to playtest with V1.47n. The reverse is also true - V1.47n editor cannot use V1.43n-F player for playtest mode.

Upgrading from an older editor version?
There's a bit more to it than just replacing the EXE. Follow these steps:
1. Delete everything in the "styles" folder, except for the NeoLemmix subfolder. If you have any NeoLemmix graphic sets in other folders, move them into the "NeoLemmix" folder first.
2. Move everything from the "NeoLemmix" subfolder to the main "styles" folder.
3. Delete the "NeoLemmix" subfolder.
4. Extract the entire contents of the new version's ZIP, not just the EXE. You don't need to replace the settings INI file, but be sure to replace the copies of the default graphic sets; a few of the older versions have issues with the new editor version.

[namida]

I've reuploaded the player with a couple of hotfixes - one involving the locked release rate state becoming "stuck", the other involving a purely graphical issue in the Tree set.

Please redownload if you downloaded it prior to this post.

[Tsyu]

The default volume for both sound and music defaults to 0%. It should be increased to something more sensible (like 100%) or else users will wonder why there's no sound.

[namida]

Ah, I guess no one caught this because we were generally running the experimental in a folder that already had an existing installation of V1.43n-F - in which case it does set the volumes correctly (because a config file at least exists, even though it has no information on sound / music volume).

I've reuploaded (again) with this issue fixed; although it's minor enough that most people probably don't need to redownload for this.

[Minim]

Another small issue that can easily be fixed: It looks like you've changed the background color for the DOS crystal graphic set; however, I noticed in the Extra Levels pack that the Genesis version remains black.

[namida]

The Genesis crystal style isn't included with NeoLemmix (it is however on the auto-downloadable list), the Extra Levels NXP just has a copy of it built in. So, this can be fixed without having to re-update NeoLemmix itself.

I've PM'd Dullstar about this, as he's the one who created the upgraded versions of the Genesis sets (with extra objects etc).

[namida]

Most things on the website have been updated. Those that haven't yet are:

- The Holiday and Doomsday menu graphics (these just need the "Code" panel changed to "Level Select" as far as I'm aware)
- The color-shifting floater / glider sprites
- The Flexi Toolkit tutorial, though I did add a notice to say that it's out of date

[namida]

Released a V1.47n-B update for Flexi Toolkit that fixes a bug where mass export of NXRP replays will save them with an LRB extension instead.

[Dullstar]

Another small issue that can easily be fixed: It looks like you've changed the background color for the DOS crystal graphic set; however, I noticed in the Extra Levels pack that the Genesis version remains black.

The Genesis crystal style isn't included with NeoLemmix (it is however on the auto-downloadable list), the Extra Levels NXP just has a copy of it built in. So, this can be fixed without having to re-update NeoLemmix itself.

I've PM'd Dullstar about this, as he's the one who created the upgraded versions of the Genesis sets (with extra objects etc).

I've just compared the colors to the actual Genesis version, and noticed that they all have a background color of 0, 0, 33.
I'll update the sets to reflect within the next few days to reflect this.

The Crystal set is going to be handled differently, though, since there's a gameplay reason to keep its background a different color - we don't want terrain that's the same color as the background, and the darkest color in the terrain in the Genesis version of the set is also the 0, 0, 33. This means that the Genesis version of the Crystal set should be okay with a black background, unless the colors in the existing set are wrong, in which case the update will take a while because if there are color discrepancies between the Genesis version and the sets, they need to be fixed.

So, to summarize:
The sets all need updated with background colors to better match the actual Genesis version of the game.
The Crystal set, for gameplay reasons, should ideally be a different color than the darkest terrain color, though, so there are two options:
            1) Keep it black
            2) Make it the same color as the regular version is.

The latter might be better for consistency, so that's probably what I'm going to do.

[namida]

WARNING: Please do not attempt to use the mass level dump feature in V1.47n (mass image dump is fine). I forgot to revert some code that makes it save to the future-version NXLV format rather than LVL; NXLV levels are currently NOT intended to be used outside of development, and I make no promises that NXLV files dumped now will work on future versions (in fact, it's more likely they won't, due to this version not knowing how to translate the piece numbers to piece names, while future versions that use NXLV will expect names when loading NXLV files).

If you need to mass dump your levels, please use V1.43n-F to do so if possible. If you're using new V1.47n features, you'll need to wait until I release an update that dumps to LVL files as it should (I intend to get this out very soon; but there's a few other minor things I want to fix / tweak first).

[mobius]

Another small issue that can easily be fixed: It looks like you've changed the background color for the DOS crystal graphic set; however, I noticed in the Extra Levels pack that the Genesis version remains black.

The Genesis crystal style isn't included with NeoLemmix (it is however on the auto-downloadable list), the Extra Levels NXP just has a copy of it built in. So, this can be fixed without having to re-update NeoLemmix itself.

I've PM'd Dullstar about this, as he's the one who created the upgraded versions of the Genesis sets (with extra objects etc).

I've just compared the colors to the actual Genesis version, and noticed that they all have a background color of 0, 0, 33.
I'll update the sets to reflect within the next few days to reflect this.

The Crystal set is going to be handled differently, though, since there's a gameplay reason to keep its background a different color - we don't want terrain that's the same color as the background, and the darkest color in the terrain in the Genesis version of the set is also the 0, 0, 33. This means that the Genesis version of the Crystal set should be okay with a black background, unless the colors in the existing set are wrong, in which case the update will take a while because if there are color discrepancies between the Genesis version and the sets, they need to be fixed.

So, to summarize:
The sets all need updated with background colors to better match the actual Genesis version of the game.
The Crystal set, for gameplay reasons, should ideally be a different color than the darkest terrain color, though, so there are two options:
            1) Keep it black
            2) Make it the same color as the regular version is.

The latter might be better for consistency, so that's probably what I'm going to do.

personally I would prefer keeping the background black and making the dark parts of the crystal set a lighter color. Like a very dark blue or grey. I think this ought to be the case for the regular set as well but I don't know what it might look like. Not sure I would like it cause I haven't seen it.

[Simon]

Crystal set
            1) Keep it black
            2) Make it the same color as the regular version is.

The latter might be better for consistency

For consistency with other sets, both Crystal sets at least the Dos Crystal set can keep the background black. Instead, replace the black terrain with dark turquoise.

Not sure I would like it cause I haven't seen it.

-- Simon

[Dullstar]

If the background is kept black, no changes would be needed for the Genesis crystal set, as its darkest color is 0,0,33 and not 0,0,0.
However, in the actual Genesis version, the background is also 0,0,33, and so it still has the same problems.

In the Amiga version, the terrain is in fact black, but the background of all sets is tinted 0,0,51.
Proof:







Regarding the Genesis Crystal Set:
It is not colored correctly. The darkest color in this set is 0,0,0. The darkest color in the actual Genesis version of the game is 0,0,33. This tells me that the pallettes may not necessarily be correct.
I will need to double check the pallettes of all of the Genesis sets (when I made the updated packs I assumed the palettes in the existing sets were correct) and then edit all of the terrain pieces in Crystal, and possibly some other sets if they have problems, to make the colors correct.

[Simon]

In the Amiga version, the terrain is in fact black, but the background of all sets is tinted 0,0,51.
Regarding the Genesis Crystal Set:
It is not colored correctly.

Thanks for the exhaustive analysis!

For Lemmings ports with a standard bg color across their tilesets, clash-free between terrain and bg, sure, go ahead and implement it exactly like the Lemmings port did.

What's the Neolemmix use case of the Amiga and Genesis tilesets? I assume you won't have Genesis Crystal and Dos Crystal in the same pack.

I'm concerned about the Dos Crystal set. namida mentioned how this had a blue bg, to offset from the terrain. I advise against a blue bg in Dos Crystal, for consistency with other Dos sets. I suggest the dark-turquoise terrain for this.

-- Simon

[bulletride]

First of all this new update is great! I love the new skill shadows so much that it feels like a chore to play lemmings without them in the editor now.

There is one minor nit picky issue I noticed with the key binds. I would like to be able to set it so that the game pauses when I go back 1 frame, but does not pause when I do the larger frame skip backwards. I do not believe this is possible with the current key bind options.