Lemmings Forums Level Contest #12 - Playing Phase (Discussion Topic)

[namida]

Note: This topic is for posting your comments, replays, etc for the levels. If you wish to post an update to your level, or enter a late submission, please do so in the Updates Topic instead.

Level / Versions List

Rule 1 Levels (Time limit of one minute or less)
  (V2) bulletride's "Playing With Blocks"
  (V1) Colorful Arty's "Just a Minute... You wish!"
  (V2) mobius's "The Floor is Lava!"
  (V9) namida's "The Longest Minute"
  (V8) Nepster's "Greetings from the Mad Architect"
  (V2) Raymanni's "Claustrophobic Bricks"
  (V1) Ron Stard's "Lover Of Mine"

Rule 2 Levels (No bashers, fencers, miners or diggers)
  (V3) bulletride's "Frostbite"
  (V2) IchoTolot's "Framed With The Best Skills"
  (V5) Nepster's "Dark Secret"
  (V2) Ron Stard's "The Freedom Man"

Rule 3 Levels (Special graphics level)
  (V9) Colorful Arty's "Technicolor Nightmare!"
  (V1) Gronkling's "CAT ASTROPHE"
  (V1) IchoTolot's "Soilworker's Song Of The Damned"
  (V1) namida's "The Fart Gallery"
  (V2) zanzindorf's "Fish"

Musics (place them in a "music" folder inside your NeoLemmix folder; create one if it doesn't already exist): https://www.dropbox.com/s/7ad0wa2wcmgv8u0/Contest12_Music.zip?dl=1
If you downloaded the musics prior to the 2017-05-09 09:19 update, you'll be missing this music file (which goes with a late submission level): https://www.dropbox.com/s/4j1wlew9hccv020/TTTE.ogg?dl=1

Levels and NXP are attached to this post. Both the levels ZIP and the NXP contain all required data except the (optional) music files.

Updates are now closed. Voting will open no earlier than 2017-05-26 (UTC).

[Ryemanni]

The Fart Gallery.





I could insert a lot of "wat"-memes here, but I think you get the idea.

[Nepster]

bulletride's  "Playing with blocks"

Nice short level, not overly difficult, but no special idea either.

bulletride's  "Frostbite"

I am very glad to have the clear physics mode! The hardest part was going from the starting platform to the bottom one. Furthermore the second half needs quite some precision, too: My first attempt arrived at the exit platform one pixel too low.

Colorful Arty's  "Just a minute...you wish!"

Excellent level and the hardest one in the pack (except possibly mine ). Very nice solution! I have only one small suggestion: Put small arrows below the preplaced blockers to indicate their direction.

Colorful Arty's  "Technicolor Nightmare"

Very easy and stright-forward level. I only used the topmost 60 pixels. Sorry, but I don't like the graphics here and played in clear physics mode.

Gronkling's  "CAT ASTROPHE"

Very likely a backroute saving all lemmings wile not using the builder.

IchoTolot's  "Framed with the best skills"

Not sure, whether my solution is 100% intended, because I have a walker spare. But it was much fun to play, and of medium dificulty. It has one issue though: The drop from the topmost to the second platform in the middle is exactly the splatting distance.

IchoTolot's "Soilworker's Song of the Damned"

Far harder than your other level, although I managed to save all lemmings. Nice idea, a surprising number of paths the lemmings walk along automatically, and no need for clear physics mode.

möbius's  "The floor is Lava!"

I have the feeling that my solution is not quite intended, because I use no climber and only one floater. Not the visually most pleasing level, but fun to play.

namida's  "The longest minute!"

Rather precise and fiddly solution, so probably not quite intended. But a curious layout, so I am looking forward to find the intended solution.

namida's  "The fart gallery"

Sorry, but neither the artwork nor the solution impressed me here.

Raymanni's  "Claustrophobic bricks"

I kind of doubt that I should have turned on the exit platform with the builder and miner. But even so, this was a fun little level. Pleasant visuals, too.

Ron Stard's  "The Freedom Man"

I really don't know whether my solution is intended: It has a lot of skills left over at the end, but on the other hand this is basically the only approach I can think of. Nice, "little" level, though.

[namida]

The Fart Gallery is (quite obviously) open ended, so any working solution is valid.

The Longest Minute is a backroute, indeed.

[Ryemanni]

I tried so hard to prevent that backroute on my level nepster, but I never considered building a bit and then mining to turn the lemming. Dang!

I wonder if my solution to the longest minute is a backroute, because

Spoiler

I didn't use one basher and the blocker.

[Colorful Arty]

Excellent job solving my Rule 1 level Nepster! While not exactly intended, it is both close enough and good enough to the actual solution!

Technicolor Nightmare on the other hand is a horrific backroute; one which I won't be able to patch methinks. A shame, since the intended solution is quite magnificent.

[Ron_Stard]

First of all, I have to say that all the Rule 1 and Rule 2 levels are quite difficult, at least for me! And that's a good sign of their quality I am tempted to take a peek at Nepster's replay solutions before call it a day

Regarding my level (there's no need in covering this comment within a spoiler tag, but anyway...):

Spoiler

Yes, that's the intended solution. The surplus skills are just red herrings. It's probably the easiest level of all the contest, but in my defence, I have to say that it would be somewhat harder without skill shadows (and with timed exploders).

I hope you find the 1st part of the solution creative and original, but I don't know if that maneouvre has been used before in any pack.

I'll update a little the scenario, in order to make it "a bit" harder (specially, if you want to solve it without skill shadows).

[bulletride]

Rule 1 levels done! All the levels were pretty sweet!

Arty:

Spoiler

I love freeing blockers so this level was a treat! So many solutions almost work but just don't quite do it. Great level!

Namida:

Spoiler

Nice builder extension level.

Nepster:

Spoiler

Fantastic solution! My only 'complaint' is that I didn't notice the steel in the trap at first so that was a little annoying.

Raymanni:

Spoiler

I saved 2 more than needed so this is probably a backroute. Still a great level either way!

Mobius:

Spoiler

This level has nice execution with the timing of getting the builder with using the builder in time. Great level!

[IchoTolot]

My commentated video playthrough of all V 1.0 levels (link to first video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUK4TgDMedg

Also my current solution replays are attached to this post as well

I think I've found quite a few backroutes here

[namida]

Icho's solution to The Longest Minute is a backroute (and not fixed in the updated version). Will comment on bulletride's when I'm on a PC.

(EDIT: bulletride's solution was also a backroute)

[bulletride]

Rule 2 and 3 replays attached.

[namida]

Updated the ZIP and NXP.

Changed levels:
Rule 1: bulletride's "Playing With Blocks" (V2), namida's "The Longest Minute" (V3), Raymanni's "Claustrophobic Bricks" (V2), Ron Stard's "Lover Of Mine" (late submission)
Rule 2: bulletride's "Frostbite" (V2), Ron Stard's "The Freedom Man" (V2)
Rule 3: No changes

[Ryemanni]

There are still some levels I haven't been able to solve, but I did manage to beat the new one:

The lover of Mine

A pretty good level! Maybe a bit more decoration would be in place if you ask me, but the puzzle was fun, though I'm not sure if my solution was a backroute. I saved one extra lem.

[namida]

All Rule 1 levels solved.

bulletride's "Playing With Blocks"

I'm not sure if this is intended or not; or if this level might even be an open-ended one. Either way, I found it pretty challenging and definitely a good level.

Colorful Arty's "Just a Minute... You wish!"

I'm not sure how I feel about making the level tiny and going with a 25 second time limit. A larger level, and a longer (while still fairly short) time limit could've made it more clear which solutions won't work and which just need more fine-tuning. With that being said, I do very much like this solution, and it took me quite a while to find all the tricks.

mobius's "The Floor Is Lava!"

This level wasn't bad, but I didn't feel it was particularly great either.

Nepster's "Greetings from the Mad Architect"

I'm fairly certain I backrouted this one. The solution feels both too messy and too easy to be a Nepster solution. On a side note, to someone not overly familiar with this graphic set (like myself), the steel blocks over the trap just look like part of the trap's graphic.

Raymanni's "Claustrophobic Bricks"

This is my favorite of the Rule 1 levels, and also took me longer to solve than all the rest combined. Great level!

Ron_Stard's "Lover of Mine"

This level is pretty straightforward to anyone who knows the miner-builder trick, and could use some more decoration.

[Ron_Stard]

Thank you for your comments about my last-minute level! Here are my thoughts:

Raymanni

Yes, it's a backroute. And a embarrasing one! . But it's easy to fix it. I agree with you and with Namida: the scenario is very sober and somber. I have designed -by myself, not counting the NES/ZX level conversions- only 4 levels in all my life, including this one, and in every of the previous three, I've put extra decoration, in order to make it beautiful. I was eager to send this level to the contest before time expired, so I've just make sure it worked as I wanted.

I promise I'll add decoration and fix that backroute in a next update!

namida

You're right: this is a well-known trick for the veteran player. You hit the nail with the intended solution, despite the embarrasing backroute that Raymanni easily spotted, much to my annoyance.

As I said to Raymanni, I've only made a few original levels, so it's comprehensible they are still not very hard, since I'm still a novice . However, I think the two I sent to the contest would be interesting and tricky to solve within the old engine (DOS/Lemmix), which offers no help at all to the players.

Also, I agree with you and Raymanni about the austerity of the scenario: I'll add some more extra decoration and fix the backroute in the next version. I'm afraid I can't think of anything to improve the difficulty: at least, I hope you find some challenge on the -somewhat- not trivial moment to increase of the release rate