New level pack, (Nuked Lemmings)

[grams88]

Hi everyone

I have just made 20 levels which are of varying difficulties hoping to trick the most seasoned lemmings player. Hoping I have done this correctly and everything. I tried to focus on less building levels as my last pack had lots of building in it where you would fast forward then assign a builder then fast forward again. Some of these levels do take a bit of inspiration from some of the later levels of ski sloping lemmings just as in level design and the such.

I put these levels in alphabetical order which you can play any level you want to first. If you get stuck at a level try a different one and see how many of the levels you can complete, this pack only uses the traditional skills but that doesn't mean it won't be hard.

Anyone who has played levels from the random level topic might remember two of the levels which were (pipe pits) and (Down fall lemming). If you remember completing these then you don't have to do them again but I thought they were good enough levels to be put into a pack.

No hidden exit levels, No long building levels,

Well it might have its own problems well I hope not.

I hope I did the rank name thing properly, this pack is called Nuked Lemmings, I thought of the name as I was playing some duke3d and duke3d has the nuke symbol as well as lemmings has the mushroom looking one.

Hoping not to find too many backroutes but if it happens I will have a think as to whether it destroys the level in which case I will probably try to block off the backroutes if possible.

[namida]

I played the first few levels.

"Can You Remember How?" - I do feel this level's size didn't really add anything to it; the same puzzle could have been done in a much smaller size. Likewise, the locked release rate didn't seem to serve any purpose. (These two statements are assuming this isn't a case of that my solution is a backroute and the intended solution does make use of these elements.) Nonetheless, this already shows a huge improvement over the level design style seen in your first pack, and while not particularly hard, this level was not trivial by any means.

On a more subtle note, the water under the exit - I notice this isn't quite lined up correctly. Even more importantly - you don't really need to mess around with placing multiple water objects in the first place, you can resize them - see attachment. This is a very minor detail though, and is only noticable under Clear Physics Mode.

"Complex" - This level has a lot of unused empty space at the top, I suggest reducing that. But that aside, this was a very nice level - not too difficult, but pretty fun.

"Downfall Lemming" - The screen start position is right at the bottom of this level; that should be fixed. Also, the water near the exit, it looks a bit messy with the sudden cutoff - perhaps try using some vertically-flipped waters to make this look tidier? But those are purely cosmetic issues, and in terms of actual gameplay, this is an excellent level IMO!

"Gap Fix" - I'm pretty sure I majorly backrouted this one.



I'll likely come back to this and play more later, but so far - this is a huge improvement over your first pack, and I'm quite enjoying this one! I do, in all honesty, think you've overestimated the difficulty a bit - these levels definitely aren't trivial, but they're not super hard either. But they are good.

[grams88]

Thanks Namida, it means a lot when it comes from the masters of lemmings.  I think I might have a lot of unused space in a lot of the levels.

Right okay I will make sure I do the spoiler tag thing okay.  (Namida, Comments)

Spoiler

(Can you remember how) Very good solution, a bit different to my one but I could maybe see this level being a tiny bit difficult for the newer members on the forum but don't get me wrong. I like how you used the builders in that way for the level solution, I don't think that is a backroute as such, what I mean is I probably won't be changing that one.

(Complex) Nice solution, I like how this level could offer a lot of different solutions, depends who is playing it, each person can maybe see a solution that the other person can't see. You done not bad with the climbing up the pipe and using some of the builders to help you get up.

(Downfall) Right I will try to maybe tidy this one up a bit, yes your solution was very nice, I was hoping to maybe get the player to use almost every skill which you almost did or I think you did, can't remember now but I think there might of been a blocker left. That water area does look a bit messy. I will probably fix that in my next update. I might wait a little while before I start fixing up things.

(Gap fix) You got it right , it is a major backroute, I have an idea for this one to maybe make that backroute harder. This level could be a bit tricky in relation to fixing up the backroute

Thanks again Namida for the comments, I'm hoping it was a lot better than my last pack, I did try to cut down on the builders as that was something that was used heavily on the last pack. I do feel like we need to keep on top of the backroutes especially with one of the levels was a major backroute, I won't mention what one except in the spoiler. I have a feeling what levels might need a backroute fix but so far so good, only one level needs a backroute fix so far.

I will admit there is one level I'm not too keen on, which is lemming suicide, I wouldn't say this is a spoiler but I wonder if others will probably think the same way as myself in relation to the (Lemming Suicide level)

[grams88]

Might as well get started on fixing things.

Tidied up the water area in (Down fall lemming) also tried to see if I can stop a certain backroute on the (Gap fixes) level. I think it will be a hard one to fix but you never know and hoping I get that one sorted, fingers crossed.

I will post the updated one at the top of this topic.

[namida]

Re-solved the two changed levels.

Downfall Lemming

I pretty much solved this the same way as before - maybe a slightly tidier execution, but the same solution overall.

Gap Fixes

This feels more like it could be the intended solution. I'd honestly suggest either unlocking the release rate or reducing the number of lemmings if this is intended though; as it stands, the first part of this level is really just "wait for all the lemmings to come out" - we've got the "skip 10 seconds forwards", sure, but having to do this doesn't really add anything to the level.

[grams88]

Namida Comments (Does contain a spoiler for other players)

Spoiler

I have unlocked the release rate as sort of makes you have to wait a bit but doing it this could speed up things a little. Yes this was the intended solution I was wanting, it tried to make it not seem obvious but getting all the lemmings together so you don't lose too many was the way I intended it to be. You done quite well with that one.

[Proxima]

I had a look at this pack. At the moment, the zip contains:

* Twenty loose levels
* A subfolder "Damn I'm good" containing the same twenty levels (or at least, levels with the same titles)
* Four other subfolders, containing five levels each. This seems to be an allocation of the same twenty levels to rank subfolders, but there is no indication of what order the ranks should be in, nor of the order of the levels within each rank.

As a result, there are three copies of each level, which might be identical (I'm not going to take the time to find out), but if there are any differences then there's no indication of which version is the intended one to play.

[grams88]

Actually I think I've confused myself here and everyone else. I thought I actually removed those ranks, surely I would of when I was making it up, I just realised i think I have uploaded the wrong one as I thought I removed those ranks. Right okay I've probably confused myself during  the process and added the wrong zip file. I can't even remember if I actually added those ranks to the pack, I don't think I did, part of me remembers removing those ranks.

I must of deleted the proper one that never had those ranks in it and the levels were listed in alphabetical order. They are all the same levels in the other folders.

I might change the download on the first forum post.

I looked into it more and I'm totally confused, I don't know what I've done sorry about this Proxima.

[Proxima]

Thank you, it's fine now. Sorry if my post came across too harshly. I just wanted to make sure I was playing the correct levels.

[grams88]

Not at all Proxima you were not harsh.

[grams88]

Proxima, I just realised that the pack at the top of the page seems to be version with the backroutes still in it. I'll need to fix, must apologise again, I don't seem to be firing on all cylinders at the moment. I'm back to confused.

I fix the level pack as two levels didn't have the backroute gix which I'm sure I done anyway. arrggggggggggggggg I'm causing people to get annoyed at me and they will eat me alive.

[kaywhyn]

Hello grams88,

I have solved the entire pack. My replays are attached. I have also LPed the pack.

Link to LP: Kaywhyn's LP of Grams88's Nuked Lems pack. Enjoy!

Regarding the difficulty, after reading from you that the pack is difficult, I was definitely worried that the pack would get too hard even for someone like me, but now that I have solved the entire pack, I'm definitely in agreement that the pack is difficult and challenging. The pack starts with a not too difficult level, but at the same time it's still not trivial. From there on, the levels got quite difficult, although there were some levels where the solution is obvious, but the execution is difficult. Some had pretty tough timings to do.

I say the hardest the pack ever gets is level 13. As can be seen in my LP, this level took up the most videos, 3, before I finally solved it. However, there is a problem with the level where there's 11 entrances even though there's only 10 lemmings. As a result, one of the entrances doesn't even spawn any lemmings. I'm wondering if this was an oversight, as this is definitely a design error.

Speaking of design, there were some levels that were huge where one doesn't even use most of the map. Here I'm thinking 1 and 4. The former seems to have no purpose in having the level be that big, as you can certainly achieve the same result with a much smaller map. The latter is worse in this regard, although props to you for at least in the effort of decorating the level in an attempt to make it look nice 9 would also fall under the latter, although it's not a big level but still has an obvious half of the level that can't be used in the solution. At the same time, the bubble tileset happens to be a tileset that I like, due to the design and also association of fun time with bubbles. 

As for the quality, there's definitely plenty of variety in the puzzles. Some were difficult but they felt satisfying to figure out. There were some levels that I wasn't a fan of due to the fiddlyness of the solutions, especially since most of the time it's difficult to know where to place the skills in order to be efficient in the solution. As a result, some of the levels have potential to be better than they currently are with some tweaking/fixing. However, the fact that I solved the entire pack means that it's been proven that all levels are currently solvable and possible.

Overall, this was a decent pack. It's not over the top great, but at the same time it isn't terrible either. So, I would say the quality is average, almost leaning towards above it here. Compared to your Ski Slope pack, I have no idea if it's an improvement, since I haven't played your other pack yet. I will, though. I'll probably just go through it the way it is currently, with a level removed from each rank, resulting in only 19 levels per rank.

Detailed Feedback on the Levels

1-1: Can You Remember How Nice level to start off the pack. Reminds me of the penultimate level of Clammings, the pack I LPed before I LPed this pack, since it requires the builder wall to turn lemmings back to the exit as well. Again, the huge tallness of the level serves absolutely no purpose at all. It's still a decent looking level though.

1-2: Complex Somewhat more difficult than the previous level, though still not too hard. I say the hardest part is the beginning with getting both crowds up to be able to keep going to the right towards the exit, especially with the limited skillset.

1-3: Down Fall Lemming This one was a hard one for me. I was told by another member that he went down the left side of the level, the route which you do see in the LP but I quickly rejected it as not being possible. That likely explains why I found the level difficult. I guess I thought it wasn't possible due to the skillset. Nice decent looking level!

1-4: Gap Fix I thought this was going to be extremely fiddly to execute, but it turned out to not be so bad. I did have the climber worker make a round, but luckily that's all that is needed in order to have him bunch up with the crowd to get through the spinning wheel traps to minimize losses. Here, the level suffers the same problem as 1 in that it's a tall level where the bottom isn't even used in the solution. However, you get bonus points for the decoration there.

1-5: Lemming Run This one was quite hard. Figuring out the correct path to take is very difficult, especially with the very limited amount of builders and the restricted skillset.

1-6: Lemmings Suicide Yea, I'm in agreement with you here in that I wasn't a fan of this level at all. Way too much bombing. It's not obvious how many bombers are needed to make it through each of the very thick floors. I'm generally not a fan of levels where one has to repeatedly spam the same skill over and over in a very short amount of time. In a way, 4 would be another I wasn't a fan of, although it's just simply spamming climbers to every lemming in a safe environment, so it wasn't too bad.

1-7: Man I Am Stuck This was another hard one for me. This is the only level of the LP that isn't the original recording. I had OBS open, but I had forgotten to switch back to the hotkey function of OBS instead of the function that's printed on the keyboard key via Ctrl + esc. Luckily, I had realized it about 5 minutes into doing the level, so only about 5 minutes of the recording isn't the original. Even then, this level took a long time to solve. It's not easy at all to figure out how to get up the tall level. In particular, the route to take to do so isn't easy. It can also be fiddly in the execution. Fortunately, I'm very well aware of the trick of cancelling midstroke with a blocker and bombing close to it to release him while keeping the staircase intact.

1-8: Muddy Perhaps the easiest level of the pack up to this point. It does feel a bit hackish, though. In any case, nice short and easy 1-of-everything level and was one of my favorites.

1-9: Pipe Pits This one seems like a very severe backroute. It really seems that the level should be harder than that. Then again, it's probably intended, although there is a lot of pixel precision in the digger basher staircase I did at the end. Once more, the bottom half is not and can't be used at all in the solution, although this gets a free pass due to how I like the bubble tileset and the level looks quite nice.

1-10: Sand Slabs This one was difficult for me as well. In particular, I was trying to see if I could save a basher instead of use it in the starting area so that I have one for the end. It's not easy to work out how to make sure everyone is safe at the start. Knowing myself, I likely overcomplicated the solution to this level.

1-11: Save Two Not Four This one I thought wasn't so bad at all, but it was still somewhat challenging. My solution involves getting through the traps without getting anyone killed by them. Originally, I was going to send them out in groups of two through the traps, but I think the problem I had was one of them would need to go back to release the other lemmings later on at the start, and that would end up getting the lemming killed once he's on the left side of the spinning wheel trap where the trigger is. It would necessitate the use of another builder or so in order to avoid getting killed.

1-12: Snow Sensation This one was a hard one. The most difficult was figuring out how to get the bottom crowd up. It's clear that all of them are climbers, but it was hard to figure out where they should go to get up the level. This was still a nice puzzle, though. Here, it wasn't so bad with all the climbers, at least compared to level 4, where there's 60 that need to be climbers.

1-13: Ten Lemming Challenge Challenge indeed. This is by far the hardest level of the entire pack, as clearly shown by how it took me 3 videos before I finally solved the level. It's never certain whether you have the skills distributed correctly at any point, and the risk of running out of skills is very high here. The most difficult entrances to figure out were all the left ones except the one with the lattice grid where it's a dig and that's it. In the end, I manage to have just a blocker and climber leftover. As already mentioned, the level has a problem in that there's 11 entrances but only 10 lemmings. As a result, one entrance doesn't even spawn any lemming. Seems like a oversight design error here.

1-14: This Will Be Mayhem Much easier than the previous one. I say that's really interesting going down through the right edge to set up the route for the remaining lemmings. The most difficult part is probably the staircase on the pillar down where the exit is, but otherwise it's an easy level.

1-15: Timing Problem The next stumper for me. The solution is obvious, just the execution is difficult in order to not lose that many lemmings. In my unsolved attempt, it just simply required a minor tweak at the beginning to get a working solution in the next video. I thought it was going to be quite fiddly due to the climbers and floaters. I tried to compress the groups as much as I could with the floaters initially, but my working solution has so many climbers and floaters leftover. I guess the distance between the blocker and wall was just right so that you can get by with not too many losses to the rope trap. Even then, the level is already annoying as is.

Here, I feel as if I have played this level before. If it's not this one, I seem to recall playing an extremely similar level to this. If I have, I don't recall where the level came from.

1-16: Too Hectic Somewhat easy level. Solution feels hackish to me, especially since the timing has to be right in order to not lose anyone else besides the bomber. This definitely had a "how in the world do you get the lemmings down safely from a very high place if you don't even have floaters or none of them are pre-assigned floaters?" reaction from me. Then I realized how the wall on the sides aren't exactly vertical and there's some offset to provide stepping stones to break their fall. I'm not sure if it's possible to bomb and not have to use a builder to allow them to get down safely, though. Even then, you can afford to use a builder for it and still have enough to solve the level.

1-17: Trapped In Cave Nice 1 builder puzzle! The only hard part is getting up the web so that you can build to the exit. Save requirement is very lenient here, which allowed me to lose a couple that slipped past the digger tunnel at the start.

1-18: Two Sand Lemmings I really like this one. Very nice puzzle that was satisfying to figure out. The hardest part was getting up to the exit. There might be easier ways to get the climber to turn back to the left after mining the non-climber out. I would provide more leeway with the right lemming so that it's clear he can make it down safely with the miner. It's all dependent on where the digger is placed. This is another level I feel I have played before, but whether I have or not I'm not sure. I also don't remember where the level comes from if I have. It definitely looks and feels familiar.

1-19: View From Earth Due to the tall size, I thought I was going to be stuck here for a while. It turned out to not be as hard as I thought. It can definitely be fiddly, though. Bombing through the first wall at the start was the most difficult due to the extreme precision needed. It almost doesn't work either, and it really looked as if they wouldn't be able to step out to the right after the third bomber.

1-20: Volcano Hell Nice level to round out the pack. Certainly nowhere near the hardest level for the final level of the pack. Solution is obvious, execution can be a bit wonky, but that's due to the timing needed to have a worker lemming slip by and blocking with a nearby lemming to turn the miner around after breaking through the wall to the right.   

Once again, nice job and attempt with the pack. Thank you for recommending this pack for me to LP. As for my call, I wouldn't exactly suggest to play the pack, since I think it is of average quality. Not over the top great, but at the same time the pack isn't terrible either. It still might be fine for those who loves the game in general to play. I still see great potential with the pack being much better with some major changes, though. I think had you not suggested this pack to LP, I might not had even played it all even though I have plans to eventually play all packs available. In particular, I mostly played the pack to see if I'm able to get through it due to what sounds like a difficult pack and how bad it would stump even someone like me, which as you know I have solved so many packs. Indeed, it was difficult and challenging, and certainly some of the levels were satisfying to figure out.

I hope you find the LP, replays, and feedback helpful!  

[grams88]

I fixed a very major backroute for (This will be mayhem) level and the new download is up at the top. Would you be up for trying the new (This will be mayhem) level?

Merry Christmas everyone.

[kaywhyn]

Resolved Rank 1, level 14. Replay attached.

Spoiler

Definitely a much better level as a result. I'm wondering if that was simply a design error of allowing a worker lemming to get very near the deadly side of the level to go down. It wasn't too hard for me since I already know the trick required of mining out the ceiling a bit at a time so that the builder doesn't hit his head and stop, so it was an extremely quick solve. It only took me about 5 minutes to solve. I recently played a level from Clammings which requires this. Definitely the high number of lemmings makes it much easier to pull off despite the locked RR.

[grams88]

Thanks Kaywhyn, I consider that a Christmas present to me as well. We watched another one of your videos, been enjoying seeing the solution, I like how there was one level where you might have thought, how the heck do I solve this.

I'll probably give more detailed feedback on the levels after the new year.