Lemmings World Tour Remastered [New-Formats Version] [Difficulty: Medium]

[Strato Incendus]

Well, that was quick! Thanks again for your persistence, IchoTolot!

IchoTolot's solutions

Rockstar 22 (Summer of 69): Close enough now, spared one Fencer.
Rockstar 38 (Stonehenge): That was weirdly creative, but kind of cool, so I don't think this requires further fixing.
Rockstar 39 (Holy Mountains): Nope, nope, nope, just going underneath that temple building saves quite a lot of skills. Looks like I've got some more construction work to do on the Turkish-Armenian border.
Rockstar 40 (Dream on): Surprisingly skill-efficient - but I guess that's what I get when I make the intended solution include a double-layered Builder staircase. I don't think there's a lot more I can fix about this...

Legend 01 (Bolemian Rhapsody): Ah, this looks much better, this is almost exactly as intended!
Legend 07 (Lemmingrad): This is one I'm really happy about! It's very, very close to the intended solution, but without being nearly as precise. Much like with Legend 37, I figured if you had actually found the intended solution, you probably would have criticised its pixel precision. But now I have a clear conscience, knowing that a very similar but much less precise solution exists!
Legend 09 (Eye of the tiger): Yes, compression method is part of the intended solution. Not quite like this, though, but you've made use of other tricks taught on previous ranks (like the Glider gliding over a Blocker to isolate a second pioneer lemming). This is fine by me!
Legend 11 (Living on a prayer): This still seems a bit too easy for my taste. I'm glad the one-way-up arrows on the second platform were enough for you not to try to lead the top crowd there directly, but instead you've joined the top crowd with the one on the right. Maybe I still need yet even more steel...
Legend 13 (Master of puppets): Well, you basically used the same backroute again. But this time, you had to employ the double-Builder turnaround trick to do it! That's such an obscure trick, but the Noisemaker rank teaches it, and when there is an opportunity to make good use of it on one of the harder levels, why should I punish this cleverness? The pattern of skills you had left over is probably a bit too arbitrary to turn this into a talisman, but it will definitely remain possible to do this!
Legend 17 (Y. Lem C. A.): Since you were able to use the Fencer where you did, that saved you a lot of Builders, which made this solution look a lot easier than it should be. Maybe the letter "C" needs even more steel?
Legend 22 (Blowing in the wind): That was another whacky and weird solution. The intended solution involves radiation anyway, so I'm not too narrow-minded when it comes to tinkering with the New-Formats solution. I think this was "obscure enough" for the final main rank and will thus stay as it is.
Legend 23 (Wish you were here): I put in one-way arrows and you find a way to simply go underneath. More than that, since you actually built towards those one-way arrows from the other side, I think even if I extend the arrows further to the buttom, your solution will still work, because you can simply have the Builder bash through the stripe of terrain from the other side. Actually, these one-way arrows should just act like steel... Maybe they need to be upward arrows?
Legend 24 (Let my Lems open the door): Not quite as intended, but you used every skill except 1 Basher. Close enough, stays this way!
Legend 26 (Time to say goodbye): Ah, another backroute fix that already seems successful after the first attempt! Like with Legend 01, this is not exactly as intended, but very, very close!
Legend 30 (Knocking on Heaven's door): Better than before; still seems a little easy, but I don't know what more to fix about it.
Legend 34 (Purple Haze): You've got the main trick now, despite saving four skills. Seems close enough.
Legend 37 (Breaking the law): See Legend 07: The intended solution is very precise. Now you've qualified for an alternative solution - since yours also uses every skill! And I once again have a clear conscience now about the pixel precision of the intended solution, because this alternative approach also exists!
Legend 38 (Thriller): See Legend 22: Obscure enough now.

Maybe with the next update I can finally also fix something about the Encore and Groupie ranks.

[Strato Incendus]

Okay, here's a quick assessment of IchoTolot's solutions for the final two ranks:

For Encore, as I was hoping for (but not really expecting, so this was still a pleasant surprise), there were pretty much no backroutes. This is most likely because the levels are taken from older packs, i.e. they have been out for ages, and any one of them that contained backroutes was broken and consequently fixed long ago. The only exception is maybe the level "Twilems", where IchoTolot managed to solve the level in a pretty straightforward way using Platformers, instead of the slightly more obscure intended solution. Maybe I can enforce this... maybe I can't.

Groupie, on the other hand, of course had many more backroutes, because IchoTolot was probably the first one to play the entire rank. Most other people, at least that's how it seemed to me, mainly focused on finding out which level had been dedicated to them, and then they "left". Or, if they did play the entire rank in an effort to find out which levels were theirs, they didn't upload their replays except for those select few which they considered potentially dedicated to them.

Thus, there were quite a few Groupie levels that managed to completely enforce their intended tricks...

Spoiler

That's a hard level that is!, Praise be to God!, (K)itty compression, Scot-free, Take a byte, I am E.T., Johnny B. Goode, A Mazu Grace

...some that didn't enforce the intended signature trick, but still featured nice alternative solutions...

Spoiler

No true Scotslem, Tin limmings on this livel, Read my lips, All for love, Le vent nous portera, Bon appetit!, Kiwi knights in white satin, Dove is in the air, Joga, I see fire

...and some which utterly failed to enforce their intended tricks.

Spoiler

When the cat's away, Stacks and stones, Killed by death, Every Geoff you take, Not the incended solution

Though with "Not the incended solution", a backroute is kind of in flavour - and even anticipated by the pre-level text...

"Killed by death" is the easiest fix of them all, because it had the most glaring backroute - glaring backroutes are usually easier to fix than complex alternative solutions.

IchoTolot's solution for "Kiwi nights in white satin" blew me away with some completely new trick I wasn't aware of at all .

Spoiler

Apparently, when digging through terrain with steel at the bottom on one side - and further terrain beneath that steel, but no further terrain under the Digger himself - you can dig in such a way that the Digger still makes a slight dent into the wall under the steel. IchoTolot was then able to have a Climber climb up into this dent and start mining from there.

[IchoTolot]

IchoTolot's solution for "Kiwi nights in white satin" blew me away with some completely new trick I wasn't aware of at all .

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Well, if I would have digged a pixel more to the left the digger would keep on going. But in this case he only had one pixel left and will therefore stop - and digging down comes before the "can I continue check". The steel is irrelevant here.

You can see this by simply digging down in such a way that a digger stops by only having 1 pixel left to dig on the sides (no steel needed!): He always still digs down the first instance of "1 pixel left" and stops AFTER that.

Be aware even without this dent trick I can backroue this with the "a bit more to the left" way as I have a leftover stacker to cancel the digger.

Moving the steel block a bit down (1 pixel would be enough here) would block any dents as then he stops before that will happen as the steel then is indeed relevant and gives the digger nothing to dig.

[Strato Incendus]

Okay, good thing I waited with an update until version 12.10 was released, because a bunch of my old replays broke for unknown reasons.

Maybe this has to do with yet another physics change? I remember reading something about a Miner-Basher inconsistency being changed?
It's not mentioned in the 12.10 changelog though, and I can't seem to find a Bug Thread for it either.

Another thing is that lemmings now seem to slip through ceilings through which they didn't use to slip before. (Since lemmings can slip through thin stripes of terrain, they also do that at the top level border, because terrain above the level border is treated as non-existent, even if a thicker terrain piece is placed there.) I had fixed the ceilings for all levels for which it was relevant during the initial New-Formats conversion, so I knew about this. However, now there seem to be levels affected that weren't before.

Those are easy enough to fix: Just add a couple of pixels extra to the Y dimension of the level, select everything, move it down that number of pixels, and the steel piece or whatever I've placed at the ceiling to prevent lemmings from walking upwards and dying gets lowered further into the level. It takes a while to identify them all, though, especially since I've fixed them all before.

A similar thing is true for the Glider-Faller physics change: I had fixed all levels where this was relevant, but now it's suddenly an issue again.

The strangest error was on the level "Streets of London", where somehow the save requirement had been raised from 57 to 59 (out of 60), breaking my solution because I had used two of the three Bombers.

I also had to correct the object name for nin10doadict's cat trap again in one level file ("The lion sleeps tonight"), changing it from the style "nin10_cattrap" to "nin10_misc", and changing the object reference to "TrapCat" instead of "catTrap" - even though I was certain I had already done so.



My replays are sorted and the solved vs. unsolved levels after the Mass-Replay check are easy enough to tell apart;
I'm just referring to finding out whether the level broke because of a ceiling death, the Glider-Faller physics change, or because of some other reason.

So far I've fixed everything from Noisemaker up to the end of Professional, but there are still many unticked levels left.

Sometimes, there's actually nothing wrong with the solution, and the reason the level remains unticked is probably just because the level counts as "undetermined", taking longer than the cutoff amount of time after the last skill assignment for everyone to get to the exit. In that cases, I just run the same replay over the level again that didn't pass the mass replay check (and left the level unticked in the selection menu), and it passes as normal and the level gets ticked. So it is also not a problem of the levels not having my correct user name, because I've run them all through the Replay Refresher again.

At least the menu signs were easy to reset to my custom ones . Lemmings World Tour actually didn't have a custom rank sign before (custom rank labels, yes, of course, but not the sign itself). Fortunately, I could still grab those PNGs from Old Formats. I just had to add separate image files for the old up and down arrows. The new ones look nice on the black menu signs I had made for Lemmings Open Air, but I want to keep Lemmings World Tour as it is.

TL;DR: A bunch of levels broke in version 12.10 and this is clearly more than I can fix in one afternoon. This pack is currently not ready to be played in version 12.10!
If you're currently playing it, either keep it in version 12.9 or wait until the update. Either way, be prepared for a bunch of your replays breaking when you update to 12.10.

As a result, I'm also not sure to what extent IchoTolot's and kaywhyn's remaining replays will still work if I watch them now in version 12.10...
I expected some levels breaking with the update, but certainly not THAT many at once!

[kaywhyn]

Since I'm currently going through the Old Formats version of the pack, do you think I should still wait for your update to the Encore/Groupie ranks, or should I go ahead and solve off the entire final rank?

[Strato Incendus]

I haven't fixed the Groupie rank yet, mainly because there are a couple of levels which IchoTolot backrouted but which I still have no idea how to fix. Right now, ensuring general playability of the pack (i.e. the main ranks) is more important.

Never mind with regard to my ability to watch your replays, though. I just realized: Not only that Old Formats is independent from all of this, I also still have the backup of all the levels in my 12.9 folder, to watch IchoTolot's Groupie replays again if I need to .

All the changes to the levels I only made after I had already copied them to the 12.10 folder. It's just that any changes I make in the New-Formats version will only be done on the 12.10 versions of the level files, since there's no use in maintaining 12.9 any longer.

[IchoTolot]

Okay, good thing I waited with an update until version 12.10 was released, because a bunch of my old replays broke for unknown reasons.

Maybe this has to do with yet another physics change? I remember reading something about a Miner-Basher inconsistency being changed?
It's not mentioned in the 12.10 changelog though, and I can't seem to find a Bug Thread for it either.

Before you try to fix anything and jump to more conclusions:

There was no physics change with this update and all my replays for your pack are still 100% functional with the new NL release! I checked via a mass replay check.

I suspect the issue is that you have some really old replays in there.: https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5195.msg87047#msg87047

Quote from that topic:

The only thing that comes to mind is, are the replays in a very outdated format?

You could try running them through the Replay Refresher to see if this helps. Note: Do NOT use this tool on any replay for a level that uses the Jumper skill; it almost certianly will not handle this cleanly as it pre-dates the Jumper being added. Shimmier is fine.

[IchoTolot]

Also from that topic:

If your replays are not working, first try using the Replay Refresher tool on them. If they still do not work, please report this - there is a possible bug here, it is unclear and needs further investigation.

Note that the Refresher tool should NOT be used on any replay that uses the Jumper skill.

So stop fixing anything for now as the issue is more likely to be inside your replay files.

[kaywhyn]

I haven't fixed the Groupie rank yet, mainly because there are a couple of levels which IchoTolot backrouted but which I still have no idea how to fix. Right now, ensuring general playability of the pack (i.e. the main ranks) is more important.

Never mind with regard to my ability to watch your replays, though. I just realized: Not only that Old Formats is independent from all of this, I also still have the backup of all the levels in my 12.9 folder, to watch IchoTolot's Groupie replays again if I need to .

All the changes to the levels I only made after I had already copied them to the 12.10 folder. It's just that any changes I make in the New-Formats version will only be done on the 12.10 versions of the level files, since there's no use in maintaining 12.9 any longer.

Didn't quite directly answer my question about whether or not to proceed, but from what it sounds like above, it's advisable that I wait for the update to the Groupie rank. So, I will go ahead and wait some more for that instead of play through the Groupie rank, even though I really want to just so the pack's done and out of the way. No pressure and hurry at all. There's plenty of other packs to keep me busy anyway, so it's all good. I can also keep myself busy with other LPs I'll be recording. Which reminds me. In case you haven't seen my post on recommendations/suggestions on a 3rd/other level packs to LP, feel free to drop your ideas at my topic. Thanks for the recommendation on Lemmings Migration for my 1st LP Indeed, that's what I ended up LPing as my 1st pack.

[Strato Incendus]

@IchoTolot: No worries, by "fixing" I mainly mean "checking everything again whether it works". And then potentially "fixing" the replays instead of the level itself.

As I said though, some levels had random changes to their properties, like the save requirement on "Streets of London" being upped to 59 instead of 57.

If IchoTolot's replays still work, then most likely because I've allowed them as alternative solutions. In those cases, often not all the skills are being used, to there is more leeway and less likelihood for failure. If a certain skill is miss-assigned by a couple of frames in my replay, that can cause it to fail, whereas if IchoTolot didn't use that skill in the first place, his solution will be unaffected.

A lot of my replay files also still just run through as normal. I guess on some of them, the failure had to do either with my strato_generalmd tileset not being present yet during the initial mass replay check (since that is obviously one of the few tilesets that don't gome with the standard styles download), or because of overlapping level IDs for reruns.

A noticeable crash however was on the level "YerushaLem shel zahav" from the Diva rank: Apparently, Flopsy swapped out the exit for the Sandopolis tileset? The new one has a narrower trigger area and also looks different. Since the lemmings drop into the exit from above here, the trigger-area size is what's relevant here. I swapped it out for the standard Pillar exit in both Old and New Formats now; that one has a wider trigger area than even the former Sandopolis exit. So now, the level should be slightly easier (not with regard to its puzzle solution, just because of fewer losses; I've provided some leeway for how many lemmings you can lose on this level anyway).


@kaywhyn: Yes, indeed I'd advise to wait with the Groupie rank. It's just a couple of levels I need to fix, but those are very difficult to fix (especially if "fixing" means "enforcing a specific trick that I consider a signature of level designer X"). However, it will certainly be more rewarding for both me and the players when it finally works!



Good to know I can still watch all of IchoTolot's replays in the new version, though! That saves me a lot of back and forth, thanks a lot for checking this!

[Strato Incendus]

And the update is here, with the same fixes to the Groupie rank as in Old Formats, but also including the menu changes required for NeoLemmix 12.10!

I expect there will be another huge update after I've watched all of kaywhyn's (Old-Formats) solutions.

[IchoTolot]

Resolved/Rebackrouted the fixed levels.

[IchoTolot]

Are my solutions acceptable now   If yes, I would consider recording the pack up soon.

But I highly suspect that there are still backroutes.

[Strato Incendus]

Yes, quite a few of them are still at least somewhat of a backroute - and I haven't even had a chance to look at kaywhyn's solutions for the main ranks yet.

I assume there won't be many more backroutes on the first couple of ranks... so if you want to, you can start uploading those. At least I don't remember a lot of backroutes from your replays for the first two ranks, because those had already been played by both Colorful Arty and Flopsy. And whatever I found for those I'm pretty sure I have fixed by now.

But you can expect at least one huge update once I've watched all of kaywhyn's replays.

My collection of your replays also somehow stopped at 12th September - I guess this may have to do with my old laptop having crashed in the meantime, so maybe this was the latest state I had saved somewhere. Anyways, I also re-checked you replays since 17th September, and there are also some things on the Rockstar and Legend rank I can hopefully enforce better. (For example, on "Holy mountains", you could just go beneath that entire temple structure, or on "Blowing in the wind" you could completely ignore the upper exit by simply connecting the crowds. These are the types of backroutes that a few steel walls can fix quickly.)

However, I always implement the changes in Old- and New Formats in one swoop, so that I don't forget any. And right now, I don't want to fix any levels before I've watched kaywhyn's replays (even if they're for Old Formats).

Because I've noticed, some of the fixes I've implemented for kaywhyn's Groupie solutions now already broke some of your solutions for those levels (e.g. Groupie 05). I assume that's because you had found a similar backroute as him, especially with your announcement that you "re-backrouted the levels" . But of course, I can never be sure.

The downside of "watching everything first, then implementing the changes" is of course that with such a large pack, it's still easy to overlook somethings when going back to the level editor. I do watch them in bites, of course, not in one piece, and I do take my notes where necessary... but still, some backroutes can always slip under the radar.

[kaywhyn]

I just posted my 100% replay solution to Groupie 40 in the LWT Old Formats. I have just checked with the New Formats version of the level, and my replay indeed works here too. So, find my 100% solution replay attached. The replay was made in v10.13.8. Just like you and Icho, I have speculated that such a solution should be possible. With this great find, we can all now put our minds at rest whether a 100% solution is possible. The only thing that was holding me back in finding the solution was my reluctance in playing the level again, since I voiced being very annoyed from all the excessive scrolling and not being able to watch all crowds at once. However, I rose up to the challenge and even played the entire level all over again from scratch. There were a lot of skill assignments that needed to be tweaked anyway, and so I probably would had ended up being very annoyed from finding the correct action in the replay edit mode to delete anyway since there are way too many skill assignments and finding the right ones would be extremely difficult.

I'll echo a lot of what I said in the Old Formats level pack topic. This solution still took me a really long time to find, 1.5 hours. Also, the solution ended up using all destructive skills provided except 1, meaning 59 destructive skills were used.

Spoiler

I'm guessing in all of our solutions we ended up losing the blocker from the second entrance from the right. As it turns out, a very specific setup is required in order to release the blocker with a single basher with a lemming from the right-most entrance. You will need a spare builder to turn the blocker around afterwards. The spare builder I had was originally used to plug up both very small gaps in the pillar in the middle of the level. That area needs extremely good timing in order to send a climber out to the left before a dent is made that makes it unclimbable. That's why I allowed multiple lemmings to turn around on the blocker to make it easier before releasing him with the final lemming from the entrance.

Icho and Strato, you two are welcome Oh, and this is definitely very gold talisman worthy. I say add it in! Very fitting difficult challenge for the epic final level of LWT! I should be awarded for my efforts in some way, too