Lemmings re-make

[tseug]

[random]I think I should point out that those rings can be made with 8 pieces each. 4 curved pieces and 4 black curved pieces.[/random]

[ccexplore]

Ok then, less work for me too. &#A0;I did assume though that you actually had a reason to use the particular platform you used in the Cheapo version, when you could've used the "real" platforms.

In the MichaelPink style that is one of the real platforms; I don't always remember where all the different pieces come from, so I treat them equally.

Looking back, I see that it's a rotated version of the pillar found in (e.g.) Fun 19. I can't be bothered to look through every level to see whether it ever occurs horizontally as well, and of course I don't use LemEdit so I don't know whether on Fun 19 it's a single object or built up in a complicated way. But I preferred to include it in the style because I wanted to include all graphics used on the real levels.

Ok I guess I misread your post.  So do you want it to look like the way it is in the Cheapo version (but possibly thicker depending on glitch fix), or do you want the 5-pixel thick striped pieces?

[ccexplore]

[random]I think I should point out that those rings can be made with 8 pieces each. 4 curved pieces and 4 black curved pieces.[/random]

Can you e-mail a demonstration?  I had been thinking more along the lines of just one curve pieces and then a gazillion non-curved black pieces.

It just seems to me that you won't get the right curvature on the ring's hole if you use black curved pieces to carve it out, but maybe you have another way.

[ccexplore]

Of course, being the lazy guy that I can be, I do wonder now whether we should simply ignore the existence of backroutes that use glitches, instead just pretending that the game does bar those glitches. &#A0;(Although, I'd probably still hack the game to at least fix the inconsistency regarding miners facing left/right and one-way walls.)[/color]

I'll stand on the side of laziness. &#A0;;D &#A0;Personally, I think the game engine should be, for the most part, unaltered to make it as original as possible. &#A0;Besides, how many people outside of this forum would know about most of these glitches?

Perhaps we can vote on which (if any) glitches to fix for the remake.

I would think for example that no one would miss the nuke glitch going away.  The glitch regarding one-way-wall mining (ie. can't mine thru a right OWW facing right even though you can mine thru a left OWW facing left) is also special since rather than enabling backroutes, it has the more serious problem of preventing moves that really should be legitimate.

Anyway, I have made 6 glitch fixes so far:

http://www.geocities.com/guestlevels/lemmings/nobuglem.zip

This is a modified version of nocdlem.  I'll apply the patching to the lemmings remake EXE when the time comes.  Also include is a text file describing which glitches are fixed, and what side effects the fix introduces.  Some of the description are purposely vague.  If you want details, you can always PM me with proof that you understand the glitch whose glitch fix you want to ask about, then I'll give additional details.

I have tested it out a bit, but I encourage you to test it out on a variety of levels to make sure there are no unexpected behaviors.

[Leviathan]

For all I know the climbing trough terrain wasn't a glich but a well-known sneaky trick...in this case the 2-part level I've made earlier (highway to hell/litter on the highway) would be rendered cumpletely ueless,as it uses this trick (or glitch)...

So a general question to everybody: is climbing trough terrain a glitch which should be avoided like hell or a sneaky trick that makes you think a lot untill you try it out and see what happens?

[tseug]

It's kind of borderline, just a weird part of the game mechanics. Changing it would prevent more levels than you'd think.

EDIT: I think it would be better just to leave the little glitches in. The ones that really need fixing are things like the nuke glitch.

EDIT2: The columb set has different pieces than I thought it did. It will take more than 8. It turns out that it's like you said, two curved pieces with lots of black pieces in the center. Maybe you could get the level data from a genesis rom and see how they do it?

EDIT3: Those rings in Ahribar's level are copies of the ones from the genesis version. It looks like they were filled in with black pieces. So you either stuff a bunch of black pieces inside, or make it a special graphics level (or maybe just change the scenery).

[Proxima]

Is the climbing through terrain part of the game mechanics? First I'd like to know which versions of the real game it's possible on. (Telling me how to work the trick so that I can test the Genesis and Mac versions for myself would be a start.....)

Even if it does work on every version, it's more likely to be unintended than not. It's not used by any of the real levels and it doesn't follow from the skill behaviours the player is actually taught.

Perhaps we can vote on which (if any) glitches to fix for the remake.

Not a bad idea. But you'd need to draw up a list of which glitches are up for consideration. Some of us know very little about what the different glitches are, remember  

[ccexplore]

It's kind of borderline, just a weird part of the game mechanics. Changing it would prevent more levels than you'd think.

Well if you insist on creating one hundred levels that require it, then of course "changing it would prevent more levels than you'd think". : Gee, I wonder how Psygnosis managed to create over 158 levels (not counting the repeats and Tame) without ever using that glitch?

It's true I guess when I analyzed it the way I did in the notes in nobuglem.zip, it doesn't seem so glitchy.  On the other hand, there is totally nothing like it with other skills.  Note for example that you can't even build your way up when you're stuck inside a wall.  It is also totally opposite the concept that when the climber hits its head, it's suppose to fall, not gradually raising up.  And the whole reason it works pretty much rests on a single implementation detail.  It could have just as easily been the case that they check for collisions first before moving the climber up, in which case the behavior would be equivalent to what you see in the fixed version.

You two are actually making it very tempting for me to put that fix in!

Surely you can find another way with your levels without using that glitch.  Besides, most of the time to use the glitch you'd need to waste a whole bunch of builders just to setup, so it is hardly an elegant move.

EDIT3: Those rings in Ahribar's level are copies of the ones from the genesis version. It looks like they were filled in with black pieces. So you either stuff a bunch of black pieces inside, or make it a special graphics level (or maybe just change the scenery).

I'm under the impression that they might've added additional terrain pieces in the genesis version.  I certainly find it unlikely that they'd actually do the black piece approach when they don't have to.

For me though, I definitely will not waste a special graphics set just for it, especially as it is very achievable with normal pieces.  I'm still partial to the idea of using special graphics sets solely for representing other games, like the way it is in the original.

[Proxima]

Ok I guess I misread your post.  So do you want it to look like the way it is in the Cheapo version (but possibly thicker depending on glitch fix), or do you want the 5-pixel thick striped pieces?

No, use the normal 5-px-thick striped pieces.

And don't worry about "From the Other Side", I've started on redoing the decorative terrain without using those ring pieces. I should have that done soon.

[ccexplore]

Is the climbing through terrain part of the game mechanics? First I'd like to know which versions of the real game it's possible on. (Telling me how to work the trick so that I can test the Genesis and Mac versions for myself would be a start.....)

As far as I know, it does work on all versions that has Amiga-like mechanics (as opposed to NES and Gameboy).  I know it works on the Mac version (ie. it has been checked).

Simply find a place with a low ceiling, then repeatedly build to get yourself stuck in the wall, then assign the lemming a climber and see.  It looks like Fun 12 is perfect for this (block off all but one lemming, and bash to create the low ceiling).

I should note that its presence on multiple versions is a rather poor indicator of intentions, since many versions are after all simply ports.  I'd actually say you get a better idea of what moves can be argued as glitches when you have a more independent remake/imitation like Cheapo.  Would someone please check what happens in the PSP version when it finally comes out?

Perhaps we can vote on which (if any) glitches to fix for the remake.

Not a bad idea. But you'd need to draw up a list of which glitches are up for consideration. Some of us know very little about what the different glitches are, remember &#A0;

Well, that's partly where the glitch list included in nobuglem.zip will come in handy.

I still have a few more glitches I'm thinking of fixing, so once the list is more or less finalized I will copy the list to a post here.

[ccexplore]

I should note that its presence on multiple versions is a rather poor indicator of intentions, since many versions are after all simply ports. &#A0;I'd actually say you get a better idea of what moves can be argued as glitches when you have a more independent remake/imitation like Cheapo. &#A0;Would someone please check what happens in the PSP version when it finally comes out?

On that note, instead of waiting for the PSP, maybe someone can check out the behavior in Lemmings Revolution?  To be sure that game isn't exactly Lemmings 1, but it's still interesting to see what happens.

[ccexplore]

Gee, I wonder how Psygnosis managed to create over 158 levels (not counting the repeats and Tame) without ever using that glitch?

Sorry, I meant "DMA" not Psygnosis.  Good thing Mike doesn't read this thread much! ;D

[tseug]

I meant that many already existing levels use the climber trick. IS in particular.

All the glitches I can think of (that have an effect):
nuke
OWW (miners)
OWW (offset)
steel detection
sliding
miner (bad positioning)
basher
blocker/steel
OWW/steel
climber (temporary walker)
lingering effect
weird_glitch_related_to_the_lingering_effect_that_I_don't_know_much_about_and probably_doesn't_affect_any_levels
blocker/terrain
blocker/object

I might know more but can't think of them atm.

[ccexplore]

I meant that many already existing levels use the climber trick. IS in particular.

Fortunatley for us, isteve has plenty of other levels that doesn't use any glitches from the list below, so I don't think it would be problematic.

Ths list you have I think covers more or less all the glitches I can think of off top of my head.

I do want to start off by mentioning the glitches that, for technical reasons, I'm not thinking of fixing, at least at this point:

steel detection:  I'm assuming this relates to the fact that an exploder can take out steel merely if he's not standing on a steel area, and related things like digging off the edge of a steel plate.  It's simply one of those glitches that would take a failry involved effort to fix, so no for now.

miner (bad positioning):  I'd like to fix the glitch, but the naive way to do it will probably change the position at which the miner's terrain-removal masks are applied, and that's a definite no-no.  I'll need to see if I can change the position at which the animation frames of the lemming are drawn without changing the position of the lemming itself.  So no for now.

blocker/terrain:  As much as I hate the idea of being able to use blockers to push lemmings into walls (or worse, through thin walls), this can actually be somewhat complicated to fix, so no for now.  Just refrain the urge to use this in the remakes, and make your walls thicker to minimize the damage.

OWW (offset):  This is actually very easy to fix if I change all the groundXo.dat files, but I'd prefer to minimize the number of changed files since each changed file will need to be included in the final distribution.  Besides, you can generally avoid this by adding an additional OWW object that's 4-pixels lower (to compensate for the offset), and set its flags to no-overdrawing so it stays hidden.

basher
OWW/steel

Wow, you managed to be even more vague than I am.  Can you remind me which glitches those 2 are talking about?

[Leviathan]

I guess he means the glitch where a OWW interacts with a steel area and neutralize the steel area...or am I wrong?

And what is meant by the miner's bad positioning?
I can think of multiple miner glitches at the moment (about 4 to be exact)...


Another thing: if the climbing trough terrain trick (yes,I still see it as a trick and not a glitch) isn't allowed for this remake, is building to get up trough terrain OK?