Who designed which levels in the Original game?

[Minim]

Hi. According to Mike Dailly's blog, it turns out there were four designers involved in designing levels for the game. I'm trying to work out who designed what level. While I might get some of these wrong, having a long detailed look at the blog, there are clues that I'm able to spot in designers' behaviours.

* Mike mentioned that he created the special graphics levels. Also, he sometimes like to make titles of levels that give clues for the player and also some recognisable pictures (Anyone fancy inviting him to this month's Level Design Contest? ).

* Gary created the tutorial levels, but beforehand often use just one terrain piece to create the entire level, and are so minimalist that he was told by his boss to decorate them; the only exception is likely to be "Tightrope City" (Strange, decoration for this level must have been forgotten about entirely). They're so recognisable that I usually remove all the terrain after the exit terrrain piece in the .nxlv file to see if I'm correct.

* Scott's levels aren't recognisable pictures but are generally neatly put together, sometimes with some interesting sounding names in the titles.

* Dave might not have created too many levels, but I notice that there's one designer that doesn't fit into any of these categories. These levels are generally long, loose and quite generic with some kind of obvious challenge and usually have all eight skills involved. The time is usually tight as well. I'm guessing this is a connection between the observations and that Dave created these levels.

Out of the 79 levels introduced in the game, (WAFD I think appears twice in the original packs) here are my predictions, hidden in spoiler tags.

Dave Jones

This should be a doddle!
If at first you don`t succeed..
POOR WEE CREATURES!
How do I dig up the way?

Gary Timmons

Just dig!
Only floaters can survive this
Tailor-made for blockers
Now use miners and climbers
You need bashers this time
A task for blockers and bombers
Builders will help you here
One way digging to freedom
Turn around young lemmings!
Tightrope City
Cascade
I have a cunning plan
Perseverance
Izzie Wizzie lemmings get busy
The ascending pillar scenario
Bomboozal
King of the castle
Follow the leader...
Call in the bomb squad
We all fall down
Down, along, up. In that order
Poles Apart
Last one out is a rotten egg!
The Great Lemming Caper
Stepping Stones
All or Nothing
Save Me

Mike Dailly

The Crankshaft
A Beast of a level
MENACING !!
All the 6`s ........
The Island of the Wicker people
Lost something?
Rainbow Island
Lend a helping hand....
The Prison!
Every Lemming for himself!!!
The Art Gallery
Livin` On The Edge
Upsidedown World
Hunt the Nessy....
What an AWESOME level
Mary Poppins` land
X marks the spot
Walk the web rope
Steel Works
The Boiler Room
It`s hero time!
Curse of the Pharaohs
Pea Soup
The Fast Food Kitchen...
A BeastII of a level
The Steel Mines of Kessel

Scott Johnston

From The Boundary Line
Watch out, there`s traps about
Heaven can wait (we hope!!!!)
Compression Method 1
Tribute to M.C.Escher
Feel the heat!
Come on over to my place
Take a running jump.....
Triple Trouble
The Crossroads
One way or another
Pillars of Hercules
The Far Side
Just a Minute...
And then there were four....
Time to get up!
With a twist of lemming please
Going up.......
Have a nice day!
Just a Minute (Part Two)
Mind the step.....
Rendezvous at the Mountain

[namida]

As a semi-related point of interest: Every Lemmings 3D level (including all but one of the levels in the Winterland bonus pack) has a note of who created it in the level data. I forget the names now, but there was one designer - I think his first name may have been Martin - who in particular made a lot of L3D's best levels. There was also one guy who only made a few levels, but it was interesting that several of them were some of the most boring, tedious levels in the game - only for him to then have also created "Hole In One, Two, Three" which was again one of the best.

[607]

Ah, that's nice! I have wondered about themes shared between levels because they were created by the same creator as well, but I didn't have anything to go off. I don't know the levels well enough to have a picture for most names, though, and I still haven't beaten the game yet (it has probably been a year since I last continued :$) so I don't fancy looking them up as I wouldn't mind the last few levels having some surprises in store.

[WillLem]

I'd love to know this as well. Have any of the DMA guys ever been on these forums?

[namida]

I'd love to know this as well. Have any of the DMA guys ever been on these forums?

Yes. Mike Dailly posted regularly for a while and gave some interesting insights into the game's history. Adrian Powell also posted here for a while, though this was mostly just to promote his Lemmings-related artwork.

I also privately contacted Mike a while back via email, after he demonstrated during an interview a level which was created for Orig but didn't make it into the game. Apparently hundreds of these existed, I asked about the chances of obtaining a copy, but he didn't want to because of his perception of their quality (although a recent thought I've had is - if the Budget Amiga levels and/or Genesis levels were from these, then there are very clearly some total gems among them, even if most may be bad - indeed the one he demonstrated didn't look very interesting), and more importantly, doesn't have access to the hardware required in order to do so.

I didn't really push it any further than that, don't really want to annoy the guy. Hopefully he'll be able to share them further down the track.

[607]

I didn't really push it any further than that, don't really want to annoy the guy. Hopefully he'll be able to share them further down the track.

Yup, I recognise this thought. In the Re-Volt community we've occasionally had contact with one of the designers from the game (Paul Phippen), which we got some cool stuff out of. He might have more, but it's also a case of not wanting to nag him about it.

[mobius]

I'd love to know this as well. Have any of the DMA guys ever been on these forums?

Yes. Mike Dailly posted regularly for a while and gave some interesting insights into the game's history. Adrian Powell also posted here for a while, though this was mostly just to promote his Lemmings-related artwork.

I also privately contacted Mike a while back via email, after he demonstrated during an interview a level which was created for Orig but didn't make it into the game. Apparently hundreds of these existed, I asked about the chances of obtaining a copy, but he didn't want to because of his perception of their quality (although a recent thought I've had is - if the Budget Amiga levels and/or Genesis levels were from these, then there are very clearly some total gems among them, even if most may be bad - indeed the one he demonstrated didn't look very interesting), and more importantly, doesn't have access to the hardware required in order to do so.

I didn't really push it any further than that, don't really want to annoy the guy. Hopefully he'll be able to share them further down the track.

on the Genesis levels being from this batch of 'lost' levels; [this is total speculation] I tend to think not for a few reasons;
One, The level "I am AT" indicates that at least one person (AT whose name can be found in the credits to other Sega games) though I would guess probably more than one designed those levels. And most of their design style is at least somewhat noticeably different from the original team. While the original team's design (from an artistic standpoint) is no slouch; the Genesis team went above and beyond.
Secondly while they either created their own editing program or acquired Mike's I suppose they could've bought or acquired the lost levels and asked if they could use those; but if that were the case wouldn't Mike have mentioned that in one of these speeches where he's specifically talking about this and/or in his message to you?

I don't know anything about the budget Amiga levels (can't even remember them when I looked at them once from the comp you or someone made available for NL...

Also have to just add; I agree it's a good thing not to annoy people about this even if it's very frustrating for obsessive nerds like myself. In another community I know of some fans who irritated a game designer in this way to the point where he left the community.