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https://www.smspower.org/Hacks/Lemmings-SMS-OhNoMoreLemmings-Mod

Quote

This is a small demo of Oh No More Lemmings for the Sega Master System.
It is a hack/mod of the original Lemmings made for the SMS Power!
Competition 2024. So far it has 5 levels and 4 different themes. I hope
to finish some additional levels *soon*.

Apply the patch to "Lemmings (UE) [!].sms"

Version 0.02:
Improved the graphics of level 3 (snow), so i dare to post a screenshot now ;).

Download v0.02 here

Somebody made a Youtube video of v0.01, so i will post it here, until Maxim has recorded a video.
The video was recorded on a 50hz Mega Drive with an Everdrive. For some reason many voice samples sound distorted though.

OhNoMoreLemmingsDemo-screenshot4.png (6.16 KB)

Lemmings-SMS-OhNoMoreLemmings-Mod-0.02.zip (142.11 KB)

Great hack. I did get some corruption on the background tiles, though. The empty black tile got a white line in the moment the level started. It looked fine while I was still previewing the level. It didn’t always appear, so I don’t really know what’s causing this.

Hmm, one of the things I did with the underlying hack was to speed up some of the slow waits around VBlank writes to slightly improve the frame rate; but everything should be good on a real SMS and was tested with Emulicious. What hardware are you using?

I’m also curious about the sample corruption in the video, does anyone else have that?

Thanks for playing Kagesan!

Unfortunately i don't have an Everdrive to test on real hardware myself.
On what hardware did you play? 50hz or 60hz?

Or did you play on an emulator? I've not seen the issue on Emulicious, Mekaw or RetroArch with PicoDrive and Sega Genesis Plus GX.

I think there might be issues on Game Gear because I tuned it to 26 cycles.

I’m playing it via Master Everdrive X7 on an SMS 1 at 60 Hz.

Great work hacking Lemmings, Slogra & Maxim.
I guess this paves the way for future hacks / level packs at some point?

The level editor was made quite a few years ago, but there’s some more hacking work to do before the game is really opened up for editing everything. I’d like to do an original levels restoration mod too - spending more ROM space to enable more faithful conversions - but some of the limitations will remain, the engine does run out of tiles for the lemmings to build/bash/mine/etc if you use too many for the layout…

Alright, i finished 9 levels in total now. While working on the new levels i also improved the existing snow and rock levels a bit.

All these first levels are extremely easy to play, so i guess you make it a bit more challenging by going for a 100% score, although even that is not very hard to do :)

Download v0.03 here

Here is a screenshot of one of the new levels:

OhNoMoreLemmingsDemo-screenshot-level8.png (5.27 KB)

Lemmings-SMS-OhNoMoreLemmings-Mod-v0.03.zip (143.19 KB)

Thank you :) I had fun playing these new levels and didn't notice anything strange besides the right shift exit animation of the Lemmings (I mentioned on Discord) repeats in level 6. This might be related to the exit door theme. Keep up the good work.

Played on a PAL SMS 1

Very good idea to port the expansion of this great game, the master system version is my favorite version of Lemmings :)

The audio was going well before uploading it to YouTube, now it's out of time :(

Nixon87 wrote

Thank you :) I had fun playing these new levels and didn't notice anything strange besides the right shift exit animation of the Lemmings (I mentioned on Discord) repeats in level 6. This might be related to the exit door theme. Keep up the good work.

Thanks! Maybe i placed tiles incorrectly by accident. Or maybe it is caused by the animation tiles that i moved from the outer sides to the center of the exit.
Perhaps i can find a workaround by moving some of these exit tiles.

weirdzod wrote

Played on a PAL SMS 1

Very good idea to port the expansion of this great game, the master system version is my favorite version of Lemmings :)

The audio was going well before uploading it to YouTube, now it's out of time :(

It took me a while to come up with this idea :p.

Thanks for the video! Great job on saving all Lemmings :)

Looks like you are having the same graphics corruption as Kagesan. So both 50 and 60 SMS1 are having this issue.

Hopefully Maxim will find a way to fix it.

But good to hear the samples are working on an SMS1 (they didn't work on a megadrive).

I can’t see any reason for the samples to fail on Mega Drive. The video of the screen corruption is useful, it seems to be when the entrance opens, so I’ll dig into that a bit.

The strangest thing about the audio corruption on the MD is that it actually sounds like the opening of the hatch. While that sound is not in the SMS game.... or maybe it is, but not used?

I’m pretty sure it’s not a sample, they stand out clearly in the ROM.

Hi Slogra and Maxim. That somebody is me. It was me that uploaded the first video 0.01.

Very impressive hack! I found this by accident when I was uploading some of Pooty's old custom made levels played by SquidgyAdam who deleted them all from his Youtube channel some years ago. I recorded them to DVD and reuploaded them and when I found this I just knew I had to share it. Not sure why the voice sample is corrupted on the Mega Drive or why some of the graphics are corrupted in that other video played on an SMS I in PAL? One thing for certain is the ''OH NO!'' when pressing the nuke is very clear! Much clearer than the original Lemmings on Master System.

The video corruption should be fixed now, but I can't easily test it. The sample issue on Mega Drive is very odd, because it's just streaming data without paging; I'd be interested to know if that's reproducible on other flash carts and also how your cart handles pcmenc roms in general - see https://www.smspower.org/forums/post130648

Okay for you Maxim I just did a test and played the same ROM 0.03 on a cheap Chinese Master System EverDrive played from the same Mega Drive using the Master System/Power Base Converter like in that video and guess what? No corrupt ''Let's Go!'' voice sample, so the Mega Drive is not to blame but the Mega EverDrive X7.

I wonder if the Pro has the same sample bug? I don't have a Pro but it would be good if we can find out if it does.

How bizarre... is there an in-game menu you can disable and see if that affects it?

On the Mega EverDrive X7 you can't bring up the in-game menu in the middle of playing an SMS game, only on Mega Drive games you can bring up in-game menu. When I recorded the 0.01 video I already had the in-game menu turned off for Mega Drive games anyway. The old legacy X7 carts don't support a Master System mode in-game menu or an OS unlike the Pro which does support a dedicated SMS OS and in game-menu which brings me back to what I mentioned above that i'd be very interested to see if the same sample glitch appears on that.

At this point it's fair to assume that the Mega Drive (Model 1 at least) is not to blame for the corrupt noise. Certain flash carts are to blame.

Here is a video of the latest build demo v0.03.

It was played on a cheap Chinese knock off Master System EverDrive on a PAL SEGA Mega Drive model 1 console using the Master System/Power Base Converter.

Because I didn't use the Mega EverDrive X7 this time, the voice sample is clear as intended.

I'm happy to release v0.04 with 20 levels in total!

Download the patch HERE

Level11.png (4.84 KB)

Level13.png (3.63 KB)

Level14.png (4.87 KB)

Level16.png (4.83 KB)

Lemmings-SMS-OhNoMoreLemmings-Mod-v0.04.zip (154.55 KB)

My mouth is drooling! Can't wait to sit down and play this tonight.

Slogra, you're a genius!

Okay I played it and happy to say that I loved every minute of it.

This hack really does deserve more recognition than what it's currently getting.

If I wasn't so busy on another project right now i'd be uploading another video on the recent build 0.04.

Well done Slogra, can only encourage you to keep going with it.

Thanks! This is why we do it. Making the fans happy. Or in this case the 1 fan ;).

Hope you will make a video later, it'd love to see it running on real hardware.

I stayed up late last night just to get the video recorded and just now uploaded it.

This is a video on Slogra's newest build v0.04.

That weird Mega EverDrive X7 voice sample bug is not heard as I didn't use that flash cart but rather a cheaper Master System EverDrive that doesn't have that bug.

Hope you all enjoy this video and appreciate the ROM hack and how much hard work Slogra and Maxim are putting in just for the community.

Thanks for the video! It's great to see it working on real hardware.

You seem a Lemmings veteran. Do you know if the 4 themes have official names? I simply call them Brick, Rock, Snow and Ball.

Also let me know if you see any unexpected behavior.
The fall height can be configured for each level. So that is relatively easy to fix if needed. I use the same value for all levels at this moment.
Map layout can be tweaked if it affects gameplay. But i guess it does not really matter in these level with very simple gameplay.

Meanwhile Maxim did some more fantastic work on the code. He figured how the exit works exactly and made the exit tile configurable.
It turns out the top left tile of an exit determines where the lemmings jump in.
The only exit with animation is the "rock" exit. I moved the animated tiles (compared the original), but turns out one of those tiles also determines the jump in location. So that explains why they jump in too much to the right.
That is fixed now.

Hi there Slogra and you're welcome.

Never got to play the expansion pack as a kid as I never owned an Amiga and i'm by no means an expert at knowing all the ins and outs of the game technically, just a simple fan of the original game and the ports on different consoles. I grew up with the Sega ports on Master System and Mega Drive as a kid and they really made an impression on me having a lot of fond memories, maybe that's why I get really excited when I find hacks on Lemmings?

Sure no problem, if I see anything unusual in the game I will let you know but I was only aware of the things you already pointed out like the Lemmings jumping in the exit too far to the right.

Just a little bit of friendly gossip to say that, this hack is moving around the community. I spotted a post about it over on the Lemmings forum directing people back here to check it out.

So this brilliant piece of work by Slogra and Maxim is getting some recognition after all. Here check it out.

https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=6715.new#new

I played Lemmings for the first time on an Amiga at a friends house. It was connected to a great stereo system. That was really amazing. I was hooked immediately.

At that time at home we still only had a very old pc. For some reason we had Oh No More Lemmings, but not the original Lemmings. Played it in 16 colors and a pc speaker. Of course that was very underwhelming compared the Amiga.

Good to see the hack was spotted by someone on the Lemmings forum. I wonder if Pooty has played it too :)

A request to anyone with edit permissions on SMS Power.

Please add v0.04 to the hack page here:
https://www.smspower.org/Hacks/Lemmings-SMS-OhNoMoreLemmings-Mod

Thanks!

slogra wrote

A request to anyone with edit permissions on SMS Power.

Please add v0.04 to the hack page here:
https://www.smspower.org/Hacks/Lemmings-SMS-OhNoMoreLemmings-Mod

Thanks!

Done!

Thanks, much appreciated!

Amazing stuff, Lemmings SMS is one of my favourite games of all time!.

I developed the achievements for the original game over on retro achievements, will do the same for this once it's completed! :)

Thanks Slogra and Maxim,
I really enjoyed playing the new levels, and hope you won't stop expanding on this :)
The intro animation seems to be fixed too, great job.

I've waved this under Pooty's nose. We'll see if he bites. I imagine he'll find this interesting.

EDIT: Yep. Don't suppose you guys are looking for help with anything? >D

Hello Slogra and Maxim.

My brother alerted me to this ROM hack, and it's looking great. Even the background of the main menu looks so much nicer.

Implementing the entirety of the Tame difficulty is an excellent start, with much of the game's graphics already implemented.

Some of the later difficulty levels might be more challenging to implement because of a few gameplay-affecting bugs and inconveniences. Of the top of my head, there is only support for one trap per level, the digger doesn't work well when used on right-ascending inclines (see attached), and lowering the release rate doesn't work as expected. No promises, but I would like to look into some of these issues and see if they can be fixed. If not, there's always creative solutions to get around them, as the original development team for this game had done.

I'm looking forward to seeing this project being developed further. I am a huge fan of Lemmings, so I would love to help out with this project if I can.

slogra wrote

Do you know if the 4 themes have official names? I simply call them Brick, Rock, Snow and Ball.

I'm not sure if these are the official names of the ONML styles, but the community generally refers to them as Brick, Bubble, Rock and Snow.

Digger Bug.png (861 B)

SMS Lemmings Digger Bug

The one trap limit may be hard to extend, if only because of the way tile animation is used for them. The tile limit may also be an issue - the Lemmings 2 developer mentioned changing levels and removing skills to avoid scenarios where you can run out of tiles, but you can still do that on existing levels if you try hard enough.

The digger bug may be fixable but will require a lot more disassembly work. So far I’ve been focusing on the graphical parts.

Lowering the release rate sounds possibly fixable. Likewise for the water builder bug.

Also maybe of note is that I’ve been populating details at https://www.smspower.org/Development/Lemmings-SMS and https://tcrf.net/Lemmings_(Sega_Master_System,_Game_Gear) as I go. There’s a huge amount still to go.

Also note that the sample quality is improved :) and should be a decent match to the Amiga samples.

Hi Pooty,

Nice to see you here. Let me first thank you for all the work you put into the level editor. Making import and export possible in Mappy was a brilliant idea. It works really well.
I was very surprised nobody else used it to create new levels during the years.

After some considering some other ideas, i decided to use it to create ONML levels. The first level was the ideal level to try recreating as most of the graphics are on the 8x8 grid. The next Rock, Snow and even Bubble levels were much harder to make.

After finishing all the first 20 levels, i'm close to the tile limit of each theme. That means that additional level will be harder and harder to make. The tilesets are never complete, as the original game does not work on an 8x8 grid. Each new level will probably require a few new tiles.
But the good news is that the next difficulty (Crazy) has a lot of the easy to make Brick levels. So far I only finished the first level of Crazy, which is a Brick level, but did need additional tiles.

Honestly, i think finishing Crazy will be a stretch, when taking tile limit and traps into account. Not to mention all the other difficulties. I'm really happy i was able to finish Tame though.

I would like to improve the exits in the current levels. It would be great if i could make them the same size and the same animations as the originals. Thanks to Maxim it is now possible to change the tile that indicates the exit and more tiles can be assigned to be passable/non-solid (like the tiles of the exits). He is also working on making more animated tiles possible.

slogra wrote

I was very surprised nobody else used it to create new levels during the years.

I can only assume that Pooty's Mappy converter is too hard to use and learn for the average user, adding to the fact that Lemmings is not popular enough in the same way as Sonic, Alex Kidd or Mario to warrant enough users to learn the editor perhaps? Plus Lemmings is way more popular being hacked on PC than console.

This is related to Slogra's hack:

If you haven't seen this video yet, I do have another example of Pooty's Mappy converter being used, (if you guys are interested) in some footage of old levels that Pooty made for this game played by Youtuber ''Squidgy Adam'' that I recorded from Youtube long before the videos were deleted. I recorded them to DVD for archival reasons and i'm glad I did as they would have been lost forever otherwise.

These were made a very long time ago and they were never made available to the public to play.

The dark contrast in the video is down to re-uploading it Youtube as Youtube always makes the contrast very dark in my videos.

With a bunch more work we can extend beyond the number of themes on the original, as it’s mostly just a matter of ROM space. At an extreme, this could allow having a unique tileset for every level. However, it also means extending the code and lookup tables for every place where the level type is considered…

G'day Maxim and Slogra.

Hats off for you two for the job well done with thia ROM Hack. Finally gotten around to playing this hack myself ( v0.04). Took the time to record this gameplay on a real Sega Master System II console which looks great and phenomenal in RGB video. I'm looking forward to seeing how this project goes.

Here's the Video recording for yous.
Best Regards,
Josho

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