Previous Next

Okay, the four of you who know nothing about Lemmings, the biggest Amiga games phenomenon to date, check out the 'Wildlife Conservation: A Beginner's Guide' box right now and then come back. Everyone else, you've probably already got a cast-iron opinion of your own on whether you hate or (altogether more likely) love this monstrously popular and successful game, so you aren't likely to be too interested in the minor details of this 'sort-of-'follow-up released by Psygnosis one year after the original, and just in time for the Christmas market surge. In that case, why have to bothered to read this far in the first place? Go on, clear off. Right, so who does that leave? (Silence.) Oh, just me, is it? Fine.

Well, Stu, Oh No! More Lemmings! comes in two formats, as either a standalone new game or as a data disk containing the same 100 levels, but which requires a copy of the original game to run and costs £5 less. The game is exactly the same as before - same graphics, same icons, etc - although the music is new, original stuff rather than the nursery rhymes of before. The only real change is that there are now five difficulty ratings (with twenty levels in each) instead of four. The same incredibly addictive gameplay that made Lemmings the No. 2 game in our All-Time Top 100 is back and really, all that needs to be said in the way of analysis is that if you liked Lemmings, you'll like this. All that's left to explain now is why I haven't given it the kind of mark you'd expect for the second-best Amiga game of all time.

The hair-splitting starts here. Now it's all very well saying this is only a data disk and not a sequel, but I can't help feeling more could have been done to make it different from the first game. Maybe some really imaginative new graphic styles for the levels would have helped - Matt levelled much the same criticism at Magic Pockets a few months back, and would it really have been so tough to dream up a few different kinds of landscape for the little mammalian anti-heroes to wander through than the same old earth, fire, ice and water stuff you get here? Surely not.

Also, the difficulty curve is all wrong. Think about it - almost every Amiga owner in the country who was around this time last year must have a copy of this game by now, and the new ones will have got it in their Cartoon Classics pack. Making all of the first 20 levels embarrassingly easy, then, seems like a bit of a waste of memory. Anyone with the slightest grasp of the game's mechanics will sail through all of them at the first attempt - there's a dangerous possibility of boredom setting in before it gets interesting. After those, though, (and the first level at the second difficulty setting) comes a screen so unbelievably evil that it wouldn't be out of place on the very toughest level of the original game. Less of a difficulty curve than a difficulty cliff, this kind of thing shows that there just hasn't been as much care taken over this effort as was the first time around.

DMA have also passed up the chance to right a couple of the flaws present in the original, especially the one which makes it impossible to tell which way a particular lemming is going when there's a whole mass of them milling around and you need to perform a precision move. The over-riding impression (especially when you see the price) is that Psygnosis have - if not exactly rushed it out - certainly held a lot back (presumably many of these changes are being saved for a genuine Lemmings 2) and their real interest here is just to make a killing at Christmas. Sad, perhaps, but it's the way of the world.

If you're new to Lemmings (I can't imagine how you could be, for the reasons mentioned in the main review, but just for the sake of argument), you're probably wondering what all the fuss is about. Well, *here's* what.

Released a year ago, Lemmings was (and is) more or less the most original game concept ever seen on the Amiga. Lots of the furry little darlings drop from a trapdoor at the start of each level, and your task is to guide them all safely to the exit.

You don't control their movements directly, though, but by the use of a number of icons displayed along the bottom of the screen. Each icon instructs a single lemming to perform a specific action, which normally results in some kind of change to the landscape of the level.

It's not that easy though - all the time you're doing this, the other lemmings are marching around independently, but being lemmings they're oblivious to danger and, if you don't stop them, they'll usually endeavour to get themselves killed by one of the many dangers littered around the screens.

Luckily, by a careful combination of the various effects brought about by the use of the icons, it's possible to alter the layout of each level in such a way that the lems will follow a safe path which will lead them to the exit. To successfully complete a level, you have to rescue a certain percentage of the lemmings in it, within a given time limit, and that's pretty much all there is to it. Of course, it's never quite as easy as it looks...

Uppers: The same classic game it always was, and I'd forgive a lot of sins just for those gorgeous speech samples.

Downers: Where's the imagination that gave Lemmings its character in the first place gone? The difficulty curve is crap, and the price is ridiculous for the data disk version.

Definitely a missed opportunity (I suspect DMA are keeping most of the good stuff under their hats for Lemmings 2), but still an excellent game. This lot should keep you going until next Christmas.