First let me introduce myself. Name: Michael. Age: 21.

We've been a Mac-only house most of my life, so I didn't have any of your advantages like the Cheapo game, but I made some good levels with ResEdit. (Any of you know what this is, or do I need to explain?) Trouble is, I was limited to clones of the original levels (i.e. layout same, stats and skills different). In spite of this I made a few very nice levels.

Just found Cheapo for the first time today. I'm going to have great fun with it, both making levels and playing the ones other people have created (just started "Lemmings Plus", completed Level 1 on my first try). I have a couple of questions.

(1) How exactly do metal and one-way wall work, in terms of adding them to my level?
(2) Are clones of the original levels available, so that I could recreate the levels I've already designed with Cheapo and share them with you?

Many thanks

When you add metal or the one-way arrows, you then need to drag a rectangle over the terrain. Any terrain under that rectangle will become metal or arrows when the level is played in the game.
If you click on the "edit object" toolbar button, you will be in a mode where you can resize or move those rectangles.

thank you!

To the best of my knowledge, there are no remakes of old Lemmings levels in Cheapo. You'll need to re-make them yourself.

Can you message me some of your task revisions in original Lemmings? The name of the level and task amounts are sufficient. Thank you.

PS: I have many Cheapo levels and sets I made -- if you want to try them, though, you'll have to E-mail me at stem_balo@sbcglobal.net.

Thank you, Steve.

I've now made ten levels of my own Cheapo set..... one more question, what exactly is a "sketch"?

I will indeed message you as soon as I've finished writing this post. I'd be very interested to see your levels; you can e-mail them to me at zarathustra47@yahoo.com.

The purpose of the "sketch" layer is to provide a way for you to plan out the level terrain ahead of time. If you know you want a big hill on the left side of the screen, sketch one in, and put the actual terrain there later.

The sketches are most useful for seeing how many builders are needed to reach a certain location, or to see if the lemmings can fall a certain height without dying (that's what the long vertical bar is, the maximum fall distance). When you choose a sketch, you can draw all over the level with it, but the player never sees it. I don't remember if the sketches are saved in a level or not.

No, they are not. I tried.

No, the sketches aren't saved. What would be the point? The sketches are purely for the convenience of the author.

thank you again!...... those really are going to be useful!

I have two more questions about Cheapo....... firstly, I've just done a level with multiple trapdoors. What determiners the order in which they are used? Secondly, if I want to show my levels to other people, which styles will everyone definitely have? Just the Lemmings and ONML ones, or are there any others?

any answers?

1. To determine the order of the trapdoors, you have to click on Edit objects icon and press one of your trapdoors. A window appear and you can select the number of the order you want. Trapdoor with number 1 = first, 2 = second...

2. There's a lot of styles that are created. You can find some of them on Garjen Software:

http://www.garjen.co.uk/Lemmings.php

For #2, the styles people will definitely have are the original Lemmings, ONML, and the beach style. Any other style will have to be downloaded, so there is no guarantee that they have them.

I personally would send any styles you use with the set except for the original lemmings and OHML styles. That's just me, though.

Thanks.... wouldn't it be illegal to send styles that someone else had designed, though?

Depends on their "licensing terms" if any. The creator always have the option to release their styles to public domain.

For the most part I believe most style files in use are intended to be distributed freely, given their purpose. If you're worried or want to be formal, you can always try contacting the creator and ask for permission to use, but it's probably unnecessary.

I see. Thank you again.