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Lemmings Level Designer
-------------------------
Copyright (c) 1997,9 Philip Kendall
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
(at your option) any later version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
0. Contents
-----------
1. Overview
2. Tap2Lem
3. Lem2Tap
4. .lem Format
5. Miscellaneous
6. Author contact information
7. Thanks
1. Overview
-----------
This set of two programs (Tap2Lem and Lem2Tap) are designed to allow you to
easily modify and create new levels for the ZX Spectrum version of Lemmings.
They work by converting between a .tap file (an image of a tape - this
format is used by many Spectrum emulators), a simple text file specifying
the information about the level (the .lem file) and a Windows bitmap (.bmp)
containing the graphics for the level.
2. Tap2Lem
----------
Syntax: Tap2Lem tapefile
Tap2Lem takes the .tap file given as tapefile, and for every Lemmings level
it finds within that file, it will output two files:
1) levelnn.lem, where nn is the level number, which contains the
information on the level name, number of skills available, trapdoor and
home locations, etc. See Section 4 for a complete descripition of the .lem
format
2) levelnn.bmp, a 512x128x2 Windows bitmap which contains the graphics for
the level.
Note that files already existing with the names given above will be
overwritten.
3. Lem2Tap
----------
Syntax: Lem2Tap textfile tapefile
Lem2Tap takes the .lem file given as textfile and using that (and the .bmp
file specified within it - see Section 4), appends the Lemmings level
specified to tapefile.
The .bmp file must be a 512x128x2 Windows bitmap; no other sizes or number
of colours are supported. Also, compressed bitmaps are not supported.
4. .lem Format
--------------
The .lem files used to specify the level information should be text files,
in your system's normal format for such files. How files which are not in
your system's normal format will depend on your compiler.
No blank lines are allowed in .lem files (except at the end and possibly if
you want a blank level name). Comments are permitted - these should begin
with a semicolon (;) and continue to the end of the line. Data items on the
same line should be separated with commas (,), and should be specified in
decimal.
1st line: The level number and the rating of the level (1=Fun, 2=Tricky,
3=Taxing, 4=Mayhem).
2nd line: The number of lemmings are the number to be saved.
3rd line: The initial (and minimum) release rate.
4th line: The time in minutes available to finish the level.
5th line: The number of each skill available (in the order climbers,
floaters, bombers, blockers, builders, bashers, miners, diggers)
6th line: The level name (max 32 characters; only capitals, digits and
spaces will appear correctly). No comments are permitted within
the first 32 characters.
7th line: The x and y locations of the trapdoor and home respectively.
8th line: The colours used to display the levels (in standard Spectrum
attribute format - bit 7: flash, bit 6: bright, bits 5-3: paper
colour, bits 2-0: ink colour)
9th-18th lines: The hazards on the level, one per line. Each line should
have three numbers: the hazard type (only 4, water, allowed)
and the x and y locations of the hazard.
19th line: The name of the 512x128x2 Windows bitmap containing the level
graphics.
5. Miscellaneous
----------------
1. The specification of the .tap file format can be found in either
FAQ for the comp.sys.sinclair newsgroup
(http://www.kendalls.demon.co.uk/cssfaq/).
2. The Windows bitmap format, being a Microsoft format, isn't well
specified. Your best bet (and what I did) is to use a search engine with
something like "bmp format specification".
3. Lemmings is available from
ftp://ftp.nvg.ntnu.no/pub/sinclair/tapes/l/lemmings.zip
6. Author contact information
-----------------------------
E-mail: pak21@cam.ac.uk (should last until at least June 2002)
Postal address: 15 Crescent Road, Wokingham, Berks, RG40 2DB, England
7. Thanks
---------
Darren Salt: for writing the first (and only) Lemmings editor that I found,
which inspired me to write this and also helped me to work out
the bits of the format which I hadn't done up to that point
(principally the hazards). Darren's editor is available from
ftp://ftp.nvg.unit.no/pub/sinclair/snaps/games/unsorted-new/
misc/DS_Own/LemmsEd.Z80.
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