Lemmings
Psygnosis' classic franchise returns! Hands-on impressions await you inside.
Published: April 24, 2006
It had arguably the least flashy showing at Sony's pre-E3 event last week, but Lemmings, in the quiet way only Lemmings can do, was one of the most solid games shown. To be fair, everything at the event was solid, but Lemmings has a sort of undeniable charm to it that seeps into slowly ever after just a few minutes.
Maybe it's that the poor little green-haired guys march valiantly off to their doom unless you actively tell them not to, or maybe it's just that the gameplay, the very same stuff that was introduced decades (yes, that long) ago works just as well here, though it's certainly been gussied up a bit for Sony's cutting-edge handheld. Whatever the reason, Lemmings is back, and it's just as fun as ever.
Now mind you, we only played a couple minutes of the game before the ADD-addled sections of our brain took over and we were off sucking down drinks, cramming food in our mouths and jumping from game to game at lightning speed like a kitten chasing a ball of tinfoil, but we took away enough to confidently state that the franchise is in good hands: the good folks at Team 17, who continue to breathe life into the Worms franchise.
If you haven't played a Lemmings game before, here's the gist: little green-haired guys drop out of a chute and start walking until they run unto a wall. If there's no wall, they'll keep going, and if there's, say, a giant fiery chasm with naught but a bubbling sea of molten rock below, well, guess where they're headed? You can head them off by gifting certain lemmings with the ability to block the way with outstretched arms, herding the masses back in the opposite direction, as well as do more sadistic stuff like detonate one or a group to carve a new path through rock or play nice and gift them with an umbrella so they don't go splat.
That's essentially it. A puzzle game in the most direct sense, Lemmings forces you to get as many of these little guys from one end of the level to the other. What was originally done with a mouse and keyboard has been remapped to the PSP controls with surprising ease. The shoulder buttons let you cycle through the different roles you can give to a lemming, the analog nub lets you scroll along the length of the mostly-flat levels (and the 16:9 PSP screen is awesome for taking in as much of the view as possible) and the d-pad moves the cursor so you can pick out a lemming and give them their new job.
These new jobs are limited, and pre-selected for a given level, so you'll have to figure out where to send the proper lemmings and what to task them with in a set number of moves, though there is an open-endedness to the level design in some cases. With 150 puzzles (20 of them coming from the Team 17 folks) and quickly increasing complexity and difficulty (broken down in tiers), the game allows you to pause the game to move around and take in more of the situation, as well as kick on a fast-forward when you think you've got it all set up. As we quickly discovered, we hadn't, and many lemmings were lost in the making of this preview.
Team 17 is including both an incredibly deep level editor/designer (which was just a bit too much for us to take in, and sadly we didn't get enough time with it), and Wi-Fi multiplayer matches via both Ad-Hoc and Infrastructure. The latter inclusion is brilliant, as the game really lends itself to the perfect kind of pacing needed for long-distance wireless matches.
Not surprisingly, given the late May release date, the game was all but done, and we'll be sure to bring you updated impressions as soon as we get our hands on a final build.
Maybe it's that the poor little green-haired guys march valiantly off to their doom unless you actively tell them not to, or maybe it's just that the gameplay, the very same stuff that was introduced decades (yes, that long) ago works just as well here, though it's certainly been gussied up a bit for Sony's cutting-edge handheld. Whatever the reason, Lemmings is back, and it's just as fun as ever.
Now mind you, we only played a couple minutes of the game before the ADD-addled sections of our brain took over and we were off sucking down drinks, cramming food in our mouths and jumping from game to game at lightning speed like a kitten chasing a ball of tinfoil, but we took away enough to confidently state that the franchise is in good hands: the good folks at Team 17, who continue to breathe life into the Worms franchise.
If you haven't played a Lemmings game before, here's the gist: little green-haired guys drop out of a chute and start walking until they run unto a wall. If there's no wall, they'll keep going, and if there's, say, a giant fiery chasm with naught but a bubbling sea of molten rock below, well, guess where they're headed? You can head them off by gifting certain lemmings with the ability to block the way with outstretched arms, herding the masses back in the opposite direction, as well as do more sadistic stuff like detonate one or a group to carve a new path through rock or play nice and gift them with an umbrella so they don't go splat.
That's essentially it. A puzzle game in the most direct sense, Lemmings forces you to get as many of these little guys from one end of the level to the other. What was originally done with a mouse and keyboard has been remapped to the PSP controls with surprising ease. The shoulder buttons let you cycle through the different roles you can give to a lemming, the analog nub lets you scroll along the length of the mostly-flat levels (and the 16:9 PSP screen is awesome for taking in as much of the view as possible) and the d-pad moves the cursor so you can pick out a lemming and give them their new job.
These new jobs are limited, and pre-selected for a given level, so you'll have to figure out where to send the proper lemmings and what to task them with in a set number of moves, though there is an open-endedness to the level design in some cases. With 150 puzzles (20 of them coming from the Team 17 folks) and quickly increasing complexity and difficulty (broken down in tiers), the game allows you to pause the game to move around and take in more of the situation, as well as kick on a fast-forward when you think you've got it all set up. As we quickly discovered, we hadn't, and many lemmings were lost in the making of this preview.
Team 17 is including both an incredibly deep level editor/designer (which was just a bit too much for us to take in, and sadly we didn't get enough time with it), and Wi-Fi multiplayer matches via both Ad-Hoc and Infrastructure. The latter inclusion is brilliant, as the game really lends itself to the perfect kind of pacing needed for long-distance wireless matches.
Not surprisingly, given the late May release date, the game was all but done, and we'll be sure to bring you updated impressions as soon as we get our hands on a final build.
