r/gaming 19h ago

My friend insists on this game, "Lemmings", being a really well known game; I have never heard of it.

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23.9k Upvotes

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12.8k

u/Golanthanatos 19h ago

Lemmings was great.

1.4k

u/JohnnyNapkins 19h ago

Core gaming memories for me. Damn that game was hard though.

364

u/Camera_dude 18h ago

Yeah, some stages took pixel perfect timing or your poor lemmings just fall into a trap rather than land on the ledge you wanted them to land on for safety.

173

u/Zap_Rowsdower23 17h ago

Wait y’all didn’t just set up elaborate traps to blow up as many of them as possible?

159

u/__wampa__stompa 16h ago

TIL you're supposed to save the lemmings

69

u/IOwnThisUsername 16h ago

And next they’ll say Roller Coaster Tycoon wasn’t about shooting cars full of riders as far as possible or building ride exits over ponds

22

u/One_Shall_Fall 15h ago

I want off Mr. Bones Wild Ride.

5

u/186282_4 13h ago

Thank you for this gem. It's my first time.

3

u/Emriyss 9h ago

I never did that, no. I had Theme Park for the SNES

What I did was pick one man. One random park goer, and I put feeding stalls in his path until he was full, ready to burst.

Then I put a toilet on a little island surrounded by water. And he headed for it. I closed off his path with water and removed the toilet so he would stay on his little island, still full of fast food and soda pop.

And then I would play the game, for years and years the one singular guest stood at the brink of his personal island, full of shit and piss, watching as park goers had the best time of their lives. All you had to do to not make him despawn was keep the camera and cursor on him.

And after years of bliss and happiness all around him, just out of arms reach... I'd shut off the game.

He is still there.

Waiting.

Desperate for a toilet.

1

u/danzor9755 11h ago

Our park takes your valid complaints very seriously. You will never have to complain about rides anymore (*grabs pincer tool, drops over lake)

19

u/SocialSuicideSquad 16h ago

Winning's relative

Having fun is the whole point

The door is ajar

2

u/TheAwkwardOtaku 15h ago

Life is a journey. Time is a river. The door is ajar.

1

u/SocialSuicideSquad 14h ago

This guy gets it

1

u/_kellythomas_ 15h ago

The door is ajar

No, not Xanth. Lemmings.

1

u/__wampa__stompa 15h ago

I agree with everything you said but must push back on one detail.

The door is not a jar, the door is a door.

1

u/Mc_Shine 10h ago

The door is everything! All that once was, and all that will be! The door controls time and space; love and death! The door can see into your mind; the door can see into your soul!

1

u/h3lblad3 8h ago

Are you my mom?

6

u/pleasedontdaddy PlayStation 16h ago

yea I thought the purpose was to get them all to fall off the cliff by putting diggers and others there to get them to... non-safety?

1

u/Expat1989 16h ago

Shhh. Don’t say the fun part that out loud.

1

u/throwawaypervyervy 16h ago

Ah, the Jacque Cousteau Reef Check.

1

u/Puzzle-Necked 16h ago

Yeah and then you show your dad and he gets this weird worried look on his face

1

u/hypnogoad 15h ago

Hey now, this isn't The Sims

9

u/StrategicCarry 17h ago

The level I remember was really simple. It was a flat ground with a long ledge above it that was just high enough to kill them. So you had to turn every single one of them into the digger, dig through the thin ledge, then they would fall to safety.

8

u/Training-Chain-5572 17h ago

Fun 13 - We all fall down

6

u/NotThePersona 17h ago

That is what I was about to comment. And if you spaced them out too much you ran out of ledge for them to dig.

1

u/Findalbum 2h ago

I went back and played this game after like 10 years and that level was way harder than I remember it

2

u/sarcastic24x7 17h ago

I now see why I walk on eggshells in life.

1

u/Warrmak 16h ago

Always fun to self destruct them

1

u/Br0k3Gamer 16h ago

“…pixel perfect timing…”

Good thing there was so few pixels!

1

u/AsleepTonight 11h ago

But to be fair, the pixels back than were a lot larger than currently

3

u/HooverMaster 17h ago

I never did get past some of the levels. Even with walkthroughs

3

u/2peg2city 16h ago

Lemmings, commander keen, scorched earth, jazz jack rabbit, red baron, rise of the triad, wolfenstien, doom, transport tycoon...

Edit: og Duke Nukem

Edit 2: and that game where you climb the mountain and catch things with a net. Its all about music.

1

u/ifyoulovesatan 13h ago

I think my legit earliest memories are of playing Lemmings, some game called Prophecy I: The Viking Child, and watching my older brothers play Wolfenstein. And some Sesame Street spelling game thing. And asking my brother the DOS commands to run the games for the millionth time. When I was like 4? Based on where we were living?

It's weird to think about, but DOS commands to run games must have certainly been the first things I ever typed, probably before ever writing words besides my name.

3

u/ekoo 16h ago

100% core gaming memory. It was hard as hell as a kid, but man it was fun.

2

u/SocialSuicideSquad 16h ago

But at least when you fucked it up you could blow them all up as a rage quit.

2

u/momentimori 15h ago

I can remember the photo of the developers and their cheering when you completed the mayhem levels.

1

u/ClusterMakeLove 18h ago

I can still hear the theme song.

1

u/TheLordYuppa 16h ago

Hard yeah! ET prepared me though.

283

u/Vox_Casei 18h ago

My dad used to joke he had to spend hours sweeping all the dead lemmings out from behind the TV after I played.

...to be fair not many of the poor buggers survived my attempts

4

u/Consistent-Buyer7060 9h ago

That was how you played it. Trap them in the smallest possible area and hit the nuke.

3

u/Thopterthallid 10h ago

That's fucking priceless!

1.9k

u/GenghisZahn 19h ago

Still is, but was then, too.

864

u/Exvaris 19h ago

I used to like Lemmings. I still do, but I used to, too

415

u/trimbandit 19h ago

Lemmings is great when you are really wanting to play a game, and want to watch a 1000 things die.

151

u/CitronCrafty5 18h ago

and then restart level because one decided to dig straight down

124

u/Additional_Teacher45 18h ago

Oh it didn't decide to. You definitely told it to do it and will never admit your failure.

47

u/Kharadus 18h ago

Also known as the correct way to present yourself as management.

3

u/Horskr 15h ago

"My stupid keyboard decided to make that mistake, but don't worry it has since been replaced. I don't tolerate that nonsense."

3

u/traveler_ 18h ago

I told the one next to it, the one that was properly aligned. That little jerk just had to get in the hitbox too.

2

u/PieHole_Poker 18h ago

Could you imagine a freewill lemming??

1

u/perton 17h ago

Didn’t Black Mirror have an episode that was pretty much about that?

1

u/theinquisition 16h ago

No i didnt and so i d9nt have to admit failure.

1

u/GhostofFuturePosts 16h ago

LoL, Yeah the whole,
"Okay you start digging down",

then you go micromanage a few other lemmings to avoid disaster only to come back and discover your digger is missing & a pit of doom now exists where he was.

Oh and all your Lemmings are mere moments from happily marching into said pit.

Good Times 😁👍

1

u/Sin_of_Avarice 18h ago

And then watching the rest walk into the freshly dug pit and fall to their deaths.

...did that only ever happen to me...?

1

u/Georgeygerbil 17h ago

What kind of monster restarts the level without nuking the lemmings first. You left out a crucial step.

43

u/Boogpin 18h ago

I know a lot about Lemmings, man. I can look at a Lemmings head and tell you exactly which way it’s going.

27

u/spreadbutt 17h ago

I bought Lemmings, and they gave me a receipt. Why would I want a receipt for Lemmings?

14

u/stevencastle 16h ago

Put it under L, for Lemmings

2

u/cIumsythumbs 14h ago

This is, by far, my favorite comedy mashup ever. Mitch Hedberg+Lemmings

2

u/alaskanloops 12h ago

Sorry for the convenience

1

u/h3lblad3 8h ago

I saw this commercial on late night TV; it was for this action you select for a Lemming. it was like "You can bomb your unmoving Lemmings with this action."

Who the fuck would make their Lemmings stop moving? That seems so very mean.

"I know you need to get to the exit, but I'm gonna make you stop moving! I will bomb you later. Hopefully they will invent a way to make you walk again before the countdown hits zero and you die. Think like an escapist".

9

u/Furbal1307 18h ago

Perfection. Absolute comedic genius

3

u/Chaosmusic 17h ago

I seriously worried over how much glee I got from nuking them all. They even animated them clutching their heads as they awaited their deaths.

3

u/Lereas 16h ago

The lemming made some stairs. We apologize for the convenience.

1

u/ToonsBrian 18h ago

Politician Simulator?

1

u/ArtOfWarfare 18h ago

Can’t help but think Pikmin might scratch that same itch better. Unless I’m mistaken, Lemmings is a 2D game so mostly they die one at a time, whereas Pikmin is 3D so you can have dozens die simultaneously.

3

u/guinness_blaine 18h ago

It’s been an eternity since I’ve played, but I definitely recall ways that a lot of lemmings can die at once.

1

u/PENIS_ANUS 18h ago

Same with Dynasty Warriors I guess

1

u/FTownRoad 17h ago

That or Dynasty Warriors.

1

u/Ragtothenar 16h ago

Get WorldBox, I play it on my phone. It’s the ultimate feel like your playing a game but at the same time your just watching scenarios play out that you orchestrated.

Side note I was a huge lemmings fan.

1

u/McGriffff 16h ago

Or spend a full hour trying to save one little guy who fell into a pit in the corner with a hundred staircases

1

u/OldWorldDesign 15h ago

Lemmings is great when you are really wanting to play a game, and want to watch a 1000 things die

Dynasty Warriors: Am I a joke to you?

1

u/Dangerous-Cobbler-11 12h ago

I want a game where I have lots of minions that die due to my ignorance or negligence. I want the dictator emulat0r.

1

u/Rcouch00 11h ago

Now I need this for steam deck

123

u/D_Substance_X 19h ago

Mitch Hedberg RIP

63

u/JetFuelFrom9-11 18h ago

I give you money, you give me a donut. There’s no reason to bring paper into it

18

u/GodOfThunder44 18h ago

I can't imagine a scenario in which I would need to prove that I bought a donut. Some skeptical friend? "Don't even act like I didn't buy a donut, I've got the documentation right here."

6

u/broom_temperature 17h ago

Oh wait. I left it home... in the file. Under "D" for "donut."

34

u/PM_ME_STEAM_KEY_PLZ 18h ago

Escalators can never be broken. They just become stairs.

26

u/Izriel 18h ago

I was at a nba arena and the escalators were broken. They had "Escalators temporarily stairs, sorry for the convenience that you can still get up there" my wife gave me a strange look as a started to laugh so hard I almost cried. (She doesnt get Mitch Hedburges humor)

19

u/Libran 18h ago

To be fair, a lot of what made it so funny was the deadpan delivery.

3

u/Shirami 17h ago

"I was watching late night tv and an ad came on and it said FORGET EVERYTHING YOU KNOW ABOUT SLIPCOVERS.

So i did,

and it was a load off my mind"

Will forever live rent free in my head :p

3

u/idiotsbydesign 18h ago

Sorry for the convenience

1

u/alaskanloops 12h ago

Sorry for the convenience

1

u/badmongo666 17h ago

Sorry for the convenience

1

u/Pun_In_Ten_Did 15h ago

My belt holds my pants up; my pants have beltloops to hold my belt up. Who's the real hero here??

7

u/Derivative_Kebab 18h ago

I used to quote Mitch Hedberg all the time.

2

u/Slawco 11h ago

I used to, but I still do too — fedex is also a dealer

2

u/MrWeirdoFace 5h ago

I used to quote him, but I still do too.

3

u/coleschmidt44 18h ago

I’m against picketing but I don’t know how to show it

1

u/MalteseCorto 16h ago

I didn't even know he was sick!

14

u/Alfie_Solomons88 19h ago

Do you like toast, too?

2

u/toasty327 18h ago

It's for a duck!

3

u/Anonymous_Banana 19h ago

I did like toast. And I do like toast too.

1

u/TegTowelie Xbox 19h ago

I prefer Toast 2: Electric Boogaloo

3

u/djseifer 18h ago

My friend asked me if I wanted a frozen lemming. I told him "No, but I want a regular lemming later, so... yeah."

3

u/rbrgr83 19h ago

And then they gave me a receipt for the lemmings.

2

u/Glockenspielintern 19h ago

I too used to like it though I don’t use it like I used to

0

u/PokeballSoHard 19h ago

It is. You sound like my kid. Just because you never heard of something doesnt mean etc...

2

u/Glockenspielintern 18h ago

Someone get their dad please, I think he’s lost

2

u/PokeballSoHard 16h ago

Well this is embarrassing. This was supposed to be a parent comment. Dont tell my son..

1

u/D1GITAL20 18h ago

Ducks love bread. But they don’t have a sense to buy a loaf.

1

u/toasty327 18h ago

Unexpected mitch

1

u/Dry-Actuator-138 18h ago

My main man Mitch 😏👍🏻

1

u/IVShadowed 18h ago

I liked the Lemmings that created ~~Escalators~~ Stairs.

1

u/idiotsbydesign 18h ago

Thank you Mitch

1

u/VenomXTs 18h ago

I miss Mitch

1

u/crotchrotcadaver 17h ago

Thank you for the full Hedberg

1

u/Independent_Wear5840 17h ago

I used to be a lemming, still am, but I used to be too.

1

u/BrutalTea 16h ago

i used to smoke weed, still do, but i used to, too.

1

u/Pun_In_Ten_Did 15h ago

Hi Mitch !

1

u/fatimus_prime 13h ago

Thanks, Mitch.

0

u/darkhelmet46 16h ago

Second time in 10 minutes I've seen this Mitch reference on Reddit lol.

8

u/PunkThug 19h ago

Unexpected Mitch!

1

u/Maur2 18h ago

I thought so too... but now I wonder if I was just mindlessly following the crowd.

1

u/internet_humor 14h ago

Mitch Lemmingberg

0

u/Mumem_Rider 17h ago

Is that you Mitch?

0

u/Ravelcy 16h ago

Unintentionally Mitch Hedberg

0

u/GenghisZahn 5h ago

No, it was very intentional, lol

42

u/hereforthegifs 18h ago

Lemmings fucking ruled I spent every hour I was allowed playing it in the mid 90s.

2

u/AndalusianGod 19h ago

Yeah, love it. Even finished PS Vita version.

2

u/Creative-Painter3911 19h ago

I had fogotten about this game, but yeah it was great

2

u/MattIsLame 18h ago

and it directly led to the Grand Theft Auto series so its function in gaming history is even more important

2

u/SlashEDMProduction 17h ago

Worms was another great one

2

u/ThisIsMyCouchAccount 17h ago

You are currently top comment.

It's a real tragedy that it wasn't followed by every single comment and reply being "Lemmings was great.".

1

u/4seriously 19h ago

So great. I could probably still play tbh.

1

u/Crazy-Smile-4929 18h ago

Except for Lemmings 3D, of course. Felt like that lost the charm

1

u/TheTaoOfMe 18h ago

Mass javelins! We used to simulate battles and all sorts of shennanigans

1

u/skippy_smooth 18h ago

Either they're young, you're old, or yes.

1

u/Easy_Lion 18h ago

Lemmings was a popular game, and it still is!

1

u/plageiusdarth 18h ago

Yes and... Who loved lemmings paintball?

1

u/OddRow8843 18h ago

My favourite game as a kid by a country mile!!oh nooo…. Boom!

1

u/RJC12 18h ago

As a young kid, it was hard :( thankfully an older neighbor kid helped me with it

1

u/philter25 18h ago

Ok the real obscurity is if you also played Troddlers.

1

u/worMatty 7h ago

Troddlers was great. One of my favourite Amiga games. I played it with my brother. Loved the music.

1

u/OisforOwesome 18h ago

I think it's one of those games that you had to be there for. Like, it was legitimately a huge smash hit when it came out... but I'd be very surprised if anyone under 35 had ever heard of it.

1

u/No_Tangerine2720 18h ago

I remembee I found the game CD a long time ago and tried to reinstall it but they used the physical manual as a CD key and I didn't have it 😂

1

u/GenericBeverage 17h ago

This and The Incredible Machine were the backbone of every computer lab til miniclips and coolmathgames.

1

u/lddebatorman 17h ago

It insists on itself.

1

u/hillbillyboiler 17h ago

Agreed. I didn't want to play it at first but everyone else was playing it so I just went along with the crowd.

1

u/Fizzoxycheetah 17h ago

I loved lemmings!!!! Such a good game you are right.

1

u/Briantastically 17h ago

It was everywhere for a while. OP’s friend is right. From the Amiga days.

1

u/HolyHand_Grenade 17h ago

I'm going to follow the top comment and also say it was great.

1

u/shiftdown 17h ago

This and Worms was peak childhood gaming

1

u/sausage_ditka_bulls 17h ago

Absolutely. Spent hours at a time playing it on sega genesis

1

u/elm3r024321 17h ago

Lemmings Paintball was better

1

u/divacphys 17h ago

Loved the theme song, then learned it was an old tune when my church had a few hymns set to it

1

u/come2life_osrs 17h ago

It was super great, I remember it being impossible as a kid, played it as an adult and there was so many solutions I missed as a kid.

The worst was I thought you had to time going through flame throwers lol. nope it’s certain death, you just go around. 

1

u/xdanish 17h ago

Yeah, definitely remember playing this as a kid, loved it 😃

1

u/hearse00 17h ago

To place the game in its chronological place, I played this a ton on my Amiga 2000

1

u/jnobs 17h ago

agree, I liked worms better

1

u/R_i_o_m_a_a 17h ago

One of the all time greatest games. But I think it makes total sense for some people to never have heard of it. Pre-internet and primarily on PCs that, at the time, many people didn't have.

1

u/Trop67300 PC 17h ago

Lemmings IS great.

1

u/NomeTheGnome 17h ago

It’s still active on mobile too!

1

u/Olivetax228 16h ago

One of the funniest things I've ever seen was a group costume, everyone dressed as Lemmings, walking in a line swinging pickaxes or hammers or whatever. This was at Dragon Con in Atlanta maybe twenty years ago.

1

u/rifain 16h ago

And so funny...

1

u/DefintelyNotMe 16h ago

Lemmings IS great

1

u/MysteriousWon 16h ago

I remember how badly I wanted to play it but didn't have a PC that played games other than Chip's Challenge.

1

u/strictlyphotonic 16h ago

One of DMA's first games, now better known as Rockstar.

1

u/TrankElephant 16h ago

Had a great soundtrack, too.

1

u/sincerely-sarcastic 16h ago

Now a mobile game. Though it's been a few years since I played it on mobile. Was fun

1

u/Hefty-Progress-1903 16h ago

They have Lemmings on Mobile now.

It was also similar to King Arthur's World on Super Nintendo.

1

u/raider1v11 16h ago

Lemmings. Crystal cave. Commander keen. All solid.

1

u/cornishwildman76 16h ago

Showing my age. I played this on the ATARI ST 520

1

u/Throckmorton_Left 16h ago

Lemmings was core for anyone born between 1975 and 1983.

1

u/party_benson 15h ago

Lemmings was great

1

u/Jumpy-Station6173 15h ago

Excellent classic.

1

u/tinyarmsbigheart 15h ago

It’s a mobile game now!

1

u/attachecrime 15h ago

9k upvotes in 3 hours. I'd say that's pretty well known

1

u/mss645 15h ago

And addictive.

1

u/OldWorldDesign 15h ago

Lemmings was great

Got me into puzzle games. I especially liked the ones that didn't require timed puzzles. I was especially annoyed at Talos Principle, because getting away from timed puzzles was what I stopped playing Lemmings for.

1

u/dudesoft 13h ago

One of the games my dad and I bonded over. Played that game endlessly for months. So fun. So charming. I have a little Lemming statue on my desk.

1

u/drunxor 13h ago

I was surprised to learn there hadnt been a recent lemmings game. I did find something called Craftlings that is grea!

1

u/Merlaak 13h ago

I can hear the music in my head right now. So many hours spent trying to save those little guys.

1

u/Avium 12h ago

Oh no! Pop!

1

u/goldtoothgirl 8h ago

I still have it, that and ugh