Aquaria: Lost Treasures Mod

[Danger Mouse]

Aquaria: Lost Treasures Mod
Development by: Danger Mouse
                                  Shiloh Stieber

Working on Story, Level Design, Concepts and Lua Scripting.

[Opening Prologue]
Chapter: In the Beginning
   [Game Scene Replay]   Scene of where Naija first meets Li.
        [Extend initial scene]   Li falls off the boat after staring into water where he had first gazed into Naija's eyes.
                                                        [New Sound Effect, wa wa ...wwWOAH!!] [Splash!]
                                                        Not knowing how to swim Li struggles at the surface and sinks, drifting downward losing
                                                        conciousness.

                                                       Naija Returns out from the depths grabbing Li and bringing him up to the shore. Saving Li's
                                                       life by bring him to the surface where he meraculously starts breathing again after Naija
                                                       gives his lips a kiss.
                                                       [Magic Effect between their lips]
                                                       [New Sound Effect, [GASP] [Cough Cough Cough]]
                                                       (Text from Li: Wha-What happ..., W-Where am I?) with teen Naija looking over him at his side.
            
                                                       Naija, startled, rushes back off into the water. Scene follows Naija, further in to the
                                                       depths of the water where Naija stops. [Zoom in on Naija]. She turns around and looks back
                                                       in the direction from where she had pulled Li up onto shore, and decides to return to make
                                                       sure he is alright.

                                                       When Naija reaches the shore for the second time, she finds that Li is no longer there.
                                                       But in his place is a weathered beaten book. Naija, not seeing Li decides to take the book
                                                       back to home.

                                                      She opens the book and begins to read it's pages. [Narated story with book cover and page
                                                      images  (Aquarian Text, with Images of 10 Lost Treasures that combine to form a suit fit for the
                                                      gods)]

                                                     (I had decided to venture back to the dry airid realm, so that I may, in hopes, find
                                                     the boy who could not breath underwater. Perhaps to find out how he had gotten this book, or
                                                     maybe I was just too curious about this creature that looked like me but could not breath underwater. I
                                                     couldn't help but admit that I found something attractive in his eyes when he first looked at me.
                                                     Why was I so compelled to press my lips against his?
                                                     ..And, what was the warm tingling feeling that it gave me? For a moment I felt lighter than air.
                                                    What was he doing up there?
                                                    Why couldn't he swim??
            
                                                    When I had returned to the sandy shores I could find no sign of the curious boy. Behind the
                                                    oddly shaped trees along the shore there appeared to be a little house of some sort that I had not noticed before.
                                                    Maybe I would be able to find some answers there I had thought to myself.)

Planned Suits and Forms:

[Energy Form]
[Fish Form]
[Beast Form]
[Monkey Suit: Walk Outside of Water] New Suit Ability
[Climber Suit: Climb Walls] New Suit Ability
[Invisible Cloak: Invisibility to some creatures] New Suit Ability
[Modified Plant Suit: Ability that lets you stand on the spiny growths, and flowers produce poison to enemies] Modified Suit Ability
[Modified Sun Suit: Shoots a light beem that blinds some enemies] Modified Suit Ability
[Confusion Suit: Makes creatures attack any creature nearby] New Suit Ability
[Muck Paralysis Suit: Primary weapon Vine attack (close range), Charged muck glob spray out making contacted creatures
                                           slowed, slower with more globs attatched] New Suit Ability

New Creatures:

Tropical fish
Jellyfish
Baby Gii [2-Finned Drill-Sharfin Pet: Basic Drill Attack (Small Damage)]
Young Gii [4-Finned Drill-Sharfin Pet: Basic Drill Attack (Medium Damage)]
Adult Gii [6-Finned Drill-Sharfin Pet: Charged Drill Attack (Large Damage), Basic Drill Attack (Moderate Damage)]
(Secret) Golden Gii [8-Finned Drill Sharfin Pet: Shielded (Magic Effect), Charged Drill Attack (Massive Damage),Basic Drill Attack (Big Damage)]
Dolphins [Friendly unless confused]
Giant Squid [Shoots ink (Blind Effect), Grabber tenticles that make you stuck to creature taking damage unless using spin
                         for 3 seconds]
Mahjin Odiuss [unknown]

Modified Sprites:
Teen Naija
Teen Li

[===================== *SPOILERS* ====================]

[Concepts & Design]

10 Different Realms each with 10 Different Treasure Guardians

[Crystal Glade: Splitting Crystalin Giant] [Confusion Suit]
[Deserted Dunes: Giant Sting Ray]
[Ice Cascades: Killer Whale (The Ice Orcha)]
[Deep Abyss: Giant Squid] [Modified Sun Suit]
[SeaKelp Tangle: Giant Snapping Turtle] [Modified Plant Suit]
[Tropical Isles: Poisonus Lionfish] [Monkey Suit]
[Bubble Fortress: Blue Dragon]
[Rainbow Trails: Phoenix] [Invisible Cloak Suit]
[High-Water Towers: Wall of Doom] [Climber Suit]
[Mossy Floors: Mossy Muck Blob] [Muck Suit]

            10 Treasure Suits combined to make the Ultimate Treasure
               
[Naija wants the Ultimate Treasure to be able to stop Mahjin Odiuss from fullfilling his plot to become a god; Mahjin Odiuss

desires the Ultimate Treasure to become an unstoppable war tyrant god and to become the ultimate ruler of the sea.]
[Mega-Boss; Mahjin Odiuss]            
            10 Mini-Bosses to kill to get last Major-Treasure Piece that Mahjin Odiuss had guarded

[===================== *SPOILERS* ====================]

Deep Abyss

Easter Eggs

[Edit #1]  The Rock with the writing saying "Mithalas" I have redesigned. You'll have to do the research to figure out what it says.
[Edit #2] Frog I created from scratch; Inspired by Derek Yu's Comic Manjuu in "Mix Tape". Derek Yu Rock! I particularly love your latest literature piece on the functions of the left and right side of the brain on your website, quite fascinating and most definitely seems true.
[Edit #3] Grown form of a dolphin and shark like combined creature named Gii. Swims with the motion of a dolphin. Uses air to propel faster as it exhausts from it's head, and attacks with a drill on it's snout.
[Edit #4] Jelly Fishes, losts and lots of Jelly Fishes! Missing their tentacles, but those will be manipulated using particle effects.
[Edit #5] Sea Kelp...   ...mmm mm tasty! Anyone for Sushi?
[Edit #6] Colorful tropic fish.
[Edit #7] A VERY small glimpse of one of the bosses.
[Edit #8] Finished 4 variations of Dragons. Added Mahjinodiuss Evil Huminoid-Squid Boss.

BTW:  A little thank you going out to Derek Yu for the nice pixel art tutorial. I've always loved graphic design, and have always been extremely talented with the arts, whether it be graphics or music. It definitely must be as you mention with how we are brought up being trained to use our right brain. Being in the military, has definitely made my left side of the brain stronger however, but I still seem to always fall back to creativity. I just want to thank you for all your inspiration. Both you and Alec of course. Perhaps that's how you two made such a wonderful game. Alec is probably more geared towards the left side of the brain, and Derek is probably more geared towards right side of the brain; together they made this whole package complete, and that is why I call it a Master Piece. Not many people take the time to put in so much effort, and so much detail into a project, both in graphics and in code. Kudos!

   

[Alec]

That looks awesome!

[Ugly Duck]

That is gorgeous. I particularly like the picture of the shallows. Not only does it have a real sense of depth of field, but the contrast is lovely. Needs a random monkey though, IMO. Quite an ambitious mod, I look forward to seeing it develop.

[Danger Mouse]

Thanks, I'm glad to see I'm getting some positive feedback. Currently I have no entities set in the maps. That will come later. But a lot of stuff is coming together on the "drawing board", so to speak. It looks like it's going to take a lot of lua scripting effort to get the younger Naija sprites to work right. Currently I'm going off the example created by the replace Naija mod. But things such as the swirling water particle effects, and clinging to walls, sit spots, sleeping spots and such aren't implimented. I'm sure even more will be involved once work starts on other suits, such as the energy form for starters. Going to need all new artwork for that, and animations. Definitely going to need pointers for the LUA scripting if you ever have the time Alec. I've already gone completely through the wiki and the LUA library basics. Unfortunately it's my weaker point in the creation process, but I'm a quick learner and hopefully will work my way through it with some direction.

[inkblob]

ooooooo that looks fabulous! this is helping to stoke the fire under my butt to do a mod, I just need an idea that I can run with and feel inspired by! can't wait to see a playable version!

[Hiro]

Dude, that looks so awesome!

I love your idea. And it looks like you have a good start there. Good luck man. 

That squidy dark picture is creepy. o.o

[Danger Mouse]

Thank you again for the positive support and encouragement! Seriously! You don't know how much that helps on keeping up motivation. Today I spent the majority of the day making new tiles. The first chapter has been coming together nicely, and the main storyline is coming together well too. I must say a lot of it is inspired from multiple games; aquaria of course but with a legend of zelda and metroid feel to design and game elements. I'm really liking the multiple pet idea that grows over time, and has powers that will help you solve puzzles to advance as well as help fight, and I might implement it as well, possibly with meshing it into the story line where your first pet that becomes of great help to advance through the story but sacrifices itself in doing so. But, in it's loss you get a different pet with different abilities that will be more helpful (I'm thinking along the lines of both the bird for quick transportation in legend of zelda so that it's with you and you don't have to go running all over the map for a turtle ride... however I might make it so that will be the only way at first, just to make it more work to get places so that it gives you the time to actually see and experience everything). Just ideas at the moment though.

Still working on Sprites, Story, and Level design... all the Lua scripting stuff will come when I'm done with those.

Has anyone thought of making more Particle Effects?

Alec: In the upcoming release, will the Animation Editor not close out of your mod when you exit it? Also, will there be more stuff involved with the Particle Effects Section?

ALSO: Will there be a way to seperate MODS, from Released/Installed mods, so that people don't just use the Map Editor and press P to move their main character through-out the maps??? I'd really like to see this one implemented.

[silverflagon]

Dangermouse that looks awesome, I nearly said something along those line last night but I was tired and sleepy after sharing some vino with my son (celebrating his coming birthday) so I decided to wait and let Alec, Dave or someone else have the honours of first reply.
Have you added some more screenshots since last night, only I swear that those lower jump scenes weren't there when I looked?

[Danger Mouse]

silverflagon:
Dangermouse that looks awesome, I nearly said something along those line last night but I was tired and sleepy after sharing some vino with my son (celebrating his coming birthday) so I decided to wait and let Alec, Dave or someone else have the honours of first reply. Cheesy
Have you added some more screenshots since last night, only I swear that those lower jump scenes weren't there when I looked?

No they were there from the first post... but I will post more, currently busy with new tiles though.
I had just realized earlier today that the "Mithalas" rock was being displayed backwards, so I made my own, and it's now facing the right direction. lol

[Danger Mouse]

Hiro:
Dude, that looks so awesome!
I love your idea. And it looks like you have a good start there. Good luck man.  Azn
That squidy dark picture is creepy. o.o

Yeah, you don't want to get too close to the Squidy, I already have it made so that it grabs you and pulls you in, unfortunately currently you can't get back out of its grasp though, that's what Li will be for though. *spoiler*

[Hiro]

Lol.

Eehhh, I can't read Aquarian anymore.. *sniff*. I did draw a picture with "where am I" written on it in that language though lol.

[Danger Mouse]

[Edit Original Post]  Now for those that don't have a way to decipher the caption on the rock image, it's written below the rock.

There you go Hiro.

So, I spent the day working on a new pet, the list of functions on the wiki just isn't good enough!! There's so much information missing still it's crazy. Alec if you read this, hopefully you have some time to revise the function lists so that they are fully explained with what ranges can be used for the functions and so forth. I'm sure if you looked through it you'll see what I mean. Not to discredit all the work gone into gathering that information and posting it. But it needs a serious overhaul and update for the modders to be able to continue work with new content.

If I could recommend a feature for the Animation Editor I would suggest making it so that when you hit play animation there is a progress bar to indicate what frame it is at while it's playing. If what I am suggesting is confusing then let me put it this way; The Animation Editor could use a scroll line like that of Windows Media Player or any other movie player that allows you to see a marker of where in the time-line of frames it is currently at, allowing for live rewind, fast-forward, stop and play. The reason I'm recommending this is so that it is a LOT easier to tell in an animation loop where movement is not what you would like or expect.

I'm thinking maybe it could look better, instead of just the gradient white background. Perhaps a screen more like the in game menu or something. If you want I could come up with some artwork on my spare time for it. Aquaria excels in graphics everywhere except there, in fact I'd say that the only part of the game that needs any attention is the Editor and Support for it.

I know that most of the focus is on converting to different operating systems to expand the games audience , but these things will help expand the games user audience as well as experiences. And surely it would speed up the releases of mods as well.

BTW: Alec, This game truely is a masterpiece. *Two Thumbs Up!*

Note: If any of you other modders have learned ways of scripting new things in LUA for aquaria, please post a tutorial.  I'm sure it would be appreciated by all of us here working on new mods. I'll make sure that anything that I've managed to create, I'll post information on how I made something work. It may not be for everyone, but certainly it may help others interested in creating mods.

[Alec]

BTW: Alec, This game truely is a masterpiece. *Two Thumbs Up!*

*high five* 

[Danger Mouse]

I know I have gotten my own creations to work with the animation editor, but for some reason I'm having issues this time around. I followed the tutorial to the 't' this time and my bones are loading fine into the animation editor, and I'm able to animate my everything just fine, everything saves fine in it as well. But when I place the entity that I have correctly placed in the entitygroups.txt it shows up as a white box, and if I select it and escape out then place it on my map in entity mode it only shows up with the main bone and doesn't animate at all.

Here's what I'm working with:
leftbrain.png

middlebrain.png

rightbrain.png

top.png

All 56x56 resolution, placed in _Mods/Lost_Treasures/graphics/pinkjelly/.
I have the following pinkjelly.xml in the animations folder:

<AnimationLayers>
    <AnimationLayer />
</AnimationLayers>
<Bones>
    <Bone idx="0" gfx="pinkjelly/top" pidx="-1" name="Top" fh="0" fv="0" gc="1" cr="0" cp="0 0" />
    <Bone idx="1" gfx="pinkjelly/middlebrain" pidx="0" name="MiddleBrain" fh="0" fv="0" gc="1" cr="0" cp="0 0" />
    <Bone idx="2" gfx="pinkjelly/rightbrain" pidx="0" name="RightBrain" fh="0" fv="0" gc="1" cr="0" cp="0 0" />
    <Bone idx="3" gfx="pinkjelly/leftbrain" pidx="0" name="LeftBrain" fh="0" fv="0" gc="1" cr="0" cp="0 0" />
</Bones>
<Animations>
    <Animation name="idle">
        <Key e="0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="0.1 0 4 -8 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 -1 0 0 2 1 0 0 0 3 -1 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="0.2 0 9 -14 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 -2 0 0 2 1 -1 0 0 3 -2 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="0.6 0 -1 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="0.9 0 2 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
    </Animation>
    <Animation name="swimloop">
        <Key e="0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="0.4 0 0 -53 -68 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="0.8 0 -68 -95 -105 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="1.2 0 -83 -19 -188 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="1.6 0 -125 32 -141 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="2 0 -154 86 -234 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="2.4 0 -75 98 -330 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="2.8 0 -22 15 -351 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="3.1 0 14 -80 -327 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="3.5 0 69 -123 -284 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="3.9 0 108 -89 -241 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="4.3 0 126 -23 -200 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="4.7 0 102 26 -164 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="5.1 0 55 81 -126 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="5.5 0 21 103 -160 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="5.9 0 24 123 -236 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="6.3 0 46 119 -326 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="6.7 0 42 94 -420 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="7.1 0 18 73 -433 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="7.5 0 -5 37 -376 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
        <Key e="7.9 0 0 1 -359 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 " />
    </Animation>
</Animations>

, and the pinkjelly.lua in the scripts folder:

--================================================================================================
-- P I N K  J E L L Y F I S H
--================================================================================================

dofile("scripts/entities/entityinclude.lua")

--================================================================================================
-- L O C A L  V A R I A B L E S
--================================================================================================

STATE_MYSTATE = 1000
localVar = 0

--================================================================================================
-- FUNCTIONS
--================================================================================================

function init(me)
   setupBasicEntity(
   me,
   "pinkjelly/top",         -- texture
   4,               -- health
   2,               -- manaballamount
   2,               -- exp
   1,               -- money
   48,               -- collideRadius (only used if hit entities is on)
   STATE_IDLE,            -- initState
   56,               -- sprite width
   56,               -- sprite height
   1,               -- particle "explosion" type, maps to particleEffects.txt -1 = none
   1,               -- 0/1 hit other entities off/on (uses collideRadius)
   4000               -- updateCull -1: disabled, default: 4000
)
end

function update(me, dt)
   entity_updateMovement(me, dt)
end

function dieNormal(me)
end

function enterState(me)
end

function exitState(me)
end

function damage(me, attacker, bone, damageType, dmg)
end

function hitSurface(me)
end

Maybe someone else can see what I'm doing wrong. :/
I surely would appreciate the help, been a while since I dabled with the entities.

[Danger Mouse]

Anyone?

Note: [Edit #2] For Original Post added today.