egomassive's Knytt Stories Plus mod

While experimenting with custom fonts, I noticed that KS+ Instructions seems to be missing the   from the start of the fifth row of characters. Browsers really seem to want to render this as   so I've decided to provide a .txt file that I think features the correct character slotted in with the others.

Also, as of version 1.2.6, two copies of KS+ Instructions appear, one outside of the main folder along with "oco letters.txt". A mistake?

Also, as of version 1.2.6, two copies of KS+ Instructions appear, one outside of the main folder along with "oco letters.txt". A mistake?

Yes, that's a mistake. "oco letters" refers to where I store values inside the program for my own personal reference.

Nice catch on the fonts instructions. I use Notepad++ for text editing. While I was trying to figure out what happened, it mysteriously happened to the file you provided as well. The character vanished. I corrected my copy of the instructions text, and it was correct when I closed and reopened it, but I guess I'll have to keep an eye on it from now on. I may just replace it with a normal space since it makes no difference to the text blitter in the program. For this and the question I saw you field about Level Editor failures yesterday I'm giving you a star.

I may just replace it with a normal space since it makes no difference to the text blitter in the program. For this and the question I saw you field about Level Editor failures yesterday I'm giving you a star.

It seems to stay intact in regular Notepad, though I'm definitely not encouraging you to use that instead.

There actually are a few differences. Firstly, &#160 can be used to pad out space at the very start of a sign, whereas   gets ignored. Secondly, that character can be repurposed for a custom symbol or other elaborate font replacements, such as the secondary character set you might have seen in The Empty Planet. I've been working on a tool to ease such substitutions with a friend, so the possibilities are very fresh in my mind. I won't mind if you do decide to just swap it for a regular space for the sake of convenience, as even from that webpage that character copies as a regular space no matter what I do. At least our flaws would match.

And thanks, I have extra appreciation for that star since it pushes me very close to a number you probably don't want me reaching yet. Not that I'm bothered about timeliness, and I hope nobody else is either!

There actually are a few differences. Firstly, &#160 can be used to pad out space at the very start of a sign, whereas   gets ignored. Secondly, that character can be repurposed for a custom symbol or other elaborate font replacements, such as the secondary character set you might have seen in The Empty Planet.

To clarify, I meant I'd change the character in the instructions. The game engine would not change the way it treats them. However, it may make things confusing for people who know the difference between the two.

Your project sounds like something I could use myself. Although I've avoided any Empty Planet spoilers, I believe I'm doing something similar in my own level. I considered incorporating an interface in my editor, but ultimately decided it would not benefit enough people to justify the effort. I would certainly like to host a download link on my website since it'll be relevant to KS+ designers.

I don't think we'll be making a downloadable version of the tool (or even changing it all that much). It currently works as well as I need it to, though maybe its  interface is a little inscrutable. Here's a GIF I recorded of myself using it. Bearing in mind that it probably won't be 'polished', if you'd still like to link to it or even host it, that sounds great to me. It's just a lone html file and might stay in that state, but I'll ponder improvements I can make for a little longer. Suggestions are welcome as well.

Neat but not at all what I was expecting. I can see how that would benefit you with a font like Plural's. I was imagining something like Windows' Character Map tool. You could mouse click the digits you want directly from your custom font image.

I am experiencing a pretty disastrous bug.

It started a few days ago when I tried to create a new KS level using the editor. I was at this point using the most-recent-but-one version of  KS+. The level name I created had a colon in it, along the lines of 'Shooby: sha Dooby da Wooby', which is the only odd circumstance I can think of. I was creating a KS+ level.

Anyway, the editor generated a totally blank level; it didn't contain the default new-level first screen and then I realised that the world.ini was completely blank. Further investigation revealed that the editor hadn't even generated a world folder for the level. A later check revealed that the level isn't appearing in the KS+ player level directory.

At this point I reset the editor and tried creating the level afresh with the same title. I got the following error message:

DirPacker Error: Directory Exists

Well ok, I thought, that possibly makes sense at this stage. Having lost motivation for starting a new level by now, I gave up for a few days.

Since then I've come back to it and had the problem persist. I tried recreating the level with the same title and got the same error message. Then I decided to give up on that title and tried to create a level with a different title; I got the same error message. I went so far as to randomly bash keys to try and generate a level title I couldn't possibly have entered or installed before but got the same error message again.

Since then I have switched to the most up-to-date version KS+ and re-downloaded the most recent level editor. I've tried creating a vanilla KS level instead of a KS+ level... bug still persists. I wanted to try creating the level with the vanilla editor but my virus checker has now picked up on the Trojan in there and kindly deleted both my copy and my backup without asking my permission. I could probably (possibly) bypass the problem by C'n'Ping another level's world folder and clearing its contents for a fresh start... I'm out of ideas for a fix, short of reinstalling vanilla KS (I haven't tried that since the 'Dragon Myth' ball is now back in my court and a few hours' work from release. Once it's done I'll come back to banging my head off of this problem).


I don't know if this is related to the two minor bugs I reported a while ago that you couldn't reproduce, though downloading the most recent version seems to have fixed the ambience-consistence-after-reset problem I was having.

The level name I created had a colon in it, along the lines of 'Shooby: sha Dooby da Wooby', which is the only odd circumstance I can think of.

Colon is a verboten character in Windows filenames of any kind, so I suspect this is the root of the issue. Sounds like KS+ could be missing a check for this, though!

I believe you can fix the error message you're getting by deleting the folder in the Worlds folder called "Nifflas - Template". I think it gets created when something goes wrong with making a new level.

Jdl, you're a genius! Thanks!

I'm trying to be a bit cheeky, using object 15:6 (the block that appears as you get closer to it) for an OCO, but it doesn't seem to work.  Is there anything I can do about that?

I don't know how well it will suit your purposes, but if 15:6 turns out to be impossible, the next best thing would probably be 14:20. Admittedly, it would pop in more than fading in gradually, and you might have to add an invisible wall tile, but maybe you could get the result you wanted.

On another note: attached below is a version of the KS+ Info.png file that should behave identically, but is 3KB smaller. Almost pointless, yes, but I already made it so I might as well post it.

I don't know how well it will suit your purposes, but if 15:6 turns out to be impossible, the next best thing would probably be 14:20. Admittedly, it would pop in more than fading in gradually, and you might have to add an invisible wall tile, but maybe you could get the result you wanted.

Way ahead of you - with a bit of subtle animation, I've gotten a 14:20 OCO to look nice and smooth.  5 frames of animation ain't a lot, but it's enough.

Huh, for some reason I've missed all posts in this thread since June. First of all, thanks to Jdl for solving Talps' problem. *Gives a well deserved star* I'll add this issue to my to-do list, as it will inevitably rear it's ugly head for another unsuspecting level designer.

@Sergio: I'll use the new info image. Why did you even make it? As for the music, I'll need to consider it. I'm wondering how much benefit they could provide this late in the game. A few knytt.bins will be smaller than they would have been. We'll have a slightly larger variety of default tunes for designers who use default music but not default KS. I'd actually really like to add them, but I can't come up with a reason that justifies the KS+ download increase.

@Ultigonio: There is no OCO support for the object you wanted because that object has no animation. It changes its transparency level which is something COs can't do. Technically you can animate a change in transparency, but I can't tell it to match its transparency to that of another object. For the same reason I haven't supported anything in the ghost category. I often think it would be useful even if the OCOs didn't flicker. However, it would be weird if something that wasn't ghostly didn't appear unless you had the ability to see ghosts.

@Sergio: I'll use the new info image. Why did you even make it? As for the music, I'll need to consider it. I'm wondering how much benefit they could provide this late in the game. A few knytt.bins will be smaller than they would have been. We'll have a slightly larger variety of default tunes for designers who use default music but not default KS. I'd actually really like to add them, but I can't come up with a reason that justifies the KS+ download increase.

PNG compression is one of my nerdier hobbies... I could probably have pushed it even further. I agree that there's basically no worthy justification for including the extra music.