Mods

(PC modes only) Overview
Want to create your own custom character in Blazing Beaks? Awesome, you are in the right place. Here you will find everything you need to create one. For creating character you might need character editor. You can download it: Blazing Beaks Character Editor

Also templates might be useful for creating sprites: Sprite templates

Also configuration template might be useful for creating mod manually: Config template

Guidelines

 * Don't use copyrighted material unless you have owners permission.
 * Don't use any assets from other games or any other media.
 * Mod should be finished and in fully working condition before making it available to public.
 * Don't reupload mods created by others.
 * Don't publish mods that are for personal use only.
 * Comply with Steam Subscriber Agreement and Rules and Guides for User Generated Content.

Character editor
To make character creation accessible for everyone we made Blazing Beaks Character Editor. Using this editor you can easily configure character parameters, import sprites, sounds, upload to Steam Workshop or export and share with other players. Recommendations and instructions on how to use editor can be found below.

Making mods without editor
You can also create character mods even without using character editor. You can find all your mods in C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Local\BlazingBeaks\mods. If mods folder does not exist, you should create it. mods folder should contain mods.txt file and each mod should be stored in separate folder. To start creating new character mod, make new folder in mods folder and insert the name into mods.txt file. Each folder name in mods.txt file need to be in a separate line. Folder name should contain only a-z, A-Z , 0-9 and _ symbols. Here's an example:

Using editor
To create new mod launch Blazing Beaks Character Editor (bbceditor.exe) and click Create Mod button. If there is a mod already created you can select it in the list and click Edit Mod to edit it.

After clicking Create Mod or Edit Mod buttons configuration window will be opened. In configuration tab you can edit various parameters. The list with all the parameters and what they do you can be found below.

Also you can delete mods by selecting them in the list and clicking Delete Mod button. If mod was created but not yet uploaded to Steam Workshop it will be deleted locally, if it was already submitted to Steam Workshop it will be deleted from Steam Workshop too. Please note that after deleting the mod from Steam Workshop all users will lose the access to the mod, it will also be completely deleted to all the users who subscribed to this mod through Steam Workshop. So in case you don't want to give others an access to your created mod anymore we recommend changing it's visibility to <font color="#b5a2b1">Hidden.

Editing manually
Once you created new directory for new character in <font color="#b5a2b1">mods folder and added character folder name to <font color="#b5a2b1">mods.txt, now you can use character configuration file <font color="#b5a2b1">config.ini from template. You will find all the parameters that can be changed in the list below.

Sprites
Every character has several sprites. For example some of them are used for idling, running, some are used in menu. If any of the sprites are not present, custom default sprites will be used. To make it easier to create your own sprites, sprite templates might be useful. The list of required sprites can be found below.

You will need have any of many software to create sprites and here are some of them that can be used:
 * Photoshop
 * Krita
 * Gimp
 * Aseprite
 * Pyxel Edit

Recommendations
Best way to create new character visuals is being consistent with current Blazing Beaks characters style and here are some best practices to do it:


 * Using template make sure that visuals are above red guideline.
 * Do not make too small or too big characters because the collider does not change and is the same for every character. Blue rectangle in templates represents stepping on obstacles collider and orange+blue rectagles represent hitbox for bullets.
 * Characters have "black" outline which is actually not black. It's color is RGB: <font color="#b5a2b1">26,26,32 or HEX: <font color="#b5a2b1">#1a1920 .
 * The same idle, walk and slide sprites are used for Skull keeper mode in Tournament except they have an additional yellow outline. It's color is RGB: <font color="#b5a2b1">255,221,102 or HEX: <font color="#b5a2b1">#ffdd66 
 * Frozen character sprite must have 50% oppacity for character to blend with ice block. It has a different outline and it's color is RGB: <font color="#b5a2b1">28,59,80 or HEX: <font color="#b5a2b1">#1c3b50 . In addition to that to better blend with ice block marked red pixels should be removed (if you use .psd template the layer name is <font color="#b5a2b1">"remove marked pixels" or if you use .png template there is an overlay with the same name).

Adding sprites
In Blazing Beaks Character editor <font color="#b5a2b1">"Sprites" tab you can import all the required sprites. Select the sprite according to it's name and editor will rename file if needed and place it where it should belong.

If you are adding sprites manually place all the sprite images in character mod folder and name it according to names.

Sounds
All the sounds must be in .ogg format. If any sound is missing the default one will be used. Although the sounds are not required to submit new character mod to Steam Workshop they make character alive, adds personality and make mod to look professional.

You will need some software to make sounds, you can use a free one:
 * Audacity

Adding sounds
Similarly as with sprites, in Blazing Beaks Character editor <font color="#b5a2b1">"Sounds" tab you can import all the sounds. Select the sound according to it's name and editor will rename file if needed and place it where it should belong. If you are adding sounds manually place all the sound files in character mod folder and name it according to file names in the list.

Testing
Before making mod available to public it is highly recommended to test it thoroughly and make sure that mod is fully functioning without any issues. In order to test a newly created mod there is no need to upload it to Steam Workshop.

If you created a mod with Blazing Beaks Characters editor and saved all the changes by clicking <font color="#b5a2b1">Back and choosing <font color="#b5a2b1">Yes in prompt window you can launch the game and a new character should already be there. If you went through the process of manually creating a mod just run the game will load your mod if you setup everything correctly.

Every time you make changes to your mod, Blazing Beaks has to be relaunched to load an updated mod.

Upload to Steam
To upload mod to Steam Workshop Blazing Beaks Character editor must be used. Configuration must be filled and sprite files imported. Additionally, go to <font color="#b5a2b1">"Steam" tab in Blazing Beaks Character Editor and import preview image and fields required for Steam Workshop (Title, description and change notes). Preview image must be square and at least of 512x512 size. Set visibity to <font color="#b5a2b1">Hidden. Make sure that Steam client is running and click <font color="#b5a2b1">Upload to Steam button to start uploading.

When mod is uploaded to Steam Workshop as <font color="#b5a2b1">Hidden you can subscribe to it on Steam Workshop and test it in the game. Make sure that everything is working properly before setting visibility to <font color="#b5a2b1">Friends only or <font color="#b5a2b1">Public. If you make any changes upload an update again.

Export
You can share your created mods with others without Steam Workshop. Using Blazing Beaks Characters Editor you can click <font color="#b5a2b1">Export button and mod folder will be created at your selected location with all the assets inside.

Troubleshooting
Aditionally:
 * Make sure that you accepted the latest Workshop Legal Agreement on your Steam account.
 * Make sure that all the texts used in your mod (title, name, descriptions, change notes and etc.) have only alphanumeric characters (A-Z, 0-9). Localized descriptions are not allowed.
 * Make sure that the computer path to your mod files does not contain any non-English characters - the upload will fail if it does.
 * Make sure that any 3rd party software (firewall, antivirus and etc.) is not rejecting the upload process.
 * If any of mod sprites don't look good in the game or cause any other issues make sure that the dimensions of the sprites are as per Sprite list table on this page.