Your browser does not seem to support JavaScript. As a result, your viewing experience will be diminished, and you have been placed in read-only mode.
Please download a browser that supports JavaScript, or enable it if it's disabled (i.e. NoScript).
A list
Given the lack of decent documentation of the editor, and the inaccuracy of that which does exist (node editing section of the tutorial, I'm looking at you), I've decided to go through the editor, and document what all of the keystrokes do in each editing mode. This list contains everything I've run into so far, but may not be complete- additions are welcome.
Notes: This list was created using Aquaria 1.1.0, running on a MacBook Pro with only the built-in keyboard and single-button trackpad for input. The operating system was Mac OS 10.5.5.
I have not worked out a way to set the visual properties of sprites (theoretically numpad 0-7) on a current Mac laptop keyboard, so I have not included those commands (sorry, I no longer trust any documentation for this thing that I haven't tested personally). Changing these properties may require editing the map XML directly.
- Edwards
GLOBAL
Tab Toggle between playing and editing. Shift-Click Duplicate sprite, node (but not entity). Control-Drag Rotate sprite, entity in 45° increments. Command-Drag Rotate sprite, entity smoothly. Option-Drag Drags the viewpoint around. Non-functional in windowed mode. W A S D Move view. F Create Aquarian language sprites at current cursor location. Does not change the editing mode. Control-E Bring up entity selection screen. Changes mode to Entity Edit Mode. Within the entity selection screen, E and R cycle through entity groups. Control-R "Recache Textures" (Not sure exactly what this does.) Shift-R Regenerate collisions (fixes problems caused by deleted sprites). Shift-F1 Load different map in mod. F1 Reload map. F2 Save map. F5 Switch to Tile Edit Mode. F6 Switch to Entity Edit Mode. F7 Switch to Node Edit Mode. F9 Toggle show collision boundaries mode. F11 Rebuild map from map template image. F12 Auto-generate map boundary sprites.
Note: If you have ExposĂŠ features assigned to the F-keys, and are working in windowed mode, ExposĂŠ will override Aquaria's use of the keys.
TILE EDIT MODE
Command-Shift-Drag Scale sprite (X and Y locked to same scale factor). Command-Shift-C-Drag Scale sprite in X dimension only. Command-Shift-V-Drag Scale sprite in Y dimension only. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Select background layers 0-6. (Note: The "out of map" black is in layer 4.) 8 9 Select foreground layers (7-8). B N M Select parallax layers (9-11). J Select Dark layer (12). , . / Select parallax layers (13-15). Shift-(layer key) If done while cursor is over an existing sprite, moves that sprite to the specified layer. Option-(layer key) Hides/unhides the specified layer. Option Moving the mouse (without clicking) creates an invisible rectangle, with all sprites within selected. Spacebar Place new sprite. E R Cycle forward, backward through sprites. Z Move sprite to back of layer. X Move sprite to front of layer. T Flip sprite horizontally. Y Flip sprite vertically. L Toggle sprite scaling type between Scale and Tile. O Change sprite non-damaging collision type. I Set sprite to damaging collisions. P Move player avatar to cursor location. Delete Delete selected sprite.
ENTITY EDIT MODE
Spacebar Place new entity. Delete Delete selected entity.
NODE EDIT MODE
Command-Shift-Drag Scale node (with independent control over x and y scaling). Control-Spacebar Place a new node. Spacebar If the cursor is over an existing node, adds a new link immediately after the selected node. If the cursor is not over an existing node, has no effect. N Change path of node. Y Toggle node shape from rectangular to circular and vice-versa. Delete Delete selected node.
This post has been edited by Edwards : 26 December 2008 - 02:26 PM
Have you checked this guide out? I find that to be pretty helpful.
Also, I'm working on improving the editor tutorial, so keep a look out for that in the future!
We had one of these with the aquaria wiki but that's sadly gone down. I had added all the controls not mentioned in the docs but the last archive of the page doesn't have any of that :(. I was going to add another page for animation editor controls but never got around to it.
"Option Do not select sprites on hover." Holding option and dragging the cursor will draw an invisible selection rectangle, selecting all objects within that rectangle.
"L Change sprite scaling from Scale to Tile (but not vice-versa. I have not found a way to restore sprites to Scale mode in the editor)." Weird, it works for me.
"Control-Drag Rotate sprite, entity in 45° increments." This is actually just control + move mouse horizontally. You don't need to click.
"Option-Click Move cursor to center of screen." In fullscreen mode, option+drag = drag map around. In windowed mode it's broken and just centers the cursor.
Command+click is equivalent to RMB (which is what you'd use in the windows version) Option+click is equivalent to MMB
I don't think you've missed anything that I had (except for a command which apparently served no purpose and was removed).
This post has been edited by Guy : 23 December 2008 - 08:18 PM
@adam_0, on Dec 23 2008, 05:44 PM, said in Editor Controls:
I have gone through that guide a few times, and I agree that it's useful- it's where I finally found the correct command to create a new node. However, it's very incomplete.
@guy, on Dec 23 2008, 05:59 PM, said in Editor Controls:
Thanks for the comments- I've fixed the things you pointed out. Regarding the wiki, someone really needs to put up a new one- regardless of whether the contents of the previous one can be salvaged, we need to have a place to consolidate editing information now.
@edwards, on Dec 24 2008, 01:22 PM, said in Editor Controls:
Interesting problem and I can't help with it but I thought I'd just add that if you edit the effects file and add more effects types then the full 0-9 works to set them. If anyone's interested I've also documented the effects file as best I can. I was going to put it on the wiki but...
This post has been edited by Guy : 26 December 2008 - 01:13 AM
Give me a day or two, and I'll see what I can do. Any wiki software requests? I'm not familiar with any of them (where by "familiar" I mean "have installed in the past"), so I'm willing to use whatever people like best.
@guy, on Dec 25 2008, 11:11 PM, said in Editor Controls:
Interesting problem and I can't help with it but I thought I'd just add that if you edit the effects file and add more effects types then the full 0-9 works to set them.
...Which in turn implies that it's likely possible to have an effectively limitless number of effects if you edit the map file directly, as the effect type is just stored as an ordinary number there (although I haven't yet bothered to find out which number it is ). Interesting.
Oh, and regarding the "swap between scale and tile" command, it started working for me after I restarted Aquaria. Weird that it only half -worked earlier, though.
@cheleball, on Dec 27 2008, 06:06 AM, said in Editor Controls:
I'd suggest you head over to the bit-blot forums to discuss it (specifically, here). We have to remember that the Windows user base is much larger than us
This post has been edited by Guy : 26 December 2008 - 06:49 PM
@guy, on Dec 26 2008, 02:25 PM, said in Editor Controls:
OK, I posted to that thread (I'm ryos on that forum), but that shouldn't stop y'all from voicing opinions.
Okay, I'm not really familiar with anything either so I don't have any preferences but here's a possibility: Wikia. This is used for the EVN wiki. Free hosting, though it does have ads and stuff.
Wikia looks interesting, but if I take on responsibility for administrating the wiki, I'd want to have full control, and that means using my hosting account.
Since there wasn't much input either way, I decided to just use MediaWiki. See my post at the Bit Blot forums for details.