This is the old version of the documentation. Please go to tapgiles.com/docs to find the latest version! (If that takes you back here, please clear your cache to fix this.)
With Video References
Table of Contents: To see a table of contents, please use the Document Outline. To show this, open the View menu and select Show Document Outline.
This document is based on my own experience with Dreams, as well as the many videos online showing how to use Dreams.
Note that this is a living document that is being edited often. As such, as you use this document, what you are reading may move around as I add more content. For larger additions, I type things up in a separate place to avoid doing that too often. But when I paste it in here, the entire document may shift down a page or two. I don’t think there’s any way around this right now, unfortunately.
Video Credits:
Mm - Media Molecule. Youtube, Twitch. PSN: Media Molecule, MmOfficial, MmDreamQueen.
Tg - tapgiles (me). Twitch, Youtube. PSN: Supposer.
Jj - JimmyJules153. Youtube. PSN: JimmyJules153.
Pk - Pookachoo. Youtube. PSN: Pooachoo.
Cc - CuriousCat. Youtube.
At - Atomtwix. Youtube.
Ne - NeonTheCoder. Youtube.
Ao - AmazingOomoo. Youtube.
Bg - BoggoStreams. Twitch, Youtube. PSN: Doepfish.
Ac - Aecert. Twitch, Youtube. PSN: Aecert.
You will see links with these abbreviations in the document. These are links to particular moments in particular videos where they are showing or explaining the features discussed directly prior to the link. or if there’s a link at the start of a section, it may cover that general topic and you may find what you’re looking for in there. It can be useful to see these tools in action, to really understand how they’re used.
There are (?) markers showing places where I’d like to confirm I’ve understood how things work correctly, to double-check my explanation is correct.
I’ve made good progress on the documentation so far. The tutorial videos people have released have been very useful! There is, however, a long way to go.
Below is a list of gadgets I haven’t got anything detailed for or do not have videos for. The biggest way people can help me with this project would be to send me links to videos (or create them) that talk about the gadgets to some extent, and particularly those that show each tab of the tweak menu on-screen.
Advanced Mover Advanced Rotator Controller Sensor Checkpoint Destroyer Dialogue Text Displayer Emitter Follower Force Applier Global Settings Grab Sensor Gyroscope | Health Manager Health Modifier Impact Sensor Laser Scope Look At Rotator Movement Sensor Mover Node Number Displayer Prize Bubble Puppet Interface Randomiser | Rocket Rotator Rotation Sensor Rotator Ruler Rumbler Score Score Modifier Subtitle Displayer Switch Teleporter Timeline Wiper |
Advanced Mover Advanced Rotator Controller Sensor Checkpoint Destroyer Dialogue Text Displayer Emitter Follower Force Applier Global Settings Grab Sensor Gyroscope | Health Manager Health Modifier Impact Sensor Laser Scope Look At Rotator Movement Sensor Mover Node Number Displayer Prize Bubble Puppet Interface Randomiser | Rocket Rotator Rotation Sensor Rotator Ruler Rumbler Score Score Modifier Subtitle Displayer Sun & Sky Switch Teleporter Timeline Wiper |
A “DS4” controller is a regular PS4 controller with sticks and triggers and buttons and the touchpad.
Move controllers have a “primary” controller used to do most things within the game (signified by the imp have eyes and a mouth) and a “secondary” controller used mostly to tweak settings as you create (signified by the imp having no face).
Any button shortcuts mentioned here without specifying which move controller it is on should be assumed to be on the primary move controller. If R2 is mentioned but not the move controller equivalent, it’s a pretty safe bet it will be the primary trigger.
The UI is configured to work well for right-handed people by default (as in, they hold the primary move controller in their right hand, and the menu appears to the right of their secondary controller). To change this to left-handed, press Options, click Accessibility, and look for the Handedness setting.
The “shift” button changes the function of other buttons. The shift button on a DS4 controller is L1. The shift button with the move controllers is triangle on the secondary move controller.
To do most things in 3D space, use R2 on the DS4 or the primary trigger with the move controllers. For example, to move an object, hover over it, hold R2, move it around, and let go of R2. Using the move controllers, use the primary trigger in the same way to move and rotate an object at the same time.
With the DS4, hold L2 to rotate an object by twisting the controller or using the sticks. (Tg) (Which axes are used by which sticks?) Alternatively, you can touch the touchpad and drag around to rotate the object without holding L2, or use two fingers in a rotating gesture just like on a phone or tablet. You can rotate an object while holding it, or when just hovering over it.
To clone an object, hold shift and move it. You will now be holding a copy of what you were hovering over, while the original stays in place. See Cloning Sculpts, and Live Cloning.
Tip: If you want to make a clone in the exact same spot, turn on grid mode. Now, you’d have to move your hand a lot to accidentally move the copy before placing it. (Mm)
To multi-clone, press up and down (or secondary X and square) while holding the copy to add clones either between the new copy and the original or beyond the new copy. When adding between, the change in transformation between the original and clone will be subdivided for each multi-clone. When adding beyond, the change in transformation will be added for each multi-clone. Note that change in rotation is applied before position, meaning if you rotate an object and move it, it will bow out in a path towards the final position rather than simply rotating in place linearly.
To “click” on a UI button in the menu, or to drag a UI element within a tweak menu, use X.
Select any object by pressing X. Deselect everything you have selected by pressing circle. Select all objects within the current scope by double-tapping X (pressing X twice in quick succession).
“Scoping in” to an object lets you manipulate it directly. (Mm) “Scoping out” of an object stops manipulating it directly. If the object is a group, you will simply scope in to that group. Not all objects can be scoped into. Scope in to an object by pressing shift + X. Scope out of an object by pressing shift + circle.
Note, if you’re holding an object with R2 and you scope into a group, that object will now be inside that group. Same for grabbing something within a group and scoping out of that group. (Mm)
Also, if you scope into an object that isn’t currently grouped while holding another object, this will automatically create a group that includes the “scoped-in” object and the “held” object (?). (Tg)
In most cases, you should use this technique to add individual objects to a larger group, rather than the other way around. If you hold a group and scope-in to a non-grouped object, it will create a new group, which contains individual object and the group you were holding. So now, to get into that original group, you will need to scope in twice. Do this again and again and you can end up with many many layers of groups before you can manipulate the object you wanted to move in the first place. (Tg)
To undo, press left on the d-pad. To redo, press right on the d-pad. When using move controllers, primary square while tilting the controller left (anti-clockwise) to undo, or tilting right (clockwise) to redo.
To change your view, use the left stick to move the camera relative to the current view (like strafing in a first-person game): left and right to move left and right, and up and down to move forwards and backwards. Holding L1 while moving the left stick up or down will move up or down relative to the current camera angle. Use the right stick to rotate the camera around the imp.
Holding R1 will put you into grabcam mode. When used while not holding anything and hovering over an object, the imp will zoom over to its surface and grab it, allowing you to swing yourself around it using the sticks. Otherwise, holding R1 will let you move around relative to the imp itself. For example, this can be useful for getting closer to a shape you’re about to place in a sculpt.
Holding shift and pressing R1 while hovering over an object or window will zoom your view to that object or window. (Tg)
Flip an object by pressing L3 or R3 while holding it. (Tg) Or with the moves, while holding the object with the primary trigger, hold secondary square and arrows will appear. Flick the secondary controller in a direction and it will flip along one of those arrows.
Open any object’s tweak menu by pressing shift + square. If multiple objects of the same kind are selected when opening the tweak menu (?) any changes made using the tweak menu will be applied to all selected objects. (Mm) Note: may be bugged in beta.
Drag using X to change settings. Press triangle on a setting in a tweak menu to reset its value will to default. (Mm) When dragging a value slider from a non-default value, it will also “stick” on the default setting.
For example, a slider defaults to 0 and it’s currently on 10. If you drag the slider towards -3, it will stop at 0. Let go and drag again to move it beyond the default value.
Press up or down on the d-pad of the DS4 to increase or decrease the value of a slider one notch. Or for move controllers, use the secondary X to increase and secondary square to decrease (?).
Some menu items have a small circle to the bottom-right of it that is either empty or has a checkmark inside. I will refer to these as “menu switches.” These can be clicked with X to check or uncheck that option.
Some menu items have a darker background with a lighter section going across it. These are effectively sliders for various effects, which I will refer to as “menu sliders”. Hold X on a menu slider and drag up and down to adjust it.
Hold R2 to move windows around. Note, when hovering over a gadget within a window, this will move the gadget instead.
Press X on the window’s title at the top to edit the gadget’s name.
There are 3 buttons on the top-right of every window:
“Save Position” will save the position and rotation of the window so that next time you open it, it will open in the same position. (Mm) When green, the window is in the same position as the one stored. When yellow, the window is in a different position to the one stored. When grey (“off”), there is no stored position.
“Pin to Screen” will attach the window to the screen itself. This allows you to move around the scene while still being able to see anything “pinned to screen.” Note that when you turn off “pin to screen,” the window will return to the in-scene location it was in before it was pinned to the screen.
“Close” closes the window. Shortcut: shift + circle.
There are four types of creation.
Dreams are rectangular. They contain scenes or other dreams, and they can be linked together by plugging wires into doorway nodes of different scenes. (Tg) If there is more than one scene that could be seen within the dream map, a map button is shown on the dream’s cover page.
Dreams can have a maximum of 200 scenes (including scenes nested within other dreams). Dreams can be nested up to 4 deep—including the top-level dream. Only 50 dream creations can be contained within another dream.
If a player has played the dream before, a red reset button is shown on the dream’s cover page. Click this and confirming will delete all data about their playthrough including persistent variables and which scenes they’ve played and which was the last one they played.
When a scene is within a dream, the current values of any variables marked “persistent” will be saved before leaving that scene. And if the dream is in the dreamiverse—whether private, mixable, or playable—scoreboards will keep a record of all posted scores coming from any scenes within it.
They cannot be remixable. (Tg)
Use shift + square on a scene to adjust its “lock mode” and “assigned scoreboards” settings.
There are 4 lock modes, and these affect how scenes are shown and how they can be interacted with within the dream’s map.
A scene has a locked state and a visibility state. When unlocked, the scene can be clicked on in the map view to get to its cover page. When locked, the scene cannot be clicked on but is visible. When visible, a scene can be seen within the map view. When invisible, it cannot.
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When inside a dream, scenes can store values between playthroughs and between scenes. See Persistent Variables.
When uploaded to the dreamiverse, a dream can display scoreboards from the cover page and scores can be posted from scenes within the dream. (Overview Jj) See the Score and Score Modifier gadgets.
If you own the dream, you can edit the scoreboards to tell Dreams what kind of scoreboard it is. Click on the scoreboards icon on the cover page, scroll over to the scoreboard you want to edit, and then click on the pencil button on the top-right. (Jj) Here you can set a number of options:
“Score Unit” has two options. “Number” will display the score as a number. “Time” will display the number as a time, with the integer part of the score representing one second.
“Better score is…” has two options. “Higher” will sort the scores highest-first. “Lower” will sort the scores lowest-first.
“Multiplayer Boards” has two options. This option is used when there have been scores posted for that number of players(?) to that scoreboard, without the “multiplayer” option turned on for that score gadget(?). “Separate” will show a dropdown to select the player count of the scores to show (so if “2 Player” is selected, only 2 player scores will be shown). “Combined” will display all such scores in the same view, with no dropdown to filter them. Note that changing this option will reset all scores (possible bug?).
Scenes are circular. They contain external elements, and things created directly inside the scene. All scenes have an entrance by default. They can also have doorway gadgets that will show up as nodes when linking scenes in a dream.
They may be remixable.
Elements are hexagonal. They may are individual creations that people can bring into their own creations. They may contain external elements. They are always remixable.
Collections look like a circular dotted line with 3 thumbnails of contained creations featured. These may contain any kind of creation. They cannot be remixable.
Everything you see in a scene is rendered using flecks. Flecks are images. That’s about it. But thousands and thousands of them are rendered across the scene to give the impression that things are solid.
“Looseness” is the size of each individual fleck. And, for sculpts (?) this means fewer of them are rendered to cover their surface. So high looseness means large flecks which means fewer of them being rendered. The opposite of loose is tight.
Note that flecks by themselves are transparent. As such, anything behind a fleck such as in a painting must still be rendered to the screen. On the other hand, sculpts are always opaque which means things behind a sculpt can be skipped, saving on rendering time. (Tg)
Everything starts with the menu.
While using the DS4, press square to open the menu at the top of the screen (depending on your settings). And square to close it again. Context menus will appear on the right side of the screen.
While using the move controllers, the menu will appear next to your secondary move controller while pulling the secondary trigger. While the menu is showing, the context menu will display just below it. While the menu is not showing, the context menu will hang by the secondary controller at an angle.
There are a number of modes. These modes have some tools and abilities unique to that mode. Some are activated automatically when taking other actions.
Select an imported object with X. A context menu button will appear to “edit source” (it will be disabled if you are unable to edit it). Click on it to start editing that creation. If you have done this, an extra button will be shown in the pause menu allowing you to go back to the creation in which the thing you are editing was used. This lets you quickly flick back and forth between creations. You can then use Update Mode to update all instances of that object once you’re back in the original creation. (Tg)
See Sculpt Mode.
Automatically creates a new empty sculpt.
Activated when scoping-in to a sculpt, allowing you to edit that sculpt.
See Paint Mode.
Automatically creates a new painting.
Activated when scoping-in to a painting, allowing you to edit that painting.
See Coat Mode.
Provides tools to affect coat settings on sculpts and paintings.
See Style Mode.
Provides tools to affect the style of the flecks on sculpts and paintings.
See Effects Mode.
Provides tools to add animation to the flecks on sculpts and paintings.
See Sound Mode.
Provides tools and gadgets to record audio and create music, sound effects, etc.
See Test Mode.
Allows the creator to play the game while all gadgets, etc. are still visible. Very useful for debugging and playtesting. (Tg)
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Shows a list of all imported creations. Allows the creator to update all copies of a particular creation, or turn on “auto-update” so that each time they come in to edit, copies of that creation will update to the latest version. (Tg)
Allows the creator to position the view and take a photo in edit mode, with gadgets shown or hidden.
(Mm)
Shortcut: R3 on the DS4. Move controllers have to use the menu button.
Starts time running. Click again to pause time. (Pk)
Shortcut: R3 on the DS4. Move controllers have to use the menu button.
Starts time running. Click again to pause time.
The menu items listed here are shown when not in any particular mode. See sculpt mode context menu and paint mode context menu for mode-specific context menus.
Only available when more than one(?) painting has been selected, and no other types of objects have been selected(?).
Permanently merges and flattens paintings into a single painting object. (Can be undone, but there is no “unmerge” button.) The flattening process converts any kaleidoscope or mirror effects into regular edits. (Pk) Note that this also means that those paintings will not benefit from clones all referencing the same original painting. So if you have 2 clones of one painting, and merge them together, the graphics thermometer used by those paintings will double(?).
(How does merging affect the new painting’s origin and endpoint positions?)
Merging paintings uses less gameplay(?) thermometer than having many separate paintings. However, because it flattens things like mirrored strokes and kaleidoscoped strokes into individual edits, there may be more stored edits than you had without merging.
Displays the number of selected paintings next to the button.
Saves the selection as a new creation. Asks for a name.
Shortcut: triangle while hovering over the selection or an unselected object.
Delete the object from the scene.
Shortcut: shift + square while hovering over the selection or an unselected object.
Opens the tweak menu for the current object.
Shortcut: shift + X while hovering over the selection or an unselected sculpture.
Only available when 1(?) sculpture is selected.
Edits the selected sculpture.
Shortcut: shift + X while hovering over the selection or an unselected sculpture.
Only available when 1(?) painting is selected.
Edits the selected painting.
Sculpts can be scoped into to edit them.
When going into sculpting mode, you will have the smear tool active by default, with the cube shape selected.
Advice: Add a negative shape, then multi-clone it around in a spiral or whatever line you want to cut out. (Mm)
A sculpt is made up of an ordered list of edits that the system uses to play back how you made it to recreate the sculpt when it is used in a scene. (Tg) (Tg) Each edit only affects the edits made before it.
For example, say you’ve placed a positive sphere, then a negative wedge to cut out part of the sphere. You can add a positive cube to where that negative wedge was. Because it was added after the negative edit, it won’t be affected by it. And because the sphere was added before the negative edit, it will be affected by it.
Use R2 or the primary trigger to place an edit. Edits cannot be scoped into, neither can they be selected.
While using any tool, press circle to exit the tool and default to the Move tool. (Pk)
A sculpt adds to the graphics thermometer based on its outer surface area and detail resolution. But cloning a sculpt adds only a tiny amount to the gameplay thermometer. So to optimise thermometer use, it’s a good idea to reuse sculpts as much as possible. (Mm) (Mm) (Mm)
For rendering, Dreams uses a combination of flecks and a hard inner body (sometimes referred to as the “hull”). The inner and outer parts of rendering can be adjusted separately. The more loose the flecks are, the more of the inner body can be seen through the flecks. (Pk)
While using the stamp or smear tools (smear is the default), you can toggle between the two using L1 + triangle. (Tg)
The first ever edit you make in a new sculpt will set the origin point of the sculpt and its orientation. These are used to dictate where the mirror line is and where the kaleidoscope will rotate around. When realigning the grid to the sculpt, this origin point and orientation is also used.
While holding a shape, tap the spheres of the two move controllers together to enter non-uniform scale mode. Here, each imp is attached to a different part of the shape. As you move the controllers around, the shape will scale to keep those two points attached to the imps.
This resizing of the shape is equivalent to going into edit shape mode, and using the stretch tool to drag out the shape in various directions.
The specific points attached to the imps will differ for different shapes.
Note this mode works differently for the curve shape.
(Mm)
A menu toggle between making edits add or subtract. This means different things depending on the tool used. Shortcut: triangle. (Pk)
When in subtract mode, an extra menu switch appears for Add+Subtract. When checked, this allows you to have different settings for adding and subtracting, making it easy to swap between two kinds of shapes while editing the sculpt.
If you click on a shape menu item, you will get the default settings and default scaled shape.
Defaults to a spherical shape. But there are a number of differences.
Smearing in its sphere configuration is a lot smoother than smearing with a normal sphere. With a sphere, many spheres are placed along the line you draw out, meaning you can often see where they intersect. Smearing with a curve in sphere configuration creates many curve instances(?), which are perfectly smooth along their length.
Also, the harder you pull R2 while smearing the larger the sphere gets, and the softer you pull R2 the smaller the sphere gets.
In edit shape mode, there are special handles added to the shape that you can use to manipulate the curve.
When still in sphere configuration, there is only one handle with a “stretch” icon. Drag that around to move the “end” of the curve, while the “start” stays in the same position. (Pk) Once the sphere configuration has been stretched out, there will not be a total of 6 handles: 4 stretch handles along the length, with two of those at either end, and two tapering handles past either end.
Dragging the stretch handles pulls those parts of the curve. The further away from the straight-line position of that part of the curve the handle is, the lesser its effect on that part of the curve. This results in a nice, smooth curve, regardless of how you position things. (Pk)
The tapering handles at either end manipulate how “fat” the corresponding end is. Dragging one of the handles further away from its end makes that end fatter, and dragging it closer to that end makes it sharper.
When using the move controllers, you can do this in a more intuitive way if you prefer—though with less control over the middle 2 handles. Tap the spheres together like you would to go into non-uniform scale mode. Now, either end of the curve is attached to the nearest imp. A natural curve will be made between them. Twist(?) either controller to adjust the fatness of that end of the curve.
A selection of groups of colour (eg. shades of green). To the far left is the colour picker, as well as any saved colours or colour mixers.
A tool. DS4 shortcut: press the touchpad. Move shortcut: tap secondary sphere to primary base.
A colour picker. Around the outside is a circular hue slider. In the middle is a triangular shade picker (saturation and brightness). In the gaps between the shade and hue selectors is a preview of the currently selected colour. (Tg)
Use X or R2 or the move’s primary trigger to pick a colour. This will be displayed as a blob in the “Pure” area.
Drag the colour to the “Mixed” area to add a blob of it to the mixer. You can add multiple colour blobs to the mixer, and they will merge like a soft-blend in a sculpt. While this mixed colour is selected, each time you use a tool that applies colour it will apply a different one of those selected colours. Use R2 or the primary trigger to spin the mixed blobs to have them transition to each other. The current colour under the crosshair in the middle of the mixer will be used as the current colour in that moment. Use the same control to stop them spinning. (Mm) (Tg)
Press “Save” to store the selected colour or mixed colour to the main palette in the menu for later use. These are only stored within this scene.
Use X on something within the scene to grab that colour. (Tg) Note that this is not affected by lighting.
Sets the base fleck type for the entire sculpture. (Pk) Will not affect application of the Style Mode Apply Fleck tool(?).
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When checked, hides everything not within that sculpt.
Creates a new sculpt, and edits it while keeping the active tool and settings you had before.
Shortcut: shift + square.
If using the DS4, the shape freezes in place while in this mode. When using the move controllers, there are many shortcuts to allow you to do the things you can do in Edit Shape mode without going into that mode.
Context menu item.
Stamps a single shape in its current position.
Move controllers shortcut: primary trigger.
A menu switch.
While checked, you can drag the sides of the shape in the same way you can with the Stretch Tool. Again, this has a live preview. (Pk)
If you bring make the shape thin enough, the shape itself will disappear and an outline of a cross-section of the shape will appear attached between the two imps. This would leave the shape in “extrude” mode.
With the DS4, while in edit shape mode click on the “grab point” button. With the secondary move, hold circle and hold the trigger over the shape. (Mm) While in this mode, a number of spherical nodes will appear on the shape. Select the one you want, and that will become the point attached to the end of your imp. Note that the angle you were holding your controller at will also be used as the angle you are holding the shape at (?).
Only available in Stamp Mode.
A menu slider that sets the amount of blending the current shape will have when added to as an edit to the sculpt. Shows a live preview. (Pk) More on what effect this has in the Stamp Mode section.
A menu switch. Only available in Stamp Mode.
When checked, will put the blending into “hard blending” mode. More on what effect this has in the Stamp Mode section.
A menu slider. Move shortcut: hold X and twist. (Mm)
Affects the size of the flecks of the edit. As the visuals are entirely made up of flecks, this can make the object look rough and deformed. (Does this affect the physics of the actual geometry?) (Pk)
A menu switch. Move shortcut: while holding X to adjust looseness, press primary triangle.
When on, the middle of a flat (?) surface will have as much looseness as possible, but the surface will become tighter as it approaches a corner. This effectively means you can have looser, more textured surfaces while keeping the edges tight and crisp. (Mm)
This is a menu slider. This is not available for all shapes(?).
The hole is defined by how far away from the outer surface of the shape the hole starts. Then everything from there in is cut away. (Pk)
This is a menu slider. This is only available when using the Spraypaint tool.
Dictates how much the existing surface colour of the sculpt is affected by the new colour. (Pk)
Click on this to cycle through the sections available for the current shape, which cuts away the shape into different fractions. Most of the time these sections are 1, 2 (half), and 4 (quarter). (Pk)
When adding a smear edit, keep it held and move the imp around, and more of the same shape will be added to the same edit. (Pk)
Note that even if you pull the trigger for a moment, it will likely place multiple of the selected shape—purely because of hand shake, etc. If you want to be sure you’re only adding a single shape in an edit, use the Stamp Shape tool.
Only one shape will be added when using the Stamp Shape tool, even if you drag the imp around while holding R2. (Pk)
The Stamp Shape tool allows you to blend the new edit with the existing edits. To increase the blend amount with the DS4, go into Edit Shape mode and drag the blend amount up using X. If using the move controllers, hold secondary square and twist the controller to adjust the blend amount. (Mm) To toggle between soft and hard blending modes, while holding secondary square, press primary triangle. (Mm)
The blending mode defaults to soft.
Soft Blending will smoothly transition existing edits towards the new edit (or transition away from the new edit if in negative mode). (Ne)
Hard Blending works the same way, but the transitions are more harsh, with one in-between step to blend the edits (?).
When adding positive geometry, blending will draw the existing geometry and the new geometry edit towards one another.
When adding negative geometry, blending will cause existing geometry to shrink away from the new geometry edit.
The existing colour of the positive geometry will change in a gradient, becoming closer to the colour of the edit as it nears the centre of the edit. (Mm)
Affects the looseness of the surface of positive geometry more as it approaches the surface of the edit shape.
Hover over the sculpt to see the wireframe of different geometry edits within the sculpt that affect that area of the sculpt. If the edit is positive, this will show the shape you can already see. If the edit is negative, this will show the normally invisible shape that cut away mass at the point you are hovering over.
Dragging a smear edit will move the entire smear, not just one shape within that smear. (Pk)
Note that when moving one edit, all other edits—negative geometry, colour, etc.—will not move. So if you have a sphere with some cuts in it and you later move that sphere, the cuts will not move with it but will instead affect whatever mass is still there after the move.
Hover over a face of a shape, and use R2 to stretch it out or push it in. A good way of using this is to add a smaller edit without worrying about getting the size exactly right, and then using the stretch tool to bring one side out to get the size perfect. (Mm)
Note: Some creators consider using the stretch tool to be inherently bad for a sculpt’s graphics thermo cost. However, this is not the case. Stretch away! (Tg)
These lets you add shape geometry edits to the sculpt, in smear or stamp mode. If in positive mode, these edits will add visible mass to the sculpt. If in negative mode, these edits will remove cut out existing mass from the sculpt.
If the shape has been edited such that it is in “extrude” mode, the controls will work a little bit differently. Press R2 to set the start point of the shape. Hold it as you move around the end of the shape, effectively dragging the cross-section out from point to point in a straight line. You’ll see a live preview of what the final shape will look like. Let go to set the end point of the shape and commit the edit.
Note that exactly how the extrusion and cross-section will behave will depend on the shape selected.
The colour and looseness settings of the edit will also apply to the new surface of the sculpt. For example, if you have a tight (non-loose) sphere and you cut out a loose cube from its side, the surface of the cut will have the same amount of looseness that edit has. (Mm) (Mm)
Adds colour to any positive part of the geometry within the volume of the shape of the edit. (Pk)
Applies the looseness of the edit to any positive geometry within the volume of the shape of the edit. (Mm) (Pk)
This tool locks to stamp mode (?).
When using this tool, the sculpt will be transparent. Move your shape within the sculpt, and the parts that will be kept will be shown as fully opaque. Add the edit with R2 or the primary trigger to apply the crop. (Pk) This adds a shape that makes anything outside of it be removed—like an inverse negative edit. (Tg)
It can be difficult to figure out exactly where your edit is in relation to the rest of the sculpt. One way of making this easier is to go into shape edit mode and move it around.
This tool locks to stamp mode (?).
This tool works exactly the same as the Crop Tool with one difference. It creates a new cropped version of the sculpt like before. It also adds that same edit as a normal negative edit to the sculpt you’re editing. So it’s as if it takes out the part of the sculpt you highlighted into its own sculpt, but left everything else in place. (Mm) (Pk) (Tg)
Note that because it creates a new copy of the sculpt that is different from the original, it will add to the graphics thermometer (?). Also, it seems the preview of cutouts and crops can leave jagged edges but these are cleaned up when the edit is committed.
A note on crop edits and cutout edits in general: These are just other kinds of edit. It can be adjusted just like any other edit. All other parts of the sculpt, all the other edits, are still there. You just can’t see them. Think of this more like an inverse negative edit, where it dictates what can still be seen rather than what is hidden.
Lets you choose which fleck new edits will have. (Unsure how these affect the flecks in existing edits, or how this works with blending?)
Use the sculpture detail tool to lower the detail of a sculpt to make it cheaper on the thermometer. Things that are more detailed than other things in the scene will be more red, and things that are less detailed that other things in the scene will be more blue. (Pk) Note that paint cannot be affected by the sculpture detail tool, so their visuals will not be affected by this colouring. (Pk)
A sculpture’s resolution (detail) dictates the minimum visual looseness. (Mm) Because of this, if you have metallic or shiny sculptures, lowering their detail can affect the reflections in the surface of the object, making them less crisp and clear. (Pk)
The outer colour is rendered using flecks. Making the inner colour different from the outer colour will obscure that colour, depending on how loose you make the flecks. (Mm)
You can have a sculpt be both invisible and cast shadows. (Mm)
Similar to the Outer Properties. See Graphics.
Three options: never, when visible, always. (Pk)
“Never” lets the paint itself glow but without illuminating other things nearby.
“When visible” means the object will only emit light when the camera can see the object (?). This is the default option.
“Always” causes the object to always emit light whether the object is visible or not.
Three options: never, when visible, always. (Pk)
“Never” means any occluded light source will still cast light through the object.
“When visible” means the object will only cast shadows when the object is also set to be visible(?). This is the default option.
“Always” causes the object to cast shadows whether the object is visible or not.
Similar to the Outer Properties. See Graphics.
This is a switch. When on, the sculpt will react as a physical object within the scene. (Pk) Because of this, objects that are movable can fall away from each other, even when they’re inside a group. (Mm) (Tg) (Tg)
This is a switch. When on, other collidable objects will react physically when they come into contact with one another.
Note that collidability only takes effect when in play mode. While editing and moving things around, you can place collidable objects so that they overlap each other without a problem. (Pk)
This is a switch. When on, the sculpt will be visible in the scene. When off, the sculpt will not be visible in the scene.
Note that something can be invisible and still be collidable or cast shadows. This switch only affects the visibility of the sculpt and nothing else. (Tg) (Tg)
Only works when movable is turned on. Affects how the sculpt reacts when it would scrape by another object that it collides with. (Pk)
When the sculpture collides with the surface of another sculpture, its direction will reflect off the surface, and its speed will be preserved by the amount dictated by the bounciness setting.
For example, a ball is heading for the ground at 10 m/s, and its bounciness is set to 60%. When it hits the ground it will start moving at 6 m/s.
When the sculpture collides with the surface of another sculpture, it will deform along its original direction up to the amount dictated by the squashiness setting.
For example, a spherical ball that is 1 m in diameter is heading for the ground at 10 m/s, and its squashiness is set to 40%. When it hits the ground, it will deform to 40 cm in diameter before returning to its normal size.
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A selector with 3 options:
“None” means the imp will not affect or be affected by the sculpt in any way.
“Collide” means the imp will move around the sculpt when it comes into contact with it.
“Grab” means the imp will be able to grab this sculpt. When hovering over the sculpt, the dot on its antenna will glow, indicating a grabbable object.
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Dictates which labels are required on a sculpt to collide with this one. (Tg)
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This is an output.
Sends a signal when the sculpt has been detected by a trigger zone. (Tg)
Scope into a painting to edit it.
A painting made up of individual flecks.
Use R2 or the primary trigger to place an edit. Edits cannot be scoped into, neither can they be selected.
The “origin” of the painting is defined by the first position of the first edit. For example, the position of a stamp, or the first fleck’s position in a line. Note that once set, the origin point will not change even if that original edit is changed in any way (deleted or moved). (Pk) (If there’s nothing else in the paining and the original edit is deleted, would that reset things so that the next edit made will become the new origin point?)
The “endpoint” is defined by the last position of the last edit added(?) to the painting. (Will this update if that edit is changed?)
The origin and endpoint are used by various tweak menu effects. See Duplicates, Physical Properties, and Effects.
Note that it is very difficult to split up parts of a painting or to erase from a painting. You can, however, merge multiple paintings together. See Context Menu > Merge Paintings.
Use paint, and change the fleck density to make each line dashed. (Mm)
This menu item shows the current frame number. (Pk) If there is more than one frame in the painting, these will animate through the frames while time is running.
The painting will start at the last frame you viewed while editing it. (Pk)
Opening the menu reveals some sub-menu items:
Shortcut: shift + d-pad left, or shift + secondary square.
Moves to the previous frame and displays it for editing. (Unsure if these will loop, eg while in the last frame the “forward” option will show the first frame?) If there is no frame before the current one to move to, adds a frame at that position and moves to it(?).
Shortcut: shift + d-pad right, or shift + secondary X.
Moves to the next frame and displays it for editing. (Pk) (Loops?) If there is no frame after the current one to move to, adds a frame at that position and moves to it. (Pk)
Only available when you are on a frame that has a frame after it.
Inserts a new blank frame after the current one and before the next one. (Pk)
Deletes the current frame.
Displays adjacent frames transparently in-place. (Pk) You can move and clone strokes from onion skinned frames into the current one. This can be very useful, but when moving things around you may want to turn off onion skinning so you can be sure you don’t accidentally change a different frame. (Pk)
When active, reveals a selector with 3 options (Loops?):
“Back” will show the previous frame shaded red.
“Forward” will show the next frame shaded blue.
“Both” will show the previous and next frames.
This is a menu switch.
Hides everything outside of this painting.
Creates and edits a new painting object, while keeping the tool settings.
Pressing circle while using a tool will come out of that tool and default to the move tool.
Use R2 or the primary trigger to drag strokes around.
This will only ever place a single fleck at a time. (Pk)
The Stamp Fleck tool has a couple of special features you can use.
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The harder you pull the trigger, the more opaque the flecks will be as you draw. This is the equivalent of adjusting the opacity as you draw the line. (Mm) (Pk)
When setting the opacity of the paint separately, this is used as the maximum opacity the brush tool can create (?).
The harder you pull the trigger, the larger the flecks will be as you draw. This is the equivalent of adjusting the scale of the flecks as you draw them. (Mm) (Pk)
When setting the scale of the paint separately, this is used as the maximum scale the draw tool can create.
Draws a line starting from where you started to hold R2 to where you let go of R2, with a live preview of the line itself. (Pk)
Context menu item. Shortcut: shift + square.
This is a menu slider. Only available while in stamp mode.
Creates a 2D cluster of flecks around the original position and at the original angle, with less and less opacity as it spreads out. The slider controler how far they spread out and so how many extra flecks are added. (Pk)
This is a meny slider.
Controls the opacity of any flecks you add.
This is a menu slider.
While using the Stamp Fleck tool, works similar to fade. Creates a 3D cluster instead, and does not fade out the opacity as the flecks spread out. (Pk) (Unsure how fade and scatter affect each other?)
While using the other tools, the 3D position of the flecks added are randomised. Because the scattered flecks are at different angles relative to the sun and sky of the scene, they can appear lighter and darker. (Pk)
This lets you choose which fleck you use to paint with.
How opaque the flecks are. Lower means more transparent. (Pk)
Settings for how flecks are to be rendered based on the start and end of each individual stroke. (Pk)
How far along each stroke in the painting the flecks will start rendering.
How far along each stroke in the painting the flecks will stop rendering.
How dense the flecks are packed in to the stroke. A low density will leave gaps between each successive fleck, whereas a high density will close those gaps.
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Duplicates the painting relative to the origin of the painting. Duplicates do not add to the graphics thermometer. (How do duplicates interact with things like physics? How do positional duplicates and rotational duplicates interact when they’re both turned on?)
Duplicates the painting preserving orientation but randomly(?) changing position in directions allowed by the setting. (Pk) (Does this use the origin to decide what direction the “plane” is going in, for example, or is it “upright” as Pk suggests?)
“None” means there are no positional duplicates.
“In a Line”
“On a Plane”
“Around a Circle”
“Around Camera” places copies within view of the camera. As the camera moves, copies no longer seen won’t be rendered, and new ones will be rendered when in range. (Pk)
“Along Line” …
Duplicates the painting, randomly(?) rotating each around the origin in directions allowed by the setting. (Pk) (Pk)
“None” means there are no rotational duplicates.
“All Directions” will make copies randomly going in all directions, centred at the starting point of the painting.
“Around Hemisphere” will make copies similar to the “all directions” setting, but only have them on one side.
“Around Cylinder” will make copies similar to the “all directions” setting, but only have them on one axis.
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Affects the distance from the original position that the copies will shown at. (Mm)
The max size a clone can be. Each clone’s size is randomised to somewhere between 100% of the original and the scale jitter size. (Mm)
Increase the animation speed to have flecks smoothly travel along the drawn line, adhering to the size (and opacity?) of the original line. If you turn down the fleck density, the gaps will travel along the line at the same speed.
The animation tab has various ways of animating the flecks along each stroke. (Pk)
The speed at which each stroke’s flecks move along the line. If there is a lower fleck density, the gaps move along the stroke in the same way. (Mm)
When off, plays whatever animation would happen once only. When on, seamlessly replays the animation constantly. (Unsure how looping off would affect non-pulse animation.)
When switched on, instead of the flecks moving along the line, the flecks stay in the same position and their size is animated. At the front of a pulse, they snap to being 100% size. Then, moving back toward the start of the stroke they become smaller and smaller. (Mm) (Pk)
The length of the pulse’s trail relative to the length of the entire stroke (?). Only available when pulse is active. (Pk)
Turn on Jet Trail to leave an image of the painted flecks within the scene for a time. If the flecks are moved within the scene, they will linger where they were a moment before(?). (Mm)
This is a switch. When on, the paint will have some limited physical reactions to things such as being moved or forces being applied. (Pk) Note that when strokes move, the start always stays in the same position. (Tg) (Tg) (Tg)
This is a switch. When on, the start and end points will remain static, while the length of the strokes can physically move. (Pk) (Tg)
Click this button and then a different object. While the tweak menu is open, the target object will have a translucent white sphere around it. The ends of all strokes within the painting will now keep their position relative to the position orientation and scale of the target object. Press triangle on the button to remove this link. (Tg)
How much each stroke can deform when forces affect the painting.
The higher this is, the more the “wind” affects the paint strokes. (Pk) Requires the paint to have floppiness so that it moves in the wind.
If wind strength is more than 0%, a white widget appears allowing you to move the wind and change its direction relative to the painting (?). (Pk)
The higher this is, the faster the waves of wind hit. (Pk)
Simulates gravity on the strokes, as if there was a projectile fired from the start point toward the end point (?). (Mm)
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(I haven’t updated all this to be universal until I know if all of the below is the same for sculpts and paintings?)
When cloning sculpts, the graphics thermometer will not go up because they will all reference the exact same sculpt. Any tweak menu changes (including the use of styling tools etc.) do not change the sculpt itself but simply its appearance. (Pk)
However, if you edit one of those clones, the graphics thermometer will go up become it has become a unique sculpt separate from the others and so cannot reference the exact same sculpt. (Pk)
See Live Cloning for details on how to edit one clone and have others automatically update, to make sure the graphics thermometer does not go up.
Even though cloning doesn’t add to the graphics thermometer, each clone made will add a tiny amount to the gameplay thermometer, which tracks how many “things” are within the scene. (Pk)
Because of this, it’s preferable to share the load between graphics and gameplay thermometers by creating a medium-sized sculpt and cloning it several times but not too many.
For example, if you make a single sculpt of a small roof tile, and clone it 100 times to cover a large roof, it will have low impact on the graphics thermometer and high impact on gameplay thermometer.
On the other hand, if you made a single sculpt containing 100 tiles, it would have high impact on the graphics thermometer (the sculpt covers a larger 3D space) and low impact on the gameplay thermometer. Either of these situations could make it very difficult to add more things to the scene.
To lower thermometer use on graphics and gameplay, you can make a larger sculpt of 20 tiles which would have a much lower impact on the graphics thermometer than the full 100-tile roof. Then you could clone it 5 times to cover the entire roof, which would have a much lower impact on the gameplay thermometer. And, having shared out the load, you’d have a lot more spare memory for more graphics and gameplay objects within the scene.
Cloning a painting will add to the graphics thermometer, because even if they are identical they do not reference the same original object(?). (Though it seems they don’t add evenly; cloning a 1% painting doesn’t bring you to 2%?)
Sculpts have a “hull” behind the flecks (you can see this hull if you up the looseness and make the inner colour tint different to the outer tint). This hull is always completely opaque, which means Dreams knows it can skip drawing anything behind a sculpt, taking less time to render that frame to the screen and therefore improving performance.
Paintings, however, are purely made of flecks. Flecks are not fully opaque, and all have spots of transparency. This means that Dreams must still render things that are behind a painting in case those things can still be seen. So if you have a lot of paintings on-screen at once, it has to render each of those paintings, which isn’t so great for performance and in some cases can slow the framerate to a crawl. (Tg)
The tools affect the corresponding setting on objects the imp is hovering over. (Pk) See Outer/Coat.
Use R2 to gradually apply this change.
Shortcuts: see Basic Controls.
Undoes or redoes the last coat change(?).
If the Tint Amount is currently 0%, instantly sets the colour to the selected colour and gradually increases the Tint Amount and reduces Original Colour Saturation. (Pk) (What if the tint amount is not at 0%? 100%? 200%?)
Changes the hue shift setting. (Pk)
Increases or reduces the selected finish. When increasing, moves the corresponding settings towards the maximum selected setting. (Pk) When reducing, moves all settings towards 50%(?).
For example, when increasing the “Shiny Metal” finish on a sculpture, the Shiny/Rough slider moves towards 0% (all shiny), and the Waxy/Metallic slider moves towards 100% (all metallic).
Increases or reduces the glow setting. (Pk)
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Shortcut: triangle.
Toggles between increasing and decreasing a particular coat using the tools.
Select a colour. Used by the Tint tool. See Colour.
A selection of finishes to choose from. Used by the Apply Finish tool.
There are 10 finishes available. They are the following: (Check order, names, settings?)
“Defaut” is 50% Waxy/Metallic, 50% Shiny/Rough.
“Shiny” is 50% Waxy/Metallic, 0% Shiny/Rough.
“Waxy” is 0% Waxy/Metallic, 50% Shiny/Rough.
“Rough” is 50% Waxy/Metallic, 100% Shiny/Rough.
“Metal” is 100% Waxy/Metallic, 50% Shiny/Rough.
“Waxy Rough” is 0% Waxy/Metallic, 100% Shiny/Rough.
“Metal Shiny” is 100% Waxy/Metallic, 0% Shiny/Rough.
“Shiny Waxy” is 0% Waxy/Metallic, 0% Shiny/Rough.
“Rough Metal” is 100% Waxy/Metallic, 100% Shiny/Rough.
“?” …
(Not sure what’s in here?)
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The tools affect the flecks of a sculpture or painting. (Pk)
Shortcuts: see Basic Controls.
Undoes or redoes the last style change(?).
Gradually reduces whatever fleck style is currently applied and applies more of the currently selected fleck style. Using this, you can have up to 4 different flecks showing on the same sculpt at once. (Pk)
Changes the Looseness setting. (Pk)
Changes the Impasto setting. (Pk)
Drag using R2 over a sculpture or painting to pull all flecks in that direction. (Pk) Note that it’s easier to get a more uniform look of everything heading in the same direction with smaller flecks; large flecks tend to stick out all over the place no matter what you do.
Changes the Ruffle setting. (Pk)
(?)
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Applies animation effects by changing the Effects settings on the object. While in effects mode, the effects animations will be previewed even if time is not running. (Pk)
Shortcuts: see Basic Controls.
Undoes or redoes effects changes(?).
Adjusts the corresponding settings on the object. See Effects.
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Sound gadgets sometimes have a different kind of slider in them (I’ll refer to this as a “split slider”), denoted by two thin nubs next to each other instead of one single node. This allows you to set a range of values. Also most non-slider settings in a sound’s tweak menu can be set to a range.
Hold shift while dragging the setting with X to widen the allowed range, setting a minimum and maximum value. Each time this sound is played, or a new note is played with the instrument, a random value within that range will be used for that setting for that specific play. (Mm) (Tg)
This is a gadget. Scoping into it shows a window in which you can place other gadgets. (Mm)
This creates a timeline gadget that defaults to using music measures.
Lets you search the Dreamiverse for sound-related creations of various kinds.
Defaults the filters to search for instruments with nothing recorded in them. (Mm)
Defaults the filters to search for effect fields. (Mm)
Defaults the filters to search for entire phrases or loops of music. These are instruments with patterns already set within them. (Mm)
Only available while scoped in to a sound gadget, in the piano roll view (?).
Use R2 or X(?) to add notes to the piano roll. Hold R2 and drag, to lengthen the note you are drawing. (Mm) Hold L1 while adding a note to allow a freeform pitch bending note; just drag along over multiple pitches and the instrument will smoothly transition over them when playing.
Spiciness can also be set when adding notes by holding L2 do different degrees. Notes will be coloured according to the amount of spiciness added to the note(?). (Bg)
Unavailable when no active microphone connected to the PS4(?).
Stamps a Sound gadget into the scene and begins recording from the currently selected microphone attached to the PS4. (Mm) You can record using a headset-style “4 pole” cable plugged in to the controller. (Tg)
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(Tg)
Press triangle on a live-cloned sculpt to turn it into a normal clone.
When active, all objects in the scene will turn a white colour. Click things with R2 to turn them yellow. When you go out of this tool with circle, anything that was marked as yellow will be hidden--regardless of whether “preview invisibility” is turned off or not. (Tg) (Tg)
Note that an object being marked as “hidden” in this way only has an effect on its visibility when in edit mode. This is particularly useful when working on some part of the scene that is normally hidden behind other objects.
When active, all objects in the scene will turn a white colour. Click things with R2 to turn them blue. When you go out of this tool with circle, anything that was marked as blue will be “frozen.” (Tg) (Tg)
Frozen objects cannot be changed in any way. When attempting to change a frozen object, it flashes blue to remind you of why you cannot change it. You can see this in action in the homeworld and in the tutorial scenes.
Note that an object being “frozen” in this way only has effect on attempting to edit it. When time is running, that object can still move and change through other means; just not by direct user manipulation.
Contains a number of guides for positioning things while editing the scene.
Not available in sculpt and paint modes.
Obeys the settings required by auto guide gadgets while moving objects they are attached to(?). (Pk) See Auto Guide.
Only available in sculpt and paint modes.
Edits being added will snap to the surface of other objects the imp is hovering over within the scene (not just within the same object). While sculpting, the point that snaps is the grab point of the shape. While painting, the point that snaps is the centre of the fleck. (Pk)
When painting, surface snap will also orient the fleck to the rotation of the surface, as if to lie flat on it.
When using tentacle snap, the start(?) of an edit will also snap its orientation to be perpendicular to the surface being snapped to. (Pk) (Is it the start only, or is it all parts of an edit in which the imp is still hovering over a different surface? Are the same grab point rules used for tentacle snap?)
(How is the behaviour affected when both surface and tentacle snap options are activated?)
The grid is represented as dots at each intersection. (Pk) These dots will be displayed around the middle of the screen, fading out in a circle as it nears the edges.
This grid of dots will only be shown for the axis you are facing. For example, if you’re facing down, you’ll see a grid of dots across the floor. If you’re looking along the X axis, you’ll see a grid of dots in front of you.
This scale will default back to 1, relative to the object itself, whenever you open a creation for editing(?). While the grid is activated, two new buttons will be shown next to the grid menu item to allow you to adjust this scale. (Pk) They are the following:
“Finer” halves the distance between the dots in both directions.
“Coarser” doubles the distance between the dots in both directions.
The shortcut to adjust the size of the grid is shift + up and shift + down.
When moving something on the grid, the green plum line shows exactly how much you’ve moved it. (Mm)
While using the moves, the imp reach will affect the scale of the grid. So zooming in with the moves will get you closer to what you’re trying to line up, and make the grid more fine to help you line it up also. (Mm)
While holding an object, press triangle to align it to the current grid and snap it to the nearest grid point. (Mm) (Tg)
Hover your primary imp over an object and press shift + triangle to realign the grid to that object’s orientation. (Tg) The grid will now be based on the one used to create that object, as well as its current scale and rotation. (Pk) (See Origin and Grid Orientation for more details.) Do this while not hovering over an object to reset to the world grid, (Mm) (Pk) or press the reset grid context button.
Note that UI elements such as tweak menus that aren’t “pinned to screen” will also be affected by the grid.
Whenever grabbing an object or window, it will be rotated to be “upright.” For sculpts and paintings, the “upright” orientation depends on the grid that was used to make the first edit within the object(?).
This is very useful to keep windows straight on the screen. (Mm)
When on, reveals a menu switch for “right angles.” When on, this allows you to rotate objects but only to right angles of the upright orientation. (Jj)
Only available in sculpt and paint(?) modes. (Pk)
All edits added will be reflected in a plane onto the other side of the sculpt. These mirrored edits will be previewed before committing each edit. The centre of the mirror (not the rotation?) is defined by the first edit made in the sculpt. (Mm) (Pk) Note that existing edits will not be affected by the current mirror settings when cloning or moving them(?), but will preserve the mirror settings they had when they were made(?).
Note that using the mirror does not add to the graphics thermometer(?).
While active, two new menu switches are revealed:
“Clipped Mirror”(?)
“Hide Mirror” will hide the plane of reflection. (Mm)
Within sculpt mode(?), if an edit that was made with the mirror active will always be tied to that mirror effect for moving or manipulating after the fact. (Pk)
While kaleidoscope mode is also active, each iteration is mirrored. (Pk) So if you have a kaleidoscope of 4, with mirror mode on, stamping a single cube will create a total of 8 new cubes.
Not available when the grid is activated. (Pk)
Gives you much more control over angles when moving or rotating objects.
When activated, two new menu switches appear. (Pk) These are the following:
“Local Space” allows moves and rotations relative to the grid the object used when created, as well as its current scale(?) and rotation. This is similar to re-aligning the grid to the object before going into precise move mode. (Pk)
“Grid Space” allows moves and rotations relative to the current grid. This is selected by default when a creation is loaded.
When moving an object, arrows are displayed indicating the dimension relative to the grid. If you move the object in two axes, white lines come out from those two arrows to the current position of the object. You cannot move an object in three dimensions at the same time while in this mode(?). (Pk)
Hold shift while moving to lock the current axes in. While still holding shift, hover the imp over another surface to move the point being dragged to the point being hovered over along those locked-in axes.
When rotating an object, an arrow and arc are displayed, as well as a readout of how many degrees from the initial orientation the object has been rotated. When you let go of the object, it snaps to the shown degree(?). You cannot rotate an object around more than one axis at the same time while in this mode(?). (Pk)
Hold shift while rotating to lock the current rotational axes in, and rotate in 15 degree increments. (confirm?)
Only available in sculpt and paint modes(?).
Added edits will be repeated, rotating each iteration around the y axis at the centre point of the first edit made in the sculpt or painting. (Mm) (Pk) Note that existing edits will not be affected by the current kaleidoscope settings when cloning or moving them, but will preserve the mirror settings they had when they were made(?). (Pk)
The number of iterations is shown as a number in the bottom-right corner of the kaleidoscope menu icon. The last-used number of iterations is remembered per object, and defaults to 5 in new objects.
Note that using the kaleidoscope does not add to the graphics thermometer(?).
When active, two new buttons are revealed:
“Increase” increases the number of iterations.
“Decrease” decreases the number of iterations.
Within sculpt mode(?), if an edit that was made with the kaleidoscope active will always be tied to that kaleidoscope effect for moving or manipulating after the fact.
When on, lighting is not taken into account when rendering the scene. All objects are shown with their real colours, as unaffected by lighting. Shadows are not cast. The sky becomes a light grey. This can be useful if you’re designing a dark area, but want to actually see what’s going on for object placement, etc. (Pk)
Note that all objects providing lighting (eg. glowing objects) remain their normal colour.
When on, shows a translucent floor grid from the origin of the scene grid, as well as a circle around the centre of the scene. Useful to have a visual reference for placing things or orienting yourself within your scene.
A number of switches that makes different aspects of the scene visible or invisible.
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Only available when editing an element.
When on, shows a white dot indicating the “grab point” of the creation. This grab point is where the imp will be holding the creation from, when importing the element into another creation. (Tg) (Tg)
To join two objects together, first click on the “parent” object with the yellow sphere (the object that won’t move in relation to the joint), and then click on the “child” object with the blue sphere (the object that will move in relation to the joint). (Mm) (Jj) When a connector is placed, the parent will have “movable” turned off(?), and the child will have “movable” turned on. (Jj) For some kinds of connectors, a purple joint will appear exactly between the yellow and blue ends of the connector.
Once placed, the position of the yellow and blue nodes doesn’t matter. They’re just a handy indicator as to what the ends of the connector are attached to. The purple joint’s position and angle dictates how the connector will behave. You can move the purple joint independently of the yellow and blue nodes. While the connector is selected, or you have hold of the purple joint, indicators will display showing you how the joint will behave. For example, a circle showing angle at which a joint can spin, or lines showing the angle limits. (Jj)
Now, if you move the parent object, the child object will move with it. And if you try to move the child object, it will only move as allowed by the connector. (Though beware of moving things while time is paused; strange things can happen if you move an object attached as the parent of a connector. Always rewind first.)
To reposition connectors, press triangle over an object with connectors. Now the objects can be freely moved, while leaving the purple “joint” part of the connector in the same place. The position of the yellow and blue ends of the connector will update to keep the same relative position to the object they are each attached to. Moving the parent will not move the child, and moving the child will ignore the constraints of the joint. (Mm) While repositioning, you can also move the yellow and blue ends. If you release them while hovering over another object, that end will now be attached to that object. (Mm)
An important thing to note about connectors is that the child will react to physics. In fact, the child’s “movable” will be set to on while attached to the connector(?). If you want an object to be constrained by a joint but not move on its own because it has an unbalanced mass, turn off gravity.
Note that you can move a connected object in one of two ways: with forward kinematics (FK), and inverse kinematics (IK). FK means you’re rotating an object as the parent of its connected children, which means any children and any of their children (etc.) will stay in the same position and rotation relative to that parent object. IK means you’re moving an object as the child of its parent. Here, though, it will drag its parent and their parents (etc.) around so that the child object you’re actually moving can get to the position you’ve dragged it to. (Mm)
With the DS4, use R2 to move a child in IK mode, and L2 to rotate a parent in FK mode. With the move controllers, use the primary trigger to move a child in IK mode, and tap the secondary sphere to the primary base to toggle FK mode.
Purple joint nodes can be pulled apart, depending on what’s happening with the parent and child ends of the connector. The “strength” setting in the tweak menu is how strong the force is to keep the joint intact. (Is this a thing?)
Note that while recording with a keyframe, you can hold L1 while moving a jointed sculpt in IK mode to dislocate the joint, allowing you to move that sculpt further than the joint would normally allow. (Mm)
This is a selector. Only available on ball, bolt and motor bolt connectors.
Has the options “Ball Joint,” “Bolt,” “Motor Bolt.” (Jj) See below for details on each.
Dictates the force(?) required to make the joint move. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, collision works as normal. When off, any collisions between the child and parent objects will be ignored. (Jj) Having this turned on can cause physics problems with a group of collected objects constantly colliding with themselves.
Only available in motor bolts.
Dictates the prefered(?) number of cycles to be completed in a minute. (Jj)
Only available in motor bolts.
How much force is applied to force the joint into the correct position (?).
This is a switch.
When on, the behaviour of the joint will be limited in some way. For example, a bolt can only rotate between two specific angles. (Jj) When on, the limits will be visualised as part of the indicator.
Dictates the angle of motion allowed within the limits. This updates when the limit indicators are manipulated. Changing this will push the yellow lines away from the angle exactly in between them. (Jj)
This is an input and output.
The signal represents the progress between the minimum limit and the maximum limit. (Jj) (What does this do when limits are off?)
Rotates in one axis, around a single point. (Tg)
Limits can be added for minimum angle, maximum angle, and current angle. The indicator will display two yellow lines for the limit angles, and a blue line for the current angle. Note that changing the current angle using the indicator will tell Dreams where the child object currently is, relative to the limit angles; it will not move the child object. (Jj)
Moving a yellow line past the blue line will move the blue line along with it to stay within the limits. Moving a blue line past a yellow line will move the yellow line to expand the limits. Moving a yellow line past a yellow line will not move the yellow line, as this would either set the limits at 0 degrees of movement or 360 degrees of movement.
Works identically to the bolt, but automatically adds forces to turn the joint. (Jj) (Tg)
…
General logic tutorial (Mm)
Most value sliders now allow you to input number values directly instead of dragging the slider, by pressing shift + square on the slider. (Tg) This is most useful for setting it to some specific number, or to larger numbers that would normally take a while to get to when dragging the slider with the imp.
Some gadgets have references to positions within the world. This is represented by a white circle with an arrows icon (denoting you can move it) hovering above the gadget when moving or selecting it. When this is the case, the position is set to the centre of the gadget itself, and the scale and rotation is used from the gadget also. When such a gadget is inside a microchip or nested within several layers of microchips, then the top-level microchip’s position is used instead(?).
But you can drag that white circle around independently of the gadget, and it becomes a white sphere within the scene. This means you can have your gadget somewhere more prominent and easily accessible within the world, but place the position it uses in a particular place. Note that in this state, changing the gadget’s position, rotation, and scale will still affect the white blob, but not the other way around. (Mm)
However, if you drag the gadget into a microchip, the white blob’s position will be remembered. This can make it easier to arrange logic without disturbing the way the gadget behaves. (Mm)
Press triangle to reset the location marker to default. (Mm)
Wires connect gadgets together, making complex logic possible. Some gadgets have input ports (circular nodes on the left of the gadget) and output ports (nodes on the right). Tweak menus have input tabs on the left of most settings and output tabs on the right. They also have one tab at the bottom for the power of the gadget.
Press X or R2 on an input or output port or tab to create a new wire connected to it, then press X or R2 on wherever you want to connect it up to. Note that you cannot connect an output to another output, or an input to another input. And wires can only connect into the power of a gadget.
If you want to connect the same input or output to many nodes, hold shift when attaching the end of the wire. The wire will be attached as normal, but you will now be holding a new wire that starts at the same node as before. (Mm)
Some outputs give “fat wires” that hold multiple values simultaneously, as indicated by many colours threading around the wire. Inputs will use the first value in a fat wire, apart from splitter gadget inputs. (Jj)
Fat wires have types associated with them, and types associated with their contained values. Each value can in turn be a fat wire(?). The type of each value will be used to determine which icon and tooltip splitter output and combiner input ports will have, and in some cases the colour of the associated wire. The types of fat wire are as follows (Jj):
“Boolean” contains 1 value(?) of 0 or 1.
“Number” contains 1 value(?).
“Colour” contains 3 values between 0 and 1: Red, Green, and Blue.
“Transform” contains 3 values(?): Position (relative to the world grid?), Orientation (rotation relative to the world grid?), and Scale. Position is a “3 Numbers” fat wire(?). Orientation is a “Rotation” fat wire(?). (Tg)
“Signal” includes a single value(?).
“4 Numbers” includes 4 values for any purpose.
“3 Numbers” includes 3 values for any purpose.
“2 Numbers” includes 2 values for any purpose.
“Spice & Randomisation” includes 4 values for the spice amount and the randomisation of a sound. (No idea what this does?)
“Rotation” includes 3 values, representing the angle of rotation around each axis. (Is this in degrees?)
“8 Numbers” includes 8 values for any purpose.
“Collision” includes 3 values: the impact force of the collision, the surface type that was collided with, and the position of the collision. (Tg)
“Sticks” includes 2 values: Left/Right, and Up/Down. These both range from -1 to +1.
“Music” includes 6 values: Volume, Button Pressed, Note Played(?), Spice Amount, Imp Position (when recorded in the performance window), and Note ID(?). The Imp Position is a fat wire also, containing an X and Y coordinate value(?). (Tg)
“Player Info” contains 5 values: 1 per player and 1 for an unspecified player.
When attaching a wire to an input or power tab in a tweak menu, there are 3 modes that connection can be in. You can cycle through these modes by hovering over the tab and using shift + X(?).
“Overwrite” (>) will set the value of the setting by the highest value coming from any of the connected wires. (Jj) If the setting was zero (or default?) when the wire was connected, the connection mode will default to “overwrite.”
“Modulate” (X) will multiply the base value of the setting by the highest(?) value coming from any of the connected wires. (Jj) Note that if you hover over the setting, it will show you this base value, and allow you to adjust it as normal. If the setting had a non-zero value when the wire was connected to it, the connection mode will default to “modulate” and the base value will be set to the setting’s value as it was before the wire was connected.
“Blend” (O) will overwrite the value of the setting with the weighted average of the wires connected to it. (Jj) The weighting is done using the power of the gadgets the signals are coming from. So a mathematical expression might look something like this: (sum of all signals) divided by (sum of the power of all gadgets those wires are coming from). Note that most of the time, these gadgets are simply “on” or “off,” in which case it works like a normal average.
If a field is asking for a “name,” you can input text as normal. Or if there are existing objects of the right type with names, or other gadgets looking for the same type of object by name, you can adjust the value (like with a number slider) to cycle through all those names available within the scene.
While moving a gadget, hold shift (L1) while hovering over an object to snap it to the surface of that object. Remember to still be holding L1 when you let go of the object to make sure it stays snapped. (Tg)
When a gadget is first surface-snapped to an object, it becomes “attached” to that object. If you then pull the gadget away from the object, you will see a special wire coming from the gadget to the object itself, indicating that the object is the one the gadget will affect. If it’s a gadget that can affect an object such as a rotator or destroyer, for example, then it will rotate or destroy the attached object object. You can delete that wire as normal with triangle. (Tg)
Note that if a gadget is inside a microchip, and the microchip has this “attached object” set up, then it will affect the attached object and not whatever it has wires going out to(?).
Action recorders are like many keyframes, with associated times—recording state changes over time and transitioning between states automatically. (Mm)
So while you could have 10 keyframes activated in sequence to move and rotate an object at a certain speed, you could instead use an action recorder to record you moving and rotating that object instead.
When the gadget is selected or its tweak menu is open, anything affected by the recording will display hatch marks over them. (Jj) Press triangle on those elements to remove the recorded state from the gadget for that element (?).
When recording a change in position for an object, a line will be drawn reflecting the movement recorded. Hovering over an object for which a change in position has been recorded will display the path that the recording follows, as well as a white sphere at the beginning and end positions.
Note that any movements are relative to the object’s starting orientation; this means if you flip the object after recording it moving around, the object will move around in a different direction.
Placing a new action recorder will start recording with it. Otherwise, scope in using shift + X to start recording, or use the Start Recording context button. As soon as you begin changing anything in the scene, recording will begin. (Jj) Stop changing things in the scene and the recording will stop until you start changing things again, which will resume recording from the same point. A recorded bar is shown at the top of the screen, the red area representing the time recorded. The bar’s scale will change as time goes on, to fit the time recorded in the same space. (Jj)
If time is running, the recording will begin from the moment you enter recording mode. If time has been paused midway through the gadget’s playback, the changes will be added to the recording from that point onward. Time and playback will also resume when you begin changing things. (Jj) Also, when you stop changing things, the recording will continue but record no state changes until you change things again. These pauses will be shown in the recorded bar as gaps in the red. (?)
If the gadget already has state changes recorded and you activate record mode, you can record more changes to happen in sync with the existing recording. These new changes will be added to the recording. The recorded bar’s current time will show the moment you are adding to the recording. (Jj)
While time is running and the action recorder has power, the changes in state that have been recorded will be played back. While playing back, the gadget will display a vertical bar indicating how far through the recording the gadget currently is. (Jj)
While recording, press shift + circle or click the Stop Recording context button.
Placing an action recorder on a timeline will replay the recorded state in sync with the timeline. (Mm)
This is a selector.
Playback mode affects how the slice moves through the sample while playing. See playback modes. (Jj)
Dictates how fast the recording will be played back, relative to the original speed. (Jj)
Increases and decreases movement relative to the original position. (Jj) (How does this work with rotation? How about other value changes?)
How much the changed values will overshoot their intended position at the end(?) of playback. Higher springiness means the values will overshoot more, and will take longer to bounce around and settle on the final position. (Jj) (Again, what about things other than position?)
This is a switch.
When on, reverses the animation when playing back. So it will effectively start playing from the end toward the beginning.
This is a switch.
When on, will keep the last changes made once playback has ended. The next time the animation is played back, it will be relative to this new state. (Jj) When off, will reset all state at the start of playback.
Alternative explanation(?): Instead of setting all state the first one recorded, applies state relative to the initial starting point of whatever it’s manipulating. (How does this behave if you move the original object to a different point to the place it was originally recorded at?)
Alternative alternative explanation(??): Playback is always relative to the initial starting points. When Travel is off, everything is reset to the first recorded state when playback begins. When Keep Changes is off, everything is reset to the first recorded state when playback ends. (A lot of experimentation is needed to clear this up, I think?)
This is a switch.
When on, will leave all affected state in the final recorded position at the end of playback. When off, will reset all state at the end of playback. (Jj)
This is an output.
Sends a pulse(?) when playback has ended. (Jj)
Changes the position of an object over time. (Jj) Provides finer control compared to the Mover gadget. (Tg)
The target speed of the affected objects on the X, Y, and Z axes.
When using the modulate blending mode, change the speed of an axis from positive to negative or visa versa to invert that axis. (Tg)
How forcefully the mover overrides physical forces that are acting on the affected objects, such as gravity and friction.
How quickly the object slows down to the target speed. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, the X, Y, and Z axes will be relative to the rotation of the gadget. When off, the axes will be absolute to the scene’s grid.
This is an output that only connects to objects. Surface-snapping the gadget to an object automatically attaches a wire from this to the object.
Changes the rotation of an object over time. Provides finer control, over the Rotator gadget. (Jj)
Has a location marker with an arrow to set the Y axis(?) orientation.
These are shown as inputs on the gadget by default.
The rotation speed around the axes in degrees per second. (Jj)
How much force is applied to reach the target rotation for the current time(?).
If the rotation overshoots the target rotation, how much force pushes brings it back to the target rotation(?).
This is a switch.
When on, the orientation of the axes change as the gadget changes orientation. When off, the orientation stays fixed relative to the scene. (Jj)
Defines the object to be rotated. If surface snapped to an object, that object will automatically become attached.
Detects the angle the gadget’s location marker is currently at in relation to a target angle range.
Has a location marker with added features. Attached to the marker is an arrow pointing at the centre of the target angle range, as well as a cone visualising this target range. Also attached is a line with a sphere at the end showing the aim of the angle sensor, relative to the marker is used to detect the angle in relation to the target range. (Jj)
For example, if the sphere is aiming away from the gadget and the gadget is rotated 90 degrees right, the sphere will now aim 90 degrees to the right (?).
The angle of the core angle range to detect. (Jj)
An angle measured from the edge of the core range. (Jj)
Output.
While the aim is within the core angle range, outputs an “on” signal.
While the aim is within the falloff, a signal will be sent based on how far through the aim is from the edge of the falloff to the core. (Jj)
For example, the falloff is set to 20 degrees and the core range is set to 10 degrees. If the aim is currently 50 degrees from the centre, no signal will be sent. If the aim is currently 25 degrees from the centre, it is 5 degrees into the falloff, so a signal of 0.5 is sent. If the aim is currently 5 degrees from the centre, a signal of 1 is sent.
Only sends an “on” signal when all inputs are “on.” (Jj) More specifically, outputs the lowest signal it receives. (Mm) See Many Inputs or Outputs.
For example, you want to activate a keyframe when the puppet is in a trigger zone and the player is holding square. Place an AND Gate, and wire up the trigger zone’s “detected” output to an AND input, and wire up the controller sensor’s square output to an AND input. Then wire up the AND output to the keyframe’s power. Now, when the puppet is in the trigger zone and square is being held, the keyframe will be powered.
Another way of getting a similar result using that example would be to use the square “on” signal to power the trigger zone, then use the trigger zone to power the keyframe. In this case, the keyframe can only power on when the puppet is detected in the trigger zone. But the trigger zone can only detect the puppet when the player is holding square.
The number of used ports. (Ao)
Many inputs used to find the lowest value. If all input values are 1, for example, then the lowest input will be 1.
This is an output.
Normally used to output 1 when all inputs send 1. Outputs the lowest value signal received.
Indicates to the Guides system how an object is to be placed, effectively overriding the current guide settings. (Pk) See Obey Auto Guides.
This is a switch.
When on, must be placed at a point on the grid(?).
This is a selector with 3 options, dictating how the object should be placed relative to surfaces. (Pk) The options are:
“None” means no surface snapping is active by default.
“On” means the object will snap to surfaces.
“Snap Orientation” means the object will rotate to match the surface(?).
This is a switch.
When on, the object will always stay upright. (Pk)
The minimum and maximum the object can be scaled to. (Pk) If the minimum is changed to higher than the maximum, the maximum value will match the minimum value(?). If the maximum is changed to lower than the minimum, the minimum value will match the maximum value(?).
(While auto-guides are on, would the object automatically change scale to fit?)
When turned on, the player’s view changes to the one set by the gadget. To time things out nicely, you can put the camera gadgets onto a timeline. (Tg) (What happens if there are two cameras powered at the same time?)
While there are no cameras active, the player can move around the scene as they wish using the normal camera controls.
Scoping in to the camera gadget will go into the view of the camera, and activate certain shortcuts as detailed below. You can also move the view around the scene using normal camera controls. (Jj)
When you scope out again, the new view settings will be kept by the camera. Also, the normal camera will stay in place. This means if you scope into a camera and out of it again, you can get a sense of what the view will be like, but you can also edit the scene from a similar view to the camera. (Are settings like FOV etc. ignored when you scope back out?)
Has a location marker. When the gadget is selected or its tweak menu is open, a wireframe of the camera’s view is displayed. This shows 4 lines along the 4 corners of the screen for that view, and a rectangle representing the focus depth(?) for the camera. A white dot at the centre of the rectangle is a handle to more easily adjust the viewing angle and focus distance of the camera. (Tg)
Shortcut while scoped in, for DS4: shift + d-pad up to focus in, shift + d-pad down to focus out.
Things at the focus distance away from the camera will be in focus. The further away something is in the scene from this focal distance, the less it is in focus. Though how blurry things can get when not in focus depends on the aperture size. (Jj)
Affects who far away from the gadget the wireframe rectangle is.
The wider the aperture, the more blurry things become when not in focus. The narrower the aperture, the less blurry things become when not in focus. (Jj) (Does this affect bloom?)
This is a selector with 6 options.
When this camera is made active, dictates how the player’s view transitions from what it was before to this camera and settings. (Jj) Note, this does not affect the transition from this camera to a different camera. (Jj)
The options are the following:
“Smooth” (Ease In-Out) starts slow, speeds up in the middle, and ends slow. (Jj)
“Cut” changes to the new view instantly. (Jj)
“Ease In” starts slow and speeds up.
“Ease Out” starts fast and ends slow.
“Linear” changes at a constant rate.
“Crazy” changes further away from this camera before moving towards it.
Does not take effect in “Cut” mode.
How long it takes for the player’s camera to change to this camera after it’s made active. Note, this does not affect the transition from this camera to a different camera. (Jj)
Shortcut while scoped in, for DS4: d-pad up to narrow angle, d-pad down to widen angle. (What is it for move controllers?)
The angle from the camera in which you can see the scene. So a narrower angle will zoom in and you’ll see less stuff. And a wider angle will zoom out and you’ll see more stuff. (Jj)
Affects the angle of the wireframe lines for the edge of the screen.
This is an output signal.
Sends “on” while the player’s view is using this camera. (Is this only when the view is locked to the camera, or is it “on” while transitioning also?)
This is a switch.
When on, displays black bars like some films. Useful for cut-scenes.
Unavailable if imps are hidden.
The size of the imp relative to its normal size.
Unavailable if imps are hidden.
The range of distance from the camera the imp can be within the scene. Within that range, the imp will slip over sculpt surfaces within the scene(?), and outside that range, it move over an invisible wall at the maximum distance.
When changing min to greater than max, max will change to the min value. When changing max to less than min, min will change to the max value.
Unavailable if imps are hidden.
An angle the camera may move to follow the imp when the imp nears(?) the edge of the camera’s view. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, no controller input will be processed by the scene. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, no imps will be visible or interact with the scene. (Jj)
When turned on, the controller sensor’s default camera will change orientation to match the orientation of the gadget. (Tg)
You can scope in with L1 + X to the camera pointer itself to preview the angle the controller sensor’s camera will adjust to. (Tg)
When turned on, moves the active camera left, right, up, and down over time, as if being shaken.
Mathematically combines two values based on the current settings, and gives the result as an output.
Fat wires will have all values affected using the corresponding values from both operands. (Tg) For example, adding (1, 2) to (3, 4) will add 1 to 3, and 2 to 4, giving the fat wire (4, 6).
The first value.
This is a selector with 15 options. (Jj) They are the following:
“Add” = A + B. By wiring the calculator’s result into itself, you can store a particular value indefinitely. (Tg)
“Subtract” = A - B
“Multiply” = A × B
“Divide” = A ÷ B
“Greater Than” results in 1 if A is greater than B, or 0 if A is not greater than B.
“Equal” results in 1 if A is the same value as B, or 0 if A is not the same value as B.
“Less Than” results in 1 if A is less than B, or 0 if A is not less than B.
“Remainder” (modulo) divides A into B as many whole times as possible, then outputs what’s left. For example, 7 ÷ 2. 7 can be divided into 3 groups of two, leaving 1 left over than cannot fill another group of 2 completely. So 1 is the remainder.
Useful for finding how many times a number can go into another number. For example, if you want to find how many tens are in 112, first find the remainder (2), then subtract that from the original number (112 - 2 = 110). This new number will be perfectly divisible by 10. So divide that by 10 (110 ÷ 10 = 11). So there are 11 tens in 112.
“Minimum” results in the lower of the two values.
“Maximum” results in the higher of the two values.
“Power” raises A to the power B(?).
“Round Down” (floor) results in A rounded down to the nearest integer.
“Round” will round down A if its decimal part is 0.5 or lower, or rounded up if its decimal part is higher than 0.5.
“Round Up” (ceiling results in A rounded up to the nearest integer.
“Absolute” results in the magnitude of A. This means if A is less than 0, the result will be more than 0 by the same amount. For example, if A is -3, the result will be 3. If A is 5, the result will be 5.
Not available in “round down,” “round,” “round up,” or “absolute” modes(?).
The second value.
This is an output.
Outputs the result of the calculation.
A combiner combines multiple values into a single signal, outputting a fat wire.
This is a selector. It has a number of options to select the fat wire type to combine values into. See Fat Wires.
Dictates the number of input ports active, their types (for showing the correct icon, tooltip, and sometimes wire colour), and the outputted fat wire’s type. (Jj)
Used to get signals from dualshock 4 controllers. Works for some things with a move controller, but not all.
By default, when a new sensor is placed in the scene a wire is connected from “Is Dead” to “Respawn,” and from “Circle Button” to “De-possess.”
Has a built-in camera that is moved with the right stick and adheres to the “invert camera”s setting within Dreams. (Tg)
(Mm)
Sends the amount the left trigger is being pulled: 0 for not at all, 1 for when it is pulled all the way.
Sends the amount the right trigger is being pulled: 0 for not at all, 1 for when it is pulled all the way.
These are on/off buttons with input and output, corresponding to the named buttons on the controller.
Gives a fat wire.
The X and Y values given sent are relative to the current view, such as through a camera, such that pushing “up” is always pointing away from the current view in scene-space and “left” is always pointing to the left of the current view in scene-space. (Tg)
Gives a fat wire with 3 values corresponding to the controller’s scene-space orientation(?) relative to the current view.
Sends 1 (“on”) while corresponding button is held down.
Gives a fat wire.
The X and Y values are taken directly from the sticks themselves, and are not relative to the current view. (Tg)
Sends 1 (“on”) while the corresponding button is held.
Sends 1 (“on”) while the corresponding customary button for such a function is held. For example, in Japan circle is to enter and cross is to go back, where as in most other places cross is to enter and circle is to go back.
The controller sensor has a camera built in and ready to use. It focuses on and revolves around the controller sensor gadget itself.
The height relative to the controller sensor, multiplied by the camera distance(?) the camera focuses on. (Not sure what point this percentage is relative to?)
The desired camera distance from the controller sensor. (Tg) If the camera would go inside an object that is visible, it will move closer to the focal point to avoid this.
(Tg)
The tilt around the camera’s X axis (looking up/down) relative to the focal point. So when the value is high, it looks down on the sensor. When the value is a low negative, it looks up towards the sensor. Values go from -57 degrees to 57 degrees.
By default, this angle can be adjusted while playing using the right stick. As the controller sensor moves though, the camera will try to match the desired angle.
What angle of the view is seen on the screen. High values let you see more of the outer edge of the view as if zooming out. Low values cut out more of the outside edge of the view as if zooming in.
To get an orthographic view for an isometric game for example, use a camera that is very far away with a very low FOV. This will limit the effect perspective has as the camera moves.
Other objects in the scene will be different depths from the camera from any given view. The difference in depth from the camera is used to calculate how blurry they should be. The strength of this blurriness is defined by the aperture. A high aperture means more blur effect.
Only takes effect when the sensor is surface-snapped to an object.
This darkens all objects to black directly below any visible part of the object the controller is attached to, regardless of a sculpt’s “cast shadows” option. This setting specifies the strength of this effect.
Dictates how the player can interact with the controller sensor or the attached object.
This a selector with 4 options:
“None” will not allow the player to affect the sensor in any way while playing, and the sensor’s camera will not take effect. This is useful for when you have recorded a possession that has effects other than positioning. Deleting the sensor will still allow the recorded positions to work, but any other controller inputs will not. In this mode, the recorded outputs will still fire as normal.
“Possessable” makes the attached object possessable.
“Follow Imp” makes the attached object possessable, but it will also follow the imp’s position and orientation on-screen.
“Remote Control” will output controller signals even though the attached object is not being possessed. Useful for things like menus where there is no object to possess.
These are settable switches.
When on, allows that number player to possess the object, or when using the remote control setting that player’s inputs will be output by the sensor(?).
When using the “follow imp” setting, dictates how the attached object orients itself relative to the imp.
A selector with 2 options:
“Maintain Orientation” will not reorient the object to match the imp.
“Imp Faces Camera” will reorient the imp so that it faces the camera.
This is a switch.
When on, the imp will not move to the gizmo, but will move independently of it. Note that even when this setting is on, if the imp is hidden by global settings or the current camera’s settings, the imp will be invisible.
When off, when a controller sensor is possessed, the imp zooms into its gizmo location, makes a “zip” sound and causes whatever object it has possessed to glow moentarily.
(Thanks to /r/AnotherWitcher.)
This is a switch.
When on, the imp will immediately possess the controller.
How the imp will be displayed once the attached object is possessed.
This is a selector with 4 options:
“Hidden” will not show the imp.
“Eyes Only” will show only the face of the imp (including the mouth).
“Visible (body on target)” will show the entire imp with its body at the gizmo’s centre.
“Visible (tip on target)” will show the entire imp with its tip at the gizmo’s centre.
This is an input.
When a tag’s Scene Space Transform output is wired directly into this, the imp will appear at that transform (including position, rotation, and scale). Tag’s white gizmo will also change into a preview of the imp when possessed.
Again, note that trying to wire anything apart from a tag’s Scene Space Transform output into this will not be allowed.
This is an input.
When sent an “on” signal, the controller sensor will send no outputs from the player that has possessed it.
This is an output.
Sends a signal when the controller sensor is currently possessed.
This is an output.
Sends a “player info” fat wire regarding who is currently possessing this controller sensor.
Sends the current volume being picked up by the possessing player’s(?) microphone.
This is an input.
When “on”(?) is received, the possessed object is destroyed and recreated in a set position and orientation. This position will be the last activated checkpoint if there is one. If there is no such checkpoint active, the original position the object started will be used instead. (Tg)
This an input.
When “on”(?) is received, the controller sensor stops sending output. (Unclear what the difference between this and “disable controls” is?)
If there is another possessable controller sensor within the scene (such as in a puppet), the camera will move towards it. (Tg)
This is an output.
Sends “on” while the controller sensor is in the “dead” state. (Tg)
This is a settable switch. Applicable in multiplayer only. (?)
When on, will show an indicator at the edge of the screen when this controller sensor’s object is off-screen and the built-in camera is at minimum zoom and cannot let all player-possessed puppets stay on-screen at once. This indicator will flash if the “stay onscreen” setting is turned on (see below).
This is a settable switch.
When on and the controller sensor is offscreen (see offscreen indicator to see how this is defined), a countdown will be started as set in the global settings gadget. When the countdown is up, that controller sensor will “die.”
This is an output.
Sends a signal when the controller sensor dies as a result of being offscreen for too long (see “stay onscreen”).
Stores an integer value, allowing other signals to change that stored value. (Jj) Displays a progress bar representing how far the current value is from 0 and how near to the target value it is. (Jj)
Useful for setting something to be permanently “on” with a pulse to “count up” or “off” with a pulse to “reset.”
The target integer value, used to determine completion and progress of the counter. Also dictates the maximum value allowed.
The current integer value of the counter. Cannot go below 0, or above the target.
This is an output signal.
Outputs “on” while the current value is equal to the target. (Jj) (Tg)
This is an output signal.
Outputs a value between 0 and 1 based on how far through the current value is from 0 to the target. (Jj)
This is an input.
When a signal begins, increments the current value.
This is an input.
When a signal begins, decrements the current value.
This is an input.
When a signal begins, sets the current value to 0. (Tg)
The last activated checkpoint will be remembered. When respawning, the player will appear at that checkpoint.
This is an input.
When sent a non-zero signal, the checkpoint becomes the active one.
This is an output.
Sends an “on” signal while the checkpoint is active.
This is a pulse output.
Sends an “on” pulse on the frame when something spawns at the checkpoint.
Settings works similarly to a trigger zone shape, without falloff.
When a possessed controller sensor enters the zone, the checkpoint will activate.
When on, destroys itself and any object it’s attached to, removing them from the scene entirely. (Tg)
Displays text, along with button options. Allows the player to more easily create branching conversations.
Used to exit the current scene, as well as link scenes together within a Dream. (Jj)
Within a Dream, the doorway type icon will be used to indicate what kind of doorway it is. The name of a doorway gadget will also be used as a tooltip on doorway node when editing a Dream.
Has a location marker with an arrow coming from it. This dictates where the player will spawn and the direction they will face. Note that this only happens if the doorway the player came from has “checkpoint mode” on(?).
Note that the wipe of a doorway will be used to transition out of the current scene and transition into the next scene.
This is a selector with 3 options.
Dictates the kind of doorway this is for the scene, and how it can be used. (Jj)
“Entrance” means this doorway can be used to enter the scene from elsewhere. Links can be made to an entrance within a Dream from an exit or two-way node.
“Exit” means this doorway can be used to go out of the scene to somewhere else. Links can be made from an exit within a Dream to an entrance or two-way node.
“Two Way” means this doorway can be used to enter the scene or exit the scene. Links can be made to any other doorway node.
This is a selector with 5 options.
The graphical style of the wipe itself. (Jj) The options are:
“Bokeh” is the default option, and is used throughout the Dreams menus. Colours from the current view are used to create circles of light that move toward the camera while fading out. When the new view is loaded, colours from that view is used to create circles instead.
“Dissolve” (fade) will fade in a colour over the current view, and then fade it out when the new view is ready.
“Linear” will show an opaque box moving over the current view in a straight line, and then move out in the same direction(?) to reveal the new view.
“Hole” (looney toons) will show an opaque box with a hole in the middle through which you can see the current view. That hole starts off larger than the screen, and shrinks until the current view can no longer be seen. Then the hole will expand to reveal the new view.
“Circle” is the opposite of the “hole” setting. An opaque circle appears over the current view, and expands to cover it entirely. Then it shrinks down to reveal the new view.
Not available when using the Bokeh wipe(?).
The colour the wipe will transition to. (Jj)
(Unclear what this does?)
Not available when using the Bokeh wipe(?).
Blurs the edge of the wipe. (Jj)
For the hole and circle wipes, dictates the centre of the circle relative to the screen. (Jj)
(Unclear how this functions for other wipes?)
Note that this setting is overridden if there is a target set.
This is a button.
Click to start selecting. Click an object within the scene to track that specific object. Now, the direction will be set dynamically to follow that object. (Jj)
Press triangle on this button to turn off this feature(?).
Dictates how long a transition takes into or out of the wipe. (Jj) Note that the “ramp in” slider is for turning on the wipe obscuring the current view, and the “ramp out” slider is for turning off the wipe revealing the new view.
This is a button. Only available when the doorway can be used as an entrance (including two-way).
When on, the player will spawn at the target doorway’s designated location when this doorway is used as an exit(?). The player will also spawn at this doorway’s designated location when used as an entrance. (Jj) Note this only works if there is a controller sensor with the same name as the controller sensor that was possessed while the source doorway was activated.
Note that this has no effect when exiting to a different Dream(?). (Does this apply only to dreams outside of this whole dream?)
This is a pulse output.
Pulses “on” when a player spawns from this doorway. (Jj)
Use the attached object button to connect the emitter to an object within the scene. That object will now disappear, and will be emitted by the gadget at the right time.
Useful for controlling thermometer use. Before any instances have been emitted, only one lot of gameplay/graphics/audio thermometer memory will be used. When an object is emitted, this can be added to. When an object is destroyed, this can be reduced. So if you use emitters and destroyers in smart ways, you can control how much memory is being used at a given time within the game. (Jj)
Note, however, that this is only effective and useful in certain circumstances. Generally, it’s useful for instances where you have a lot of instances of logic but don’t need all of it to be running at all times. But for graphics stuff such as having many sculpts in a scene this technique is not so useful. (Tg)
If you’d like to see the emitted object, turn off preview invisibility. (Mm) Then, if you’d like to edit it, you can scope into the object like it was a group and even take things in and out of the emitted object. (Tg)
Copying an emitter will use the same source object to emit, which means it will not increase thermometer cost for the source object to emit. This also means that if you edit the source emitted object the objects that the emitter copies will emit will also update. (Tg) (Tg)
Note that copying an emitter and the reference object will actually make a copy of that reference object, adding to the thermometer cost. So unless you want to be able to change that new copy separately from the original emitter reference, it’s generally best to copy the emitter only and have the emitted object stored safely somewhere in your scene. (Tg)
Once it’s attached to the emitter, you can move, rotate, and scale the emitted object without affecting how it will be emitted. (Mm)
Has a location marker. It may be moved to dictate where the object will be emitted. When an object is first attached, the location marker moves to the object’s original position. It also displays an arrow, indicating a direction. The emitted object will move in that direction, depending on the settings. Red circles around each axis are shown around the attached object. (What are the circles for?)
Once an object is attached to the emitter to be the emitted object, it will be turned off and so become invisible. Turn off preview invisibility to see a ghost image of it. You can now scope in to that object, or take things in to the object, etc. and these changes will be reflected by what is emitted by the emitter. (Tg)
When an initial rotation is set, a white circle with moving radial lines will appear to indicate the initial rotation when an object is emitted. Attached to that is a line with a blob at the end. Drag the blob to adjust the axis around which the rotation occurs.
While the tweak menu is open, a preview of the emitted object will be shown at the position, scale, and rotation it will be emitted at. (Tg)
The emitter will use the centre point of the original object to emit from. You can however manipulate where this centre point is in relation to the object you want to emit. (Tg)
This is a link. Click on it and then an object in the scene to attach the object to the gadget. Press triangle to unattach the attached object. (Jj)
The attached object will be hidden, and will be emitted by the gadget when required.
The initial speed of the object along the specified direction. (Jj)
The initial rotation speed of the object. (Jj)
This is a switch. On by default.
When on, the initial speed will be used absolutely. When off, the initial speed will be added to the speed of the gadget. (Jj)
When in continuous mode(?), specifies how long to wait after emitting an object until the next object is emitted. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, the location and rotation objects are emitted from are relative to the location and rotation of the gadget. When off, they are absolute to the scene.
This is a selector with 2 options.
“Once” will emit one object the moment it receives power. (Jj)
“Continuous” will emit objects as often as possible while receiving power.
Defaults to infinity.
Each object will be destroyed the specified duration after they are emitted. (Jj)
While there are already the specified number of objects emitted from this gadget still existing within the scene, no more objects will be emitted. (Jj) See Recycle.
If there have already been the specified number of objects emitted during the entire lifetime of the scene, this gadget will not emit any more objects. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, instead of not emitting when the “Max Emitted at Once” number is reached, the oldest emitted object still existing will be destroyed and a new object will be emitted. (Jj)
…
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This is an input.
Sets the absolute transform the object will be emitted at. (Tg)
…
Only available in Sound Mode by searching for Effect Fields (?).
Place in a timeline to affect everything within that timeline while it is active. The time it is active is indicated by that time period being highlighted as a column. (Mm) Effect fields do not affect parent timelines. (Mm)
To restrict the effect to only affecting some sounds within the timeline, you can add another timeline into the timeline and place the effect and the sounds you want to be affected by it in that nested timeline.
Effect Fields manipulate the sound in the same way as changing the sound gadget’s settings do. If the gadget has fades set within the timeline, they will gradually be applied or be un-applied according to those fades. (Mm)
Effect Fields can be wired up to logic, as with any other gadget. (Mm)
Most of the sound gadget’s settings can be found in this menu, and so can be manipulated by the effect field. (Mm) (Unclear how the effect field settings are blended with the sound gadget they are affecting?)
This is a switch.
When on, the gadget affects sound gadgets within the scene, much like a trigger zone. (Mm)
Only available when positional is on (?).
“Sphere” uses a sphere shape within the world to dictate how much the effect is applied to sound gadgets, depending on their proximity to it. In the scene, use R2 or X to you can edit the size of the sphere, and shift + X to edit the size of the fall-off.
If a sound gadget is within the core sphere, the effect will be applied fully. If a sound gadget is within the fall-off, the nearer it is to the outer edge of the fall off, the less the effect will be applied. The closer it is to the core, the more the effect will be applied. (Mm)
You can animate gadgets moving in and out of the effect field, to perform such changes. (Mm)
“Scene” will affect all sound gadgets within the scene.
When a gate is open, allows a signal through it. Only one gate with the same name, depending on certain rules. (Ac) On the face of the gadget, a gate icon shows if that gate is currently open or closed.
The signal to output when the gate is open.
The input signal, when the gate is open.
This is an input. With no wires connected to it, defaults to on.
While on, the gate with open and close as dictated by the other settings. While off, the gate’s state will not change to open or closed. (Ac)
Changing priority of this gate, or activating “interrupt” on another gate will override this behaviour while gate sync is off.
This is an input.
Does not work in “Automatic” mode. The moment a signal wired into the “Close Gate” input goes from 0 to positive(?), the gate will be closed. (Ac)
(The gate can be closed like this while the input is not 0, but strange things can happen?)
This is an output.
Sends a signal while this gate is currently open.
If a gate could turn on and it has a higher priority than any other gate that could turn on, this gate turns on. (Ac)
Only works in “Queue” mode.
The moment(?) a signal is sent to this goes from 0 to positive(?) and it has the same priority as other gates in the queue, this gate skips to the next one in the queue. If a positive(?) signal is currently being input to the gate, this gate becomes open and all others close. If the input signal is 0, this gate will be the next one to open. (Ac)
This is a selector with 3 options:
“Automatic”: If a gate’s input signal is positive(?) it will be open while no other powered gates with the same name are open. (Ac)
If a gate was open when powered off, it will remember that. When it is powered back on, it will become open again and close all other gates. (Unclear if this is intended design or not?)
“Manual”: A gate will remain open until the “close gate” input is triggered. (Ac)
“Queue”: Works like manual mode. However, a gate will open only if it has opened the same number of times or fewer than all other gates of the same name. (Ac)
This is a colour picker.
Dictates what colour the gadget will appear.
Sends an “on” signal when only one of the inputs are “on.”(?) (Jj) See Result below for a detailed explanation. See Many Inputs or Outputs.
The number of used ports.
Many inputs checked.
This is an output.
Normally used to send 1 when only one of the inputs are receiving a 1.
Outputs a received value when it is greater than 0, and all other received values are 0. (Tg)
Adds light-absorbing particles within a specified zone. (Tg) While the view is within the fog, it’s easier to see that the particles take the form of tiny translucent flecks. These flecks are the same type used for the sky. These particles linger in the scene even as the fog is moved. (Tg)
While the fog gadget is selected or its tweak menu is open, a zone is shown for where the fog is placed within the scene. While hovering over the tweak menu however, it is hidden so you can see the fog itself better. (Tg)
The colour of the fog.
Shifts the hue of the colour of the fog.
How much light the fog absorbs and blocks from getting through the fog. (Tg) This density is multiplied by the 0 - 1 signal being used to power the gadget(?). (Tg)
How much the noise reduces the density of the areas it affects. (Tg)
How much the noise pattern is scaled up from the centre of the fog’s zone(?). (Tg)
How quickly the noise changes over time. (Tg)
How much the fog glows. If the fog looks a bit dingy because it is not catching enough light to appear the true colour you have set, increase the fog a little.
This is a selector with 3 options: Sphere, Cube, and Cylinder.
Works like a trigger zone. See Core and Falloff.
Moves the attached object towards or away from a tag.
Has a location marker. The gadget uses this location relative to the gadget as the point to move towards or away from the target position. (Tg)
This is a selector with 2 options:
“Follow” will move the attached object towards the target.
“Flee” will move the attached object away from the target.
Shown by default.
The target speed of the object as it travels towards the target.
The gadget’s ability to overcome other physical forces such as gravity and friction.
The gadget’s ability to slow the object once it reaches the target.
The name of the tag to use as the target. (What if there are multiple tags?)
Use the adjustment controls to cycle through the names of all tags in the scene and tag names other gadgets are looking for.
The tag must be further away than the minimum distance and closer than the maximum distance to be used as the target.
If min is changed to be greater than max, max will be set to the min value. If max is changed to be lower than min, min will be set to the max value. (?)
Affects the strength in particular axes. (How does this affect normal strength?) This can be used, for example, to keep a character on the same plane as a tag for a 2D platformer. (Tg)
Affects the damping in particular axes. (How does this affect normal damping?)
Affects damping towards the target.
…
This is an input/output.
When set, the follower will try to move the affected objects such that the follower’s position is at the target position. (Tg)
This is an output signal. Shown by default.
Sends “on” while a target is being used.
Applies force to objects within the scene that are movable (physically simulated). (Mm)
Has a location marker as the source of the force. When in “Directional” mode, an arrow is also displayed that you can drag to set the direction of the force.
The intensity of the force applied to objects.
The speed(?) of the force applied to sculptures.
The speed of the force applied to paintings that have “physical” enabled. (Tg) (Tg)
This is a selector with 2 options.
“Push” (up arrow) will apply force away from the source, like a blowing wind.
“Pull” (down arrow) will apply force towards the source, like gravity.
This is a selector with 2 options.
“Radial” will push or pull things from the source point.
“Directional” will push or pull things along a particular direction, regardless of where the object is in relation to the source point.
This is an input.
Sets the location of the source of the force.
This is an output.
Sends “on” while an object is being affected by the force.
Rotation will stay relative to the group.
The zone is shown when the gadget is selected, or its tweak menu is open. (Jj)
The shape of the zone in which objects are affected by the force. See Zone Shape.
The size of the zone and a falloff in which the force is applied to a lesser extent. See Core and Falloff. (Jj)
Drag the zone shape in the scene with R2 to adjust the core size, and with shift + R2 to adjust the falloff size. (Jj)
… (Tg)
Contains many settings that apply to the scene as a whole.
This is a switch and a slider.
When on, activates the gravity strength slider. This will adjust gravity across the entire scene.
Note that the puppet settings define how high the puppet can jump as opposed to the amount of force applied when jumping. The force applied when jumping is calculated using the current gravity setting, to ensure this jump height.
This is a switch and a slider.
When on, activates the Max Fall Height slider. If a possessed puppet freefalls(?) further than this distance, it is killed if it would collide with an object or not.
This is a switch and a slider.
When on, activates the Multiplayer Max Camera Zoom slider. This dictates the maximum distance away from all players the camera can go. (No idea how this works, as I do not own 2 controllers?)
This is a switch and a slider.
When on, activates the Multiplayer Offscreen Timeout slider. This dictates how long a player can be offscreen before their puppet dies. (test?)
This is a switch and a slider.
When on, activates the Camera Boundary Distance slider. This dictates how far outside of the bounds of the scene the player can go before the camera will stop following them. (What decides the boundaries of the scene?)
This is a switch.
When on, allows normal imp showing settings. When off, hides the imp regardless of other settings(?).
This is a slider from 0 - 4.
Dictates the maximum number of players that can be active in the scene at once. (What order is this decided in?) Controllers for players beyond this number can still pause the game with the Options button.
If this is set to 0, no players can have any control within the scene.
This is an output.
Sends the current number of players in the scene. (Is players with active imps or possessing a controller sensor? Or just the number of individual controllers or sets of moves?)
This is an output.
Sends the current view’s transformation details, regardless of transitions, which camera gadget is being used, if no specific camera is being used, etc. (Tg)
This is an input.
When it receives an “on” signal, resets the scene including logic, position of object, etc. as if it were freshly loaded. Anything emitted(?) will be removed. The values of any persistent variables will not be saved, but will be reset to whatever values were stored before the scene was initially loaded. (Tg)
Detects imp interactions with the attached object. Note that these interactions are not restricted to grabs only, though the tooltips talk about these interactions as grabs. (How does this stuff work when using the moves?)
This is a slider from “All,” to 1, to 4.
For any interaction sensed by this gadget, the number of imps from different players must meet or exceed(?) the number specified. (Jj)
This is an input that may only connect to sculpts(?). When the gadget is surface-snapped to an object, a wire is connected from that object to the gadget (does this work now?). (Jj) Multiple objects may be connected to this input at the same time.
Any sculpts attached to the gadget will be used to sense imp interactions.
This is an output.
Sends a signal when an attached sculpt is grabbed that also has the “grab” imp interaction enabled. (Jj) (Jj)
This is an output.
Sends a signal when an attached sculpt is hovered over. (Jj) (Jj) (Does this require “collide” or better in the imp interaction options for the sculpt?)
This is an output.
Sends a signal when an attached sculpt is being grabbed and pulled on. The strength of the signal between 0 - 1 reflects how far away the imp is from the grab point, and therefore how hard they are pulling the object. (Jj)
The value 0 is given when the imp not any distance away from the grab point.
The value 1 is given when the imp is as far away from the grab point as is possible.
Affects how the entire view looks for the player in many different ways.
Increases or decreases the overall brightness. (Jj)
Increases or decreases the contrast between light and dark colours. High contrast means dark colours become darker and light colours become lighter. Low contrast means dark colours become lighter and light colours become darker, heading towards a 50% grey. (Jj)
Increases or decreases the saturation of the colours. Low saturation means colours become more grey. High saturation means the colours become more intense. (Jj)
Cycles all colours through the “colour wheel.” For example, increasing this slider pushes reds to yellow, then green, then blue, then purple, and back to red.
These are colour selectors.
Adds a colour tint to parts of the view depending on their brightness. (Jj)
Black will always appear black, white will always appear white. But anything in between will be tinted by the colours specified.
Has options for a vignette and other effects.
A vignette is like a shadow around the edges of your screen—though using the settings, this “shadow” can be any colour.
Dictates the colour of the vignette effect when visible. (Jj)
The opacity of the vignette. (Jj)
Light will “bleed” out of bright objects within the screen, making halos appear around these objects. (Jj)
Similar to bloom, but produces a line of light as if refracting through physical lenses in a camera. (Jj)
Adds a randomised, ever-changing noise to the view, making pixels slightly brighter or darker than they normally are—as if filmed on an old camera, or one that does not work so well in low light. (Jj)
Blur makes things blurry. (Jj) (Not sure what sharpen does?)
When objects move within the view, they will blur in that direction—like watching things go by quickly in a car. (Jj)
Blurs the entire view depending on the speed of the camera movement. (Jj)
Warped the view from the centre of the screen. Increasing bulges out the middle and the corners are pulled inward, leaving black corners—similar to a fish-eye camera. Decreasing pinches the middle and the corners and pulled outward. (Jj)
A graph with a single node. Has 2 inputs and 2 outputs for X and Y pixelation.
The left-right axis dictates the x-resolution of the view from high (unaffected) on the left to high on the right. The down-up axis dictates the y-resolution of the view from high (unaffected) at the bottom to low at the top. (Jj)
Dictates the opacity of darker horizontal lines across the view. These lines are affected by the pincushion setting. (Jj)
Reduces the number of colours shown in the view. Colours are rounded to the nearest allowed colour. (Jj)
Pushes the red green and blue colours around relative to the centre of the view(?). Gives an old-school dodgy TV vibe. (Jj)
This is a graph with a single node. Has 2 inputs and 2 outputs for glitch X and glitch Y.
Adds VHS-style glitchiness to the view. The x axis adds more x-oriented glitch the further right you go, and the y-axis adds more y-oriented glitch the further up you go. (Jj)
Y-glitch adds lighter horizontal flecks to the view and warping at the top and bottom, as well as moving the entire view vertically from time to time.
X-glitch adds horizontal ghosting to the view, as well as subtle lighter and darker horizontal bars moving up over the image.
Keeps an object oriented a certain way.
Stores the current health of an object.
Changes the health of objects.
The impact sensor outputs signals when a linked movable object collides with another object. (Tg) (Jj)
An object input. Automatically applied when the gadget is surface snapped to an object. If the gadget is inside a microchip with a linked object, that object will also be sensed.
The object to sense impacts for. (Jj)
All impact force outputs are multiplied(?) by this setting. (Jj)
Outputs a collision signal while the object is touching another object. The strength of the output is 1(?) while touching. (Jj)
Shown by default.
Outputs a collision signal when the object first collides with another object. The strength of the output is the force of the collision. (Jj)
Outputs a collision signal while the object is rolling on the surface of another object. The strength of the output is the speed the object is rolling. (Jj)
Outputs a collision signal while the object is scraping (or sliding) across the surface of another object. The strength of the output is how much downward force is being applied toward the object being slid across. (Jj) (Is this the friction force? Do the friction settings make a difference to the output?)
Restricts collision outputs based on which labels the object that has been collided with has. (Jj) This is a selector with 2 options:
“Some” will detect objects when they have at least one of the labels specified.
“All” will detect objects only when they have all of the labels specified.
It is likely that this was intended to be removed(?).
A keyframe holds state. This can include one more other objects, positions, settings… everything apart from individual sculpture or painting edits (?). (Tg) (Mm) (Pk) Also captures the use of tools to adjust settings. (Mm)
When a keyframe is first placed within the world, it automatically goes into recording mode. (Mm) You can trigger this mode by scoping into a keyframe (shift + X).
Note that when first placed, a keyframe is powered off.
When a keyframe is selected or its tweak menu is open(?), the state stored in the keyframe is previewed. (Pk) (Tg)
While a keyframe is selected or its tweak menu is open, objects and settings affected by the keyframe will have hatch-marks across them. (Tg) Press triangle on things with hatch-marks to remove the recorded state for that object or setting. (Mm) (Tg)
Hovering over an object that a keyframe has recorded something for will cause the keyframe to throb. (Tg)
When an object that has state recorded by a keyframe is copied, the keyframe will affect the copy also. (Tg) However, if the object and the keyframe was copied at the same time, the original keyframe will affect the original object, and the keyframe copy will affect the object copy. (Tg)
When on a timeline on the same row as another keyframe, with no other gadgets between them (?), becomes part of a keyframe set. When part of a keyframe set, you can blend between keyframes with more precision. Press shift + X on the space between the keyframes to cycle through the previous keyframe’s different blending modes. (Mm) While recording into a keyframe in a keyframe set, you can move to the previous keyframe with shift + left, and to the next keyframe with shift + right.
When a keyframe within a keyframe set is highlighted, objects whose state is affected by those keyframes will show a path of their changes. The dashed line of the path indicates the blending between each keyframed position (longer dashes for faster movement, shorter dashes for slower movement). Each keyframed position is also marked with a glowing white(?) sphere.
Depending on the value being used to power a keyframe, its state will be applied to that degree. (Pk) For example, a keyframe stores a move of an object as +10 on the X axis. If powered with a signal of 1 (or more?), the object’s position will become +10. If powered with a signal of 0.6, the object’s position will become +6. In this way, by changing the value used to power a keyframe over time, you can animate values and positions etc. of any state recorded by it. (Tg) (Tg) (Tg) (Tg) (Tg) (Tg)
While keyframes are on the same row of a timeline, use L1 + X between them to cycle through blending types. These will interpolate between the states of keyframes on either side for the blend as the timeline goes through it.
Tying keyframes into a set in this way also allows a shortcut to move between them while recording, by using L1 + left/right. (Tg)
Also, if you select one of the keyframes a preview of the path being taken of moving objects will be shown in the scene. (Tg)
Available only when part of a set of keyframes within a timeline. Dictates the interpolation between this keyframe and the next keyframed state within the set.
Note that if rotation is recorded, it will rotate the object using the shortest route. So if you want something to rotate 180 degrees or more in a particular direction, it may be safer to use several keyframes to make sure it rotated in the desired direction. (Tg)
“None” doesn’t interpolate at all. The current keyframe will simply remain active until the next keyframe is activated.
“Linear” will transition towards the next state at a steady speed. (eg. +3, +3, +3, +3, +3.)
“Ease in” will transition slowly at first, and become faster. (eg. +1, +2, +3, +4, +5.)
“Ease out” will transition quickly at first and become slower. (eg. +5, +4, +3, +2, +1.)
“Ease in and out” will transition slowly, then quickly, then slowly. This is useful for more natural movements. (eg. +1, +3, +5, +3, +1.)
Dictates how intense the speed difference will be at the beginning of the transition(?). The “strength” of the blend. For example, if using “ease in,” a higher strength will begin the transition slower.
When the keyframe is trying to set its state, a higher springiness will allow the state to be overshot, wobbling back and forth like a physical spring, until eventually coming to a stop at the correct state.
This is a switch. It is on by default. When on, activates the following behaviour:
When part of a keyframe set, will use the incoming trajectory of a state transition to plot a smoother transition heading to the next keyframe(?). (Tg)
For example, you have three keyframes positioning an object at points of a triangle, with some sort of blending between them. If smoothing is off, the object will move to the next keyframed position, then move to the one after that. You’ll see the “corner” of the keyframe and an abrupt change in direction. If smoothing is on, the transitions will take into account where the object is coming from and where it is moving to, and attempt to smooth out corner. So the path of the object will still hit those positions at the corners of a triangle, but those corners will be smoothed out and less noticeable.
This is a switch.
When off, after the keyframe is powered off the states affected by it will revert to what they were before. When on, the state will be preserved instead.
These sliders set how long it takes for the state to be reached by changing values linearly(?). (Mm)
(Raycasting)
Plots a line in a particular direction, and senses what it collides with.
The length of the ray that is cast. (Jj)
A distance beyond the length of the ray that will produce a lower signal depending on how close the hit is from the end of the falloff and towards the core length. (Jj) See Core and Falloff.
This is a switch.
When on, will detect tags with the specified name. (Jj)
The name for the tag to look for. (Jj)
Use the adjustment controls to cycle through the names of all tags in the scene, and all tag names that are looked for by other gadgets.
This is an output.
Sends “on” (1) when the laser scope hits an object as defined by the settings. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, the angle of the laser scope changes with the rotation of the gadget itself. When off, the angle of the laser scope doesn’t change, but the location will follow the group. (Jj)
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Defines settings relating to how labels are detected. Also contains settings for the target object’s visibility and collision. Note that groups can also have labels and collision settings associated with them. See Common Settings > Labels.
This is an output.
When detected, sends the object’s position within the scene(?).
This is an output.
When detected, sends the 3D angle of the surface(?) hit by the laser scope.
This is an output.
When detected, sends the distance from the laser scope source to the point hit.
Emanates light. This affects objects within the scene. Also lights up fog. There is a very mild fog across every scene by default. So if the light has sufficient brightness, you’ll see a slight fog around the light itself.
Spotlights can casts shadows when hitting sculpts that have “cast shadows” enabled.
Has a location marker, and a shape depending on which mode the light is in.
When in spotlight mode, a cone comes out from the location marker indicating the range and angle of the beam. You can drag the side with R2 to adjust the angle of the beam, and drag the flat end to adjust the range. There is also a white dot on the flat side which can be dragged to adjust the angle of the light itself and its range.
When in diffuse mode, a sphere comes out from the location marker indicating the range of the light. Dragging this sphere with R2 will adjust the range.
This is a selector with 2 options.
“Spot” turns the light into a spot light, targeted in one direction.
“Diffuse” turns the light into a point of light that sends light all around it. Note that diffuse lights cannot cast shadows; only spotlights.
The brightness of the light when it affects the scene.
This is a colour picker.
Dictates the colour of the light emitted by the gadget. A darker colour will appear as though less light is being emitted.
Cycles the hue of the selected colour.
Only available in spotlight mode.
The range of the spotlight.
Only available in spotlight mode.
The angle of the spotlight beam.
Only available in spotlight mode.
The percentage of the full beam angle that fades out. If set to 0, the edge of the beam will be crisp. If set to 100%, the strength of the light will be strongest in the centre of the beam and fall off towards the edges.
This is a switch. Only available in spotlight mode.
When on, sculptures that cast shadows will block the light when hit by it.
Only available in spotlight mode.
A slider with 15 different associated images that will be used as masks over the light source as if blocking it. This is a very easy way to add some atmosphere to a scene and give the light some texture.
When set to 0, no image will be used and the light will be emitted as normal.
Only available in spotlight mode.
When using an image, dictates the percentage the image will be blurred before blocking the light. Setting to 0% leaves the image crisp, setting to 100% will blur the image a lot.
Rotates an object to “face” a tag. (What happens if there are multiple tags in range?)
Has a location marker with an arrow showing the direction the object is “looking at.” The object will be rotated so that the arrow points at the target. (Jj) (Is this actually tied to the centre of the object?)
Sets the rotation speed in degrees per second. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, only rotates around the Y axis(?). (Jj)
How quickly the object’s rotation will reach the specified rotation speed. (Jj) (Is this affected by the weight of the object?)
How quickly the object’s rotation will slow down to face the target. (Jj)
The name of the tag to “look at.” (Jj)
Use the adjustment controls to cycle through names of tags within the scene and tag names other gadgets are looking for.
The location marker must be at least this far away from the tag for the gadget to start “looking at” it.
The location marker must be within this range of the tag for the gadget to start “looking at” it.
How quickly the rotation gets to full speed in each axis. (Are these multiplied by the main rotation strength?)
Stores any gadgets, to keep them neat and compartmentalised. It’s a good idea to begin any feature you want to create with placing a microchip, naming it, giving it an icon, and a colour. (Mm)
Note that if you surface-snap a microchip to an object, that object will be used as the “affected object” for gadgets within the microchip, such as the destroyer gadget or rotator gadget. (Ao) (Tg)
Scoping in to a microchip opens a window that contains everything inside the microchip. Here you can move things around, drag them in or out, clone them, etc. using the normal controls.
To expand the window, hover over an edge (or corner). A white halo effect will appear at that edge. Hold X(?) and drag to adjust the window’s size.
Wires will curve nicely from the source to the destination. However, if you have a lot of wires, this can get confusing to look at. Hover over a wire and press X to add a node. When a wire has at least one node on it, they will become straight instead of curved. These nodes dictate “corners” the wire will head towards. Add multiple notes to make a path the wire will follow. (Mm)
Hold X on a node to drag it around. If the node is dragged over another node, the nodes will stick together and you’ll now be dragging both as one. If more than one wire has a node in the exact same spot, they will path around that node in a “ribbon” effect, lining up next to each other.
Press triangle on a node to remove it.
The colour of the microchip. Note that this will also colour the background of the microchip’s window. It can be useful to adjust this to make it easier to see certain wires.
The icon of the microchip. Note that a smaller microchip icon will also be shown in the bottom-right corner.
Senses the movement of the attached object.
Moves an object in a direction.
Has a marker showing the X, Y, and Z axes. (Jj) When in “local space” mode, these will reflect the current orientation of the gadget(?). Otherwise, they will be locked to the world grid.
This marker has an arrow attached to it. You can drag this arrow to point in the direction the mover will move the object. (Jj)
The speed the object will move at.
How much effort the mover will put into getting the object up to the desired speed. A high strength means things like mass, friction, and collision with other objects will have less impact on the velocity of the object while being moved in the specified direction. (Jj)
How much effort the mover will put into slowing the object down to the desired speed. A low damping means the gadget will never slow the object down. Whereas 100% damping means the object will never go faster than the specified speed. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, the direction the object will move will be affected by the orientation of the mover gadget.
(How do these interact with normal damping?)
Affects the damping in specific axes.
Affects the damping in the mover’s direction.
Inputs and Outputs.
This is a link to one or more objects. If the gadget is stamped while snapping the surface of an object, that object will automatically hook up to this setting. (Jj)
The affected objects will be moved by the gadget.
Input will set the direction of the mover.
Output will send the current direction the attached objects are moving. (What if there are multiple objects?)
Passes signals through from its input to its output. (Jj) Can be used as ports in a microchip that show on the microchip gadget itself, making it easy to hook wires up without understanding the inner workings of the microchip.
Note that, just as with any gadget, no outputs will send any signals while the gadget is powered off.
The colour of the node gadget. Wires coming from a node’s output also use this colour. (Jj)
This is a selector with 24 options.
Sets the icon for the gadget. If the gadget is used as a port, dictates the icon used for the tab shown on the gadget.
This is a selector with 3 options. (Jj)
“No-port” (sometimes referred to as a passthrough node) simply takes a signal and sends it out.
“Input Port” takes a signal from outside the microchip. This node is shown on the left side of the gadget.
“Output Port” sends a signal to outside the microchip. This node is shown on the right side of the gadget.
When in a microchip, input and output ports appear as nubs on the left and right of the microchip respectively, allowing wires to be plugged into those ports even while the microchip is closed. When not in a microchip but inside a group, these ports can be seen from outside of the group allowing wires to be plugged into them without scoping into the group.
This is an input and output. Shown on the gadget by default.
This is an output.
Sends 1 (“on”) while there is at least one wire connected to the node’s input. (Jj)
Outputs “on” if the input is “off,” and outputs “off” if the input is “on.” (Jj) See Output below for a fuller explanation.
The input to invert.
Normally used to send 1 when the input receives a 0, and send a 0 when the input receives a 1.
When receiving a value from 0 to 1, sends the value subtracted from 1. When receiving a value less than 0 down to -1, sends the value subtracted from -1. (Tg) You can even is this to cerate certain animated effects. (Tg)
Some examples:
Input | -1 | -0.4 | 0 | 0.2 | 1 |
Output | -1 - -1 = 0 | -1 - -0.4 = -0.6 | 1 - 0 = 1 | 1 - 0.2 = 0.8 | 1 - 1 = 0 |
Displays a number. Similar to the text gadget.
The value to display.
This is a selector with 2 options:
“Number” displays the value as a normal number.
“Time” displays the value as a time, the value representing seconds.
Only available when in “number” mode.
The number of decimal places to display.
This is a switch. Only available when in “time” mode.
When on, will display milliseconds as a decimal.
See Text Displayer.
See Text Displayer.
Sends an “on” signal while a number is being displayed.(?)
Sends an “on” signal when at least one of the inputs are “on.” (Jj) More specifically, outputs the highest signal it receives. See Many Inputs or Outputs.
The number of used ports.
Many inputs used to find the highest value.
This is an output.
Normally used to send 1 when any of the inputs are receiving 1.
Outputs the highest value signal received. (Tg)
Shows a metallic bubble. When the player collides with it, it “pops.” A bubble can contain a creation from the Dreamiverse. This item will be made available when the player edits their homespace(?).
Puppets are the basis for most characters in Dreams. They give you procedural walking, and basic actions like jumping. There are two kinds of puppet you can get from the gadgets menu: the basic puppet which is a tan colour (like wood), and the deluxe puppet which is a blue colour. Note that the deluxe puppet is the basic puppet, with extra logic added that you could build yourself. (Mm)
Procedural animations such as walking, and running—and jumping up, at the peak of a jump, or falling down for more complex puppets such as the deluxe puppet—are based entirely on how the puppet is moving. This works regardless of how the puppet is being moved. (Tg) For example, if the puppet is being moved by using the left stick or by a mover gadget or some animation, they will all trigger the walking animations.
The puppet consists of a special kind of group, sometimes referred to by Mm as a “puppet heart.” Tweaking this group, or the purple base that appears when scoped into the puppet, will give you the special puppet tweak menu.
If you scope in to the puppet, you will see that each part of the puppet (head, limbs, etc.) is a separate sculpt. Those sculpts are joined by normal connectors. Though, again, these sculpts are a little special.
You can also use the stretch tool (without editing the sculpt itself) to adjust the proportions of the puppet. (Mm) (Does this work on all parts of the puppet? What would happen if you edited the sculpt, and then tried to stretch the proportions?)
You can scope into these to edit those sculpts as normal, or to add objects into a group with that sculpt. (Mm)
Note that puppets will automatically die when they have fallen a set amount of in-scene distance. This is set in the Global Settings gadget.
If the run speed is set to equal or less than the walk speed, running is completely switched off.
If the run is enabled, the puppet transitions between the base settings to running-keyframed settings based on the magnitude of the puppet interface’s walk input between 0.95 and 1.
You can turn a regular puppet into a first-person puppet. By making the head invisible, adjusting its controller sensor’s camera distance, and turning on the “face camera” setting.
By default, puppets come with a “lean” functionality that allows the player to expressively look around with their character and bend their body by tilting the controller. Though this can be adjusted however you like. (Tg)
Puppets can fairly easily be converted into a first-person view. (Tg)
This is the same as the basic puppet, with an extra microchip with extra features. Those features are:
These settings control the speed of the puppet based on the magnitude of the “walk” input on a corresponding puppet interface (I will refer to this as the “magnitude”). By default, that input is connected to the left stick (camera-relative) on the controller that is possessing the puppet.
So if you push the left stick all the way to the outer edge on the controller, the magnitude is 1. If you let it stay in the centre, it is 0.
While moving, the maximum speed of the puppet is whichever is greater out of the walk and run speeds. This speed is modulated by the magnitude.
For example, at 0.97 magnitude it moves at 0.97 of its run speed. And at 0.5 magnitude it moves at half of the run speed. If the run speed is 10 m/s and the magnitude is at 0.5, the puppet will move at half of 10 m/s, which is 5 m/s.
While moving slower or equal to the set walk speed, the walk settings will be in effect. From above walk speed to the run speed, the settings will transition to the run settings. If the run speed is equal to or less than walk speed, the running settings will not come into effect.
For example, say the walk speed is 5 m/s, and the run speed is 15 m/s. The setting for “arm flail” is set to 0 for walking, and 100% for running. While the speed of the puppet is 10 m/s—halfway between its walk and run speeds—the arm flail will be at 50%—halfway between the walking arm flail and the running arm flail.
Note that in reality, this is most likely based on the magnitude value, and uses the ratio between walk and run speeds to figure out the transition. The explanation is still accurate, as the puppet speed and walk magnitude values are strongly linked.
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(Tg)
Sends commands and receives data from the puppet the gadget is in(?). (Tg)
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(Tg)
Sends a signal to a random output port. Similar to a selector.
Outputs a signal to one of many outputs. (Jj) See Many Inputs or Outputs.
This is an input.
If a wire is connected(?), whatever signal is sent to this port will be sent out to the currently selected output port.
If no wire is connected, an output of 1 will be sent.
This is an input.
When it first receives signal, which output port is selected will be randomised.
Has a minimum value of 2(?), and a maximum value of 10.
The number of output ports to be randomly selected between. Each port has a 1 in (output count) chance of being selected each time the gadget is randomised.
Note that you can have ports empty, and have the count be higher than the number of ports actually used. This can be useful for adding in random moments of nothing being selected.
This is a selector with 3 options:
“No Repeat” will not allow the same port to be selected twice in a row.
“Shuffle” will play back the same order of unique selections each time the scene is begins. It will also loop through this order(?) if randomised more times than the output count. Similar to a “seeded” random generator.
“True Random” will select a random port every time, even if the same port is selected twice in a row. Note that if the same port is selected twice in a row the signal will simply continue to be sent with no break.
This is an output.
Sends the index of the currently selected port. (Tg)
Note that this index is zero-based. So if the first port is selected, a 0 signal will be sent. If the second port is selected, a 1 will be sent.
Rotates the attached object around its center of mass(?).
Senses rotation of the attached object.
Rotates the attached object.
Has a gizmo positioned at the centre of mass(?) of the affected object. This gizmo shows X, Y, and Z axes coming out of it. A circle is shown to indicate the axis the object will rotate around. And a stalk with a movable nub at the end is used to adjust this rotation axis.
The target speed of the rotation. (Jj)
The gadget’s ability to overcome physics while increasing its rotation to the target speed, such as the object’s inertia due to mass, gravity, friction, etc. (Jj)
The gadget’s ability to slow the rotation of the object when it is rotating too fast. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, the rotation axis changes orientation with the gadget. When off, the rotation axis stays the same relative tot eh overall scene.
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Shows a rectangular transparent box in edit mode only. Used to measure distances for jumps, etc.
Also good for orienting yourself in a scene—for example, to help make sure rolling hills are still walkable.
Three sliders dictating the size of the ruler in meters.
Rumbles the DS4 controller. Though in most cases, less is more. (Tg)
The strength of the rumble of the left motor in the controller. This is the stronger of the two rumbles.
The strength of the rumble of the right motor in the controller. This is the more subtle of the two rumbles.
This is a button.
Press it once to activate the gadget’s rumble settings for 2 seconds(?), even when powered off.
Stores the current score, and can post it to a scoreboard of the same name. (Jj) To set the name of the scoreboard in the dream the scene is in, edit the name of the gadget itself. This name will also be used to define which score should be modified when using the score modifier gadget.
The initial score before it has been modified.
This is an output.
Sends the current score. (Jj)
If multiplayer is on, sends a fat wire of the “player info” type, containing each player’s current score. (Jj) See Fat Wires.
This is a settable switch.
Splits each player’s score into a separate post to the scoreboard. Affects how score posting and the current score output works, and how score modifiers work.
If you want to have the score be counted as many players working together, leave this setting off so that it’s just a single score. (Jj)
This is a pulse output.
Sends a pulse when the score has increased. (Jj)
This is a pulse output.
Sends a pulse when the score has decreased. (Jj)
This is an input.
While playing this scene from inside an uploaded dream, posts the score to the dreamiverse when a signal it receives changes from 0 to positive(?). (Jj)
If the version of the dream you are currently playing is uploaded privately but it has been uploaded publicly at some point, then no scores will be posted.
If a score is posted for a player that is “better” than a score previously posted by that player—as defined by the scoreboard settings in the dream—a notification will pop up announcing their new high score. See the Scoreboard “Better is…” setting.
If the version of the dream is private but it has been uploaded publicly at some point, then this message will only appear if there has already been a score of the same name posted to the public version. Also, the message will add that the score has not been posted because you are not playing the released version of the dream.
When multiplayer is on, if the “post score” input receives a signal that is a fat wire of the “player info” type, only players for whom the corresponding player info signal is positive(?) will be posted. (Jj) (Jj) However, if a simple “on” (1) signal is sent to this input, all stored scores will be posted. (Jj) See Fat Wires.
Accesses the current score, normally based on the set Operation Value. (Jj)
The name of the score to modify. You can cycle through all named score gadgets in the scene by hovering over the text box and pressing up/down on the d-pad.
This is a selector with 4 options:
“Set” will set the score’s value to the Operation Value. (Jj)
“Get” will get the score’s current value without changing it. (Jj)
“Add” will add the Operation Value to the score. (Jj)
“Reset” will set the score to its initial value.
Not available when in “Get” mode.
This is a selector with 2 options:
“When Powered” will modify the score when the gadget is first powered.
“Continuous” will constantly modify the score each frame while the gadget is powered. (Jj)
The number to use to modify the score, based on the current Operation Type.
When the associated score gadget has “multiplayer” on(?), you can set different this value with different values for each player by using a fat wire of the “player info” type. See Fat Wires. (Jj) (Jj)
Outputs a signal to one of many outputs. (Jj) See Many Inputs or Outputs.
The number of selections used.
Labelled as A - J. Selections beyond the port count are greyed out.
A selection’s output port sends an “on” signal, while selected. If “passthrough” mode is active, the value (or wire?) connected to its input port will be outputted instead. (What happens if passthrough is on, but no signal is connected? Does it default to “on”?)
When a signal is received by a selection’s input, the gadget sets it as the current selection.
Changes the current selection to the next one in the list. If this would go beyond the selection count, the current selection will be the first one.
Changes the current selection to the previous one in the list. If this would go beyond the first selection, the current selection will be the last one.
This is a switch.
Sets the gadget to “passthrough” mode. See Selections.
Gets or sets the currently selected selection. The input value is rounded down (floored) to choose which channel is selected. Note, however, that the channel numbers begin at 0; so A = 0, B = 1, etc. If a negative value is received, the first channel becomes active. If a value greater than the last channel is received, the last channel becomes active. (Pk) (Tg) (Tg)
Generates a signal that changes over time. (Pk) The signal is based on a sine wave, though you can get different shapes to the signal depending on the settings. (Overview of all features Tg)
A “sweep” is defined as the values generated from a minimum to a maximum or maximum to a minimum.
The max and min value ranges are tied into a single 4-value input and output.
Some settings within the signal generator have two sliders associated with them: one for the highest value of a range and one for the lowest value of a range. Each time this setting is used, a random value will be used within that range.
When changing the sliders, if the highest value becomes lower than the lowest value, the lowest value will change to match the highest value. If the lowest value becomes higher than the highest value, the highest value will change to match the lowest value.
This is an output.
Sends the current value of the generated signal.
How long it takes to go through a single sweep of values.
Moves through 0 - 1. How long it takes to do this is dictated by the sweep seconds setting.
Contains a range slider pair. Has a 2-value input and output.
This dictates how long the signal will “hang” at the highest and lowest values.
Contains a range slider pair.
This dictates the highest value reached by a given sweep.
Contains a range slider pair.
This dictates the lowest value reached by a given sweep.
There is no input on this graph. It is a visual representation of the values generated over time using the current values.
Manipulates input signals in various ways, and outputs them again. Only uses a fat wire’s first input, and outputs a thin wire(?).
On the face of the gadget two bars are shown representing the original input value and the manipulated output value. (Jj) (Jj)
The input to be manipulated and the manipulated output. These inputs and outputs are shown on the gadget.
This is a selector with 4 options.
Dictates the high-level way input signals are manipulated.
The options are the following:
“Smoothing Only” will ease-out changes to the output based on the input, according to the output smoothing settings. (Jj) (Jj)
“Pulse On Input On” will send a pulse of 1 when the input becomes 1(?). (Jj) (Jj) (Tg)
“Invert” will turn a 0 into a 1, and a 1 into a 0, and linearly interpolate any other values. For example, -0.2 becomes 1.2(?), and 0.7 becomes 0.3. (Jj) (Jj)
“Custom Remapper” allows you to manipulate the signal more specifically, using a number of other settings. (Jj) (Jj)
Only available in “Custom Remapper” mode.
This is a line graph representation of the input signal on the left and output signal on the right.
On both sides there are “maximum” and “minimum” horizontal lines. Drag these using X to adjust them. While “Edge Mode” is set to “none” (the default), the input value will be identified relative to the input max/min and mapped to the output max/min. (Jj)
For example, the input range is 1 - 2, and the output range is 10 to 20, and an input value of 1.5 is received. This is halfway through the input range. So the halfway mark of the output range is found, which is 15. So the value 15 is outputted.
Using the same setup as the previous example, say the input -1 is found. This is -1 through the input range. The same -1 position in the output range would be -10. So the value -10 is outputted.
There are two buttons on the graph.
“Learn Input Range” is over the input side of the graph, and appears when time is running or paused. While held, the maximum and minimum values will be adjusted to include the range of values currently shown in the input graph. So when clicked, it will use whatever values are in the graph at that moment and adjust for those. (Tg)
“Invert Input” is to the right of the graph. Click this to flip minimum and maximum settings. (Is this actually a switch?)
Only available in “Custom Remapper” mode.
Shapes the output curve when the value would normally be beyond its range limits. A special button that displays the name of the shaping mode, as well as a preview of how the outputted curve will be affected by it. Click on it with X will cycle through the following modes:
“No shaping” does not shape the curve at all. This means that if the input is beyond the specified range, the output will still be scaled relative to the output range. This means the output can be beyond the limits of the specified range. This is the behaviour for other remapper modes also(?). (Jj)
“Flip values below Minimum” will invert values that would be below the output range’s minimum. For example, if the output range minimum is set to 1, and the value would be 0.2, the difference (-0.8) would be added to the output range minimum before outputting the value, sending 1.8 instead. Note that if the value would be above the range maximum, those values will be unaffected. (Jj)
“Clamp values” ensures all values output are within the range. Any values that would be above the maximum or below the minimum will snap to the range maximum and range minimum instead. (Jj)
“Ease in” causes values to be multiplied by how far they are away from the range minimum towards the range maximum. Values beyond the range minimum are clamped to the range minimum. If you wire up a value that increases over time, the output will appear to increase slower than normal until it reaches “full speed” near the range maximum.
“Ease out” uses a similar algorithm to “Ease in” but compares to the range maximum instead.
“Ease In & Out” uses a combination of “Ease in” and “Ease out” to slow at the range minimum and maximum. Also clamps beyond the range minimum and maximum.
“Threshold” will output the range maximum if the value is equal to or greater than the range maximum. Otherwise it will output the range minimum. (Tg) (Jj)
Not available in “Pulse” mode. Has 2 value sliders. (Jj) (Jj) (Tg)
When the output would become(?) a larger number, the output “eases out” to that value over the “Smooth Rise” duration.
When the output would become(?) a smaller number, output “eases out” to that value over the “Smooth Fall” duration.
Only available in “Pulse” mode. Has 2 value sliders.
“Pulse Rise” dictates how long it will take to get to the recorded input value.
“Pulse Fall” dictates how long it will take to get to the recorded input value.
This is a settable/gettable button.
While active, the output value will not change, but whatever the output was at the moment this was turned on will continue to be sent. (Jj) (Jj) (Tg)
The fact that you can freeze many values at the same time means you can store many values in a single signal manipulator, which if used correctly can save you a lot of thermo.You can even use a destroyer to destroy other gadgets that generated these signals once they’ve served their purpose. (Jj)
This is a selector with 7 options. (Tg) They are the following:
“None” will not use any edge features.
“Pulse at On” will pulse output a 1 signal when a positive(?) signal is received. (?)
“Pulse at Off” will pulse output a 1 signal when the input signal goes from being positive(?) to being 0. (Tg)
“Pulse at On and Off” will pulse output a 1 signal when the input signal changes from positive to non-positive. (?)
“Toggle When On” will toggle between outputting 1 and 0 when a positive(?) signal is received.
“Toggle When On” will toggle between outputting 1 and 0 when a negative(?) signal is received.
“Toggle When On or Off” will toggle between outputting 1 and 0 when a positive or non-positive(?) signal is received.
This is a number of switches, one for each value of the input wire. So if the input is a fat wire with multiple values, there will be one switch for each value carried by that fat wire. (Jj) (Are nested fat wires split out for these switches?)
When active, input values will be passed directly to the output. (Jj) (Can this be changed in-game? Only by a keyframe?)
(Only stampable in Sound Mode?)
A “slice” is the name for a sample of an audio recording.
Anywhere in the sound’s tweak menu where you see the waveform (or envelope?) of the recording, while the sample is being played, circles appear and move along the sample. These represent each part of the sample that is currently being played.
You can set a “Spicy” state of the instrument settings, much like a keyframe. Hold L2 and adjust the settings. Now when performing, use L2 to interpolate between the non-spicy settings and the spicy settings. (Mm) (Unsure how to remove spiciness from a setting? perhaps use triangle on it Mm.) Note that if a slider has been split into a range, that range size will hold for the spicy and non-spicy setting. (Mm)
Note that some tabs have a large circular “on” button at the top for that entire tab. Remember to turn it on, or none of those settings will be in effect.
“14 tabs on the tweak menu? What the hell?!” —People inside Media Molecule (at first). (Mm)
Sound gadgets can be used outside of a timeline, and powered by logic to play them. (Tg)
Scope in to a sound gadget to open the sound window and switch to Sound Mode (?). Here, you can manipulate what is played when the gadget is activated.
Some features only available for sound gadgets in instrument mode (?).
(It’s unclear how these controls work with the move controllers?)
Along the top-left are 3 buttons:
As well as the 3 buttons part of all windows in Dreams, there are 3 extra buttons that change the window’s view:
When first opening the window, the view defaults to performance mode. (Mm) If this view had been previously changed to a different one, that view will be opened instead.
When changing to the performance view, you will be taken into performance mode, so that you can play in the window. To exit from this mode, use L1 + circle. To re-enter this mode, use L1 + X.
On the DS4, hover within the window and press the d-pad buttons or the face buttons to play notes with the instrument, within the current key. Tilt the controller left and right to go to higher or lower octaves.
Start recording by clicking on the REC context button, or pushing the right and left sticks together (L3 + R3). Recorded notes are shown as points or strokes of light on the window’s surface, which reflect their colours as shown in the piano roll view. (Mm) You can record more notes into the same clip. (Mm)
Effect field gadgets can be brought into the performance window. These fields will take effect while a note is being played within its influence, as shown by a circular colour around the gadget. (Tg) Sound gadgets can be brought into the performance window also. These work the same way for performance but have a rectangular shape. (Tg) Note that effect fields and notes within such instruments will not be triggered while inside a containing performance window.
A piano roll lets you manipulate notes recorded in performance mode, as well as new ones.
To the left of the window is a bar displaying all notes, or if it’s more of a series of samples like a drum kit, it will display icons for each d-pad and face button corresponding to which buttons play which sample in performance mode. You can click on these buttons to preview the sound they make.
In the main window, the notes are displayed as lines going from left to right which shows when they will begin and end—much like in a timeline. Hovering over the main window will show which notes are which to the right of the nearest bar mark (?).
You can drag notes around like you would drag objects around in the scene. Dragging from the right edge of a note lets you change its length. Note that there is no way of changing a note’s length from dragging from the left edge.
You can clone and multi-clone notes as you would in the scene.
(Mm)
The slice mapper shows all audio samples the instrument uses, and allows adjusting settings for these slices such as the note it represents, the spiciness it will activate on, and where the slice begins and ends. (Tg)
You can drag existing instruments or sound gadgets into the slice mapper to add those slices to the gadget. (Bg)
Slices can have spiciness set, so that they are only used when the note that is being played is closer to its own spiciness setting than other slices’ spiciness settings. This means that depending on the spiciness of the note, different groups of samples can be used even from the same instrument. (Bg)
This is a split slider.
The volume of each note played. (Tg)
This controls the fade in or fade out of each playthrough. (Mm) The acronym stands for: Attack, how long it takes to get to full volume; Decay, how long it takes to get from full volume to the sustain volume; Sustain, the volume level the slice will play at until released; Release, how long it takes for the slice to fade out.
Start time is where each slice will begin playback. It has the same capability as a split slider but the UI looks different. (Mm)
Where in each slice playback will begin.
When in sound effect mode, a slice begins when the gadget is powered, and ends when the gadget is unpowered. When in instrument mode, a slice begins when a note starts, and ends when that note ends. Note that multiple slices may play at once from the same gadget, depending on the settings.
The “sound effect” type has no unique features (?). It simply plays one of its slices when it receives power.
The “instrument” has the unique feature of allowing you to play the same sound clip at different pitches using the performance mode or the piano roll. (Mm) (Tg)
Slice playback mode affects how the slice moves through the sample while playing. See playback modes.
Once and Sustain modes limit the maximum duration in a timeline to the length of the clip. Loop and Sustain modes will allow you to drag the clip beyond the clip’s normal duration, showing show faded repeats of the clip.
Course pitch shift will adjust the semitone the sample will be played at.
Fine pitch shift will adjust the sample pitch between semitones.
Glide (something to do with pitch bending in performance?).
Note drop sets the probability that any given note (or slice?) will not be played at all. So at 50%, half the notes will note be played, and at 100%, no notes will be played.
…
Places the sound at a position in the scene. The audio coming from this gadget will be affected based on the position and angle of the camera relative to this position. (Tg)
Note that if you’d like to have the audio volume etc. be affected by some other position such as the puppet to allow you to freely move the camera, you can get similar effects using a trigger zone. (Tg)
Delay
Up to 100% will add reverb based on the sound (turns up the “wet” effect). Above that up to 200% removed the original sound and just keeps the reverb (turns down the “dry” original audio).
There are 4 reverb modes:
There is a Spiciness slider in this tab. If a performance captured use of spiciness, the slider value is blended with the recording, allowing you to adjust the overall spiciness of the same recording. As this is a tweak menu setting, you can set it with logic. (Mm)
When turned on, the sound is played as “grains”—tiny slices of the sample. This lets you mess with the audio at a much finer level and get all sorts of interesting effects.
“Grains are the flecks of audio.” —Alex Evans, 2019.
1:50:21
Time Stretch affects how far through the sound gets relative to real time before it cuts off (?). So at 100%, each grain will play the same part of the sample as it would normally. At 0%, each grain will play for a fraction of a second and end.
(Or…) Time Stretch dictates how far through the next grain will start playing from(?). So at 100%, each grain will play the sample from right after the previous one ended. At 50%, each grain will play the sample from halfway through the part the previous one played. At 0%, each grain will play starting at the same point. At negative values, parts of the sample will be played in reverse order, as if being played backwards.
(Mm)
The overlap of the grains affects how they merge together into one sound. If you lessen the overlap, you will hear longer gaps in the audio. If you increase the overlap, you will hear fewer gaps in the audio (and other things?). (Mm)
Grain shape affects how the volume of the grain changes over time (?). If you give it a left slant, each grain will come in at 100% volume and go down to 0%. (Mm)
The interval setting affects how long the next grain waits before being played(?). So at 0%, it is played when it would be in real time. Whereas -10% will play it 90% through the previous grain. (Mm)
This is the same setting as the one on the Sound tab. Changing one will change the other.
Resonant filtering is a different kind of EQ effect. The graph shows how the frequencies are affected by the filter. Move the node left and right on the graph to adjust the point at which higher frequencies will be cut off. Move the node up and down on the graph to adjust the volume boost given to the frequencies just below the cut-off point. (Mm)
You can hold shift and expand the node in the graph, also. (At) (Not sure what this does?)
Move the node on the graph to adjust the amount and type of distortion applied to the sound.
Soft clipper (Mm)
Chorus repeats the exact same audio output (Mm) at slightly different pitches (?).
Chorus Amount increases the volume of the chorus layer. (Mm)
Delay.
Chorus LFO.
(Abbreviation of Equalisation.)
The graph shows the a black line representing how the frequencies are affected by the EQ settings. There is a grey line showing the neutral state that would not affect the frequency output of the sound gadget. Any part where the black line is above the grey line is boosting those frequencies. Any part where the black line is below the grey line, it is attenuating (turning down) those frequencies.
You can drag the black nodes on the graph itself with X to adjust the EQ. (Mm) There are 4 bands with nodes, as well as one for low cut and one for high cut (though these only become visible if you turn up or turn down those settings enough so that they become visible on the graph). You can adjust the width of these bands (how broadly the black line is affected by the node) by holding shift and dragging from the node left or right. (Mm)
Low Cut Frequency makes frequencies below the setting quieter. (Mm)
High Cut Frequency makes frequencies beyond the setting quieter. (Mm)
A splitter takes a fat wire and splits those into separate outputs to allow you to isolate specific values. See Fat Wires.
This is an input. Shown by default.
Takes any kind of wire, and splits it into multiple wires. (Jj)
This is an output.
Sends a signal value based on the source of the input wire(?). (Unsure what this does for thin wires? How about fat wires from combiners? And what values correspond to what source types?)
There can be multiple outputs depending on how many values the input wire holds. If the input comes from a non-combiner(?) gadget’s output, the number of outputs and what they represent is automatically detected. The icons for these outputs will be based on those output types also. (Jj) When the source of the input wire is a joiner, the outputs will be labelled as “A,” “B,” “C,” etc.(?)
For example, wiring up the output from a controller sensor’s left stick will give two outputs: “Left/Right” and “Up/Down.” (Jj)
If the wire carries a single signal, the splitter will split it into a positive and negative output instead. (Jj)
Displays text on the screen like subtitles. SImilar to the text displayer.
Can use the PS4’s subtitle settings, allowing the player to customise how these look to some extent.
(More documentation to come.)
…
Changes the appearance of the sun and sky, as well as the angle and brightness of the sunlight. (Tg) Note that the sky is reflected by metallic finishes.
The sun light casts light and affects areas of objects this light hits. The sky light affects areas unaffected by sunlight, such as shadows.
The gadget itself has a special gizmo that hovers above it. It has a globe which represents the sky, and a stalk with a sphere along it representing the sun.
Using R2, you can drag the sun around to affect where it is in the sky and the angle of the sun’s light. Is closeness to the sky globe sets its brightness, not its size in the sky.
You can drag the surface of the sky globe also, to adjust the position of the sky image (see below), or use L2 to rotate it using the normal controls. (Tg)
Note that the “rays” of light cast by the sun are parallel as if emitted from infinitely far away.
The sky itself is made up of flecks, just as all things are in dreams. If you want to hide those flecks you can turn the tint amount all the way up so that all the sky’s flecks are the same colour. (Tg) Or you can use the camera’s aperture settings to blur out the sky. (Tg)
A colour picker.
Sets the colour of the sun and of the light the sun emits across the scene. (Tg)
The intensity of the light emitted by the sun across the scene.
The size of the sun in the sky, in degrees of the sky taken up by it(?). (Tg)
This is a switch.
When on, the sun is visible in the sky.
When off, the sun is not visible in the sky. Note, however, that its light is unaffected.
This is a switch.
When on, any objects that cast shadows will create shadows when hit by the sun’s light.
When set to 0, a default sky image is used with a smooth blue gradient from one side of the globe to another.
When set to a particular sky image, that image will be used as a guide for the colours across the sky—though these colours are affected by the other settings below. (Tg)
The fleck used to render the sky.
Affects the intensity of the sky light within the scene.
Also affects the brightness of the sky image itself. For example, a lower brightness will make the sky image darker.
Affects the saturation of the sky image. Lower means the colours of the sky image itself move towards grey.
Adjusts the colours of the sky image as a whole.
A colour picker and slider.
Affects the tint colour and tint amount applied to the sky image. (Tg) (Tg) See Graphics for details.
How dark the lower half of the sky appears. Lower values affect the rendered sky less.
The distance from the camera that “fog” begins to appear. This fog is not the same as fog created by the fog gadget. It is the area in which the sky shows through objects.
There is a gradient to how intense this effect is applied around the specified distance. (Specifics?)
An on/off switch to be used with logic. (Tg) Only visible in edit mode.
This gadget is larger and shows an interactive switch for use in edit mode.
This is a colour picker.
Dictates the colour of the gadget itself.
This is a switch.
Sets the current state of the switch.
The value sent when the switch is off.
The value sent when the switch is on.
This is a switch.
When on, the interactive switch on the gadget will be shown. When off, the gadget will only show the current value being sent.
Has a location marker. (Tg)
Marks a named position, and orientation, and scale within the world. (Jj) (Tg)
Looks dark unless detected—even when powered. While a trigger zone that is looking for the tag has its tweak menu open, flashes green. (Tg)
Output.
While detected by any trigger zone, sends an “on” signal. (Jj) (Tg)
Output.
Sends the current position and rotation(?) of the gadget.
When turned on, moves the attached object to the position and/or orientation of a specified tag. (Tg) (Jj)
The signal sent to power the gadget (between 0 and 1) dictates how quickly the affected object will move towards the target position and/or orientation. Sending 1 (“on”) will move the affected objects to the target position immediately. (Tg) (Jj)
The name of the tag.
The tag location to teleport to. (Tg) (Jj)
Use the adjustment controls to cycle through names of tags in the scene and the names used by other gadgets looking for tag names.
This is a settable switch. On by default.
When on, the affected object will change position to match the target tag’s position. (Jj)
This is a settable switch.
When on, the affected object will rotate to match the target tag’s orientation. (Tg) (Jj)
Dictates the objects to teleport. (Jj)
Displays text either on-screen or in the world. (Mm) Drag the displayed text itself to the position you want it to display at.
There are three parts to a text box: the text, the box which serves as the background for the text, and the border which lines the outside of the box. Settings for one will not affect the other two.
The gadget is larger than other gadgets, and shows the text on its face.
The text gadget can be used in clever ways to add effects other than text to the game. Examples include shafts of light (Mm), and water ripples (Mm), and glass (Tg).
The text to display. Click on it to bring up the text input interface. The text is shown on the gadget itself. (Jj)
Note that the text to be displayed cannot be changed in-game. Also, the text gadget will not render if there is no text to display. (Tg)
Dreams icons can be used in text gadgets by typing icon names between <angle-brackets>. You can see a list of all available icons on indreams.me, or the TAPgiles Icon Guide.
Emoji can be used in text gadgets by typing Emoji One short codes. You can see a list of all available emoji on emojipedia.org. So find the short code for a given emoji, click on the emoji and scroll down to Shortcodes.
This is a colour picker.
The colour of the text. (Jj) The gadget’s colour uses this colour also.
Higher values also cause the text itself to glow(?). Note that if the text is set to be too bright, it can become hard to read.
The opacity of the text. Lower is more transparent. The lowest will make the text disappear completely. (Jj) Note that this opacity does not affect the box or border.
The font of the text. (Jj)
This is a switch.
When on, the background text box will be shown. When off, it will be hidden. (Jj)
This is a colour selector.
The colour of the box. (Jj)
Chooses from a number of tail styles as if the box were a speech bubble. The tail comes from the bottom centre of the box. (Jj) The first option is “none,” which will not show a tail.
If there is a tail and the gadget is selected or its tweak menu is open, a location marker will appear below the text box representing the position the tail is pointing towards. (?)
Note that the appearance of the tail (eg. colour) will be the same as the box itself. Also, the border wraps around the tail if there is one. (?)
The brightness of the box. (Jj) Higher values makes the box glow. (?)
How opaque (solid) the box is. Lower values make it more transparent.
How rounded the corners of the box are. (Jj)
These rounded corners are not necessarily perfectly circular. The percentage value is used relative to the width and height of the box. For example, if a box is wider than it is tall, the corners will be wider than they are tall. (?)
This is a switch.
When on, the box will automatically resize to fit the size of the text. When off, the box size can be changed independently of its contents with nodes along the sides of the box. (Jj)
Selects from a number of textured backgrounds. (Jj) (based on the flecks?) When at the first (left) position, there is no texture applied to the box.
When a texture is selected, further options are activated.
Only available when a texture is selected.
How much of the texture is blended(?) into the box colour.
Only available when a texture is selected.
How large the texture is. (?)
Only available when a texture is selected.
How far in from the outer edge the texture fades out, becoming the original solid colour. (?)
This a switch.
When on, the border is shown. When off, the border is not shown.
This is a colour picker.
Dictates the colour of the border.
How bright the border is. Higher brightness causes the border to seem to glow.
How opaque the border is. Lower values make the border more transparent.
How wide the border is. (How does the percentage relate?)
This is a switch.
When on, a shadow of the border is shown behind the box. It also enables further settings.
Only available when the box shadow is on.
The opacity dictates how opaque the entire shadow is.
The softness dictates how far from the outer edge of the shadow it takes for the shadow to get to full strength. (?) From that point to the outer edge, the shadow becomes more and more transparent.
The shadow is shown a certain distance away from the centre of the box, along the specified angle. For example, 90° would make the shadow peek out to the right of the box, and 0° would make the shadow peek out to the top of the box.
Only effective when the box is not auto-fitted to the text. (?) These are selectors with 3 options each.
These dictate the alignment of the text within the box.
Horizontal options are: Left, Centre, Right.
Vertical options are: Top, Middle, Bottom.
Only available when not in-scene. These are selectors with 4 options each.
These dictate the position on the screen the entire box will be displayed at. (Jj)
Horizontal options are: Left, Centre, Right, Custom.
Vertical options are: Top, Middle, Bottom, Custom.
When an axis is set to custom, the text box can be dragged using the imp to the desired position along that axis. If both are set to custom, the box can be dragged freely.
This is a switch.
When on, the text will be displayed at some 3D position and rotation within the scene. (Jj) When off, the text will be displayed directly to the screen, on top of anything within the scene.
Only available when in-scene. This is a switch.
When on, the text will always be displayed straight-on to the camera, even when changing the angle the camera is looking at the text from. Effectively, this means the text will only have scale and rotation, but no 3D perspective. (Jj)
Only available when in-scene. This is a switch.
When on, the text will not be obscured by anything else within the scene, apart from other always-on-top text objects(?). When off, the text can be covered by objects within the scene. (Jj)
All text objects on a lower layer number will be displayed above all text objects on higher layer numbers. (?) This ignores always-on-top rules.
Note that text objects on the same layer will be displayed in the order they were created. (?)
Only effective when not in-scene. (?) This is a switch.
When on, you may rotate the text.
How many characters are typed per second when the gadget receives power. (?)
While typing, text is wrapped at the point that the next character would push the word beyond the size of the containing box. (?)
…
Counts time to a target duration. (Jj) (Tg)
Tip: If you wire the “finished” pulse output to the “reset” input, the timer will loop and send a “finished” pulse at the interval set as the target time. (Jj)
The duration the timer will run for.
This setting has an input and output.
The current time of the timer.
Input and Output uses values representing the number of seconds.
The type dictates how it reacts to the start signal, and how it views the progress of the timer in relation to the target time.
For all but “count down,” the timer will be considered “finished” when the current time reaches the target time.
“Count up” will begin adding to the current time until it hits the target. Note that the timer will continue running even when not receiving a signal into “Start Timer.” (Tg)
“Speed” will add time multiplied by the signal received by “Start Timer.” For example, while 0.5 is sent to “Start Timer,” 0.5 seconds to be added to the current time for each realtime second that passes. (Tg) (Tg)
“Positional” will set the current time based on the signal received by “Start Timer.” The time set will be the target time multiplied by the input signal. For example, sending 0.2 when the target time is 10 seconds will set the current time to 2 seconds.
“Count down” will begin at the set target time and count down to zero, at which point it will be considered finished.
This is an input. Shown by default.
Starts time running for the timer. (Tg) See Timer Type for the specifics of how this will behave.
Shows by default. Pulse.
Sends an “on” pulse the moment when the timer completes. (Pk) (Tg)
This is an input. Shown by default.
Sets the current time based on which type the timer is set to use. If set to “count up,” “speed,” or “positional,” it will reset to 0. If set to “count down,” it will reset to the target time.
Shows by default. Signal.
Gives a 0 - 1 representation of the progress the timer has made towards its target. Think of it as a “progress” signal. (Pk)
For example, a “count up” timer with a target of 10 seconds is at 3 seconds. It will give a signal of 0.3. Works the same for a “count down” timer. But with the same settings, this would give a signal of 0.7 (?). (Jj)
This is an output.
Sends “on” while the timer has finished. (Pk) (Tg)
Any gadgets within a timeline will be activated and deactivated (turned on or off) at the right times depending on where they are located within the timeline. Placing a gadget more to the left of the timeline will activate it earlier, and placing it more to the right of the timeline will activate it later. (Tg)
You can move, clone, delete, select, etc. gadgets within the timeline as you would in the scene. You can also drag from the left or right edge of the gadget to adjust when they start or stop being activated within the timeline. Note that some sound gadgets limit this depending on their contents and settings.
The time mode can use musical measures and BPM, with features to help snap clips to these measures. Or it can use normal time. To cycle between these modes, click on the measures or time display in the top-right of the window. (Mm)
Each gadget (?) in a timeline will have handles in the top-left and top-right corners. These fade in or fade out that gadget. For example, bringing the volume of a sound gadget to 100% over a period of time. Note, not all gadgets respond to fades.
Timelines can have timelines nested within them. Nested timelines will play in sync with their parent timeline.
You can use a keyframe within a timeline to affect the timeline itself. (Tg) Timeline settings can be changed as it is playing using various kinds of logic. (Tg)
The playhead shows which part of the timeline is currently being played. While time is running, you can use X to drag it to a new position or click on the head of the timeline (showing the time or bar numbers) to snap the playhead to that position.
You can record a keyframe to set the playhead’s position, but need to use L1 + X to record the playhead’s position. (Tg)
How fast the timeline plays at. If in “beats” mode(?), shows a beats per minute display in a tooltip as you edit the setting.
When nested inside a parent timeline, the speed of playback will be multiplied by its parent’s speed. (Tg)
This is a switch.
When on, the sidebar is shown. This has two buttons for each row of the timeline: “power”(?) and “solo.” Power will turn an entire row on or off. If there are any rows with “solo” enabled, all rows that do not have solo enabled will be turned off. (Tg)
Sends a pulse when the end of the timeline is reached. (Tg)
Detects if an object of some kind is within the defined zone. (Mm) For example, detecting if a tag gadget is within the zone. (Jj)
Has a location node associated with it that marks the position of the trigger zone within the scene. Note that this doesn’t do anything if using the “scene” as the zone to detect in.
While the gadget is selected or its tweak menu is open(?), the zone will be displayed in the scene. While it’s displayed, you can adjust its size by hovering over a side to see an arrow pointing away from the shape in the direction you can pull it. Drag it to adjust that side. This works the same as the Stretch Tool in sculpt mode. (Jj) (Mm)
Can also have a falloff, to measure how close a detected object is to the core zone. This falloff is measured from the edge of the core shape and beyond. You can adjust this by hovering over a side of the zone and holding shift while dragging it out.
Defines what kind of object the gadget tries to detect. Note that if an object is within the trigger zone but powered off, it will not be detected.
“Possessed Controller Sensor” will look for objects that a controller sensor is attached (surface-snapped) to that is currently possessed by a player.
“Tag” will look for a named tag. (Cc) (Tg) Tags that can be detected—as allowed by the mode, name, and detection scope—will flash while the trigger zone is selected or its tweak menu is open. This happens whether they are currently detected by the trigger zone or not. (Cc) (Tg)
“Imp” will look for an imp. (Cc)
“Camera” will detect if the player’s current view originates within the specified zone. (Cc)
“Element” will look for any(?) instance of a specified Dreamiverse element. (Cc)
“Labels” will look for elements with the labels defined in the labels tab. (Cc) If a name is specified in the “Name to Detect” setting, only detects objects that also have that name. Because of this, you can use this mode and allow all labels, and just use the name feature. (Tg) Elements with labels that can be detected—as allowed by the mode and specified labels—will flash while the trigger zone is selected or its tweak menu is open. This happens whether than are currently detected by the trigger zone or not.
“Scene Element” will look for a specific instance of an object within the scene. (Tg)
Used to name the tag, scene element, or labelled element being looked for. (Cc) Can use the adjustment controls to cycle through the names of existing scene elements and tags, and names other gadgets within the scene are looking for. (Tg) (Is it disabled if the trigger zone is not in “tag,” “scene element,” or “label” mode?)
If no name has been set to look for, only unnamed tags in “tag” mode or elements in “scene element” mode will be detected. (Cc) (Cc)
This is a selector. Only available when looking for tags.
Dictates where the target must be located as it related to the trigger zone gadget’s location. For the definitions below, “here” is defined as any of the following:
There are 3 options. (Cc) They are the following:
“Anywhere” will detect if the target whether it is “here” or not.
“Here” will detect only if the target is “here.” (Cc)
“Not here” will detect only if the target is not “here.” (Cc)
The minimum number of targets required to be considered “detected.” More targets may be present. (Cc)
Also dictates the maximum number that will be sent by the “number detected” output.
Turning the slider down beyond 1 will change this setting to “all.” With this, all possible targets existing within the level must be within range to be considered “detected.” (Cc)
This is an output.
Outputs the number of detected targets, to a maximum of the “number to detect.” (Cc)
This is an attachment input to link to an element within the scene. Only available when looking for an “element.”
Lets you search for a specific element locally or in the Dreamiverse. The trigger zone will look for that element. (Cc)
Only available when looking for a “scene element.”
Output. Shown by default.
Sends a 0 - 1 signal based on the target’s position within the defined zone. See Core and Falloff Output.
…
You can use things like fall off to make it seem like the sound is at a certain position within the scene. (Tg)
The shape of the zone within the scene that the gadget can detect targets within (Jj), including the entire scene (Tg). See Zone Shape.
X, Y, and Z sliders that adjust the size of the zone. (Do these change behaviour or change entirely when using different shapes?) Not available when “scene” is selected as the zone shape. (Jj) See Core and Falloff Output.
X, Y, and Z sliders that adjust the falloff size of the zone. (Do these change behaviour or change entirely when using different shapes?) Not available when “scene” is selected as the zone shape. See Core and Falloff Output.
Defines settings relating to how labels are detected by the trigger zone. (Cc) Also contains settings for the target object’s visibility and collision. Note that groups can also have labels and collision settings associated with them. See Common Settings > Labels.
This outputs a specific value signal that has been set. Also provides a UI to easily adjust this value while the game is running in edit mode without opening the tweak menu. (Jj) Note that this gadget will never be seen by the player, even when its UI is set to visible.
These are particularly useful for seeing the output of a signal in realtime when debugging things (Jj), or to easily configure more complex aspects of logic.
When holding a wire connected to an output and hovering over the gadget, an input port for the value will appear.
The colour of the gadget.
The current value to be sent. (Jj) If set to below the minimum value, will reset to the minimum value. If set to above the maximum value, will reset to the maximum value(?).
Changing this will update the UI on the face of the gadget, and changing the UI on the face of the gadget will update this value.
The output port for this value is shown by default.
The minimum value that can be sent.
The maximum value that can be sent.
This is a switch.
When on, the UI on the face of the gadget will be shown. When off, the UI on the face of the gadget will not be shown. Instead, the gadget will simply show the current value being sent.
A variable gadget defines a variable. The name of the variable is defined by the name of the gadget. These names are case sensitive (eg. “P1” is a different variable to “p1”). (Jj) These values can be stored between scenes and between playthroughs of the Dream the scene is in.
The variable will have this value when the game is first loaded. If this is variable persists in the Dream and its value has been stored as something else, the gadget will have that value instead.
The lowest value the variable can have.
The highest value the variable can have.
This is a switch.
When on, each player will have their own copy of this variable to read and change. (Jj) (No idea how to differentiate which player’s variable you want to modify? This may only be available in online multiplayer?)
This is a switch. Not settable at runtime.
When on, the variable’s value will be stored when the player leaves the scene. When a scene loads with a similar(?) variable gadget within it, the stored value will be retrieved. Using this, you can transfer data between scenes. (Jj) (Tg) (Tg) (Unclear which parts of the gadget must be the same for it to be considered “similar”?)
This is a switch.
When the gadget is powered(?), the stored value is reset to the initial value. (Further investigation needed?)
This is an output.
Sends the current value of the variable.
This is an output pulse.
Pulses when the variable’s value is increased by a variable modifier gadget.
This is an output pulse.
Pulses when the variable’s value is decreased by a variable modifier gadget.
A variable modifier gadget changes the value of the variable indicated by its name. Note that there must be an existing variable gadget with that name in the scene, to be able to set its value.
This is a text field.
You can adjust the value of this field to cycle through the names of all variable gadgets within the scene and all variable modifier “variable name” values within the scene.
Dictates which variable will be modified by this gadget. (Jj)
This is a selector with 4 options, dictating how the variable’s value will be modified by the gadget (Jj). They are the following:
“Set” will set the value of the variable to the operation value.
“Get” will never change the value of the variable, but will enable the output.
“Add” adds the operation value to the variable’s current value. Note that you can add a negative value to subtract from the variables current value.
“Reset” resets the variable’s value to its initial value. (Tg)
This is a selector with 2 options that dictates when the variable’s value will be modified. (Jj) They are the following:
“When Powered On” will apply the modification once, when the gadget is powered on.
“Continuously While Powered” will apply the modification each frame(?) while the gadget is powered on.
Only available in “set” and “add” modes.
The value used to modify the variable, as defined by the operation type.
This is an output. Only available in “get” mode.
Outputs the variable’s current value. (Jj)
Displays different wipe effects.
Transmitters communicate with receivers on the same channel, and receivers communicate with transmitters on the same channel. Useful for when you need wires to cross great distances or have a single source picked up in many locations. Note that receivers cannot communicate with other receivers, and transmitters cannot communicate with other transmitters.
A transmitter’s channel is defined by the gadget’s name. (Jj) A receiver’s channel is defined in its tweak menu.
A transmitter will always broadcast whatever it is told to. A receiver will only pick up on such broadcasts when they are within range, as defined by a specified zone and falloff. (Cc)
Using a 0-size core and large falloff, we can find a value representing how close a transmitter is to the receiver. (Cc)
A receiver will broadcast whatever it is told to within range, including the falloff. A transmitter will pick up signals from receivers when within range, but will not “ramp” the signals while in the falloff zone; it will be all or nothing. (Cc)
If there are multiple transmitters or receivers on the same channel, they will all communicate on the same channel(?). (If signals are sent by multiple sources at the same, how are these combined? What if the signal is a fat wire from one transmitter and a thin wire or different type of fat wire from another source?)
This is an output. Shown by default.
Outputs anything that a receiver has sent. (Jj)
This is an input. Shown by default.
Broadcasts any signal it receives.
This is a text input. Adjusting its value will cycle through the names of existing transmitter gadgets and channels that existing receivers are currently listening on.
Dictates which transmitters can communicate with the receiver. (Jj)
This is an output. Shown by default.
Outputs anything sent by a transmitter within the specified zone. The strength of the signal is based on its position within the defined zone. See Core and Falloff Output.
This is an input. Shown by default.
Broadcasts any signal it receives to transmitters within the specified zone. (Jj)
A selector, dictating the shape of the zone the receiver can communicate within. See Zone Shape. (Jj)
Defines the size of the zone. Sliders will differ depending on the selected zone shape.
Defines the size of the zone falloff. Sliders will differ depending on the selected zone shape.
Shortcut: shift + R2.
Lets you clone just using R2. But more importantly, allows you to turn on live cloning.
A context menu switch. Not available in sculpt or paint modes(?). Only has effect on sculpts(?). (Tg)
You can clone as normal. The difference is that clones using this method are “live” clones.
Live clones also use a reference to the same sculpt. But when editing, instead of turning the clone into a unique sculpt, the original “reference sculpt” will be edited instead. This means all live clones will seem to “update” as you edit any one of them.
This is useful in a number of situations:
While active everything becomes white or grey. Things that are currently hidden are shown in yellow. Use R2 on objects to make an object hidden, shown in yellow.
When not using the tool, the hidden objects cannot be seen. (Mm) (Does turning off preview invisibility show these?)
These menu items are all menu switches.
On by default. When on, invisible objects will not be shown. When off, invisible objects will be shown, and powered off sculpts and paintings will be shown as transparent (?).
When checked, shows paint in the scene. When unchecked, hides paint in the scene. (Pk)
Some settings work the same way for different kinds of object.
Shared between sculpts and paintings.
A colour selector. Becomes larger while clicking on it to give you finer control over your selection.
How much the selected tint colour is applied to the object. 0% will not apply any tint at all. 100% will apply it in equal amount to the existing colour on the object itself. 200% will override the object’s colour completely. (Mm) (Unclear what kind of blending is used to merge the two colourings.)
Note that when you scope into an object, the tint is still applied to what you see. So if you have a colour tinted at 200%, and you try spraypainting a sculpt with some different colours, you won’t see the changes you’ve made until you turn the tint amount down.
How saturated the object’s original colouring will be rendered as. 0% saturation means the colour will become grayscale. 100% means the colour will be as vibrant as it was in the original.
Shiny things do not reflect the world around them, but are highlighted by light sources.
Adjust the shiny finish of sculpts to give the impression of some being more worn than others - Mm
Add a light, set to 1% brightness so it doesn’t affect the scene too much. Turn shadows off, as they’re not intended as a true light source. Now, shiny things will show a highlight as if they are reflecting light from that direction. (Mm) Note that shiny things will reflect multiple light sources. So if they are intended to intensify the strength of a single light source, or simply for effect, shiny things may reveal the use of multiple lights used in this way.
Waxy things absorb the light more evenly, making it look brighter when lit.
Metallic things reflect the sky, whether the sky can be seen from their position or not.
Rough things don’t reflect the sky.
How much the object glows. (Pk)
Glowing objects give off light based on the lightness of their colour. If a part of the surface is black, it will not glow while lighter parts do glow. (Mm)
Adding glow to the outer flecks is more visible. Adding glow to the inner geometry will be obscured by the flecks on the outside.
For paint, this is effectively “always” or “never” (?). (Pk)
Adjusts the look of the flecks. (Pk)
How much each fleck is randomly rotated. (Pk)
The thickness of the flecks, how much they project out from their surfaces (?). (Pk)
Scales up the individual flecks.
(Not sure what this does?)
Animates the flecks on the outside of the sculpt in different ways. (Pk)
Flecks fade in and out(?).
Flecks fade in, move in one direction a certain distance, and then fade out. The distance travelled is dictated by the amount of flow.
Flecks fade in at a negative rotation, rotate to the same positive rotation, and then fade out. The rotation magnitude is dictated by the amount of wave.
Flecks fade in, then slowly rise away from the surface and fade out.
“Sphere”
“Cube”
“Cylinder”
“Cone”
“Non-uniform Sphere”(?)
“Scene” will detect anything within the entire scene.
Sends an “on” signal if the target has been detected within its defined zone. If the target is within the falloff area, the normal output signal will be multiplied by a percentage (0 - 1) reflecting how much progress between the edge of the falloff and the core zone the object’s location is. (Tg)
For example, the falloff is set to 10 meters, and the normal signal that would be sent is 5. When the target is 4 meters, it is 40% through the falloff, so 40% of 5 will be sent: 2. As the target moves closer to the core, the progress approaches 100%. While the target is within the core, the progress is considered 100%, and so the signal will be sent without being reduced. (Cc)
The core can be resized using R2. The falloff can be resized using shift + R2.
(reword to make them generic descriptions?)
When power is received, “Once” will play through from the start(?) to the end, and then reset to the beginning once completed(?). This will keep playing even if power stops being received. (Jj)
“Sustain” will continue playback as long as it has power, but will pause at the current time when unpowered. (Jj)
“Loop” will continue playing forwards from the beginning when it reaches the end. (Jj)
“Ping-pong” will to start playing backwards when it gets to the end of playback, and forwards again when it reaches the start. (Mm) (Jj)
Some gadgets can have a variable number of inputs an/or outputs. These gadgets will have a “Number of Ports” slider at the top of their tweak menu.
This slider dictates the number of ports used, with a minimum of 2(?) and a maximum of 10.
When hovering over the gadget, and there is a wire connected to the highest allowed port, and the number of ports is not already maxed out… the next highest port will be shown. If a wire is connected to that port, the Number of Ports setting will increase to accommodate this. However, if all wires are removed from the highest allowed port, the Number of Ports setting with not decrease.
Not available when the trigger zone is looking for tags, imps, or the camera(?).
The Visibility setting is a selector with 3 options. (Cc) They are the following:
“Visible” detects objects only if they are visible.
“Hidden” detects objects only if they are not visible.
“Both” detects objects whether they are visible or not.
The Collision setting is a selector with 3 options. They are the following:
“Collidable” detects objects only if they are collidable.
“Non-Collidable” detects object only if they are not collidable.
“Both” detects object whether than are collidable or not.
Only available when the trigger zone is looking for labels.
Match mode is a selector with 2 options.
“Any Selected” will detect any object with at least one of the selected labels. (Cc) (Cc)
“All Selected” will detect any object with all selected labels. (Cc)
There are 9 input switches, on for each label. They are the following: “Friend,” “Foe,” “Scenery,” “Object,” “Machine,” “Weapon,” “Missile,” “Target,” and “Unlabelled.” (Cc)
Unlabelled will match any object that has no labels at all.