4. Custom Missions
The base game of Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes includes a Bomb Binder with a variety of missions in it, such as "One Step Up" and "I Am Hardcore". With the mod kit, you can create your own such missions and arrange them in a table of contents in the bomb binder.
A Mission consists of a Title, a Description, and a set of rules for generating the bomb. To create a mission, select Keep Talking Modkit --> Missions --> Create new Mission. This will create a new KMMission instance, which is a type of ScriptableObject. The mission object will be saved as an asset under Assets/Missions by default, but it doesn't matter where the assets resides. It will also be tagged for inclusion in mod.bundle automatically.
Select the mission asset and view it in the inspector. The inspector has been customized to make editing missions easier.
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ID: each mission requires a unique identifier (unique within the scope of this mod). The ID is simply the name of the asset, so rename the asset to change the ID. -
Display Name: The name of the mission as it appears in game. -
Description: The description shown in the bomb binder. -
Pacing Events Enabled: Set to true to allow pacing events, like the lights turning off and the alarm clock.
These settings describe how the bomb will be generated.
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Time Limit: The amount of time on the bomb, in seconds. -
Num Strikes: The number of strikes on which the bomb explodes (e.g. 1 strike is "Hardcore" mode, 3 strikes is the more forgiving mode). -
Time Before Needy Activation: The number of seconds that elapse before any unactivated needy modules are automatically activated.
In the base game, a given mission would generate a narrow variety of bombs. This prevented missions from being too predictable and helped avoid players just grinding their way past certain puzzles. To do this, a mission consists of one or more Component Pools, which is basically a selection of puzzle types as well as the number that should be selected from that pool.
For example, to make a mission that generates a bomb with 3 Keypads plus 1 of either a Maze or Memory, you would set up: ComponentPool 1: Count=3, Types=Keypad ComponentPool 2: Count=1, Types=Maze,Memory
It's also possible to create a Component Pool that draws from All Solvable or All Needy modules. This is useful for quickly including all puzzle types, but is also dynamic so it can include extra module types that come from other mods.
To add a Component Pool, use the Add Component Pool button.
To edit the Count of a pool, use the drop-down on the left.
To edit the modules in a pool, click the Edit button. This will expand the details of the pool. From here, you can either choose one of the special "All Modules" selection types or specific types.
To select either "All Solvable" or "All Needy", choose from the Type dropdown. You can then also select whether "All" refers to modules in the Base game, modules added by mods, or both.
To select specific types, simply begin checking off the types you wish. If you want to include modules from mods (either this one or others), you can expand the Mod Types foldout and list them by their Module Type. A module's type is set up in the KMBombModule script but can also be found in the ktane.log output when mods are loaded.
Currently you should limit the number of modules in a mission to 11. Your mission won't make sense if it's possible to select only Needy modules. If you include modules from mods, the player will need to be running that mod to run your mission. You will probably want to mark your mod dependencies in Steam Workshop.
Once you've created a mission or two, you should make a Table of Contents. A Table of Contents (ToC) is required in order to see your missions in the game. To create one, select Keep Talking ModKit --> Missions --> Create new Table of Contents.
Note: If you have just cloned the github modkit project, there will already be an example Table of Contents under Examples/1.11 Missions. You can just delete that one, since a mod should only have one Table of Contents in it.
A ToC is easy to set up. Give it a Title as you'd like it to appear in the bomb binder in game. Then add a Section, which should also have a title. In the base game, Sections have names like "Challenging" and "Exotic". You may wish to group your missions together in some fashion too.
Next, hit the small + icon to add a mission into the section. All the KMMission assets in your project should be listed in the context menu that appears. Note that missions should only appear once in the ToC.
You can drag to rearrange missions within a section. Use the - button to remove a mission from a section. Sections themselves can also be added and rearranged.
Once you're happy with your mission(s) and the Table of Contents, build the mod bundle and place the built mod into your /mods folder. Run the game, open the bomb binder, and you should see your new Table of Contents listed right after the base game's mission.