the cyf/cyk engines.

i remember the first time i tried to mod a mod.

i was playing one of those edgy, pre-chapter2 "susie vs kris!!!!" ones.
a certain mechanic seemed a bit unfair to me. so i said:
"why don't i open up the game's code and fix it? shouldn't be too hard, right?"

yeah.
i saw the "Lua Experience is REQUIRED to make mods!!" warning
and laughed at its face.

guess what, though? i don't know Lua.
never knew Lua. never really sat down to learn it.
yet here i am!!

i remember the first, proper mod I made.
i called it "The Ink Monster".

it was no more than one of those daydreams people have
about a certain scene with their own fantasy characters.
but with my OWN epic cool OCs and my OWN fantasy landscape!!!11!1!!1!

for the longest, i wondered whether such a mod even
belonged in the CYF (Create Your Frisk) community.
it's not a mod about kris fight god-mode sans or the friend or
whatever?

i felt like i was pushing my own "culture"
onto a community where that didn't really "belong".

which is the reason i kept it hidden,
until now that i just decided i don't care.

but, to be fair, i was never part of the community.
if you came here from the CYF discord server,
you've never heard of me. which is fair. ^3^

i played mods i was lucky enough to find,
messed around with them, learned from them,
then used that knowledge to further my own endeavors.

i then finished my work, all to receive
little to no acclaim, other than the personal satisfaction of
"having made the thing i wanted to, how i wanted to."

except that one stupid CYK (Create Your Kris) video that's a mod of a mod,
not even actually mine,
which remains my most watched video to this day.
...people sure do love their edgy kris fights.

still. i'm baffled i somehow managed to experience all of
these games with no connection to the people behind them.
i wish that weren't the norm.

the CYK + Overworld library.
it soon became my most ambitious project by far.

working on it was ardous.
it was, simply put, not a fun experience.

but i pulled through. i'm no quitter.
i'm not willing to let my ideas die out like that.

the library went through 3 iterations and 3 renames,
but i still didn't quit. i'm no quitter.

i started my work early in 2022.
back then, the Kristal engine wasn't a thing
(at least to my knowledge!!)
and, when faced with rewritting Deltarune from scratch,
i opted to simply modify the existing CYK library.

i combed through the original code,
wrapping the existing object initialization code into functions,
i learned how to parse json files in order to
distribute room and dialogue data,
i learned to USE that data in order to
create rooms automatically,
i polished down minute visual effects,
comparing my game to chapter 1's deltarune
over and over for innacuracies,

and lots of insane stuff like this!

i was absolutely enraptured by a project whose's
scope kept endlessly expanding like an immense kaleidoscope,
but the most meaningful bit to me was writting the documentation.

when i first saw the CYK's documentation page, i was fascinated by it.

the cute, unique quirks to the page meant to resemble
the original Undertale, from the buttons to the font to
the colors... To me, at the time, it seemed like an immense
titan of wit, creativity and ingenuity, a gigantic creation
which i thought i'd never be able to match, let alone touch...

...until I had to.

Y'see, you can't just simply release an undocumented piece of
slop out on the internet. no one will be able to use it.
and, after working so hard on my library? i wasn't going to simply
let. it. waste.

And I made it.

It was hard, so hard, the memories were wipped from my brain.
My friends probably remember hearing me whine about my code endeavors
every other afternoon. I feel for them.

But I made it, by sheer luck.
By simply having all the tools I need at the palm of my paw.

I lucked out.
I was "let off easy".
And now, I can move on.

I know it's a foolish thought, but,
I want to think my library will, maybe,
maybe by sheer coincidence, be able to give someone else
the same feeling CYK gave me.

I wouldn't know,
but I bet everyone who writes a library would hope for the same thing.

But I can hope.
I've done all I could.

done all i had to.