[Starbound] Animation Framework 0.1

DESCRIPTION:

My first mod ever!

This mod is [eventually going to be] a modder's resource to handle animation of the player and NPCs in Starbound using their active visual assets. No cloning, no fakes, and no 'invisible' replacements - this framework aims to use the actual characters as they exist and animate them. This mod does nothing on its own, but enables players to create and include .sequence files that the framework uses to animate the characters.

Important notes:
- THIS MOD IS PRE-ALPHA AND SHOULD NOT BE USED ON SAVES WITH LONG HOURS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

- This is, at this point, an in-progress proof of concept. It is quite incomplete, though a lot of work into trying to make it as bug-free as possible has been done. This is more meant for modders to be able to poke around and see how I intend to implement this once current showstopper problems are fixed or worked around.

- It is currently in a heavy debugging state - it WILL flood your starbound.log with stuff that I use/need to see that things are progressing, though I have turned off some of the more spammy ones.

Installation:
Just extract the animFramework_pre_alpha.zip and place the extracted animFramework folder into your /gamepath/Starbound/mods folder. That's it.

How to make it work:
When you first get this mod in your Starbound, it won't do anything. You will have to manually start the invisible quest that runs everything by going into admin mode (type in: /admin) and entering in the following command: /startquest "'animFramework'" (single quotes INSIDE double quotes - this is necessary or you'll just get an error). Once the mod is running on a save file, you shouldn't need to do this again. I intend to automate this in the future.

After the quest is running, you'll need a way to start the animation. I have included an activeitem that takes the place of some other script starting the animation process. Use the command /spawnitem animControlActivator to give it to yourself.

Since the current default setup of the animFramework is to display setting up both the player AND an NPC, it will spawn a generic, naked human villager NPC to be used when you pick up the animControlActivator item. If there already is a usable NPC nearby (close to your character), it'll just use them instead of spawning another.

When you use the animControlActivator, you will see a big green plus appear. This is just a placeholder to show that the animation framework vehicle has spawned properly and its scripts are working (if you don't see a green plus, something went wrong somewhere). The animation framework will then take over control of the NPC and your character and animate according to whatever .sequence file has been selected and the plus will vanish and return control to both the player and the NPC when the sequence is finished.

.sequence files - how do they work?
The .sequence files are the bread and butter of the animation framework. (Check the resources below) I have also included three sample .sequence files for people to poke at/look into, called "testOne.sequence", "testTwo.sequence", and "testThree.sequence". Just know for now that the default one called for the example is testTwo.sequence.

Known issues:
Due to this being pre-alpha there are a lot. I will focus on the primary ones:

• Not tested for multiplayer compatibility
• NPCs do not animate (they just stand there, though their emotes do change) - Currently a showstopper, might be a hard engine limitation
• Participants currently do not change their facing direction as they should in accordance with the sequence
  

Resources (helpful for understanding how to build assets for and use this framework):

• Breakdown of the .sequence file
• Expanding the Spritesheets to increase animation possibilities (Part I) (Part II)