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Canopyshadows

Based on game build 714014 | Last updated: 2026-03-04

Overview​

Canopyshadows is a lightweight utility module (not an ECS component) that provides a single function, spawnshadow, to procedurally generate canopy-related visual effects in the game world. It manages shared global state for shadow tile tracking and canopy/spawn coordination. It is used during world generation or dynamic environmental setup to populate shadow visuals over a circular area centered on a given position.

Usage example​

local canopy = require "prefabs/canopyshadows"
local range = 5
local no_lightrays = false

local shadow_data = canopy.spawnshadow(inst, range, no_lightrays)
-- shadow_data contains references to spawned entities for cleanup or updates

Dependencies & tags​

Components used: None
Tags: None identified

Properties​

No public properties. This module only exports a function.

Main functions​

spawnshadow(inst, range, no_lightrays)​

  • Description: Spawns leaf canopy entities and/or lightrays in a circular region around the entity's position. Tracks tile usage via global TheWorld.shadetiles to avoid duplicate spawns and supports stacking (incrementing tile counts). Returns metadata including spawned entities and tile keys.
  • Parameters:
    • inst (Entity) – The entity whose world position serves as the center of the shadow region.
    • range (number) – The radius (in grid units of 4 tiles) over which to spawn effects.
    • no_lightrays (boolean) – If true, lightray prefabs are not spawned; otherwise, they may spawn with 50% probability per tile where no canopy was placed.
  • Returns:
    • data (table) with keys:
      • lightrays (array of entities) – Spawns of "lightrays_canopy".
      • shadetile_keys (array of strings) – Tile identifiers ("x-z") that were processed.
  • Error states: Returns nil implicitly if no tiles are processed, though the loop always covers a non-empty circular region for range >= 0.

Events & listeners​

None. This module performs synchronous world modifications and does not use event listeners or dispatch events.