Fish

Based on game build 714014 | Last updated: 2026-03-05

Overview

The fish.lua file defines a factory function for creating fish prefabs (raw and cooked) used in Don't Starve Together. It centralizes shared setup via commonfn, with specialized variants for raw (rawfn) and cooked (cookedfn) states. The raw fish exhibits animated "flop" behavior and sound effects upon placement, and supports drying and cooking. The cooked variant disables drying/cooking support but retains perishability and floatability. It integrates with the inventory, edible, perishable, dryable, cookable, bait, and tradable systems.

Usage example

local raw_fish, cooked_fish = fish("my_fish", "my_fish_build")

Dependencies & tags

Components used: edible, stackable, bait, perishable, dryable, cookable, inspectable, inventoryitem, tradable, floater, soundemitter, animstate, transform, network, hauntable (via MakeHauntableLaunchAndPerish) Tags: meat, catfood, pondfish, dryable (raw only), cookable (raw only)

Properties

Property	Type	Default Value	Description
build	string	nil (set at creation)	Build name used in stategraphs (e.g., SGwilson); passed from fishingrod.lua
floptask	Task or nil	nil	Reference to the currently scheduled flop sound task; cleaned up on inventory insertion or death

Main functions

commonfn(build, anim, loop, dryable, cookable)

• Description: Core factory function that initializes the base fish entity with shared components and tags. It is not called directly; instead, rawfn and cookedfn invoke it with specific parameters.
• Parameters:
  build (string) – Build asset name for the entity.
  anim (string) – Initial animation name to play.
  loop (boolean) – Whether to loop the animation.
  dryable (boolean) – Whether to enable the dryable component and dryable tag.
  cookable (boolean) – Whether to enable the cookable component and cookable tag.
• Returns: inst (Entity) – Fully configured entity instance (server-only).
• Error states: Returns client-side proxy immediately on non-mastersim worlds; no components added on client.

rawfn(build)

• Description: Creates a raw fish prefab. Sets food stats, enables drying/cooking, adds animation looping and flop sound behavior, and configures perishing speed.
• Parameters:
  build (string) – Build asset name.
• Returns: inst (Entity) – Raw fish entity.
• Error states: Returns client-side proxy immediately on non-mastersim worlds.

cookedfn(build)

• Description: Creates a cooked fish prefab. Disables drying/cooking support, adjusts perishing time, and enables floater scaling/offset.
• Parameters:
  build (string) – Build asset name.
• Returns: inst (Entity) – Cooked fish entity.
• Error states: Returns client-side proxy immediately on non-mastersim worlds.

makefish(build)

• Description: Wraps rawfn and cookedfn as functions to support deferred prefab instantiation.
• Parameters:
  build (string) – Build asset name.
• Returns: Two functions: makerawfn, makecookedfn – each returns the respective entity when invoked.

fish(name, build)

• Description: Top-level factory that produces two Prefab objects: one for raw fish and one for cooked fish.
• Parameters:
  name (string) – Base name of the prefab (e.g., "fish").
  build (string) – Build asset name.
• Returns: Two Prefab objects: raw fish and <name>_cooked.

flopsound(inst)

• Description: Schedules two sequential fishing sound effects to simulate the fish flopping after being caught.
• Parameters:
  inst (Entity) – The fish entity.
• Returns: Nothing.
• Error states: Cancels existing floptask on re-entry to prevent duplication; creates floptask only on mastersim.

Events & listeners

• Listens to: animover – triggers flopsound and re-plays "idle" animation when animation ends on raw fish.
• Pushes: None directly (uses PushEvent indirectly via component callbacks like onperishreplacement or hauntable logic).
• Listens to: OnLoad – assigns stopkicking to restart flop cleanup on save/load.