USEFUL NOSTALGICS

Bring the magic of classic Minecraft modding back to life!

Remember the days when Minecraft mods were full of useful items, and little inventions that made the game work better?

Useful Nostalgics is a love letter to that era.

⚙️ REQUIREMENTS & COMPATIBILITY
  
**Required Dependency:** GeckoLib 4.4.9+ for Minecraft 1.20.1  

**Size Experiment is bundled with Useful Nostalgics.** You do not need to install it separately.

The mod is inspired by classic projects such as Mo' Creatures and earlier backpack mods, but those projects are not required to enjoy its main features.

For multiplayer, install the mod and its required dependencies on both the server and client.

Inspired by the creativity and charm of vintage Minecraft mods, Useful Nostalgics brings back forgotten utils while introducing original creatures, meaningful quality-of-life improvements, and entirely new ways to interact with your world.

Capture your beloved pets inside magical amulets, equip a backpack, travel through glass elevator tubes, or send a messenger owl on a journey across the wilderness.

Explore distant lands with **The Traveller's Book**, hunt down powerful Oni to collect their mysterious essences, discover the monstrous Sarcomonstrum lurking in the swamps, or stumble upon a peculiar pack of cats with an insatiable hunger for protein.

And that's only the beginning.

BARN OWLS - YOUR VERY OWN MESSENGER SERVICE

Why transport your items through boring pipes when you could send them on an adventure?

Meet the Barn Owl, a charming, companion found throughout the taiga.

These adorable creatures are much more than ordinary pets. They are living messengers capable of transporting items across the world!

Features:

- **Messenger system:** Set two destinations using coordinates and let your owl travel between them.
- **Automated deliveries:** Equip your owl with a chest and use hoppers to load or unload its inventory.
- **Chunk loading:** Messenger owls can keep nearby chunks loaded during their journeys, with configurable controls.
- **Expandable storage:** Increase their carrying capacity using backpacks.
- **Custom flight animations:** Watch them fly, accelerate, slow down, and land.
- **Companion commands:** Tell your owl to follow, stay, roam freely, or perch on your shoulder.
- **Home system:** Set a home location and order your owl to return.
- **Breeding:** Raise adorable baby owls.

Tame them with raw chicken and breed them with raw rabbit.

An owl on your shoulder is a friend. An owl carrying your valuables across a forest is a legend.

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 GENETICS - EVERY CREATURE HAS A STORY

What if your pets were more than copies of their parents?

Useful Nostalgics introduces a genetic system that allows compatible creatures to inherit and develop unique characteristics across generations.

Breed, experiment, and discover!

- **Inherited traits:** Offspring can inherit mutations and abilities from their parents.
- **Potion mutations:** Certain potion effects can influence a creature's genetic characteristics.
- **Size genetics:** Breed unusually small or large creatures, with inherited dominant and recessive traits.
- **Color inheritance:** Discover new color variations and pass them down through generations.
- **Special abilities:** Some mutations grant unusual advantages, including amphibious adaptation, fire immunity, nocturnal benefits, enhanced survival, and protective instincts.
- **Progressive mutations:** Developing increasingly powerful genetic traits becomes more challenging over generations.

Want a gigantic companion? A tiny creature with extraordinary abilities? A unique bloodline of animals unlike anything else in your world?

*Experiment with genetics and discover what your companions can become..

The included Size Experiment system also provides tools to customize creature size and coloration. I also included new taming methods for 

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 PET AMULETS - A FORGOTTEN CLASSIC RETURNS

Inspired by the legendary pet amulets of classic Mo' Creatures, Useful Nostalgics revives one of Minecraft modding's most beloved ideas.

Carry your pets with you, safely stored inside magical amulets!

Discover six different amulet types:

- **Pet Amulet**
- **Bone Amulet**
- **Ghost Amulet**
- **Sky Amulet**
- **Fairy Amulet**
- **Golem Amulet**

Each is designed for different categories of companions.

No more abandoning your favorite pet because a mountain, ocean, or dangerous journey stands in your way.

Useful Nostalgics also expands the domesticability of several vanilla creatures, allowing you to build a truly unusual collection of animal companions.

And with the Tame Book, you can keep track of your pets and their most important characteristics.

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THE FIVE ONI - MYSTERIOUS ESSENCES

Across the dimensions, five powerful Oni await discovery.

Each inhabits a different environment and carries an essence with its own magical applications.

| Oni | Essence |

| Red Oni | Fire Essence |
| Blue Oni | Dark Essence |
| Green Oni | Undead Essence |
| End Oni | Light Essence |
| Snow Oni | Cold Essence |

Explore Nether wastelands, underground caverns, frozen regions, and the mysterious End to encounter them.

Their essences unlock unusual interactions with other creatures, magical transformations, protection, and even alchemy.

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 SARCOMONSTRUM - THE HORROR OF THE SWAMPS

Something terrible has happened beneath the wetlands.

As soul sand began seeping from the Nether into the Overworld, certain frogs adapted to consuming this strange substance.

Over generations, their bodies changed.

What emerged was something entirely new.

The Sarcomonstrum.

A monstrous, undead amphibian lurking in swamps and mangrove forests.

Despite its terrifying appearance, this unusual creature can be domesticated using Light Essence.

Raise your own Sarcomonstrum, breed it, and discover its genetic potential.

Not everything monstrous has to be your enemy.

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CHESATS - THEY ARE LOOKING FOR PROTEIN

During rainy weather, strange packs of feline predators may appear.

Meet the Chesats.

These peculiar cats hunt together, pursue hostile creatures, and occasionally become interested in players carrying Ender Pearls.

You can earn their trust by throwing Ender Pearls for them to consume.

But be careful. Attack one Chesat, and you might make an enemy of the entire pack.

And during thunderstorms, something even stranger may happen...

BACKPACKS - PACK YOUR THINGS!

Inspired by the classic backpack mod (By MigthyPork and Eydamos) of Minecraft's earlier years, Useful Nostalgics introduces three upgradeable backpacks with reworked textures based off the bundle.

| Backpack | Storage |

| Small Backpack | 18 slots |
| Medium Backpack | 24 slots |
| Large Backpack | 50 slots |

Make your backpack truly yours!

- Choose from all 16 classic Minecraft dye colors.
- Use dyed cauldrons to create custom colors.
- Upgrade your backpack without losing its stored items.
- Rename your backpack.
- Open it directly or through a configurable keybind.

Simple, colorful, and useful. Just like the old days.

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ELEVATOR TUBES - UP, UP, AND AWAY!

Forget complicated elevators!

Useful Nostalgics brings back the simplicity of vertical transportation through **Tube Blocks**.

Stack them vertically, jump to ascend, or hold Shift to descend.

Features:

- Smooth vertical transportation.
- Transparent glass tubes.
- All 16 dye colors.
- A special light-blocking Tinted Tube.
- Automatic visual connections between adjacent tubes.
- Support for transporting items and certain small companions.

An elevator doesn't have to be complicated to be fun.

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 THE TRAVELLER'S BOOK - THE WORLD IS YOURS

Adventure is wonderful. Finding your way home is another matter.

With The Traveller's Book, you can save destinations through Fast Travel Pages and return to places worth remembering.

Record important locations, prepare your journeys, and explore the world with the comfort of knowing that your favorite places are never truly lost.

Whether you are searching for rare creatures, building distant settlements, or hunting Oni across the dimensions, your journeys are now easier to manage.

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13 NEW ENCHANTMENTS

Useful Nostalgics introduces 13 functional enchantments to make equipment more interesting and exploration more rewarding.

Mining and gathering

- **Vein:** Mine connected veins of valuable ores.
- **Excavation:** Break larger areas with your tools.
- **Felling:** Chop down trees more efficiently.
- **AutoSmelt:** Automatically smelt compatible materials while mining.

Combat

- **Vampirism:** Steal health from your enemies.
- **Disarming:** Give enemies a chance to lose their weapons.
- **Ricochet:** Make arrows bounce in blocks.
- **Frost Thorns:** Punish attackers with freezing effects.

Movement and survival

- **Slime Landing:** Bounce when landing instead of simply hitting the ground.
- **Air Boost:** Gain extra mobility through enhanced jumps.
- **Rooted:** Improve your footing and resistance to unwanted movement.
- **Clinging:** Climb walls using your leggings. A rare treasure exclusive to End Cities!

Fishing

- **Abyssal Fishing:** Discover new possibilities in the depths.

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MORE USEFUL NOSTALGIC FEATURES

The adventure doesn't stop there! 

Uncrafting Table

Recover materials from crafted equipment with the help of amethyst.

Reclaim part of the resources from damaged items and, with the right materials and sufficient experience, preserve valuable enchantments.

Colorful Cauldrons

Inspired by Minecraft Bedrock Edition, colored cauldrons allow you to experiment with dyes, mix colors, interact with equipment, and create colorful water.

Improved Armor Stands

Place armor stands with visible arms by default.

Hold Shift while placing one to create a miniature armor stand!

Magical Wands

Discover tools for creature taming, changing colors, and controlling hostility between mobs.

World Challenges

Looking for something more dangerous?

Experiment with additional world difficulty modes through the `/challenge` system, including **Hecatombe, Titanomaquia, and Apocalipsis**.

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❤️ ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Useful Nostalgics was created by JMTC as a tribute to the creativity of Minecraft's classic modding community.

Special thanks to:

DrZhark, whose work on Mo' Creatures and its unforgettable pet amulets helped inspire this project.

Eydamos / MightyPork for the legacy of classic Minecraft backpacks.

And to those who contributed sprite work for some of the project's items.

The original spriting, reintroduction of nostalgic mechanics, implementation of new features, and overall development of Useful Nostalgics represent my own creative work/ are slightly based on old projects made in the minecraft community.

This project is an independent tribute to the ideas and memories that made Minecraft modding so special.