obfuscation?

[Rutex]

All good time. As someone who loves Open source products, like a man who loves modding, etc, I would like to ask the developers. I perfectly understand that now the game is in an early stage, alpha, and still. Why are you doing code obfuscation? What is the result? Protect? with java?? i dont think so.
I really liked the game and I bought it. But I would really, really wouldn't want that would repeat the sad fate of minecraft where 3 years later all that is able to Forge - multiblock mashines or something like this. Whether at the end of the alpha\beta\etc stages will be available code as it is? or goodbye dreams of a good opensource and modding game?

p.s. sorry for my bad english.

 

[SkylordLuke]

as you can see here: https://trello.com/b/9Kg5Jn6g/starmade-roadmap
In the planned section,you can see official game API,if they plan that..I guess the the devs will eventually allow you to turn the code upside down if you want,dont know when,soon I hope :D I really cant wait to see all the crazy stuff you guys will mod

 

[Rixxan]

He'res to hoping when that happens we get some server-side addons that don't require anything client side- maybe add in more commands through mods like add /admin to do the same job as /admin_add, ect. Like minecraft's Bukkit server mod.

 

[Keptick]

I doubt that the entire code will be deobfuscated, since this game is aimed to eventually provide profits (so not fully open-source). However, I assume that the modding API will open up a lot of possibilities for modding.

 

[Rutex]

keptick, I disagree. First of all, the game has a free version. (Though perhaps temporary). And she completely easily and quietly downloaded and played without any restrictions. Secondly - java. Using native reflect you can work around this limitation. Those who understands it all will make for a couple of days or less.
Exactly the same happened with minecraft. However, there is obfuscation did not help. ( except the servers which catch pirated copies). The writing Forge Api took too much time and effort. and on a result of 3-4 years was not "Revolutionary" updates. and again, the Mojang at the time had nothing against. (and in this case Microsoft). Logic?
In this case with starmade I am afraid that will repeat destiny minecraft. The developers will give some weak api, close code, people will write new api that the result would bring nothing to the game apart from some blocks or something similar.

 

[CyberTao]

I thought MC had like 0 API, it was all brute-forced by their community.

Whether the game receives a proper API or not is really Schine's decision anyways. If they want to say "fuck you", then fuck us I guess. But we have a council that is suppose to relay the wants and desires of the community to Schema, and part of that council is made up of modders who have already made small mods for Starmade with what little tools there are currently, a large chunk of the community wants a modding API, and even the majority of the bloody Dev team supports the idea.

A proper API will happen, it's just a matter of priority when it will be, but it will happen (otherwise I expect some form of rioting, within the community and the Dev circle). If you wanna be all doom and gloom and say it's not going to happen, then fine, but don't expect the devs to deviate from their plans because you don't trust them.

Sit down, wait, and have faith.

 

[Rixxan]

I thought MC had like 0 API, it was all brute-forced by their community.

Whether the game receives a proper API or not is really Schine's decision anyways. If they want to say "fuck you", then fuck us I guess. But we have a council that is suppose to relay the wants and desires of the community to Schema, and part of that council is made up of modders who have already made small mods for Starmade with what little tools there are currently, a large chunk of the community wants a modding API, and even the majority of the bloody Dev team supports the idea.

A proper API will happen, it's just a matter of priority when it will be, but it will happen (otherwise I expect some form of rioting, within the community and the Dev circle). If you wanna be all doom and gloom and say it's not going to happen, then fine, but don't expect the devs to deviate from their plans because you don't trust them.

Sit down, wait, and have faith.

Yes, Minecraft's modder API is a complete brute force, as Mojang never got their collective donkey's in gear, the API has been overdue in MC for over three years. The development roadmap shows an API is in the work, It'll happen. ANOTHER THING TO NOTE:
This game is NOT minecraft! Although they're both written in java and both use block-based designs, they are very different, so comparing them is like comparing orange colored apples to green colored oranges. They share some aspects but they are NOT **not** the same game, several key elements are very different.

 

[CyberTao]

Spoiler: Off topic

ANOTHER THING TO NOTE:
This game is NOT minecraft! Although they're both written in java and both use block-based designs, they are very different, so comparing them is like comparing orange colored apples to green colored oranges. They share some aspects but they are NOT **not** the same game, several key elements are very different.

If you felt the need to declare this, you do not know why it was mentioned. No one was comparing the games, they were comparing the development teams and promised made versus those kept. Which is reasonable, indie devs like the ones that made MC do not always tell the truth or do not deliver their promises. Could have probably used any other game like DF-9 where the devs just bailed, but MC was probably the best game to use for comparison here because the topic was Modding API.

In short, go to bed.

 

[Rixxan]

Spoiler: Also off topic

Spoiler: Off topic

If you felt the need to declare this, you do not know why it was mentioned. No one was comparing the games, they were comparing the development teams and promised made versus those kept. Which is reasonable, indie devs like the ones that made MC do not always tell the truth or do not deliver their promises. Could have probably used any other game like DF-9 where the devs just bailed, but MC was probably the best game to use for comparison here because the topic was Modding API.

In short, go to bed.

A) Yes mother, I'll head there right away
B) I felt a need to declare it because both the dev teams and the game are important factors here. The games are different, and those differences make a difference in if it's easy or hard to implement an API, or develop several things. What's easy for a dev team to do in one game might be different from another game. That's why I pointed out they're different, the motivation of the dev teams are not the only factors in play here. Although I understand why the topic was brought up, it's not the only thing relevant.

 

[jayman38]

Going back to the OP, I think Schine will keep the game closed source, to avoid free legal forks that would remove their revenue stream. Maybe some day, when the stream has dried up, they might release the code.

The game's core programming library is Lightweight Java Game Library (LWJGL), which is open source, so by reverse-engineering some key concepts, such a per-entity voxel grids, you might be able to make a clone, similar to how the MineTest C55 project created an open source game similar to MineCraft.

 

[Lecic]

(Though perhaps temporary).

The game being free is temporary.

 

[Rixxan]

The game being free is temporary.

As soon as it's out of alpha it will stop being free, you'll need an account and to buy the game, I think. Uplink won't be optional and you'll have to have paid for the game. So buy now, it's cheaper now than it will be when it exits alpha.

 

[Bench]

The game is free for now, but won't always be. We're keen to support mods in fact we plan to try to make mods simple to create and manage. At the moment however compiling an API is not high on the priority list, I've been told it'd need to be reworked time and time again if one were released now, due to other future plans for the game, so it's more practical to leave it back. All these things factor into why it'll remain obfuscated.