Close-sourcing the HTML5 exporter

> Just want to point out there are other alternatives to selling a product.

> Adds for example. Yeah I know boo / hiss, but let me ask this: Would you rather put up with a few adds, or pay for play?

>

Ads won't amount to much though. If this were up to me, I would sell a commercial license WITH a small royalty. The software would be free and full-featured to use for non-commercial purposes, then a fee would be paid to use it commercially, with a small percentage of profits as well.

Could then take it a step further and sell specific exporters as well, adding another supplemental income source, without locking out anyone from the main exporters (html5 and exe being what I would consider the main ones).

a one time fee is better than small percentage of profits, no one wants to deal forever with a company just because they used a tool of theirs. I agree that ads aren't enough

if you've ever tried to develop for android or iphone, you'll know what a godsend construct 2 will actually be. They'll be able to make plenty of money just selling the exporters. I still think the IDE should have a full preview feature if possible. better than a 30 day trial, someone might not really get going until after 30 days, then discover they NEED construct. give them that chance, just don't let them export to a permanent format. only previews

....

yeah, as soon as you said some features disabled I started thinking about darkbasic

darkphysics,darklights,darkAI. one of construct's initial draws for me before I realized it was god's gift to 2d game dev was that it had physics included.

I'm fine with some things being closed source in construct if you're going to end up selling it, but I would still be very disappointed if it started selling for a ridiculous amount of money (like it's $120 for multimedia fusion), the maximum I would be willing to pay would be around $20. Although that depends on how many features end up in the final release.

My couple cents:

• hobbyist license - free (+ pay what you want) for projects that will not generate any revenue (free games etc.) - watermark, splash
• indie license - free IDE, a reasonable flat fee for each exporter used for distribution of the game that generates revenue, premium plugins
• developer license - free IDE, source code access, plugin SDK, a flat fee for each exporter used for distribution of the game, premium plugins

Fees are per game release. I believe flat fees are better than royalties, since royalties are a pain to administrate. Moreover, the more successful the game is, the more traffic it would drive toward Construct 2.

Also, since there'd be a fee for each exporter, the developer would want to polish his game before releasing it. So less half-assed games out there on the market.

Did you notice premium plugins? Those would be plugins created by community members or anyone outside Scirra; they could release plugins for free (hobby license) or premium plans (meaning that they get a small share of profit if their plugin is included in a licensed game). This would be a good incentive for developers to release quality plugins; the better plugin, the more likely it is to be included in a game project, thus more likely to earn moolah.

Each game would have its own license key integrated, which would then be checked with the Scirra database for authenicity of the game.

Everyone would want to start with the hobby license, which would be free and allow them to release as many free projects as they want - as long as they don't make any revenue (from sales, advertising, paypal etc.)

Should they want to sell the game, they'd have to get the individual indie license key for the game. This key would then be assigned to the game; it would also serve as the unique identifier for the game (and its revisions/patches).

The developer license would come with everything a developer would need to extend Construct 2.

Just my modest 2 cents.

How fast do you need the money?

You could follow Minecraft's example and charge a small amount of money for the alpha version. When it goes in beta, you'll have to pay more. And even more when it comes out of beta.

I'm not sure how many developers are interested in C2 at the moment. (Minecraft is a game and got very popular, very quickly). This might not be the case with C2..) If there are thousands of people already interested in C2, this method might get you started..

p.s. I would also pay up to 80 dollars for a pro version. I even wouldn't mind a % of the profit to go to Scirra either..

I'd pay for construct 2, but i'd much prefer a fixed price like �100 or something than be nickel and dimmed for every exporter or plugin.

I like the idea olf being able to pay for source code access. I believe the havok physics engine has a license like that, or maybe its physx that does.

Especially since ashley said that a plugin should be able to modify any part of the ide due to their being javascript. Almost any of my c1 plugins would have benefitted from being able to alter the ide. I could easily imagine all sorts of things, an isometric movement plugin, with corresponding layout editor tweaks for level creation,

I know I've mentioned it twice already, but id like to be more straightforward about it. The exporter thing. When I'm done with my current project, probably a year or so off, my next would have been to write an importer for c2 for the files this project exports. After that iwas going to focus on writing exporters for the mobile platforms, or if I'm incapable of doing it myself, I was planning to hire out the work. Id be willing to do the profit share thing with c2 if these exporters proved worthy, but its more to have these exporters than to profit from them.

If construct doesn't have an android or iphone exporter by then, what sense would it make to not have that avenue open for other developers to contribute

Also, a plugin store would be awesome if integrated with the site. You could sort by rating, or most downloaded, or search only free plugins, etc...

...ashley said that a plugin should be able to modify any part of the ide due to their being javascript.

Actually, it's any part of the runtime - javascript plugins can't yet mod the editor.

> ...ashley said that a plugin should be able to modify any part of the ide due to their being javascript.

>

Actually, it's any part of the runtime - javascript plugins can't yet mod the editor.

Ah, I see. My mistake.

Though, you say yet, does that mean its a planned feature? Or just a possibility?

This really isn't going anywhere is it?

So far just about everything has been about how to take things away rather than how to keep things working, and make a profit.

What if you could keep everything necessary, open sourced, and free for use, while still supporting indie game devs, something that has become synonymous with the names Scirra, and Construct?

All while making a profit?

The answer is literally staring you in the face right now.

Rather than selling a program outright, which is bound to go into saturation at some point.

Why not offer a service to the developers?

As it stands its relatively easy for someone to upload their game and disseminate it for free.

But when it comes to actually selling that game the options dwindle.

My thought is, why don't you just make a site that will handle the selling of those games for a profit?

Sure there are sites that do that now, but most of them are terrible to the dev.

They will take a huge percent of what is sold, and some even force you to hand over your rights.

Sure you wouldn't make as much as those sites do, but as people find out about the no bs policy they will come here.

You could even offer other services, such as selling plugs, resources, etc.

Think it over, its already happening with other venues, and there's no limit to its potential.

This really isn't going anywhere is it?

So far just about everything has been about how to take things away rather than how to keep things working, and make a profit.

What if you could keep everything necessary, open sourced, and free for use, while still supporting indie game devs, something that has become synonymous with the names Scirra, and Construct?

All while making a profit?

The answer is literally staring you in the face right now.

Rather than selling a program outright, which is bound to go into saturation at some point.

Why not offer a service to the developers?

As it stands its relatively easy for someone to upload their game and disseminate it for free.

But when it comes to actually selling that game the options dwindle.

My thought is, why don't you just make a site that will handle the selling of those games for a profit?

Sure there are sites that do that now, but most of them are terrible to the dev.

They will take a huge percent of what is sold, and some even force you to hand over your rights.

Sure you wouldn't make as much as those sites do, but as people find out about the no bs policy they will come here.

You could even offer other services, such as selling plugs, resources, etc.

Think it over, its already happening with other venues, and there's no limit to its potential.

Couldn't agree more with this.

Though harder to realize for the devs i think it's best for most of people. Not selling Construct as a product directly but selling services. I don't know if it could work well it Construct , but something like what the Stencyl guys are doing would be great. Well the domain is similar Stencyl is Flash and iOS games , Construct is Html5 for now... And having used both Construct and Stencyl i still prefer Construct , even if Stencyl has some great features. Anyway i hope we'll find the best strategy in the end.

Just no watermarks or splash screens please.

I refuse to use any program, even if I can pay for it to go away.

It puts a sour taste in my mouth

I think if Construct 2 doesn't have at least ONE free exporter then it would need to be a lot more professional than C1 was to make any money. Not that C1 was bad, in fact it was by far the best free tool I found for making 2d games, but if I were going to pay for it I'd want to be a lot more sure that my gamemaking was serious, and if it were more serious I'd probably want a more serious tool with support.

I think what would work better is if you make all the exporters only cost money if a game is commercial. In other words, if money is made by a game exported with said exporter (even if it is advertising money from a web-game) then the developers have to pay some license (and maybe have a few tiers of payments based on how commercial a game is). On the other hand, games that end up making no profit should have a pay-what-you-want scheme.

I should also say that my approach might actually discourage other free exporters that might act as competition for Scirra from being developed. Probably no one will bother to code and release an exporter just so that commercial games don't have to pay Scirra money if there already is one that is pay-what-you-want for non-commercial games.

my 2 cents on the scirra game arcade service as a sale. I feel the total opposite. I'd rather pay to dewatermark an otherwise fully working version of construct.

I don't want to sell my game on scirra arcade. I want to sell it on steam, itunes, and the android app store. no offense, but I never even consider buying games from a "all games here made by our special tool" stores.

I would hope anything I was trying to sell could stand on it's own. I'm not saying there shouldn't be a scirra arcade. I'm just saying I think construct 1 or c2 is powerful enough to make "real" games. I think making the business model revolve around a scirra store wouldn't work. The truly successful games would sell better elsewhere, leaving scirra with only profits from less successful games.

I still think the most important thing is to decide exactly which part to sell, probably making it a pay this much if your game makes over 100,000 type license. Make it cheap enough it isn't worth the trouble of pirating, and I think it will go far, and ash and the gang can live comfortably as we head toward construct 3

I don't want to sell my game on scirra arcade. I want to sell it on steam, itunes, and the android app store. no offense, but I never even consider buying games from a "all games here made by our special tool" stores.

This.