How do I keep the file size smaller

Hi

I am actually creating a game with more number of levels. A lot. So I thought I should be worried about the game size from now on. What exactly increases the file size quickly

Adding more events

Adding more sprites

Having lots of physics objs

More layout (coz more levels) or

Something else

I think sprites and music are 80-90%.

It's all about the images size.

If you make many copies of the same image in the same layout the Size will be the same.

But if use it in many layouts the size will go up

Iolva & A0Nasser ....Thanks and good to know that.

damnn....I will be using the same game images in multiple layouts called as levels. What do i do. It is gonna be large one.

I also have another bad practice. I create even small images like button images or small character images in bigger size just for great reflective quality images. I should be reconsidering about the size of the images.

Your game for mobile or pc?

Mobile y

you can load your images from url external image files, not packaged with game this keeps it smaller. You will have to have a loader screen on each level while images download.

That s a good idea. You mean downloading images for that level at that moment via Internet while loading.

So the player may have to keep internet on all the time right?

That s a good idea. You mean downloading images for that level at that moment via Internet while loading.

So the player may have to keep internet on all the time right?

Correct.

DUTOIT what is happening with downloaded files after closing the game? are they stored somewhere on mobile or are they deleted and must be re downloaded next time you start the game?

DUTOIT what is happening with downloaded files after closing the game? are they stored somewhere on mobile or are they deleted and must be re downloaded next time you start the game?

Good question. I'm not sure - I would imagine it is cached with game data. But honestly I haven't got a clue.

Edit: I see new beta has "File chooser plugin" which allows you to access files from users system. So you could download the files to a location and retrieve it - ??? - this is speculative as I am downloading beta version now, and haven't even tried it.

Ashley do you know what is happening with downloaded files after closing the game on mobile? are they stored on device or deleted?

Any images or sounds not added in the Construct 2 editor are not included in the offline cache, because there's no way for the editor to know about them. Therefore any images you request are not guaranteed to be saved anywhere. This means you could play the game 3 times in a row and it re-downloads the images every time, or if you go offline then the game fails to run at all. It's best where possible to keep all resources within the Construct 2 editor itself so they can be properly cached and loaded offline.

The best tips to reduce file size are probably the image-related parts from this guide: https://www.scirra.com/tutorials/577/construct-2s-export-time-optimisations

In particular:

• duplicate images don't matter, they're deduplicated on export
• spritesheeting can help compress away similar parts of animations
• images with <256 colors will automatically be recompressed to much smaller PNG-8
• use Construct 2's Image Format dialog to manually select JPEG or PNG-8 where appropriate

Selecting JPEG on backgrounds alone can massively reduce the file size.

Don't trust Construct 2's 'estimated download size' too much. Everything that happens on export is so complex that it's impossible to accurately predict what it will result, so for best results from time to time you should actually export the project and see how big it ends up.

Note this is specifically to do with the download size, not memory use. Don't get them confused! Although they tend to roughly correlate, it is not helpful to be looking at memory use if you're actually trying to measure the download size. A0Nasser posted a screenshot of the debugger which only shows memory use and won't tell you anything about the file size.

Thanks Ashley