Frankly, Whats the point of c3?

Stencyl's price model:

Free: Almost all the features of the engine with some restrictions (branding and stuff), but export only to Web... Yet, you can still test your game on the other platforms.

100$/year: Export to Web, Windows, Linux and Mac (no watermarks or forced branding), have Steam support

200$/year: Export to Web, Windows, Linux, Mac, iOS, Android, has Ads, IAP, leaderboards... etc

In short, even if you stop paying, you still can make your games with some decent restrictions. While I dislike subscriptions, Stencyl offers a nice subscription model.

The thing is C3 can't pull this off since is only exporting HTML5

I don't like this. 200 a year for things I might use.

Ah you never know how C3 will turn out later on down the road. C2 when it first started sure isn't the C2 we got now. I'm sure plenty more will be added in time.

mumu64

The point was that you can use Stencyl Free version as much as you (no limit to a number of events and even preview native exporters) and buy the 1 year subscription (100$ or 200$ depending on your needs) only when you want to export/publish native.

With C3 Free you will be able to open your projects, but will not be able to edit them if they have over 100 events (or something like that).

You understand now the difference ?

As for the price, C3 also has 150$/year and 500$/year business subscriptions for the same features as the 100$ personal license.

DarkRoomGames

C3 surely had a great start

You know what they say about first impressions.

It's certainly different from what we're used to with a Scirra product. And personally I'm not 100% sold on it yet myself, but I'm sure they still have plenty more to show before its release. Don't wanna bury em before they're dead, ya know? They might surprise us all with something that we never even saw coming that just blows our minds. Whatever it is, if it's worth the price to me, I'll pay it.

From what I have seen... c3 is basically c2 that you have to rent. Whats the point? I feel as though I am part of a c2 community that begged for just a few simple features. Features that you sort of need to actually make a decent game (something beyond flappy phone games)... Heck, even working box2d physics sure would have been nice. We weren't asking for 3d, we were asking for the basic tools any game engine needs. (collision filtering, raytracing, collision callbacks, swept shapes, ... I could go on) Not to mention extreme scalability issues when making complex games. And javascipt is stupid for games (but thats obviously a given, a compromise that wont be changed)

Is c3 going to address these problems? I haven't heard, frankly, I don't care because I got sick of not having the tools needed for really making a game in c2 and so dropped it.

And I'm not someone who thinks a behavior should make my game. I program. I have rolled 3 different platform engines on my own, and a custom retro based physics behavior for c2. I just wanted basic features literally almost every other engine has.

I've been happily using Unity for free. With c#. Why would I rent c3 when I only use c2 for simple prototypes ?

I don't care that it is on mac (see above). I don't care that its in the cloud (see above). I don't care that it has a 3 in its name if it doesn't actually fundamentally address the major issues with making a game with c2.

Anyone have any insight?

The point is that tools which can run on tablets are aiming for the educational market, not professional game developers. I had some long, interesting conversations about the direction C3 is taking while at GDC and that's the conclusion which was independently arrived at by most everyone I spoke with. It is making itself the polar opposite of the "best 2D game development tool." Which is fine, if that's the tact Scirra wants to take, as it's their business, but it would clear up a lot if they'd just say that instead of announcing the porting of the sub-par image editor from C2 or...wait for it...rounded corners. Oh, and BBCode in comments, when the text & spritefont objects still can't handle multiple weights or colors.

While it's an impressive coding exercise to run a tool like C2 in the browser - and let's be honest, C3 is really just C2 with a few visual tweaks in terms of features, based on what's been announced - who in their right mind is going to work on larger games through a browser interface? Is anyone really supposed to be excited we now have to scroll to see all Function parameters? Now, if we could name the parameters, that would be a big step, but scrolling forces further mouse interactions (and no, tabbing to the next field is no better), which slow down development, especially if you're typically using hotkeys rather than slowly navigating through C2/C3's multiple popups that would have been better off being combined into the rest of the interface if there's some use case requirement that they remain separate panels at all.

mumu64

The point was that you can use Stencyl Free version as much as you (no limit to a number of events and even preview native exporters) and buy the 1 year subscription (100$ or 200$ depending on your needs) only when you want to export/publish native.

With C3 Free you will be able to open your projects, but will not be able to edit them if they have over 100 events (or something like that).

You understand now the difference ?

I know and I should have made myself more clear. Stencyl free version with editing possibility comes with a price: pay (more) for all your needs.

I don't like any version of the Stencyl example.

who in their right mind is going to work on larger games through a browser interface?

Could you further explain this thought?

> who in their right mind is going to work on larger games through a browser interface?

>

Could you further explain this thought?

Browsers can barely handle websites without crashing. Every browser-based tool I've used professionally has had stability issues, often crashing the browser, not to mention performance issues associated with browsers and all such products being dependent upon the whims of the third-parties developing browsers. Standalone applications based on web technologies (wrapped in Electron, NW.JS, etc.) seems to fare somewhat better, avoiding the forced updates of Chrome, Firefox & Edge, but achieve nowhere near the performance or stability of standard applications, including those created specifically for professional use, which are created by much larger teams of developers with proven track records working with web technology. And this is just desktop - Android/iOS bring their own issues with stability, memory usage, and performance.

> From what I have seen... c3 is basically c2 that you have to rent. Whats the point? I feel as though I am part of a c2 community that begged for just a few simple features. Features that you sort of need to actually make a decent game (something beyond flappy phone games)... Heck, even working box2d physics sure would have been nice. We weren't asking for 3d, we were asking for the basic tools any game engine needs. (collision filtering, ray-tracing, collision callbacks, swept shapes, ... I could go on) Not to mention extreme scalability issues when making complex games. And JavaScript is stupid for games (but that's obviously a given, a compromise that wont be changed)

>

> Is c3 going to address these problems? I haven't heard, frankly, I don't care because I got sick of not having the tools needed for really making a game in c2 and so dropped it.

>

> And I'm not someone who thinks a behavior should make my game. I program. I have rolled 3 different platform engines on my own, and a custom retro based physics behavior for c2. I just wanted basic features literally almost every other engine has.

>

> I've been happily using Unity for free. With c#. Why would I rent c3 when I only use c2 for simple prototypes ?

>

> I don't care that it is on mac (see above). I don't care that its in the cloud (see above). I don't care that it has a 3 in its name if it doesn't actually fundamentally address the major issues with making a game with c2.

>

> Anyone have any insight?

>

The point is that tools which can run on tablets are aiming for the educational market, not professional game developers. I had some long, interesting conversations about the direction C3 is taking while at GDC and that's the conclusion which was independently arrived at by most everyone I spoke with. It is making itself the polar opposite of the "best 2D game development tool." Which is fine, if that's the tact Scirra wants to take, as it's their business, but it would clear up a lot if they'd just say that instead of announcing the porting of the sub-par image editor from C2 or...wait for it...rounded corners. Oh, and BBCode in comments, when the text & spritefont objects still can't handle multiple weights or colors.

While it's an impressive coding exercise to run a tool like C2 in the browser - and let's be honest, C3 is really just C2 with a few visual tweaks in terms of features, based on what's been announced - who in their right mind is going to work on larger games through a browser interface? Is anyone really supposed to be excited we now have to scroll to see all Function parameters? Now, if we could name the parameters, that would be a big step, but scrolling forces further mouse interactions (and no, tabbing to the next field is no better), which slow down development, especially if you're typically using hotkeys rather than slowly navigating through C2/C3's multiple popups that would have been better off being combined into the rest of the interface if there's some use case requirement that they remain separate panels at all.

Could not agree more with both of you. As someone starting his first larger game as an indie dev, I fail to see how any developer would choose Construct at this point as a 2d game engine. I would have liked to see Construct 2 being further developed with actual new features such as a timeline, function parameters, native export, and other improvements and additions that have been requested by users for a longer time now. Scalability is a big issue for me in C2: even with the relatively simple medium-sized games I created so far in C2 I found managing the event sheets and functions bothersome.

Even if Construct 3 had not been rental-only, it is a tough sale in my opinion.

I have one other worry in regards to a browser-based environment: in Construct 2 panels can be teared off the main Construct window, and placed/organized on multiple screens. I always hoped Construct 2 would be improved for multi-screen usage in order to allow the developer to place the event sheet separately on a different screen (I have a third screen pivoted in portrait mode for coding). I do this when I do my front-end development work. In comparison, Netbean's window setup is infinitely more configurable, and I can have split windows, multiple code views, and so on. Construct 2 is severely limited in this regard, but Construct 3 will be even more limiting for desktop users BECAUSE it is browser based.

As far as I have experienced in other browser-only apps, and based on my front-end coding knowledge, placing panels independently from the main window will no longer be possible in C3: panels will only be able to exist within the scope of the Chrome window, thus negating the option to place any panels independently.

From a desktop developer's point of perspective, being browser based, Construct 3's configurability is going to be even worse than version 2 - one more indication against Construct 3 as a valid platform for serious game developers. I keep wondering who Scirra has in mind as their target users - because they sure are not wooing (semi)professionals at this point.

Construct 2 is severely limited in this regard, but Construct 3 will be even more limiting for desktop users BECAUSE it is browser based.

Actually, Construct 3's multi-monitor support is better than Construct 2's. You can do things like open a layout view on a different monitor. Construct 2 could not do that. We hinted at the windowing support in this screenshot from one of the first blogs. We're going to cover this in a bit more detail in one of our future blog posts.

Lots of people are making statements like this which totally underestimate what you can do with a browser. We're aiming to prove that it can equal, and even exceed, native apps. It's not really possible to keep repeating this with the hundreds of posts we get every day, and people get sick of hearing me say the same things repeatedly anyway, so really the big thing is to wait for the public beta and see for yourself how it does.

FWIW, we are still focused on indie devs and making it a better tool for them - it's still probably the largest segment of our userbase. We are interested in education as well though, so we're trying to expand there at the same time.

> Construct 2 is severely limited in this regard, but Construct 3 will be even more limiting for desktop users BECAUSE it is browser based.

>

Actually, Construct 3's multi-monitor support is better than Construct 2's. You can do things like open a layout view on a different monitor. Construct 2 could not do that. We hinted at the windowing support in this screenshot from one of the first blogs. We're going to cover this in a bit more detail in one of our future blog posts.

Lots of people are making statements like this which totally underestimate what you can do with a browser. We're aiming to prove that it can equal, and even exceed, native apps. It's not really possible to keep repeating this with the hundreds of posts we get every day, and people get sick of hearing me say the same things repeatedly anyway, so really the big thing is to wait for the public beta and see for yourself how it does.

FWIW, we are still focused on indie devs and making it a better tool for them - it's still probably the largest segment of our userbase. We are interested in education as well though, so we're trying to expand there at the same time.

If that is the case, I stand corrected. Having a separate layout window and events windows on two screens is a clear step forward in regards to usability.

Quit a lot of people already wanting to jump ship without seeing the final product.

I can understand it though but it may be a bit soon. Maybe let Scirra unveil it first?

I'm not sure I'll be doing a subscription model either.

Construct is great...I really do like it.

Currently still tinkering away in Unity + Playmaker and some other addons and it's coming along slowly and surely. Every now and then I open up C2 and play a bit with some ideas and have some half finished projects that I'm dabbling with.

Construct 2 is definitely faster than doing stuff in Unity but I know Unity can do anything I want it to game wise and the payoff is that what I learn in 2D also translates to 3D. Whatever game I can think about it's possible.

However there is often un-needed complexity. It's not just jump in and click a few things together and there you have a working prototype.

The main thing I see as a problem here is the Subscription model and a reason I went from Adobe Photoshop/ Illustrator to Affinity Designer and Affinity Photo

The same reason I went from Autodesk even though I have student account to now using Blender3D.

I'm not against subs, but I want to get useful features to me. Doesn't help I tinker around with the product and I pay but I can't get my games on ios or android without using other 3rd party apps etc.

I get the reasoning behind Scirra's move - Scirra is after all not a charity and they want to grow a successful company, to do that they need a revenue stream, but I just don't see myself paying that fee personally - I'm obviously not the target audience, I'm a hobbyist mostly with an idea that if one day I feel something is good enough I'd like to put it out there and then I wont mind to pay for the privilege. I'm from a country that the conversion rate kills the subscription idea for me unless I get monthly benefits thats worth the price. he proposed C3 Sub is half the payment on my 2015 model BMW motorcycle every month.

I bet if they only get a 20% conversion rate they are still way better off financially than now.

For the rest of the people wanting to jump ship.

Where are you wanting to jump to?

Imho Fusion 3 and Unity+ Gameflow or Playmaker are the contenders.

Stencyl...also sub model, Buildbox also a sub model, Gamemaker Studio 2 looks great but the Drag and Drop is limited forcing you to learn a proprietary language...might then as well learn C#.

GameSalad is looking to be a sinking ship with a few scooping out the water but ultimately not as active or as frequently updated as it once were..

If you don't like that why not stay with Construct 3 and see what they offer first. Pay the first month and then see if the tools speed up development, if its slow (I really doubt it will be slow) or if it caters for your needs?

I can see the potential in it. I'm just not going to be paying monthly for it.

Lots of people are making statements like this which totally underestimate what you can do with a browser. We're aiming to prove that it can equal, and even exceed, native apps. It's not really possible to keep repeating this with the hundreds of posts we get every day, and people get sick of hearing me say the same things repeatedly anyway, so really the big thing is to wait for the public beta and see for yourself how it does.

FWIW, we are still focused on indie devs and making it a better tool for them - it's still probably the largest segment of our userbase. We are interested in education as well though, so we're trying to expand there at the same time.

Except...I'm doing no such thing. For professional work, I often find myself in browser-based prototyping tools such as inVision, Proto.io & Marvel. These are aimed squarely at the "pro" market, cost a pretty penny for larger organizations to license, sometimes per seat and sometimes per-location, and they're all perfect examples of why browser-based technologies aren't - at least yet - the way to go, often breaking with browser updates that are unavoidable unless you're at a large corporate organization that blocks automatic updates (common in corporate world, not so common in advertising/marketing agency or indie game world). These web apps all cost more than C3, are developed by teams larger than C3, and are targeted towards Enterprise organizations, and still constantly break down.

As for making Construct a better tool for indie devs - I'd love to see that. But I have yet to see that. Instead I've seen posts about substandard image editors (compared to other, low-cost dedicated tools) that don't have the features I'd expect - easily accessible playback speed changes per-frame, image layers, REAL onion skinning with user-specified frame ranges and color tint to more easily identify which frames are behind/ahead of the current frame, some form of keyframe/timeline editor, which is bog standard now in image editors - and rounded corners on Events. How about better spritesheeting without unsightly seams (I emailed you about that, then had to roll my own solution)? If someone wants rounded corners on Events, couldn't they have added that with the new CSS styling options? How about inline comments? More fully featured NW.js support (again, I ended up using a custom-rolled plugin for basic, but necessary, NW.js features)? Rendering optimizations to improve performance on a wider range of PCs? More fully-featured WebGL2 support past non-power of two images? Maybe more portable Events/Actions that can be decoupled from objects? I could keep going but I can only bang my head on the brickwall between users and discussion of relevant or genuinely more beneficial features for game development in the coming update so many times.

Again, it's your software and you're welcome to handle it any way you'd like. But I'm definitely not seeing many new, useful features in C3. Or features that were requested years ago - you have a forum full of them, that we can all see, keep in mind - and at the time you commented you'd look into them...and still no joy. So I think being a bit wary of what's promised should not only be expected, but that it couldn't really hurt to address them more directly as opposed to talking around them with vague half-answers. Especially for the few developers using C2 currently who are trying to do more than simple mobile games or template-based Steam Greenlight cash grabs. Much like calling XB1 support "beta," I'm not seeing many fully-baked new ideas outside of a browser-based interface, and only, once again, a vague suggestion that a desktop/wrapped version maybe, could be, at some point, coming down the road.

Quit a lot of people already wanting to jump ship without seeing the final product.

I can understand it though but it may be a bit soon. Maybe let Scirra unveil it first?

I'm not sure I'll be doing a subscription model either.

For the rest of the people wanting to jump ship.

Where are you wanting to jump to?

Imho Fusion 3 and Unity+ Gameflow or Playmaker are the contenders.

Stencyl...also sub model, Buildbox also a sub model, Gamemaker Studio 2 looks great but the Drag and Drop is limited forcing you to learn a proprietary language...might then as well learn C#.

GameSalad is looking to be a sinking ship with a few scooping out the water but ultimately not as active or as frequently updated as it once were..

If you don't like that why not stay with Construct 3 and see what they offer first. Pay the first month and then see if the tools speed up development, if its slow (I really doubt it will be slow) or if it caters for your needs?

I can see the potential in it. I'm just not going to be paying monthly for it.

For me it is predominantly about the features I need for my upcoming large game project(s). I always research options out there, and I do not really care whether the game engine provides a fully visual editor or not - as long as it is easy and convenient to use.

Ashley has already said C3 is going to be based on the same C2 engine, and actual new features are going to be added later. I can't wait that long. For my project I need some kind of animation timeline, and good project management tools. And other engines offer a slew of additional features that Construct is still missing.

Also, native export support is another reason for my decision to leave C2 (I learned an important lesson from my own experience with wrappers so far and together with Next Penelope's developer's issues I will not touch wrappers at this point anymore).

But most importantly, I will never allow myself to be locked into a rental model for my development. It just does not make sense as a indie game developer to rent the game engine - too risky.

Currently I am teaching myself Godot, but other engines remain a possibility (Fusion 3, Visionaire 4). It depends a bit. I do not mind coding, as long as the scripting is straight-forward. I actually prefer scripting in a lot of cases. Godot's scene approach is great, and I am awaiting version 3 in April. I will also investigate the new version of Fusion 3, which looks like a good spiritual successor to Construct 2.

As it stands, Construct 2/3 do not cut it for any indie developer interested in working on anything beyond simpler mobile games. I was hoping to see this improved in Construct 3, but I have not seen anything that is going to change my opinion.

Interesting you mention GoDot as I see they are also implementing Visual Scripting for the upcoming release. Kind of looks like Unreal Blueprints.