I was part of this conversation in the C3 thread as well. A major concern of mine in regards to not being able to encrypt one's assets is that sometimes assets from a third party are licensed under the condition that the developer takes the appropriate steps to protect those assets by encrypting them.

This is done in order to protect the developer from legal litigation by said third party. Simply stated: plausible deniability. You as the developer took steps to protect the assets, and when someone hacks that encryption, you cannot be held legally responsible.

I came upon this at the GraphicsRiver asset foundry in their extended license:

[quote:2s9rz8if]11. You must not permit an end user of the End Product to extract the Item and use it separately from the End Product.

https://graphicriver.net/licenses/terms/extended

I read this, and in my opinion unencrypted assets potentially break this requirement. Tom's opinion is that as long as a Terms and Conditions statement (txt file) accompanies your game, you should be fine.

Definition of "Permit": officially allow (someone) to do something.

So in my understanding of this, as long as you do not give official permission for them to take the assets you're good. Put in your T&C something along the lines of "You are not permitted to extract and use any assets in this game for any purpose". I can see how this might be interpreted in the way you say though, but doubt that's the spirit of it because it's impossible to enforce imo.

Probably best to check with Envato though of course. If you don't want to clarify that with them, let me know and I can send them an email if it's a big concern for you.

* This is my opinion, IANAL etc.

So I contacted Envato (owners of GraphicsRiver) and today Envato Market Help got back to me:

[quote:2s9rz8if]

Thanks for taking the time to thoroughly research the terms of our license usage. Many people buy the assets without caring. That being said, you should be fine with an extended license but adding the statement on what is not allowed is wise. I can see how GraphicRiver assets would commonly be distributed in other items but that should cover you legally, if needed. The buyer would then be essentially doing what we ask of our buyers in our disclosures.

Go forth and prosper!

Kind Regards,

Now, the part that worries me once again is the "you should be fine" and "should cover you legally" parts. "should" will not hold up in the worst legal scenario.

Of course, it is a very slim chance that someone will care about all this, I agree. But let's just assume someone develops a game in Construct 2/3 that becomes incredibly successful, and sells tens of millions of copies. The game uses a number of assets from GraphicsRiver. The designer of those assets notices this, and downloads/installs the game on a Windows machine, and discovers that his/her assets are unencrypted, and anyone can have access to them by merely unzipping them. The designer (US based) is aware of point (11) of the extended license, and decides to take legal action against the game developer in the US.

Even though the developer included a T&C, I could imagine that US copyright lawyers shred it to pieces because of the fact the plaintiff's assets were not encrypted at all and left out in the open, because in my view (11) implies that the developer must take appropriate steps to help protect the plaintiff's assets, and a case could possibly made by high-flying lawyers that the defendant failed to do so.

I am aware that it is highly unlikely and doubtful that such a situation may occur, but the point I am making is simple: if Construct allows for a simple asset encryption option during export, the game developer won't have to run any such risk at all in the first place.

All the other game engines allow the user to encrypt their files. Yes, assets can be hacked/ripped anyway, yet I think it is a fundamental option to have anyway. At least provide the option to do so.

>

> > Buildbox is also a subscription model, you pay 99 USD or 84 USD each month.

> >

>

> Very simple: offer BOTH options. Everybody happy.

>

Why don't you give it a rest and wait to see it when it is released. They will have a free version to test so you certainly can not complain about that and if you are correct and people do not want a subscription based engine and there is not enough new features to make it a good deal then they won't sell any and will have to change their marketing strategy right?

Beating up Scirra over releasing a new engine is not helping and is driving down moral on the forum in my opinion.

I was merely responding to Bad Wolf's post.

A limited free version will not change the fact it is rental-only, will it? And many competing alternatives offer a free version that is fully functional.

You are right, though - no sense in continuously beating a dead horse, as the expression goes. I'll stop yapping now, and concentrate on learning new things instead - more constructive indeed.

Apologies for the wailing and crying

Buildbox is also a subscription model, you pay 99 USD or 84 USD each month.

Yes, and even if Buildbox was made of gold I would not touch it either because of the rental-only option. It is not about pricing.

Scirra subscription model cost 99 USD a year which is something more than 8 USD a month.

Your point being? It is still an rental plan. I would gladly pay $99 for a perpetual license with paid updates, and the choice to update or not.

Renting software (almost) always puts the user at a disadvantage compared to a perpetual license with regular (paid) updates.

Please stop moaning about the new Scirra subscription model, it is very fairly priced and give Scirra more resources to maintain and update the software.

Whether the rental-only business model will hurt or help Scirra remains to be seen. Their position is very different compared to Adobe, who are the industry standard, with little or no competition on a professional level. Scirra, on the other hand, will have to deal with excellent alternatives that A) are less expensive (free), and/or B) seen as the professional standard, and/or C) offer perpetual licenses.

Renting makes sense to (semi)professional game developers and companies, not to hobbyists and small freelancers (which Scirra are primarily aiming at).

And we (long-time Scirra users who have been with Scirra since version 1 and who hate renting software) have all the right to moan and complain in the hopes that Scirra will change their minds - just as much as you have every right to hail software rental as the best thing ever.

Very simple: offer BOTH options. Everybody happy.

blurymind

I am currently teaching myself Godot, and Godot's basic architecture using nodes is - dare I say it? - beautiful. The concept is very well thought out, and ideal for game development. Not only that, the one thing missing for me in Construct 2 is the lack of a decent "animate all" timeline. Godot has it. And so many other things.

Also, I just love how I can use Blender to animate 2d puppets, and the IK and animations are directly supported in Godot. And render 3d models to 2d sprites. Wonderful.

It might be one of the best 2d engines out there currently - but visual scripting is not part of it (yet). They are working on it, though. It's stunning that Godot is open source and free. But you are correct: Godot's language is easy to pick up.

I am unsure whether Scirra's decision to switch to a browser-based editor and completely rewrite it was such a good idea, but we'll see what we'll see. I keep saying I won't be part of it, because I am still terribly disappointed about their decision to go rental-only, and it really is a crying shame. I'd rather have preferred real improvements to the editor of Construct, such as a built-in animate-all timeline with graph editor control.

Luckily, with all the (free) alternatives currently available to 2d game developers, I certainly am not worrying about the future. Frustrated by the Scirra's rental model, though.

> You're kinda making a case for choosing open source software here.

>

And what do you think happens if key people who maintain open source projects move on? Even open source projects have that sort of risk.

Of course, I never said this isn't the case. All human endeavours die at some point. At least with open source you cannot suddenly be cut off from your applications for work, unlike rental software (for various reasons both on the developer's part or the publisher's part).

I'll have to try that sometime.

Magically make a living by making my code open source.

Where did I state anyone should open source their software? Now that you mention it though, many people are making a nice living out of open sourcing their work, by the way. You are much too one-dimensional in your thinking, my dear Newt.

Open sourcing Construct 3 makes for an interesting discussion, actually. It may actually work in favour of Construct's development, and allow Construct 3 to flourish in ways beyond what we can imagine. It all depends on how you monetize and approach it. The Blender foundation seems to be doing just fine financially, and they keep expanding their services (yes, even with subscriptions to content ).

Just imagine how Scirra could focus on building professional-grade games and improve the software in a real-world scenario, bringing developers and creatives together in a similar way as the Blender foundation - it has worked well for them, so why not for Scirra? I see possibilities, not limitations in a business model like that.

All depends on how one approaches their business. Not saying Ashley and Tom should go open source, though! (I certainly wouldn't mind, and I'd sponsor them with a $10 a month, like I do Blender).

I like the way Scirra thinks about this. It should reassure anyone who is worried about Scirra's death in the future. Let's hope it never comes to that.

Tom may say this may happen, but of course there is no guarantee that it actually will, of course. I have seen too many software companies go under that stated even unequivocally that they would open source their code, but it never happened. EditShare (company behind LightWorks video editor) promised to open source their code six years ago, and nothing happened as of yet.

Not saying Tom intentions aren't honourable and honest - I am certain they are. And many dead software companies have indeed released their products either for free or open sourced them after their demise, so there's that.

No-one knows what the future holds for sure, though. For me a rental business model is just too icky and uncertain to touch even with hardened gloves on.

I own a Windows tablet with a Wacom digitizer with both pen and touch support, and various smaller Android tablets, and an older iPad 2. From experience I can tell you that doing any real work on the road (outside drawing and ideation) is a very painful and cumbersome process on tablets without an actual keyboard.

Doing any game development without a keyboard is like trying to run through a river of mud - SO slow and frustrating. I tried. It is no fun at all. Tablets are meant for media consumption foremost.

The OP mentions large fingers - you will probably need a stylus in that case. Android and iOS pen support is rather primitive, and imprecise compared to Wacom, though.

Another issue is screen size. For productivity you need something bigger than a regular iPad. An iPad Pro would be okay from this viewpoint, but you would still have to deal with the lack of a keyboard - and you mentioned you do not want to go down the Apple road. But a stylus is offered by Apple to make like easier working on the screen. Fingers, in my experience, are way to in-precise, and prone to errors.

Android tablets seem to be on the way out - even Nvidia cancelled their upcoming game tablet. The only Android tablet that I might suggest to get at this point is the Google Pixel tablet, but that one's only available in the US, I believe - and anyway, that screen size is too small for actual (game) development.

Windows tablets like the Surface Pro are very expensive, and you'd be better off getting a notebook for less money.

Perhaps consider looking into Chromebooks? Those seem to be the next step in the evolution of Android. I've looked at several at the Google booth at BestBuy, and the screen sizes are pretty good, they have keyboards and are convertibles: use them either as tablets or note(net)books. Android apps run in a window, and multitasking is possible.

Since Construct 3 is going to be Chrome based, a Chromebook seems like the perfect companion for on the road C3 development: you get both a (large) tablet, and a proper notebook for development. Games can be tested in an Android environment. And most of these fall within your budget as well.

So the risk you are looking to mitigate here is us going out of business and totally stopping support of our products?

If we did go completely out of business, shut the doors, and we all went and got other jobs and completely stopped selling Construct, Scirra is completely dissolved, at that point I don't see why we wouldn't give it away or open source it. I mean this event would currently appear to be highly unlikely.

As others have pointed out, even though Construct 2 is buy once, if we go under in the future and a new bug is introduced by Windows, Chrome or any other supporting software what then? This is a risk with ALL software.

You're kinda making a case for choosing open source software here.

Software rental business models have been a primary reason to me to switch to open source in my pipeline as much as I can. As long as the community is a supportive one, open source software can be as good or better as commercial alternatives, e.g. Blender, Krita, OpenToonz, ... One reason why I have been teaching myself Godot lately. At the very least you yourself and the community has access to the source code in the worst case scenarios.

Software comes, and software goes. There are no guarantees that software will be supported long term.

However, a rental model does have the disadvantage that if the company goes under, or decides to discontinue a product, developers run the risk to be stone-walled in the middle of a project.

Point in case: Adobe announced a couple of weeks ago that Director development and support will be ending sometime in March. Existing rentals ("subscriptions") will be cut off at that time as well.

Developers on the Adobe Director forum are not happy about this (understatement) - for example, one developer is in the middle of a project, and it will take him longer than March to finish. Others have projects done for clients (museums, for example) that must be maintained and updated after the March date.

Unfortunately, those developers who rented the software seem to be out of luck. They contacted Adobe, and asked for some lenience. But they will lose access to Director and with it lose access to their projects sometime this year.

Director first entered the market in 1985(!). The oldest surviving 'multimedia' producer is now dead. There are no guarantees for software survival. But Director users with a perpetual license may continue to use the software to open their older projects - renters ("subscribers") are at a distinct disadvantage in these type of situations.

> (And good luck convincing schools and colleges to rent your software - after all the Adobe rental issues experienced in educational environments, they will think twice about adding one more rent to their software lineup.)

>

Well, for what it's worth, Construct 2's education license is already a subscription, and that seems to have been working out fine.

If that is true, I stand corrected. The schools and colleges where I teach abhor rental software.

Also, you'd rather pay $500 up-front? That gets you five years of usage...

Again, you are not getting it. I give up.

[ > > Very well put. > My problem is not with Scirra, which I think is a wonderful company, but it is supporting the software subscription model itself. I will never comply. NEVER. > > I won't be part of the crowd that will make this model successful and make every software go for it. > Imagine every game and every software you own suddenly change to this model. You'll have dozens of "cheap" monthly fees that add up to a monster bill. I, as a user and consumer, will never let that happen. > > My 99 dolars, I mean... my two cents. > Hear, hear.

> The problem is the payment model and the investment it asks for- doesn't justify a html5 only game engine. Even stencyl - which is very similar in pricing and target audience (perhaps inspiring scirra) can compile to native games and can still export in the free version to one of the targets

>

Construct 2 has so many more features than a lot of these other tools, that I'd actually struggle to make a comprehensive list of them all. This is made possible by the fact we use HTML5. It makes cross-platform support a breeze and lots of sophisticated features like networking, audio and video support are provided by the browser. Some tools don't even have form controls out of the box! When comparing to other tools with different technologies, I think it's important to take in to account the actual feature sets supported. Sure, you can pick a tool which has native export for example, but how many features will you lose or gain?

Sorry Ashley, I love Construct 2 (and you !), but I'd rather switch to tools with less features than bow down to a rental model and become a serf in the digital serfdom. The feeling really runs that deep for me. It's about freedom for me.

And I am not alone in this. Renting software runs against the blood for many (most?) of us. I just CANNOT bear software rental - it just feels utterly wrong to me. Why do you think Serif is so successful with their Affinity line of products? They advertised right from the start to Adobe users who were unhappy about the rental model. And even though Affinity offers less features, those ex-Adobe users just DON'T CARE. Watch Clickteam do the same with Fusion 3, make my words. They listened to their users - and their users favoured a non-rental option.

For companies and professionals, sure. Not for me personally. I would have no qualms paying you $500 for a developer's perpetual license, though. This would be easily solved by offering both options: a full perpetual license option, and a rental option.

My depressed feeling two cents.

(And good luck convincing schools and colleges to rent your software - after all the Adobe rental issues experienced in educational environments, they will think twice about adding one more rent to their software lineup.)

I tend to agree with Blurymind.

In my opinion, a software rental scheme (so-called 'subscription', which it is not!) only works well if

1) your sofware is the industry standard (people depend on the software for their living), and/or

2) it is the best in class, and/or

3) it is unique/fills a niche that no-one else offers, and/or

4) it offers functionality no competitor delivers.

Compare to Adobe:

1) industry standard? Check.

2) best in class? Mostly, yes. Certainly on a professional level. Check.

3) Unique? At a professional level, yes, mostly.

4) offers functionality no competitor can deliver? Yes, for a large part, in particular for professionals again.

Construct 3:

1) Nope, C3 still has to proof itself. C2 is not the industry standard either - not by a long shot.

2) up to a point, as a visual editor, perhaps. But this is marred by its Achilles' heel: lack of native export, and other game dev environments just offer more features (animation timeline, for example!).

3) No, Construct is not the only visual game editor in town. With competitors improving this aspect (Fusion 3, Godot, Unity&external plugins, ...) it is not unique here. The web export is outstanding, though. Trouble is, the competitors also provide web export, aside from native export.

4) No, competitors deliver equal or more functionality at this point.

Here's the rub: as Blurymind mentioned, software rental works well for professionals. If Construct 3 would be aiming at that segment of the market, I believe it might do well. The trouble, though, is that Construct 2 isn't really part of that market. It is mainly small developers, freelancers, and hobbyists for whom Construct 2 is an attractive proposition, and that is how Scirra are marketing their tools.

Switch to a software rental business model, and I am pretty sure a large (if not the majority) of Construct users will leave for alternatives - or at the very least consider a switch. The market for game engines is just too open, and I can see commercial competitors such as Clickteam rubbing their hands together right now, and I assure you they will offer Construct 2 license holders a cross-update when Fusion 3 comes out later this year.

On the other side competitors like Unity, Godot, Unreal all offer excellent FREE options for the market Scirra is operating in currently. Why pay the rent for software that is out-classed in most departments (excepting perhaps the 'easy' visual scripting) when so many free escape routes exist? Speaking for myself, I am now teaching myself Godot, and will look into Fusion 3 when it comes out. (Godot is actually quite an amazing tool.)

Anyway, I just can't see this work out for Scirra. Perhaps I am a cynic.