48 replies to this topic

[TheRock]

How about making a engine of say Godot or Unity that acts like ZQuest. So the screen scrolling and all. I for one will be doing that for all my future projects. This will allow people of everywhere to access to a Zelda like game making tool. 

[Nightmare]

How about making a engine of say Godot or Unity that acts like ZQuest. So the screen scrolling and all. I for one will be doing that for all my future projects. This will allow people of everywhere to access to a Zelda like game making tool. 
 

Was actually thinking of making a top-down closed source engine in GODOT, but IDK how much I'd be allowed to discuss that topic here, so I keep it on the low for now.  It's only in the infancy of planning right now, so not much to say.

Admins, if there's a place here I can talk about it besides my Discord, please advise me.

 

-James

Edited by Nightmare, 04 September 2023 - 11:03 AM.

[Alucard648]

Side question (and my finger is way off the pulse here since I no longer develop with ZC): is there even a demand for new ZC features? Does scripting not already open the door to whatever else a quest author would want to add? Is the goal merely to make these features simply more accessible?

Just check out "Feature Requests" Discord channel. Many highly demanded features are still missing. Here are most demanded features still missing:

1. New autocombo mode - revamp of old Relational/Dungeon Carving drawing modes for screen editing - WIP by Moosh.

2. Z3 Srolling areas - in developmnt by ConnorClark.

3. Expand itemcount max limit above 255. 

Rest of the features can be easily replicated by scripts.

[connor.clark]

James:

 

"ZC" is open source and may be used by reference by other game developers or whomever wants to understand how games work.  This does not mean the individual parts are open source and people just have the right to dilly dally and use what they want.

 

That's exactly what GPL affords - using the code without anyone's permission. You must only adhere to the other requirements of the license, namely to publish any derivative work under the same license.

 

 

Taco Chopper:

re: lifetime subscription stuff

You're talking about hypotheticals of a footnote to a proposal. If I had said "permanent" would that have prevented this line of disagreements? That's indeed what I had in mind in that bullet point.

I agree with your point of "haves and have nots", I see how that could be awkward for new members.

I'm pretty sure we would have arrived at this conclusion internally if we actually had a chance to discuss it amongst the devs. I'm on the same page as you here - I don't think a subscription anything would be good. To be clear, I'm not speaking for all the developers just myself.
 

You made that thread about licencing, replied to two people, and left everyone else's input untouched. I know I can't help but feel like there's a sense of disconnect between the developers and the community right now, and a situation like that will only cause more distrust when situations like this arise.

If you're going to make a recommendation like that, then why did you choose to not engage in the feedback from the community? You've said yourself that it was proposed to help structure conversation.

I largely agreed with the responses and better understood things from the conversation that did happen. Frankly I felt the need to step away after some personal attacks and never thought to return to it. FWIW, I did engage in DMs with Aevin about their being uneasy about their quest being on the web version, as it was the first time I received negative feedback on it IIRC.

 

I want to highlight from my last post:

 

 

Yes, we could push the donations a little more, but without growing the community of players that isn't a long term solution. ... a work-for-donations model doesn't give a very strong foundation for a community of this present size.

First, backing up a lot, as I think we may be spending too much time on the fine details: the main goal for this proposal was "Growing ZC", in service of increasing how much time we could dedicate to features and bug fixes. We could possibly accomplish that without any revenue share (via an optional distribution model) or optional client features (via a subscription model) --- in other words, by commissioning tilesets and making them freely available + finding ways to market ZC, and hoping that the donations increase enough to make up for said investments. It's correct that building out what's needed for a platform is a lot of work, so this is a valid alternative to all that. It could be more productive to shelf everything about monetization, and seek solutions to this goal directly.

 

 

 

Thoughts?

Another idea is to put a link to the Patreon somewhere in the Launcher.

[Mitchfork]

That was about seeking clarification about how people view the assets they share with the community - framed as a proposal to help structure conversation. A big topic in the past year has been about copyright in the engine, so it was natural to extend that to the assets people share here. It's not sneaky to suggest it could be good if submissions to the database could be clearly marked with a license in some way. I know I approached that topic without a good understanding that most of the prolific creators would never want to allow their stuff in commercial games - but that's kind of the point of making such a thread. It feels like I'm being characterized in the worst possible light for making a recommendation. Just as there are people who will share their creations "just not for commercial purposes", there are also people that just don't care. Something as simple as a field in the submission entry to convey that is what I felt was missing.

It is specifically the link between these things that is suspect to me.  You suggested a very specific solution, not a generalized discussion of a problem - that suggestion would benefit this plan, that context was not apparent, and I think that's valid to characterize negatively. 

 

Do you mean "client / player" features? Assuming you didn't typo, but just misread something: editor features was explicitly marked as not a good candidate for a hypothetical subscription, and it isn't even feasible (anything in the main codebases is GPL forever and we'd really have to tie ourselves into knots to portion off parts of that behind a paywall). Not only is it an awful idea to make it harder for some to use the editor, it isn't legally possible.
 
Assuming you really meant "client / player" features: The idea seemed feasible legally because it'd be interfacing with and wholly require an external service to work. Such an external service would be a new work by the current developers, but still made open source. At the risk of delving too deep into the implementation of a hypothetical plan: we'd probably license it under MIT or GPL, which means someone could (and likely would, I suspect) just take it and run their own free version. But that's a occupational hazard in open source and in many cases can be good for everyone. In addition, the way the client would actually interface with external services would be done in an entirely open and documented way, making it easy (not obfuscated) for anyone to provide their own extensions.

 

You are correct - this is a misread on my part. It does not really alter my underlying feelings on such a thing.

[connor.clark]

The impetus for that thread was wholly unrelated to the topic at hand, it wasn't even a concept. It was in response to this:


https://discord.com/...198250505768992

https://discord.com/...215227630682145

In other words I wasn't doing some Machiavellian ploy. I was attempting to convey a possible solution to a problem that came up in chat.

[Taco Chopper]

I’d attempted to write two versions of this post earlier this morning… only to have them erased by the forum reply system. Oddly enough, I think what I was going to say this morning has been tempered a bit by taking my mind off of it - for the better, I think?
Here’s what I’ll try to say 15 hours later anyway.
 

You're talking about hypotheticals of a footnote to a proposal.

Initially I was going to say that it’s still a worthwhile argument, and that these things need to be double, triple checked irrelevant of whether or not they’ll happen.

Since reading your most recent response to Mitch, I’m… still not on board with it, unfortunately. I see your angle, but I’m going to agree to disagree with you regarding this. I’m not willing to sacrifice the database - and the history this website carries - for the sake of a commercial version of ZC, hypothetical of a footnote of a proposal or otherwise.
 

If I had said "permanent" would that have prevented this line of disagreements? That's indeed what I had in mind in that bullet point.

I feel like “lifetime” and “permanent” are interchangeable terms when it comes to software licensing. Again, understand where you’re coming from with it, but it’s wholly at the developers’ discretion around what the definition of either “lifetime” or “permanent” may be. It wouldn’t change my stance on it at all, personally.
 

I agree with your point of "haves and have nots", I see how that could be awkward for new members.

Something else I’ve considered today - what would you define as a pre-existing/“old” member’s eligibility for a “lifetime subscription” of ZC? Would there be a cut-off date to claiming one? Would you propose other criteria to determine their eligibility? What if an “old” member returns after you’ve issued all these “lifetime licences”?

I know if I’d returned to PureZC/ZC in 2021 and missed a “lifetime licence” due to not being active etc in contrast to someone like Mitch (sorry Mitch), I’d be feeling incredibly awkward as well - and wondering why I would want to pick up where I left off with ZC.
 

I'm pretty sure we would have arrived at this conclusion internally if we actually had a chance to discuss it amongst the devs.

I think the communication issues of the last few days have really played a hand in this for sure, but this is not the appropriate time or place for me to discuss that. That said, I’m incredibly frustrated and disappointed that everything has transpired the way it has in this community as a whole - and that isn’t solely on the developers at all.
 

I largely agreed with the responses and better understood things from the conversation that did happen. Frankly I felt the need to step away after some personal attacks and never thought to return to it.

Understand the why around you wanting to take the step back, and I think this is where I was annoyed - preceding the weekend’s events, of course. The discourse around the initial post is a fair enough reason to take a step back, but I think to leave the thread to be an echo chamber was a misstep, if only due to the fact that it was made by a ZC developer, and not just a general member of the community.
Writing a short reply acknowledging the received feedback would’ve made a difference, particularly considering the brevity of what you were proposing, and the implications it would have across the site database. Particularly without the context that you highlighted as:

In other words I wasn't doing some Machiavellian ploy. I was attempting to convey a possible solution to a problem that came up in chat.

For what it’s worth, I know I perceived your silence that came after to be a disregard of the community’s opinion on the matter, rather than your removing yourself; if there was such an overwhelmingly negative response to it, then it made sense that you wouldn’t want to regard what the community was saying. As Mitch said, it’s valid to characterise that negatively.
From a wider - exclusive of certain people - perspective, the way that thread was left was a factor in how events transpired over the weekend - I know I’ve viewed it as “oh, so these rough ideas of proposals have leaked, this is just further proof that the devs are just going to do whatever they want, and not listen to us at all”.
Connecting the leaked messages, as well as what happened after, with the licensing proposal thread was too straightforward a connection to not make; any goodwill toward the devs from the community may have been used up through these incidents. Similarly with the way the Discord thread unravelled after your opening post as well - not that I think that the thread had any chance to be more than the metaphorical Molotov that it became.

On a more positive note, I appreciate that you’re making an effort now to reply to selected parts of the community’s feedback.

This morning I was going to highlight how Mani’s discussion around paid assets - and residual income - would be a better option of attack around anything regarding monetisation. I still want to touch on this in regards to the quoted text you posted.
Bundles, pay-what-you-want models a la itch.io, etc are probably an avenue to look at. I know I’d pay $2 for a bunch of tile sheets to test stuff out - I did so for the Two Week Quest Contest before I realised I wouldn’t have the time to do it! - and while they’re a fairly inconsistent way to generate income, they aren’t going to divide the community anywhere as much as shifting ZC to a paid model overnight would.

I think that's going to do more than promoting free assets while relying on a donation system.
 

Another idea is to put a link to the Patreon somewhere in the Launcher.

A separate tab for it - i.e. some kind of “about” tab - wouldn’t go astray. I’d like to note that having any form of pop-up, WinRAR style, would be irritating to deal with though.

[Timelord]

I guess I'll summaries what I told Emily in voice on a completely different discord server the other day, in regards to this.

Moving the engine towards a state where it's a generic engine and it's feasible for people to make and package commercial games with it is actually a good idea. We've seen some pretty massive leaps towards allowing this in recent times (the implementation towards just a single game/quest executable, etc).
 

 

Well, gee, thank you. I proposed it in 2018. My model was to get an open and completely Nintendo resource stripped version of ZC available on Steam, allowing content creators to monetise their custom content. I did not in any way expect royalties or any remuneration out of that, but m general plan would have allowed people who created games in the engine to sell their work; just not sell the base engine itself. 

 

I compared it to PICO-8, but with a wholly free and open basecode, and it was the primary reason that I made so many different game engine models in ZScript.

 

The modules system was a very deliberate attempt to sanitise all infringing IP from ZC, and KI paid a gfx artist a stupid sum of money to create custom assets for this project (OpenZC), which sadly went into the void as he took the money and ran. In short, my goal was always to facilitate content creators and permit monetising your own work, just not our work. I never desired anything in return and the licence wfor ZC would never have changed to require any such notion.

 

I was never in this for the money, and in fact I bled funds for my entire time involved. I paid for HW, SW and server space and other needs of my staff. Every penny I paid out is a donation, and I will never see a return on that. I accept that as this is a hobby or a labour of love, for me not some method of making mad bank. 

 

You do you. I personally have zero objections to your subscription model as its own separate platform and wish you all the best. Peace and Cheers.

 

 

I have respected every request to remove something from the web version. Please, assume good intentions. Mine were to make these amazing games more accessible.

 

 

 

Oh heavens.... People are giving you some absolute shade for...performing three flipping miracles. I love you mate, and have always for your help on Allegro issues. Making a web version of ZC is something I deemed reckless and implausible.

 

Yet, they toss contempt at you? Mate, this is why I was not polling people on my decisions. as if you did this, you get a gold star from me. I was skimming the changelog and you are the MVP. Just ignore the complaints and keep on keeping on.

[Bagu]

 

I was never in this for the money, and in fact I bled funds for my entire time involved. I paid for HW, SW and server space and other needs of my staff. Every penny I paid out is a donation, and I will never see a return on that. I accept that as this is a hobby or a labour of love, for me not some method of making mad bank. 

 

 

...and this has never been sufficiently appreciated (IMO)

Edited by Bagu, 05 September 2023 - 10:04 AM.

[Mitchfork]

I was never in this for the money, and in fact I bled funds for my entire time involved. I paid for HW, SW and server space and other needs of my staff. Every penny I paid out is a donation, and I will never see a return on that. I accept that as this is a hobby or a labour of love, for me not some method of making mad bank. 

 

Thanks for your input, Dr. Czerwinski. How's your other "labor of love", Merlancia, doing these days?

[Hergiswi]

if zc were to be monetized, does that imply that development would move quicker? i don't want to come off as snarky, but we've been on version 2.x since 2005. i can't imagine monetizing something whose last major update took place when bush was in office unless it was going to significantly expedite updates

[connor.clark]

Just look at the alpha changelogs. The version number is pretty arbitrary, if that's your measure for progress it's entirely useless and therefore unfair to categorize the huge updates over the last couple years as containing "no major updates". FWIW we're gonna bump to 3 and update the versioning method we use soon-ish.

 

if zc were to be monetized, does that imply that development would move quicker?

For myself, I don't see how I could spend much more time on dev work (in fact I'm looking to reduce, especially once the z3 feature is done), and it replacing my actual job is not a serious proposition. I don't want to speak much on Emily's situation, but I think it's public knowledge enough to at least say that there is a significant risk to losing the majority of dev work due to financial issues.

[Magi_Hero]

I want to add that the numbering scheme was not properly utilized in the past. It is being worked on for future updates.

Yes, it does seem stale that when you see ZC that it is still in version 2.x when ideally through all of the features and updates done especially in 2.x+ that it should be closer to double digits.

Edited by Magi_Hero, 06 September 2023 - 04:44 PM.

[Hergiswi]

okay, cool, that's encouraging to know. though if things are going to be monetized, i hope the numbering system is something that would be addressed, as it comes across as stagnant to somebody who doesn't keep up with the dev logs and i could imagine it stifling the amount of money coming in

[Twilight Knight]

I'm all for this plan and trust in the devs to make the right moves forward.

 

I don't think I would make a full fledged game in ZQuest to be able to make a buck out of it (I simply don't have time for that), but as long as we can still make hacky Zelda-esque games with it I'm fine.

 

Opening up ZC to a different kind of audience is always a good idea!

 

Also making this Nintendo proof is an even better idea...  I've always feared them taking ZC.com or PZC.net down....