[Development] CliCli Incubation Program!

[Mayday]

Hello Hive! We're here to present map makers with a fantastic opportunity to expand their creativity with our new editor tool, CliCli⁽ᵃˡᵖʰᵃ⁾!

What is CliCli?

CliCli is a brand new editor and platform that draws inspiration from old school RTS game editors and modern game engines alike. We aim to provide an editor tool for authors to create and monetize their games from. We invite you to take a look at our first semi-public alpha build.

How's it different?

This tool/platform consists purely of User Generated Content (UGC). We do not offer any attached core gameplay, however, this does not necessarily mean we do not offer features an author would require to begin producing content. Currently, CliCli has thousands of included assets from characters and buildings to spell effects. We've got you covered from the start and will continue adding resources at no cost. Because CliCli is first and foremost centered around UGC, the store will accrue thousands of assets from other members in the community.

What is the benefit of CliCli?

This tool provides many built in features a would expect such as: uncapped object limits, a built in model editor, non-proprietary file type formats, and more! We also provide networking, monetization models, and a game info page directly into the client.

Technical Details

Programming

There is no experience needed as game logic can be designed through a simple yet elegant graphical user interface. You can control events, conditions, and actions to shape your game with our trigger API and inbuilt tools.

For those who wish to directly create their code, a full function library will be available with native support for Lua, which additionally allows for other translated languages.

Design

Produce scenes, draw terrain, build civilizations, and design a unique environment with many expanded tools that allow you to create a world that is truly unique.

Design characters with ease with an inbuilt model designer that allows for customization without external tools or re-importing data.

Assets

Just want to jump in and get started? With an available collection of art resources including characters, decorations, and environment pieces it's simple.

Want even more options? Marketplace integration allows you to share and trade all types of assets. Looking to create your own resources for yourself or to share? With commonly used formats it’s easy to use your favorite tools to export directly to the editor. Models use FBX, textures use PNG, and sounds use MP3.

Creativity

Support for various game genres allows for endless design ideas. Have you wanted to make your own Tower Defense, or MOBA? From text-based games to full blown RPG’s we’ve got you covered, and will include templates to showcase how many different genres work.

Technical Support

Have an issue? With our responsive technical support, issues you present can be solved on an internal level. Support for game making, publishing, branding, and building a player community is also included.

Publishing

One-click packaging and instant free publishing to the platform. Preview, pre-launch, limited-time sales, campaign management, and data analysis features provided.

Personalized Algorithms

Individual users discover games through an intricate “for you page” with algorithms by age levels, genre, interests and playing behaviors. This assists in helping the right players find your game.

Localization

Global users can play together with real-time automatic machine translation in English, French, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Russian, and more.

Monetization

Supported Financial Models

• Pay-To-Play - Set up a monthly fee for players to continually stay apart of the community.
• Free-To-Play - Allow anyone to play your game.
• Single Purchase - Purchase access once to play forever.
• Customizable In-Game - Offer cosmetics or functional components directly integrated into your game.
• Game Pass - Join a group of other game creators to share an access fee between your projects.
• Creator Subscription - Subscribe to your favorite creator to have access to all of their projects.
• Donations - Players may donate directly to support the game, without receiving any incentives or benefits.

Competitive

We offer a compelling split revenue plan for developer profits. This allows for creators to spend their earnings to improve their own game and build toward game development as a full-time career.

Art Preview

Incubation Program

Now that you have a background on what the tool is please head over to the official site for program details.

Contact Info

This concludes our introduction into the wonderful world of CliCli.

In order to contact someone about participating, please reach out to your most favorite moderator Mayday#1328 on discord, or in the comments below!

 

[BogdanW3]

This looks amazing! Even just the premise of putting the moddability of War3 to a modern engine shows a lot of promise. And Lua support on top, so nothing to research from scratch. This can become big very easily and I hope it does. The name's a bit strange though, and can currently bring up search results for "CLI" so some confusion might become of it if it's kept.

 

[00110000]

I've got a lot of ideas to try so I hope there's an extra week for the proposal deadline so that people could submit multiple entries. Also the buildings look like a true re-reforged.

 

[Damage]

I like the visual aspects, certainly. I hope the models for units are just as varied and in a similar style.
The editor UI is different to the World Editor (obviously) but I can get used to it over time. I wonder how easily we can adapt to this new editor assuming we've all been using Blizzard's tools beforehand.

This makes me wonder about the Incubation program's timeline. If each step is roughly one month long, it depends how many times we discover some idea isn't feasible to implement. With a strict deadline, it could be hard to keep up if we're also learning how to use the tool at the same time.

Still, all of this is yet to be revealed, so I'll reserve judgement for later.

EDIT: Oh, and the name is kinda... weird.

 

[brownin]

I second what others have said regarding the art style and graphics, they look very much how I'd have wished reforged was done. Looks like wc3 editor has 2 weeks left to live

 

[MindWorX]

For those wondering, this tool is being developed by NetEase, so plenty of experience with user generated content.

 

[Blackveiled]

Visually the assets look great; I could personally see a good modding scene come from this type of project. Beyond that since I haven't witnessed the tool nor used it, it looks promising for developers and people who want to work on their own projects as a personal hobby.

My main criticism is the name of the project. CliCli doesn't strike me as a serious platform name. Sorry, but that's just my opinion.

 

[Lizreu]

some questions immediately pop to mind:

• any chance that parts/the whole thing will be open-sourced at some point?
• what's the multiplayer model? client/server, deterministic lockstep, something else (gasp) ?
• how's the content pipeline look like? does this take in a bunch of well-known formats w.r.t. to modelling, audio, maps? what will those formats be?
• is this going to be a free or paid product for regular players who don't want to peruse the monetization?
• how 'deep' does the scripting api go? what's the lua version being used here? will we be able to do weird shit like modify the map at runtime, or build it procedurally, or will it have to be prebuilt in the editor?
• linux compat?
• any way to participate or have a peek at the thing if im not interested in the monetary reward?

 

[Deolrin]

Certainly looks very interesting, even exciting. .PNG textures scares me a little, that's a bit outdated I guess (no shaders?), but it's fine. The platform name is... Not great, it's generic and forgettable. It makes me think of some sort of phone app rather than a game engine.

The info on the Incubation page is a little bit unclear. It's hard to tell how many people will be selected for each phase of the project, or what happens to a project that is rejected. There are also some unclear things, like what does "Unlock Stage 2 compensation bonus" actually mean? What does each Milestone mean?
The monetary compensation looks good and is certainly a good incentive. But it's unclear what is actually needed to qualify for it.

I'd also love to know if there is any kind of separation by international regions, whether in the platform itself (for sharing and trading assets and project files) or for the incubation program's competition.

I'd also like to know if there is support for team colour or replaceable textures in the engine.

 

[Dr Super Good]

This makes me wonder about the Incubation program's timeline. If each step is roughly one month long, it depends how many times we discover some idea isn't feasible to implement. With a strict deadline, it could be hard to keep up if we're also learning how to use the tool at the same time.

Which is why the payments are made in milestones. If a project turns out to be not feasible after some milestones it can be cut at that point with only some fraction of the total payment made to cover the time spent. This is pretty common in game development as not all ideas can be turned into fun games.

My main criticism is the name of the project. CliCli doesn't strike me as a serious platform name. Sorry, but that's just my opinion.

Tell that to names like WeChat, NetEase, e.t.c. Sound silly to some but are huge.

 

[Kam]

some questions immediately pop to mind:

• any chance that parts/the whole thing will be open-sourced at some point?
• what's the multiplayer model? client/server, deterministic lockstep, something else (gasp) ?
• how's the content pipeline look like? does this take in a bunch of well-known formats w.r.t. to modelling, audio, maps? what will those formats be?
• is this going to be a free or paid product for regular players who don't want to peruse the monetization?
• how 'deep' does the scripting api go? what's the lua version being used here? will we be able to do weird shit like modify the map at runtime, or build it procedurally, or will it have to be prebuilt in the editor?
• linux compat?
• any way to participate or have a peek at the thing if im not interested in the monetary reward?

• Unlikely but it's not off the table
• It is lockstep and we will have more details later in development
• Models use FBX, textures use PNG, and sounds use MP3
• There is no cost to use the platform or editor
• Currently 5.1 but we will be migrating to 5.4.4. There will be more details later.
• Linux is not currently supported but we are considering it
• Absolutely! I'll put you on the list for the 16th. We want your feedback.

 

[Lizreu]

• Unlikely but it's not off the table
• It is lockstep and we will have more details later in development
• Models use FBX, textures use PNG, and sounds use MP3
• There is no cost to use the platform or editor
• Currently 5.1 but we will be migrating to 5.4.4. There will be more details later.
• Linux is not currently supported but we are considering it
• Absolutely! I'll put you on the list for the 16th. We want your feedback.

awesome, thanks for the answers to my questions. im very much interested in how this turns out

suddenly i've got a whole lot more reasons to work on my wasm lua transpiler :^)

 

[Kam]

Certainly looks very interesting, even exciting. .PNG textures scares me a little, that's a bit outdated I guess (no shaders?), but it's fine. The platform name is... Not great, it's generic and forgettable. It makes me think of some sort of phone app rather than a game engine.

The info on the Incubation page is a little bit unclear. It's hard to tell how many people will be selected for each phase of the project, or what happens to a project that is rejected. There are also some unclear things, like what does "Unlock Stage 2 compensation bonus" actually mean? What does each Milestone mean?
The monetary compensation looks good and is certainly a good incentive. But it's unclear what is actually needed to qualify for it.

I'd also love to know if there is any kind of separation by international regions, whether in the platform itself (for sharing and trading assets and project files) or for the incubation program's competition.

• We are looking at a starting cap of 50 teams (up to 150 people) but that may expand
• If you fail to meet criteria for a milestone you will not receive that payment and you may continue developing to meet the next milestone.
• The requirements for each milestone are defined on the official site - let me know if it's still not clear though.
• Stage 2 compensation is still being discussed but will be a longer term bonus for competing and making it through to the end.
• There is no region locking although there may additional regional rules. We will update you when there is more information.

 

[GrapesOfWath]

wow! what a cool and novel concept that I was previously unaware of! amazing!

 

[Shar Dundred]

For those wondering, this tool is being developed by NetEase

Not fond of the sound of that ngl.

I for one intend to stay as far away from this as humanly possible.

 

[Deolrin]

• We are looking at a starting cap of 50 teams (up to 150 people) but that may expand
• If you fail to meet criteria for a milestone you will not receive that payment and you may continue developing to meet the next milestone.
• The requirements for each milestone are defined on the official site - let me know if it's still not clear though.
• Stage 2 compensation is still being discussed but will be a longer term bonus for competing and making it through to the end.
• There is no region locking although there may additional regional rules. We will update you when there is more information.

Thank you for the reply, Kam. I have added another question to my post shortly after you got to it regarding teamcolour, if you don't mind.

 

[Mayday]

I've got a lot of ideas to try so I hope there's an extra week for the proposal deadline so that people could submit multiple entries. Also the buildings look like a true re-reforged.

Hello, thank you for your interest! We're just looking for one entry per person/team.

I like the visual aspects, certainly. I hope the models for units are just as varied and in a similar style.
The editor UI is different to the World Editor (obviously) but I can get used to it over time. I wonder how easily we can adapt to this new editor assuming we've all been using Blizzard's tools beforehand.

This makes me wonder about the Incubation program's timeline. If each step is roughly one month long, it depends how many times we discover some idea isn't feasible to implement. With a strict deadline, it could be hard to keep up if we're also learning how to use the tool at the same time.

Still, all of this is yet to be revealed, so I'll reserve judgement for later.

EDIT: Oh, and the name is kinda... weird.

hi, glad you enjoy the graphics! The models are varied, and we do have them in similar styles. We also have additional themes/styles of assets that you may enjoy.

Personally, I find the UI intuitive, but in the future please let us know if you dislike anything about it

For the timeline, you will have access to the tool roughly half a month before you need to submit a proposal. If you find you cannot do something during the milestones, you can reach out to me, or whoever else will be assisting you along the way. If it's something we can fix/add, we will look into it & if it simply cannot be done, we're open to some modifications of your milestone updates along the way. Hope this answers any concern you have. Thank you

I second what others have said regarding the art style and graphics, they look very much how I'd have wished reforged was done. Looks like wc3 editor has 2 weeks left to live

Haha, glad you enjoy and look forward to seeing your work!

For those wondering, this tool is being developed by NetEase, so plenty of experience with user generated content.

Visually the assets look great; I could personally see a good modding scene come from this type of project. Beyond that since I haven't witnessed the tool nor used it, it looks promising for developers and people who want to work on their own projects as a personal hobby.

My main criticism is the name of the project. CliCli doesn't strike me as a serious platform name. Sorry, but that's just my opinion.

We hope your opinion stays positive as more is revealed to you! We'll take your feedback into consideration

wow! what a cool and novel concept that I was previously unaware of! amazing!

glad you like the ideas

Not fond of the sound of that ngl.

I for one intend to stay as far away from this as humanly possible.

Hello Shar, I am sorry this doesn't appeal to you. Hopefully in the future on its official public release, we'll have changed your mind!





Thank you everyone for your comments & feedback. If you're interested in joining on, please reach out to me and I'll get you included

If you still have more questions, feel free to post them here!

 

[Lt_Hawkeye]

This looks very promising.

 

[Kam]

Thank you for the reply, Kam. I have added another question to my post shortly after you got to it regarding teamcolour, if you don't mind.

We do support replaceable textures, but no team color yet.

 

[_lycan]

I may check it out, I don't know about the timeline though I'm kinda busy for the remaining of the year sadly.


Now outside of that:

1) I was going to say that the website needed some actual information considering it's talking about a contest and paying and all that, at least who the makers were but if it's Netease then that gives me more trust of backing.


2) I don't know how I feel about the visuals though, it reminds me about Reforged a bit too much.


3)What engine is it using? Is it unreal engine 4 or some other engine?


4)Having models is fine and all but... how will you guys deal with dummy stuff? not having content outside of the editor is alright if it's custom game oriented but that may mean that people have to redo abilities from scratch, I see an abilities tab there but I'm not sure if it comes with anything by default


Lastly:

Those timelines to get paid seem a bit... unrealistic to develop a map at least a map with a decent amount of polish, idk though

 

[Mayday]

This looks very promising.

Thank you Hawkeye, let me know if you'd like to join!

I may check it out, I don't know about the timeline though I'm kinda busy for the remaining of the year sadly.


Now outside of that:

1) I was going to say that the website needed some actual information considering it's talking about a contest and paying and all that, at least who the makers were but if it's Netease then that gives me more trust of backing.


2) I don't know how I feel about the visuals though, it reminds me about Reforged a bit too much.


3)What engine is it using? Is it unreal engine 4 or some other engine?


4)Having models is fine and all but... how will you guys deal with dummy stuff? not having content outside of the editor is alright if it's custom game oriented but that may mean that people have to redo abilities from scratch, I see an abilities tab there but I'm not sure if it comes with anything by default


Lastly:

Those timelines to get paid seem a bit... unrealistic to develop a map at least a map with a decent amount of polish, idk though

Hello Lycan,
1) Thank you for your feedback
2) We have a lot of different visuals and themes currently, and we plan on adding more along the way.
3) We're using a in-house engine.
4) We plan to offer templates for most object-types, so you may custom make your own as needed.
5) We're looking for quality over quantity, but I will relay this feedback as well

 

[Vibe]

Monetization

Supported Financial Models

• Pay-To-Play - Set up a monthly fee for players to continually stay apart of the community.
• Free-To-Play - Allow anyone to play your game.
• Single Purchase - Purchase access once to play forever.
• Customizable In-Game - Offer cosmetics or functional components directly integrated into your game.
• Game Pass - Join a group of other game creators to share an access fee between your projects.
• Creator Subscription - Subscribe to your favorite creator to have access to all of their projects.
• Donations - Players may donate directly to support the game, without receiving any incentives or benefits.

Competitive We offer a compelling split revenue plan for developer profits. This allows for creators to spend their earnings to improve their own game and build toward game development as a full-time career.

A diversified financial model is what I am optimistic about, which can attract game developers and players from different starting points. I think this is my ideal UGC community state.

Some people choose to play for free and buy game equipment, some choose to pay monthly, some choose to buy out, and some choose to donate money. Different types of developers can choose, and different types of players can also choose.

This is healthier than both Blizzard's war3 and Netease's war3. If NetEase did this on the NetEase war3 platform, I wouldn't feel that my living space as a fan has been violated like I do now.

To be honest, I never thought about my actual view of the financial model before seeing this post. But now, what I want is not just free play and buy game equipment, nor just donations, what I want is that as a developer I can choose freely.

Well, sorry I'm not interested in your project, but I do understand from your financial model that the problem is to give everyone a choice. So still thank you.

 

[00110000]

Hello, thank you for your interest! We're just looking for one entry per person/team.

What happens if too many people pick similar genres? We should be able to submit multiple entries if they're of different genre at least.

 

[Dr Super Good]

What happens if too many people pick similar genres? We should be able to submit multiple entries if they're of different genre at least.

They are looking for professional level commitment. You are unlikely to have the resources and time to be able to make multiple submissions given they expect a gameplay demo and you only have 14 days to make it and all accompanying submission documentation.

 

[00110000]

They are looking for professional level commitment. You are unlikely to have the resources and time to be able to make multiple submissions given they expect a gameplay demo and you only have 14 days to make it and all accompanying documentation.

Which is why I wanted more time and there will definitely be outliers who do have the resources and time even with just 14 days.

Documentation can largely start right now even without access or info about how the editor works. Commitment is a problem if 25 out of 50 teams become committed to making Tower Defenses. I'm sure they wouldn't want that.

At the very least there should be a poll where teams vote for what genre they are thinking of doing so there isn't a massive market saturation. I have a feeling if anyone made a MOBA, it would be because they think almost no one else is and they want to plan ahead to take advantage of that.

 

[Kam]

This is not a competition so participants are free to discuss their plans at any point.

 

[Arious]

This looks good. I am interested in participating but I have some questions.

• Who are the developers of this tool?
• For how long have you been working on this editor?
• Can we see a preview of what the GUI triggers will look like?
• What does the name 'CliCli' mean? Why did you chose this word as the name of this tool?
• The UI screenshot of your Object Editor has 2 separate columns for 'Doodads' & 'Props'. What is the difference between doodads & props?
• The main focus of this editor seems to be top view game projects. Will this editor also allow us to make first-person & third person projects?
• Will we be able to distribute games made with your platform on Steam or Gog? Are there any plans for Xbox, PlayStation support?
• Why would someone use your tool over Unreal Engine 5 or Unity? What are you offering that will make indie developers switch to your editor?

Thank you for your time. And I will be thankful if you can answer my questions. I wish you all the best with your project!

 

[Dr Super Good]

Which is why I wanted more time and there will definitely be outliers who do have the resources and time even with just 14 days.

People with professional level commitment would have no problems reaching the deadline in 14 days, which is likely the point of the short deadline. Like wise they would devote all their effort to a single submission to maximise success chances. This would look especially good for their submission as the more progressed the gameplay demo is, the more likely they are to keep to the other strict deadlines and produce a polished product at the end so the more likely they are to be deserving of the grant/milestone money.

For how long have you been working on this editor?

I suspect it is more than just an editor but also a game engine. The length of time is not really relevant as at the end it is the quantity of resources that were devoted to making it that count. Given the amounts of money in play for the incubation program this is clearly not an indy tier project and likely has quite a lot of resources backing it.

Why would someone use your tool over Unreal Engine 5 or Unity? What are you offering that will make indie developers switch to your editor?

Looking at the documentation above it is more RTS orientated, likely with specific optimisations targeting that sort of game, and also offers a different licencing model. I suspect this tool is aimed to be easier to use than Unity or Unreal Engine 5 but that might come at the cost of flexibility.

 

[Mayday]

This looks good. I am interested in participating but I have some questions.

• Who are the developers of this tool?
• For how long have you been working on this editor?
• Can we see a preview of what the GUI triggers will look like?
• What does the name 'CliCli' mean? Why did you chose this word as the name of this tool?
• The UI screenshot of your Object Editor has 2 separate columns for 'Doodads' & 'Props'. What is the difference between doodads & props?
• The main focus of this editor seems to be top view game projects. Will this editor also allow us to make first-person & third person projects?
• Will we be able to distribute games made with your platform on Steam or Gog? Are there any plans for Xbox, PlayStation support?
• Why would someone use your tool over Unreal Engine 5 or Unity? What are you offering that will make indie developers switch to your editor?

Thank you for your time. And I will be thankful if you can answer my questions. I wish you all the best with your project!

Hello Arious, thanks for your interest.

1) The CliCli team, of course!
2) DSG covered this in the previous post.
3) They're ECA (events, conditions, actions) if this answers your question.
4) We chose this name from the words "ClickClick" whereas with just a few clicks, you can have a game up & running!
5) You'll be able to see on the 16th when the download is ready!
6) By default, it is top-down view. We have plans later down the road to expand it, and currently you can use camera functions to mimic what you'd like.
7) No, we have our own included platform. We're not ready to reveal any other device support at this time
8) We believe the ease of learning our tool, as well as the integrated features make it very compelling to new and veteran developers alike. Networking, monetization, players, etc. are all built into the tool, and only require you to configure your map settings.

I hope I answered your questions as best as I can for now. Please reach out to me on Discord if you would like to participate!

 

[Arious]

Hello Arious, thanks for your interest.

1) The CliCli team, of course!
2) DSG covered this in the previous post.
3) They're ECA (events, conditions, actions) if this answers your question.
4) We chose this name from the words "ClickClick" whereas with just a few clicks, you can have a game up & running!
5) You'll be able to see on the 16th when the download is ready!
6) By default, it is top-down view. We have plans later down the road to expand it, and currently you can use camera functions to mimic what you'd like.
7) No, we have our own included platform. We're not ready to reveal any other device support at this time
8) We believe the ease of learning our tool, as well as the integrated features make it very compelling to new and veteran developers alike. Networking, monetization, players, etc. are all built into the tool, and only require you to configure your map settings.

I hope I answered your questions as best as I can for now. Please reach out to me on Discord if you would like to participate!

Thank you so much for the answers. Judging from the information you & DSG provided, I am concluding that your tool is an alternative to game creation systems like Roblox & Core. What makes CliCli stand out from the rest is the UI & Features based on Wc3 World Editor... And I hope there are no NFTs & gambling/Pay2Win mechanics incorporated by the games hosted on CliCli platform.

I am really interested in using your tool when it becomes available on 16th. If possible, I will try to participate in the Incubation program.

Seems like Roblox & Core have only 2 weeks left to live

 

[Mayday]

Thank you so much for the answers. Judging from the information you & DSG provided, I am concluding that your tool is an alternative to game creation systems like Roblox & Core. What makes CliCli stand out from the rest is the UI & Features based on Wc3 World Editor... And I hope there are no NFTs & gambling/Pay2Win mechanics incorporated by the games hosted on CliCli platform.

I am really interested in using your tool when it becomes available on 16th. If possible, I will try to participate in the Incubation program.

Seems like Roblox & Core have only 2 weeks left to live

Thank you for the interest please message me on discord to participate!

 

[Daffa]

This really hyped me out, but I will be more on the sideline watch for now. Not really having much time to devote for projects at the moment.

But if this really is how I thought of it, I'm totally ditching Unity

 

[Mayday]

Hello everyone,

we're now live!

CliCli - Check out our website! You can download the editor here.
r/TheCliCli - Our reddit page contains important updates to our timeline, and other community news!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeTMnn_dw5SM0285K8WjbpQ/playlists - Here you can view tutorials for the editor, and see some more of the art for yourself

In order to access the editor after installation, please join us on discord to gain an access code

We're still allowing those interested to explore our editor with our explorer program,
and still accepting incubation program members until 7/31!

Please feel free to message me on discord (Mayday#1328) or here on hive's direct messaging to gain access to our discord server!

 

[Arious]

CliCli is a brand new editor and platform that draws inspiration from old school RTS game editors and modern game engines alike.

False marketing. What I got was a low quality editor that is more glitchy than the Visual Basic level editors from 1990s and has much worse art assets than Reforged. I would rather make maps for Doom 1996 than use your editor that is littered with weebo/anime assets and major bugs.

I have shared my feedback privately (suggestions+bugs) on your discord. I will not share in it public here cz it will harm your reputation.

And please learn to manage expectations. Dont compare your pre-alpha product with masterpieces like Unity, Unreal, Godot, Sc2 Galaxy etc and try to be honest. A major reason why Reforged received the negative reaction was due to overpromising and underdelivering. Please learn from this as I really want you to succeed.

Hope this helps.

If this was an indie project, I would have been forgiving but the installer has the signature of Netease Publishing. Also on your discord rules, you call yourself a ''AAA' development team. Nothing I saw in your editor was AAA or high budget, same disappointment I had with Reforged.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Nothing I saw in your editor was AAA or high budget

Apparently the assets included are a small selection of what the final product will contain. Intended to have enough variety for alpha testing and proofs of concept.

Part of the reason for this program seems to be to gather lists of the sort of assets creators want rather than guessing what they want. StarCraft II and Warcraft III did not need to do this since the assets were entirely created and polished around what the campaign, melee and coop play required which are all complete game modes.

 

[Shar Dundred]

the installer has the signature of Netease Publishing

Nothing I saw in your editor was AAA or high budget, same disappointment I had with Reforged.

Not sure what you expected tbh.

 

[erfaned]

Feedback

• Remove annoying login screen at startup
• Remove DRM
• Stick to a consistent artstyle. atm your assets are a mix of anime (similar to Genshin Impact) and LoL-like cartoony style. I want to focus on making maps easily rather than spending my time on making sure the assets of my map are consistent.
• Improve the in-game graphics. The lighting/shading looks like Reforged. Try to make your graphics more like sc2
• Your editor is hard to use for me, just like sc2 Galaxy Editor. The main problem is that there's a lot of unnecessary features like the UI designer. Why would I use map editor to create UIs? Having a lot of features do make your editor flexible but also hard to learn/understand. The UI designer may be helpful for nerd modders but what about the mainstream modders? Nearly 98% of wc3 maps on epicwar dont use custom UI. Even Dota doesnt use custom UI. What's the point of a UI designer? And when we already have regions, why did you add 'points'? I kept asking myself this question: Should I use regions or 'points'?
• Spells were already hard to understand in wc3 WE as they were made of 2 objects: Abilities & Buffs. Now in CliCli, to make a spell I need a Buff, Ability and Projectile. 3 big objects! Who has time for this? Even Einstein would get confused he he were asked to make a custom spell in CliCli.

"Should I start with the Projectile? Or Ability? Or Buff?" - Cyborg Einstein from year 2345 when he was asked to make a custom spell in CliCli

EDIT: worth mentioning that there is no trigger in CliCli for 'Wait x Seconds'. So if you want pauses in your trigger, you have to rely on timers. Seems like CliCli is the Dark Souls of map making tools.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Remove DRM

Part of the point of the product is DRM since they can "protect" creators content unlike games like Warcraft III or StarCraft II which could not.

Stick to a consistent artstyle. atm your assets are a mix of anime (similar to Genshin Impact) and LoL-like cartoony style. I want to focus on making maps easily rather than spending my time on making sure the assets of my map are consistent.

They want suggestions for assets and also want to support multiple art styles by the look of things.

Why would I use map editor to create UIs?

Most maps need a custom UI as SC2 has shown.

Nearly 98% of wc3 maps on epicwar dont use custom UI.

The feature was only implemented ~3 years ago...

What's the point of a UI designer?

Check HotS development blog for reasons. UI often needs to undergo many revisions. SC2 arcade has shown this a lot.

And when we already have regions, why did you add 'points'?

Regions represent areas. Points represent points on the map. They are two incompatible types. Hence why even WC3 made a distinction between them except was so shallow it only had the rect panel (not even true regions).

I kept asking myself this question: Should I use regions or 'points'?

Region if you want an area of the map. Point if you want a specific, exact, location on the map. For a tower defence trigger to cause life loss you would use regions. To order units around the tower defence maze you would use points. At a crossroad where you need units to randomly selection directions in the maze you would use a region to detect the unit entering the crossroad and then a point(s) to order it towards its destination. Same as Warcraft III (points had to be initialised by triggers) and StarCraft II.

Who has time for this?

Anyone who wants to have their abilities not be generic clones of 1,000 other maps like they were in WC3.

"Should I start with the Projectile? Or Ability? Or Buff?"

Like with SC2 map development you start with the ability. You then create what you want for the ability to get the desired effect. Buff is only needed if you want the ability to have a buff. Projectile is only needed if you want the ability to have a projectile. Not all abilities need both...

EDIT: worth mentioning that there is no trigger in CliCli for 'Wait x Seconds'. So if you want pauses in your trigger, you have to rely on timers. Seems like CliCli is the Dark Souls of map making tools.

There was not one in Warcraft III either. TriggerSleepAction actually meant "instruct the server that in roughly X real time seconds and some net sync to resume thread execution if the thread currently supports this otherwise crash the thread". This meant results varied with worst case latency of the game and with game speed.

Wait is often not needed in CliCli since they support a much finer event based triggering. For example instead of trying to wait a few seconds until a buff expires you can instead write script that directly triggers when the buff expires. In fact triggers are integrated straight into the data editor allowing you to trigger enhance all aspects of your abilities.

As for the TLDR... A big issue currently is that the English documentation is quite poor. It supports a lot of very advanced and powerful features that trivialise some concepts that Warcraft III required huge and complex scripts to try and simulate but you might not be aware of this because of unexpected naming choices or incorrect grammar at times.

 

[Drake53]

Part of the point of the product is DRM since they can "protect" creators content unlike games like Warcraft III or StarCraft II which could not.

Or they can just get rid of all those nasty financial models and only allow donations (especially the monthly fee, seriously why did we ever allow world of warcraft to normalize this).
I doubt the DRM will be effective anyways, people will always find a way to circumvent it.

 

[_lycan]

Or they can just get rid of all those nasty financial models and only allow donations (especially the monthly fee, seriously why did we ever allow world of warcraft to normalize this).
I doubt the DRM will be effective anyways, people will always find a way to circumvent it.

Why? because you want to? it's up to the map maker to decide what monetization he wants to implement, "donations" are not enough in many places, unless your map is extremely popular then maybe you can make by, selling cosmetics hurts no one, selling a map hurts no one, if the person is selling the map from scratch he most likely would not have made it in the first place if he couldn't monetize, they probably want to make a living.

This sense that map makers don't deserve to make a living out of what they do is just hilarious to me, meanwhile faceless corporations who exploit people get to do exactly the same and even worse (diablo immortal), oh but yeah they can do that much worse stuff because they are a legal company instead of a single dude in his room, seriously?

 

[Arious]

Why were my comments removed? Is it illegal or against rules to ask devs for adding beautiful female models to CliCli Editor?

Cant I just speak the truth and say that I use Wc3 WE because of the beautiful models? Dont I have freedom of speech?

 

[Lizreu]

Dont I have freedom of speech?

freedom of speech does not extend to private platforms hosted by others

 

[Drake53]

Why? because you want to? it's up to the map maker to decide what monetization he wants to implement, "donations" are not enough in many places, unless your map is extremely popular then maybe you can make by, selling cosmetics hurts no one, selling a map hurts no one, if the person is selling the map from scratch he most likely would not have made it in the first place if he couldn't monetize, they probably want to make a living.

This sense that map makers don't deserve to make a living out of what they do is just hilarious to me, meanwhile faceless corporations who exploit people get to do exactly the same and even worse (diablo immortal), oh but yeah they can do that much worse stuff because they are a legal company instead of a single dude in his room, seriously?

You completely missed the point. I'm not against monetization (except predatory forms like monthly fees or gambling), I'm against DRM. Since monetization is used as an excuse to implement the DRM, I half-jokingly made this suggestion as the simplest solution to get rid of the DRM.

You say it's up to the map maker, but this is not true. Can I decide to make my map completely free? No. The DRM cannot work if it only applies to monetized maps, it needs to apply to the entire ecosystem.

I agree that after donations, cosmetics are the least bad form of monetization. However, if you want to 'protect' the map makers, even this form of monetization requires DRM, otherwise you can just make a copy of the map and inject cheats to give you all the cosmetics for free.

Have you seen how many maps, models, icons, spells, systems, etc we have for warcraft 3? Are these all monetized? Maybe in China. But there are plenty of people who are not motivated by monetary gain, that's what makes this community so great.

If you want to make a living creating user content that's fine, but if you expect to do that with a new platform like this you must be crazy. Maybe in two years if it turns out to be really popular, but if you want to make a living right now? Get a real job.

 

[Mayday]

You completely missed the point. I'm not against monetization (except predatory forms like monthly fees or gambling), I'm against DRM. Since monetization is used as an excuse to implement the DRM, I half-jokingly made this suggestion as the simplest solution to get rid of the DRM.

You say it's up to the map maker, but this is not true. Can I decide to make my map completely free? No. The DRM cannot work if it only applies to monetized maps, it needs to apply to the entire ecosystem.

I agree that after donations, cosmetics are the least bad form of monetization. However, if you want to 'protect' the map makers, even this form of monetization requires DRM, otherwise you can just make a copy of the map and inject cheats to give you all the cosmetics for free.

Have you seen how many maps, models, icons, spells, systems, etc we have for warcraft 3? Are these all monetized? Maybe in China. But there are plenty of people who are not motivated by monetary gain, that's what makes this community so great.

If you want to make a living creating user content that's fine, but if you expect to do that with a new platform like this you must be crazy. Maybe in two years if it turns out to be really popular, but if you want to make a living right now? Get a real job.

Hi Drake,

We currently require a constant online connection for the incubation period, yes. We're evaluating this in the long term, for the editor to not require a connection other than to publish.

It is also entirely possible to have a "map completely free." You are not required to charge anything if you don't want to. Unless I misunderstood your point here.

Your point about protection is correct, games are hosted on a server, and other users cannot inject/steal/etc anything inside your personal game, only those you share the source files with (partnerships/templates/etc).

You're also free to upload anything to our store at no cost, giving users free resources to utilize.

I am sorry you're not a fan of any DRM services, but we do have some positives to it as I listed above

Let me know if I didn't address any of your concerns!

 

[_lycan]

You completely missed the point. I'm not against monetization (except predatory forms like monthly fees or gambling), I'm against DRM. Since monetization is used as an excuse to implement the DRM, I half-jokingly made this suggestion as the simplest solution to get rid of the DRM.

You say it's up to the map maker, but this is not true. Can I decide to make my map completely free? No. The DRM cannot work if it only applies to monetized maps, it needs to apply to the entire ecosystem.

I agree that after donations, cosmetics are the least bad form of monetization. However, if you want to 'protect' the map makers, even this form of monetization requires DRM, otherwise you can just make a copy of the map and inject cheats to give you all the cosmetics for free.

Have you seen how many maps, models, icons, spells, systems, etc we have for warcraft 3? Are these all monetized? Maybe in China. But there are plenty of people who are not motivated by monetary gain, that's what makes this community so great.

If you want to make a living creating user content that's fine, but if you expect to do that with a new platform like this you must be crazy. Maybe in two years if it turns out to be really popular, but if you want to make a living right now? Get a real job.

"If you want to make a living creating user content that's fine, but if you expect to do that with a new platform like this you must be crazy. Maybe in two years if it turns out to be really popular, but if you want to make a living right now? Get a real job."

When did I said that it should happen right away? it's obvious nobody will make a living right away, but it's a possibility with these models, the DRM question is simply not going to be a thing, They were many reasons to not want to release it DRM free, not even wc3 is drm free right now, deal with it.

 

[Arious]

Hi Drake,

We currently require a constant online connection for the incubation period, yes. We're evaluating this in the long term, for the editor to not require a connection other than to publish.

It is also entirely possible to have a "map completely free." You are not required to charge anything if you don't want to. Unless I misunderstood your point here.

Your point about protection is correct, games are hosted on a server, and other users cannot inject/steal/etc anything inside your personal game, only those you share the source files with (partnerships/templates/etc).

You're also free to upload anything to our store at no cost, giving users free resources to utilize.

I am sorry you're not a fan of any DRM services, but we do have some positives to it as I listed above

Let me know if I didn't address any of your concerns!

When are you going to implement monetization for real mapmakers like me?

Suggestion: Add a monetization system that pays us for looking at hot 3d models. Eg 10 USD per hour.

If you can do that, I am sure CliCli will be the next Minecraft.

EDIT: but first add cool female models to CliCli then plan the rest.

 

[Dr Super Good]

Or they can just get rid of all those nasty financial models and only allow donations (especially the monthly fee, seriously why did we ever allow world of warcraft to normalize this).

I suspect the option is more intended for subscription content and the like rather than requiring it for people to play a map. They give it as an option for a financial model, not a requirement. If you make your map subscription only I highly doubt you will get many players, and hence many subscriptions.

From what I can tell they are not selling a base game like WC3 and SC2 did. Their financial model seems to be a cut of all micro transactions for creator content. Similar to how platforms like steam and epic games work.

I do agree that consumer protection and rights is a little concerning to me. Steam and epic both have to comply to consumer protection laws. Not sure CliCli does for its in-game micro transactions.

I doubt the DRM will be effective anyways, people will always find a way to circumvent it.

Character progress can be saved to the cloud. This gives the creator full control over character progress. It also prevents most of the "cheats" Warcraft III and StarCraft II had to be able to modify progress. The final kind, modifying the executable itself, might be detected by anti-cheat. As such from my view it looks to offer a lot more integrity and is a lot less exploitable than both Warcraft III and StarCraft II.

Why were my comments removed? Is it illegal or against rules to ask devs for adding beautiful female models to CliCli Editor?

Cant I just speak the truth and say that I use Wc3 WE because of the beautiful models? Dont I have freedom of speech?

Might have been removed by moderator staff as womanizing is not really appropriate or respectful behaviour.

 

[Drake53]

Hi Drake,

We currently require a constant online connection for the incubation period, yes. We're evaluating this in the long term, for the editor to not require a connection other than to publish.

It is also entirely possible to have a "map completely free." You are not required to charge anything if you don't want to. Unless I misunderstood your point here.

Your point about protection is correct, games are hosted on a server, and other users cannot inject/steal/etc anything inside your personal game, only those you share the source files with (partnerships/templates/etc).

You're also free to upload anything to our store at no cost, giving users free resources to utilize.

I am sorry you're not a fan of any DRM services, but we do have some positives to it as I listed above

Let me know if I didn't address any of your concerns!

Hey, thanks for the response.

When I said completely free I meant 'free of DRM', not 'free of charge'.
I'll be honest though I don't know any of the technical details of the platform and how you're handling DRM so I'm making a lot of assumptions. In my view there are three places where you'd be able to apply DRM: in the client, the editor, and the map itself. From what I understand the first two do have DRM, though if you're considering to maybe remove the editor DRM in the future I'd encourage you to do so.
I'm not sure if you have any DRM in the maps / file formats themselves, so like I said I'm making assumptions here. If you really want to protect the map makers you have to have DRM in the maps, otherwise what's stopping someone from stealing the map like we see in warcraft 3? All I can think of is some kind of manual review process where maps need to be approved when published before you can host them. At the same time there are a lot of situations where you could take someone else's map instead of making your own, not all of them would be bad either:

• You do not want to pay a monthly fee, so you copy the map and publish your own version free of charge;
• You want to 'have some fun', so you copy the map, edit it / inject cheats, and publish it;
• You like a (free) map but you're an asshole, so you copy the map, edit it, and remove credits to the original author (this happened to a friend of mine in wc3 btw), then publish it;
• You like a (free) map but you're an asshole, and you want to make some money, so you copy the map with (added) monetization;
• You like a (free) map, but the author has abandoned it and is unreachable, so you update/maintain it;
• You like a (free) map, and want to make your own version (a fork), with the original author's approval.

How do you intend to prevent the bad situations from happening (and maybe allow the good ones)?
I assume you download / have access to the map when you play it (for example as a .zip file), and even if the published assets are somehow different/protected from the source files, you'd still be able to edit and publish your own version easily.

When did I said that it should happen right away? it's obvious nobody will make a living right away, but it's a possibility with these models, the DRM question is simply not going to be a thing, They were many reasons to not want to release it DRM free, not even wc3 is drm free right now, deal with it.

Well I was just responding to you ranting about how corporations can do whatever they want, meanwhile you 'don't deserve' to make some money.
Also the Warcraft 3 version I play came after 1.21b where they removed CD DRM, and before 1.32, so whatever DRM is left (I guess bnet but that's offline anyways) doesn't even affect me. So yeah I think I can deal with it just fine, thanks.

Character progress can be saved to the cloud. This gives the creator full control over character progress. It also prevents most of the "cheats" Warcraft III and StarCraft II had to be able to modify progress. The final kind, modifying the executable itself, might be detected by anti-cheat. As such from my view it looks to offer a lot more integrity and is a lot less exploitable than both Warcraft III and StarCraft II.

SaaS (software as a service) might be the strongest form of DRM there is. All it takes is a ban or the servers to go offline and you lose all access.
Wouldn't say it's a good thing though. We're lucky Warcraft 3 survived 20 years, but if it gets abandoned for real (servers offline too), the current version with its new DRM will become unusable.

 

[Damage]

Drake, you can't just "download a map" and edit it yourself. The map's source is only accessible to the map maker.

 

[Arious]

Drake, you can't just "download a map" and edit it yourself. The map's source is only accessible to the map maker.

If the Game can read map triggers, then it should be possible for others to get the source code.

For example triggers of 'Protected' wc3 maps can be read by the game, this allows hackers/programmers to develop tools that read data from these 'protected' maps and ultimately de-protect these maps.

The situation is similar in CliCli but there is one major difference: The file which contains triggers is stored on Netease official servers, not on the computer of players.

But when players will play these maps, the triggers/commands will need to be temporarily stored on their RAM. I know many programs that can rip stuff from GPU then save it in hard disk. Sure there will also be a way to get data from RAM and store it in hard disk. And this way, the triggers of CliCli maps can be viewed.

The map protection in wc3 and DRM in CliCli can deter some amateur/layman from viewing and modifying your map triggers. But if someone with knowledge of programming/computing wants to see your map triggers, then I dont think it will be impossible for them.

Some hackers can make tools that will allow de-protection of CliCli maps. These tools may be abused by people who want to pirate your map and play it without paying monthly fee etc

Therefore I think CliCli doesn't need DRM. DRM as a technology is not effective today. Fact: Most games that use Denuvo (the most advanced DRM tech for video games) are cracked within hours of release. DRM just doesnt provide sufficient protection then if you consider its downsides like annoying the users with login screens and wasting their time daily, you can conclude that DRM should be avoided by developers.