![]() In other words, DON'T write a separate engine for the editor. Reuse this code! If you already have a bunch of classes for drawing and updating stuff for the game, there's no need to rewrite it for the editor. If you're at the point where you need a level editor, you probably already have a bit of structure to your game architecture (classes, interfaces, inheritance, etc.). But why not make this process as painless as possible? You might cringe at the fact that you'll have to write more code for a level editor. Next, I'll share my top tips for creating a robust and effective level editor. It's up to you, but for the sake of this article, I'm going to focus on designing your own. Con: More development time to build the editor.Pro: Tailors exactly to how your game works. ![]() Con: Might have limitations with your game's design.Here's my personal list of pros and cons for each type of editor: This digs into iteration time and can result in a lot more unnecessary time spent during content creation.Īlso, you have to learn how to use it, whereas if you used your own editor, you obviously know everything about it already. It's likely to be robust and well-maintained, but it knows nothing about your game, so you might have to do clever tricks in order for it to interact correctly with your game. There are advantages and disadvantages to using a generic, existing editor. You might be asking why you would want to make your own editor when there are already so many freely available to use - and I'm not going to lie, there are some great editors out there. So, in summary, the three most important reasons for having a level editor are that they allow you to: Good communication - both verbal and visual - is essential within a team, and a level editor can make non-technical designers' lives a whole lot easier, as well as removing a potential communication barrier between them and the developers. This is especially relevant when working in a team: imagine sending the above text file to the artists and telling them to design levels in that format! The final reason for having a level editor is that it makes the job of level design much less technical. It is crucial that you can move seamlessly between the Design and Test phases, as this allows for quicker iterations and less time spent overall. The process of level design can be broken down to a simple flowchart like this: As described above, it's much easier to design when you can see what you are editing.Īnother advantage is that it allows for quicker and more efficient design iteration. One of the most important advantages to having a level editor is the convenience of WYSIWYG ("What You See Is What You Get" - what you see in the editor is what you'll get in the game). To apply the same logic to level design, we should create a tool that will allow us to visually edit such levels - a level editor. He made his paintings by, well, painting them. ![]() Think of an painter: Picasso didn't make his paintings by inserting RGB values per pixel into a computer. Players aren't looking at text files, they're looking at images, sprites, animations, and so on. Levels are a form of visual communication. What, then, can be done about this? The answer, surprisingly, lies in the context of the problem itself. The problem is that it is very difficult to edit something that is meant to be seen. The process would be incredibly slow and time-consuming - not to mention frustrating. Imagine trying to create entire levels like this.
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