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Hey there, I want to use this post as an opportunity to update you all on the editor because I have seen a few threads about the editor recently, including some asking us to get our editor out as soon as possible. While we would love to be able to provide the entire editor to everyone early, realistically that is not something that we can do. We are still working hard on our editor as we are actively using it to develop the game.
To give some context as to where we are with the editor right now, we have a fairly strong terrain/map editing tool that we use to build all of our maps for playtesting. Though I am not a level designer, to my knowledge they currently use our editor exclusively for building our playtest maps. It is not as robust as we want it to be just yet, but it is coming along well, and probably the most complete of our modules.
While that’s fairly far along, please note that an editor used in-house by someone at Frost Giant (who can also nudge the person sitting next to them to report bugs) is very different from the kind of experience we are working to provide to you.
We also have a data editor that allows us to do things like make units and a bunch of other types of game data. The data editor is also coming along well and we are making constant improvements to it. Some of our data, particularly data tied to visualization, is still being driven by Unreal, which is allowing us to move faster developing the game, but ultimately would be problematic for modding, and this is a significant challenge for us to overcome.
We are working on our scripting (trigger) editor and that is not as far along as the other modules, but we are able to do some basic scripting using the tools we have, and more advanced scripting manually in what is basically a constrained C++. We’ve also been working on our visual editor, so modders won’t need to write any code at all.
I am constantly impressed by what our engineers are achieving, but building this within Unreal Engine poses some unique challenges that we are having to work through as well. As much as Unreal Engine was not designed specifically with RTS games in mind (which led us to create SnowPlay, our own technology to layer on top of UE5), it also was not designed with building your own unique editor outside of the Unreal editor in mind. Things like allowing modders to customize UI, or import custom assets are very complicated problems to solve. Unreal is an amazing engine, but we have some real challenges to tackle due to the specific nature of our game.
In addition, we are also working through how map publishing will work in general. Releasing the tools to modders is not as valuable if they have no way to publish or share their maps so that others in the community can play them. This isn’t a small undertaking, either. We are making headway on this front, but it isn’t entirely resolved yet and that could take some time.
So what does this mean for the editor and when we will be able to release it? We really don’t have a concrete answer for when the editor will be available. At this point, we are fairly confident we will be releasing the editor in stages rather than all at once. The first publicly available iteration of the editor is likely to be the terrain editor by itself, with the ability to produce melee maps to support multiplayer.
As time goes on, we will unlock more of the editor tools as we are able to consolidate them and polish them in a way that makes sense for modders to consume. When that first version of the editor, that can make melee maps, is available to players is going to depend on a lot of other factors that are still in progress.
The team here is incredibly passionate about modding, and a significant chunk of us were former modders. I myself bought a beta key for SC2 off of Craigslist specifically so I could mess around with the editor. So I understand the desire to get these tools as soon as possible, but I also understand the road we have still ahead of us to achieve that. I want to be open with you all about where we are, and am grateful for your support for Stormgate.
I’ll do my best to answer any questions you may have in the comments below.
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