Would you prefer your projects here passworded?

[edward850]

There is a real way to protect your projects, but that is applicable only for map ACS scripts or ACS libraries - not providing the source code of the scripts.

@Hisymak
There's decompilers for vanilla ACC.
However, there doesn't seem to be one for GDCC or any other non vanilla ACC ACS bytecode compiler...

It should be noted that DavidPH and a select few others here can almost read raw ACS bytecode, so anybody dumb enough to try and hide their "precious modding secrets" aren't exactly accomplishing anything, decompiler or no.

[NeuralStunner]

At the least, some people can read a disassembly of it. (Obviously if it can't be disassembled into something readable, it's just as useless to the engine.) Though if you're just trying to discourage casual snooping, I can kind of understand that.

Locking down the whole file is, aside from pointless, pretty extreme. If you don't wish for your original work to be copied/reused, say so. This community tends to react rather unhappily to such things.

[ibm5155]

At least, this is one of the points I like about sgt mark IV (related to Warcraft 3 mods), why the heck do you want to protect your precious effect from? one way or another people will rip it on the easy way or the hard way (just like the spooky house Project that I'm doing, there's the easy part that the author let the textures in a usable way, and also there's the hard way where I need to play the game, rip every sound played, get audacity and remove the music ambiente from the effects to get a proper rip).

The best you can do is to delete the map acs source code, but that's BAD, I already did that in some of my projects, but at the time I noticed I erased the source code, the result: I can't modify my map now (The only thing I can do is fix the strings that's the only thing not compiled).

Resuming: Password is bad, you're not earning any Money with it, and in a way or another people will rip your work, imagine if each Linux kernel was passworded, the Linux community would be kinda dead now...

EDIT: I just remember my first wads, It was just a rip of alot of people's work, but it was funny, I still remember that I Always ripped acs code from other maps, since I didn't knew anything about acs... The time passed, I learned to make some basic sprites, and some nice acs/decorate, and I think it's nice to see people using your work, even without credits, it means your work was good enough to the point that other people want to use what you've done.

[TheBadHustlex]

I basically learned how to DECORATE by looking into the coding of other projects. OK, BrutalDoom wasn't the best way to start (Gosh, he works even sloppier then I do), but I did copy the MP40 into my first wad. I kept changing and changing it, until I understood how weapons work. Same with monsters and other things in DECORATE and ACS.

[Gez]

Look up Streisand effect. People are a lot more likely to want to look at how you coded your stuff if you lock it.

[esselfortium]

My answer is no. The truth is, few of my projects are truly 100 percent "mine" in terms of resources and code, because I often make use of the inherently open source nature of ZDoom to construct my mods. I would not feel right to lock that all down and not let people root around in it to see how it all worked, even if I did have a guarantee that it wouldn't get cracked.

Indeed.

To the OP, if you can say earnestly that you personally created every piece of your project, or that any other contributors specifically consented to have their work locked up along with yours, then what the hell. Go for it. You would likely cut down the potential size of your audience, due to the need for a customized closed-source EXE to read your encrypted data (by which you'd be both inconveniencing players and requiring them to trust the safety of your custom EXE), but you could do it.

If it's all your stuff, then no one should be able to stop you from doing what you want with it, even if I or anyone else thinks it's impractical or inappropriate. If the project you want to lock up isn't all your own original work, though, then it's pretty questionable from a moral standpoint.

[phantombeta]

The best you can do is to delete the map acs source code, but that's BAD, I already did that in some of my projects, but at the time I noticed I erased the source code, the result: I can't modify my map now :( (The only thing I can do is fix the strings that's the only thing not compiled).

ACS is easily decompilable. There are a few decompilers around.
In fact, some people can probably even read raw bytecode.

[Gez]

Fun fact: Blood's assets are encrypted. Now guess how much good it did them wrt. not having ten thousand Doom mods using ripped Blood sprites or music.

[Kinsie]

They also included tools to edit and extract those assets on the CD, so...

[Nash]

If not for this thread, I would have NO idea Blood's resources were encrypted. All the more reason to not even bother with this shit - someone is going to crack your shit so hard that there will eventually be a generation of people who won't even realize it's encrypted.

[GooberMan]

> bust open a game that some company spent hundreds of thousands on
> repurpose it to your own ends in your spare time for no money
> seek a way to ensure no one else can bust open your work

[Kinsie]

Is there really anything left for this thread to say, or should we just keep spinning our wheels in the mud of self-righteousness?

[leileilol]

I encrypt my Games Factory/MMF2 games just to keep the secret easter eggs more secreter.