Obfuscating Code

[Faherya]

We can consider that, in fact, even users who use open source software do not personally check the code, but trust the judgment of the community behind it. Now, I would like to know what is the reason that led the team to overshadow the plugins.

Repeating my points: 1) If you don't know what's going on, you can't say if the code does only what it says it does and how it does it. Therefore, it is impossible to optimize. 2) In programming in general, one of the greatest sources of study is to study other people's codes. Obfuscated code is, in my view, a very childish obstacle. I expected more from people experienced in the area.

And well, there is not much to comment on. I would like to leave some suggestions. The first is that plug-in users, developers and interested parties research about deobfuscating. Don't just learn about, but actively decode anything you put into your projects. Remember, it's not just about your machine. It's about the players' machines, the servers where you host your projects. The responsibility for anything will be yours.

Finally, I don't see why using a coded plugin if we have a team of excellent programmers making free, open-source code. They are not new members, they have been programmers since the days of VX, with experience and knowledge.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

Obfuscated code is, in my view, a very childish obstacle. I expected more from people experienced in the area.

Strange how I can lay out simple ground rules on having the discussion, and some people can't manage to last one post without insults.

 

[Faherya]

This was not an insult, it was a fact. It was not a personal attack on the team or its members. If they convince me with a single rational reason, I will withdraw what I said. But don't come up with "Oh, company X doesn't release its code". One thing is a finished product, another is something that needs to be used in creating it.

Imagine you, buying a box of screws without knowing with which wrench you can tighten them?

 

[Touchfuzzy]

Calling someon's actions childish is an insult. Just as I called out someone earlier for calling people's actions entitled even though I actually 100% agree that a lot of people in the RM community are acting entitled is an insult.

You can either 1. suck up the fact that you are being insulting and stop doing it, or 2. leave the conversation.

You don't get other options.

 

[Astrea]

Now, I would like to know what is the reason that led the team to overshadow the plugins. ...

... 2) In programming in general, one of the greatest sources of study is to study other people's codes. ...

To my understanding, there was some hubub about Yanfly's code being stolen a few years back, which caused a serious shift in how they view their plugin code on a intellectual property level. VisuStella is, at a base level, a port of YEP for MZ, but it's being built with the intention of closed source much more up front.

To your second point, I agree. I understand that JS isn't some arcane language no one can use, but (especially back in the MV days), I found it very difficult to find good documentation on how the engine actually works. Other plugins were the best source I had access to in order to work things backwards and make some edits myself. (Also if there is an actual engine documentation for MZ and I just haven't found it, pls tell me where it is.)


Honestly, that's kind of the end of the closed-source vs open-source discussion, IMO. Closed-source is perfectly valid within the rights of the developers, but has its downsides in the eyes of the end user.

The reason people are still talking about this seems to be less about that as a whole, but more about a once-open bank of resources for the community is now being recreated with a big "do not touch kthx" banner on them. If I made a plugin and made it closed-source, no one would care, because what I'm making isn't associated with the largest bank of plugins since VX.

 

[Faherya]

Fair enough, I will respect the rules and take leave of the conversation. As a last point, I suggest that all other developers make their code explicitly incompatible with obfuscated code. Especially because, I believe that you don't have crystal balls to program.

Now, if Degica doesn't really support the team, I don't see the reason for so much attention. It is a matter of rejection or acceptance of the community with the community itself. Good luck to both sides, as this has become more of a question of who wins the discussion.

 

[Caz]

See, the one using the plugin just goes: its like "oh compatibility?"... Okay now I have to take a choice or try to go into bureacracy of trying to find someone from Visu team to fix it, or I just give up on one of the plugins.

I just wanna weigh in here because this is an absolutely absurd excuse that I've heard a lot of times and it's getting very tiring. With respect, most content creators would ask that you contact them before you edit their IP. VisuStella have made it incredibly easy to get in touch with them should you require help, and it's not some long, painful "bureaucratic process" to ask about compatibility patches.



On the VisuStella itch.io homepage, there are two links: one for Discord server, one for email. I guarantee if you hop onto that Discord server and ping someone to ask for help with compatibility, you will get your response and be on your way within the hour.

Stop making out like it's some horrible, arbitrary process that we've made difficult on purpose. We want to protect our IP. We want to protect the IP of the plugin devs who have worked alongside us. We have our reasons and we are trying to be accommodating. Certain people are jumping to conclusions and perpetuating ideas about VisuStella without getting the facts, or even just trying to help themselves.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

@Astrea It wasn't just about the theft of code (and it wasn't just YF's code, it was several other coders as well), it was about how several RM Communities reacted to the stolen code, siding with code thieves over the people who made the code originally.

If the RM community had come out as a whole and ostracized the code thieves, things might have turned out differently, but that isn't what happened.

Honestly, I'm not a proponent of obfuscated code personally, but I understand why they have gone the path they have, and it isn't a decision for me to make, I'm not the creator. Additionally, they have done everything they can to make dealing with any issues devs have with the compatibility as easy as possible (their discord server is fantastic btw).

The RM Community has gotten really toxic towards coders and resource creators, and it just sucks.

 

[Astrea]

I just wanna weigh in here because this is an absolutely absurd excuse that I've heard a lot of times and it's getting very tiring. With respect, most content creators would ask that you contact them before you edit their IP. VisuStella have made it incredibly easy to get in touch with them should you require help, and it's not some long, painful "bureaucratic process" to ask about compatibility patches.

View attachment 159431

On the VisuStella itch.io homepage, there are two links: one for Discord server, one for email. I guarantee if you hop onto that Discord server and ping someone to ask for help with compatibility, you will get your response and be on your way within the hour.

Stop making out like it's some horrible, arbitrary process that we've made difficult on purpose. We want to protect our IP. We want to protect the IP of the plugin devs who have worked alongside us. We have our reasons and we are trying to be accommodating. Certain people are jumping to conclusions and perpetuating ideas about VisuStella without getting the facts, or even just trying to help themselves.

While I definitely don't agree with the previous poster's tone, I will say that from my standpoint, I'd rather not have to contact an outside developer when the project I'm working on breaks due to comparability issues. You aren't doing anything wrong, by wanting to protect your IP.

 

[Kino]

There's quite a few developors working on plugins now. Personally obfuscation doesn't matter to me. I get the frustration coming from both sides of the fence.

But, I think it will die down with time as more time is allowed for developers to make things. Time is better spent working on plugins and content rather than anything else. End of the day users will decide what they want to use.


Also in terms of documentation see post here: https://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/inde...gmaker-mv-mz-typescript-documentation.126123/

Again, something developers in the community have been working on.

 

[Chaos17]

It's nice you wanted to clarify OFFICIALLY that Degica isn't behind VisuStella team but anything other than that should be dealed outside of official forum by VisuStella team themselves.
The reason is that members of this company (team) have a key position or special status on this OFFICIAL forum. This will only lead to a conflict of interest and distrust with the base users.

 

[Raizen]

@Caz I'm not, I just stated a fact haha, it happened, and it wasn't from the plugin developer side. The gamedev gave up on trying to make it work, it has nothing to do how you accept or not. Everyone who asks me compatibility patches I will tell them to go to you, now how you will deal with that point is up to you guys, since I can't touch the code, you guys do your best to make it work.

 

[??????]

Not here to take much time, pretty busy atm, but im fairly certain that I seen Archiea mention something about any attempt to un-obfuscate the vs codebase would be dealt with in an official forum capacity. I dont remember the exact wording and dont have time to try search threads, but this suggested some sort of ban or suspension type thing to me..

If I was also to release obfuscated plugins, and someone un-obfuscated it, would that also qualify them to receive an official form of penalisation by the forums? Cause if not, then its pretty clear that vs and the official forums are connected.

If the answer to this is an unlikely yes, would I also be allowed to release a node electron app that uses obfuscator.io on all plugins of a users plugin folder? Because at this time, I cant really release a tool that would benefit the community greatly when deploying their games.

Thanks in advance :*

 

[Kupotepo]

@Touchfuzzy, I think it would be good idea to add the character assassination to the forbidden rules. It takes two tangles. I think, but I could be wrong that the flame wars started when people start indirectly attack another person characters.I do not know how the obfuscating code work, so I do not have an opinion on that. And hope everyone here is being civil and thinking of each others as the friends.

 

[Astrea]

@Astrea It wasn't just about the theft of code (and it wasn't just YF's code, it was several other coders as well), it was about how several RM Communities reacted to the stolen code, siding with code thieves over the people who made the code originally.

If the RM community had come out as a whole and ostracized the code thieves, things might have turned out differently, but that isn't what happened.

Honestly, I'm not a proponent of obfuscated code personally, but I understand why they have gone the path they have, and it isn't a decision for me to make, I'm not the creator. Additionally, they have done everything they can to make dealing with any issues devs have with the compatibility as easy as possible (their discord server is fantastic btw).

The RM Community has gotten really toxic towards coders and resource creators, and it just sucks.

There is a lot of nuance to the discussion on intellectual property and the role it has in a community for making video games, but I ultimately think this post was less about closed-source code and more about the VisuStella team and their library.
From just this thread is seems that
VisuStella inherited a lot of the bad blood that I saw when YEP went pay-to-use (which is fine), and the closed-source nature of the code is, in and of itself, a smaller prickle on the metaphorical cactus of this topic.

On a community level, high-profile employees of Digeca having connections with a plugin team who's the subject of a lot of volitile discussion probably isn't a good look, either, especially with the previously mentioned "VS getting the MZ editor first" situation. I wouldn't go so far as to say there's anything shady, that's absurd, but it seems more like the VS team and those associated with it have had a bad reputation built around them.

 

[LTN Games]

This entire topic has a bad smell to it. Outsiders see this "Hey, I'm an official company and I'm making an official announcement to let you know we don't officially endorse this third party company. But we would like to discuss everything about them anyway.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

It's nice you wanted to clarify OFFICIALLY that Degica isn't behind VisuStella team but anything other than that should be dealed outside of official forum by VisuStella team themselves.
The reason is that members of this company (team) have a key position or special status on this OFFICIAL forum. This will only lead to a conflict of interest and distrust with the base users.

The forum is about RPG Maker. VisuStella's works are part of the RPG Maker community. Outside of banning conversation of the plugins entirely (which is a disservice to everyone), we have to moderate discussions about them just as we would any other discussion.

I'm as impartial of a person as we can get, as it isn't like all the moderators don't know Archeia either, and at the end of the day, the buck stops with me on how moderation is handled on the forum, so guess who gets this job that no one actually wants?

If you think I really want to spend my Saturday morning moderating this discussion...

 

[Astrea]

Not here to take much time, pretty busy atm, but im fairly certain that I seen Archiea mention something about any attempt to un-obfuscate the vs codebase would be dealt with in an official forum capacity.

If this is true, it really isn't okay. The RM forums and VS's intellectual property rights are two very different avenues, and having them cross over is a bad look.

 

[Touchfuzzy]

If this is true, it really isn't okay. The RM forums and VS's intellectual property rights are two very different avenues, and having them cross over is a bad look.

We've always taken a hard stance against anyone breaking the EULA of any resources on our forums. De-obfuscating the code is breaking the EULA that VS set up and if it was reported to me I would take actions against the person who did it on our forums.

Just the same as we would take actions against a user posting edits of a sprite that the original creator said no edits on. Or we crack down on rips from games.

 

[Astrea]

We've always taken a hard stance against anyone breaking the EULA of any resources on our forums. De-obfuscating the code is breaking the EULA that VS set up and if it was reported to me I would take actions against the person who did it on our forums.

Just the same as we would take actions against a user posting edits of a sprite that the original creator said no edits on. Or we crack down on rips from games.

That makes a lot more sense now that you explain it. I think the "bad look" was more because Archiea is both an employee and a member of the VisuStella team. Regardless, I'm sorry for making such a quick judgement without thinking first.