CCCreator
Chip's Challenge Creator, commonly known as CCCreator, is a level editor developed by The Architect. It is the only editor that can create both CC1 and CC2 levels, and the only still being updated.
History
When Chip's Challenge 2 was released in 2015, a level editor was included. However, this "official" editor faced criticism for being hard to use and lacking several features commonly available for CC1 editors. While Chuck Sommerville released a simple script, dat2c2g, to convert DAT files into CC2 levelsets, several people experienced issues getting it to run. The Architect therefore decided to create his own editor to address these issues; the project was publicly announced on CCZone in November 2016.
In August 2017, private beta testing of CCCreator began, to find bugs before a widespread public release; the first public release took place on 2 January 2018. In order to make sure people are always using the latest public version, previous versions are set to expire and become unusable a few months after release.
| Version | Release date | Expiration date |
|---|---|---|
| 0.1.0 | 2 January 2018 | 31 December 2018 |
| 0.2.0 | 14 March 2018 | 31 December 2018 |
| 0.3.0 | 2 April 2018 | 31 December 2018 |
| 0.3.1 | 18 June 2018 | 31 December 2018 |
| 0.4.0 | 21 December 2018 | 1 May 2019 |
Platform support
CCCreator is written in the Java programming language and distributed in a JAR file. Therefore, it can run on any system that supports Java 8 or later, including Windows, MacOS, Linux and even Haiku.
File formats
CCCreator, by default, saves levelsets using the Chip's Challenge Unified Data Model (CCDUM), developed by The Architect to store levelset data in a version-independent way. Such files have a CCS extension, and store all levelset-related information, including not only the levels, but also CCX and C2G data.
Data can be imported to a CCS file, for example adding CCX data or additional levels in other files. CCS files can then be exported into a variety of other formats, including DAT and DAC for Tile World, as well as C2G and C2M for Chip's Challenge 2.
Features
CCCreator includes many features that originated in CCEdit and CCDesign.
CCCreator has several ways to place tiles: draw, pencil (straight line), box (filled rectangle) and path maker (draws a path of ice, force floors, railroad tracks, etc.) Exclusive to CCCreator is a flood fill feature, which fills an entire area with the specified tile.
The tile selection menu separates the tiles by type: basic, obstacles, doors, items, blocks, creatures, miscellaneous, logic, and non-standard. An "all elements" option is also available. A future version will give uses the ability to create their own tile palettes.
Tiles can be placed on the ground layer by holding the Ctrl key while clicking; to place tiles on the bottom layer in the MS ruleset, the shift key should be used instead.
CCCreator can also display metagraphics, making it easy to see linked teleports and buttons, as well as logic circuits, a time bomb's explosion area, the in-game play area (in both 9*9 and 10*10 sizes), a grey button's control area, and monster paths. These can be disabled if the user doesn't want them.
CCCreator has an "inspect element" ability, making it possible to examine all elements on a single tile, modify each one's properties, and remove some of them without removing the others.
CCCreator also has several menu options to make it easier to add multiple hints in CC2 levels, and perform basic C2G, scripting like adding music or text between levels.
While CCCreator does not yet have the ability to directly export levels to image files, there is a workaround, by selecting the entire level and then copy/pasting it into an image editor.
Missing/upcoming
CCCreator is still under active development, and therefore there are several features not present yet. The Architect is currently working on a way to check a level's ruleset compatibility. Other notably absent features are C2G import (exports work fine) and playtesting capabilities (currently levels must be exported before they can be tested).
External links
- Official website and download
- CCZone thread about CCCreator
- CCDUM documentation on CCZone