This is a weird question, and I'm more so looking to be pointed in the right direction than given a specific answer.

So I've got my game I'm making in Allegro 5, I've done basic File I/O a few times... but what's the best practices for when it comes to release time and information that was good to have in human readable language during development and debugging suddenly shouldn't be visible to the user. How might someone go about solving this?

Maybe here's a better example: I'm currently working on a Tilemap system for a 2d RPG type of game. The tilemap will consist of both a bitmap and a text file, probably written in XML or similar style, which says what bitmap regions get drawn where. Obviously in Debugging its awesome to have information like that readable so both me and my artist can read it without any headaches. But say it comes to release time, how do I conceal these from a player who might, say, access and edit them... or steal them... or break their game, etc.

I think the only time I've seen something like this implemented is when I was working with XNA for a short while, XNA has like a content pipeline which I think incorporates assets once you compile the program. I have no idea what this was called or how to implement this kind of thing, or even if that's best practice.

Any advice, tips, or points in the right direction?

I agree with this, given enough time and effort all of your assets can be stolen. Despite since your tilemap will be visible on the screen nothing will prevent the user from taking screenshots anyways.

If your biggest interest is to prevent players from mucking with your data or steal it or break their game, don't bother. They'll do that no matter what.

If your biggest interest is to prevent players from mucking with your data or steal it or break their game, don't bother. They'll do that no matter what.


If your interest is to create a neatly packaged bundle of files for some builds and also allow regular directory trees during develoment, there are great tools to do that.

Thanks guys for your input. I guess I should have been clearer: I'm not really interested in making it hacker proof. If people are able to rip images from game cartridges 20 years ago, I don't really consider myself to be above having old Mario sprites and levels on the internet, or the ROMs for emulators. I guess I was just moreso... interested in that one layer of protection, so at least not everyone would have the ability to peek in there and accidentally muck something up. Or have access to raw PNG files.

So I'll definitely look into the libraries suggested or the general concept of compiling assets into binary, that sounds good enough for me.

If your interest is to create a neatly packaged bundle of files for some builds and also allow regular directory trees during develoment, there are great tools to do that.

One such library is PhysFS.

See this page for integrating PhysFS with Allegro 5.

I'd go with storing the level data in a binary file but just to reduce filesize, not for preventing people from peeking at it.

In fact, in the long term attempts to stop people from messing with the files it may be a bad idea. Remember modding is a big thing, if your game can be modified without much trouble, the players may be more bound to want to keep playing it. Heck, I think the main reason Wolfstein 3D became popular wasn't the graphics, but the fact the level format got cracked in under a week and players started making their own levels.

And as mentioned, if somebody really wants to steal your assets, that's going to happen no matter what.

See this page for integrating PhysFS with Allegro 5.

You probably just saved my life there. :O

I'd go with storing the level data in a binary file but just to reduce filesize, not for preventing people from peeking at it.

In fact, in the long term attempts to stop people from messing with the files it may be a bad idea. Remember modding is a big thing, if your game can be modified without much trouble, the players may be more bound to want to keep playing it. Heck, I think the main reason Wolfstein 3D became popular wasn't the graphics, but the fact the level format got cracked in under a week and players started making their own levels.

And as mentioned, if somebody really wants to steal your assets, that's going to happen no matter what.

Yeah, I guess I might of worded it wrong. I basically just wanted to make it so raw pngs and txt files were not just laying around a user's computer... like, if someone wants to decompile the binary or rip the information, that's cool. I just want to make it harder for the common user to accidentally break the game, or suddenly be making a shitty sprite comic with our png XD That and I'd rather not have the game make a mess on the user's hard drive once installed with whatever directory system I had to make the game work.

As for modding, I'll definitely keep that in mind but I don't really see any ways this particular game would appeal to the modding community. It's a 2d, top down, Zelda style dungeon crawler... so its not like 3d where you could import different character models, you'd have to draw your own sprites to change anything. And on top of that, there's a very specific aesthetic we're going for with the art style... I don't really wanna have that changed unless the end user is spunky enough to do that.