Testing and Exporting

Testing catches mod problems while they are still small. Exporting turns your editable source folder into a playable .cne mod.

Goal

Test a mod in-game, export it, and understand what the exported file is for.

Test in the editor

Open the mod from the game editor menu (Extras->Editor) and choose Test. The mod is played as it is, without exporting first.

A mod rarely is a whole game, so anything it doesn't provide itself is borrowed from 30th Anniversary for the duration of the test: levels, characters, gameplay settings, HUD, palettes and cutscenes. If that pack is unavailable, Test falls back to Classic. A mod with only a character is played through the reference levels; a mod with only a level is played with the reference characters; a mod with only gameplay settings uses your settings.

Reskins are tested too: a presentation-only skin runs 30th Anniversary with your mod as the active skin, so replaced character art, level art, cutscenes, sounds and music all show up. The base pack supplies gameplay and the roster. Your own skin preferences in the options menu are left untouched, and the previous session settings are restored when you leave Test.

Test is greyed out only when there is nothing the game could show - a mod with just color palettes, for instance. Any playable character, level, cutscene or reskin enables it, and so does marking the mod as playable in the export settings.

Check:

  • The mod appears with the correct name and thumbnail.
  • Playable characters appear in the character select screen.
  • Enemies spawn with the expected palette, health, behavior, and sounds.
  • Bodyboxes and hitboxes seen in test mode are coherent.
  • Level walls, scroll limits, enemy waves, and item drops work.
  • Cutscenes end and transition correctly.
  • Music loops cleanly and sounds play at the right volume.
  • Lua scripts do not break when the move misses, hits multiple targets, and framerate remains smooth.

Export the mod

From the mod editor menu:

  1. Choose Export.
  2. Wait for the export to complete.
  3. Find the exported .cne in Mods.

The exported mod is what you upload, send to friends, or post to a community link. Other players place that exported file in their own Mods folder and the game auto-detects it.

Test after export

Test that the exported mod behaves as expected:

  • Test color palettes.
  • Test online multiplayer, specially if your mod uses Lua scripts.
  • Confirm framerate keeps stable.
  • Confirm music loops smoothly.
  • Check level loading times. Loading times may take longer in exported mods than during editor testing - this happens due to compression and optimizations for runtime performance.

Multiplayer checks

All players must have the same mod version. The game checks checksum equality for the loaded mod and dependencies.

If a player has a different version, or a dependency with a different checksum, multiplayer may reject the session and report the mismatching versions.