Sharing Your Space Colony Campaigns

If you want to play other user-created campaigns or to share your own campaigns with other players, please visit our Downloads section. Here are some tips for getting your files ready to share. If you have any questions after reading this, you are welcome to or join the spacecolonyforever Yahoo! discussion group and post your questions there.

Unless your operating system has one built in, you'll need an archive utility. This is a program that lets you package files together into a single compressed file. That way you only need one file per campaign, making organizing, uploading and downloading easier. An archive utility also lets you open the files other players have created.

The most common archive file type is the .zip file, but some users prefer .rar files, since they are more compact. There are many utilities available to create and open these files. WinZip, PKZip, 7-Zip and WinRar are just a few. Also, newer versions of the Windows operating system include a built-in archive utility. (Use Windows Help to search for "zipped file".) Macintosh systems also have their own archive utilities, such as ZipIt, StuffIt, etc. If you don't already have an archive utility and know how to use it, check Google or your favorite search engine for information.

Within the .zip archive, every mission should include at least three files: a .map file, .cam file and .txt file.

• PlanetName.map - This is the file you created in the Planet Editor (where PlanetName is the name you chose). There may be more than one .map file if you used more than one map in your campaign.
• CampaignName.cam - This is the file you created in the Campaign Editor (where CampaignName is the name you chose). There is only one .cam file per campaign.
• Readme.txt - Each mission should also include a plain text file introducing the mission and telling who the creator is and how to contact that person. When writing a readme.txt file, you may also want to include simple campaign installation instructions. Plain text files can be created in a word processor or a simple utility like Windows Notepad.

When you download another player's mission and open the .zip or .rar file (using an archive utility), you'll need to extract the files inside and move them to the proper directory so the Space Colony game program can find them.

• .map files should be extracted to the maps directory, which will be something like C:\Program Files\Firefly Studios\Space Colony\maps (depending on where on your system you installed the game).
• .cam files should be extracted to the campaigns directory, which will be something like C:\Program Files\Firefly Studios\Space Colony\campaigns (depending on where on your system you installed the game).
• .txt files can go anywhere. Just remember to read the file before playing in case the creator has included any special instructions.

If you can't find the directory where you installed the game, just search for Space Colony.exe (the game program). The map and campaign folders will be in the same directory.

Then, if you would like me to include your campaign on this site, just send it to me as an email attachment.

Click to return to the Planet Editor or Campaign Editor page.

Text and site design copyright © 2004- Stellalune. Game art, screenshots, Space Colony name and logo copyright © 2003- Firefly Studios and Gathering of Developers. All rights reserved. See the main page for copyright guidelines.