WorldEditor

One session of the in-game 3D world editor: browse a player's worlds, fly, place, undo, save and play-test.

Location

Purpose

WorldEditor is the in-game 3D world editor. One object lives inside the game host for the whole run and switches between two modes. While browsing (IsBrowsing()) it drives the world screen of the selected player (ten slots, older and shared worlds) or the galaxy screen (the player's own campaign). While editing it flies a free camera over the loaded world, aims a ray through the cursor, places and removes blocks, objects, BigDecor and Blupi starts from the palette, edits objects' routes and timing, keeps an undo history, copies and pastes boxes, and saves and play-tests the world.

The editor is the project's one approved exception to the faithful-remake rule: it may add content-authoring conveniences (a 3D camera, copy and paste, backups, thumbnails, sharing) but no gameplay mechanics. What it can place and how it validates follows the same registries the game uses (BlockDefinitionRegistry, ObjectDefinitionRegistry). It was called GEWorldEditor until the editor moved into the GalaxyEggbert::Editor namespace and lost its GE prefixes; the verifiers keep the old names (VerifyGEWorldEditor and so on).

Collaborators

The editor is split into small parts under src/GalaxyEggbert/Editor/; WorldEditor composes them.

Uses also: World and MoveObjectRecord (the data it edits), GetObjectDefinition (exit and motion capabilities), WorldRuntime::kWorldCenterX/Z (raw grid to render space).

Used by: GalaxyEggbertGame (member worldEditor_) and the editor verifiers in tools/.

Key members

A selection of the public API of WorldEditor.hpp, as of 2026-11-10. XNA and cna-engine namespaces are left out of the signatures for space.

How it is used

GalaxyEggbertGame enters the Editor game phase in three ways:

• The main menu's editor button: EnterBrowser(selected gamer), ShowSlots().
• The main menu's Galaxy button when the player's galaxy has no main hub yet (StartGalaxy()), or the world screen's Galaxy button: the galaxy screen.
• The xnjttjpo cheat typed in Play (OpenMissionInEditor()): for a campaign world BeginOutsideSession(CampaignBackupsDir(), CampaignEditsDir()) after keeping the shipped original; for a galaxy world backups stay beside the file. Stop returns to the mission, which restarts from its beginning with what was saved.

Each tick in the Editor phase the host either drives the browser and acts on its request, or runs an editing frame and acts on the editor's one-shot signals (from src/GalaxyEggbertCNA/GalaxyEggbertGameUpdate.cpp, shortened):

if (worldEditor_.IsBrowsing())
{
    const auto request = worldEditor_.UpdateBrowsing(
        mouse, viewport.getWidthProperty(), viewport.getHeightProperty(),
        phaseKeys.IsKeyDown(Keys::Escape));
    ...
    else if (request.shouldOpen)
    {
        LoadCustomWorldForEditing(request.openPath);
    }
    ...
}
else
{
    worldEditor_.Update(phaseKeys, mouse, dt,
                         viewport.getWidthProperty(), viewport.getHeightProperty(), camera_,
                         worldRuntime_.GetWorldMutable(), editorNavigation);
    ...
    if (worldEditor_.ConsumeNeedsPresentationRebuild())
    {
        RebuildWorldPresentation();
    }
    InteractionSystem::AdvanceEditorPlatforms(worldRuntime_, dt);
    if (worldEditor_.ConsumePlayTestRequested())
    {
        LoadCustomWorldForPlayTest(worldEditor_.GetWorldPath());
    }
    else if (worldEditor_.ConsumeLeaveRequested() && editorMission_ != 0)
    {
        LeaveMissionEditor();
    }
}

A new world is created by the host (CreateEditorStarterWorld(), or CreateGalaxyStarterWorld(mission) for a galaxy place), saved, then opened like any other. While editing, the world clock still runs, so lifts preview their patrol. A play-test loads the saved file with a fresh InteractionSystem and BlupiController; Pause's Menu or Back, or the return button on the Win/Lost screen, reopens the same world in the editor. Before an editing frame the keyboard, mouse, touches and gamepad pass through EditorDeviceControls and EditorCommandKeys.

Controls

Rules and invariants

• No new mechanics. The editor only places what the game already plays. Palette entries without a verified Galaxy implementation keep their Eggbert 2 position and show "Not yet implemented."
• Every change is a command. Each mutation is pushed onto EditCommandStack as one command per user action (a box fill or a paste is one); MarkMutated() sets the rebuild and unsaved flags together.
• The host owns loading. WorldEditor never loads or creates a world itself; it raises requests (BrowserRequest, Consume*()) that the host consumes, the same pending-signal idiom as InteractionSystem.
• Unsaved work is protected. Stop with unsaved changes needs a second press. The first save after a world was opened backs up the previous file.
• One exit per world. Placing a red exit arrow or a final golden key, directly or in a paste, replaces the previous one (the original editor's PlaceDecor10), in one undoable step.
• Coordinates. The world and its records use raw grid cells (0-99). Drawing uses render space, raw minus WorldRuntime::kWorldCenterX/Z. The camera's yaw follows BlupiController: yaw 0 faces -Z.

Tests

Five verifiers drive the real editor without a window. They share one object library (GEEditorVerifySupport in CMakeLists.txt), are registered by ge_add_editor_verify and run in the build directory's verify-run/, because they write customworlds/ relative to their working directory.

For a look at the real thing, tools/qa_live.sh runs the step files in tools/qa_steps/editor_*.txt (play-test, copy and paste, lifts, backups, thumbnails, auto-tiling, cursor aiming). See Testing.

Related pages

• 3D World Editor: the editor from the player's side
• Your Own Galaxy
• CustomWorldStorage: where the edited worlds are kept
• GalaxyEggbertGame: the host and its Editor phase
• World, MoveObjectRecord, BlockDefinitionRegistry, ObjectDefinitionRegistry
• Modifying levels
• Cheats & Diagnostics: xnjttjpo