Development Guidelines

Before publishing your Mod, please read and follow these guidelines. They protect players, protect developers, and protect the ecosystem.

1. Don't Break Original Game Balance

Red Line

Do not create Mods that break original game balance, such as modifying judgment, accuracy calculation, damage values, or other content affecting the core game experience. Game judgment is an official red line.

• This tutorial will not cover how to modify judgment, and you should not promote such features on any channel
• If you want players to get better score displays, refer to the organization's NotEnoughAccuracy, JustEnoughAccuracy — accuracy statistics solutions that don't affect original judgment

2. Credit AI-Generated Content

If you use AI to generate code, documentation, or assets, note it in the repository.

<!-- This module was AI-assisted ([tool/model name]), please review manually before use -->

Why:

• Ensures code quality and credibility
• Respects contributors and users
• The organization's ecosystem values transparency and trust

3. Don't Lock Level Content

DANGER

You must not mark levels or other content as "requires your Mod to open."

• Level files belong to their creators and should not be held hostage by a Mod
• Your Mod can enhance the experience, but not kidnap content
• Mods published on modrift.org follow the same principle

4. Don't Distribute Original Game Binaries

DANGER

Mod artifacts and source repositories must not contain original game binary files (Assembly-CSharp.dll, UnityEngine.dll, etc.) — they are copyright-protected.

• For original DLLs needed at compile time, use the private lib repository approach (see GitHub Actions Auto Build)
• Build artifacts (Release zips) should only contain your Mod files — don't include game DLLs
• Decompiling game binaries is for understanding and debugging only — do not distribute

5. Other Quality Requirements

• Testing: features must be tested; verify in a clean environment before publishing
• Comments: code should have good comments (especially AI-generated parts)
• Data safety: persisted data should be stored in the Mod's local config directory to prevent being overwritten on update
• Robustness: proper error handling — don't let a single error crash the Mod (see Finalizer Patch)
• Collaboration: if extending an existing Mod's functionality, prefer submitting a PR to the original project

What You Learned

• Four uncrossable red lines (balance / credit AI / no content locking / no binaries)
• Basic quality and collaboration requirements

Next Step

Running into problems? See Troubleshooting