Is there life after Game Maker?

[VinnyVideo]

In the beginning, MFGG was a Clickteam-centric community. The vast majority of fangames were made in one of various Clickteam products, and even graphics files were usually submitted as libs - a format optimized for importing into Clickteam.

Then, a new tool called Game Maker entered the scene. By the middle of the previous decade, games made in GM started to become more common on MFGG. GM offered a very different interface (one that I found to be more intuitive than any Clickteam product) and a lot of powerful features. MFGG, YoYoGames, and other communities quickly pumped out engines and tutorials (which varied in quality, but were still useful, especially to new users) to help new GM users get started. Plus, GM was very affordable - the free version could do most of the things the Pro version could do, and the paid version only cost $20 for a permanent license.

Each new GM release - 8, 8.1, various versions of Studio 1, and Studio 2 - brought new features (and occasionally new bugs). Despite GM's occasional irritations, it became the dominant tool for making games on MFGG. Since 2010 or so, the majority of MFGG fangames have been made in GM.

GM was born as a tool for teaching computer science. Its target audience was students and amateurs - beginning-to-intermediate users. This is not a very lucrative market, and as GM added more features, it started trying to appeal more to a small-scale indie developers. GM still isn't ideal for more complex indie projects - especially 3-D development. But it's still good as a "jack of all trades, master of none". I still use it because I'm very comfortable with the GM ecosystem and I can make it do what I want it to do.

Unfortunately, GM is not as accessible for new users. The learning curve is a bit steeper than it used to be, since GM isn't as geared toward beginners. More importantly, it's a whole lot more expensive. The free version is very limited - you can only use a few resources, and it can't even compile a distributable .EXE file. Older versions were much more generous than this. If you want a version that compiles executables for Windows, you have to pay $99 (or $39 for a one-year license). Even though you get a lot of features with GM, it's prohibitively expensive for a lot of people, especially new users. YYG also tries to avoid supporting older versions that offer more generous terms.

Of course, GM Studio 2 will probably go on sale at some point, and I'm sure that some people will use shiver-me-timbers methods to get a not-quite-legit version. However, we can't count on the former, and I don't want to endorse the latter.

It would be awesome if MFGG offered more resources and tutorials for people wanting to get started with game-making tools that aren't GM or Clickteam. For example, Godot looks promising, but I'm fuzzy on how to make stuff with it. What if someone made a tutorial on how to make a simple platform game with Godot? There are lots of other good tools for making games, too. GM is still a great tool, but we shouldn't be putting all our eggs in this basket.

[GuiltyGhost]

So you're asking for a new Hello-like or Gatete-like Engine but in something like Godot, Unity, Unreal, etc?

[VinnyVideo]

@GuiltyGhost That wouldn't be a bad thing, but I'd really like to see something like Dazzle's platform engine - a simple but well-designed example that walks you through doing basic things, especially the things that MFGGers would be likely to do in their games.

Course clear! You got a card.

[Mariotroid]

Godot is pretty powerful. I've fooled around in it and did a tutorial. However, it is a lot more complicated than GM and seems was tough to get started. My brother whom I am working with believes Godot is the future.

[GuiltyGhost]

To a point, I feel mfgg needs to move to 3D, even if its still just a sidescroller. Seeing the same resources and mechanics over and over is stale.

[Mariotroid]

To a point, I feel mfgg needs to move to 3D, even if its still just a sidescroller. Seeing the same resources and mechanics over and over is stale.

You can have different mechanics with 2D sprites.

Plus, there aren't really that many BIG mario fangame on this site that aren't hello clones.

[GuiltyGhost]

You can but people don't, which is my problem. Newcomers usually try to mimic the game that their sprites fit or their engine was made for. If there was an engine with 3D resources, then I'd hope newcomers would atleast try to mimic 3D games like Galaxy, Sunshine, 3D World, New Super Mario Bros, or even the RPG's. There's a variety to pull from visually and mechanically.

[Mariotroid]

You can still use those mechanics in 2D version. Or think of 2D mechanics that are original like Abducted Toad or Thunder Dragons games.

[GuiltyGhost]

There are also a decent amount of 3D models to use today. At worst, they have to learn how to animate. But at the same time, MFGG could possibly host animations just like they do sprites.

[HylianDev]

I'd love to see us move beyond Game Maker. GMS1 seemed really wack to me, though I didn't use it a bunch.

Unity is a great engine that's used by lots of indie companies, and I think even some AAA companies.

As for making 3D fangames, Unity can do that well.

Hylian's day job, little did we know, was saying controversial things on the internet.

you fool!!!! you fixed it wrong!!!!

Bibby Team

[Cruise Elroy]

I personally wanna get to know Godot a bit more. GM:S1 has served my purposes pretty well, but since support for it has been dropped it's probably my queue to look into something else. I'm personally not interested in paying $100 to get my hands on GM:S2, however.

GOTM Awards:

Spoiler

[Heapons]

I actually miss most of GameMaker 8 functions.

[VinnyVideo]

@Heapons Yeah, GM 8 had some useful functions removed in Studio. Some of them, like execute_string() and the built-in save system, were pretty glitchy, and there's usually a much better alternative to using them. However, there were some functions like screen_redraw() and screen_refresh() that are hard to work around if you were relying on them.

Also, I miss GM 8's built-in high scores system, although you could just use MFGG's online high scores system instead!

Course clear! You got a card.

[Q-Nova]

It's kinda unfortunate to see how Game Maker has went from being a great tool for both beginners and experts that just want to make games to something that, although it has some neat features (animated tiles and auto-tiling are a couple that stood out to me), doesn't seem to be made for beginners and hobbyists. Game Maker nowadays seems to have a rather high price, a free version that is rather restrictive, and such. I've been doing pretty good with Game Maker 8.1 and GameMaker: Studio 1 for quite a long time, but I have not even tried out GameMaker: Studio 2 and I'm not sure if it'd be worth spending about $100 for it or not. I have taken a look at a few other game-making tools a few times to see if there's an alternative that doesn't cost as much or is even free while being quite flexible.

Unity seems nice, being able to produce both 2D and 3D games, although the full versions seem rather expensive ($35 per month just so you can have the plus version? Really?). The free version doesn't seem to be so restricted, though, so it may not be so bad for those that just want to make fangames. Godot Engine looks rather great; it can do 2D and 3D like Unity, but it's also free and open-source! It might be worth checking out someday, even though, I have heard that it may require a different mindset than one that would be used while working with Game Maker and Clickteam.

I'd also like to bring up something that I found through MFGG Wiki, which is ENIGMA. It seems to be like Game Maker, except that it's free, open-source, compatible with Game Maker projects, and can make games with less file space and higher speed than Game Maker games with little (if any) differences in the game content.

Whatever ends up being the next widely-used game-making tool, I think it would benefit MFGG if that tool was free, open-source, and can be used in more than one platform. As far as I know, Game Maker can only be used with Windows and while it can produce games for other platforms (such as Mac), nearly all games that are released on MFGG will only work with Windows and not other platforms without any special programs. Having games that work not just on Windows but also on Mac and Linux (and perhaps more) could attract a broader audience and using a tool that either doesn't cost much or is free may make it easier for beginners that are trying to get into making fangames.

Quillax Ship - Where you can download all of my cool, keen mods and super-marvelous fangames!

[Shadow Administrator Drei]

People need to expand their horizons. Love2D is a legitimately great framework to start off learning in, and Godot *should* be way more appealing to the crowds found at Serebii and MFGG. I'm surprised Stencyl didn't garner more popularity either since it does appeal to the uninformed ideas about

[Xander]

I should make a video or do a write up on using the Impact Engine.

Also, I should post about the game I'm making with it... heh

Me.

[FabianLC]

It's kinda unfortunate to see how Game Maker has went from being a great tool for both beginners and experts that just want to make games to something that, although it has some neat features (animated tiles and auto-tiling are a couple that stood out to me), doesn't seem to be made for beginners and hobbyists. Game Maker nowadays seems to have a rather high price, a free version that is rather restrictive, and such. I've been doing pretty good with Game Maker 8.1 and GameMaker: Studio 1 for quite a long time, but I have not even tried out GameMaker: Studio 2 and I'm not sure if it'd be worth spending about $100 for it or not. I have taken a look at a few other game-making tools a few times to see if there's an alternative that doesn't cost as much or is even free while being quite flexible.

Unity seems nice, being able to produce both 2D and 3D games, although the full versions seem rather expensive ($35 per month just so you can have the plus version? Really?). The free version doesn't seem to be so restricted, though, so it may not be so bad for those that just want to make fangames.

Unity is not limited, you only have to pay if you make profit with your games

[starscratcher]

Hey folks,

for 2D games I can only suggest to learn C# and get going with the MonoGame framework.
To be honest, it's a little hard to learn how MonoGame works, but you'll eventually find out that it kinda works like GameMaker does.
Right now I'm developing a library which makes MonoGame a lot more like GameMaker by implementing sprites, game objects, rooms, etc.
If the time has come, I may release that library. But for now it requires a lot more tweaking and fixing, and I should make a game with it first!

Some links:

MonoGame framework

Tutorial

[bowsette_game]

I certainly hope so. GMS became too restrictive, implemented a rather aggressive Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) scheme on the latest version, and they overhauled the interface. I'm not a fan honestly - the main reason I used GMS1.4 was because I was already used to the old GM interface (my first games were made with 5.3/6.1 very long ago).

Hopefully Godot will get more traction and more tutorials will pop in. Being 100% free software is a huge plus. It also runs natively on GNU/Linux and macOS. I probably won't keep using GMS1 after I finish the 2 projects I'm still working on.

ENIGMA is also a pretty good tool depending on your requirements. It's 100% FOSS and also multiplatform, like ENIGMA. If your game compiles with GM8.1, then it probably works with ENIGMA without any changes. However, if you rely on new features introduced on GMS1.x, chances are you gonna run into incompatibilities. For example, it doesn't support enums and acessors. They also are making a new IDE, which isn't usable and god knows when it will be.

ENIGMA currently uses LateralGM for its IDE, which I've found to be very unstable, even resulting in code loss sometimes. It's usable if you only want to look into GM source code, though.

tl;dr use Godot

[Clobbah]

I've played around with Godot, mostly with 3D. It's programming language is actually pretty easy to understand even if you're more of an artist. Hopefully someday I actually make a finished product with it.

Beware the mighty Wariphant.