gaming GameMaker: Studio Standard Edition free for limited time.

[Discordian 6,015]

Ever wanted to try your hand at video game development? Got a Windows computer with version XP and higher? Here's your chance!

 

http://gamemakerblog.com/2014/02/22/gamemaker-studio-standard-edition-is-free-for-a-limited-time-50-value/

 

GameMaker: Studio's free version normally limits your resources to twenty sprites and five "rooms" (where you would create levels, essentially) and so on so it's really only for testing the grounds.

 

Until March 2nd the Standard Edition which allows unlimited resources is free when normally it would cost you $49.99USD! Just download the free version and follow the instructions. No programming experience necessary to use GameMaker: Studio. Great for aspiring game designing novices!

 

Get it while it's hot!

Edited February 22, 2014 by Discordian

[Scootalove 10,689]

That sounds like a good opportunity for a lot of people who want to make video games, awesome.

[FoxyCryptid 4,330]

I remember when I was in High-School, it was just called Game Maker 6, and I paid $20 US for it. I also remember when the creator still owned it instead of YoYoGames.

 

God, I feel old as shit now....

[Jokuc 8,173]

Yeah game maker is quite old. I remember that me and a friend was making a shooter game in it when we were younger

 

It's actually a quite neat program.

Edited February 22, 2014 by Jokuc

[Discordian 6,015]

Old or not it'll still help people who want to break into the industry of hobby and indie game development with little to no knowledge. Better than trying to start programming in Java or C++ which can overwhelm the faint of heart.

[Leavinh 313]

I don't think I've made anything since my text based "choose your own adventure" game I made in Notepad when I was 12, so it should definitely be interesting to give this a shot. I have absolutely no coding knowledge, so if I can make something then this program is miraculous.

Edited February 22, 2014 by AyoMistadurrk

[Discordian 6,015]

I don't think I've made anything since my text based "choose your own adventure" game, so it should definitely be interesting to give this a shot. I have absolutely no coding knowledge, so if I can make something then this program is miraculous.

The only difference programming does is give you a bit more control over things in the application you develop. You have everything you need to do just about anything you want and they offer tutorials in both coding and non-coding ways to use GameMaker.

 

Ultimately it just speeds up the process. Sometimes coding just takes forever and it's faster just to have the visual buttons do all the work like telling a character which way to go when you press whatever keys. That's the sort of stuff you don't really need code for unless you need specialized functions.

[FoxyCryptid 4,330]

Game Maker is a Godsend for the novelty of being able throw together a stand-alone program so quick and easy and goof around.  

[Discordian 6,015]

Game Maker is a Godsend for the novelty of being able throw together a stand-alone program so quick and easy and goof around.

It's that nice little mix of professional and casual use and doesn't require you to be one or the other to just have fun with it. Which is hard to find in the programming community. A lot of things kinda require you to know a little too much to take full advantage of any IDEs you can find. Makes newbies' heads spin.

Edited February 22, 2014 by Discordian

[DashingDuke 13]

Defiantly grabbing this. This and something like GIMP for making sprites has some possibilities. Been an age since I made a game and even that was for school, a Text based version of Deal Or No Deal in a command window with C. Not C# or C++, just C. Using an out of date free compiler required by the school. Mentioning that makes me want to go dig it back up now. Ah the self induced nostalgia.

[Discordian 6,015]

Defiantly grabbing this. This and something like GIMP for making sprites has some possibilities. Been an age since I made a game and even that was for school, a Text based version of Deal Or No Deal in a command window with C. Not C# or C++, just C. Using an out of date free compiler required by the school. Mentioning that makes me want to go dig it back up now. Ah the self induced nostalgia.

That reminds me that I need to figure out how to make sprites. Not sure if I just wanna do it myself or try to hire an actual spriter when and if I get going on a real project instead of a learning/funsies one. I'm no artist so it'd be difficult to make one on my own and make it look any kind of good.

 

Same with music.

 

Guess that's why they have teams. One person doing everything is gonna bog down the quality of the entire project, especially if he doesn't know how to do everything.

Edited February 22, 2014 by Discordian

[FoxyCryptid 4,330]

It's that nice little mix of professional and casual use and doesn't require you to be one or the other to just have fun with it. Which is hard to find in the programming community. A lot of things kinda require you to know a little too much to take full advantage of any IDEs you can find. Makes newbies' heads spin.

 

That's what nice about it, even the programming language is pretty straight forward and simple. 

[Discordian 6,015]

That's what nice about it, even the programming language is pretty straight forward and simple.

It also seems to be very similar to Javascript so if you like what you can do in it you can probably broaden your horizons to web development if that's your thing.

[Zhortac 1,474]

That reminds me that I need to figure out how to make sprites. Not sure if I just wanna do it myself or try to hire an actual spriter when and if I get going on a real project instead of a learning/funsies one. I'm no artist so it'd be difficult to make one on my own and make it look any kind of good.

 

Same with music.

 

Guess that's why they have teams. One person doing everything is gonna bog down the quality of the entire project, especially if he doesn't know how to do everything.

 

That's how I feel with RPG Maker...although, I have no bloody idea how the hell I'd make sprites of my characters...I never even made sprite lol.

[Discordian 6,015]

That's how I feel with RPG Maker...although, I have no bloody idea how the hell I'd make sprites of my characters...I never even made sprite lol.

You and me both!

 

It's not that the concept is particularly hard, it's just that if you have little to no artistic sense it can get kinda awkward. It might differ based on what language you're using too so it might not work the same in RPG Maker for animating sprites as it does for GML.

 

So I just make custom stickmen sprites and Atari-esque backgrounds for simplicity. Function over form, as they say.

Edited February 22, 2014 by Discordian

[Zhortac 1,474]

You and me both!

 

It's not that the concept is particularly hard, it's just that if you have little to no artistic sense it can get kinda awkward. It might differ based on what language you're using too so it might not work the same in RPG Maker for animating sprites as it is for GML.

 

So I just make custom stickmen sprites and Atari-esque backgrounds for simplicity. Function over form, as they say.

 

True. Although, Ace has a sprite generator built in. Nothing fancy, but it gets the job done lol.

[FoxyCryptid 4,330]

I once made a really basic virtual pet AI that would move around at random and pick up food when it's hunger gauge depleted. Wonder if it's still on one of my many old back-up CDs. 

[Discordian 6,015]

True. Although, Ace has a sprite generator built in. Nothing fancy, but it gets the job done lol.

Pretty sure YoYoGames has some basic asset sheets you can use for music, backgrounds and sprites as well but they specifically say it's meant to test out your games. They are not meant for real projects.

 

Plus they have no restrictions on what you can or can't use so if you find anything on the internet that's legal to use in your projects you can just use those so it doesn't have to come from YYG specifically.

 

I never bothered to look for them though. I'd rather learn to sprite myself.

[Zhortac 1,474]

Thanks for sharing this btw. Now I'm gonna totally make a cliche creepypasta game of stupid!

[Discordian 6,015]

I once made a really basic virtual pet AI that would move around at random and pick up food when it's hunger gauge depleted. Wonder if it's still on one of my many old back-up CDs.

That's pretty sweet. Like a Digi-Pet or Tomagotchi type thing?

 

My first project in GameMaker (kinda slow-going cuz job hunting) is gonna be something like a Operation Logic Bomb or Gain Ground type game. Not anything as intricate, obviously, but just as practice.

 

Here's some gameplay of the two in case you don't know them.

 

Operation Logic Bomb:

 

 

Gain Ground:

 

 

Seemed simple enough to make a basic version of them. Plus they are awesome games and good ones to use as example of good game design.

[FoxyCryptid 4,330]

That's pretty sweet. Like a Digi-Pet or Tomagotchi type thing?

 

My first project in GameMaker (kinda slow-going cuz job hunting) is gonna be something like a Operation Logic Bomb or Gain Ground type game. Not anything as intricate, obviously, but just as practice.

 

Here's some gameplay of the two in case you don't know them.

 

Operation Logic Bomb:

 

 

Gain Ground:

 

 

Seemed simple enough to make a basic version of them. Plus they are awesome games and good ones to use as example of good game design.

 

No, it was just a little fuzzball with a tail that ran around in top-view, and occasionally went to his bail of hay to eat when his hunger meter drained.  

[Discordian 6,015]

No, it was just a little fuzzball with a tail that ran around in top-view, and occasionally went to his bail of hay to eat when his hunger meter drained.

So no player actions, just watching?

 

Still, it's a good thing to know how to do stuff like that. AI is important!

[FoxyCryptid 4,330]

So no player actions, just watching?

 

Still, it's a good thing to know how to do stuff like that. AI is important!

 

Pretty much. I was just experimenting with AI and seeing what I could make something do. 

[Nerdy Luigi 2,065]

I used a Game Maker program. I'm sticking to tabletop games for now.

[MadDoggyca 710]

to be honest its a ok-ish dev tool for simple games... how ever the lack of  it noting being a steam key takes a lot of out this app. This tool works best on steam due to the integration of The steam Work shop.

also on a very good sale u can get a massive deal on the pro version ..