With 2D game engine Game Maker, the user can create all sorts of games, such as platform games, scrolling shooters, puzzle games and multiplayer online games. While Game Maker has the limited ability to create 3D games, this is a relatively new feature, and does not compete well with dedicated 3D game making software such as FPS Creator. However, Game Maker excels in the creation of all manner of 2D games.
The Professional edition of Game Maker 7 retails for $20, making Game Maker one of the most affordable commercial game creation solutions available today. The brainchild of Mark Overmars, Game Maker has over 75000 registered users, and is noted for its accessibility to novice game developers.
Mark Overmars and Game Maker
Dutch-born Mark Overmars is an author, teacher and computer scientist. Overmars first released Game Maker to the public in 1999. Written in the Delphi programming language, Game Maker started life as Animo, an application for creating graphics. Overmars has continued to develop Game Maker over the years into a resoundingly successful, approachable 2D game engine.
Overmars, along with co-author Jacob Habgood, is the author of The Game Maker's Apprentice: Game Development for Beginners. He has also penned several books and many papers on computational geometry, a subject in which he is considered an authority, and on which he lectures as a faculty member of Utrecht University.
YoYo Games and Game Maker
In a public statement to the Game Maker community in January 2007, Overmars announced that Game Maker had entered a partnership deal with emerging UK games development company YoYo Games:
“...the time I could devote to Game Maker was limited because of my additional position at Utrecht University. This was hampering the development and the service I could provide to the community. YoYo Games has the resources to make Game Maker into an even bigger success.”
This announcement was met with mixed responses from the Game Maker community, but Mark Overmars was quick to clarify the future of Game Maker and how this move would benefit both software and community:
“YoYo Games will put considerable resources into the further development of Game Maker but we will not change its global purpose. Game Maker is directed to beginner game developers and will remain to be so. The further development of Game Maker should only make it easier to use Game Maker, not harder.”
Game Maker Simple Interface Overview
Game Maker operates a simple intuitive drag-and-drop interface that allows the user to effectively click together a game without writing a single line of code. A game is created using a number of elements:
- Resources are loaded into the Resource field. Resources include 2D sprites, sounds, rooms, background art, and any other asset that will appear in the game.
- These resources are used to create game objects. A single resource can appear in a game as multiple instances of a game object.
- Each instance of a game object has events applied to it. Events include create events, which occurs when the object instance is first initialized, collision events and mouse events amongst many others.
- Actions are specified for when an event occurs to a game object instance. Thus, whenever an event happens to a game object instance, it reacts by performing an action.
- Rooms are a resource that is used to make the stage on which other game object instances interact. A room can be thought of as a game level – the container in which the game takes place.
All of these game elements are added using the Game Maker interface. Game object instances are dragged and dropped into position in rooms, and events and actions are dragged and dropped onto the game object instances to provide them with instructions on how to behave during the game.
Game Maker for Kids?
The concepts that power Game Maker are simple enough for young children to understand, and Game Maker is perhaps the best introduction to video game creation for a younger audience. But to suggest that Game Maker is targeted solely at the beginner or is only for children would be to underestimate the power of the application.
The strength of Game Maker is its simplicity, but its simplicity is the result of elegant design rather than a lack of features or functionality. Considering the affordable retail price of $20 for a professional Game Maker license and the gentle learning curve which is made even gentler by the exhaustive supporting documentation and the wealth of community tutorials, Game Maker is a game engine no independent or hobbyist game developer can afford to be without.
To learn more, visit the YoYo Games Game Maker website.
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