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A recent editorial from 'Defenders Quest' developer Lars Doucet has sparked my interest, and it has arisen from the news that GameMaker has been acquired by a gambling company.
For a little background, Lars worked with Flash and Adobe Air, and because of their issues he has moved onto using the open source Haxe project. He also tweets about how awesome it is a lot, and he even contributes code directly to HaxeFlixel.
Let me re-hash the tweet included in the linked editorial to help remind you:
XNA: abandoned.
Lars Doucet ن (@larsiusprime) February 16, 2015
Flash: neglected.
GameMaker: sold.
Your proprietary tool could be next.
Open Source. For your own protection.
I imagine for anyone using GameMaker this would be pretty scary, and who the hell trusts a gambling company? They are the same types of companies that email me every single week to try and sweet talk me into injecting their links into our articles for money (for just one annoying example). Anyway, onto the editorial in question!
GameMaker Studio's company YoYo Games Limited was sold for $16.4 million, but if you don't know what GameMaker is have a look at these games:
- Hotline Miami
- Risk of Rain
- Gunpoint
- Gods Will Be Watching
- Nidhogg
- Spelunky
- Nuclear Throne
All of those were made with GameMaker, and many more too.
The developer who wrote the editorial linked at the top has been stung by closed source platforms before, and that's where the doubts come from. Lars created Defenders Quest using Adobe Air, and Air dropped Linux support some time ago. So, Lars knows all too well that closed platforms can lock people out and force them to re-do their work when they remove support for things they need.
LarsThat said, technology gets old fast without maintenance. Adobe dropped Linux support for AIR a few years back and it has been an enormous pain point of mine in supporting legacy Defender's Quest builds. Yeah, I could always drop the Linux target, but I shouldn't have to.
It's an interesting read, and I agree with Lars on many things.
We don't know what the gambling focused company 'Playtech' will do with GameMaker, but we will keep an eye out if they ever decide to bring GameMaker to Linux. Sadly, what happens with a lot of these deals is a lot of company restructuring, and support for things can get dropped easily (like platform exporters that aren't raking in the big bucks for them: Linux).
Personally, if I was using GameMaker, I would be looking for a more open solution for my next game. While Lars points out there are drawbacks to both open source tools and closed source tools, it's still better to have the option of fixing issues/forking the project completely to keep it alive, rather than see all support for it to disappear which is possible.
There are a few good open source tools like Godot, and maybe a few people will look towards it now. Hell, even the ENIGMA tool which is compatible with GameMaker's "GML" could see more activity now.
It's also worth noting for XNA developers that you could look at FNA. FNA is cross-platform and aims at being an accurate XNA4 runtime for the desktop (Windows, Mac and Linux).
What are your thoughts on this? And what are your favourite open source game creation kits we didn't mention? Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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QuoteWe don't know what the gambling focused company 'Playtech' will do with GameMaker, but we will keep an eye out if they ever decide to bring GameMaker to Linux.
But GameMaker IS available for Linux, isn't it?
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Quoting: subNo it's not, they have an exporter for Ubuntu.QuoteWe don't know what the gambling focused company 'Playtech' will do with GameMaker, but we will keep an eye out if they ever decide to bring GameMaker to Linux.
But GameMaker IS available for Linux, isn't it?
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I'm definitely glad Godot released when it did, before Unity ever shat out a Linux editor (they're still constipated, in that regard). I find it works great and I've even contributed a bit of code to it. Overall, it's come leaps and bounds in the past year or so, with a bright future ahead.
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Also
- Stealth Bastard
- To the moon
And counting...
Game maker has made much progress, I tried to use it back when I was a kid, but it was quite limited at the time.
Yeah, closed source is not viable, from this point of view. That's what RMS is fighting for : own your work, don't let any evil closed source tool steal it away from you whenever they want to.
- Stealth Bastard
- To the moon
And counting...
Game maker has made much progress, I tried to use it back when I was a kid, but it was quite limited at the time.
Yeah, closed source is not viable, from this point of view. That's what RMS is fighting for : own your work, don't let any evil closed source tool steal it away from you whenever they want to.
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Feel free to add Valdis Story: Abyssal City to the list, one of my most favourite games of all times. A damn fucking shame if the linux support is dropped, but let's hope for the best.
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natewardawg Feb 17, 2015
I enjoyed Lars' article, and Defender's Quest of course :)
Unfortunately for folks using GameMaker, it will almost certainly not get a Linux editor now. Even though pretty much all companies have a desire to maximize profit, they usually at least have a passion for improving their products. I'm sure that even Microsoft as a whole has a desire to make Windows a better product. Gambling's sole focus is to maximize profit, money is the product.
Unfortunately for folks using GameMaker, it will almost certainly not get a Linux editor now. Even though pretty much all companies have a desire to maximize profit, they usually at least have a passion for improving their products. I'm sure that even Microsoft as a whole has a desire to make Windows a better product. Gambling's sole focus is to maximize profit, money is the product.
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Quoting: natewardawgI enjoyed Lars' article, and Defender's Quest of course :)They could try Enigma.
Unfortunately for folks using GameMaker, it will almost certainly not get a Linux editor now.
1 Likes, Who?
natewardawg Feb 17, 2015
Quoting: adolsonQuoting: natewardawgI enjoyed Lars' article, and Defender's Quest of course :)They could try Enigma.
Unfortunately for folks using GameMaker, it will almost certainly not get a Linux editor now.
That does look like a good transition off of GameMaker. Just like Godot has been a fairly smooth transition away from Unity so far.
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Gambling company? Ouch! Anybody who owned and used Gamemaker just got burned. Even the most likely scenario (dropping Linux support) happens, what might await the future of those who bought and used this tool? Now I'm glad I snubbed proprietary tools like this in the past as a teenager (maybe even a bit obnoxious about it). Those tools have either now died or those who survived become sellouts. As someone who scruitinized tools like this, I've always been approached by the said developer in question that claim they will "live on" and "don't worry". Then the mob of denizens who used such tools would fan boy (yes, some aspiring indies don't always get along) it and claim it will be alive until death because they have no clue how to adapt without it.
Sorry for the rant, had a lot of history with those tools (free ones) and some of the nutty community (mostly indies who never make it, like me) around them.
I just wish the open source solution, Godot, arrived 5+ years sooner. My interest in making indie games has waned a bit. Now I just like to draw or tinker.
Sorry for the rant, had a lot of history with those tools (free ones) and some of the nutty community (mostly indies who never make it, like me) around them.
I just wish the open source solution, Godot, arrived 5+ years sooner. My interest in making indie games has waned a bit. Now I just like to draw or tinker.
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