So what are your opinions about Game Maker?

[FranklinBluth]

Subject title pretty much says it all. Personally I think it's pretty nifty although the downside I could see to it would be less-involved programming (so you don't learn as much using it).

What do you guys think?

[LuX]

If you just want to make games it's pretty cool I guess, but if you want to learn to program you can do all the same stuff yourself. I've never used it myself however.

[thetoddfather]

GameMaker, in my experience, can best be described as a gateway drug into game making. You will never actually be able to make the games you want to make, but it may frustrate you enough in doing so to make you say, as I did, "fuck it, I'm learning C"

[Musi]

I had that exact experience, but with rpg maker. I was frustrated by its limitations so i decided to start programming myself.

[FranklinBluth]

Yeah, I can definitely understand the limiting aspects of the program. I'm currently just using it for a simple little pnc adventure (mainly focusing on improving/developing art techniques and overall asset creation) while I'm using the programming side of chili's tuts to *attempt to* write a basic biological micro-evolution simulation program in the hopes of getting some college credit for individual research.

[thetoddfather]

Hope you share your results with us! I'd love to see that.

[FranklinBluth]

Of course! I definitely plan to, but it may be a little while as I'm just in the initial design phase. I'm trying to take more time to organize my program structure rather than using the cram-everything-in-one-object design style (or lack thereof) that was evident in the space thingy I did. My biggest emphasis in this project will be designing a highly modular architecture that'll let me expand upon the model once I've gotten this semester's work done. Besides basic OOP guidelines, are there any other skills or techniques I could be learning that would help in programming modular program architectures?

Any help or advice is much appreciated!

[thetoddfather]

None that I could offer. Perhaps adding scripting languages would come in handy for certain applications. At my current skill level it's just been oop and a whole lot of trial and error so I wouldn't be much help.

[Clodi]

GameMaker, in my experience, can best be described as a gateway drug into game making....fuck it, I'm learning C"

ahah nice one mate. agreed.

[thetoddfather]