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Game Maker 8.1: New Lite Restrictions


Once we revealed YoYo Games’ intention to remove the option enabling Game Maker 8.1 Lite to export games in .exe format some strong opinions were voiced against the change.

A consultation took place via the GMC where users could put forward their own viable alternative solutions which would “clearly mark” games created using the free version of Game Maker. The removal of the “create executable” option in Lite and the subsequent replacement suggestions were devised to “encourage you to upgrade, but not piss you off and drive you away” from Game Maker according to Mike Dailly.

A new version of the Game Maker 8.1 beta has been pushed out to testers and the “Create Executable” and “Publish your game” File menu options have both returned to the Lite version, along with the full room editor improvements.

In exchange a semi-transparent “Made with Game Maker” logo now appears in one of four pre-defined positions above all game rooms in similar style to the identifiers affixed by some television channels in the corner of the screen. On closing an exported game a Game Maker advert is shown for 3 seconds. The image, which is currently a placeholder, appears behind the game and any other running applications.

The Game Maker watermark and exit splash screen are not shown whilst testing your game from within Game Maker and are only added when you choose to save your game as an executable file.

What do you think?

13 Comments

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  1. I was considering GameMaker again myself, but come back to a ripoff-festival on a polished site.
    It may be better to use Stencyl which is free to export as flash and pay to export to other stuff.
    Plus I’m pretty sure the pay stuff costs less for Stencyl than gamemaker studio and have more export options I think too.
    Is the old GameMaker still available for download somewhere?
    I guess I could still use GameMaker Studio just for practice in prototyping a game since the export options suck unless pay a fortune anyway, but apparently there’s a ton of limits on actors an such.

  2. This watermark thing is simply unacceptable.

    I have been using GM lite since version 7. I was considering upgrading to GM 8 Pro for $25 or whatever the cost used to be, but now they’ve raised the price to $40. Why in the world would I pay not $25, but $40 essentially JUST for the 3D functions and data structures? (From what I’ve heard, GM’s 3D functions aren’t even that great, and can only be used to make super-low-poly games like the original DOOM.)

    I was on the fence with $25, but the added 15 bucks on the pricetag essentially blew me clean off that fence (back onto the “not buying it” side.)

    To add insult to injury, from what I can tell, 8.1 has little to no major new functions when compared to 8.0 (except that the lite version now has image_angle, which I’ve gotten around anyway.) And now 8.1 lite has this ridiculous watermark.

    Why isn’t a starting splash screen enough? Why must there be a watermark? It makes every GM lite game with 8.1 look like utter crap. I’ve seen some lite-made games that looked somewhat respectable, but with the watermark, any sense of pride and dignity in a designer’s creation is completely obliterated.

    Honestly, how many people are going to play a game, miss the opening “made with GM lite” splash screen, but actually see the WATERMARK, then actually ENQUIRE as to what Game Maker actually is, then actually buy it?

    If you’re showing a great game you made to a friend, even if they didn’t see the opening splash, if they were actually interested in making games themselves, wouldn’t they ask, “Woah, how did you make this?” Then you would tell them “Game Maker” and they’d go from there.

    Instead of dazzling them and sucking them in, the watermark will just serve to distract them, and even (if subconsciously) make them think of the game as being low-quality and/or crappy.

    Now potential new Game Maker users are more likely to dismiss GM lite as not being worth it.

    Now the reaction will be, instead of:

    “Woah, that’s a cool game! How’d you make that? I need to go get Game Maker!”

    it will be more like:

    “That’s an interesting game. Looks kinda crappy with the watermark though. I guess I won’t ever be using Game Maker. It’s not worth my time to make crappy games.”

    I think this watermark is really going to work backwards.

    I’m not even going to download 8.1 lite because of this, which means that I won’t be buying 8.1 pro for any amount of money since I won’t know what 8.1 lite is like.

    Good job, yoyogames. You just lost at least $25, if not $40. And I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels this way.

  3. As someone using GM since version 5, I find all of this very disappointing. Having “made with Lite” stuff show before and after a game was and is a fine compromise, but having it show as a watermark during the game makes anything exported just a joke. No kid is going to proudly make a game and post it online with a watermark, and there is a huge number of kids out there who simply can’t pay for the full version. This article sums it up better than I did: http://home.sevenstories.com/index.php/news/anna-anthropy-author-of-rise-of-the-videogame-zinesters-writes-on-the-hobby-of-gamemaking/

  4. Must admit, this is a far far better implementation. Nagware isn’t as bad as stopping you exporting executables.

    Considering, how many kids would pay $30+ to export a simple game they’ve made for family & friends? This way the GameMaker spirit stays intact and we get a great product 🙂

    And the rise in price is completely understandable on the part of YoYo. Just hope PSP development continues well 🙂

  5. Seems like a very small price to pay considering they are receiving a quality product for free!!! Again thank you yoyogames for the ones who choose not to buy or cannot afford standard 🙂

  6. Thank god….now maybe the whinners will stop whinning so we can wait in peace lol…..Thank you yoyogames although i did pay for the full version 8.0 and i get the free upgrade to 8.1 standard… 🙂

  7. Though this is far better than the original plan to basically make the whole damn thing useless unless you pay for it, I say the list of limitations has to be reconsidered at this point. My biggest issue with GM Lite’s limitations was the inability to use the draw_xxxxx_ext commands, as they are integral to any good game programming.

  8. Watermark at least better than gamemaker close after certain time 😀

    especially the majority of lite users, mostly those who are training
    with GameMaker in the first place, as long as they hooked and (Confident) with GameMaker
    they wont be hesitant to pay for GameMaker, they will love it and seek for more functions.
    ( Confident earned by creating and publishing games I believe with GM )

    I’m happy for yoyo decision.

    peace

  9. So does this mean that the lite has full pro functionality (3D, datastructures, surfaces…)?
    If it does, then I prefer a watermark instead of limited functionality for lite.
    Then I can run my pro gmks on a school comp or something like that.

    If it has both limited functionality and watermark than it’s baaad :Q!
    Limited functionality and ads for GM while loading was enough for me to buy 7Pro….

    • No. When I said “no additional limitations” I meant over Game Maker 8.0 Lite. That could have been more clear, sorry. In the earlier beta the room editor zoom buttons were also disabled in Lite.

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