64Digits

Game Maker Studio: Standard, free upgrade

Posted by Astryl on Nov. 26, 2013, 4:09 a.m.

Thanks to RC for pointing this out to me.

YoYo Games has decided to allow GM:S Free users to upgrade to Standard for… free.

To do this, install that standalone version of GM:S Free (The Steam version will not work), then choose the Beta Update channel and let it update.

Don't choose a license yet (If you've already chosen the Free license beforehand, just delete the C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Game Maker Studio folder to reset it, and reinstall).

After the update, the launcher screen will provide you with three license choices. Free, for Free. Standard, for Free, or the upgrade to Professional (For not-so-free).

Doing this upgrade also shaves $50 off any future upgrade to Professional.

Why is YYG doing this? It's kinda obvious. Unity comes along and starts providing 2D functionality out of the box, allows all sorts of exports to various platforms for free, and is generally doing a better job of providing tools to hobbyist game developers.

Took 'em long enough to figure out that their gypped 'Free' version was unusable.

Anyway, enjoy everybody.

Comments

Toast 10 years, 9 months ago

Quote:

the 2D support is really half-arsed.

So just like Game Maker then?

Glen 10 years, 9 months ago

For quick projects, such as the two month programming contests we have, GM 8 is perfect. It's easy to get something going in a very short amount of time. It's nearly flawless in terms of glitches. I plan on using it for Frosty Four Digits, and will probably convert it to something else after the fact, only if needed. At the moment, I don't need any functions that aren't already available to me and I rarely run into lag issues.

Powerful Kyurem 10 years, 9 months ago

GM 8 is good for long term stuff too. The major issue with GM supposedly is that GM has extremely 'heavy' objects, and it is very difficult to design large levels, and it also has horrible 3D.

Toast 10 years, 9 months ago

I must admit I'm probably using GM:S for Frosty 4 because it will be the quickest way to make a Wolf 3D/Doom esque FPS.

Astryl 10 years, 9 months ago

Quote:

When you import the sprite, you can change how it's filtered by clicking the sprite in your hierarchy. One of the options turns it off entirely, giving you that nice pixel look.

Actually, that was a derp on my part. I did turn filtering off, but at the same time my sprite sheet for the dragon was 1280x128. The max texture size is, by default, 1024, resulting in some scaling. Got it right now.

I'm still lamenting the lack of tile support. Technically, I can either import a tileset as a sprite sheet and use those for tiles, but the editing is going to be a pain.

Alternatively, I can use a level editor that allows me to export layers as bitmaps and roll with that.

KyleKubik 10 years, 9 months ago

What do you mean by lack of tile support?

you can set backgrounds to be used as tile sets, and add them to the rooms via the room editor, if that's what you are talking about. I may be misunderstanding tho.

Astryl 10 years, 9 months ago

Hmm? Oh, I'm talking about Unity.