The other day, super bunnyhop, a well known youtube reviewer reviewe'd Hyper Light Drifter. This game is a high profile Game maker game that highlights all of the strengths this 2d dev tool has to offer. And all of its weaknesses. With all the talk of framer ates out there it was just a matter of time before someone noticed how one of GM'a quirks would affect game play since games like Freedom Planet, made with an older game engine was admittedly a superior game.

Review her:

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OWFYccSCk0Y

I am starting to get rather annoyed with gms. Spine support has been added but not all of its features. It is funny how events, a feature present in a skeletal animation plug that works in gm7 is not implemented in the official version. Or how you can export to android but not android TV in more recent versions.

Currently you has closed the sandbox and archived the gmc. They say that they are replacing the software, but aren't giving us a concrete date when it comes back. For me at least this is a sign that game maker has reached its operational limit, much like adobe flash. And much like flash a major overhaul is needed to make it relevant again. I still use flash and will continue to use game maker. It is awesome. Game development has never been easier and now I have more choices than ever on how I choose to make my games. But times are changing. The runner is still buggy as hell, the room editor is still not as intuitive as I would like and tile scaling is horrible.

There is still hope. Flash has been replaced with animate, a tool that focuses on what flash is good at, animating! By removing the bloat of game development and video editing it is a much stronger product. I think with game maker the problem is with the arcane way its engine is written. It was written when Dx8 existed. It supports modern shaders but only as an add on.