Should I Learn Unity Or Gamemaker

For developers merely starting in the industry, the task of choosing the best game engine can be daunting. Here, nosotros'll attempt to address many of the issues concerning one of the most popular game engines, GameMaker, so you can see if it's the correct game engine for your project.

You can read our other in-depth guides on all the major game engines on this page.

If you're a games journalist secretly dreaming of being a programmer, chances are you lot've given GameMaker a try.

Above all, GameMaker is an engine for novices -- the artists, the writers, the non-programmers, the people with ideas who have never written a single line of code and wouldn't know where to start. But GameMaker is also much more than that. It'due south the high-terminate 2D engine, the top-down activeness games engine, the puzzle-platformers engine, the pixel art engine.

Vadim Dyachenko has congenital a career from working with GameMaker. After gaining renown for online multiplayer mods, he was recruited to work on Nuclear Throne, Forager, Nidhogg i and 2, Rival of Aether and Caveblazers, amidst others -- all of which were created with GameMaker.

"The engine is perhaps the most known for a wide diverseness of pixel art games made with information technology," he says. "But the past years have seen an increment of college-allegiance games like Swords of Ditto, Levelhead, Synthetik, or Nidhogg 2."

GameMaker was created past YoYo Games 20 years ago, with an underlying goal to "streamline the development process" using a drag-and-drop visual scripting tool. The engine is currently bachelor under its latest iteration, GameMaker Studio 2 (GMS2), which was released in March 2017. More than one,000 users register to use the engine every single twenty-four hours.

GameMaker supports a dozen platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch, Windows, Mac Bone, Ubuntu, Android, iOS, tvOS, Burn, Microsoft UWP, and HTML5.

In August 2021, YoYo Games streamlined its license options for GameMaker, switching from permanent licenses to a subscription model. Instead of its former Creator, Developer, Console, and Ultimate licenses, the engine now offers two new options.

The Indie license, at $9.99 monthly (or $99.99 yearly), gives access to all non-console platforms in one bundle. It replaces the engine's Developer license, which was divided by platform (desktop, mobile, web, UWP). Each were permanent licenses and priced individually from $99 to $199.

The second option is the Enterprise license, priced at $79.99 monthly, or $799.99 yearly. It gives admission to all platforms. GameMaker previously had a console-only license for that same toll, likewise as an Ultimate license with all platforms included for $one,500/year. Both take at present been retired.

It's worth noting that at that place's also an Education version of GameMaker, aimed at teachers who want to innovate their students to the engine, with various platform options. Prices start at $10 a calendar month, per seat, with a minimum purchase of five seats. You lot tin can find more details virtually GameMaker for Education on this page.

What are the advantages of GameMaker?
What are the disadvantages of GameMaker?
Advice for new GameMaker users

What are the advantages of GameMaker?

GameMaker is the best engine for 2D games

GameMaker'south primary strength lies in making second games, equally highlighted past Butterscotch Shenanigans CEO and co-founder Seth Coster. The co-creator of Crashlands and Levelhead, Coster went from no programming knowledge to total-fourth dimension developer within 2 years, all using GameMaker.

"GameMaker is the best tool around for making 2D games of any kind"

Seth Coster, Butterscotch Shenanigans

"GameMaker is the best tool effectually for making 2D games of any kind -- that's what it was built for," he says.

Teddy Diefenbach, aka Teddy Dief, co-designer and developer of Centre Machine's Hyper Light Drifter, agrees that GameMaker shines in "straightforward second game making," while also praising its "direct control of how sprites are rendered."

GameMaker can handle all genres and styles

GameMaker is at its best when building sprite-based 2D games, but according to Benjamin Rivers, the creator of Home, Alone with You and Worse than Decease, information technology can be applied to a variety of genres.

"In our experience, its toolset allows you lot to brand just nearly any game you can imagine, whether large or small," he says. "Tutorials and videos often focus on games that use pixel art, just GMS2 can handle high-res, varied art styles every bit well. In two dimensions, I tin can't think of a single genre it couldn't handle."

Julian 'Juju' Adams, developer on Hyper Light Drifter and Swords Of Ditto, cut his teeth on various genres in GameMaker and confirms its versatility.

"GameMaker every bit a tool has few difficult limits: I've made 3D games, I've fabricated roguelikes, I've made metroidvanias, I've made competitive multiplayer brawlers," he says. "I brand the kind of games that'd make 14-year-sometime me proud. GameMaker makes the worlds I dreamt of exploring equally a kid."

GameMaker is (very) fast

GameMaker is the go-to engine for beginners for myriad reasons, but its speed at the tiptop of the listing. You can take a simple game running in tape time, while also iterating and prototyping with ease.

"The workflow of GameMaker is incredibly fast," Coster says. "If you want to return a sprite to the screen, it's a single line of lawmaking. If yous want to add together a font, it's a ii-step process. If you want to play a sound, it's a unmarried line of code. When y'all switch to other engines, you will mostly detect that everything you do takes some series of steps to get that thought going, while GameMaker does most things you want it to practise with hardly whatsoever effort."

GameMaker is simple

GameMaker is also a elementary engine to learn, using a plug-and-play organization for making games with most no programming.

"GameMaker removes a lot of the overhead from setting upward a projection"

Benjamin Rivers

"GameMaker removes a lot of the overhead from setting upwardly a projection," Rivers says. "With more full general-purpose 3D engines, you take to shoehorn a lot of front-end work to prepare the in-engine tools y'all need to first creating the type of game you lot want, sometimes choosing entire tool-set modes.

"GMS2's 2d toolset, yet, handily takes intendance of the most common aspects you'll accept to deal with -- objects, sprites, sounds, then on -- which means that in most cases, you're not edifice tools to build more than tools. You'll probably have the majority of what you demand right in forepart of you, and considering it'south not juggling both second and 3D tasks, it's lighter-weight with less bloat and a more focused interface."

GameMaker has its own, easy to larn linguistic communication

Even if you want to go across the drag-and-driblet tool, GameMaker uses its own language, and then you notwithstanding don't need programming knowledge to jump in.

"GameMaker Linguistic communication (GML) is the code linguistic communication used by the engine," Dief explains. "It's not as robust or object-oriented equally common languages like C# or C++, so you will sometimes hit ceilings as your project gets more complex. But spend plenty time with GML and you'll as well love it. It has weird quirks and shortcuts yous won't go elsewhere.

"C# is more robust, merely as well 'heavier'. GML is Wild West code. Information technology'south fast results code. It'southward beautiful and wild and sometimes frightening."

GML is uncomplicated to acquire, for both beginners and programmers. Jon Peterson has been using GameMaker for over a decade, making his name past creating tools and guides for the engine -- including Retro Palette Swapper, a system for cartoon sprites, surfaces and backgrounds.

"GML is a very forgiving linguistic communication with few types and fewer syntax requirements," he says. "No need for ; at the end of each line, yous tin write an 'if' check without parentheses, and new variables can be defined at pretty much any fourth dimension."

GameMaker makes exporting to multiple platforms simple

Some other way GameMaker simplifies developers' lives is by making it easy to port your game from 1 platform to some other -- provided y'all have the right publishing licence, of course.

"GML is Wild West lawmaking. It's fast results code. Information technology'southward cute and wild and sometimes frightening"

Teddy Dief

"It really is just choose the platform and press the 'export' button once yous're ready to go," Rivers explains. "Nosotros shipped our most recent game, Worse Than Expiry, on v dissimilar platforms from 1 projection file. That's a huge win for a modest studio, especially, that wants to launch and manage its titles for multiple audiences."

GameMaker's file sizes are well optimised

GameMaker's simplicity and flexibility is axiomatic in the size of its files, which remain lightweight even when there'south a lot going on.

"Games made in GameMaker tend to be pretty well optimised in terms of file sizes, RAM usage, and general overhead, so you can make some pretty elaborate stuff," Coster says. "Forager and Levelhead, for example, often have thousands of instances running at once, and GameMaker handles it merely fine.

"Levelhead has dozens of songs in its soundtrack, hundreds of sounds, thousands of sprites, and around ninety,000 lines of code. All that comes out to a file size effectually 250mb, and the game uses around 350 mb of RAM. For how much content that is, that'due south tiny."

GameMaker is skillful at debugging

Debugging is a crucial part of development for any creator, and it is an overlooked strength of the GameMaker engine.

"The debugger is fantabulous and doesn't get praised enough," Adams says. "It stands caput and shoulders above whatsoever other engine that I've used."

GameMaker makes it easy to build in-game tools

According to Teddy Dief, Middle Auto didn't apply GameMaker'south drag-and-drop system for Hyper Calorie-free Drifter, writing custom mechanics for the hit game instead. Dief says that GameMaker allowed the studio to create the tools to exercise this very easily.

"The simplicity of its rendering systems let us build our own tools within our game more easily than I've found with any other engine," he adds.

What are the disadvantages of GameMaker?

GameMaker isn't free

Ane of GameMaker's greatest paradoxes is that, while it'south meant to help beginners get something off the ground quickly, there is no gratuitous version. Unity, for case, allows individuals to create commercial games for free, with a cap on revenue. That's not the case with GameMaker.

"Hobbyist and educational sector users will indicate out that GameMaker costs money"

Vadim Dyachenko

"Perceived disadvantages of GameMaker depend on who you lot enquire, only hobbyist and educational sector users will betoken out that information technology costs money," Dyachenko says. "The cost of game development tools has decreased a lot over the years, but information technology's no aid if you don't accept much spare funds to begin with.

"GameMaker tries to accommodate this by offering a month-long trial version -- which is enough to make a small/boilerplate-sized game and decide if y'all like information technology or not. But not everyone has enough fourth dimension to dedicate [a calendar month to it] either."

GameMaker is non made for 3D

While some developers praise GameMaker's versatility, others signal out that YoYo Games' engine lags behind when it comes to 3D. Dief confirms GameMaker is "much stronger in 2D than 3D," while Peterson adds that it "lacks good support" for 3D projects.

Peterson continues: "3D is possible, just the tools to brand working with 3D assets (models, textures, animations, and so on) are non-existent, and because GMS2's UI isn't mod-able, nobody can build tools to plug in to make 3D projects more manageable."

GameMaker's language tin lead to bad habits

GML is a double-edged sword: its simplicity is why developers are drawn to GameMaker, simply that same simplicity can atomic number 82 to many challenges downwards the line. According to Teddy Dief, GML is "both an advantage and disadvantage," especially when dealing with larger projects.

Peterson points out that "because GML is so forgiving, it can atomic number 82 to some bad habits that could hamper the developer if/when they motion to a different linguistic communication."

Adams adds: "Information technology is hard to maintain a clean namespace in GameMaker. This acts as a hard limit to the complexity and scale of games, and it makes implementing libraries and extensions impuissant. It's hard to write reusable code."

GameMaker makes recruitment more challenging

While it has advantages, GameMaker'southward language can cause recruitment issues. According to Rivers, it can be "harder to convince seasoned developers who prefer C# or similar languages to jump on board. If they know C#, they desire to work in it."

"Information technology is hard to maintain a clean namespace in GameMaker"

Julian Adams

A lot of developers tend to abandon GameMaker after a fourth dimension to work with other engines, which makes finding experienced recruits relatively difficult.

Dief says: "If you lot're planning to run a big squad and hire a bunch of developers experienced in your engine, GameMaker is harder than the megalopolis engines Unity and Unreal these days."

GameMaker'southward ecosystem is minor

Another consequence stemming from GameMaker's status as an engine for beginners is its limited asset store -- especially when compares to Unity or Unreal Engine iv.

"GameMaker'southward asset ecosystem is smaller than that of Unity," Dyachenko says. "Websites and services don't offer ready-to-use extensions for GM as frequently. Most C++ SDKs can be wrapped for use with GM hands enough, but that'south nonetheless extra work."

GameMaker doesn't support automatic deployments

While GameMaker makes exporting a game to different platforms uncomplicated, information technology doesn't automatically packet and deploy patches to all platforms at one time. According to Butterscotch Shennanigans' Coster, this is "GameMaker's biggest trouble correct now."

"The games marketplace is incredibly fragmented nowadays, and if y'all are an contained studio without an exclusive locked downwards, your best avenue for making a living is to put your game on as many platforms as possible," he says. "To do that, y'all need to be able to automate your deployments, so yous tin can create builds and ship patches to all of your supported platforms at once.

"Nosotros've congenital our ain automated deployment pipeline for GameMaker, but it took a lot of hacky workarounds to get it going, and well-nigh teams aren't going to have the fourth dimension or resources to make that happen."

GameMaker needs more features

Overall, most of GameMaker's weaknesses steam from its smaller ecosystem. YoYo Games simply doesn't accept the resources of Ballsy Games or Unity Technologies, and that shows in the engine's capabilities.

"Advanced and intermediate users generally want more features from the scripting language," Dyachenko says. "People with complex asset pipelines want tools for extending the born editors, which is a very valid point, merely likewise a huge time investment to implement correctly."

"Advanced users by and large desire more than features from GameMaker'southward scripting language"

Vadim Dyachenko

Adams has concerns about GameMaker's visual scripting system: "It's a shadow of the powerful tools available in Unreal, and a comparison betwixt the ii is non favourable to GameMaker... I don't have any bright ideas here, but GameMaker is lagging behind."

GameMaker also lacks support in some key languages. Downwell developer Ojiro Fumoto says he wishes GMS2 "was localised to Japanese so [he] could recommend it more to the developers here."

Advice for new GameMaker users

Give information technology a endeavour, and examination its capabilities in key areas

The best way to understand any engine is to get-go using it, simply with GameMaker it is specially important to exam information technology confronting the needs of the project you want to build.

"GameMaker has an official 'Acquire' page with a number of tutorial serial," Dyachenko says. "Participate in a couple of game jams -- one- to ii-24-hour interval jams are the all-time, every bit these offer an opportunity to exam a tool in 'real conditions', and not risk much if you make mistakes."

Rivers adds: "Go your easily on it and test it for your key pillars -- operation, networking, co-op, 2D workflow, whatever they are -- but don't presume it tin't do something. The sheer diversity of amazing and creative projects released with it have disproved that time and fourth dimension again.

"Know what kind of game you want to make, and where you desire to release information technology, before determining if GMS2 is the right engine for yous. Non everyone will click with GMS2'southward programming language or its general menses, specially if they're coming from another engine."

Skip drag-and-drop and start learning GML

GameMaker's drag-and-drop feature is a strength when it comes to novice users, only if your intention is to become a professional game developer, you'll have to get further.

"Drag-and-drib is a cool characteristic, but really only recommended for those with literally nothing programming experience," Peterson says. "I recommend jumping into GML as shortly equally possible.

"Also, don't copy and paste the code from tutorials. Write the code out yourself and rename all the functions and variables. It's a much better way to learn and make the code your own."

Lean on GameMaker's community -- they're happy to help

GameMaker has a very strong community of hobbyists and professionals who will willingly assist you. Co-ordinate to Adams, the engine's customs is "unlike whatsoever other."

"The distance betwixt experienced professional developers and newbies is pocket-sized," he says. "Good technique doesn't take far to travel, and when a new technique is invented information technology quickly gets into the hands of the next generation. We're all constantly improving our agreement of game development, and that self-improvement is embedded deep in GameMaker'due south Deoxyribonucleic acid."

Dyachenko lists a few community-driven places you lot should have a await at in case of any bug: "There are official forums that are well moderated and serve for mid/long-term give-and-take. At that place's a large, 7,000 members Discord server and the associated GitHub organisation, which is perhaps the best place to get if y'all take small but numerous questions."

Co-ordinate to Adams, that sense of customs is peculiarly stiff with GameMaker, which has "been the underdog for its entire history." While beingness small has some disadvantages, it has a singular advantage that its competitors cannot emulate.

"We push boundaries and detect things for ourselves, making honest and beautiful things as we go," he explains. "A game engine is certainly a tool, but it's likewise a civilization, and I stay for that culture. In a world where technology is accelerating and products are converging and intertwining, it is the community spirit that makes GameMaker dissimilar. Information technology'due south why I've stuck around."