Want to try your hand at making games? With all the tools, tutorials, and community support out there, there’s never been a better time to put your fingers on a keyboard and get coding. There are lots of free ways to get started, but some tools can help give you a jump-start, providing frameworks that remove many of the finicky bits that can put off newcomers. This is where the GameMaker Bundle comes in.
Is GameMaker good for making games? You bet. Crashlands is an indie title from Butterscotch Shenanigans, and it was on display as part of the prestigious PAX 10 last week in Seattle. I sat down to play the demo, and it was a beautiful, fun, and polished game that was drawing quite a crowd. You can see where I’m going with this: they made it in GameMaker Studio, and it’s available on Steam, Android, and iOS. There are tons of other games made in GameMaker, and devs are excited to see the bundle opening access to a wider audience.
You can grab GameMaker Studio for free anytime you like to write games for Windows, but there are a number of features in the professional version that you might want as you progress towards a finished product. Normally, that would cost you $150, but there’s a Humble Bundle on right now where you can get it for the astonishingly low price of pay what you want.
Despite that, I would recommend paying $15 (or more). At that point, you wind up with the Android, iOS, and Windows Universal Platform modules, each of which would raise the price of this package by hundreds of dollars, but are required to export to those platforms.
Moreover, at the $15 point, you get source code for a number of games, including a bunch from Butterscotch Shenanigans: Flop Rocket, Extreme Burger Defense, Freeway Mutant, and Shep Hard. These are working, playable games, some in app stores, and they can serve as an excellent reference point for learning how to structure games!
I got so excited about the bundle while writing this post that I convinced myself and picked it up! Which reminds me: the Humble Bundle is about charity, so feel free to up your donation a bit. And remember that you can adjust those sliders beneath your donation amount to distribute where your money goes.
The GameMaker Bundle is an incredible value and fantastic opportunity for anyone who has thought about making games. Sure, it’s not over until 20 September, but what are you waiting for? Grab it now and make something cool!
