by BRIAN FETCHER
GAZETTE — If you missed out on part one, go back and read it! Here's the rest of the tour.
by BRIAN FETCHER
GAZETTE — It's finally happening, folks! YoYo Games is moving into their new Office! See how I said that with flared nostrils? That's how excited I am! Have you ever wanted to get a good look at the new YoYo Games Office (Located at: 5 West Victoria Dock Road, Dundee, DD1 3JT, Scotland)? You're in luck. Enjoy!
THEY EVEN BUILT A BUILDING WITHIN THE BUILDING!!!! Check it out!
by BRIAN FETCHER
GAZETTE — Softwrap (popularly known as SoftCrap among a vast number of GM users in the Game Maker Community) handles registration upgrades (GM Lite to GM Pro). Softwrap was to distribute GameMaker without fear of piracy (as they do with many other products). Sandy Duncan just received the following letter from Softwrap, which he says "will make some long term GameMaker devs smile quite a bit". Softwrap service termination date has been announced for: September 1st, 2013.
by BRIAN FETCHER
GAZETTE — 1 year ago YoYo Games developed an amazing product. A product that would revolutionize game development for mobile platforms. That product is GameMaker Studio, and it just turned 1 years old today! Help YoYo Games celebrate by retweeting and telling YoYo Games what you love about GameMaker Studio.
"We've even got a few bday presents to give away!" -- YoYoGames, Ltd.
Happy Birthday!
by BRET HUDSON
YOYO GAMES — The official, non-beta version of the Windows 8 native export was released on May 16th, 2013. The export is now available to all users with FREE, STANDARD, PROFESSIONAL, and MASTER collections. The export allows for easy deployment of GameMaker: Studio games onto the Windows store. Along with the release, YoYo Games is hosting the "WIN BIG Competition", which allows users to submit their games to the Windows Store to win part of the $35,000 in prizes. Check out http://www.yoyogames.com/promotions/win_big for more information. Also:
YoYo Games is also offering GameMaker 7, 8, and 8.1 customers to upgrade to GameMaker: Studio PROFESSIONAL for only $50! This is a unique opportunity so upgrade now before it is too late.
by BRIAN FETCHER
GAZETTE — Folks I'm going to be featuring Open Source game maker project engines that serve as tutorials for players to learn from. Made a great example? Post it on Game Maker Community forums. The great ones will be features on the Gazette.
Stay tuned!
by BRIAN FETCHER
GMGAZETTE — YoYo Games has uploaded the manual for Game Maker Studio online. Why are they doing this? The reason behind this was to make it both easier on the developers of the Manual and easier on the users. Hosting it online allows them to edit the manual and provide instant updates without waiting for an update download within the program itself. Game Maker Studio is still an evolving model, so additions/modifications will happen often. When they do, they will be automatically updated and uploaded. Users can access this online without having to download updates to upgrade their version of Game Maker Studio. So there's no worry if you're not using an up-to-date client.
URL: http://docs.yoyogames.com/
by BRIAN FETCHER
GMGAZETTE — Folks, I was looking through an old article ("GM8 crack means money loss for YYG") and thought I'd give Ron a shout. He monitors download pages and keeping record so that he can test for increases and decreases in downloads by date. I asked him for a more up-to-date graph. The previous article claims $47,390.00 was the value of all these downloads combined.
The Updated Graph:
2011-2013: $58,850.00 value
Please note that we're only halfway through 2013, making this number incomplete.
Ron says more than half of the links he follows have been active 3+ years (many of which are still to this moment active). This shows the response time for YoYo Games removing illegal downloads to be somewhat lacking. For research purposes he does not report the links, but rather expects someone else to. He also noted that these links were so easy to find that anyone could find them.
"Use of any version of GameMaker without paying for it is piracy pure and simple, it drains our resources and withholds funds (that we use to improve GameMaker) any loyal fans and users should condemn this practice and have nothing to do with those that do." -- Russell Kay, CTO, YoYo Games, Ltd.
by BRIAN FETCHER
GAME MAKER GAZETTE — Folks I've gone through and cleaned up the blog. It's now cleaner and fresher than it has been in the last 5-10 months. Things should be easy to find, and the design should be easier on the eyes. Enjoy!
by BRIAN FETCHER
GAZETTE — We're getting ready to revamp the blog here. Fixing script bugs, interface issues and color schemes. New version of the Gazette will feature a cleaner layout and a new logo. No exact date set for this, but we do plan to do this in the next couple weeks.
by BRIAN FETCHER
GMINDIE — The podcast is set to return Saturday, May 11th. Tweet @Brian_Fetcher if you're interested in attending.
We expect to have this podcast every other Saturday at 1PM Pacific Standard Time (-7 GMT), but are debating whether or not we should just have it once a month instead. Official word on that will be in the podcast this Saturday.
Topics: Product discussion and Attractive game features.
Listening Instructions (LIVE!)
To listen live, download RaidCall. Make an account. Login. Type '6187781' or type 'GMIndie' in the search box. You are welcome to contribute to the conversation if you hop in during recording time.
Listening to uploaded/edited podcast
When it's officially edited and uploaded it will be found at https://soundcloud.com/gmpodcast.
Attendance host and co-host names are unavailable at this time.
by BRET HUDSON
GAME MAKER COMMUNITY — The GMC Jam #8 theme was just announced, revealing it as "Disaster", along with the handicap of "Cannot use text". Have fun working with this theme, as well as trying not use any text in your game! Post in the GMC topic to enter your game in and win prizes.
by BRET HUDSON
YOYO GAMES — The Steam Software Store launched recently, adding GameMaker: Studio as one of its first programs available for download. The Steam version of GameMaker: Studio is the same as the version you can get via YoYo Games, however, you are able to save your work to your Steam Cloud storage space as well as be a part of the "Steam Workshop". The Steam Workshop is an online game portal designed for user-created games using the program. "GameMaker: Studio takes advantage of Steamworks features like easy installation, automatic updating and the ability to save your work to your personal Steam Cloud space so files can travel with you." To read more on what Valve's Mark Richardson and YoYo Games' Sandy Duncan had to say about this, check out the YoYo Games News article. To purchase the program, either search for it via the Steam program or check it out on theSteam website.
by BRET HUDSON
YOYO GAMES — YoYo Games has finally hosted their first official competition since May of 2010, with their "Discovery" competition. The new competition has been started in celebration of GameMaker: Studio™'s new Windows 8 Export feature, allowing users to export their games for the Windows Store. We'll do a quick rundown of the major rules here, however, if you'd like to look at the full list of rules, please read the official announcement page. All games must be created with GameMaker: Studio™, using the Windows 8 export. The export is free for all Standard, Professional, and Master Collection Studio™ users. Competition entrants have to register as a Windows Developer, either using the free Student registration or the paid Professional registration. Using this account, you can submit your game to the Windows Store by December 8th, then officially enter the competition by submitting your game to the submittion page. The winner of this competition gets a lovely $500 Visa gift card, along with tons of bragging rights that they've won the 7th official YoYo Games competition!
by MATT CHELEN
GAME MAKER COMMUNITY — Picks of the Week is an article done by Matt where he informs you, the reader, of games and a tutorial that he's seen in the past week that he found interesting or fun enough that thought he you should know about them.
Insane Balancing On One Leg In Extremely High Places!
Insane Balancing On One Leg In Extremely High Places! is a game that is simple fun with flashy, colorful graphics. It consists entirely of balancing on one leg in high places, and having to adjust yourself as you get thrown back and forth, while simultaneously jumping to avoid thins such as birds and jumping sheep. The controls make it easy to pick up and play while the precision involved ensures that it is hard to master.
DarkVN
DarkVN is an interesting beast. It's a single-script port of VNDS to Game Maker 8.1 for intended use on Windows. So far, it's confirmed to be compatible with two VNDS powered visual novels, Clannad and Tsukihime, and it, along with its more advanced sibling, AngelVN, is continuing to receive post-release support from its author.
One to Watch - Legena: The New Dawn
Legena: The New Dawn has been in development for almost a year. In that time, it has slowly been shaping into a good-looking RPG. With SNES-inspired graphics, and an easy to use interface, it could easily put itself up there in Game Maker's best-of list sometime soon.
Tutorial of the Week - RGB CRT distortion effect
Having created one of the flashiest CRT effects I've ever seen, GMC user deluksic takes this week's Tutorial of the Week. It comes fully loaded with RGB phase shifting, shifty scan lines, and a faux TV glare.
by MATT CHELEN
GAME MAKER COMMUNITY — Next Friday, October 26th, 2012, will see the beginning of the Game Maker Community's eighth GMC Jam.
The theme has only barely been revealed as of yet, with the letter board currently consisting of nine spaces, the second of which is an "i", and the seventh of which is an "e".
There is quite a bit of speculation, and a bit of disappointment brought on by said speculation, that the theme will be "discovery." However, we will only know for sure once we get closer to the Jam's starting date.
by MATT CHELEN
YOYO GAMES — Along with the announcement of the Windows 8 export module, YoYo Games announced that through the rest of the 2012 calendar year, they are giving Game Maker 8.1 users a shocking fifty percent discount on Game Maker Studio's Standard and Professional editions, marking them down to $25 and $50, respectively.
by MATT CHELEN
YOYO GAMES — YoYo Games has just recently announced that everyone who currently owns Game Maker Studio Standard or Professional editions has access to a new export module made for Windows 8 Metro applications.
The new export will require users to download and install both Microsoft's .Net Framework 3.5 and Visual Studio to build for it.
by Bret Hudson
GAME MAKER COMMUNITY — NAL posted a video on debugging Innoquous 4 on his Xperia PLAY Android device via GameMaker:Studio! NakedPaulToast discovered the video and posted it on the GMC, and we've copied the embed video and put it here for your convenience.
by BRET HUDSON
GAME MAKER COMMUNITY — The fourth GMC Jam is coming up this weekend, starting Saturday at 00:01 GMT. The short jam will last for 72 hours (exactly 3 days). The theme has not been announced, but the hint is *A*S, with the stars representing letters we don't know yet. To keep updated on when it starts in your time zone, please redirect yourself to The GMC Clock.
GMC members are current voting on which method they are going to use for the jam judging method. If you'd like to participate, go to the official announcement topic.
