Game Maker is one of the most over-hyped game design software packages out there. In general, Game Maker is not recommended at all. It is slow, clunky, and the graphical drag and drop interface makes it confusing to use for noobs.

If you are just starting to learn to make games, you are better off with a game programming language like PlayBasic.

Pros and Cons

These pros and cons *really* need to be updated.

Pros

• Limited-feature free version very useful.
• Registered version cheap!
• Very easy to use and learn.
• Full game engine included.
• Active and helpful community.
• Very large amount of tutorials and examples available.
• There's a book for novices written by Game Maker's creator, Mark Overmars
• Visual level design.
• Sprite editor part of the IDE.

Cons

• Restricted to game engine, cannot start with an empty code window and start from scratch.
• 3D functions iffy.
• Array functions limited.
• Community full of immature teenagers (majority, not the rule).
• Large part of the community ignorant of programming and uses Drag and Drop actions instead.
• Unbelievable amount of clones made with Game Maker (1 Billion Zeldas made to date)
• Available for Microsoft Windows only (2000,XP, and up)
• Not compiled, slower than most game programming languages.

Related Pages

• Game Design Software
• Software

Versions

• Game Maker 6.1 ^GM
• Game Maker 7 ^GM

Similar To

• Construct
• Game Editor
• Unity - unity is geared towards 3D
• zGameEditor

Links

• Game Maker Wiki - our Game Maker wiki

Official Links

Official links need to be updated for the new yoyo games website.

• Game Maker Pages - official Game Maker website
• Game Maker Community - official Game Maker forum

Other

• Game Maker Games - An archive of game maker games.
• Game Maker Knowledgebase
• A page dedicated to Game Maker
• Game Maker - a basic introduction to Game Maker.