OUT NOW: GameMaker 2.3 – Simpler, Faster, More Powerful Game Development

Did you know that one of the world’s most popular game development tools is made in Scotland? GameMaker, enables developers to create games within a single code base and then publish them to run natively across almost every platform and device.

To date, it’s had over 10,000,000 downloads.

Now YoYo Games, the company behind the GameMaker has released GameMaker Studio 2 version 2.3 – the biggest update of the technology since the release of GameMaker Studio 2.

The update comes packed with a host of improvements to the GameMaker Language (GML) and Integrated Development Environment (IDE), alongside a raft of new features designed to make creating games as easy and accessible as possible.

One of the most anticipated new features is Sequences – an easy-to-use tool for adding sound and animation to visual assets. Used in conjunction with another new top-level feature, Animation Curves, Sequences enables artists to unleash their creativity to create dynamic animations and cut-scenes, all without needing a coder to change every pixel.

In addition to the streamlined new project format, the latest update also sees the Resource Tree replaced with the Asset Browser, in a significant IDE upgrade which offers developers a completely redesigned way to create, manage, tag and filter their assets.

GameMaker enables experienced and novice video game developers alike to create the games they imagine. GameMaker Studio 2 version 2.3 combines easy-to-use drag-and-drop tools, tutorials and game assets with the powerful GameMaker Language (GML) and advanced, professional functionality, like the physics engine, particles and advanced shaders.

Stuart Poole, the General Manager of YoYo Games, told SGN:

With version 2.3 of GameMaker we’ve not only changed the best practices for doing almost everything in GML, but with new features like Sequences and Animation Curve we’ve introduced incredibly powerful new tools which continue to open-up GameMaker Studio 2 to people who are less experienced with code and who prefer a more visual approach to making games.

This ability to synchronise audio and animation and invoke instances of it at any point through game logic is going to increasingly add a huge amount of polish to games, by giving content creators a very high level of control over how their designs are implemented within the game.

Several developers who were involved in the closed beta test, were impressed by the new, more powerful capabilities of 2.3

Developer JuJu Adams was particularly impressed by the new Asset Browser:

The biggest workflow improvement is ensuring merge conflicts in source control no longer require Bletchley Park to decrypt. That resources can be anywhere is a game-changer for many reasons, not least because you can communicate a lot of information about the underlying structure of a game just through your Asset Browser tree.

Sam Baylus from MashArcade said:

Developing cutscenes or complex animations may have been difficult before but has been streamlined tremendously with Sequences. With just a couple of keyframes, I’m able to see my animation come to life immediately and make small adjustments to get it just right,” s, adding: “Sequences allow me to work quickly, efficiently, and more intuitively than ever before and developers have only begun to scratch the surface of what Sequences is capable of.

Gurpreet Singh Matharoo is also excited by the potential of Sequences:

There is so much I like about v2.3, but Sequences outshines them all. There’s so much you can do with them. Animations and cutscenes are the obvious ones, but even GUI design, audio sequencing, template design (for example, pattern of incoming enemies in a space shooter game), and so much more that is yet to be discovered.

GameMaker Studio 2 can be purchased for Windows desktop, Mac OS X, Ubuntu, Android, iOS, Amazon Fire, Microsoft UWP, HTML5, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One, starting from $39.