[HN Gopher] GameMaker to be free for non-commercial purposes and...
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GameMaker to be free for non-commercial purposes and have one-time
fee license
Author : flykespice
Score : 179 points
Date : 2023-11-21 14:43 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (gamemaker.io)
(TXT) w3m dump (gamemaker.io)
| geiagal wrote:
| This company changes their licensing terms every three years or
| so. This is the same deal that Game Maker Studio 1.4 was licensed
| under, then they brought out a subscription model for GMS 2 with
| no free tier. It's hard to take them at their word and have faith
| that there will really be a full-features free version "from now
| on."
| wilsonnb3 wrote:
| They've been bought and sold a few times which is probably
| related to the licensing changes.
|
| Currently owned by Opera since 2021.
| rollcat wrote:
| I wonder if there's anything like a "rug-pull-proof"
| licensing/development model. Even AGPL is not a guarantee, if a
| single entity owns the copyright to the entire project (through
| CLAs), and decides to switch to BSL, and has enough influence
| to make forks irrelevant.
|
| I think Linux's model is the strongest: individual contributors
| retain copyright, and there are enough individual copyright
| holders to make relicensing insanely difficult. Coupled with
| the project's pace (and the pace at which they change the
| internal APIs) it basically provides such a guarantee. Most
| projects however are less successful and the users/downstream
| developers can't count on momentum as the safeguard.
| iudqnolq wrote:
| A project could always be abandoned, there's no way to
| guarantee perpetual labor on your behalf.
| falcor84 wrote:
| What does this have to do with the preceding argument? Yes,
| the company could abandon the project, but the concern here
| is about them taking all the previous work (including
| volunteer contributions) and proceeding with a more
| restrictive commercial license; that's what we want to
| prevent.
| asalahli wrote:
| > the concern here is about them taking all the previous
| work
|
| Not unless they retroactively change the license on said
| previous work, which I'm pretty sure they cannot.
| falcor84 wrote:
| I haven't looked into GameMaker's license specifically,
| but many projects require a copyright assignment as part
| of their contributor license agreement.
| zem wrote:
| that allows relicensing of the combined work moving
| forward, not retroactive relicensing of already released
| code.
| falcor84 wrote:
| That's indeed what I meant, apologies if I was unclear.
| josephcsible wrote:
| Nobody wants to guarantee perpetual future labor. The
| guarantee we want is that _if_ there 's future labor, then
| we want the fruits of it to remain FOSS.
| rollcat wrote:
| The concern is not about free labor, the concern is that
| the product I'm building might get killed by vendor
| deciding to just fuck me over. Whether the software is free
| (as in beer or freedom) or not is a secondary concern - I'm
| merely noting that even a license as strong as AGPL is not
| a guarantee that I won't get fucked.
| OkayPhysicist wrote:
| It is, though? All that is required is that you're
| allowed to maintain your own fork. Which is guaranteed to
| you, in perpetuity, by the AGPL.
| EarlKing wrote:
| There is. It's called Pay The Author. If you don't have a
| bare license conditioned on someone's pinky promise, but
| rather you pay the author and thereby perfect that promise
| into an actual, enforceable contract, then when someone
| attempts a rug-pull you can actually file suit to enforce
| your legal rights. Simple as.
| TheRealPomax wrote:
| That's the nice thing about a one-time license fee: whether
| they maintain that license "from now on" is basically
| irrelevant. There is only "for the version you bought". They
| can change their license all they want in the future, that one-
| time fee license will forever be valid for the specific version
| you were willing to pay for.
|
| It's why some folks are still using Photoshop CS6.
| ajdude wrote:
| I actively use game maker and as much as I love it, I really
| got screwed over by this.
|
| I bought game maker studio version 1 for mobile and paid a
| great deal of money for it, it was shortly before they
| released the new version of 2.0 with the new model and then
| android dropped support for 32 bit mobile applications. I was
| unable to build my android apps moving forward because 1.0
| never supported 64bit while 2.0 did.
|
| It took me a bit to finally come around to using the engine
| again (I currently pay the monthly fee as I develop my game)
| CodesInChaos wrote:
| Pixel images are stable enough that they remain usable
| forever. Windows is a relatively stable platform as well, so
| not updating your development tools mostly works there. But
| on mobile there are too many breaking changes and updated
| store requirements for that to work for long.
| heywhatupboys wrote:
| can you get gamemaker 8 legally somehow?
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| I've wanted to make a game for a while now as a side project; but
| art styling matters immensely to me - more than the gameplay
| itself, honestly. I feel like I need to become a good artist
| first...
| Kye wrote:
| I bought this on the strength of the main instructor's concept
| art course[0]: https://www.humblebundle.com/software/learn-to-
| create-game-a...
|
| [0] I'm halfway through and have made more progress in a week
| than in a lifetime of false starts (complete with Black Friday
| coupon):
| https://www.gamedev.tv/courses/1289989?coupon_code=YIPPEE
| cloudking wrote:
| There are so many generative AI tools for creating game assets
| now, you don't really need to become a good artist.
|
| https://www.scenario.com/
|
| https://www.rosebud.ai/ai-game-assets
|
| https://www.layer.ai/
|
| Coming soon https://unity.com/products/muse
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| True; but other indie gamers would never forgive me because
| it's seen as plagiarism.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Ignore them.
| tensor wrote:
| What are some of your favourites?
| warent wrote:
| I've been using https://cascadeur.com/ to animate the
| models that I hire artists to make
| noodlenotes wrote:
| What are the best tools for commercial use? I've been using
| Midjourney for some stand-in assets, but I haven't researched
| the license implications.
| joshstrange wrote:
| That only really works if there is a way to keep all the
| generated art in the same "genre" (aka looking similar). Most
| tools I've used create completely different outputs on each
| run and trying to subtly tweak something is difficult.
| ghqst wrote:
| While I wouldn't personally use them, that appears to be
| the point of all three of the services he listed.
| joshstrange wrote:
| I think they added those links later, IIRC the comment
| was just the first line of text when I replied but that's
| interesting for sure.
| zachrip wrote:
| Can we share a few resources for these?
| cloudking wrote:
| Updated comment with examples
| kdfjgbdfkjgb wrote:
| but you'll be banned from Steam
| duxup wrote:
| How does this work exactly?
|
| Every time I've played with AI generated art it's like
| rolling the dice for any given image or single peace.
|
| Then I ask for another, and I get something completely
| different that would never fit with the first piece...
|
| A game requires some level of consistency across the assets.
| HumblyTossed wrote:
| > How does this work exactly?
|
| AI> Design me some game graphics that look similar to Mario
| Bros, except instead of the main character being a plumber,
| make him an electrician and instead of having a brother who
| is a plumber also, give him a sister who sells stuff on
| Etsy.
| duxup wrote:
| Even if that gives me a baseline, then what? If I want
| more I find I get something out of left field. The non-
| deterministic nature of AI makes it kinda hard to iterate
| all assets right?
| Taylor_OD wrote:
| Well it takes some work to get something you like...
|
| But prompting with things like, "Return all future images
| for this chat in the style of x" help.
|
| You're not just going to be able to say, "Create all my
| artwork for my game" but prompting and honing in on
| something is easier, imo, than learning how to create
| that artwork yourself.
|
| If you do something like pixel art, you can also get a
| rough draft from dalle then do some editing yourself.
| Again, it isnt doing everything for you but its
| significantly easier and faster than learning how to be
| an artist yourself.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| Generative AI is not non-deterministic, it is just
| chaotic. (That is, small changes to input may have large
| and hard to predict changes in output.)
|
| OTOH, there are lots and lots of tools to improve
| controllability. Still, though, tricky for most game
| assets (though inprovements are being made by leaps and
| bounds) beyond static illustrations/icons.
| jstarfish wrote:
| ControlNet lets you direct posing, for starters.
| broken_clock wrote:
| Those are just frontends on top of Stable Diffusion. They
| won't provide what you need for a game - the results aren't
| animatable or rigable.
| warent wrote:
| If you have the money for it, you should really consider hiring
| a contract artist to supplement your gaps.
|
| A concept artist and a 3D modeling artist altogether will cost
| like $3000 for 1 fully complete character that fits your
| vision. For 2D probably a lot cheaper.
|
| For me, $3000 is worth the months/yrs of saved time.
|
| Of course if you are having fun learning the art side and don't
| care about the destination as much then ignore this and have
| fun with it! If you practice every day for a year you'll
| probably start getting close to what you invision.
|
| EDIT: I'll also add that it's possible most of the aesthetic
| you're looking for can be achieved via shaders (for both 3D and
| 2D games). A lot of art looks very different in-game because of
| shaders doing all kinds of manipulations.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| They could start with stick figures and placeholder graphics
| to communicate the idea, then level up; a great example of
| this iterative approach is Factorio, which redid some of its
| graphics and graphics pipelines over the years, starting off
| with basically MS Paint style graphics, then moving to a
| detailed 3D model transformed to 2D sprites pipeline.
|
| Then there's the Kingdom of Loathing games that never moved
| on from shitty Paint drawings, lol.
| aethertron wrote:
| Find that good artist then either:
|
| 1. pay them to make art for the game you want to make, or
|
| 2. work with them for free to make the game they want to make.
|
| Good luck.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| there's an artist out there that probably has the opposite
| problem, this is how many games are made
| rychco wrote:
| Like many others, I had (appropriately) written off gamemaker
| entirely as soon as they changed to a subscription model. It was
| always a solid choice for making games, so I'm glad to see that
| it might be worth using again.
| charcircuit wrote:
| Of $100. This is quite steep compared to when the pro version
| only costed $20. I don't think the lite version prohibited
| commercial use either, it was just limited in what it could do.
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| Who needs game maker when we have godot, etc?
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| Different strokes for different folks. It's like asking why we
| need PowerPoint when we've got LibreOffice.
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| LibreOffice is a substandard imitation. Godot is more
| powerful than Gamemaker. It can do anything Gamemaker can do
| and it's free.
| nacs wrote:
| Godot is definitely far more powerful but it has a higher
| learning curve.
|
| Gamemaker is far easier for beginners who are making that
| Gamemaker type of game (typically top-down, pixel-art for
| graphics, etc).
| pipeline_peak wrote:
| That is true. It's just an unfortunate that GameMaker is
| the one of the that isn't open source
| nottorp wrote:
| That is the problem actually. You don't always need
| powerful.
| wilsonnb3 wrote:
| people who want console support without paying a third party
| company to port their game, for starters
| riffruff24 wrote:
| True, you pay them instead of Godot. Unless your third party
| company is w4games, then you're just paying godot with extra
| steps.
| bogwog wrote:
| Who needs Vue when we have React? Who needs Javascript when we
| have Typescript? Who needs MariaDB when we have MySQL? Who
| needs Docker when we have Podman? Who needs Burger King when we
| have McDonalds? Who needs Wish.com when we have Amazon?
|
| ...
| anthk wrote:
| MariaDB is MySQL.
| Y_Y wrote:
| #notmysql
| beretguy wrote:
| Who needs Java when we have C#?
| sproketboy wrote:
| Who needs C#? Nobody.
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| Who needs Python when we have machine code?
| tomschwiha wrote:
| Who needs programmers when we have GPT?
| josephcsible wrote:
| The point is that this is still proprietary, but we already
| have FOSS that does the same thing. Who needs AIX and HP-UX
| when we have Linux and BSD? Who needs leaded gas when we have
| unleaded gas?
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| Who needs Lego when you can buy a welder in a supermarket?
| qbrass wrote:
| Not I
| jessepasley wrote:
| Can Godot export to mobile/console/etc easily?
| madjam002 wrote:
| Last time I used Game Maker was just before they got acquired by
| YoYoGames, it actually inspired me to learn programming along
| with Roblox (early 2007).
|
| It's cool to see how it's still going!
| Dudester230602 wrote:
| A lot of old things from 90s are still going surprisingly
| strong - Python, JavaScript, Java etc.
| xur17 wrote:
| Agreed! I'm assuming this is the same gamemaker I used back in
| highschool (~2004), which is what got me into programming in
| the first place.
| ruuda wrote:
| Game Maker was how I got into programming in the early 2000s!
| Looking at the website now, it looks very different today, but
| the core is still there.
| Ajedi32 wrote:
| Wow, I followed that exact same path! First GameMaker, then I
| moved on to Roblox later, and now programming is part of my
| job!
|
| I think I might still have some of the old .exe files for the
| games I made back in the day...
| daviddoran wrote:
| Same! I created numerous games with early GameMaker as a pre-
| teen. I even managed to use it for making various useful little
| programs, like an interactive calculator to show my Dad's
| company that the bandwidth required for multiple security
| cameras would eat up all the bandwidth available on the
| relatively slow internet connections. It definitely had an
| enormous positive effect on my career in software.
| HumblyTossed wrote:
| Every time I see GameMaker, I think Gary Kitchen's GameMaker.
| Ahhh... Good times.
| lxe wrote:
| I believe this is the "same" GameMaker I built my first game when
| I was 13 back in 2001 or 2002.
| matsemann wrote:
| For me I think it was version 5 in 2003
| https://gamemaker.fandom.com/wiki/Version_5
|
| At least the screenshot tingles something in the brain.
| famahar wrote:
| Same. I was so active in the legacy forums before YoYo games
| deleted it all. I found an archive of the old forums on
| archive.org and I'm extracting the folder as I write this
| (process has been taking over an hour so far and it's only
| halfway). So far it seems to be almost 60GB of information. I
| thought it would just be text, but I guess it's that plus all
| the images. I can't wait to see what 10 year old me was up to
| back then. It's been 20 years.
| heywhatupboys wrote:
| are you talking about gmshowcase.dk ? The site YoYo games
| literally pulled from existence to become their own "half
| baked" showcase?
| dylanjcastillo wrote:
| Me too! I started programming because of Game Maker.
|
| I lost all the games I did. I wished I had saved them
| somewhere.
| bossyTeacher wrote:
| Probably only doing it because competition. They had the chance
| to do it +20 years ago
| a1o wrote:
| I would be curious if someone with Game Maker experience could
| try Adventure Game Studio and report what did they think of it
| what is to like and what isn't, what is good and what is bad.
| conorcleary wrote:
| Many thanks to Mark Overmars for the development of GM, it was a
| core part of my toolkit in the early 2000's and introduced me to
| offline programming.
| mollerhoj wrote:
| I made superslimesoccer.io with game maker back in the day, still
| going strong with 1000s of daily visitors
| sirwhinesalot wrote:
| This is nice but they really need to fix their new UI, it's a
| mess. The sprite editor is lovely but the multi-window layout is
| needlessly confusing, it's extremely cumbersome to edit code in
| drag-and-drop compared to the old studio 1 UI, and it's extremely
| unstable, with regular "game maker has become unstable, please
| save your work and restart" messages.
|
| I'd sooner pay 50 euros for Game Maker with a stable, simpler UI
| than 0 for the current one.
| adamrezich wrote:
| neat, too bad my Game Maker 5 license won't qualify though. still
| kinda salty it didn't transfer over when YoYo bought it out.
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