Game Maker

[Lucifer]

Heyas,

My sister is very interested in coding/creating games, I've been taking programming classes with her at my community college and she's very talented at it. She recently started poking around with Game Maker, and I was curious if any of ya'll know of any good up-to-date tutorials &/or tips/tricks to help her out, or if there's a better/easier program you'd recommend for learning coding/creating games.

Thanks!

[T-Rok]

Game Maker is really bad for teaching bad habits when it comes to programming, so be careful when it comes to that. As for tutorials, the best ones you'll find are probably on the GMC itself. I personally found it was more of a pick out something you want to create, and then when you're absolutely stuck look up a tutorial.

[11clock]

Game Maker is really bad for teaching bad habits when it comes to programming, so be careful when it comes to that. As for tutorials, the best ones you'll find are probably on the GMC itself. I personally found it was more of a pick out something you want to create, and then when you're absolutely stuck look up a tutorial.

Yeah, Game Maker is very flexible with how you do things, which can lead to bad habits. For example, I never place semicolons and place my if statements in parenthesis. :P

However, it's a very good program. Just know that to take full use of it, do not use its D&D functions. These should only be used by beginners who are new to game design. Use Game Maker's GML language, which is similar to Java.

Also, make good use of the GMC. They're very helpful.

EDIT: I would like to point out some games that were made in Game Maker, to show off its capabilities.

Hotline Miami
Spelunky

[Mr Pwnage]

It's a great program to get your interest sparked in the field, but even the new expensive studio versions have horribly optimized compilation methods and produce software with massive memory leaks. If you two are already taking programming courses you should probably just try to make games in C or another familiar language. C++ is virtually for just making games. However if your fixed on game maker like somebody above said, GMC has a lot. If you need a tutorial on how to do a specific thing I may be able to help you out if you want to message me on MSN. Cheers!

[11clock]

It's a great program to get your interest sparked in the field, but even the new expensive studio versions have horribly optimized compilation methods and produce software with massive memory leaks. If you two are already taking programming courses you should probably just try to make games in C or another familiar language. C++ is virtually for just making games. However if your fixed on game maker like somebody above said, GMC has a lot. If you need a tutorial on how to do a specific thing I may be able to help you out if you want to message me on MSN. Cheers!

Wait, what memory leaks? None of my games have ever had memory problems.

[krele]

It's a great program to get your interest sparked in the field, but even the new expensive studio versions have horribly optimized compilation methods and produce software with massive memory leaks. If you two are already taking programming courses you should probably just try to make games in C or another familiar language. C++ is virtually for just making games. However if your fixed on game maker like somebody above said, GMC has a lot. If you need a tutorial on how to do a specific thing I may be able to help you out if you want to message me on MSN. Cheers!

Wait, what memory leaks? None of my games have ever had memory problems.

Yes, I also think he's talking out of his ass.
Even though I only played with it for around 3 hours I can say it's much more optimized than it was before.

[ARTgames]

Game maker is an easy way to make 2D games. And has good flexibility so you can do what you want. But its not really something I would take too seriously. If you want other suggestions look into ms visual studios with XNA. Or just C++ in general and use SDL. Those two options are more like what happens in the real world. There are many other ways to go about this but thats a start.

[Scotty]

If you want other suggestions look into ms visual studios with XNA. Or just C++ in general and use SDL. 

Or, if you want to do something real slick and impress the hell outta people, look into the HTML5 <canvas> element.  Then if you want to impress people even further, port it to native mobile apps using PhoneGap.

[ARTgames]

I'm not sure if you really are going to impress anyone with a web app or phone app considering its quite normal nowadays but its also its a good idea also to learn that stuff. I mean It could be impressive if you tell the person you made it. Anyway the higher end GM has an export to HTML 5 or IOS etc. But there are more cost effective and powerful ways of going about it without GM. And for simpler projects its a better rout to take. It also has real world value with it being hot stuff right now and can lead to a jobs or hell start your own business. It just matters what you are interested in. And there is nothing stopping you from learning it all.