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GameMaker Have you *officially* moved over to GM2 yet?

Mike

nobody important
GMC Elder
I like GMS2 better overall even though I agree with a lot of bad UX points mentioned. I love the tabs for example! I really wish the compile window wouldn't pop up all the time! I constantly have to pop it away after testing so I can get more screen to work with
Look in "General Settings -> Compiling". There is a stack of options in there including "Show the compile window during compilation" - which you can disable if you like. :)
 
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FormalCloud

Guest
Take it from me, *scour* GameMaker's settings because every time I had a request, Mike or Russell pointed out it was already a feature lol. The customization in this software is pretty dense and it can be overwhelming but there are a ton of tricks and options in there.

I got tired of feeling like a dummy. :D
 

kupo15

Member
Look in "General Settings -> Compiling". There is a stack of options in there including "Show the compile window during compilation" - which you can disable if you like. :)
Sweet thanks Mike! Should have know you guys had that covered! :)
 
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FormalCloud

Guest
We have a long term "wish" item for searching of preferences. We know it can be tricky finding "this" or "that" option. one day....
This sounds like a great reason for a short youtube series going over the options, especially for people transitioning from GMS1.x where the IDE itself was so limited. People may not be aware of the 'scope' of customization and all the work you folks have put into it.

Paging @ShaunJS ;)
 
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FormalCloud

Guest
Well, we can page whoever - if I had the time I would gladly do my part. Respect to whomever takes up this task if they do.
 
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thaaks

Guest
I find this curious as I always felt it defeats the purpose of a single code base for multi-exports, no? Do you find it tedious to work on code on one project only to copy over to another branch and modify?

Perhaps I am doing it 'wrong' (To each their own of course) but I use GML's platform detection to make those adjustments based on the target platform (and this code base is great so it's usually not much) which usually turns out to be a few extra lines for compatibility vs duplicated branches of the same game. This way I only have to worry about one save file and one set to manage.
My bad, it was just a bad example. Of course having a single code base for cross platform export for a game is the proper way.

But for example I have a HTML5 game without nice GUI functionality. I have bought an asset which does that. But I also already extended this asset massively in another (mobile) game. I can't move my changes to the asset because it is a bought one and I'm not in control of it. I would have to be able to create my own personal GUI asset including my enhancements. Ideally by extracting/filecopying it from the second game which already has all of it. But I can't with GMS2.
I also cannot create a new project, load the original asset, add my enhancements, store that in a private asset and finally load it into my HTML5 game.
Even with some starter project I would be stuck because the HTML5 game was a LDJAM game in solo mode where I could not use any bought assets at all because I have to release the source code...so the only solution would be to start a new project with my starter project and merge the HTML5 game code and graphics and sounds back in which is also tedious and cumbersome...

Does that explain my issues better? I'm so open for any advice how to deal with that ;-)
 
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FormalCloud

Guest
Asset management/personal libs would def help ease that of course but I think when you're building libraries on top of libraries you're always gonna have the flip/flop you speak of there. It's just par for the course unless you flat out write your own library into one - which would be the ideal case here.

My only suggestion would be to try and plan that better in the future because in this same instance my decision would be to start working on a single set of supporting library functions to said extension on it's own once I knew I was extending it, then save those into a single folder so that I could easily import and continue working off that without feeling the need to have several versions.

I've run into this type of problem before when working with extensions and had to take the time to go back through and create 'wrapper libraries' if you would so that everything was easier to use on future projects.

I do have a better understanding of your situation though, thanks for explaining to me. :)
 
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Ninjinister

Guest
At this point, I don't have a reason to. Or the funds.
I don't even know what GMS2 would offer me personally as of this writing, that I could benefit from (keep in mind this is a me personally thing versus what others might find beneficial.)
If GMS2 gets something that I absolutely need, or the publishing modules for GMS1 stop being usable altogether, I'll have to eventually (for the latter it would be begrudgingly). But I can't see myself buying something, especially one that requires monthly subscriptions for the things I'll need, when I can barely afford rent sometimes.
 

rIKmAN

Member
At this point, I don't have a reason to. Or the funds.
I don't even know what GMS2 would offer me personally as of this writing, that I could benefit from
You should probably do some research then and find out if any of the new features would benefit you.
But I can't see myself buying something, especially one that requires monthly subscriptions for the things I'll need, when I can barely afford rent sometimes.
None of the GMS2 modules require a monthly subscription - the closest thing to that is the Creators Edition (12mth licence for $39) and the console modules (paid yearly) - but yeah I agree if you are struggling to pay rent then buying game dev software should be the least of your worries.
 
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Ninjinister

Guest
You should probably do some research then and find out if any of the new features would benefit you.

None of the GMS2 modules require a monthly subscription - the closest thing to that is the Creators Edition (12mth licence for $39) and the console modules (paid yearly) - but yeah I agree if you are struggling to pay rent then buying game dev software should be the least of your worries.
I probably meant yearly.
 
Good to see a lot of people making the jump but I have a lot of the same reservations a lot of these people have.

Honestly I would've been fine with paying a legacy support fee to stay on 1.4...but oh well!
 

rIKmAN

Member
Good to see a lot of people making the jump but I have a lot of the same reservations a lot of these people have.

Honestly I would've been fine with paying a legacy support fee to stay on 1.4...but oh well!
What are your reservations?

Genuine question because I don't understand people wanting to cling onto 1.4 other than through it being familiar and what people are used to.
It's so clunky compared to GMS2 that going back to it feels like going back in time to the 90's.

The only ones I can understand are using low spec hardware (non-DX11), and having a low screen resolution which makes using GMS2 harder than it should be.
For everything else it's better in every single way once you give it a chance and are open to getting used to it.

I hated it for 2wks when I first started using it, and now I'm used to it I could never go back to 1.4.
 
What are your reservations?

Genuine question because I don't understand people wanting to cling onto 1.4 other than through it being familiar and what people are used to.
It's so clunky compared to GMS2 that going back to it feels like going back in time to the 90's.

The only ones I can understand are using low spec hardware (non-DX11), and having a low screen resolution which makes using GMS2 harder than it should be.
For everything else it's better in every single way once you give it a chance and are open to getting used to it.

I hated it for 2wks when I first started using it, and now I'm used to it I could never go back to 1.4.

As someone who'd had to upgrade other pieces of software recently it's just annoying to have to refamioiarize myself with the new elements...it's a waste of time IMO (I'm sure there's additional features that would be useful, but I could literally do EVERYTHING I needed with the existing gamemaker so why the hell change?) Also I'm not too happy about buying everything new when I already had purchased the master edition.

I get that's how software management works, YoYo still has to make money since there's ongoing updates to make, but it's still frustrating.
 
Alright, so a few days ago, I learned that GMS2 became temporarily free, so I decided to take the plunge. Within minutes, I was hooked! I've seen many screenshots and livestreams displaying the program in use, but actually using it myself was a whole different story. The one-click chained windows, the transitions, the sole GML use, the workspaces, labelled events, tabs holding all the events (a feature I never used/properly understood in prior versions), code-folding, auto-complete for every variable and resource (which was a big surprise, especially for included files!), and a bunch of other things in addition to just how cool everything looks really won me over. I was always satisfied with how all the older versions of GM worked as it's been years since I've actually coded in other languages so this is basically all I know, but using GMS2, even within the first hour, instantly changed how I look at programming my FPS. I went back to GM:S1 for a bit just to see the difference, and it made me feel like I discovered I had Stockholm Syndrome all these years. I gave the new IDE a nice, slightly blurred picture of an Aventador to serve as both a gorgeous backdrop and as inspiration, and it's made the experience even more enjoyable. I look forward to learning more about the IDE and new functions to help better my production and my game.

One of the only things I don't like isn't a fault of the program itself, but the compatibility scripts. A couple of the D3D scripts don't properly work and I had to focus my attention on fixing them or finding workarounds until I will properly replace them all in the future. Apart from that, the import process was problem-free and I only had to remove a few DX9 shaders just to get the game up and running again.There was a bit of annoyance having to go through literally every piece of text being drawn to remove the string_hash_to_newline() function that was added; it would have been nice if the import process scanned the strings instead of just throwing it at every draw function's text argument, even if it meant stragglers due to variable usage. I am also not too fond of the necessity of things like @description and @param as I feel it makes scripts look a little bit messier compared to GM:S1, but it's not that big of a deal. My frame rate did take a nose dive of around a few hundred frames on average during gameplay, but so far it's hard to say whether that's down to issues with the program or my coding (some aspects of my game are definitely still far from being optimized). There is a bit of honeymoon phase going on and I'm sure I'll discover some more things I don't like as time goes on, but I can't see anything altering my viewpoint or my need of this new version.

Once the trial is up, I easily will be making a purchase. Usually, I wait for major sales before buying a new version, but this is too good to have to go back to 1.4 until one pops up, and the current sale price isn't bad at all, even if it will easily be the most money I've ever spent on a GM product. GMS2 gave me the same excitement my mechanical keyboard did when I finally switched over after decades of rubber membranes. YYG really made me happy with this one!
 

JeffJ

Member
For everything else it's better in every single way once you give it a chance and are open to getting used to it.
Simply not true. Go back to page 3 in this very topic - I literally mention more than 12 examples of how it is objectively worse. Many of which are actually costing me time and annoying me on a daily basis where GMS1 is objectively faster and better. For example, it is downright ridiculous that I need to temporarily paste code into notepad or similar just do basic search/replace operations, simply because it is utterly broken in GMS2. Something as rudimentary as this. Oh yeah and, search & replace is of course in lieu of actual refactoring, because... Well, it doesn't exist.

For me personally, even if all the things I mentioned (including that which I may no longer speak of, which is actually a pretty big thing for me) were remedied this instant, I would still see GMS2 as being basically on par with GMS1 - with the absolute only exceptions being code folding and custom variable recognition in auto complete. Those two things I would miss. And obviously Switch support, but that's not really a GMS2 IDE thing.

Potentially GMS2 could become superior, but right now it actually feels like a beta, with the most basic of things that works fine in GMS1 either being gone or broken. Right now, there is a long way for GMS2 to be as good as GMS1 - and then we can start talking about how to actually make it better.

I really want to like it, I am forcing myself to use it every single day and have been for several months now. But it simply is worse in more than a dozen ways, and the few advantages are not nearly enough to outweigh the many disadvantages.
 
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GMS2 has Switch support, auto-complete (kind of), a better room editor, and a nicer look and feel than GMS1. Everything else about it....ehhhhhhh. Hit and miss for me. The main workflow is actually worse than GMS1's to me, so far.

I haven't really coded anything in it yet, but whenever I do, I find myself missing GMS1...I liked having multiple code blocks, and GMS2's IDE feels like it's overly complicated sometimes. I dunno.

Edit: Just reading through the thread though, I've already found a few tips that'll improve my workflow in GMS2. A lot of the things I dislike about the program might just be me not knowing about all GMS2's options, yet. Can't really give a fair comparison until I've spent more time with it, I guess.
 
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rIKmAN

Member
Simply not true. Go back to page 3 in this very topic - I literally mention more than 12 examples of how it is objectively worse. Many of which are actually costing me time and annoying me on a daily basis where GMS1 is objectively faster and better. For example, it is downright ridiculous that I need to temporarily paste code into notepad or similar just do basic search/replace operations, simply because it is utterly broken in GMS2. Something as rudimentary as this. Oh yeah and, search & replace is of course in lieu of actual refactoring, because... Well, it doesn't exist.

For me personally, even if all the things I mentioned (including that which I may no longer speak of, which is actually a pretty big thing for me) were remedied this instant, I would still see GMS2 as being basically on par with GMS1 - with the absolute only exceptions being code folding and custom variable recognition in auto complete. Those two things I would miss. And obviously Switch support, but that's not really a GMS2 IDE thing.

Potentially GMS2 could become superior, but right now it actually feels like a beta, with the most basic of things that works fine in GMS1 either being gone or broken. Right now, there is a long way for GMS2 to be as good as GMS1 - and then we can start talking about how to actually make it better.

I really want to like it, I am forcing myself to use it every single day and have been for several months now. But it simply is worse in more than a dozen ways, and the few advantages are not nearly enough to outweigh the many disadvantages.
I already read your post on page 3, and while I agree with some of your points (search/replace, the manual search / navigation) most of the things that annoy you are things that others wouldn't even notice (line numbers, argument highlighting, ignore comment) but can be fixed / added as preferences easily enough and aren't going to be massive time sinks in terms of adding the features - and are probably already in the bug database but marked as low priority for that reason

That doesn't excuse the time it's taken for them to still not be added of course, but there are things more important than some of those you listed which mean they are at the bottom of a very long list - I've had to deal with the same frustration with Spine support, which is arguably more important than how function arguments get highlighted or whether comments get searched or not.

I did generalise a bit with my previous post which was a mistake, as a lot of the things people dislike about it are subjective and depend on the games people are making (maybe someone doesn't see the benefits of the new room editor or layering system because they don't use them) but in terms of a solid framework to build upon going forward it's pretty obvious to me that GMS2 is a much more stable platform to enable this than to keep trying to pile features onto an old creaking 1.4 written in Delphi, or to attempt to remake 1.4 using C#.

Again it's subjective, but I don't understand how anyone can prefer 1.4 over 2.x for any other reason than an ingrained habit and being reluctant to change what they know.
Grass is greener and all that - and again that's even subjective with the workspaces: some love it, some hate it for various reason, that's software.

At the end of the day nobody is being forced to upgrade, people are fine to stick with 1.4 for as long as it lasts after sunset, but YYG are a company and have to make money and GMS2 is (IMO) a massive step up in every regard in terms of the IDE and is something that can be built and expanded on for a long time.

I do agree it's frustrating waiting for things to be added (that should really already be in and work a year after release), but I commented my thoughts on the update timescale in another thread so won't regurgitate it here.
 

Dr. Wolf

Member
Again it's subjective, but I don't understand how anyone can prefer 1.4 over 2.x for any other reason than an ingrained habit and being reluctant to change what they know.
Different people have different needs, in terms of what makes them happiest and most productive.

Personally, I found that the GMS1 IDE made a good overall first impression (though not flawless), even before I had a chance to develop any habits for using it. GMS2, on the other hand, I hated instantly. When I saw the extensive options menu, I started to hope that I could configure it to work properly, but, even after spending hours and hours going through the options menu in a methodical fashion, I was unable to find any configuration that made the experience appreciably less infuriating. Since then, every few weeks or so, I've forced myself to open it up and try it again, in case either a) something has changed, or b) it starts to get better with familiarity and knowledge of shortcuts, but it has not improved. The moment I decide that I'm done with a session of forcing myself to use GMS2, I ragequit and go back to GMS1. I'm having to rethink my plans in terms of whether I migrate my own projects and where I focus my skills as a developer in the longer term in light of how much less productive I am in GMS2 and how it affects my blood pressure.

The impression that I get from GMS2 right now is that there's some kind of basic philosophical conflict between the way GMS2 is designed and what I look for an IDE. GMS2 is like having an assistant who rearranges the papers on your desk to keep things organized; either he moves things around to keep them lined up neatly (workspaces and/or columns), he puts things under other things to make a neat stack in front of you (full-screen tabs), or he moves things under your desk to keep them out of the way when you're not using them (pop-out windows). There are tons of options to change how he arranges things, and a few that can make him ever so slightly less aggressive, but even the "messiest" settings are nowhere near what you want when you're the kind of person, like me, who hates it when other people touch their papers.

The usage method that's closest to being OK, for me, is the pop-out windows, but it just needs the options I mentioned earlier to be all the way there: a) "Open in new window", so you don't have to start with a full-screen tab and then drag it free, and b) "Keep windows in front", to solve the papers-under-the-desk issue (where clicking within the IDE's base layer to open a new tab moves the base layer in front of existing pop-out windows).
 

rIKmAN

Member
Different people have different needs, in terms of what makes them happiest and most productive.
I completely understand that, but I still can't get my head around anyone preferring 1.4 over 2.x.
"I just cannae do it Captain!" :)

I guess I just don't feel like double clicking items in the resource tree to have "the assistant" auto pan / zoom the workspace to show you the exact piece of "paper" you want to see in the centre of the "desk" is not so different that it feels alien to 1.4 users having windows on windows on windows and having to sort through them and manually deal with them. Throw in some "must close" modal windows for good measure too.

From reading others posts on the forum regarding workspaces / usage, it seems like people are trying to use it in a way that isn't optimal for the way it's designed - that is trying to manually pan and zoom around the workspace themselves, remember window locations, closing windows to "make room" whilst doing this etc.

Maybe YYG did design it with people manually moving around the workspace, but in practice it doesn't work very well and so other methods to use them have to be found.
Just let the IDE do all that for you and use the resource tree, recent windows (I have it docked under the resource tree) and CTRL+T (which I use much less) to tell it where to go.

I think of it like a sat-nav, I never manually navigate the workspace (maybe slightly up or down if things are next to each other), and I let the "assistant" take me to wherever that piece of paper is on my messy untouched desk.

As I said I disliked it at first too, but gave it some time and managed to find a way to use it which I find much better than 1.4, and not perfect either - but nowhere near as bad as some of the experiences I see people having trouble with on here.

There is no way every single person is going to like it (as is such with everything in life) but there are definitely things that can be done to mitigate each individuals annoyances to try and minimise them, which ultimately is the only thing that can be done right now other than looking into other options, which would be a shame.
 
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G

Guest User

Guest
I've been pondering on gms2 for a long time now, I will admit I prefer the UI of 1.4 and I hate the workspace in 2 (it seems so very cluttered on a single 1080p monitor)
but I've been trying to force myself to use it over the past few days (thanks to the full version unlock until the 30th) and now I'm close to putting the buy button.

I just have two issues

1: is there a way of getting rid of that data.win file it keeps creating. I want a single .exe file.

2: if I buy the standalone version, do I get a steam key? (I would buy it on steam but its Ā£25 more on there!!
 

Erayd

Member
First off I want to say that I love GMS2 quite a bit. I have already written and published a game on the android play store using this IDE and have been actively refactoring an older much more complex game of mine from a few years back. I've learned a lot since I wrote the code for that game and the game worked, but I couldn't manage it. So I decided to go back and do a complete refactoring of every line of code and really think about all the little things I glazed over in the past like how best to make a blinking selector rectangle in a shop.

I have put thousands of hours in to GMS1.4 and I think 2 is a much needed upgrade. For me, I can now work faster and use a lot of shortcut functions that just weren't in GM1.4. I'm thinking about the ability to drag windows and create whole new windows on another monitor, less distracting green in the background, easier to find resources, easier to navigate my workspace, code folding, the debug tool, I'm sure I could go on for a while. I know some of these that I mentioned were in the other version but I feel they were done much better this time.

Now to why I quoted Jeff, I notice you say search and replace refactoring is broken. What do you mean? I've been using it like crazy as I sifted through thousands of badly written code I mentioned above. The only bug I see is that sometimes it doesn't scroll the page correctly to the next search object every time and it doesn't auto update if you delete a word as it only highlights the spaces the word you found existed in.

I wish I could search just a specific object or set of objects, but I imagine that sort of thing will be added and isn't really a bug nor is it broken because it doesn't have it because I can just go through the list of found objects. So what do you mean by broken? Just curious.

Simply not true. Go back to page 3 in this very topic - I literally mention more than 12 examples of how it is objectively worse. Many of which are actually costing me time and annoying me on a daily basis where GMS1 is objectively faster and better. For example, it is downright ridiculous that I need to temporarily paste code into notepad or similar just do basic search/replace operations, simply because it is utterly broken in GMS2. Something as rudimentary as this. Oh yeah and, search & replace is of course in lieu of actual refactoring, because... Well, it doesn't exist.

For me personally, even if all the things I mentioned (including that which I may no longer speak of, which is actually a pretty big thing for me) were remedied this instant, I would still see GMS2 as being basically on par with GMS1 - with the absolute only exceptions being code folding and custom variable recognition in auto complete. Those two things I would miss. And obviously Switch support, but that's not really a GMS2 IDE thing.

Potentially GMS2 could become superior, but right now it actually feels like a beta, with the most basic of things that works fine in GMS1 either being gone or broken. Right now, there is a long way for GMS2 to be as good as GMS1 - and then we can start talking about how to actually make it better.

I really want to like it, I am forcing myself to use it every single day and have been for several months now. But it simply is worse in more than a dozen ways, and the few advantages are not nearly enough to outweigh the many disadvantages.
 

JeffJ

Member
Now to why I quoted Jeff, I notice you say search and replace refactoring is broken. What do you mean? I've been using it like crazy as I sifted through thousands of badly written code I mentioned above. The only bug I see is that sometimes it doesn't scroll the page correctly to the next search object every time and it doesn't auto update if you delete a word as it only highlights the spaces the word you found existed in.

So what do you mean by broken? Just curious.
Whether you've used it as much as you claim or just a single time, it should be immediately obvious. Try using search and replace in GMS1.4 and then go (and try to) do the exact same operation in GMS2. If you still don't see the difference, I honestly don't know what to tell you.

The "find next" and "replace next" are all over the place and completely useless, because you have absolutely no control over their positioning. In 1.4 it was 100% persistent and predictable, you could place your cursor right before a certain section with lots of stuff to be replaced and it would start from there. In GMS2, if there's a single occurrence before that section, it will jump to the first, no matter where you put your cursor or what else you do. 9 out of 10 times for me, it's actually faster (and safer!) to temporarily copy the text I need to operate on into notepad and do it there. Notepad. Just think about that.

Oh yeah, also while on the topic of refactoring (or attempting to): you can no longer opt to ignore comments on projectwide searches, which again was an option that saved me so much time in GMS1.4. In general, refactoring and searching has fewer options in GMS2 - as opposed to more. Or at the very, very least - the same. That is objectively worse.
 

Erayd

Member
I see what you mean. All complaints I have had myself with it actually. It is EXTREMELY limited. I didn't use the feature in gm1.4 till the end of its life cycle so I don't remember a time when it worked perfectly. Ignoring comments would definitely save a lot of time, good thing my refactoring work is nearly conplete and I wont be using this feature much. I imagine they'll be expanding on it in the future (hopefully soon) since imo it IS very important. I don't think its broken, just has very limited functionality.

Also I normally only use it to replace chunks of variable names with something a little more specific. I rarely only replace a single result. So I havent run in to those issues myself.
 
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kupo15

Member
Whether you've used it as much as you claim or just a single time, it should be immediately obvious. Try using search and replace in GMS1.4 and then go (and try to) do the exact same operation in GMS2. If you still don't see the difference, I honestly don't know what to tell you.

The "find next" and "replace next" are all over the place and completely useless, because you have absolutely no control over their positioning. In 1.4 it was 100% persistent and predictable, you could place your cursor right before a certain section with lots of stuff to be replaced and it would start from there. In GMS2, if there's a single occurrence before that section, it will jump to the first, no matter where you put your cursor or what else you do. 9 out of 10 times for me, it's actually faster (and safer!) to temporarily copy the text I need to operate on into notepad and do it there. Notepad. Just think about that.

Oh yeah, also while on the topic of refactoring (or attempting to): you can no longer opt to ignore comments on projectwide searches, which again was an option that saved me so much time in GMS1.4. In general, refactoring and searching has fewer options in GMS2 - as opposed to more. Or at the very, very least - the same. That is objectively worse.
Oh I didn't know that. The thing that was immediately obvious to me that was broken with the search and replace is that if you dock it you can't press Enter to start searching for things and must click. So I have to keep it floating which I don't like. Also I wish the replace part was always opened or remember so I don't have to expand it every time. I didn't know 1.4 had a way to remove comments from the searches. That would be helpful to have

I think GMS2's workflow is much better, I don't know how I lived without Control+T . I'm spending less time searching my tree of scripts than ever before and hardly have to go there which is great. Still not happy with the image editor at all though I'm getting used to it. Its still much easier for me to use 1.4 to create sprites and import them into GMS2. Or export existing sprites in 2 to 1.4 then import back again...unless GMS2 decides to randomly freeze up and crash when I try to export a sprite. Grrr...
 

JeffJ

Member
Oh yeah, here's another objectively worse thing about GMS2 to add to my list. Because it was so short in the first place...

You can no longer export your project as a GMEZ to easily merge with other future projects without having to upload to marketplace. Something you could easily do in GMS1. I actually just now discovered this, and I'm a tad pissed.

What if the Marketplace is down?
What if my internet is down?
What if I don't feel like uploading proprietary code to an external server, no matter how "private" I can mark it?

Last but not least - I shouldn't really have to explain why I wouldn't want to do it this way - rather, YoYoGames should explain why we should no longer be allowed to do something locally that GMS1 allowed us to do locally perfectly fine. There is absolutely no reason for this.

I really hate to say it, but my list just keeps growing. A list of areas where GMS2 is objectively inferior to GMS1. Which would be fine if it was still beta, but seriously... This is getting ridiculous.

Really hope that this will be implemented, but just like importing multiple assets in one go, a functional resource tree, a functional search & replace and a bunch of other things, these are so basic that they shouldn't be problems to begin with in a product that's been out of beta for this long. Especially with sunsetting of the more stable, reliable and more feature rich product literally a few months away.
 
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elsi11

Guest
I won't be switching very soon because, even though GMS2 has a cooler interface and tools, and dX11, I just can't forgive the internet thing. With 1.4, you bought it, activated it, and that's it. You even got a loose steam code.
With GMS2, it's like you don't "have" the program, but rather, you get permission each time to use it. Even thought you have to update your credentials every 30 days, people have reported being constantly harassed to update credentials, and not being able to use the program offline.
I mean, I get it. It's a new program, and you have to protect it from pirates. But hey, newsflash, i read somewhere that GMS2 has been hacked. If someone really wants the program, he will get it. So, at this point, you are just inconveniencing normal, paying customers with excessive DRM. Not to mention that Steam is DRM in itself, and you really can't get a program unless you payed for it.
And not to mention the privacy implication with some server somewhere logging my every login into the program, and dates and times, and my steam account, and whatnot.
Just... NO.
 

breakmt

Member
I won't be switching very soon because, even though GMS2 has a cooler interface and tools, and dX11, I just can't forgive the internet thing. With 1.4, you bought it, activated it, and that's it. You even got a loose steam code.
With GMS2, it's like you don't "have" the program, but rather, you get permission each time to use it. Even thought you have to update your credentials every 30 days, people have reported being constantly harassed to update credentials, and not being able to use the program offline.
I mean, I get it. It's a new program, and you have to protect it from pirates. But hey, newsflash, i read somewhere that GMS2 has been hacked. If someone really wants the program, he will get it. So, at this point, you are just inconveniencing normal, paying customers with excessive DRM. Not to mention that Steam is DRM in itself, and you really can't get a program unless you payed for it.
And not to mention the privacy implication with some server somewhere logging my every login into the program, and dates and times, and my steam account, and whatnot.
Just... NO.
I don't get it - do you have some problems with internet or what? I thought most people are just online all the time when PC is on. I can imagine this problem back in the time when I used modem for connection... But it was like 15 years ago.
 
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elsi11

Guest
I don't get it - do you have some problems with internet or what? I thought most people are just online all the time when PC is on. I can imagine this problem back in the time when I used modem for connection... But it was like 15 years ago.
Yes, it is true that the internet is freely accessible in most parts of the world, and in the worst case scenario, you could go to the town square and catch some loose wifi to extend your credentials. But it's just.. I dunno. I don't like it. It's like you are renting the program. If your laptop resets or something and you loose your account logins, you are in trouble. I dunno. It's just how I feel. I'm for privacy and for being able to freely use programs you purchased offline at any time you want without having to phone back to big brother. Maybe I have a secure laptop which never goes online. Maybe I am in a tour bus in the middle of a desert.
But I guess it could be worse. At least they don't try to "protect" your account every time you dare to change your ip (like Google). "Sorry that my router reset and connected to a server 2 towns over. Must be terrorists hijacking my account. thanks for protecting me. Maybe I should give oyu my personal phone number." xD
 

breakmt

Member
Yes, it is true that the internet is freely accessible in most parts of the world, and in the worst case scenario, you could go to the town square and catch some loose wifi to extend your credentials. But it's just.. I dunno. I don't like it. It's like you are renting the program. If your laptop resets or something and you loose your account logins, you are in trouble. I dunno. It's just how I feel. I'm for privacy and for being able to freely use programs you purchased offline at any time you want without having to phone back to big brother. Maybe I have a secure laptop which never goes online. Maybe I am in a tour bus in the middle of a desert.
But I guess it could be worse. At least they don't try to "protect" your account every time you dare to change your ip (like Google). "Sorry that my router reset and connected to a server 2 towns over. Must be terrorists hijacking my account. thanks for protecting me. Maybe I should give oyu my personal phone number." xD
Yeah, I see why you don't like it and in other hand I see why YYG did it this way. Anyway, I'm sure that if I didn't want to pay I easly could get a way to avoid it. They hacked Photoshop, Windows, even USA, lol, I belive that hacking Gamemaker is not harder. But I did want to pay, cause I like this software and wish it progress further.
And also at least we have lifetime license, not months/year subscription like photoshop. It has truly "renting" program feeling which I really don't like.
 
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elsi11

Guest
Yeah, I see why you don't like it and in other hand I see why YYG did it this way. Anyway, if I'm sure that if I didn't want to pay I easly could get a way to avoid it. They hacked Photoshop, Windows, even USA, lol, I belive that hacking Gamemaker is not harder. But I did want to pay, cause I like this software and wish it progress further.
And also at least we have lifetime license, not months/year subscription like photoshop. It has truly "renting" program feeling which I really don't like.
When I saw GMS2 being like 70$ on Steam, I thought to myself: "Hey, that's a lot less than 700$" (Which I thought it was gonna cost xD). But when I saw all the orange warning signs saying you can only have on 3 computers (Why would anyone have it on more than 1? And I think this is the reason for the agressive DRM. To enforce the 3 computer rule and the "creator version" (1-year licence)), and that you have to link a yoyo account and have internet access, I was like: "Too bad...". Upon further investigation, several people said how they can't run the program offline, and how they are being harassed constantly to update their updated credentials.
The bottom line is:
- GM1.4 is solid, and the only drawback is that it runs on dx9 (which is from the San Andreas era, and I'm sure Microsoft will find a way to break it soon).
Now I only have to find out how you make your icons orange, and how to change the code highlighting, like the cool kids have :D
 

breakmt

Member
When I saw GMS2 being like 70$ on Steam, I thought to myself: "Hey, that's a lot less than 700$" (Which I thought it was gonna cost xD). But when I saw all the orange warning signs saying you can only have on 3 computers (Why would anyone have it on more than 1? And I think this is the reason for the agressive DRM. To enforce the 3 computer rule and the "creator version" (1-year licence)), and that you have to link a yoyo account and have internet access, I was like: "Too bad...". Upon further investigation, several people said how they can't run the program offline, and how they are being harassed constantly to update their updated credentials.
The bottom line is:
- GM1.4 is solid, and the only drawback is that it runs on dx9 (which is from the San Andreas era, and I'm sure Microsoft will find a way to break it soon).
Now I only have to find out how you make your icons orange, and how to change the code highlighting, like the cool kids have :D
...But also you should aware that you will get into GM2 sooner or later :)) The program can't live forever without continuously development, even if they will fix some big bugs and "API changed" things. I guess. Or maybe you will choose other engine ;)
 
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Emissary1138

Guest
How many people have made the jump and committed to game maker 2, using it on a day to day basis for proper projects?

I've bought it, but I haven't made anything serious with it. GM 1.4 is just too familiar still.
I have worked on my GM 1.4 project for 4 years.... I am afraid to make the change because I can't afford to go through everything to make sure it works properly.
My next project will be Game Maker 2 for sure, but I am just to nervous to make the change now.
 
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Emissary1138

Guest
I have both. Use them regularly, mostly for prototyping. Donno if that counts. Workspaces do my head in so I wouldn't use it for anything bigger than that.
You use it for prototyping, but what do you use for a the actual project?
 

Blokatt

Member
Switched to 2 around the time it came out. The new IDE took some time getting used to (felt a bit "claustrophobic" at first). Up until that point, I'd obviously been building my main project using 1.4., and porting that to 2 was surprisingly easy and only took a few bugfixes to get running. There was a lot of clean up to do, but it worked. I expected the process to be a lot worse.
In the end, I'm quite happy with it. There's definitely room for improvement on the IDE side of things, though.
 
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EZTALES

Guest
I really hate 2 because I was so used to 1.4! and the issues with bringing over files from 1.4 is a nightmare.......
 

Yal

šŸ§ *penguin noises*
GMC Elder
<gonna quote this entire post so that the "my post on page 3" thing gets less of a thing>
I've been trying to force myself to solely use GMS2 for the past month now. The only reason I am doing this is because I am targeting consoles, and with their rapid SDK changes, I will need the continued runtime update support. But if I'm being perfectly honest, I don't feel like I am getting any sort of upgrade in any way. I'm not gaining a single thing that GMS1 didn't already offer me. In return, I had to pay for new license, get used to a new workflow, and spend many, many hours getting 1.4 code to work in GMS2. So a good chunk of money and lots of time for... Well, what?

So far there are around two things I like about GMS2:

1: Code folding
2: Ctrl+T

And then there's dozens of things I absolutely loathe. Here's a few:

1: Can no longer do "Ignore comments" when searching through a project - something I used a lot. Lost functionality. Objectively worse workflow.

2: Search&Replace in code editor is utterly broken and buggy to the point where I'm actually doing this manually. This has actually cost me tangible time. Objectively worse workflow.

3: Can no longer right click a resource and do "Check references" like in GMS1 - again, something I actually frequently used in GMS1. Lost functionality. Objectively worse workflow.

4: Can no longer import multiple resources when choosing "add existing" as in GMS1 - this has also cost me significant time. Lost functionality. Objectively worse workflow.

5: Can no longer quickly delete an instance from room editor by simply holding a modifier key and clicking like in GMS1 - instead you have to actually select one or more instances (by for example holding ctrl and then clickselecting each instance) and then press Delete to delete them - forcing your hand off the mouse. Absolutely horrible for ergonomics and general workflow.

6: Can no longer scroll from cursor position in code editor by doing ctrl+arrow up/down. Have to scroll with mouse or move cursor all the way to top/bottom with arrows. This has actually made me lose focus on several occasions where it would not have in GMS1.

7: Searching to highlight things in documentation (Ctrl+F) is horrible; even if there are results they won't be highlighted because they're hidden away in folds, and there is no "expand all" feature. I can look up things in GMS1 docs much, much faster. Objectively worse workflow.

8: Default skin has absolutely zero contrast - select a resource in the resource tree and press F2 for renaming to see what I mean. I literally can't see whether the text is highlighted unless I squint really close to the screen. Say what you will about the looks of GMS1, but it wasn't hard to tell basic things like this.

9: I hate the way the code editor highlights the currently selected argument. In GMS1 it was the only argument out of all of them that was actually highlighted, with all other arguments being kinda "greyed out". In GMS2, it just highlights every single argument up to and including the cursor position, making it hard to identify the current argument at a quick glanse like it was in GMS1.

10: Code editor no longer displays total line numbers in the bottom unless you've actively focused on it. A small but noticeable thing, especially as a heavy multi monitor user - why is this gone from GMS1?

11: The sprite editor... Ugh, this could fill up an entire list all on its own. Things that took 2 seconds in GMS1 now takes 30.

12: The "Find and replace" window in code editor is bolted to a certain position off to the far side and can't be moved, so if your code window is big and zoomed in and you press Ctrl+F it throws you off to the far side where the window spawns. Let me move it and save its position so it spawns close enough to where I'm working without having to throw the camera!

And these are just some of the things I've remembered to write down. These are things that are bothering me on a daily basis, to a point where GMS1 was objectively better in at least these areas. The worst part is, I'm not feeling like this is an upgrade in any way. The only thing I'd truly miss by going back to GMS1 is code folding. I don't have a choice, obviously, because I need runtime update support for consoles, mobiles etc.. And the money is not an issue, I want to support continued development, and the last time I gave YoYo big money before buying GMS2 was way back in 2011, so that's fair. But... As a consumer, other than the continued support, I really don't feel like there is a single thing that is better or that GMS1 didn't already give me. I'm really, really trying to look here, but... Eh. A little disappointed, to be honest.

In the end, I feel that all I've really bought is continued support for external platforms. In that case, I would have actually preferred an option to pay to continue using GMS1 with nothing but platform support.
For the final point, wouldn't it be possible to keep working in GMS1, make hooks for GMS2-exclusive functions (e.g. your own wrappers for compatibility scripts), learn what gets utterly broken in GMS1 -> GMS2 conversions and take steps to mitigate that, and then just convert stuff to GMS2 only as a final step before making a build? (And in case you find issues in the GMS2 build, try to fix them on the GMS1 side as much as possible). I've found the GMS2 workflow to feel so clunky (and stumbled over unacceptable bugs) whenever I've tried it, I don't see any reason to use the IDE, only the compiler.

Some random bashings:
  • I can agree with everything in the above post I quoted ^
  • Git/SVN are completely broken, so it's impossible to work in a team now. Way to make GM appear more professional.
  • For a laptop user that distrust public wifis, being forced to always be online is a big no-no.
  • Pasting creating brushes makes copypasting stuff (e.g. importing edited stuff you made in GIMP) much more cumbersome and litters your brush palette with brushes you'll never use again.
  • It's not clear how to get data about what tile a tile-instance is using, so stuff like tile-based collisions are more or less impossible to do now, especially since you can't ever change the width of any tileset or the order will change. Some sort of metadata editor like RPG Maker has been using for years would be required to make the "binary blob" thing added for tiles even remotely usable.
  • Both project and exported EXE file size are more or less doubled now, and project performance (even for something not using compatibility scripts) seems worse overall.
  • Objects with the same depth seems to have completely random ordering now instead of the most recent object being in the bottom, and even that felt like a step back compared to GM8's "the most recent object is on top" way of handling it.
  • The GUI layer doesn't seem to care about layering, which means you can have your interface pop through your fade-to-black effects and such which just looks bad.
 

Dan1

Member
As it stands at the moment I am about 90% complete with a steam game I've been working on for over a year - my plan is, if it makes me enough money to upgrade, I'll purchase a new license for GMS2 and give it a go to make a judgement for myself - especially given the amount of mixed reviews it's received - but for now, I'm going to finish what I'm doing with GMS1.4 and decide from there :)
 
I have a license for it but haven't made the jump just yet; mainly because I'm pretty far into development of one of my bigger projects, but also (and this is kind of a small , poor reason) because the image editor doesn't seem to have a cropping/trimming feature
 

Toque

Member
Fully switched over. Was holding out for a while...

Also while I agree that the whole panning about workspaces is awful and a bizarre idea, the others are right, you really don't have to do it.

I spend pretty much all my time in gms with the code window maximised and lots of code tabs docked in it. Combine this with code folding and you've got a much easier faster workflow for code centric users than in gms1.4 imho

A video tutorial on navigation workflow would be helpful. There are some basic overviews but not complete work flows.
 
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Dreamgate

Guest
Thinking about it. Went to buy the program but Yoyo wants my name and address before proceeding. For a digital service that doesn't need to actually send me anything physical I'm apprehensive and don't understand why this would be a requirement. If they don't accept BTC then they would acquire those details anyway via payment method.

Furthermore, name and address were listed as optional upon sign up. Not so optional if you choose to rent/buy their program o_O
 
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Thinking about it. Went to buy the program but Yoyo wants my name and address before proceeding. For a digital service that doesn't need to actually send me anything physical I'm apprehensive and don't understand why this would be a requirement.
Probably a requirement because they need your name and address to process your billing information. If you're too afraid to give them the former, I don't understand why you wouldn't be apprehensive about giving them the latter.

EDIT: Lol, you edited in everything after my quote. If you're shopping online, for the moment you're going to have to accept that you'll have to give out your information. Crypto isn't a widely accepted form of payment. Even if it were, taxes would potentially need to be applied, requiring personal information.
 
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Dreamgate

Guest
Being mindful about security doesn't = "afraid".

I get into your email account.
Get into your yoyo account.
nacho_chicken's name is john dope lives at x address.

It has to do with where your info is stored and how easily accessible it is. Lets say you transferred money from your bank account to YoYogames. They may send an email confirmation, they may not. You can delete that. If you put your personal info in on site you may be able to delete but it could be recalled easily with SE.
 

Dog Slobber

Member
Thinking about it. Went to buy the program but Yoyo wants my name and address before proceeding. For a digital service that doesn't need to actually send me anything physical I'm apprehensive and don't understand why this would be a requirement. If they don't accept BTC then they would acquire those details anyway via payment method.

Furthermore, name and address were listed as optional upon sign up. Not so optional if you choose to rent/buy their program o_O
Almost all Credit Card purchases I make online require me to provide a billing address, it's another form of verification that reduces fraud.

It's also a requirement to determine whether you should or should not pay taxes.

YoYoGames has to charge VAT to EU residents. What do you suggest online resellers do to determine tax liability?
 
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