Question - IDE New to both GMS1 and 2, what's the difference?

[Sonny Jim]

I wasn't sure where to put this, but I'm a horrible coder who's new to both GMS1 and 2. I had 1 for a while and did the built-in tutorials before kind of forgetting about it until I got an email thing telling me I can get a discount on GMS2 and I took advantage of that a while ago.

I had a go with Shaun Spalding's built-in tutorial about the UFO game and I want to move on to other tutorials but there seems to be hardly any for GMS2 specifically. The Demo projects are cool to look at even though I don't understand what most of the code does or why it was written the way it was. The wealth of tutorials out there all seem to be for GMS1 and prior.

How much of a pain was the transition from GMS1 to 2 for you more experienced guys? Are the GMS1 tutorials largely obsolete? I don't want to start a 5-hour tutorial playlist to find out that the new software's differences cause me to hit a wall.

 

[Yal]

I haven't even transitioned to GMS2 yet, but several of my engines was possible to port over without me having to do anything (though I cheated a bit by looking up what changed between them when I designed my code ) thanks to the new import system, so you could always start using GMS1 which is the easiest to learn using. To me the hardest part is getting used to the new interface.

• GMS2 did away with the 'depth' system and uses layers, so you have full control over depth sorting. You can also specifically check for entities in one layer, letting you do stuff like multi-floor buildings easily.
• GMS2 uses "real" tilemaps, which are much faster than the old tiles (which still exist, just renamed to something else) but require you to put stuff in a grid. Among the benefits are powerful automatic tile selection in the style of RPG Maker, where wall tiles change depending on neighboring walls and such (if you set the tilesets up for that).
  
• GMS2 makes a whole lot of stuff more powerful but harder to use: views became cameras, rooms can inherit from other rooms, you can draw paths from the room editor, ...
• GMS2's graphics editor uses a layer system and you can draw animated graphics in realtime as they animate.
• Some functions are removed to accomodate for the changes in other systems (for instance the function to create objects in a room now need you to specify a layer, and was renamed) but in general the GML language itself is identical in GMS1 and GMS2.

 

[Sonny Jim]

I haven't even transitioned to GMS2 yet, but several of my engines was possible to port over without me having to do anything (though I cheated a bit by looking up what changed between them when I designed my code ) thanks to the new import system, so you could always start using GMS1 which is the easiest to learn using. To me the hardest part is getting used to the new interface.
[...]

That's a lot of changes. I don't really remember how GMS1's tile system worked, what do you mean by a "real" tilemap? Being grid-based is good for me though, I'd love to do a virtual board game someday.

 

[JeffJ]

Also, another major difference is that in GMS2 there is no such thing as a "background". There are sprites and tiles - that's it.

Although it should be noted that from my experience, GMS2 generally does a pretty good job of converting your GMS1 project when you import it. For example, I have a fairly big project started in GMS1 way back in 2011 which uses a lot of stuff that changed in GMS2 - views, lots of backgrounds layered and set up for parallax scrolling, the old tilesystem and more. All of this "just worked" when I imported it, because GMS2 will create "compatibility scripts", so even my project which uses a resource that no longer exists (backgrounds) heavily in every single room just works out of the box.

 

[kburkhart84]

I'd say if you at least keep in your head the changes that were made, a lot of the tutorials for GMS1 will be fine to use to learn GMS2. The IDE itself is one that has changed radically though, things aren't all in the same places, but the "system" as far as objects, events, room, and the GML coding are basically the same.

About the depth system, technically, it still exists as before. Layers are built on top of it for convenience. You can still use the classic depth=-y code just fine. Layers provide benefits though as mentioned above, things like grouping things, etc...

 

[Yal]

I don't really remember how GMS1's tile system worked, what do you mean by a "real" tilemap?

GMS1 let you place any-sized chunks of any background resource anywhere in the room, and they could overlap with each other and stuff. GMS2 has a set grid size and every chunk you place must be the same size as 1 grid cell (and that size is set in the tileset background as well), you can't change their color blending or any other individual property either. But the advantage is autotiling and that it's VERY fast to check if there's a tile at a certain coordinate or not (since the tilemap is essential a true/false grid now).

 

[Storyteller]

GMS2 doesn't suck.

 

[hdarren]

GMS1 doesn't suck.

 

[Yal]

GM8 doesn't suck either.

...could we get a little more constructive and detailed than this?