Your thoughts: The Marketplace Library

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icuurd12b42

Guest
Does the free Studio allow people to buy assets though? I agree for publishing assets you should at least have proven you are interested in supporting the product.
 

csanyk

Member
well id say your problem csanyk is your assets, as there not really very hard to implement in code anyway, especially the example you mentioned double click lol, that takes a minuet or two max to make, plus id never buy anything made by you just because of your blog and attitude, really if you don't like yoyo staff and game maker software as much as you preach on your blog, then why have you not gone with the other free option you said was so much better and freed your self from windows all together, im not keen on people who pray on others failing or mistakes to get them self attention, such as the bashing shaun and yoyo over the forum being late was a terrible thing to do just to get your blog more views, and the way you have tried to get votes to, im afraid i wont be buying any asset that jumps in on that incentive gained votes, so that will just alienate the marketplace even more at least to me.
This is offtopic, but I feel obligated to defend myself.

I'm a hobbyist game developer, and I'm enthusiastic about my hobby. Unfortunately, I don't have as much time as I'd like to do more with this hobby as I would like. But I do what I can, to the best of my ability with the resources I have available to me. I don't pretend to be the best programmer ever. But my marketplace assets have value, and are priced fairly. About half of what I offer on the MP is free, and the rest I charge an amount that is far, far less than the value of the time it would take you to implement it yourself. Any of them at a minimum takes a few hours for me to design, program, document, build, release, maintain, and market. You can save yourself all of that time by spending $0.99-$2.99, and frankly it's worth it. If you buy one of them, and don't agree, send me feedback by my contact link, I'd like to know how you were able to build a superior implementation in the amount of your time that is worth $2.

I'm certainly critical of YYG and GM:S, but I am in no way a hater. I feel that I am fair in my criticism, and my criticism is always aimed at making GM:S a better product. I don't think it's a bad product overall, despite being massively disappointed in the stagnation with the MP beta, and the glaring lack of concern on YYG's part over the last two years about the slow performance of the My Library UI, and their tragicomical recommendation to not purchase so many assets from the Marketplace if you don't want the UI to take 15 minutes to populate a list that should take a fraction of a second. I filed a bug report, well over a year ago, and was given "remove assets from your manifest" as a workaround, with no ETA on a true fix. I haven't done much with GM:S over the last year, in part because of the extremely poor performance of the My Library UI making that part of GM:S pretty unusable for me. After waiting around more than a year and seeing no evidence that anything was being done, I felt I'd waited more than long enough, and expressed my dissatisfaction about the matter, and it seems that a great many people agreed. And why shouldn't they?

I don't post blog articles "just to get more views" as you accuse. When I posted my article on the failed rollout of the new forums, they had been down for over two months, when YYG had announced that the new forums would be up in two weeks after taking the old forums read-only, AND there had been no visible announcement from YYG as to why they were so delayed. There's really no excuse for that -- both the lateness, and the lack of official information.

YYG is a business, and they need to realize that to stay in business they need to serve their customers and provide value. When they fall short in their mission, good customers will bring it to their attention. Businesses depend on customer feedback to know what they're doing well and what they're not, and to correct course and fix things that need fixing.

Lastly, I'm not the only one -- @TrueValhalla, the current owner of the gamemakerblog.com domain, feels similarly as I do about YYG's recent performance. So much more so than I, in fact, that he has discontinued posting updates at gamemakerblog as of March 2015, preferring to focus on other tools that he feels are better supported. His web traffic absolutely dwarfs what my little website gets, and he's a much larger influencer than I am in the GM:S sphere. If YYG are smart, they are asking themselves what they can do to ensure that serious game developers like him continue to use and enthusiastically endorse the product.

Finally, let me just say again that I really, really like GameMaker and folks like Shaun, Mike, Sandy, Nocturne, and others who've contributed to it over the years. Shaun's youtube channel for GM:S tutorials is great; I do think he dropped the ball in terms of community relations surrounding the new forums being late, but that's ok; people make mistakes, the important thing is to learn from them, not to ignore them or try to make up excuses for them. After I published my concern on my blog, he reached out to me personally and we discussed, which was great. I am confident that he got the message that when a company can't deliver on what it has announced, there needs to be someone in PR visibly explaining what's going on so that customers and other stakeholders aren't left wondering. And hopefully this message has made its way up the chain to YYG and PlayTech, and they'll do better in the future.

Moreover, I think it's likely that one of the reasons Shaun started this thread is because I've taken steps to make the concern over the deficiencies with the MP Library more visible. Which, if that's so, I'm glad that he's done so.
 
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jackhigh24

Guest
unfortunately that's not how it is, it maybe in your mind but maybe you should get someone else to read your blog oh wait i did that and gave you my opinion based on what the blog says, such as posting those messages that shawn sent to you personally and not in full context, also you state on that blog how it had got you lots of views dragging yoyo down like you did, even in this thread you state your in it for the fame and fortune, really you should take a fresh look at your manner, also if your having trouble shifting units then id look at the units again, if there good and useful then they will sell, if they don't then there is something wrong with them, like i said look at that free one, its aimed at total beginners as what it offer's is so easy to do your self, but you made it an ext which will instantly put a beginner off, why the over complexity you would of done better just supplying the code for normal gml implementation.
 

csanyk

Member
unfortunately that's not how it is, it maybe in your mind but maybe you should get someone else to read your blog oh wait i did that and gave you my opinion based on what the blog says, such as posting those messages that shawn sent to you personally and not in full context, also you state on that blog how it had got you lots of views dragging yoyo down like you did, even in this thread you state your in it for the fame and fortune, really you should take a fresh look at your manner, also if your having trouble shifting units then id look at the units again, if there good and useful then they will sell, if they don't then there is something wrong with them, like i said look at that free one, its aimed at total beginners as what it offer's is so easy to do your self, but you made it an ext which will instantly put a beginner off, why the over complexity you would of done better just supplying the code for normal gml implementation.
Yes, I mentioned in my blog that I was surprised at the traffic spike my blog post caused. I wasn't expecting it, and it certainly wasn't the reason I posted what I wrote. But clearly it was a topic that many were interested in.

Thanks for sharing your opinions with me, and for reading my blog.

I'd rather not disrupt this thread with additional conversation about me, but if you'd like to I'd be happy to message privately, via whatever contact info you prefer.
 

Yal

šŸ§ *penguin noises*
GMC Elder
well id say your problem csanyk is your assets, as there not really very hard to implement in code anyway, especially the example you mentioned double click lol, that takes a minuet or two max to make, plus id never buy anything made by you just because of your blog and attitude, really if you don't like yoyo staff and game maker software as much as you preach on your blog, then why have you not gone with the other free option you said was so much better and freed your self from windows all together, im not keen on people who pray on others failing or mistakes to get them self attention, such as the bashing shaun and yoyo over the forum being late was a terrible thing to do just to get your blog more views, and the way you have tried to get votes to, im afraid i wont be buying any asset that jumps in on that incentive gained votes, so that will just alienate the marketplace even more at least to me.
First of all, I'm astounded how you manage to stretch a sentence over five lines of text. Your rants might get taken more seriously by their intended recipents if you make them legible.
To comment on the actual contents, the double click extension is free. Before saying that you'd never buy something, you should at least do research on it instead of grabbing random words form a forum post. You're just taking the opportunity to do a personal attack on @csanyk... which is exactly the behavior you critizised him for. A moronic and hypocritical move in my opinion.
 
J

jackhigh24

Guest
yes it was a bit of a personal attack quite like yours in on me yal, but hay at least i stayed in topic as i thought this thread was about thought on the marketplace and i was just pointing out that some how he has put me off buying virtual anything off there in future, and i don't care to much about my grammar and punctuation as i worked for my family back in the old days instead of school as that's the way it was, we didn't get it all given to us back then, and now look at me i get Ā£17.000 after tax a year now working with game maker and i cant even for a proper sentence.
 
P

ParodyKnaveBob

Guest
Just a friendly reminder, emphasis mine:

[PKB snip] marketplace library / marketplace workflow in GM:S. [PKB snip]

The marketplace as a whole is less important here, specifically interested in thoughts about its integration inside the IDE.

[PKB snip]
Otherwise, I do appreciate the varying sentiments and views going on around here, even ones which have strayed from Shaun's specific interest at hand. ~nodnod~

Bob $:^ J
 

Mike

nobody important
GMC Elder
Okay guys.... easy now. Enough with the attacks. We like constructive criticism, but if it starts getting abusive or just plain ignorant, we'll just ignore it. But keep it reasonable with explanations and reasons, and we're all ears. We might not agree, but we will listen - always.

For the record, we (of course) read @csanyk's blog article. it appeared on Twitter and anything that is critical we do make a point to at least read. We also certainly don't think that anyone that posts criticism of us hates us, your all customers and have a vested interest in what we do, and as such, have a right to constructive criticism. While we certainly didn't agree with everything it talked about, there was a lot of it that was totally true, and we are already aware of. Much of it we can't talk about I'm afraid. This is one of the new things YoYo and it's customers have had to get used to. Being part of a larger company, we have to abide by their rules, and that includes not being able to talk about internal operations or information we've not been given explicit permission to actually release. This is common in larger organisations. In the past, YoYo was able to pretty much anything - Sandy loved leaking stuff (as did I), and we also loved to tell folk the ins and outs of day to day problems and issues, and yes.... the community got used to this unprecedented access. We hope that at least a little of this will return one day in the future, but for now, this is how it is, and I'm afraid we all have to live with it.

The forum issue was beyond our control, mainly because as the Playtech security guys and gals know their stuff. So our "2 week estimate" was blown out the water because of various issues that were discovered. If it had been a simple case of setup, quick validation, and release, we would have easily hit the 2 week mark - it wasn't. The reason the old forum was taken down before hand, was the whole machine had to be wiped, it couldn't stay up while the other work was going on, and when it came back, the archive process had already taken place to allow other work to continue - so we were stuck with it. Was it annoying, of course it was. We worked hard with Playtech to get things back and are of course sorry it too so long. But the security of it - and the machine, was too important to cut corners on.

As to the Marketplace, it's something we are aware of, and are looking to integrate more with in the future. With that in mind, we are looking to improve the experience both on the website, and inside the product. More than that, I'm not at liberty to say just yet.

I will also say, that if folk seem to disappear now and then, please remember we have a major product coming, and everyone is contributing to it, so we are all extremely busy on this as well.

Lastly.... Roadmap. We've explained this. Continually going back to to ask for it again and again, no matter how you (or we!) feel about it, won't change anything. We can't at the moment. When we can, we will.
 

Freddy Jones

Your Main Detective
If this wasn't already mentioned, I have a suggestion for the marketplace. I have personally found myself weary to the assets that I'd like to take advantage of, but always find I have a question that's unanswered. It's not very easy to get ahold of the content creators, nor do I think it should be the case, but I think there should be a way for the question to be answered somehow.

My suggestion is, much like Amazon has its Q&A per product, the marketplace should also have a Q&A. If potential customers could ask questions prior to buying something they (I for one), would be more likely in buying it. It could be answered by the content creators or people who have purchased the app and can/want to answer the question.

There's already a tab with reviews and ratings, now a quick product Q/A would help out a lot.

Things to consider:
  • Only users that haven't bought, but can buy(have pro), can ask the questions
  • Only users hat have bought can answer the questions
  • Questions regarding how to use the product should not be a part of the Q/A, and should be taken to the GMC forums. IE: "I need tutorial, this isn't working how to make it work, etc.etc."
  • Questions should be more towards: how flexible is it, does it work with physics enabled, does it work on <module> correctly. ETC ETC, these are important to know before blowing your money.
 

csanyk

Member
It's not very easy to get ahold of the content creators,
I'm sure that varies from publisher to publisher, but there's a Contact Publisher link right under the buy button, and if they don't respond within a reasonable time, then that probably tells you what you need to know (don't buy).

In my case, too, I write pretty solid documentation for how to use my assets, mainly because I wanted to head off as many questions (pre and post sale) as possible. I think my documentation is very good and one of my strengths, but certainly not every publisher will have the same level of documentation.

nor do I think it should be the case, but I think there should be a way for the question to be answered somehow.
This certainly has merit. But I think that the need is served adequately by the Marketplace forum's existence. Of course the problem is that currently the Forums and the Marketplace don't link to one another directly or automatically, and it's up to each Publisher to realize that the Marketplace Forum exists, and want to use it. I think most of us do, and there's not a good excuse not to, but participation may vary.

Things to consider:
  • Only users that haven't bought, but can buy(have pro), can ask the questions
  • Only users hat have bought can answer the questions
  • Questions regarding how to use the product should not be a part of the Q/A, and should be taken to the GMC forums. IE: "I need tutorial, this isn't working how to make it work, etc.etc."
  • Questions should be more towards: how flexible is it, does it work with physics enabled, does it work on <module> correctly. ETC ETC, these are important to know before blowing your money.
I do think that user who have bought should be able to ask questions in a hypothetical Q&A section.

I think enforcing these rules would be a problem. Most of them, it seems to me, would be up to the person asking the question to know the rule and follow it, which is just not going to happen 100% of the time.

But basically I think that if the publisher posted a link to their official MP forum thread on their asset page, that would probably be a reasonable workaround, already available, and easily implemented.
 

Mike

nobody important
GMC Elder
You can send a question, and the creator get's an email - and can then respond if they want to. Not sure what else you can do. If they don't want to respond, they won't, no matter what you do. They can also respond in the ratings section.

Don't see this changing as it's pretty easy just now anyway. What you may not like, is that they don't respond, but that's not up to us. I get emails now and then about the stuff I've released, sometimes I answer, sometimes I don't.

And as has been said.... they can easily link to the forums for "discussions" if they want. Again, this is down to them, not us.
 

Freddy Jones

Your Main Detective
You can send a question, and the creator get's an email - and can then respond if they want to. Not sure what else you can do. If they don't want to respond, they won't, no matter what you do. They can also respond in the ratings section.
But you just gave a perfectly good reason for why there should be this option. If someone doesn't want to, doesn't see your email, doesn't have the time, or takes months, there's little to no chance I'll be buying that asset. What if another person comes along with the same question? Same results, similar outcomes. If people could publically see these questions and responses it would be a benefit for the customers and the seller.

Don't see this changing as it's pretty easy just now anyway. What you may not like, is that they don't respond, but that's not up to us. I get emails now and then about the stuff I've released, sometimes I answer, sometimes I don't.
If that's you and your teams choice, I don't blame you. It's just a recommendation and a truthful experience I've had. The psychology behind buying things is a real thing, and the store would benefit from this particular addition. It results in less customer support needed to be handled by one person, a larger audience to answer the question and potentially people who have experienced use-cases that the product shouldn't be used for.

But basically I think that if the publisher posted a link to their official MP forum thread on their asset page, that would probably be a reasonable workaround, already available, and easily implemented.
I second that. There definitely should be an official topic per product that has a designated place on the product page, not just in the description, but specific a spot on the page. This is something I'd like to see on as many product pages I can. It would help a lot. It would benefit the seller ( indirectly and more appropriately the buyer ), if the process of setting up the product's forum thread was partially automated.

I'll stick to my thoughts, but I personally am less likely to buy products with questions unanswered. Thanks for your insights, though, Mike andCsanyk.
 
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Christoffer Karlsson

Guest
The marketplace is a great idea! Just make it less laggy and flow better in the IDE, and make it alittle more professional looking window :) I whuld like to see the comunity be able to make additions to the ide itself, for example making a particle editor / maker,and the other person can add it to there IDE and all will be integrated, but that might be a little off topic and not really possible in the current IDE :)
 

csanyk

Member
The marketplace is a great idea! Just make it less laggy and flow better in the IDE, and make it alittle more professional looking window :) I whuld like to see the comunity be able to make additions to the ide itself, for example making a particle editor / maker,and the other person can add it to there IDE and all will be integrated, but that might be a little off topic and not really possible in the current IDE :)
Extensible IDE via plugins is a great idea, but I'm sure that won't be in the 1.x sequence. Hopefully it's something that they'll design into the rewritten IDE they're going to release as 2.0.
 
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