If you want to make video games, get GameMaker

In 2013, I started my Ziff Davis career as an intern on PCMag's Software team. Now, I’m an Analyst on the Apps and Gaming team, and I really just want to use my fancy Northwestern University journalism degree to write about video games. I host The Pop-Off, PCMag's video game show. I was previously the Senior Editor for Geek.com. I’ve also written for The A.V. Club, Kotaku, and Paste Magazine. I’m currently working on a book about the history of video games, and I’m the reason everything you think you know about Street Sharks is a lie.

Although it can be pricey, no game-development program helps you transition from an amateur to a professional better than GameMaker Studio 2.

Consumer video game development software faces a dilemma. If the tools are too simple, they don’t teach you the advanced skills necessary to further your potential career. But if the tools are overly complex, you'll be too frustrated to keep going. GameMaker Studio 2 strikes the ideal balance by accommodating newcomers but not holding anything back for people with the time (and money) to fully invest in their indie game dreams. GameMaker’s excellent results speak for themselves, and it’s our Editors’ Choice pick for consumer video game development software. 

Instead of talking about the games you can hypothetically make with GameMaker, let’s just list some of the actual, famous, acclaimed indie video games built with this engine. GameMaker games includes Barkley Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden, Blazing Chrome, Downwell, Gunpoint, Heat Signature, Hotline Miami, Hyper Light Drifter, Katana Zero, Nidhogg, Nuclear Throne, Rivals of Aether, Spelunky, Undertale, Wandersong, and VA-11 Hall-A.

That list includes some of the most beloved indie console, mobile, and PC games of the past few years. It includes genres as varied as platforming roguelikes; drug-fueled, top-down shooters; cyberpunk visual novels; and comedy-basketball RPGs. If you can imagine it, GameMaker lets you make it.

Well, that’s mostly true. If you look closely, you’ll see that all those games are 2D. GameMaker lets you add limited 3D graphics to your games, but it mainly focuses on 2D games. 3D functionality is rare for consumer-level game development tools. Fuze4 offers it, but you can’t export its games off the Nintendo Switch. The same goes for Editors' Choice pick Game Builder Garage. AppGameKit Studio and Godot also let you implement 3D graphics into your game, but they require a higher level of technical knowledge. For 3D development, you need a truly professional program like Unity or Unreal Engine.

GameMaker also now lets you create multiplayer games. With these new tools, creators can give games advanced online functionality through GameMaker's servers, including rollback netcode, something not even all AAA games have. Flesh out the experience with extra features like chat rooms, spectator lobbies, and cloud saves. This greatly expands the kinds of games you can make. Core also offers online multiplayer dev tools, but that software is almost entirely for creating shooters.

GameMaker simultaneously has some of the most affordable and most expensive pricing options of all the services I’ve tested. Fortunately, its new subscription model makes it easy to tell which tier is best for you. GameMaker now has a free tier, too. As with Construct and Stencyl, you can use GameMaker's tools without paying for as long as you want, if you can accept some limitations. Free users can only export their games to the Opera GX gamer browser, similar to how Construct and Twine run in web browsers, which makes sense considering GameMaker's parent company was purchased by Opera. Meanwhile, Godot is completely free.

GameMaker's entry-level Creator tier ($4.99 per month, $49.99 per year) lets you export to Windows, Mac, and Linux through PC gaming marketplaces. That's less than half the price of rivals' similar plans. The Indie tier doubles that price but adds HTML5 web support, lets you publish to Android and iOS stores, or join the Xbox One Creators Program.

If you’re serious about game development, though, you need to get your game in front of as many players as possible. You need to get your game on consoles. Among the services I’ve tested, only GameMaker offers licenses for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One, as well as PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series S/X. Unfortunately, because the platform holders want their cut, those licenses don’t come cheap. The Enterprise subscription lets registered developers export to consoles for $79.99 per month or $799.99 per year. That price tag, while hefty, saves you more than $1,000. For comparison, a pro Unity subscription costs $1,800 per year, while Epic currently gives away the Unreal Engine for free as it pushes developers toward the Epic Games Store.

While these subscription options are nice, they also mean you can no longer pay GameMaker once for a permanent license, so fees might add up over the years. Only educators can buy permanent licenses for their classrooms. However, if you bought a permanent license in the past it should be valid going forward.

When you first create a project, GameMaker asks if you want to use GameMaker Language (GML) or Drag and Drop (DnD). GameMaker offers two informative, step-by-step, video tutorials for building the same Asteroids clone game in either language, so feel free to try both and see what works best for you. 

GML should feel familiar to anyone used to making games the traditional way: coding. Users compare it with JavaScript or C, and you can even convert it into those languages. While the tutorial is helpful, having some prior coding knowledge helps before jumping cold into GML.

True beginners should go with DnD. This is GameMaker’s visual programming language, one that turns if/then statements from finicky syntax into digestible blocks. Previously, DnD offered much less power over your game than GML. But now, thanks to a bevy of premade behaviors, you can create a complex game without writing code. 

Granted, that’s because even this “simple” language can get complicated quickly. You still do a lot of math and generate a lot of assets. For the Asteroids game, you set the frame rate, mold the physics for spaceship movement, set variables for randomly spawning rocks, and trigger explosion animations when bullets collide with their targets. I enjoyed the challenge. 

DnD is easier than coding, but it comes close enough conceptually that I feel my skills can transfer over. You can even convert DnD scripts into GML or write bits of GML and stick them in your DnD projects as discrete functions. As a result, GameMaker’s programming experience surpasses both visual-heavy software, such as Construct or Stencyl, and code-only software, such as AppGameKit Studio or Fuze4. 

GameMaker’s interface helps you keep your project under control as your game grows in scope. For example, there's a main workspace and tabs for editing specific game elements, such as level rooms or sprite images. I appreciate how the workspace organizes visual and coding elements together. Seeing sprite animations, objects those sprites are linked to, and code for that object all grouped together makes it easy to track distinct game elements and see where problems might occur. GameMaker's workflow is better than Construct's workflow, which separates visual elements and programmed events into separate Layout and Event sheet tabs. GameMaker’s layout reminds me of how Twine intuitively lays out the chunks of its interactive text stories, except with more elements. 

The more big-name GameMaker games release, the more the software’s popularity and user base grows. If you have any ambition in game design, you should leverage GameMaker’s excellent, free tutorials and example games, as well as its robust, community marketplace. You can browse for top-rated demos, animations, sound effects, scripts, backgrounds, and other useful assets to speed up your process or learn cool, new tricks. Most items in the marketplace cost either a few bucks or nothing at all.

GameMaker first launched in 1999, and many years ago I dabbled with an early version of the program. I was a dumb kid who wanted to rip off Nintendo games, but I remember being frustrated that the process wasn’t as straightforward as the name suggested. 

Today, GameMaker Studio 2 absolutely lives up its promise of letting you make real video games whether you’re a coding prodigy or have never thought about sprites in your life. Investing in its power and publishing possibilities, no matter how high the price, never feels like a waste. It’s our Editors’ Choice pick for consumer game development software, alongside the accessible 3D tool Game Builder Garage, and gets within striking distance of robust options that let you build AAA games.

Looking to expand your horizons? Supplement your game development education with the best online learning services.

Although it can be pricey, no game-development program helps you transition from an amateur to a professional better than GameMaker Studio 2.

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In 2013, I started my Ziff Davis career as an intern on PCMag's Software team. Now, I’m an Analyst on the Apps and Gaming team, and I really just want to use my fancy Northwestern University journalism degree to write about video games. I host The Pop-Off, PCMag's video game show. I was previously the Senior Editor for Geek.com. I’ve also written for The A.V. Club, Kotaku, and Paste Magazine. I’m currently working on a book about the history of video games, and I’m the reason everything you think you know about Street Sharks is a lie.

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