Embarrasing!!!

[Kakea]

I need help, seriously...


I used to make small games with Game maker studio (Don't have money ) and write at the same time, but lately I concentrated more on writing and am unable to think of anything for GameMaker...

So would you PLEASE give ma idea or mention a older/simple game so I'll some inspiration?

 

[28142]

Just because you don't have money, it doesn't mean that you can't use some of the more used engines, Unity and Unreal Engine are both free, and fully usable.

For inspiration, you said you write, so why not write a story or take one you've already written, turn it into a storyboard then make that storyboard into a game.

For an idea though, take your favourite genre of game then think about what YOU would like to play, what game YOU would like to see available for people to play. That's usually how I go, and it's how I got into making games myself.

 

[Kakea]

Just because you don't have money, it doesn't mean that you can't use some of the more used engines, Unity and Unreal Engine are both free, and fully usable.

For inspiration, you said you write, so why not write a story or take one you've already written, turn it into a storyboard then make that storyboard into a game.

For an idea though, take your favourite genre of game then think about what YOU would like to play, what game YOU would like to see available for people to play. That's usually how I go, and it's how I got into making games myself.

Thanks! I'll try the Unreal Engine (I tried Unity... Nothing happened no matter what I did... ) As for the storyboard... I have tried to before, but I messed up... if I can get the hang of the engine, I'm hoping I can make a "Smash Bros" like game! Or a RTS/RPG!

 

[28142]

Thanks! I'll try the Unreal Engine (I tried Unity... Nothing happened no matter what I did... ) As for the storyboard... I have tried to before, but I messed up... if I can get the hang of the engine, I'm hoping I can make a "Smash Bros" like game! Or a RTS/RPG!

What do you mean nothing happened in Unity? There's loads and loads of free tutorials online to teach you how to use it, and it's the same with Unreal engine, loads of tutorials for that too.

If you're gonna go with a 2D type game, go with Unity. In my experience, that one's probably the best for 2D things like that.

For the storyboard, something I've done in the past is write out a proper short-ish story and make sure there's lots of description and conversations and such in it, then take the key details out of the story and turn that into a storyboard that only contains key events and scene settings. From there you make the game around that, adding in more when see fit. That's probably not the best way of going about it, but it's probably the easiest imo.

Just keep notes of all your ideas for games (mechanics, story, characters, genre, anything), it doesn't matter if it's for the same game, or what, but I find that it's always useful to have these kind of notes on hand.

 

[Kakea]

What do you mean nothing happened in Unity? There's loads and loads of free tutorials online to teach you how to use it, and it's the same with Unreal engine, loads of tutorials for that too.

If you're gonna go with a 2D type game, go with Unity. In my experience, that one's probably the best for 2D things like that.

For the storyboard, something I've done in the past is write out a proper short-ish story and make sure there's lots of description and conversations and such in it, then take the key details out of the story and turn that into a storyboard that only contains key events and scene settings. From there you make the game around that, adding in more when see fit. That's probably not the best way of going about it, but it's probably the easiest imo.

Just keep notes of all your ideas for games (mechanics, story, characters, genre, anything), it doesn't matter if it's for the same game, or what, but I find that it's always useful to have these kind of notes on hand.

Alright, I kinda know what you mean, for the story thing!

But it's some kinda "glitch" that happens, only to me: I follow tutorials, and sometimes even copy code DIRECTLY from the site itself, to see if anything would happen. And it freezes or simply doesn't understand, what the makers programmed the software to do... I'll try it again, but if not even the creator's instruction/code works... I'm going to stay away from engines that have no... "tools" to help where programming (supposed to) work

 

[28142]

Alright, I kinda know what you mean, for the story thing!

But it's some kinda "glitch" that happens, only to me: I follow tutorials, and sometimes even copy code DIRECTLY from the site itself, to see if anything would happen. And it freezes or simply doesn't understand, what the makers programmed the software to do... I'll try it again, but if not even the creator's instruction/code works... I'm going to stay away from engines that have no... "tools" to help where programming (supposed to) work

Hm, are you sure you're using tutorials for the version of Unity you're running? Also, what are your computer specs? Since for game dev, you need a somewhat decent PC.

 

[Ace]

@SkyHuntress why are you so quick to recommend a different game building engine? GameMaker studio is a fairly legit 2 dimensional game builder. Rivals of Aether, Crashlands and Hyper Light Drifter were built with the same thing.

@Kakea as for your current predicament... I believe it has already been mentioned, but conceptuaize everything. Write out a scenario, draw up some characters, but more importantly, brainstorm with a friend. Share your ideas and talk amongst yourselves. You'll be quite surprised how it turns out.

 

[28142]

@SkyHuntress why are you so quick to recommend a different game building engine? GameMaker studio is a fairly legit 2 dimensional game builder. Rivals of Aether, Crashlands and Hyper Light Drifter were built with the same thing.

Because in my experience, there's better engines out there then gamemaker. Others are easier, and have more features. Though, different engines do different things better, for example, Unreal engine does lighting the best out of the rest of the engines that I know at least (Though Unity does lighting pretty well now).

I've used gamemaker before, and make a few things using it. But for what he's trying to do, a different engine would be better I think.

 

[Ace]

But aren't those engines you mentioned predominantly 3 dimensional game builders? (I don't know any 2D games made with those engines either.)

 

[28142]

Unreal, not so much. Unity though as as indepth things for 2D as it has for 3D. I mean, just take a look at this page: https://unity3d.com/learn/tutorials/s/2d-game-creation

I've made 2D games in Unity before, and it's been quite simple. The physics engine for 2D in Unity is pretty good too imo. That's why Unity for me is the engine I normally recommend for 2D games.

 

[Ace]

What if I wanted to make more than some crappy Flappy bird game? (I never liked that ugly little thing.)

 

[28142]

Uh, you realise that that is just a very basic example of what you *could* do in Unity? I've made prototypes of proper 2d platform side scrollers before in Unity. It's a very versatile platform for 2D games.

That flappy bird tutorial is for people who are new to it, and it's a simple introduction into making 2D games in Unity. Since, you have the basics in it, score counting, high scores, movement, obsticals, textures, all that kinda stuff.

 

[Ace]

Hmm... While I still don't know many other 2D games made with unity, I suppose I'll try it myself.
(I have been thinking about building a game lately.)

 

[28142]

Just gonna point you towards this site, and this game: https://madewith.unity.com/games/night-in-the-woods (EDIT: https://madewith.unity.com/games/ori-and-the-blind-forest Forgot about this game too.)

Another great thing about Unity, the cross-platform abilities.

 

[Ace]

Huh. I was sure Ori was a 3D game. (I didn't even realize it was 2D.)

 

[Kakea]

@Ace Thanks! I love how GameMaker works alot, it's somewhat mire understandable, than other egines. And the tutorials I saw, helped me create a few games, without needing to learn the entire language, (I even made games, WITHOUT looking at it, before )

@SkyHuntress It might help to use Unity, but: You have to understand, not everyone would know what they're talking about, from watching the tutorials. I watched one, and it explains how to use it... but only IF you were familiar with it. They speak as if you're already "In the loop" with them, and know fully well what they mean. I tried doing what they said, and nothing happened. I'd really need someone willing to show me exactly how the engine works, and how typing anything into it, would bring any result. (Seriously, I've tried before, and only text popped up... but the "demo" window never came on)

 

[28142]

@SkyHuntress It might help to use Unity, but: You have to understand, not everyone would know what they're talking about, from watching the tutorials. I watched one, and it explains how to use it... but only IF you were familiar with it. They speak as if you're already "In the loop" with them, and know fully well what they mean. I tried doing what they said, and nothing happened. I'd really need someone willing to show me exactly how the engine works, and how typing anything into it, would bring any result. (Seriously, I've tried before, and only text popped up... but the "demo" window never came on)

Well, that's how I learnt how to use Unity. Was through the tutorials on that site. Those are designed for people who have never played around with whatever the tutorial is for, and then through them you slowly start to learn what you have to do.

Just underneath the video title when you go to the page for it, it'll tell you what level of difficulty the tutorial is:

"how typing anything into it, would bring any result."
Now you're getting to the coding, and probably the hardest, part. Just randomly typing things isn't gonna work. You gotta pick a language to code something in, then use it in that specific editor.

This is the code from this tutorial: https://unity3d.com/learn/tutorials/topics/2d-game-creation/bird-script?playlist=17093

Spoiler: Flappy bird script in C#

using UnityEngine;
using System.Collections;

public class Bird : MonoBehaviour
{
    public float upForce;                   //Upward force of the "flap".
    private bool isDead = false;            //Has the player collided with a wall?

    private Animator anim;                  //Reference to the Animator component.
    private Rigidbody2D rb2d;               //Holds a reference to the Rigidbody2D component of the bird.

    void Start()
    {
        //Get reference to the Animator component attached to this GameObject.
        anim = GetComponent<Animator> ();
        //Get and store a reference to the Rigidbody2D attached to this GameObject.
        rb2d = GetComponent<Rigidbody2D>();
    }

    void Update()
    {
        //Don't allow control if the bird has died.
        if (isDead == false)
        {
            //Look for input to trigger a "flap".
            if (Input.GetMouseButtonDown(0))
            {
                //...tell the animator about it and then...
                anim.SetTrigger("Flap");
                //...zero out the birds current y velocity before...
                rb2d.velocity = Vector2.zero;
                //  new Vector2(rb2d.velocity.x, 0);
                //..giving the bird some upward force.
                rb2d.AddForce(new Vector2(0, upForce));
            }
        }
    }

    void OnCollisionEnter2D(Collision2D other)
    {
        // Zero out the bird's velocity
        rb2d.velocity = Vector2.zero;
        // If the bird collides with something set it to dead...
        isDead = true;
        //...tell the Animator about it...
        anim.SetTrigger ("Die");
        //...and tell the game control about it.
        GameControl.instance.BirdDied ();
    }
}

What I like about the Unity tutorials is that it explains each line of code using comments. (The lines starting with //). Of course, for this bit though if you want to do it, you could learn C# separately. Of course, this script on it's own wont work as it's depending on different things. Best way to learn C# for this imo though is to just go through the tutorials and code while learning. It'll be quicker and easier then going through learning C# separately (and more fun).

 

[Ace]

One more question, is there a sprite editor in unity, or do I need something else?

 

[28142]

One more question, is there a sprite editor in unity, or do I need something else?

By that what do you mean? There's this: https://unity3d.com/learn/tutorials/topics/2d-game-creation/sprite-editor?playlist=17093 Or do you mean somewhere that you can create sprite sheets and the likes? I just use GIMP/Photoshop for making the actual sprites themselves.

 

[Ace]

But can you make sprites in unity or do you need something else is my question.