Gm Tech Magazine :: Issue Five

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Opening | Startup

Staff: ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

Startup Welcome to another issue of the GM TECH Magazine. This is yet another issue full of content everyone will enjoy. There has recently been quite a number of changes at GM TECH. Gamez93 has decided to step down as editor and move on with a different GM TECH project, at the same time I (Gmjab) have taken position as editor of the GM TECH Magazine. This change doesn't mean that the magazine is fading away, all the users will still get to enjoy the magazine, only now it will be released every 1-2 months. There have also been some staff changes, we have had one staff member leave and 3 members

Gmjab Gamez93 Rup13 Cubex DE Alex M ediev al Bob - 11500k

Others: ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯ Many t hanks go t o t he people who have cooperat ed wit h t he magazine and support it . We would also like t o t hank everyone for submit t ing t o t he magazine.

Online: ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

join. The magazine has also had a face lift with a whole new magazine design. We hope that

Website: w w w .gmt ech.x10host ing.com Forum: w w w .gmt ech.invisionplus.net Email: gmt [email protected]

you will enjoy the new style as much as you did the old one. In this issue you will find new content such as GM Tips, User's view and a program look into. Also, GM TECH will be adding a new service soon as well as a new website for the magazines homepage. I hope you enjoy reading this issue and look forward to your comments. Gmjab (Editor)

Contents

Changes: ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯ In order to v iew this magazine correctly, w e recommend dow nloading Adobe Reader 8.0

Startup

02

Article: Cheats for Games

03

Article: YoYo Games – How it looks so far

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User View: Game Maker 7.0

06

Game Maker: Game Maker Tips

08

Exclusive: Liquid Light preview

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( Click above image t o dow nload.)

Preview: Cell Burst

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Preview: Star Trek – Neutral Territory (Beta 3)

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Join Us ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

Preview: D-Fence Turretz

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Preview: Embarkment Online

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Review: Pick-a-ball

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Review: Asteroids+Plus

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Head 2 Head: Game Maker Examples

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Interview: BlaXun

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Software: Look into XBlite

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Software: Free programs

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Shutdown

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We are looking for new staff to be part of the GM TECH M agazine. Do you think you got w hat it takes to be part of the GM TECH M agazine ?

03

Article | Cheats for Games

Cheats have been around since the early Atari games. Today you can find cheats for almost every commercial game, which raises the question, “Should I have cheats in my game?”. That question has been brought up several times during the development of Game Maker games. Adding cheats to a game is more than a closed answer however. Before answering that question you may wish to think about other aspects such as how it will affect and benefit you (the creator), and the player. There are also other questions that could be considered that will be explained later on in part 2 of the article. How do cheats benefit me(the creator)? To the creator, cheats are most likely to be unnecessary as the creator already knows the game inside out. In addition the creator would know all the cheats that have been added to the game, so there are no surprises there. The only real benefit to the creator is when debugging the game. For example, if a user reported an error on level 23 of your game you could easily use cheats to skip straight to that level instead of having to play each level only to find the error cannot be re-made. On the other hand, the creator could make secret cheats for himself/herself to gain a unfair advantage against a friend who's No.1 on the online highscores board. In the end, cheats are personal preference to the creator. How do cheats benefit the user? When it comes to the user, you must decide for them. Think “will the user like cheats?”, perhaps you could get a number of people to give you an opinion of what they think of cheats in games. It could be a good idea to allow the user to turn cheats on & off in the game like it was done in Age of Empires. Remember, whatever your decision you will never please everyone, but you can try to please most. Cheats have never, and will never benefit the user. The whole purpose of playing a game is to play it from beginning to end, the way it's supposed to be played. However it depends on the type of game & cheats. For example, the user wouldn't have as much enjoyment if the cheat just added 10,000 points to his/her highscore as he/she would have if the cheat added $10,000 to spend in the game. How will cheats effect my game? In the end the way cheats effect your game is up to the type of cheats you put in the game. You can consider however “How do I want my cheats to effect the game?”. Depending on the cheats you may degrade your game, making it too easy. But if you have no cheats in a hard game the user may become frustrated and annoyed that there is no cheats. The best alternative to a cheat, is a hint. A hint is helpful enough to perhaps get the player past a certain level, but will not spoil the entire game like cheats could. If you decide to have cheats, chose wisely and consider how they will effect the game. ---In the next issue of the magazine, we will review different types of cheats, cheating styles and how to make the user aware of the cheats.

Article | YOYO Games – How it looks so far

04

Many people doubted the merging of Mark and YoYo Games right from the beginning. However now people are starting to see some of the results being produced from previews, it seems their reactions have been changed. Currently YoYo Games has the BETA website which those who were privileged to test it have been trying out the new system. Here is a quote from FredFredrickson which answers some questions which many people may still be wondering about:

Is yoyo keeping the current moderators? I am pretty sure they are, but of course, there's always the possibility that I am not privy to the master plan, so you never know, hehe. At this point though, I would say more than likely, yes. When Are we expecting to move? The public beta should be live within the next few weeks. As for the "move," it probably won't be one day where the GMC is turned off and we all migrate over to YYG. It'll be a gradual move, as more people warm up to the new system, and get their junk moved over. What is going to happen to this board? Are we still going to be able to log in? You will probably be able to log in for a long time after the GMC (as we know it now) is officially "closed," but the plan is to only allow people to respond to topics that are open at the time of the "close," or possibly just leave the forum in view-only mode. To tell you the truth, I don't know too much about what the plan for this is, but as I understand it, the board will be left for people to reference for a while. Are the forums going to be almost the same? The forums are currently powered by completely different software (Beast), and look completely different. It won't be entirely the same as the GMC, but once all the familiar faces start popping up, I think it'll seem like the same old GMC again. Are we likely to see less of the too many connections message? It's too early to tell, really.

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Article | YOYO Games – How it looks from here (continued)

Also he provided some screenshots or various elements of the new website and what they currently look like in the BETA version:

Profile Page See full image( here )

Forum Page

Main Page

See full image( here )

See full image ( here )

Game Page See full image( here )

As you can see it all looks very nice and well presented. However it depends how well it will be once the rest of the community is allowed to upload and post when the site finally goes officially live. But no matter what, the community still feels a bit more divided since YoYo, simply because some of our faces we are used to are sticking to not being a part of the new upcoming community. But like in life, you can’t please everyone, so let’s just hope that Mark and the rest of the YoYo Games team do enough to please the majority of their dedicated community.

Extra website information: Lately some people have been able to access the new beta YoYo Games Website. The site has not been officially opened. Some people have been able to access that site through the URL below. If you would like to view the BETA version of the site simply click the link below. Website: YoYo Games BETA site (The website may not work for everyone)

06

User View | Game Maker 7.0

A Letter from GMMarine “Almost every Game Maker user has let Mark down, not Mark and Yo Yo Games letting you down. Can't you see how your acting, how you are posting copies of topics that already have the answer somewhere else? Probably from your perspective, you can't! I don't know about Mark and Yo Yo Games but I'm tired of this. So, since you are already reading, let me ask you some questions. Why aren't there as many features? Because Mark has a job teaching at a university, and doesn't have the required time to program Game Maker and all the features you want! Why are there so many bugs in the registration system and at the Yo Yo Games site? You wanted the GM version now and they had to rush almost everything to please you, the impatience consumer! Now, what would make Mark want to team up with Yo Yo Games even more? I know why! You all whined and whined about the GM 7 Beta lacking features! Shall we say, where will GM end up going from now? Well, I don't really know, but the way GM users are acting, Mark shouldn't even continue making Game Maker. If you didn't get me, here is example of what I said: You just bought(downloaded) your cake( Game Maker Version 7) and your probably going to complain about certain of the cake's features, or it isn't just what you expected. Wow, your first impression, this cake isn't much different from the same cake I bought a long time ago! I thought they said they added on to it, but for the same price? Oh, another thing! All that has been changed is a couple of extra icing and its just a tad taller(the added and improved features). You return the cake and debate about why it hasn't changed enough(complaining on the forums and Yo Yo Games glog) Hmm... I bet you still haven't got my point, unless you know about cakes... Literally, look at how your acting and take a look of what your life would be like without Game Maker! Support YoYo Games, support Mark, and for the dear sake of everyone else that supports the movement, be patience! -Thanks for support from other Game Maker 7 supporters, Adam”

Mark Overmars opinion: It is sometimes a bit frustrating for a creator if people do not see the things that are there. One example. People asked for printing support. So I wrote an extension package with about 100 functions related to printing. Nobody seems to even have noticed.

User Opinions HaRRiKiRi: “Well, there couldn't be much of an a opinion for the 7th version as it is mostly the same as 6th. The extension system is cool, but nothing else very important. If it would of added something very big like pixel shaders, THEN you could have an opinion of it.” Vyzer: “The last Game Maker release before GM7 was GM6.1 on May 2005. Almost two years later, and we only get basically a better extension manager, and Vista support.” ulti-man: “I don't think it's that much better. It looks just about the same as 6.1, with a few not-that-great extras. So far, I'm not convinced.” Tater Tot: “Game Maker 7.0 has absolutely no real point for existence. The company advertises itself of the bottom of the side bar and there are only three new features that were added. These features are nothing but shortcuts to what you could do in an extra two minutes.” Saiyan Kirby: “The only problem I have with 7.0 is the registration issues. I'd use it if I could get my hands on the pro version, but until then, I don't really see much use from switching. In my opinion, without the extensions, there really isn't much to look forward to in 7.0.”

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User View | Game Maker 7.0 (continued)

A small change list

User Opinions

There have been many people who have seen hardly any changes in Game Maker. To help people who haven't viewed the changes document we have provided some of the main changes in GM7 below:

Corman:

➢

New updated file format *.gmk

“Honestly I expected more, I mean the only big difference is, like, one new drawing function in D&D and Extensions. The only other things is screwed up registration and a some bugs fixed.”

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GM7 can recover corrupt game maker files

BenRK:

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New Extension mechanism that act similar to plugins

“I do think that GM7 should be called GM6.2, because its not THAT much of an update.”

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2 new toolbar icons for EXE creation and publishing

Zee of PT:

➢

Splash screen enhanced

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You can now add information to your EXE's such as company,description and version information

mechanism

has

been

“They updated their anti-piracy and Vista compatibility, that's worth going to the next level.” TGMG: “I was really disappointed with GM7, so GM6 will be my last game maker version.”

➢

New separate close button event

B&B Gaming:

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New room transitions

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Data structures now can be copied and saved to files

“Yo-Yo Games dropped a bomb on GM and destroyed it. I can't stand it.”

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Including of files has been extended a lot

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New functions to deal with sprite alpha channels

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Game Maker 7 exe's are compatible with Window Vista

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New functions to save inbuilt sprites to *.bmp

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Maximum arguments for DLL's has been increased to 16

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The limited real precision has been fixed

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1 game vulnerability was fixed

Wommelbammer: “I'm not complaining, the new functions are perfect for game development, I don't see what all the fuss should be about.” Cobra Banshee: “I prefer GM6, that's it. After reading a few topics, I know that I'm not alone. I don't think the changes are good enough. GM6 works for me, GM7 doesn't. I don't give a cow about Vista.” jazz: “So GM 7.0 doesn't have all the additions people were hoping for, so what? Personally I think it feels a little more professional compared to the previous release.”

Game Maker | Game Maker Tips

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>> Drag & Drop tip: Use Comments One of the biggest complaints about D&D coding is the immense difficulty of reading the actions. The only way to get around this is to thoroughly comment your code using the Comment action. This allows others viewing your source code to better understand your intent, and this will allow them to better help you. It also helps when you abandon a project, then return to it months later: you may have completely forgotten what you were doing, and comments will help you get back on track. >> Beginning GML tip: Indentation The first sign of a messy coder is poor indentation: all code lies smack against the left side of the code window. This is bad for several reasons: 1. The code is much more difficult to read 2. You can easily miss bracket { } errors The best way to avoid these problems is to properly indent your code. There are a few standard ways of doing this, but here are the basics: 1. Indent a line of code using a tab, not a bunch of spaces. This makes indentation much cleaner and easier to implement. 2. Code inside brackets should be indented one more tab than the brackets, like this: CODE: if(score <= 0) { show_message('You're really bad at this game!'); if(keyboard_check(ord('X'))) game_end(); } }

Game Maker | Game Maker Tips (continued)

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>> Advanced GML tip: Writing Text Files One of the best things you can use after learning basic GML is the ability to read and write text files. The GM manual goes into detail about how to do this, so we'll just place a brief example here. Here's how to write the current score, health and lives to a text file: CODE: //Open the file for writing var temp_file; temp_file = file_text_open_write("savedscore.txt"); //Write the score file_text_write_real(temp_file, score); //Go to the next line file_text_writeln(temp_file); //Write the rest of the variables file_text_write_real(temp_file, health); file_text_writeln(temp_file); file_text_write_real(temp_file, lives); //Close the file file_text_close(temp_file); And here's how you could read them back into the game: CODE: //Open the file for reading var temp_file; temp_file = file_text_open_read("savedscore.txt"); //Read in the first line score = file_text_read_real(temp_file); //Go to the next line file_text_readln(temp_fname); //Read the rest of the file health = file_text_read_real(temp_file); file_text_readln(temp_fname); lives = file_text_read_real(temp_file); //Close the file file_text_close(temp_file);

>> Q&A: How do I draw in one view then the other ? ( Topic Link ) A recent post on the GM Novice Q&A forum posed the following question: how can you draw in one room, then the other, without ever drawing in both? To put it in a more understandable form, he wants to show each player's score in the corner of a split-screen hot seat game, but he doesn't want it to show player 2's score in player 1's view. In order to do this, you have to understand the view_current variable. You could use the following D&D code, or the GML equivalent: -[ DRAW EVENT ]if expression view_current == 0 is true at position (view_xview[0] + 4,view_yview[0] + 4) draw the value of: player1_score if expression view_current == 1 is true at position (view_xview[1] + view_wview[1] - string_width(string(player2_score)) 4,view_yview[1] + 4) draw the value of: player2_score

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Exclusive | Liquid Light preview

Exclusive written by gmjab

Liquid Light Information: Author: EDGE Project start: September 14th, 2005 Estimated release: May, 2007

Liquid Light is the new upcoming 3D terrain/level editor that will impress you. Not only does it have a professional GUI, its capabilities are almost endless. LL is aimed at making level & terrain creation easy for everyone for 3D games. To make the levels even easier to load into your game, LL comes with it's own SDK to make everything a breeze. Mini Review - by gmjab LL has a great GUI, it's neat and looks professional. When designing the terrain, on a high speed computer it runs fairly well for the amount of data it processes & for GM's built-in 3D capabilities it looks very good. With LL you can make smooth terrain with great smooth shadows. One excellent thing I particularly like was the sky engine. The sky is smooth with no seams and there are even clouds that the camera can move through. I give its graphics a 5/5. LL is extremely useful for designing terrain. With LL there is no need to make terrain any other way. The controls are easy to use and find, editing terrain is a breeze & using the SDK just makes it better. LL is one of those programs that will not gather dust unless you don't make 3D games. Sometimes I find myself running the program just to prove to myself that GM is capable of more then what it's made out to be. work!

Excellent

Exclusive | Liquid Light preview (continued)

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History - written by EDGE “It started out as a 3D terrain engine for a small team group project called skyline a 3d city simulator although was abandoned because of gm's speed issues. This 3d sim project also made a friend of mine L40ntom to create his 3d building constructor for it. So when it was abandoned I had my terrain generator done and I was quite disappointed with it going to waste so i decided to continue it into a terrain maker for any game and later a full 3d level editor. Through out its creation I have made 2 complete rewrites starting from scratch because of speed, messiness, and limitations. So thats where the Third edition comes from, because Its the third time ive started from scratch with it.” Features ➢

Smooth terrain shading

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Terrain Shadows

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WIP Sky engine

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Smooth customizable interface featuring sliding menus and an optional transparency feature in the theme files

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Terrain coloring and texturing brushes

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Auto color and Auto Texture features

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Controllable Fog

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Animated water, also darkens alpha value based on the deepness

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Freehand terrain sculpting tools

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Rich SDK level import system making it very simple to import levels with just few scripts that I've created.

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Complete exporting including objects, terrain, water, and sky

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Moving and rotating objects.

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Importing model files including .mod .obj .vtx .asc .x

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Complete object mode featuring basic primitives, trees, lights, etc.

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Plugin and Update system

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Multi textured terrain

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.obj terrain exporting giving liquid light possibles beyond GM (also heightmap, colormap, and other exporting available aswell)

Final Comments At the moment Liquid Light needs optimization as it has high system requirements. In future versions Liquid Light will be made less graphically & processor intensive for older computers to handle. Liquid Light is a work in progress so features may change for the final version.

Exclusive GM TECH Magazine Offer: Thanks to EDGE we have a little gift for all the readers of the GM TECH Magazine. As a reader you can receive a open source version of the first version of Liquid Light for FREE. Just goto the website below type the username, password and download your exclusive gift. Download: Liquid Light open source version Username & Password: gmtech

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Preview | Cell Burst

Preview written by gmjab

I recently reviewed an older game made by Elmernite called “Emoticon Tournament” which was a great game. Now Elmernite has put together a new game based on “Emoticon Tournament” which is even better. Cell Burst has a goal the same as Emoticon Tournament, that is to destroy your enemy while having fun. Now that sounds simple but when you get playing it's a little harder. The graphics in this game are well done. The menu is very nice and easy to navigate. All the graphics look original and they all sit together nicely. I particularly like when choosing a level and other settings how there was a drop down list of buttons, I think that was a nice touch. When you're playing the game most of the graphics look good and the effects are well done. The only down side to the graphics were the in-game players, they didn't really look the greatest, but they will most likely be changed in future versions. One thing that I expected when I played this game was to hear music and lots of sound effects. Sadly when I played It I only heard 2 or 3 sound effects. There was only about 2 guns that had sound and there was no music. This is a WIP so I will probably be added later. The gameplay was nice and smooth and I picked up no bugs. The game was easy to control but it can be hard to kill the AI because they move around so fast. I was surprised that when I tried to get myself stuck I couldn't get stuck, so I'll give extra points for that. One good thing I noticed was when firing bullet, the bullets didn't go in one straight line which gave better realism. At this stage in development there is only single player available which when playing against AI it isn't that fun. I hope to see this game go online, if it did it would be very popular. I would play it a few times but then I think it would slowly gather dust in my games folder as it wasn't as fun as Emoticon Tournament. But again this is a WIP and a lot of it's feature aren't available yet so I expect it to be much better in the future. Well done so far. What I would like to see: –

Online play

–

Changing character colours or styles

–

Lots of music & sound effects

–

Possible level weather such as rain

Overall, the control scheme, really the only detraction from the quality of the game, can be overlooked and almost 13 Preview | Star Trek: Neutral Territory (beta 3)

Preview written by Cubex DE

Star Trek: Neutral Territory (beta 3) is a fairly well made real-time strategy game that will make you want to keep playing, not because it is exciting, but because it's just fun. It took me a while to write this preview, because I couldn't figure out for a long time what made the game so fun. That said, there are quite a few small problems with Star Trek that hopefully will get fixed in the final version. First of all, the interface is confusing, and manipulating units requires reading the manual for a while. There is no tutorial, so you pretty much have to figure it out on your own. You also are required to have a middle mouse button (something some gamers might have a problem with). These should be easily corrected before the final release, however. Once this problem is figured out, however, it is rather simple to set up and build your army and various space stations, which can in turn help you build more (just like any RTS). The only resources available are Dilithium (mined from planets which you must discover), and Diridium (mined from the cores of rocks floating around space). There are plenty of different units and lots of space to explore, but the one glaring problem is the lack of any way of selecting multiple units. Not only is there no selection box ability (which is excusable for a GM game), but there are also no ways to select all the units of one kind, or even all the units that exist (which is inexcusable). All unit interaction must be performed on each unit in turn, making gameplay almost painfully slow. This makes it extremely difficult to have any kind of meaningful combat situations. Each unit must be selected, fired from, and deselected in order to fight. I would advise this game's creator to focus on fixing this one point first. The graphics were acceptable, though not incredible. They suited the overall feel of the game, and the HUD and menu screens were well made to fit the original Start Trek style. The sounds and music were not spectacular, but they were so well integrated that you barely noticed them while you were playing; they were just there, like you would expect them to be. They didn't distract from the game at all, and instead increased the amount of player immersion, and for this reason I gave the sound such a high score. This game has significant replay value, as the combinations of adventures you may have is very large. I found myself saving my game, then starting over, trying something else, then saving and loading my other game and playing it for a while. Overall, the control scheme, really the only detraction from the quality of the game, can be overlooked and almost ignored, to the point of having plenty of fun. Star Trek: Neutral Territory is definitely worth a download.

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Preview | D-Fence Turretz

Preview written by Cubex DE

Regardless of the interesting name, D-Fence Turretz is actually a decent game that delivers an interesting challenge without relying to much on flashiness. The graphics in this game are the first thing that you'll see, and they all fit together very well: they are all bad. You will probably decide upon seeing a screenshot to dismiss any ideas of downloading the game, and you may even stop reading this review right now. There is a fine line between stylized and bad graphics, and this game flirts with it. Graphics aside, the game introduces some unique gameplay that, while not exceptional, definitely gets points for originality, and actually involves a lot more than shooting at things with a turret. Your turret can not only point in different directions, it can also move up or down along a support stand, giving you opportunity to spray a large area of ground troops. Control is through the mouse, and here lies the only code related problem (although not a bug) that I found: the farther away the crosshair from the turret, the more accurate the shot. In fact, if you hold the crosshair within a few pixels of the turret, the bullets spray wildly in all directions. Cool! Still, this error should be removed in the next version. Soundwise, the game broke no ground, but it was acceptable nonetheless. The midi music is obviously based on real music (by a real band), and sounds are similar to the ones in the resource packs. This game does contain a significant amount of replayability, since the different types of units you can "purchase" to place on the field during play are interesting and fun to collect. Also, a mission mode exists for those who love stories within games. Overall, if the graphics are improved (a lot) and the aiming accuracy bug is fixed, this game may prove to begin its own hybrid genre.

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Preview | Embarkment Online

Preview written by Medieval

Embarkment Online is an online platformer role-playing game. It is clearly inspired by the game MapleStory, and nearly everything you’d find in Embarkment Online, you can also find in MapleStory. Originally it was a single-player RPG made by Higushi, but he gave DK Productions permission to make it online. Even though there should still be loads of work put into it, it looks like it will grow out into a pretty good game. As said before, the game is inspired by MapleStory. This is also visible in the graphics, as the styles are both nearly the same. However, it’s well polished, and would also work in the final version. The user interface also looks good and fits in the game nicely. However, sometimes the graphics depth is a bit wrong, as you can walk in front of a house that is actually much more in front. For the sound, the only sound that was in the game, was a midi song, originally by Bob Marley. It started to annoy me after one minute of playing, since there was nothing else for sound, and I turned off my speakers. I expected a little bit more than just that. However, there is still a lot of work in progress, so I suppose that the sound will be worked on later. This game isn’t fun to play later again, because it looks like the progress isn’t saved. I didn’t get to the next island because I didn’t manage to get enough money, but the island that you start off on sure could be bigger and better. Embarkment Online isn’t much at the moment, and has no dedicated server, which doesn’t make it have many online functions. Quests aren’t there yet as well. However, many features will probably come in the next version. As it stands for now, it’s very buggy, and not very enjoyable. The few monsters that are now in the game bug when you walk against it, and you don’t bounce off when you jump on them. Suggestions for the next version: -

Work on the bugs with the monsters

-

Work on the sounds

-

Fix the little bug with the graphics that is mentioned above

Last thing to say, good luck with the development.

04 16

Review | Pick A Ball

Review written by Cubex DE

Pick A Ball is a simple yet challenging puzzle game that attempts to trick you through the subtle use of graphical confusion, and it succeeds rather well. The point of the game is to follow a ball as it is mixed up with two others, then pick it out when they all stop moving. It sounds easier than it really is. The graphics are the shining point of this game: everything moves and twists on its own, confusing you and playing tricks with your vision. The effect is tantalizing and fits very well with the feel of the game. There is no menu and no help file, but then these are not really needed for this game, since all interaction is through the mouse, and it is really easy to figure out how to do so. Gameplay is decent, but unoriginal. The idea of picking the correct ball after they are moved very quickly is not new, and many games have already been based on it. This one, however, pulls the trick off very well because of the graphic confusion involved. Pick A Ball has very few sound effects that are not used very well, but the MP3 music track is very well chosen and fits the gameplay well. Unfortunately, after playing this game a few times you will most likely never play it again, as the game really has no variety between games: every game is more or less the same as the last one. One nice thing about this game is that the editable is included, so if you saw something you'd like to do in one of your games, you can open the editable in GM7 and see how it was done. The MP3 file is also included. Overall, Pick A Ball is a well done and casually fun puzzle game that will entertain you for a while, and maybe teach you some new Game Maker tricks in the process.

04 17

Review | Asteroids+Plus

Review written by gmjab

Apart from the troubles I had downloading Asteroids+Plus I think in a way that it is a worth while game to be played compared to some games submitted on the GMC. Asteroids+Plus is a remake of the good old Asteroids game and It has some nice & different features with it. Asteroids+Plus is and average scoring game that nothing too special about it's graphics and sound but has some nice little extras. Some of the graphics look like they may have come from resource packs or websites like the background, player's ship and asteroids. Most of all the sprites fitted together nicely with no majorly noticeable sharp edges. The effects used in the game were well selected and looked nice. The HUD could do with a face lift since the gradient doesn't really follow together the best but it's a decent well laid out HUD. I thought the menu was quite good how it was 3D and zoom in and out every now and then. Also the font, although a bit blurry I thought suited the game nicely. The sound is a different story altogether. The music is cool but I don't think it quite suites the game. I didn't however like how all the sound effect had a reverb effect, it really put me off while playing. The game only included 2 songs that I heard and a number of little but nice effects. The gameplay was mostly smooth except I found when controlling with your mouse, the ship tends to flip around when it shouldn't. This made mouse control very hard but it was a nice feature that I haven't seen used before in a Asteroids game. The controls were pretty straight forward and easy to use aside from the mouse movement. I didn't experience any lag during game play and the actual game is not hard to beat. Overall this game has a bit of everything and also adds some new features to the old Asteroids game. The graphics, sound are fair and the gameplay is mostly good. With a few improvements this game will be quite good. CHEATS superman – Infinite shield cosmic10 – 10 Lives blowaway – Higher top speed & acceleration mchammer – Infinite double damage asteroid – Infinite 5x damage bonus4me – All bonuses death2me – Almost dead

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Head 2 Head | Game Maker Examples

Surely the majority of people have played that well known game on the Nokia phones. Yes I am talking about ‘Snake’. In this issue we have searched the Internet and found two simple ‘Snake’ examples for Game Maker so you can have a go at making your own version. Simon Donkers’ Snake Example Author: Simon Donkers Link: http://gamemaker.simondonkers.com/example/37 Just like anything made by Simon Donkers, a great deal or time and effort has been put into this example. It works well and does what it is supposed to. It can be used as an engine to build upon or simply used as a learning experience. kross_7’s Snake Example Author: kross_7 Link: http://64digits.com/games/index.php?cmd=view_game&id=197 Another good example with matching features to the original ‘Snake’ game. Has its own unique features in comparison to Simon’s and adds some competition to our Head2Head.

Simon Donkers Good points: ● Works perfectly. ● Not much complicated coding. ● Also fun to just play. ● Easy to edit levels. ● Has a time function which tells you how long you've been playing a level. ● Shows how to add music in and how to use a controller/joypad. Bad points: ● Not commented, this makes it a little bit hard to understand for novices. Score: 8/10

Kross_7 Good points: ● Very well commented. ● Does what it's supposed to do. ● Speed increases frequently. ● Easy to edit. Bad points: ● Instead of using up-left-down-right keys you can only use the left and right arrow keys to turn 90 degrees each time. ● There are some functions put inside that shouldn't be in a normal snake game.

Score: 7.5/10

Overall both contain helpful elements to somebody studying how to make a basic ‘Snake’ game. However Simon Donkers wins by half a point due to the features implemented to make it perform just like in the Nokia days. However if you really aren’t great with GML, we suggest you go for kross_7’s example due to the fact it is thoroughly commented so you can understand a lot easier.

Interview | BlaXun : Slime Online

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The GMC member BlaXun is well known for his new game Slime Online. The issue we will be asking him a few questions about him and Slime Online. [ 1 ] When you first started using Game Maker what was your dream? Why? I've always been very interested in games. When I was still younger I started making my own "computers" out of paper ^^; I was fascinated by the fun that computers, consoles and their games can give you. Then suddenly I found the "RPG-Maker 95" somewhere and started to use it. It was then when I looked up a search-engine and just inserted the word GAME MAKER...I didn't even think I would find anything but luckily I found the tool I am using since Version 3.X now ^^ From there on I realized how powerful GM is and now its a dream to create entertaining and fresh games. [ 2 ] How many games would you say you have made before Slime Online? Well, I actually browsed all my games I made yesterday. There would be about 10 games.....and many things I just started to test out new stuff. Many things I started always make me loose interest at some point. But I think this goes for many people. [ 3 ] Is Slime Online your first successful game? If so, why do you think it was? Well, before I started Slime Online I had another project called "Creators World". It also earned a lot of compliments and entertained the people with some unexpected gameplay elements. But, yes, I think Slime Online is even more successful. That's most likely because people explore a (well designed) new world and suddenly see that they are not alone. There's also the music (which I didn't make myself) which is very retro. (chip-tunes) [ 4 ] For people who haven't heard of Slime Online, what's it all about? Why should people play it? In Slime Online you take the role of a cute Slime. The game itself is basically a Platformer, but as the title says it's all Online. The game is a non-linear game. You can explore all areas as long and as often as you want. This gives the game a more "free" feeling. On your way through the world (which starts off with some small tutorial maps) you can collect so called "Slime Points" which didn't serve a purpose in beta3 (Besides getting on top of the highscore table ^^). In the next beta you will be able to buy headgears and other things like tickets for the airship, keys and more. Another key-feature of the game (which earned some critics) is that you can not freely talk to other people. However, you can communicate by using "Emoticons". By pressing s key you can get a Emoticon shown over your slime, like "Hello" "Follow me" "Lets go to the airship" "What do you mean" well, such things that are very easy to understand. I got many people asking me WHY I wont let people talk freely.

Interview | BlaXun : Slime Online (continued)

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Well, you play a cute Slime...it looks somewhat stupid..but happy. To let the players find some more charm in the game I added this limited communication system. It's really funny to see Slimes interact with each other this way ^^. But that doesn't mean that you are only limited to these emoticons! On the whole world of Slime Online there are "Chat-Rooms". You enter a chat room like any other room. You still control you slime in this room but you can also type messages and they are added to a chat which runs in the background. Many people gather at these places. Well, I think that's it about the gameplay for now, but new version will add more things of course. [ 5 ] What inspired you to make Slime Online and how long has it taken you to make it? To be honest, the idea of the game didn't even exist at first. I just wanted to test out some basics of the 39dll. But before I even realized I had a good game engine. I added some cute graphics and soon got people interested in the game. From there on I decided to work on it even more. I could have stopped by then but there is an important thing abut such games that make you want to work on it. You see people having fun in the game! With other games that you post somewhere you get replies like "Was fun 8/10!" or "Work on it some more blah blah..." but in an online game you walk through your created world and see peoples having fun. Then you realize that you want to give them more and more and more. Thats what keeps me working on the game ^^. How long it took? Well, I must say I work pretty quick (I also got some help from 39ster on some online parts later, but somehow he stopped talking to me). I think a first demo was available after 2 weeks...from there on there were some quick updates, but at the moment I am working on v4 for about...wow...months ^^;. [ 6 ] Through your development what kept you focused on Slime Online? Was there any development issues? Well, as I wrote before, the people who gave me very positive feedbacks also gave me the power to work on the game for a long time. About the issues.....yes, of course there are always some new problems appearing. At the moment I got a very nasty bug in beta4 which I didn't get to fix yet...but I am doing my best to kill this one >.< [ 7 ] What was your first overall reaction to the feedback you received? Why? The first feedbacks where so-so. I got complimented on the graphics and a solid engine...but the first versions where limited in its online functions. You couldn't even see the other players ^^; Many people complained about the game not being an online game. I think 39ster and me showed em that it is a full online game by now ;)

Interview | BlaXun : Slime Online (continued)

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[ 8 ] What do you think the future has install for Slime Online ? I got many ideas I want to add. At the moment I am concentrating on the inventory system, headgears (which are also designed by forum members of the Slime Online Board)and team-play maps. I also added a bank-system to beta4. You can deposit, withdraw and even transfer Slime Points between accounts. Future versions would get some nice features like "mining". You can use a pick-axe to mine for materials which can be used to build some headgears (which even give special ability's) Another option would be to add some kind of battle-system...but I am not 100% sure about this. [ 9 ] What would you like to say to people that would like to make a online game like yours? Any tips? Tips? Of course: Be different! Who would want to play the same game over and over again just with changed graphics? (at the moment there are like 20000 games that use the same car-driving online engine and about 487356578 games that use an online TDS engine....boring if you ask me) Why would people want to play your game? Why would YOU want to play it? Where can you add online functions? Where can you limit the player to create a challenging experience? There are many things to think about before you even start a game. [ 10 ] Do you have any other special projects you think people will like? There is no other project at the moment, but I have many other ideas I'd like to try. But for now I'll concentrate on Slime Online ;)

Software | Look into: XBLite

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For my first in-depth look into a program for this magazine I have decided to choose XBLite. XBLite is an open source development tool that has its own programming language and compiler. It is designed to create software such as games and Windows programs, it also has the ability to create dynamic link libraries.(DLL's) XBLite has been around since 2002 but it seems to remain a hidden treasure that only some people have found. XBLite is a updated version of the well known XBasic. Prior to finding XBLite I was trying greatly to learn c++ as it looked to be the next best step from the Game Maker Language. While I was learning c++, I found XBLite while browsing and since I found it I have put more effort into learning XBLite then at c++. The XBLite language is a mix between BASIC & C, so really it is a easy version of C. XBLite's language is easy to learn and easy to understand , it's so good in-fact that I was able catch on to most of it with one day. XBLite has many great features, some of these are: ➢

Advanced 32-bit/64-bit BASIC

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Fast compilation & fast execution

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Advanced memory management technology (no allocations or memory limits)

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Advanced math libraries and technologies

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Comes with a load of samples

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XBLite runs on Win32 (Windows 95/98/Me, NT/2000/XP...)

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Creates standalone executables and standalone libraries (DLL)

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XBLite is GPL, it's libraries are LGPL(you may sell your applications that are made in XBLite)

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Uses inline assembly to improve speed.

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Incorporates m4 macro preprocessor

XBLite comes with a source code editor XSED which is a scillinta based program. XSED comes with all the features a source code editor would need and it doesn't lack features very much. Along with XSED XBLite comes with hundreds of demo/example programs, so it very easy to find help for any project you are creating. I was first attracted to XBLite because I read it was able to create DLL's which would be great for use with Game Maker. At first it was hard to create a DLL because the help file lacks in that field. After a few days I was able to create my first demo DLL that was compatible with Game Maker thanks to few a helpful people from XBLite's small community.

Software | Look into: XBLite (continued)

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XBLite's syntax is very similar to BASIC but also incorporates some of C. Like c, c++ you can include libraries like user32 & kernal32, but XBLite also has it own libraries like xst which is the standard library for XBLite programs. One function I noticed that was missing that is greatly needed is “ ELSE IF ”. It could be added in a future version but until then you will have to use the “ SELECT” function which will almost does the same thing. XBLite is very easy to understand if you have done programming in basic. For you to get an idea of how a simple hello world program code would look, have a look at the below XBLite code. CODE: PROGRAM "ConsoleTest" VERSION "1.00" CONSOLE IMPORT "xst" DECLARE FUNCTION Start() '////////////////////////////////////////// '// Start() '////////////////////////////////////////// FUNCTION Start() PRINT "Hello World!" INLINE$("Press any key to quit >") END FUNCTION END PROGRAM If you were to create a simple DLL in XBLite that was compatible with Game Maker you could start of with this sample source code: CODE: PROGRAM "DllTest" VERSION "1.00" IMPORT "xst" DECLARE FUNCTION DllStart() EXPORT DECLARE FUNCTION DOUBLE Add(DOUBLE AddA,DOUBLE AddB) END EXPORT FUNCTION DllStart() Xst() END FUNCTION FUNCTION DOUBLE Add(DOUBLE AddA,DOUBLE AddB) RETURN AddA+AddB END FUNCTION END PROGRAM XBLite is really a great development tool for everyone and I believe it deserves more than what it has gotten so far. If you would like to check out XBLite please go to the homepage below: WEBSITE: http://perso.wanadoo.fr/xblite/

Software | Free applications

Open Office.org 2.0 Link: http://www.openoffice.org/ Who said you need Microsoft Office ?, Forget about paying a heap of money for it and get Open Office.org. Open Office.org is basically the equivalent to MS Office 2000-2003 but FREE, it contains a database program, spread sheeting program, drawing program, presentation program, maths program and a writer like MS Word. The Open Office writer for instance can basically do everything MS Word can from spell checking to recording macros. It supports loading & saving of MS *.doc files and can even export documents to PDF's. Even this issue GM TECH Magazine was put together with Open Office.org .

CamStudio 2.0 Link: http://www.rendersoftware.com/ Lately there have been a few games coming out on the GMC that have game trailers for them. CamStudio is a simple & free solution to people who would like to make game trailers. CamStudio will recorder pretty much anything that happens on your screen and record it to a AVI file. It can record regions (including fullscreen), sound(from different devices), allows you to have screen & video Annotations and can even convert your AVI file to a flash(SWF) file. Aside from those it has video, audio & cursor options available The best thing about CamStudio is it so simple to use. Just set your regions and about and hit record.

Audacity 1.2.6 Link: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ Looking for a audio editor ? Stop right here, this program just for fill all your needs. Audacity is a great audio editor for most sound files that support loading *.wav, *.aif, *.au, *.mp3 and *.ogg. Editing a file is pretty easy in Audacity because of it easy to use layout. Audacity has too many features to explain here so I will mention a few: Supports importing & mixing, Editing ID3 tags, exporting to *.mp3(Requires the LAME MP3 Encoder, which is free) & *.ogg, contains heaps of effect(There is also a pack of other effects on the website), can set rates & many more. Audacity is a great free one-stop-shop.

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Closing | Final Words

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Shutdown Looks like you have read through yet another issue of the GM TECH Magazine. We hope that this issue will be the best issue we have put together so far. We would love to hear from you about your personal opinion of the magazine and any suggestions you might have. Thank-you to the people who have submitted content for the mag, without you the issues would be a whole lot smaller. On behalf of the GM TECH Mag team thank-you for reading and for your support.

In the next issue: ➢ Cheats for games (part 2) ➢ Battleships Forever exclusive ➢ Comic ➢ More tip's & reviews ➢ and more...

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