Im new wanted to say Hi to all and im a 17 yearold dude that plans to start on a gamemaking experience and wants to learn all i can.First off im from PuertoRico and my main language is spanish so you might see a few bad spelling on my part. Well i dont have alot of exp with gamemaking but im working on that. So me Q would be this: What are the cons and pros of these GME's? BYOND vs GAMEMAKER vs DARKBASIC vs DBPRO vs TORQUE I have gone to the sites and heard good things about them but i cant make my mind to which one to use,so im here at GameDev asking the real gamemakers and the ppl that have used those GME's to give me some details about them,like: Power,Speed,Coding,Possibilities,etc. Thanx for the help.

To be honest i don't know, but since nooone else had posted here i'll blab.

IMO they most likely dont differ from one another too much. But i would also like to say, how experienced are you at programming. It might be worth learning something like C++ and DirectX or OpenGl urself befor you start toying with actualy game making.

ace

Hi Mech_Master,

You might try looking here for a comparison of game engines.

Quote:

Original post by Mech_Master What are the cons and pros of these GME's? BYOND vs GAMEMAKER vs DARKBASIC vs DBPRO vs TORQUE

Some of those I'd never heard of, and I can't say I've ever used any of them - but here's a basic run down based on my own research:

BYOND:
This appears to be aimed at internet based games. If you want to create a relatively simple but fun graphical MUD or other net based multiplayer game, this might be a good option. The site doesn't seem to have much detail on the language or methods used to create the game, but since it's free you can easily download it and try it out for yourself.

GameMaker:
This is a general game creation system which seems to be based on a point and click style interface, for the most part. You can create some entertaining games with it, but you'll be somewhat limited by the capabilities of the interface. There's little or no coding involved. There is a freely downloadable version which you can upgrade to the full version if you find it useful.

DarkBASIC:
This wraps up useful game programming functions into an easy to use BASIC style language. If you're interested in learning programming, this might be a good thing to start with, since BASIC is fairly easy to learn and DarkBASIC seems to be powerful enough to give you decent results. I'm not too sure about performance or flexibility, but I gather it's pretty good.

Torque:
Torque is not a game maker as such, it is a game engine, apparently suitable for developing a professional AAA standard game. I would imagine that you would need to be a fairly competent C++ programmer in order to get anything out of the Torque engine, but you have a high degree of flexibility and the potential for very good results. It does however, cost money: although the cost seems to be quite low for what it is.

Honestly? Guage your seriousness, but dont touch a real 3d api this early. I dont see why you would honestly waste your money on torque (not saying it isnt good, just saying you wont get anything done). If you are trying to get into games as a career, learn C/C++, and grab a copy of ALLEGRO or SDL (both free) or another industry equivlent language. If you just want to make a little toy game to impress your mom, try your gamemaker or click&play. If you want to create a simple CRPG or something of the like, but dont want anything facny try VERGE or learn one of your BASIC languages.

I've used DarkBASIC a bit in the past and I must say, I was pretty impressed with what it could do. In about 6 hours I created a basic VIRUS style game demo; it was without enemies or weapons, so was more of a rolling patchwork terrain thingie but it was pretty nice to see something up and running in such little time. I did find it strange as I am mainly a C++ coder, so the switch from OOP-classes to a procedural language was difficult.

I completely disagree with ace_lovegrove; I'd recommend a simple game system like DarkBASIC (and pyGame, etc) to anyone thinking of cutting their teeth on game programming. For one, you don't have to spend months and months learning the language before you see results. If you're new to coding, it'll introduce you at a BASIC level (har har) and you can expand from there. Expect a real learning curve when you do switch to lower level languages and different software design paradigms, but I think starting out with a language like DarkBASIC is a good idea.

I learned simple game programming in BASIC on the Spectrum, then later progressed to Amos BASIC and BlitzBasic on the Amiga. I had a lot of fun creating games in these languages and made quite a few decent games at the time. I'm using C++ now and seem to spend all my time working out how to do things that these environments do for you, losing time spent on making the game itself... go figure.

So, my recommendation is to pick something like Dark or Blitz and have some fun =)

It depends on the kind of game you want to make.

I've never heard of BYOND.

GameMaker is for 2d game creation. It's pretty easy to use and probably a good choice for simple games, I don't know how fast or powerful it is for more complex stuff or how much control it gives you over graphics for effects and such. I never really liked it much myself, but it's free and worth a try.

DarkBasic might have grown since last I tried it, but i'd stay pretty far away from that if you're looking to make anything halfway professional. It was missing some important features like a culling system and games made in it ran pretty slow. Plus its hideous fullscreen code editor, ugh. DBPRO is the updated version, and I never used it but it's supposed to be pretty good. Keep in mind that both of these use the BASIC programming language syntax. If you're interested in that then you might want take a look at BlitzBasic 3d as well, I think it's cheaper than DarkBasic Pro.

Torque isn't a gamemaker, it's an engine to integrate into your C++ games if you don't want to spend time writing your own. It's very affordable and impressive from what I've seen.

I've recently used gamemaker so I can only really comment on that.
It does has a lot of functions, with the ability to add dlls for added functions. Yu can create all sorts of games, though it remains primarily a 2d gamemaker. Though 3d is possible.
There is a basic(basic as in not complex) scripting language, which you can get alot more out of it than the d&d, and it is possible to get something up in around 10 minutes.
It's main downfall is speed. Compared to others it is relatively slow, but if it's not too processer intensive you should be ok.
Overall it's great to get you going in design, as it is easy to make a game, and you can always learn a language if you find it too easy.
Another thing you should check out is this.

I have 3DGameStudio which I like. As it is still evolving and new features are being added every 3-4 months, the support isn't too bad. Unfortunately after cutting my teeth on programming in 3DGS, I find myself turning to OpenGL to have "more control" over what I can do with what I want to do in 3D programming.

Most of the problems revolve around getting the program to work with my more advance modelling programs like TS as I can't afford 3D StudioMax. Most programs support the 3DS format but unless you have $3k to drop on a legal copy of 3DSM, then you are forced to look at other 3D apps for content.

All of this to shorten the pipe-line from 3d app to game content. If you can directly load game content from your 3d app, life is sweet but when you start having to resort to middleware for *GOOD* conversion to one of the supported 3D file formats of your game maker of choice, then things slow to a crawl and you find yourself bogged down in content porting rather than using the content in your program. Way not fun.

Your best bet is to buy UT2k4 or one of the other $40-50 games out there with mod tools. I highly recommend UT2k4 because I know it better than the others, BTW. UT2k4 can use maya personal to build models with and they export straight into UT2k4 for either scripting (using the free IDS UDE) or static content. As the entire game has been written in script, there isn't a lot you can't do with UT2k4.

UT2K4 - cheap, documented in tons of sites and at least one book, and has a short pipeline to work with. $40, you can't beat it. Cut your teeth on that and then expand to your 3D API of choice.

Blitz Basic. I need help with it.