Hi there, 

I’m relatively new to game making. But I will like to try my hands on making a simple pixel art game that can work on either iOS AppStore, or PC. 

Which software would you all recommend me to use? 

Hope to hear from everyone. Thanks in advance. 

Hey Tereize!

I typically use Photoshop and then Krita for animation. Krita is an ok free program even for pixel art and you can definitely do everything with it. Some people want a more pixel-art-pipeline-optimized software and many of them like Aseprite very much. I never found it superior to my trusty PS/Krita combo, but it's all about what you're familiar with.

For any beginner I'd also recommend this free PDF about gamedev mistakes.

More important than the tool is to learn the theory for selecting colors, shading, and lighting. And movement, if you're animating stuff. You can really get lost into that stuff.

Hi Ianuarius, 

Thanks for the tips and share! 

And extreme thanks for mentioning about the movement, it's something which I think will give me lots of headache. 

Will definitely check out on the pdf document. 

Check out this channel on YouTube on animation.

Alex Small-Butera knows what he's talking about.

You might not need all this stuff when making really simple animated stuff, but it helps to have the theory in the back of your mind.

I have simply used GIMP for the pixel art and then compress it into whatever texture i want for rendering.

It is quite simple to use, no learning curve, and if it's simple and does the deal, i am up for it. That's my personal preference

Cool! Thanks Sideer

Designing good looking collections of coloured pixels (aka, an image), is not related to a platform at all. At the end of the day you have a .png or so, which can be used at any platform. As such, any software that can produce such a file can be used.

Obviously, there are a zillion such software packages. Just pick one that works for you (try a few), and use that.

Agree Alberth, but I do feel that there are some softwares which makes your life easier as it has the grids and is easy to paint for certain bit size characters. But I could be wrong, so feel free to correct me if I am. 

Yes, sure. Not all pixel programs are equal. You definitely want to select one that has all the features you want to have.

You can't make a wrong choice. Editors and other programs are personal choices, for you and only you the choice has to be optimal. What all others think about your choice is irrelevant.

Everybody use the programs he/she likes best, and recommends them. However, there are no two people that make the exact same choices. As such, asking around gives you a list of software that people use, but pretty much always there is no single program that does everything optimal for everybody. You have to make your own selection of programs that work best for you. You usually do that by giving them a spin (or two), and keeping what you like. Your choices do vary over time, so it's quite likely that what you pick today will be discarded tomorrow, and that's fine. You evolve (in experience and interests), software evolves (in features), and computers evolve (in hardware, as well as software). It would be weird if you never change preferred programs in your life.