Some things I learned of AM

[Jaked]

Very easy to make adventure games, but If you want to make the next Myst, this is just a little bit short.

Athough with practice it gets much easier, scripting is always just a bestowingly hard task.

Use some kind of 3d/2d tool for frames. Art don't grow on trees.

AM is second to private game-company-programmed tools. But AM is in my opinion, #1 in the public domain!

Thank you.

[reneuend]

All good development tools have scripting behind them and allow for plugins! What makes AM so great is the community that backs it!

For the price, you got the most with AM!

[Mystery]

I tried out a few game development software, and in my opinion AM "requires" the least of scripting for customized games, and is the easiest to use.

Some software provide you with a game asset library (e.g. artwork like furniture, characters, trees; and also some basic scripts), but if you want to create your custom game, you need to create or get artwork, and do your own script, no matter what software you are using.

All software provide you with a certain set of features depending on the game genre(s) they target, but believe me, they all lack certain features at the same time. Then you have to find a workaround.
No wonder that game companies often make their own game engines that has all features that they need.

And concerning pricing, AM is at the low end, while providing a lot of features.

And I agree that the AM community is really great! It may be a small community compared to others, but the talents and skills are very broad (scripting, music, 2D artwork, 3D artwork etc.), plugins, example scripts, music and artwork are made available for others; and in my experience it's an uncomplicated bunch that is ready to help out longtime members as well as new members, regardless of the level of experience.

[mercedes]

Couldn't have said it better myself Mystery....

[Lyberodoggy]

AM can save you a great deal of time. Even if you know how to build an engine with AM's feature (meaning you don't have to spend time learning how to do that), you are going to need months of work in a daily basis to get something close to this engine, and the only benefit I can see to that is that you can constantly add features you want yourself - something that can also be done in AM through plugins.

So, yes, AM is a great software, which cannot be replaced, and although its functions (and community ) are priceless, it currently costs 50 euros (non commercial).
That's even less than a videogame, and It can do so much more!

[mercedes]

it currently costs 50 euros (non commercial).
That's even less than a videogame, and It can do so much more!

You know what else I like...U can upgrade too~

It's also really user-friendly..
I was a bit intimidated to get the Full version..cause I knew nothing of programming.. learning variables, was a task itself..
But the community helped me alot..

There wasn't a whole lot for me to go on..when i first came here..
No offense of course..I mean that by..what I wanted in my games..in terms of puzzles..ect...and not really understanding puzzles--with programming..I had to learn from scratch...

I had played so many games, and wanted all of those features in my games..lol..
Soo..after asking a trillion questions...and everyone's patience with helping me--teaching me step for step----Cause i had to know exactly how scripting and puzzles worked....


I've come to learn alot here...programming, art..the lot of it.. I knew nothing of either...before I bought AdventureMaker..~:D

So in essence;
My fav thing about AM... is the community forums....I've met alot of cool ppl here..and all, are really eager to help..

If I haven't said it before..Thanks very much..

[Harvester]

Even though none of you have seen any completed results of it, but I also used AM for quite a long time (that's why I'm here ). It's ease of use and low price make up for it's problematic points. The most I wanted to see in the beginning was panoramic support, and it came to existence, so I'm satisfied with the engine as far as I know it. I hope one day I may have the courage and enthusiasm and strenght and such to bring any of my plans to life, since there are always quite many of them...

Recently I use Multimedia Fusion 2 (again, since I have quite much experience with that series), and I find it to be the universal engine for 2d games. If you want to make an adventure game, AM is far better of course, since not many other genres require panoramic picture handling and such, so naturally they don't support adventure game specific tools. However, it needs practically no single line of scripting to make a custom game, and the built in tools are capable of virtually most of the things an indie game maker would like to use. Of course, to make anything extraordinary, you need to have the appropriate logical skills

What I find annoying in most 2d game development tools (the ones that are userfriendly to make it more specific), is that they lack the needed optimalisation for larger games. If I have a frame that are let's say 4 times the area displayable on a monitor with thousands of objects, it will lag on ALL systems (which is strange since if a machine can run a commercial high-end 3d game, how comes it can't a 2d frame?...). That's also a point at which AM is good: of course we don't have thousands of objects, but at least these games tend to run on almost all configurations.

That's what I could think of at the moment for this topic.

Harvester

[Jaked]

Actually, Mystery, there are ones with no scripting, but the Outcome is AWFUL.

[ZeornWarlock]

Actually, Mystery, there are ones with no scripting, but the Outcome is AWFUL.

That depends, really. Because just knowing how to use variables without scripting can make a big difference in the end result and game-play. And that is possible to do with the free version.

What new game designers need to do is plan ahead and be realistic with a project. Think of the following factors? How much time a day can you put in your project and what tools do you have at this very moment to make a complete game? What kind of game is it? A puzzle game, is it an escape the room game, is it a story driven game and so on? If it is a story driven game, have you written your story from beginning to the end? If not, then there is a good chance you will get stuck during creation and so on? There are many other things to think, but in my opinion some of the above covers the basics.

Sometimes projects take a good deal of time to create and even I get discouraged from time to time. I have been working for more than a year on my very own project and as much as I want to release it now, it is far from being complete. But that is only because I aim for a game with a good length, at least more than an hour if I can.

Game making takes time and a lot of efforts. And we all know there will be ups and downs and some ideas might not be possible, but maybe it is just the way we see it at first. Asking the AM community for advice, like many of us already do makes sense.

If artwork takes too long or is not satisfying, go for something else like home made pictures with a digital camera. Although, sound and music adds to a game, if you do not have access to it. So be it. Maybe in time both can be added.

I have tested many adventure game making engine and 2D/3D myself and by far, AM is the easiest to learn and that is why I have purchased the full commercial version. I?d rather spend my time building a game rather than learning how to use the engine it will be made with.

I doubt someone would really find AM that bad or too limited to work with, especially when the AM community is well supported by many talented individuals. The community might be small, but its heart is huge!

ZW.

[reneuend]

If AM doesn't have it, I've found that it is relatively simple to build it as a plugin. Thanks to the fact that we're using VB, which is a easy language to learn.

I wonder what it would take to rewrite AM in .NET? and if you did, wouldn't it open up the possibilities for AM? including building a game for the web? It seems like a natural move to make.