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''Garry Kitchen's GameMaker'' is an
integrated development environment An integrated development environment (IDE) is a software application that provides comprehensive facilities to computer programmers for software development. An IDE normally consists of at least a source code editor, build automation tools a ...
for the Commodore 64,
Apple II The Apple II (stylized as ) is an 8-bit home computer and one of the world's first highly successful mass-produced microcomputer products. It was designed primarily by Steve Wozniak; Jerry Manock developed the design of Apple II's foam-mold ...
, and
IBM PC The IBM Personal Computer (model 5150, commonly known as the IBM PC) is the first microcomputer released in the IBM PC model line and the basis for the IBM PC compatible de facto standard. Released on August 12, 1981, it was created by a tea ...
s, created by
Garry Kitchen Garry Kitchen (born August 18, 1955, in Washington, D.C., United States) is a video game designer, programmer, and executive best known for developing games for the Atari 2600, Commodore 64, Nintendo Entertainment System, and Super Nintendo Ent ...
and released by
Activision Activision Publishing, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Santa Monica, California. It serves as the publishing business for its parent company, Activision Blizzard, and consists of several subsidiary studios. Activision is one ...
in 1985. It is one of the earliest all-in-one game design products aimed at the general consumer, preceded by Broderbund’s ''
The Arcade Machine ''The Arcade Machine'' is a game creation system written by Chris Jochumson and Doug Carlston for the Apple II and published by Broderbund in 1982. Louis Ewens ported it to the Atari 8-bit family. Broderbund ran a contest from January–June 198 ...
'' in 1982. Several sample files are included: a demo sequence featuring animated sprites and music, a recreation of ''
Pitfall! ''Pitfall!'' is a platform video game designed by David Crane for the Atari 2600 and released by Activision in 1982. The player controls Pitfall Harry and is tasked with collecting all the treasures in a jungle within 20 minutes. The world co ...
'', and a birthday greeting. Two add-on disks are available for the Commodore 64 version: Sports, and Science Fiction. These include sprites, music, and background elements for loading into GameMaker.


Construction

GameMaker is divided into five tools, each of which consists of a graphical interface controlled with the joystick: * SceneMaker - for creating background graphics * SpriteMaker - for creating movable objects (i.e., sprites) * MusicMaker - for composing musical scores * SoundMaker - for creating sound effects * The Editor - for programming the actual game The programming language used by GameMaker is reminiscent of other early programming languages like
BASIC BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College ...
, but with several proprietary and tightly integrated graphics and sound facilities. Rather than enter the language via keyboard, GameMaker uses a novel contextual menu-based system. The user selects possible instructions, and then customizes the active objects of the instruction, such as variable names or numbers.


Limitations

Some limitations of Gamemaker are imposed by the Commodore 64 architecture, and some by the software itself: * Only eight sprites may be displayed at once (a C64 limit) * Each sprite and background may have a maximum of four colors, out of a palette of sixteen (a C64 limit) * Only two stationary background screens may be employed per game (a GameMaker limit) * Only 3553 total bytes are available for game resources — including sounds, music, sprites, and code (a GameMaker limit) * The games themselves may not access the disk (a GameMaker limit)


Reception

''
Computer Gaming World ''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American computer game magazine published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 1993. It expanded greatly through t ...
'' called ''GameMaker'' "excellent". ''COMPUTE's! Gazette'' called it "a thorough, complete package that makes it relatively easy to design arcade games that actually work."


See also

* ''
The Arcade Machine ''The Arcade Machine'' is a game creation system written by Chris Jochumson and Doug Carlston for the Apple II and published by Broderbund in 1982. Louis Ewens ported it to the Atari 8-bit family. Broderbund ran a contest from January–June 198 ...
'' (1982) * ''
Pinball Construction Set ''Pinball Construction Set'' is a video game by Bill Budge written for the Apple II. It was originally published in 1982 through Budge's own company, BudgeCo, then was released by Electronic Arts in 1983 along with ports to the Atari 8-bit family ...
'' (1983) * ''
Adventure Construction Set An adventure is an exciting experience or undertaking that is typically bold, sometimes risky. Adventures may be activities with danger such as traveling, exploring, skydiving, mountain climbing, scuba diving, river rafting, or other extreme s ...
'' (1985) * ''
Shoot'Em-Up Construction Kit Shoot-'Em-Up Construction Kit (a.k.a. SEUCK) is a game creation system for the Commodore 64, Amiga and Atari ST created by Sensible Software and published by Outlaw (part of Palace Software) in 1987. It allows the user to make simple shoot 'em ups ...
'' (1987) * ''
Arcade Game Construction Kit ''Arcade Game Construction Kit'' is a 1988 game creation system for making arcade-style games. It was developed by Mike Livesay and published by Broderbund for the Commodore 64. ''AGCK'' contained four floppy disks. The program uses a joystick-d ...
'' (1988)


References


External links


Official GameMaker site

The GameBase64 Collection
a compendium of user-created games {{DEFAULTSORT:Garry Kitchen's Gamemaker 1985 software Activision Apple II software Commodore 64 software DOS software Video game development software Video game IDE