Why so expensive?

Why is Construct 2 so expensive? It's a great dev tool, but GM: S is a better value to be quite honest. It's only $200 for HTML5 (GM: S Pro + HTML5 module) whereas it's $390 for Construct 2 business edition, nearly twice the cost. I'm somewhat disappointed, and as soon as I have the money I'll be switching over to GM: S.

A few things.

1. The 200$ HTML5 module for GM only gets you the HTML5 export. With Construct 2, you get every exporter they have for the one price.

2. The business edition is only needed for teams or if you have a higher income from your creation. You can get the personal edition which gives the exact same features inside of C2 for 120$ (Which ends up being less than the 200$ HTML5 module for GM)

3. You get all of the updates for free. When Scirra releases a new exporter you just update the software and you have it, no extra 200$ to unlock it. From what I can remember, if YoYo releases a new GM version you have to pay for everything all over again to get that new version.

You do not have to get a business license. Get the personal license, then when you hit $5,000 in revenue total you can get the business license without trouble. Which is a fair deal.

If you can't read the fine print, then you're not going to do well with GM, just sayin....

A few things.

1. The 200$ HTML5 module for GM only gets you the HTML5 export. With Construct 2, you get every exporter they have for the one price.

2. The business edition is only needed for teams or if you have a higher income from your creation. You can get the personal edition which gives the exact same features inside of C2 for 120$ (Which ends up being less than the 200$ HTML5 module for GM)

3. You get all of the updates for free. When Scirra releases a new exporter you just update the software and you have it, no extra 200$ to unlock it. From what I can remember, if YoYo releases a new GM version you have to pay for everything all over again to get that new version.

1. But as far as I know, the iOS and Android apps are just HTML5 and then run with a runner. Whereas in GM: S it will be compiled directly to native code (not actually available yet)

2. I plan on making a living form HTML5, so the personal edition won't cut it (I'd end up having to upgrade to the business edition anyways).

3. You get all the updates to GM for free (I've used GM in the past).

EDIT: Don't take this the wrong way, I really like Construct 2. I used Game Maker for windows for a long time, and switching over to Construct was awesome! I just don't see Construct 2 as being worth nearly $190 more than Game Maker.

> A few things.

>

> 1. The 200$ HTML5 module for GM only gets you the HTML5 export. With Construct 2, you get every exporter they have for the one price.

>

> 2. The business edition is only needed for teams or if you have a higher income from your creation. You can get the personal edition which gives the exact same features inside of C2 for 120$ (Which ends up being less than the 200$ HTML5 module for GM)

>

> 3. You get all of the updates for free. When Scirra releases a new exporter you just update the software and you have it, no extra 200$ to unlock it. From what I can remember, if YoYo releases a new GM version you have to pay for everything all over again to get that new version.

1. But as far as I know, the iOS and Android apps are just HTML5 and then run with a runner. Whereas in GM: S it will be compiled directly to native code (not actually available yet)

2. I plan on making a living form HTML5, so the personal edition won't cut it (I'd end up having to upgrade to the business edition anyways).

3. You get all the updates to GM for free (I've used GM in the past).

1. But then when you want to export to IOS/Android you need to toss in another $400, which puts the cost above the business edition.

2. The personal edition is very cheap, and you don't have to get the business edition until you make $5000. Once you've made that 5k $300 won't be too much of a problem. Since the actual software is the exact same I don't see how the personal edition "won't cut it" whereas the business one will.

3. Okay, I guess it has changed then.

1. But then when you want to export to IOS/Android you need to toss in another $400, which puts the cost above the business edition.

2. The personal edition is very cheap, and you don't have to get the business edition until you make $5000. Once you've made that 5k $300 won't be too much of a problem. Since the actual software is the exact same I don't see how the personal edition "won't cut it" whereas the business one will.

3. Okay, I guess it has changed then.

1. I don't want to make iOS/Android. It's an over saturated market that's nearly impossible to get recognized in unless you have a massive audience already. Which is exactly the reason why I chose HTML5.

2. But buying the personal edition would be literally throwing money away since I'll have to buy the business edition anyways (eventually, not right away obviously).

>

> 1. But then when you want to export to IOS/Android you need to toss in another $400, which puts the cost above the business edition.

>

> 2. The personal edition is very cheap, and you don't have to get the business edition until you make $5000. Once you've made that 5k $300 won't be too much of a problem. Since the actual software is the exact same I don't see how the personal edition "won't cut it" whereas the business one will.

>

> 3. Okay, I guess it has changed then.

1. I don't want to make iOS/Android. It's an over saturated market that's nearly impossible to get recognized in unless you have a massive audience already. Which is exactly the reason why I chose HTML5.

2. But buying the personal edition would be literally throwing money away since I'll have to buy the business edition anyways (eventually, not right away obviously).

1. <img src="smileys/smiley5.gif" border="0" align="middle" /> Then why did you bring it up?

2. It's a start up. Without putting that first amount of money into it, you won't be able to get any further.

IF you just want HTML5, I guess go for it.

For me, I like making the game once and then making minor tweaks in C2 to make the most money I can from it. That means exporting to HTML5, Amazon, Android, Windows 8, Windows 8 Phone, iOS, Blackberry 10, Tizen, Kongregate, etc. All with very minor changes to my games I can use all the features that makes the game fit with each system. Some games I make more on iOS and some do better on Droid. Anyway I do it, they make some money on each platform so why not? :)

I just finished my 5th game with Construct 2. All of my games are available on all the systems listed. Sure some you need to pay for dev licenses or whatever, but it pays for itself pretty quickly.

If you can't read the fine print, then you're not going to do well with GM, just sayin....

Exactly this.

This guy has shown in his posts that he does not read the fine print thoroughly. It is also likely that this guy has never shipped a game, because $390 is insanely cheap as a down payment for a development tool.

I wonder what this tool will do when he sees the $1,000,000 pricetag on the Unreal engine : D

And to all the people wondering why he's acting incoherently and picky about a few hundred $ - He's 15, according to one of his posts :P

Well there's no point in calling names, just like there's no point in complaining to people who have already paid for the program.

At $100 thye price is very fair, especially as you can get the free version first to see if it is for you. The business edition is also very reasonable in price. Our upgrades for Rad Studio are many more times that and they don't provide reasonable updates, instead they make a new version that you have to pay for. in other words I cannot fault scirra with their price policy. Two thumbs up.

C2 is cheap, I had a browse to see what was out there & picked C2 shortly after I was pleasantly surprised by the pricing. You wouldn't catch anyone complaining who's serious about game dev(spending 100's or more likely 1000's of hours per game)

Personally I wouldn't of hesitated if it was 3X the price

The point isn't that it's expensive (I realize that it isn't expensive relative to most other tools). But what I'm asking is, why is it more expensive than say GM: S.

Personally I really like the way GM: S does it's pricing, you only pay for what you want to develop for. I only want to develop for HTML5 (for reasons mentioned before, it's quite possible that I spend $100 annually for an Apple developer license but make much less than $100).

And I don't have a ton of money seeing as I make less than minimum wage right now (in my state if a business makes less than a certain amount of money they don't have to pay their employees minimum wage, and my employment options are quite limited as you might imagine). Plus if I were to say develop for a bunch of different platforms I would have to buy a device for each platform which in short, is a ton of money I don't have.

Enough explaining myself, maybe I will buy the Personal edition. But first I'd like to clarify one thing, do you have to buy the Business Edition after you have made $5000 from one single app, or in total from all of your games combined?

EDIT: One last thing, instead of being ridiculed for bringing up valid points, please explain your point of view instead of ridiculing mine. The burden of proof is on me, but that doesn't mean that you have to be ridiculous about it.