A wild Construct Mention

Hey all, been quite a long time since the last time I was here. Just getting back into the frame of mind to want to work on games again, and it's great to see just how far along Construct has come since my last visit. Anyway...

I popped in because I was just watching a video on YouTube, "You Can Make Video Games" (

) which is a talk which was held as part of AmeCon 2010 in the UK. The talk itself is fairly insightful, but at around the 18:50 mark while he's talking about game creation tools, Construct pops up (as the second of his chosen three).

Thought it was awesome to see that Construct is getting out there and is becoming known by more and more people.

Thats cool Looks like a good talk, and Construct was mentioned on pretty much equal footing to Game Maker. Nice to know, thanks for the link!

I used to use Game Maker when I was younger, and IMO Construct is much better.

W00t! Construct FTW!

I used to use Game Maker when I was younger, and IMO Construct is much better.

I concur.

I am here for a reason... I have used just about every game making tool out there at one point or another. I find Construct to easily be one of the more powerful (if not the most now) and the most intuitive to use.

Conztrukt fo lyfe holmez.

~Sol

Just to further the compliments on construct, I'm a C++ programmer for many years, and I always looked down upon game makers as half-assed, no-skilled dead ends for people too lazy to learn how to really make games. They were always too limited to make anything decent (and typically, suffered horribly in performance).

Forgive the snobbery, just being honest.

However, Construct has changed my opinion completely. It's extremely well done. While it still has its limitations, it's light years ahead of game makers I've looked down upon in the last decade... to the point where I'd say it's a mandatory wrench in any game builders toolbox. Whether they use it to release the game or not. It's just marvelous for fleshing out ideas quickly and getting demos up and running to pitch ideas to others.

Most of this is based around the open-ended nature of Construct and it's ability to be extended by a powerful scripting language. Instead of offering people a box to play in, you've given them an engine they can tap into (effectively, giving them a world).

Well done, Scirra!

Just to further the compliments on construct, I'm a C++ programmer for many years, and I always looked down upon game makers as half-assed, no-skilled dead ends for people too lazy to learn how to really make games. They were always too limited to make anything decent (and typically, suffered horribly in performance).

Forgive the snobbery, just being honest.

However, Construct has changed my opinion completely. It's extremely well done. While it still has its limitations, it's light years ahead of game makers I've looked down upon in the last decade... to the point where I'd say it's a mandatory wrench in any game builders toolbox. Whether they use it to release the game or not. It's just marvelous for fleshing out ideas quickly and getting demos up and running to pitch ideas to others.

Most of this is based around the open-ended nature of Construct and it's ability to be extended by a powerful scripting language. Instead of offering people a box to play in, you've given them an engine they can tap into (effectively, giving them a world).

Well done, Scirra!

other than having used c++ for years I pretty much agree with the rest of it. I used think game makers were silly toys no one could use to make anything serious.

also, don't forget you can use c++ to make plugins, which takes away almost any remaining limitations.

btw, if you've been using c++ for years, check out the sdk, it's pretty easy to get something awesome happening

other than having used c++ for years I pretty much agree with the rest of it. I used think game makers were silly toys no one could use to make anything serious.

also, don't forget you can use c++ to make plugins, which takes away almost any remaining limitations.

btw, if you've been using c++ for years, check out the sdk, it's pretty easy to get something awesome happening

Indeed. My time has been so limited lately I barely have time to even use Construct as just an end user (we just had another baby! whew!) Anyway, I'm still a novice user of Construct, so I haven't thought of a lot of additional needs yet (a few ideas...)

But in time, I plan to.

Wow, a rather interesting game i would say.

The graphics don't seem to disturb the gameplay at all according to me, but rather infact gives it a retro look - which i like. The retro look adds a different feel to the game and makes it enjoyable for the game itself rather than the appearance. The game is definitely worth having a look at.

I'd say MMF2 and Construct is better than Game Maker. I've always said this. Just about every GM game I've played weather it was well done or not, was buggy, crashy, or laggy. The creator failed to optimize. Besides from the MMF2 can Construct as well as the coding community tends to have and older members. The only I see that MMF2 has over Construct is it's folder system, but I think Construct will have the ability to drag objects from the objects folders.

I think a lot of Game makers are made missing the point of what they're supposed to be. While it's great to be able to script, write language and whatever else, I've always felt that complication is supposed to be minimized greatly with these types of programs. Construct accomplishes that.

I've used MMF a lot and the event system sucks. Plus, simple event operations are made more complicated than they should be with MMF. The only things MMF has over Construct is stability, exports to other platforms, and a better sound and music management (i.e. sounds and music automatically embed into an .exe). But in terms of intuitiveness and function, Construct is in a class of its own. Rapid prototyping is a breeze with Construct.

I do like MMF's shader system, but I wish let you combine different shaders. I kind of wish Construct has some of MMF shader system to the point of doing this.

// Pixel shader input structure
struct PS_INPUT
{
    float4 Position   : POSITION;
    float2 Texture    : TEXCOORD0;
};

// Pixel shader output structure
struct PS_OUTPUT
{
    float4 Color   : COLOR0;
};

// Global variables
sampler2D Tex0;

// Megaman Colors
float4 OL;
float4 BL;
float4 LB;
float4 EY;
float4 FA;

PS_OUTPUT ps_main( in PS_INPUT In )
{
    // Output pixel
    PS_OUTPUT Out;
	Out.Color = tex2D(Tex0, In.Texture);
           
	// Do a sum of the r, g and b values, 1 check is quicker than 3	   
	float sum = Out.Color.r + Out.Color.g + Out.Color.b;
		   
		   
	// Look for the most common colors first, for efficiency, in those cases we can end the check early
	// Based on X's standard pose:
	
   // Outline (106 pixels in X)
   if (sum>0.058 && sum<0.059)
   {
		Out.Color.rgb = OL;
   }
   // Blue (48 pixels in X)
   else if (sum>1.364f && sum<1.365f)
   {
		Out.Color.rgb = BL;
   }
   // Light Blue (44 pixels in X)
   else if (sum>1.956 && sum<1.957)
   {
		Out.Color.rgb = LB;
   }
   // Eyes(29 pixels in X)
   else if (sum>3 && sum<4)
   {
		Out.Color.rgb = EY;
   }

   //Face(29 pixels in X)
   else if (sum>2.537f && sum<2.538f)
   {
		Out.Color.rgb = FA;
}
    return Out;
}

// Effect technique
technique tech_main
{
    pass P0
    {
        // shaders
        VertexShader = NULL;
        PixelShader  = compile ps_2_0 ps_main();
    }  
}[/code:23olzfqf]
A megaman color replace shader.

IN the event editor you'd have to replace the RGB in a single line instead of 3 like the color shader lucid(?) made a while back.