Construct supports Javascript coding in addition to its block-based approach. Javascript is an industry-standard language used widely across browsers, servers a...
The problem with third-party tools is that as soon as something doesn't work properly, we have to rely on other people to fix it, as it has been happening for the last few years with NWjs. Sometimes bug takes years to fix, or aren't fixed. Every serious developer that uses Construct faces this, you have to either Google or ask around something as simple as adding "--in-process-gpu" to your args just so your game can be captured by streamers.
Performance is very important, but being able to publish your game also is - otherwise why are we even making games? Just look at how many GMS games have been published on consoles and PC to this date - even if GML is over 5 times slower.
Using third-party software is simply unavoidable with modern software development. Changing technologies still won't completely solve that. For example with native engines graphics driver issues can be far more problematic - and graphics card vendors are almost impossible to communicate with. If there's a public bug tracker, at least there's a viable route to getting something fixed - and we routinely do file issues on behalf of user issues and follow them up. Lots of bugs do get fixed this way. Some might slip through the cracks but as ever, changing technology is not a silver bullet that will solve everything.
I agree 3rd party isn't all bad and it's very necessary, but in Construct's case we have to rely on it to get our games out in basically any platform that's not web.
My point is that no matter the performance boost you can have with JS, it makes no difference if I my games keep breaking because of old NWjs bugs, or if I can't release anything on consoles. In both these cases, this doesn't happen with GameMaker.
Like I said I absolutely love Construct, but the minute we have to release something you start to notice how hard it is compared to any other engine out there - specially GameMaker.
Like any platform NW.js has some bugs but usually they get fixed in updates. And if you stay on the same version, nothing actually changes so it shouldn't suddenly break overnight. Are there any active issues with the latest NW.js version?
Well, since it's been asked...
For me, biggest NW.js export issues are incompatibility with OBS (very popular software to record footages from the game) and things like steam overlay.
But what steps are being made to solve C3's issues when publishing for PC and Consoles? Those are main markets now for indie developers, and the exporting issues have been a problem since C2's days.
We recently introduced the new Windows WebView2 and macOS WKWebView export options providing lightweight alternatives for desktop publishing - particularly relevant to people who had complained about the size of NW.js in the past. As for consoles, it's difficult for us to act on that unless console makers add support for HTML5 games - but there are third-party porting services out there.
I've seen that Scirra has filed issues on users behalf, which I think is great as sometimes a user may not know exactly how to poignantly word and demonstrate their issue - having Scirra step in can help get third-party devs and engineers to understand the issue quicker. Much appreciated for this!