‘GameMaker: Studio’ Debuts on Steam’s New App Store

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October 2nd, 2012 | By

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For better or for worse, Valve Software really do seem to be maneuvering themselves into position as a cornerstone of the indie gaming business, and now they’re getting right in on the ground floor. It’s been known for some time that Steam was going to be expanding to support commercial software soon, and now it does – the very first app on the pile? YoYo Games’ incredibly popular GameMaker Studio.

It makes sense – GameMaker has been the development software of choice for a lot of indie classics over the years, including the original version of Spelunky, Immortal Defense, freeware hits such as Iji and Hero Core and even the Cactus’ upcoming hyper-violent 80s action game Hotline Miami (coincidentally Steam-bound soon) were all developed using the package. Just about the only thing it can’t do consistently well is 3D graphics – Unity, UDK and Cryengine fill that niche, though.

What makes the Steam launch of Game Maker so important? Steam Workshop integration. Previously, games were showcased, launched and often completely lost on YoYo Games’ own showcase site. Now, games developed with Game Maker can be directly uploaded to the Steam Workshop where players can find, download, play and rate them. It effectively turns Steam into an almost Newgrounds-esque freeware hub filled, if you know where to look.

As with the regular site-bound version of GameMaker, the Steam edition comes in Free, Standard and Professional editions, and with optional upgrades to export titles as iOS, Android & HTML5 packages. Right now, there’s a 10% launch discount on all the software, and there’s even some strange Steam-specific perks, such as achievements… Yes, achievements. An amusing lot, including ones for racking up a certain number of compiler errors. Guess you’ll be able to see which of your friends suck as programming.

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About the author

(303 posts)

A geek for all seasons. A veteran of early DOS-era gaming, with encyclopaedic knowledge of things geeky on all platforms. The more obscure and bizarre, the better. If you've got indie news you want to break in a big way, send it this way!

  • MonkeyMaw

    Just found the site, thanks to a fellow tweeter. This is awesome news. I do wonder how they will prevent this from becoming like the Sandbox you mentioned. Regardless, this is a good thing and kudos to YoYo, they have come a long way in the last few years!

  • Dominic Tarason

    Why would they want to prevent it? The only problem with the old sandbox is that it was slow, clunky and hard to sort through. Problems not exactly shared with Steam Workshop. Yes, there’s going to be a ton of ‘my first game’ projects up on there, but isn’t that a good thing? Where better to start game development AND find an audience than the biggest store out there?

  • MonkeyMaw

    I’d wish to prevent it simply because it would be my company image. I wouldn’t want a bunch of click the clown games on the front page of my workshop. I suppose that’s why. I’m viewing it from a business angle of sorts.

    I understand your point however. If that’s not how they see it then great! Especially for all the little guys such as myself. It’s neat to even think you could have a screen of your project on Steam.

  • Dominic Tarason

    Given that Valve have been pushing modding and level-sharing features via Workshop pretty hard these past few months, making it a starting place for indie development is probably going to reflect very well on them as a company. A lot of their talent has come from student and indie groups over the years – it only makes sense to try and grow it at home.

  • MonkeyMaw

    Oh I’m not referring Valve in any form or fashion, I was referring to YoYo Games this entire time. Sorry, I should have made myself more clear :)

  • Petey_AM

    I think this is an awesome thing. I mean Valve tends to support their products very well and makes a viable interface which is easy to use. The release will likely raise the number of Indie Developers, as well as push more people into developing. I think its a genius move by Valve as well as a solid investment for developers.