Common Game Making Flaws

Introduction
Once, only a dozen games a month were introduced to the GM Community. Now, Game Maker has become so popular that the community is bombarded with that same amount of games in a mere hour. The purpose of this tutorial is to make suggestions to people who create games with Game Maker so that their game will stand out among thousands of others.

Diversity
When creating a game, variation is one key. A player does not want all levels to be similar; they want variation. The creator should take the time to develop unique levels and scenarios that surprise the player and keep the game fresh. In a 3D game, an environment lacking diversity is not believable. This makes it even more critical to add a variety of enemies and levels to your game. A classic example of an environment free of diversity is a simple maze game. Most maze games only feature one enemy and a few obstacles that appear in every level.

Music
Music sets the mood of games, and can invoke feelings and emotion. It can also help the player concentrate or get in the right mindset for a game. If the player is in an intense part of the game or fighting the final boss, they might hear some intense or suspenseful music. If they start the game and are on a nice grassy field, the music would generally be much brighter and almost happier. Many designers do not care about what music they use and simply pick out a few MIDI files around the internet that they like and may not necessarily apply to the game. This is obviously wrong. Regardless if the designer has the capability to create their own music, every sound that a player hears must be absolutely necessary. In other words, the music should fit the scene.

MIDI files, with an extension of .mid, .midi, or .rmi, are nothing more than instructions for a device that tell it how to generate sound. The quality of these samples generally depends on the hardware and the synthesizer used. Game designers that compose their own music must remember that the majority of computers only have GM MIDI and that music that they create will sound different. In some cases, the sound may even be harsh on the ears or may come out completely different than it did when it was created. So it is critical to ensure that MIDI sounds come out correctly because otherwise, it may be a potential turn-off.

Gimmicks
When creating a game, it makes sense to have unexpected twists or gimmicks in the games. However, these gimmicks should not interfere with standard game controls. For example, the jump button should only be the jump button. Don't extend gimmicks to the controls because the player will be infuriated. When there is something in a game that a player wouldn't normally expect, the game should demonstrate a way to make it clear to the player. Introduce an unusual gameplay element in a cutscene, or simply use graphical hints to show a player what to do.

Obstacles
Hazards such as spikes should be clear. While some levels should have hidden hazards, they should be something the player can eventually learn to avoid. Crucial objects shouldn't appear to be obstacles. For example, holes that the player must jump down shouldn't look like pits of death, and if a key looks like a spike, the player may believe that it is an obstacle and try to avoid it. Water shouldn't be deadly, whereas lava should.

Gameplay
Next-generation gaming consoles have shifted the focus of game designers. Modern game designers are focusing on graphics and sound rather than gameplay. However, Game Maker does not have the capabilities of an Xbox 360, so gameplay is much more important when creating a game with Game Maker. While art and music make up a large part of a game, a good game is only good because all the elements of a game work hand in hand. Every element of a game acts as a glue to hold the game together and provide entertainment for the player. When thinking about gameplay, a game designer must also take game speed into account. The speed of a game must be appropriate for its genre.

Bug Fixing
The final deciding factor in what makes a game great is professionalism. bugs are an inevitable part of game development but a good developer takes the time to fix as many as possible. While bugs aren't as easy to squash as their physical counterparts, most can be dealt with. A game should be tested by a person other than the creator because that is the best simulation of how real-world players will react to the game. Regardless of whether there are any bugtesters, a game designer should make it a point to play through their own work several times through development and then once or twice when it's done. Why? Because a good game is a professional game and a professional game is a game that minimizes the amount of bugs. You can never find all the bugs but quality assurance is all about finding as many as possible and fixing the ones that really harm the user experience.

View Sizes
Game Maker allows the use of views - sections of the room viewed at once. In addition to viewPORTS (Port on Screen) and the horizontal and vertical borders, the creator can make a "camera" follow the player. It is important to ensure that the view gives a good view of the area around the player without too much clutter and without making it hard to see. In addition, there must be a decent border around the view. This will ensure that when the view follows the sprite, there will be a certain amount of space between the edge of the sprite and the edge of the view; usually a horizontal border of 200 pixels ensures that as long as there's space to move, no less than 200 pixels will be free between the sprite's edge and the view's edge. In some games, this is good, and in others one might need more or less. Another commonly overlooked issue with views is the port on screen. People need to make sure that in all normal situations, the view and the port on screen values are the same (a view of 640x480 should result in a view port of 640x480).

Controls
Game Maker's best feature is the ability to customize everything, which is a downside for many inexperienced developers. People make unusual key combinations without making sure that they're appropriate for the game. In fact, many novice users of Game Maker will not even document the controls. To document the controls, some games display instructions on a need-to-know basis (button icons appear where needed) while others have instructions. But no matter how the controls are documented, they must be appropriate. Aside from being predictable, make sure that the overall control scheme doesn't randomly change - a certain set of buttons should be set in stone. Generally, a platform game uses S to jump, A to attack, and the left and right keys to move (up and down keys to look up or duck, respectively). A SHMUP game, on the other hand, should use the arrow keys to move around on screen, the S key for the main weapon, and the A key for a secondary weapon. Since people around the world can play a game, game designers should note that people's keyboards are different. The WASD keys used on US Keyboards might be different those elsewhere. Customization might prove to be useful here, or alternate controls might suffice. WASD is typically used as the arrow keys for left-handed users. However, the "WASD" equivalent on a AZERTY keyboard is "ZQSD". So it is important to ensure compatibility with all keyboards.