Three Software Packages To Get You Into Game Development

The three best software packages that allow you to create your very own video games. Two of them are free and they all don't require advanced coding experience.

Ever been playing a video game and thought: "Come on, I could come up with something better than this"? Of course you have. Anyone that's played Daikatana must have! The thought may be inspirational at first. You begin thinking about that game idea that you've had tucked away since you first played Grand Theft Auto 3: You envision an open world sandbox game based on a slasher movie like Scream, where you play the killer! But then reality creeps into your brain: You can't make a game! You're just some guy with a penchant for stalking. For one thing, you don't have any industry connections, or graphic design skills. You certainly don't have any programming skills. You might as well just give up and tolerate the bad games year after year.

Well thanks to the hard work of a few very skilled individuals, your dream of becoming a game creator can finally be realized. Several software programs exist that have been designed with the sole intention of allowing the average gamer to realise their full creative potential. Do you want to create a first person shooter from the point of view of a nameless henchman? Well, with FPS Creator by Dark Basic Software, you can. Perhaps you long to make an unofficial sequel to an old school point and click adventure game like Indiana Jones and the Fate of Lost Atlantis? Then download the Adventure Game Studio by Chris Jones absolutely free! Whatever your genre, chances are there is a package of software that will cater to your creative needs. Most of them even let you release your games commercially.

The Adventure Game Studio is arguably the best of all the game creation programs out there. In an act of true generosity and freedom of distribution, Chris Jones has provided a complete set of tools that allow for the production of complex adventure games, similar to those that dominated the early 90s gaming scene. For those unfamiliar with the genre, an adventure game can be classified by its emphasis on solving puzzles over mindlessly shooting things. It will also certainly involve pixel hunting, a term that will make any gamer over twenty have immediate and stressful flashbacks of a much simpler time.

Screengrab from Han Solo Adventures, made with Adventure Game Studio.

What makes AGS so great is that it is simple to use without compromising the potential complexity of the games that you make. The software supports the creation of games in both 256 and 32 bit color modes, where an in-house palette system exists for the former. In fact using 256 colors enables the user to create games that are visually identical to games like Leisure Suit Larry or Police Quest, titles that defined the adventure game genre way back when. For those not bothered by a more contemporary aesthetic, 32 bit colour mode allows you to import your own art from programs like Photoshop or MS Paint to use as backgrounds and characters. Under this mode, creating sophisticated animations (such as character movement, or even cut scenes) can be achieved by creating separate frames for each movement. This is done in the style of the flip book animations.

If all of this seems a little daunting, don't worry too much, because there are multiple tutorials on the AGS website that cover everything from creating your very first simple adventure game to complex coding devices that will make your game more polished. The tutorials feature screengrabs from the AGS program itself, with easy-to-understand captions devoid of jargon. They are actually a delight to read because they slowly introduce the user into the daunting world of computer programming, holding your hand to make sure that you don't get lost.

Title screen from Indiana Jones and the Seven Cities of Gold, made with Adventure Game Studio.

Once you become proficient in the AGS programming language, you can talk about your project in the AGS forums. Almost every member of the AGS community is dedicated to freedom of distribution and team-work. Below member's forum avatars are buttons that tell you what they are willing to help you with, including voice-acting, musical scoring, graphical design and programming. If you get into any little niggle regarding a troublesome piece of code, you can always ask the question in the beginners forum and you won't be ridiculed. As for the list of adventure games that are available to play for free on the AGS website, it's massive. There are original titles like the murder mystery 5 Days a Stranger, created by the guy behind the Zero Punctuation web series, Ben 'Yahtzee' Croshaw. There are fully-fledged sequels to other popular adventure games like the upcoming fan project Indiana Jones and the Seven Cities of Gold. There is even a game based on the early adventures of Han Solo in the works. The thriving community behind the Adventure Game Studio, as well as the fact that it is entirely free is what makes it the best program on the list.