Game Editor to create your game, on Linux

Jul 122011

Thanks to a great application list made by Carla Schroder I’ve discovered this software: Game Editor.

Game Editor is the open source game design software that gives you the power to create the games of your dreams, and, unlike other game creation tools, gives you the chance to get and change the source code of the game creator and design and develop 2D games for personal computers as well as mobile devices.

Game Editor produces software that runs on Windows (95/98/Me/2000/2003/XP/Vista/7), Pocket PC, Handheld PC, GP2X, Windows Mobile-based Smartphone, Linux, Mac OS X, iPhone and iPad.

The program offers a friendly environment for the beginning, for the intermediate and for advanced developer.

For the beginner, Game Editor can be used to create simple games by applying easy point and click strategies. No programming is required.
For the intermediate user, the built in scripting functions offer clear cut access via a single mouse click.
Advanced programmers will also appreciate the raw power and speed. The experienced ‘C’ Language programmer will discover that the robust Script Editor is the door to the vigorous heart of the ‘C’ programming language. It allows developers who are already familiar with ‘C’ to immediately harness the powerful features of the language.

Drawing a path for your actors

Installation

On the official download page you can download this software per Windows (most versions), Mac OS X and Linux.
I’ve not found an official package for Ubuntu (or other distro to be true).

Interface

The interface itself is relatively basic and is the same for Mac OS X, Linux and Windows. Navigating the editor map (where the level is designed and executed) involves panning. The interface is composed of a main menu at the top, which shows the current position on the map, and icons indicating the mode(s) the user is in. The interface is window based. Each action and event has its own window, along with several settings windows.

Actor concept

The objects in Game Editor are known as actors. Notably, this doesn’t mean every actor has to be a character. You can add multiple graphics and animations to an actor from supported formats.

Events

The Game Editor engine is event driven. For something to happen in your game, Game Editor handles events you create using the interaction of actors, and other game elements, the mouse and the keyboard. In Game Editor, you can customize to a very high extent what actions happen on an event.

Level creation

Game Editor provides two ways for dividing the levels of the game. One is creating separate files for each level, and then linking them with 1 or 2 functions. But if the levels are small anyway, and you don’t want to separate them so much, then you can put all levels into one file, and surround the levels with activation regions which defines the surrounded part of the file loaded in and out of the memory together.

Non-actor objects

Game Editor also allows you to create Paths, and activation events. Paths are marked as nodes in Game Editor interface, and can specify a route the actor will move on. The speed of the path can also be modified, and the path can be made up of Bezier curves and linear lines too.

Conclusions

I think this is a great software for anyone that want to try the hard work of game creator.
On the official site there is also a “game” area where you can download and see some games published by people and a demo area that can show you what you can do with this software.
The only bad thing of this software…is that it was not ready years ago..when i had more free time, more ideas and love for games 😉