I love the idea that GameSalad is putting forward. I regularly use my iPod Touch for gaming purposes (I’m sure I’ve made that clear on this blog by now) and I agree with the statement that one definitely cannot get enough games or apps to play with. Developers and independent game makers have filled the iTunes App Store with millions of fantastic games but now GameSalad is giving regular old gamers like you and me a shot at creating our own games with their application–even if we have no idea how all that coding mumbo jumbo works.
The best part about it is that they’re offering their software free of charge. How amazing is that?
Every time I play an awesome game on my iPod Touch, I secretly hope that I could get around to creating one someday. Someday when I get off my computer chair and get around to attending some programming classes so I’d actually know how to write code and stuff. Someday when I find the time to do what I just said in my previous sentence. And that’s one "someday" that never came. Luckily for me, I don’t need to drive myself crazy trying to squeeze in these classes into my already overloaded schedule because I could just get GameSalad and get to creating my game right away.
The application features a drag-and-drop way of creating your game, which means no more coding for the clueless. But it gets even better. Aside from allowing you to design and test the game, the GameSalad platform also lets you publish and distribute your original games on the iPhone, iPod, iPad, Mac, or on the web.
GameSalad consists of four simple editors:
- the Project Editor, which lets you input and change the game title, description, and thumbnail to be displayed on the GameSalad website;
- the Scene Editor, which allows you to create and compose the initial state of all the actors in your game scenes;
- the Actor Editor, which consists of an attribute viewer and editor pane that enables you to add behaviors and compose rules to create the game’s interactions; and,
- the Preview Player, which lets you play the entire game from start to finish.
Check out the video below to see GameSalad in action:
GameSalad has already been used to create over 4,500 games, and 30 of
these have actually made it to Apple’s Top 100 U.S. Games in the App
Store. In line with this, you would need to upgrade to the professional
version if you’re thinking of using GameSalad to sell the games you
create with it.
You can head on over to the official site for more information: GameSalad.
