Joshua R
New member
Ya know, I've been around for a long while, not on this site specifically, but around the gaming community, and while there are a lot of things out there that amaze me, what amazes me the most is the engines created to allow people to make their own games. That said, the sad thing is, most of these engines, including OpenBOR, are just too complex for the average individual, and basically leave a whole lot of room for error and misunderstandings. I've tried engines like PGE, RPG Maker, Game Maker, Stencyl, and others... and I have to say, as "simplistic" as some of these may seem, they really aren't. The ones that tend to be the easiest to use, also tend to lack the ability to make anything worth creating (such as Stencyl, which basically any nitwit could use), and the ones that are far more complicated (like OpenBOR), leave you wishing that they were easier to actually make something with.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying OpenBOR or any of the more complicated engines are bad by any means, but the learning curve of them is something worth fixing. I mean, look... you're making an engine that is apparently supposed to represent the idea that "anyone can do it" or "you can be a game creator too", and yet... a lot of these engines, don't see to be all that inviting. Hell, I was watching a few tutorial videos on how to create even a single stage on here, and holy smokes... it was just line after line after line after line after line of random "coding" that the average individual, just looks like a bunch of nonsense. I get it, these engines aren't supposed to be for babies, and certainly aren't supposed to be for everyone, but for some reason, any time a good engine like OpenBOR and PGE are created, you're left wondering "what the hell do I even do to begin?".
I think the issues I have with OpenBOR, really come down to the lack of support of real-time construction, where you can actually see what you're doing, and not just sit there, code out some crap and then test to see if that did something, since it won't tell you if you made an error or if there even is an error to begin with. Even with less complicated engines like Fighter Maker and MUGEN, those still have just this absurd amount of minor inconveniences that make you wish everything was a bit clearer. Honestly, I just showed up here, saw that "you can basically turn any game into a beat 'em up", saw a whole bunch of amazing beat 'em ups already made, and was like "clearly, I need to learn how to use this engine", and then I go watch some videos on what to do and what means what and I'm just like "I don't recall signing up for an entire school lesson just to learn how to place a freaking character onto a stage/map".
What I'm saying is this... OpenBOR is a great engine, but it just isn't for everyone, which is kind of what sucks about it. You know, these engines come out, and they give people hope that maybe, just maybe, they too can create something for others to enjoy and be like "thank you for making my dream come true" or "thank you for finally doing something that I wish existed years ago", and then you get into the meat of, the engine and it's just like "uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh what?". When I got here, all I wanted to do was take the Metal Slug games, rip apart every sprite (and create a playable character, which is actually easier than creating a playable stage with OpenBOR), then put out a roster of like 100+ characters from the first like 7 or 9 or something Metal Slug games from back when I used to play them in the arcade, and just go around murdering other characters. But then I realized... "oh my god, so much coding... why can't there just be like... pre-made lines or something to signify where you can stand, where you can't stand, what is solid, what isn't solid and so on and so forth, just to make a stage", but nope... code line after code line after code line".
I don't know, maybe I'm just expecting things to be too easy perhaps, but it just does seem like engines shouldn't require you to code how the game functions, that's the engine's job to figure that out. What engines should do, is make it convenient to create something that you don't have to get frustrated and confused about how to make the simplest of actions, such as a person shooting their gun or walking along a platform. Like I don't know, in a way, I was kind of expecting the Super Mario Bros X engine of beat 'em ups, but apparently, I came across MUGEN the beat 'em up engine. As I said, I know this isn't supposed to be easy, but it also shouldn't be really confusing. Like, how hard is it to create an interface that goes "oh yeah, see this line here that you can drag across the map, this line represents what you can stand on, and what you can't stand on, what you can shoot through, what you can't shoot through".
I'm actually more inclined to pay someone on here to make the game that I want, rather than learn how to understand all this confusing coding.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying OpenBOR or any of the more complicated engines are bad by any means, but the learning curve of them is something worth fixing. I mean, look... you're making an engine that is apparently supposed to represent the idea that "anyone can do it" or "you can be a game creator too", and yet... a lot of these engines, don't see to be all that inviting. Hell, I was watching a few tutorial videos on how to create even a single stage on here, and holy smokes... it was just line after line after line after line after line of random "coding" that the average individual, just looks like a bunch of nonsense. I get it, these engines aren't supposed to be for babies, and certainly aren't supposed to be for everyone, but for some reason, any time a good engine like OpenBOR and PGE are created, you're left wondering "what the hell do I even do to begin?".
I think the issues I have with OpenBOR, really come down to the lack of support of real-time construction, where you can actually see what you're doing, and not just sit there, code out some crap and then test to see if that did something, since it won't tell you if you made an error or if there even is an error to begin with. Even with less complicated engines like Fighter Maker and MUGEN, those still have just this absurd amount of minor inconveniences that make you wish everything was a bit clearer. Honestly, I just showed up here, saw that "you can basically turn any game into a beat 'em up", saw a whole bunch of amazing beat 'em ups already made, and was like "clearly, I need to learn how to use this engine", and then I go watch some videos on what to do and what means what and I'm just like "I don't recall signing up for an entire school lesson just to learn how to place a freaking character onto a stage/map".
What I'm saying is this... OpenBOR is a great engine, but it just isn't for everyone, which is kind of what sucks about it. You know, these engines come out, and they give people hope that maybe, just maybe, they too can create something for others to enjoy and be like "thank you for making my dream come true" or "thank you for finally doing something that I wish existed years ago", and then you get into the meat of, the engine and it's just like "uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh what?". When I got here, all I wanted to do was take the Metal Slug games, rip apart every sprite (and create a playable character, which is actually easier than creating a playable stage with OpenBOR), then put out a roster of like 100+ characters from the first like 7 or 9 or something Metal Slug games from back when I used to play them in the arcade, and just go around murdering other characters. But then I realized... "oh my god, so much coding... why can't there just be like... pre-made lines or something to signify where you can stand, where you can't stand, what is solid, what isn't solid and so on and so forth, just to make a stage", but nope... code line after code line after code line".
I don't know, maybe I'm just expecting things to be too easy perhaps, but it just does seem like engines shouldn't require you to code how the game functions, that's the engine's job to figure that out. What engines should do, is make it convenient to create something that you don't have to get frustrated and confused about how to make the simplest of actions, such as a person shooting their gun or walking along a platform. Like I don't know, in a way, I was kind of expecting the Super Mario Bros X engine of beat 'em ups, but apparently, I came across MUGEN the beat 'em up engine. As I said, I know this isn't supposed to be easy, but it also shouldn't be really confusing. Like, how hard is it to create an interface that goes "oh yeah, see this line here that you can drag across the map, this line represents what you can stand on, and what you can't stand on, what you can shoot through, what you can't shoot through".
I'm actually more inclined to pay someone on here to make the game that I want, rather than learn how to understand all this confusing coding.
