This software is available free for use at Idea Exchange, Old Post Office, Creative Studios.
GDevelop is a free software application for creating simple video games for PCs, web browsers or smartphones without having to learn to code. Learn the basics of game design by managing your audio-visual assets, setting up behaviours for avatars and enemies, and building a basic user interface and controls. You can create and customize a racing game, a platformer, a fighting game, and more, with GDevelop's suite of tools.
Start a New Project
It’s a good idea to start with the platformer game tutorial on the welcome screen of the program. Click the “Start a platformer game in 5 minutes” link from the Getting Started menu. It provides a great hands-on introduction.
Here are some additional tips for getting started:
Open a new project by clicking on the New icon on the top menu.
Choose the game platform you want to create for (HTML 5 – Web and Android or Native – Windows and Linux) and the genre of game you would like to build.
You can also start with an empty project, which means you will create the game from scratch with imported assets. Choose the folder where you want to save your file. A default file path is provided for you if you’re not sure where to put it.
Click on Create the New Project to confirm your choices and your game-building screen will appear.
Project Manager
The game-building screen allows you to manage the appearance of your games’ various scenes and objects. On the left side of the screen, you’ll see the projects menu, which manages the scenes and events appearing in your game. It looks like this:
Objects Editor
The objects editor is on the right-side of screen. It helps you to manage the objects in your game and how they behave. It looks like this:
Add a New Object
To add a new object, click Objects in the top menu and select the Add an Object button.
A window will pop up asking you to choose between a Tiled Sprite (a background object like a wall that needs to stretch and repeat across the screen), Text or a Sprite (a simple object). Once that’s done, you will select an image for the object.
It’s also possible to animate objects by adding numerous still images to an Animation mode on the left side of the window (i.e. several “walking” images can create the appearance of motion).
To make changes to the appearance of a Scene or Object, right-click on the scene or object you want to change. Choose either Edit Properties (on Scenes) or Edit (on Objects) to make changes to the overall appearance.
Add a New Event
To add a new Event to your game, click on Events and choose the Add an Event button.
An example of an event would be when a special key is pushed, when a game character falls off a platform or when a character collides with coin.
Use the Event menu to add the type of event you want to set up and the conditions that coincide with it (i.e. Player hits coin; Delete coin; Add +100 to score).
In the Library
Lynda.com Courses
Learning HTML Game Development
Game Development Foundations: Game-Related Math
Gale Courses
How to Get Started in Game Development
Other Resource
More Game Development Basics Tutorial
Compilgames: Developer Website and FAQS