It has been rumoured for years, but now the rumours have enough detail for us to speculate on the final emergence of Apple's take on the Augmented and Virtual Reality universe. Even though previous statements have hinted that Apple would only use Virtual Reality as a steppingstone to Augmented Reality, it seems their first device will be VR and AR capable and employ some serious horsepower to ensure the experience is at a level you would expect from a modern Apple device.

Of course, it's still rumour and this may be just another teaser along the road, but for anyone working in or aspiring to work in VR, the entry of Apple into the VR space is huge, and should squash any remaining doubts that VR is here to stay.

Facebook even changed their name to get closer to the 'Oasis-style' vision of the future, again powered by VR. It is only a matter of time before Virtual Reality becomes as ubiquitous as the mobile phone, so get yourself a headset and start your engines, it's going to be an amazing ride!

As you will have learned from our previous announcements we have pushed the release of GameGuru MAX back to March 2022. Despite our best efforts to get something amazing ready for November, it was clear as we approached the deadline that we needed to set the bar higher to meet the expectations of our community, and ourselves!

We already believe this is the best game maker we have ever created, and we want to make sure that it’s as good as it can be before we release an Early Access version of it. Especially when it comes to engine basics such as speed, stability and compatibility and, of course, gameplay basics such as convincing AI, an easy editing experience and some nice demos to get you started.

So, thank you again for your patience and giving us the time to produce a great game maker for you.

We will continue to release Alpha builds to our pre-order customers and have just released a limited number of pre-order copies of GameGuru MAX for those of you who want to join the journey to MAXcellence ?

We are on schedule to release our GameGuru Classic December Bug Fixes update shortly before Christmas and are casting our eyes over the remaining issues on the GitHub issues board.

If you are a GameGuru Classic user and there is still a lingering bug you would like us to squash, please do post it on our GitHub issues board with as much detail as you can. Our mission is to fix it, or at the very least, give you a solution - so you can continue your game-making without delay ?

This month sees a new version of AppGameKit Studio being released. The main focus has been to fix some fundamental issues in the main Studio IDE including:

  • The functions drop down list automatically updates to show which function you are working in
  • Android export App ID tooltip fixed
  • Using arrow keys no longer results in autocomplete appearing
  • JDK location can be specified in the export dialog
  • Autocomplete no longer appears when typing strings
  • Fixed code property types not reading or writing values

There’s also some fixes and tweaks included re Android app bundles, Physics, documentation and an overall general tidy up!

As usual, Steam owners of AppGameKit Studio will have the update ready for them. TheGameCreators customers can download the new version direct from our servers from their order history area of the TheGameCreators website

This month we're releasing the latest version of  AppGameKit Classic with some tweaks and improvements but the main focus has been to fix the Android exporting features:

  • Android App Bundles - export updated to ensure certain media is not compressed when the APK is delivered
  • You can now target API level 30 for the Google Play Store

Keep an eye out for the release in the run up to Christmas!

This month we talk to Chris Wolfert (aka Gladkhelek on the forum) about his game-making journey and his game Florida Simulator 1986.

Chris started tinkering with game design type stuff when he was about 10. He was a big fan of the game Mount & Blade and wanted to get into the mod-ing scene. His family was full of computer nerds, so he had great brains to pick from when picking up little skills like texturing, animating, scene-ing, sound design, etc. He then found GameGuru which gave the game dev tools without the learning curve. Chris had tinkered along the way with Unreal Engine but found that the skill it required made it less accessible to someone like him, particularly as at the time his skill set leaned heavily towards sound design as far as game design went. 

Chris explains the background to his game, “For every game designer there's the question of balance between accessibility and possibility. In GameGuru Classic the low skill requirement seemed to go hand in hand with a low ceiling for possibility within an actual game project, whereas in GameGuru Max we look to be getting similar ease of use, but with much more powerful and modern tools. Anyways, at some point in the latter part of high school I had the idea for the project, and at this point I scrapped all my other pet projects and went full speed ahead on developing Florida Simulator 1986, my silly passion project ? My vision was for the 80's Florida man experience packaged into a game. It was never supposed to be "good"; it was supposed to be fun! With help from the community who provided assets, coding tips, etc., I was able to put together my game. It was a bit rushed as I was heading to boot camp within a month after the release, so I had to get it done quickly.”

He continued, “Every week or so I'd eagerly open a letter from my parents who told me how the game was doing, stuff like sales numbers and funny reviews. I intentionally charged the price of a cheeseburger for this game so if you spent the time to write an extensive bad review that's on you, at the end of the day I had fun making it. But that wasn't really a problem because the reception was largely positive.” 

Chris is currently on active duty but still does sound design in his spare time for Firebug Games and is eagerly watching GameGuru Max's development as he plans to begin work on some sort of literal (or spiritual) sequel to Florida Simulator 1986. 

Catch up with Chris’s progress on YouTube or Steam ?