This topic contains 14 replies, has 7 voices, and was last updated by 
EdzUp
1 year, 4 months ago.
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As was said in this thread http://monkeycoder.co.nz/forums/topic/dont-worry-about-offending-people-mark-tips/
The only bit that resonates with us is getting it on steam, heck people would pay for the privilege and have it update automatically before use
I think a *bit* more professionalism needs to be implemented into the website(in terms of design) before making a big move like that IMO. But I’m totally on board with a Steam Release +1. It’s a great distribution and advertising method. It wouldn’t hurt for sure. Though I think there’s a fee for that now right?
Yes there is a fee but Mark could charge for the initial purchase of MX2 and it would make a brilliant updater tool to make sure everyone is using the up to date version, this alone would make bug squashing easier as it would be the current build.
All in all the website is not a major problem with the steam service taking up more of the slack and providing an area for the product.
The non-steam version should stay free and open though. No autoupdater for non-steam version too so people would have a reason, other than supporting Monkey development, to buy Steam version (Steam does autoupdating by default). Also, the Steam version should be cheap, 15-20 USD cheap, so people will choose Monkey over similar tools like AGK.Basically, forcing them to compete in price too.
As for any doubts if it would work, Krita (an awesome digital painting app) is using similar model and it works for them quite well. The version available on krita.org is free and open-source, but you have to keep an eye for updates and update it yourself while the Steam version updates automatically. People will pay quite happily for that kind of convenience. Not to mention Mark could update new releases of Monkey 2 to Steam before he updates release on itchio, say a week before or so. The regular users could get their hands on them there if they want to, but they’d need to compile Monkey themselves. This adds another layer of convenience to the Steam version without being unfair to people who can’t for whatever reason build Monkey from sources and can’t afford Steam version (they can wait a week)
Complete with Monkey 2 costing significantly less than similar software such as AppGameKit (I propose 15-20 USD price), this would be a big success and would massively undercut the competition on Steam since competition “game BASICs” often cost 30+USD and some even cost over 100USD. And why would you pay 300+USD for AGK (the price of Unlimited bundle which has all AGK features) where you can have similarly featured “game BASIC” that is OOP on top of that for $15? People would flock towards Monkey instead of AGK, which is AFAIK still structural BASIC and haven’t evolved into OOP variant like Monkey did after development of Blitz* line was completed.
//edit: Another thing that may make people get Steam version would be if Steam release supported Workshop for stuff like custom modules, examples and so on. Which would make it easier to get additional modules as code handling Workshop would automatically unpack and put modules where they belong instead of having user do this which is both cumbersome and, since you’re depending on human to do computer’s job, prone to mistakes.
Also, the Steam version should be cheap, 15-20 USD cheap, so people will choose Monkey over similar tools like AGK
I doubt it. Monkey isn’t as intuitive as AGK, which is more akin to Blitz3D and Dark Basic, so the two are unlikely to compete directly whatever the price difference; people looking for an easy-to-use programming language are more likely to choose AGK.
It’s all down to presentation if it looks the part and the example’s, screenshots and information is appealing then people will buy into it.
Perhaps the only reason to use Steam seems good only for “advertisement” purposes, but practically since the Monkey2 is open source it means that is already offered with the maximum availability ever possible.
But in that light, it means that it would be offered in other places as well App Store (Mac version), Ubuntu Software Center, Windows Chocolatey, etc… Which is again is only for increasing the online presence.
Availability means nothing if you don’t know it exists. I’ve recently found out about a wonderful survival sandbox MMO with an unique leveling system called Rogalia.
It literally popped into my Steam queue. There are little to no videos about it on YT in English and those that are are from a very old version. It’s available, just no one knows about it.
And Monkey2 is easy to use. I don’t know why people are saying it isn’t as easy to use as Blitz* or Dark Basic or AGK when in fact it is. Thanks to OOP focus and all modern programming tutorials being based on OOP (and all other engines using OOP languages as well) I’d say it’s even easier, all you really have to do is to get used to the syntax and making games in Monkey 2 will be a breeze.
And yes, Steam version should be cheap (again, something between $15-$20) to get the crowd that think AGK is overpriced (for a “game BASIC” it is overpriced – “Game BASICs” of old such as STOS or AMOS weren’t that expensive. They costed something like AAA game costs nowadays) or who are saving for it, but still looking for the cheaper alternative.
And once they know about Monkey and used it for some time, they’ll convince people who just bought AGK to refund it and buy Monkey instead and the word will spread about a better and cheaper game making language that doesn’t nickel and dime its users for features. Some of these people won’t even know that they can download Monkey for free (albeit without updates or Workshop support for modules and so on), they’ll buy it anyway. And even if they’ll later get to know about Monkey being available for free, they won’t care. I mean, $15 is what you pay for an indie game, and with Monkey you can make your own games.
So yeah, Mark should definitely put it on steam.
I don’t know why people are saying it isn’t as easy to use as Blitz* or Dark Basic or AGK
I don’t know why you’re saying it is. Mark moved away from that with Blitz Max and even more so with Monkey. Sure, you could get used to the syntax – you could say that about most high-level languages I guess – but Monkey really isn’t as easy as those other languages.
That’s not to say he shouldn’t put it on Steam though. I’m sure there’s an audience for it there regardless of how much it differs from AGK and other such more simpler, user-friendly languages.
There is a trade off that’s inherent to programming languages, which is the sacrifice of speed and power for a more fluent language, fit for humans. Monkey isn’t *just* another BASIC based language as it has *a lot* of flexibility; at least much more than most other BASIC-like languages I’ve encountered. It’s a sweet spot between fluency and power IMO which is fantastic. A bit more of a learning curve compared to others, however it’s worth the extra mile.
Anything to prevent me from touching C. x’D
quick question: do you believe Monkey2 (not MonkeyX2!) should be on Steam in the actual state? (=documentation, examples, guide, installation tools etc)?
And the consequently to the above question
– what does Monkey2 miss?
– what must/should be done?I’ve read many times that Marks has no time to ‘fill the gap’ and (of course) he prefers to concentrate on the ‘flesh’ (pure programming/features/3d engine etc)
So, for what I understood/remember, Monkey2 needs (at least)
– an ‘installer/updater’ what configures everything needed for the different targets (ie: Android SDK+configuration etc)
– more examples! And better organized. At the first I was looking for 3d example in bananas… without luck! Then I discovered they are under a folder called ‘test’ in each 3d-modules (loader, physics etc)Surely, I’m a ‘very basic newbee user’ – I’m still learning on the base concept, I prefer to understand better the roots than starting with big projects. But from my point of view the ‘lack’ of the basic stuff to study is a big problem: for advanced user is probably ‘normal’ and has no importance because some concepts/syntax are already acquired from experience of from other languages.
This element depends of course on what is the ‘target’ of Monkey2: ‘general’ users or ‘pro’ users.ps: please consider what I wrote as a ‘positive’ critic to discuss.
CheersInstaller to auto configure all the targets is definitely needed. From my usage of Cerberus X (a Monkey X fork which is actually really good), the setting up all of the targets manually is pretty cumbersome. It isn’t hard, but it’s definitely boring and mind-numbing. However this could be handled by Steam “first run” scripts (hey, another reason to use Steam version over open-source/free one without holding features hostage).
As for examples, these could be made by community and Mark could put them in the official release with permission of the authors. From my experience though, tutorials are far more important than examples as (at least in my case) one learns better from actually doing stuff than from reading example code.
//edit: In all seriousness, Monkey 2 could be put on steam as it is now with improvements done afterwards. It’s pretty solid in terms of main library and language’s syntax and it’s really easy to learn if you programmed in OOP languages (and virtually all programming courses nowaday teach OOP instead of structural programming) before. And even as a noob this can be easily learned as OOP just makes more sense. For example you put a cup on a table (OOP), not tell the table that it now has a cup on it (Structural programing).
Just that it needs a low price, $15-20 would be good enough. Not only it will undercut AGK and make them compete on price as well, not just features, but if Mark would make Monkey 2’s price too high, people would just download open-source version of it. And closing the source would not work, because I can guarantee somebody would fork last open release and start backporting features.
But as I’ve said previously – Krita is doing a very similar thing and it doing well. They’ve priced paid release of their software appropriately and people are buying it just for the convenience alone. It is highly likely that people will do the same in Monkey 2 case.
No offence intended, darkhog, but I’m beginning to think your desire to get Monkey 2 on Steam is less about that and more about wanting something to undercut AGK! :\
I say go for it. Instant new market and income. It’s superior to many already successful similar products on steam.
As for it getting noticed, there are only a few game development languages available on Steam, doing any type of search in that catagory will expose it imeadiatly. I wish my poor game was as lucky!
If the whole Steam idea is a go there would need to be a “steam integration module” this would put the whole thing together
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