The Daily Click

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The iOS Runtime Lands
News posted 20th July, 2011 by OMC
After a long wait in the wings for its debut-nveiling, the iOS export module for MMF2 has finally emerged onto the stage. This add-on allows MMF2 developers to create games for iPhones, iPods, and iPads with iOS 4. You can purchase the exporter at the Clickteam Web-Shop now for $129, €99, or £89. According to the announcement thread, press releases and website updates will come later. We get a head start! Before you go chucking money everywhere, make sure you meet the requirements for developing with the iOS export module. You'll need a Windows computer with MMF2, a Mac with OSX Snow Leopard, Apple developer status, and eventually an iOS device for testing. To see the full list of requirements and compatible extensions, check out this thread at the Clickteam forums. Tweet

Posted by Fanotherpg

20th July, 2011

Like usually my list is more Precise (Jeff forgot about Location object and added Mobile Utilities which are now officially not supported by iOS).

http://www.clickteam.com/epicenter/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=240168

Also the price is discounted one and only for us ATM, so better be hurry.

Posted by Fanotherpg

20th July, 2011

Also worth pointing out is that iOS is build 252. So we should get that one as well relatively soon.

Posted by UrbanMonk

20th July, 2011

It's %10 off for a limited time right now.

What about some information about the licensing? Is there anything we need to have if we decide to sell our apps? Logo, ad, ect.

Posted by Sumo148

20th July, 2011

do you have to pay to be an Apple developer? And you only have to pay for this exporter, and no extra fee's to apple?

Posted by OMC

20th July, 2011

It's free to use an iPhone simulator, but $99 a year to distribute apps and test them on physical hardware.

Posted by markno2

20th July, 2011

So are they going to get to work on MMF3D now or what?

Posted by Jacob!

20th July, 2011

I don't think MMF3D is even planned

MMF3 is in development, but focus is now on HTML5, XNA, and Android exporters, and most likely in reverse order

Posted by Dave C

20th July, 2011

the average user of click products struggles to finish even simple 2D games.. why would you want a MMF 3D? I'd have to learn how to make 3D models.. :/

Posted by Cecilectomy

20th July, 2011

I'll wait for the android exporter thanks. which will hopefully be cheaper than this, which is more expensive than the standard base product. wtf.

i already dont use mmf anymore, but i do enjoy playing around with the new features and additions. just not having to pay an arm and a leg to do so. -_-

Posted by MasterM

20th July, 2011

This is the greatest news next to the Flash run time. I am very excited yet I've got a bunch of questions:

What special objects does this offer also:

Is there a special object for finger gestures? I just want to do simple picture scrolling like you can do on any iphone when you are on a website.

Also is there a gyroscope object which can tell if the iphone is tilted so you can do games like Doodle Jump?

I already got dev account and a mac.

Posted by Rhys D

20th July, 2011

You can have multi-touch and there are conditions for dragging, you just have to use them to code your own drag engine really.

There is also a accelerometer object so you can tell if the phone gets tilted, it returns tilt values, so you will need to convert them to suit your game.

Posted by The Chris Street

20th July, 2011

Clickteam have had little choice but to release the product at its current price. As far as I know they spent a lot of money securing a licensing deal with Apple to be able to do this.

Posted by Willy C

20th July, 2011

The exporter itself is at a pretty damn fair price if you ask me. I'd buy it, but I can't afford the additional cost of an iDevice and a new mac computer atm.

Posted by Sumo148

20th July, 2011

So you cant just buy the exporter to make games on your iphone and not sell them to the market without paying the $99 each year?

Posted by Jon Lambert

20th July, 2011

Correct.

Posted by Jacob!

20th July, 2011

The exporter was going to be over twice as expensive. Jeff convinced the rest of Clickteam to half the price, so be thankful

And also, when comparing it to any other tool out there, it's still a good deal

Posted by MasterM

20th July, 2011

H Really stop whining about the 99 usd and stop blaming clickteam for it. That's just apple politics and anyone has to pay. No matter if you use unity or any other tool like mmf. Also that way apple makes sure people buy their shitty computers. Overall its a clever strategy and apple wins in every case.

Posted by Jenswa

20th July, 2011

Hihi, I believe it's a fair price too. So the exporter builds a object C project bundle for you. Which you then have to use on your mac.

O wait I don't have a mac, so if I should buy one, that adds some extra bucks to the total costs including and iDevice and the iOS license.

Doesn't really matter for me as I am not going to use it at the moment. But it would be awesome to see hhxl running on the iPhone.

Posted by Dave C

21st July, 2011

I think over the long term, 5-10 years Android will be the clear winner...

Posted by Phredreeke

21st July, 2011

Now rather than ask if you think the price is too high, I wonder how you think the cost of entry will affect the games made with it? Does it reduce the amount of shovelware by keeping less serious developers out, or does it encourage it as devs try to put out as many games as possible to recap the initial investment ASAP.

Sorry if my post doesn't make sense, I'm pretty tired.

Posted by Rhys D

21st July, 2011

If you don't want to buy a mac just type Hackintosh in google.

Posted by Cecilectomy

21st July, 2011

You missed the point. I said it was too expensive to just play around with it, As i don't use mmf2 at all anymore, except when i want to play around with new features.

I honestly don't understand why they went through all the trouble of dealing with apple, having to write a runtime that mmf2 can't self compile but rather exports a product that you have to take over to another physical piece of hardware with a different operating system(expensive), import the project and compile in ANOTHER IDE, and then have to test on either an emulator (Crap) or yet again ANOTHER piece of hardware (expensive).

Who is gonna throw ANY amount of money to have to do that? Especially when the point of entry is so high.

I want to see the returns clickteam gets on this, cause i'd be surprised if they break even, assuming an expensive licensing deal was made with apple to be able to create and release this.

No it isn't clickteam's fault that apple is devil, but it is their fault that they made a deal with him.

I think it would have been more prudent to work on the Android and Xna runtimes first, which CAN be self compiled on windows, and would be a hell of a lot cheaper to license if at all.

But that's just me -_-

Posted by alastair john jack

21st July, 2011

Hopefully now they can focus their attention on MMF3, or are they still focusing on all these exporters?

Posted by OMC

21st July, 2011

If I had an iPad, I'd probably buy it and port over Splotches.

Posted by Alonso Martin

21st July, 2011

As far as things have gone, Clickteam hasn't made one silly decision. I'm pretty sure they've thought this through.

Edit: Except maybe for Jamagic?
Comment edited by Alonso Martin on 7/21/2011

Posted by UrbanMonk

21st July, 2011

I've had the exporter since it's been in beta.

I'd say the price is fair for what you get. It's excellent..very smooth on the ipad2, and iphone 4/3GS. (Devices I've tested it on)

It includes a joystick overlay that is precoded for you, and you can swap out the graphics if you want, so pretty easy to port existing games especially if they were designed for flash since the limitations are pretty much the same. (the iOS runtime is a bit faster though)

Jeff (or Yves?) told me that the exporter was meant for more serious users, so if you just wanted to play around or make games for fun I'd suggest getting the flash runtime. It's great too!

Posted by Jacob!

21st July, 2011

Alonso, I burst out laughing when I read your edit there. Maybe add Vitalize to the list also

Posted by Strife

21st July, 2011

This is a total batch of awesomesauce!

Unfortunately, I don't meet the full requirements, and since it's a larger investment than the Flash exporter, I'd rather wait until I have some more experience with publishing games before I dive into this head-first.

In any case, best of luck to those who do get the iOS exporter.

Show 'em that klik games are still going strong!

Posted by twiterror

21st July, 2011

penis

Posted by Hagar

21st July, 2011

£89 is nothing in this day and age, and if you have a Mac already it's pennies.

Not that I shall I buying it though, just brought another laptop (which was cheaper than a lesser spec macbook pro), plus I would I never own an iOS device out of my odd principles

Posted by alastair john jack

21st July, 2011

"£89 is nothing in this day and age"

money has different values depending on the person, so these sort of comments don't mean much. To some that is a huge amount, to others its not.

Posted by Phredreeke

21st July, 2011

I think the correct statement is

£89 is nothing for the intended audience. It's not meant for your average freeware developer.

In the long term you save money, as you make your game faster than you would with just Objective C (provided you can actually make games that people would pay for)

Posted by Sephirenn

21st July, 2011

I am super-excited for this. I have yet to make a game that I would consider worth selling, but on the app store you have a huge built-in audience, and you can make a flash-size game and sell for $.99. If you can market it decently (lots of free options to do this), and use price changing to your advantage, you might have a chance to recoup your investment.

We'll see how it goes. Maybe I'll write an article about my first shot at it. My games will be nowhere near the level of most people on this site, but it'll be fun to give it a shot.

Posted by Jacob!

21st July, 2011

Well, I've made $1250 off my first real Flash Game, it's unlikely that I'll have quite the same success with iOS

I'll take a look at Android when it comes out, should be okay.

Posted by alastair john jack

22nd July, 2011

When are sub-events coming?

Posted by Cecilectomy

22nd July, 2011

I've got the flash runtime urbanmonk. played around with it and made a couple things, didn't really make any money, and it was worth it.

If i already owned a mac, it may be worth it, but i don't. My biggest problem is, as i said above, that this seems out of place, when there are more immediate and better suited platforms for "serious" developers.

I may be mistaken but wasn't there mention of a crossplatform version of mmf or at the least talk of a native mac version? it would stand to reason that the iOS exporter would have benefited far more being released alongside that.

I get all the excitement, but the exporter itself and how its set up, just doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.

Posted by Jenswa

22nd July, 2011

@The Cecilizer,

not sure what you mean with "he exporter itself and how its set up, just doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me."

Probably that it doesn't make sense to you, nor does it too me. However if the details of the deal between Clickteam and Apple would be revealed it would make sense to us all.

Posted by Jacob!

22nd July, 2011

There wasn't a deal. Apple doesn't let iOS apps be compiled on anything other than a Mac. There is no way for Clickteam to get around this. This is not for beginners; there is a large investment required and is intended for professional developers.

Posted by Phredreeke

23rd July, 2011

Here's a tip for everyone complaining: Vote with your wallet, sell your iPhone and buy an Android.

Posted by Pixelthief

23rd July, 2011

Oh its definitely a very high price to develop for the Mac store, no matter how you roll it. But don't finger Clickteam, they didn't have much choice here. They have to pay a high price to Apple in licensing, and that is reflected in the price- which is considerably lower than what it would be. Apple makes a huge profit by exploiting its developers and squeezing every last penny out of them, and I'd sooner develop for Al-Qaeda than Steve Jobs, but if you're insistent on cashing in on the iPhone craze, this is probably the best way to do it. Just be aware that developing for Apple in general is a horrid slave setup, and while Clickteam is very good about supporting its users, it gets its hands tied by Apple.

I like to support Clickteam here since they are doing great jobs with their products, but I'd avoid anything Apple related like the plague. They make money but exploiting starry eyed Software Developers fresh out of college and charging them more in licensing than they'll ever recoup in sales, whereas any other software outlet won't even come close, often free.

As said, develop for Android. iOS is old hat and the market quickly eclipsed the draconian Apple devices- its hugely outnumbered now.

Posted by Cecilectomy

23rd July, 2011

"Here's a tip for everyone complaining: Vote with your wallet, sell your iPhone and buy an Android."

already did.

"As said, develop for Android. iOS is old hat and the market quickly eclipsed the draconian Apple devices- its hugely outnumbered now."

This is why im so confused as to why clickteam would start with this exporter. it. does. not. make. sense.

Posted by Hagar

23rd July, 2011

I have only owned one apple product (never again), and that was a POS (first or second gen?) ipod. Batteries failed, so I changed them. Not soon after, I got the sad ipod face and the thing went in the bin (after stripping the micro drive out of it). I am sure they develop an inbuilt obsolescence, as a same fate happened to all of my friends ipods.

I detest Apple for their draconian ways, and for it's main front man. It's alleged he has not given a penny/cent to charity.

Also they love selling low spec machines for absurd prices

, what worries me is that at uni, Macitus (using a Macbook/ipad) is becoming increasingly popular!

Posted by Jacob!

23rd July, 2011

Clickteam started with this exporter because it is a great way for professional developers to make money. There are several MMF2-made games in the appstore right now, and one of them was featured on the iTunes main page. Android is already well into development, and will be coming followed by XNA/HTML5.

Posted by Pixelthief

23rd July, 2011

Clickteam was going to be late to the party no matter which exporter they went with, and I think they made the better choice by focusing on them in chronological order. I mean they could have made Android get out a bit earlier when iOS and Android were both alive, but then they'd never get to make an iOS exporter (it would be dead by that point).

Better to be a little late getting to both of them than being a little earlier just for one of them.

Posted by Chrisbo

24th July, 2011