GameMaker Required SDKs

YoYo QA Dept
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This article details the required versions of the various tools and SDKs that the current release of GameMaker requires. 

We do not recommend using third-party tools ahead of what is listed below - GameMaker won't know how to support them properly and you may give yourself build errors or even IDE instability.

  • For general system specifications you will require, please see the popup on the GameMaker info page. (If you are a Mac user, please also see the requirements for Xcode further down this page, as while old versions of macOS may work perfectly well with GameMaker itself, you would be blocked by Apple from submitting your games to the App Store if you cannot use a current Xcode version.)
  • For help with any file/folder permissions, network issues, or antivirus clients, please see this FAQ on the files/URLs GameMaker needs to be able to access.

Be aware also that for everything below we only offer support for physical machines running a single OS natively - we do not support any variant of virtual machines, including Parallels or Bootcamp on a Mac, "Hackintosh" PCs, or Windows emulators on a Linux distro, etc.

 

Which GameMaker Versions Does This FAQ Cover?

This FAQ assumes you're using IDE IDE v2023.2.1.75 with Runtimes v2023.2.1.90

If you're not on this version, we'd strongly recommend you update first and then follow this guide, as we cannot offer support for older releases.

Please also be aware this FAQ is only relevant for IDE Version 2022.8.0.34 (using Runtimes Version 2022.8.0.50) and all newer releases - if you do need the setup instructions for a version of GameMaker older than this, please see this Required SDKs For Old GMS2 Versions FAQ instead.

Similarly, if you need the setup instructions for the LTS release of GameMaker, please see this Required SDKs for GameMaker's 2022.0 LTS Version FAQ instead.

 

Contents

 

Setting Up The Windows IDE

  • Visual Studio is required to be installed before you can build projects for Windows YYC or any of the consoles - see the target's own section below for specifics regarding which VS version to use.
  • If you are using Spine images in your game, then GameMaker requires your files to be exported with Spine runtime 4.0 specifically.
  • A separate physical Mac is still required for creating games for macOS, iOS/iPadOS, and tvOS - see the target's own section below for specifics.
  • A separate physical Ubuntu machine is still required for creating games for Ubuntu - see the target's own section below for specifics.
  • When targeting Mac/Ubuntu machines, we would highly recommend both machines are connected to your network using Ethernet rather than WiFi, as WiFi can result in issues if you are building large projects when using YYC.

 

 

Setting Up The Mac IDE

  • Please don't use macOS/iOS/tvOS/Xcode "developer" and "beta" builds - Apple's beta builds are often subject to large changes and an issue in one version may not be present in the next update. Be aware we will only look at Apple's "GM Candidates" and fix issues present in their release builds.
  • Whenever possible, we would recommend you leave case-sensitivity off when setting up your macOS machine (which is the default when installing macOS), as whilst we removed this requirement from GameMaker itself as of v2.3.0, we cannot control what the external build tools SDKs require, so you may find some platforms will still fail to build projects.
  • Xcode is required to be installed separately before you can build any "Apple platform"  packages, and this has its own minimum OS version Apple will allow you to install it on - see the macOS and iOS/iPadOS/tvOS sections below for specifics
  • An Apple Developer account is required before you can use Xcode, and you will need Xcode to build and codesign the application as per Apple's platform requirements - and this developer account will need to be the paid version if you want to give your app to anyone else (only dev testing on your own machine is free these days). If you are a school/business, you only need one Apple account - you don't need one per student/staff member!
  • If you are using Spine images in your game, then GameMaker requires your files to be exported with Spine runtime 4.0 specifically.
  • A separate physical Windows PC is still required for creating games for Windows and any consoles - see the target's own section below for specifics.
  • A separate physical Ubuntu machine is still required for creating games for Ubuntu - see the target's own section below for specifics.
  • When targeting Ubuntu machines, we would highly recommend both machines are connected to your network using Ethernet rather than WiFi, as WiFi can result in issues if you are building large projects when using YYC.

 

 

Setting Up The Ubuntu IDE (Beta Only!)

This Beta IDE is not suitable for a production environment at this time.

  • This early beta IDE is specifically for Ubuntu 22.04 LTS versions and no other distro is offered any support - it may work if you can install the .deb and the other required packages, but we will not answer tickets about other distros or customised kernels, etc., as we are only interested in Ubuntu feedback.
  • You must have Mono 6 installed first (it does come with Ubuntu by default, so you should have it already). Beyond that, GameMaker will try to install any required components during the installer process, so ensure you are connected to the internet first.
  • A separate physical Windows PC is still required for creating games for Windows and any consoles - see the target's own section below for specifics.
  • A separate physical Mac is still required for creating games for macOS, iOS/iPadOS, and tvOS - see the target's own section below for specifics. When targeting the Mac, we would highly recommend both machines are connected to your network using Ethernet, rather than WiFi, as this can result in issues when building large projects for YYC.

 

Steamworks Support

  • If you are using a current GameMaker release along with our Steamworks Marketplace asset, then your Steamworks integration comes entirely from the asset plus your SDK install. Please check the asset's store page for which SDK version it requires.

 

 

GameMaker's Supported Export Platforms

 

Windows  (setup guide)

  • For building VM packages you don't need anything extra to be installed, as GameMaker includes everything required.
  • For building YYC packages you will need Visual Studio 2022 or 2019 (Community Editions are fine) installed and configured as per the relevant section in the setup guide above.
  • If you wish to use our GDK extension in order to support Xbox Live functionality in Windows games (i.e., to replace UWP), then please note that you need to be an approved GDK developer with Microsoft before you will be able to request the extension from us or use it in your games - more information on the GDK system and applying for ID@Xbox can be found here.

For simply playing GameMaker games: All games are always 64bit.

Vista and Windows 7 players will need to ensure they have DirectX 11 installed, otherwise the game will not run.

Certain functionality in the game, like secure websockets support in networking or various elements of security when doing HTTP requests, will prevent the use of Win 7 and Vista (or might at best require your players to install the final Win 7 Service Pack) and we are unable to do anything about this. Similarly, using any third-party extensions may have the ability to restrict this also, so please speak to the asset/extension author if you have any issues with older versions of Windows and your game.

XP is not supported at all. 

 

 

macOS  (setup guide)

  • Xcode 13 is required (2023.2.0 supports Xcode 14 also, but all older GM releases only support Xcode 13).
  • Therefore, you will also need macOS Big Sur or newer in order to install Xcode 13 (Xcode 14 requires Monterey 12.5 or newer). If this is not supported on your Mac, then we will try to support you as long as we can, but Apple will eventually stop your machine from being able to build apps and there is nothing we can do about this.
  • All code-signed macOS apps built after July 31st 2019 are now required to be uploaded to Apple and notarised once they have been built. For detailed info, please see our FAQ about Apple's "notarization" policy on recent versions of macOS.
  • You must code-sign your packages, otherwise Gatekeeper will say it's damaged and ask to delete it on Mojave and above.
  • If you're trying to use an older version of Xcode or macOS than mentioned immediately above, then you will need to update your tools/OS, as those old versions cannot be used now.

For simply playing GameMaker games: OS X 10.9 or later is required for AppStore games and OS X 10.7 or later is required for non-AppStore games. All games are 64bit-only.

 

Ubuntu  (setup guide)

  • Supports Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 64bit (preferred) and Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 64bit (also useable).
  • No other versions or distros are officially supported.

For simply playing GameMaker games: Ubuntu 16 or later is required. Other distros can usually run the games GameMaker generates with no issues, but we only state support for Ubuntu, so if you have issues playing games on these other platforms you will need to investigate this yourself. All games are 64bit-only.

 

GX.games (setup guide)

  • All releases up to and including 2023.2: Emscripten SDK v3.1.9

As part of GameMaker, everyone has the ability to publish their games to our GX.games community (for free) so that anyone else can play or indeed buy them.

There are no additional tools required to build VM projects (there are for YYC development), but be aware you must have the browser installed first in order to test your games, otherwise you will be shown a website asking you to install Opera GX.

You should also be aware of the device server which GameMaker will run in the background so you can deploy your games automatically on mobile devices you have connected to GameMaker. If you have any network/firewall issues, please see our guide about this server.

Note that this is a high-performance target much closer in functionality to Windows/Mac/etc., than it is to the HTML5 target.

 

HTML5

There are no additional tools required to build HTML5 projects, and the module supports a wide range of current browsers: all Chromium-based browsers (such as Opera/OperaGX, Chrome, Edge, and Vivaldi), plus Safari and Firefox. Mobile variants of all of these are supported also.

Please note that old IE 11 is not fully supported because it does not support WebGL, and some older mobile device browsers may have the same issue. However, you can usually run games in these browsers if WebGL is disabled in Game Options within your project.

 

Android (setup guide)

Please do not immediately update your Android Studio setup whenever updates are offered, as Google like to move files around and this breaks GameMaker support - always check here first!

  • 2023.2.0 supports Electric Eel (2022.1.1 Patch 2) and Dolphin as well as the older Android Studio releases - Inside Android Studio install Tiramisu's "Platform SDK 33", "Android SDK Build Tools 33.0.2" and NDK "25.2.9519653"
  • All older versions of GameMaker should use Android Studio Chipmunk (2021.2.1 Patch 1) - Inside Android Studio install Tiramisu's "Platform SDK 33", "Android SDK Build Tools 33.0.2" and NDK "24.0.8215888"
  • Do not use Oracle's Java - follow our setup guide!
  • Please always use a 64bit device when testing (including emulators)
  • Be aware Google Play requires you to use API 30 or above when submitting
  • Please note some third-party extensions may require you to raise the minimum SDK version to their requirements, as will enabling "Run Lint code analysis". If your project fails to build, review your whole compiler log for the exact versions you require.

For simply playing GameMaker games: GameMaker itself supports a wide range of Android OS versions, but Google Play does not (and Amazon requires fairly recent APIs also). You may find that you can build and test using old devices and old API versions, but you would not be able to publish these on some stores, and there is nothing we can do about this.

All games are 64bit-only.

 

iOS/iPadOS/tvOS  (iOS/iPadOS setup guide) (tvOS setup guide)

Xcode 14-and-newer by default will not install tvOS runtimes for you, so please ensure you do install this optional component before you try to do any tvOS builds

  • Please see the macOS section's notes a little higher up this page for Xcode/iOS/tvOS compatibility and which versions of macOS you must have in order to do iOS/tvOS development.

Our docs and the GameMaker IDE do not refer to iPadOS as there currently is no fundamental change compared to regular iOS and so GameMaker's iOS packages work perfectly fine on iPadOS. We will obviously monitor this going forward and react if Apple make a breaking change, but for now just bear in mind if you have "iOS" you have "iPadOS" also.

For simply playing GameMaker games: iOS 10.0 or above, tvOS 12.0 or above, iPadOS 13.0 or above. All games are 64bit-only.

 

 

Consoles

Please note you will only have access to the following links if you have been approved for the specific platform. If you wish to unlock access to a console (and can prove you're a licensed console developer!), please follow our Help Article that will explain the Application Process for Console Access.

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