Nintendo and developing with Playmaker - current status?

[Just]

Hi everyone!

I have a few questions regarding Playmaker and Nintendo's partnership as much as NDA comply.

Last dated messages implied that negotations with Nintendo hasn't been exactly favorable state for Playmaker. According to licensed developer, "enhanced support like Wii U custom actions" doesn't work (I refer to this thread, second post of this page: http://hutonggames.com/playmakerforum/index.php?topic=5371.15. What custom actions are we talking about here (if NDA comply to answer the question)? Does things like gamepad support still work?

It's been a few years since last talk about Nintendo here. Has situation changed at all, or has it been stalemate since then?

[jeanfabre]

Hi,

 Yeah, I am not too sure what is the situation with Nintendo at the moment, they where having a booth at Unite, but they sadly looked very lonely with not much attention, and it has been discussed around as to what could be changed to improve the situation.

 The best way to go about this is to make some noise to them, saying "We want to develop on your devices, but you have to embrace the way we want to work, and not the other way around". Something like that anyway. I am sure you'll find a more politically correct way of saying that but that's the bottom line it seems ( at least to me...)

Meaning, Unity is what it is, and the Unity's middleware world is not something that can be ignored. Yes, most games are indie games and this means most of them will never make it, it's a statistic no one can argue with. Does that means they should be "picky" about who can get in and get support and keep having a "corporate" attitude? I don't know... maybe, maybe not, it depends your point of view.

So, you should contact Nintendo and ask them what they are ready to do for you. On our side, it's simply not possible to go further than where we are with it. It may have changed since then, but I am not aware of it then.

Basically, having proper c# skills is mandatory if you want to develop for Nintendo, PlayMaker does work and can be used to produce games for Nintendo, but we can't really get in to support you within the Nintendo developer network world.

Bye,

 Jean

[Just]

Bumping this thread to let you know, Nintendo just made their developer portal more approachable to join. Now even individuals can join there, you only need to comply with their NDA and you're golden (and you don't need to pay for devkits or anything else to access there). That should made things easier for technical standpoint to support Nintendo platform with Playmaker.

13.7 Edit: I probably should answer the question I had in my OP for anyone else interested.

So basically what they meant having "no custom actions" is just need to code all hardware specific stuffs (such as GamePad functionality) to work by coding them. Obviously you can't do that with Playmaker itself. In other words, games made with Playmaker works with Wii U UI, just don't expect to be able get away from coding.

And here comes my new question. Since developer portal is now open for non-developers to join, would it be realistic to expect support from Playmaker for hardware specific actions? I'm asking that since there exists mobile specific actions.

[jeanfabre]

Hi,

 Very good news. I guess their booth at Unite in Amsterdam made them realize they need to understand and comply with the developers using Unity and not the other way around ( which shows how much Unity is now central... amazing)

I think for very very specific questions, I'll be ok to tackle that, but without hardware, it's not possible to guarantee, so someone will likely have to make the bridge and test custom actions. So I don't expect any major support until hardware is available no. Having already worked in some small api for this, I know how twisted and complex it can be, and without proper testing, it would be dangerous to claim proper support.

I think we need to call for support for the developers with hardware having an interest in PlayMaker and nintendo, maybe some kind soul will step in and provide support.

 Bye,

 Jean

[createasaurus]

Hi Just and jeanfabre,

I'm a Wii U dev and I've been using Playmaker / Unity / Wii U with great success.  There are others too... But I think our numbers are small.  I never am sure about NDA so I'm extra careful what I say on forums, but here are some tips:
1.) join up with Nintendo, it's easy and free to do.
2.) visit the Nintendo dev forums, search Playmaker, you will find discussions, but most importantly a very, simple way to put the Playmaker settings to work with Wii U
3.) pretty much everything basic works easy and fine... But there are some special things that would require someone to write (or copy and paste existing code) into custom actions... Examples off the top of my head are triggering rumble, and things involving MiiVerse stamps, stuff like that.
4.) I'm a beginner with game design.  Wii U and Playmaker are my first game design experience, so I'm not too much help troubleshooting, but I guarentee it works fine.
5.) if you are curious what can be done, I just made a fully Playmaker game on Wii U, called B3 Game Expo For Bees.  Probably can find a video on YouTube.

Best luck!!  Hope to see you on the Nintendo dev fourms.  And thank you Playmaker for being the best software in the universe, that allowed me, a beginner to release a counsel game.

[Rabagast]

Hi!
I contacted Nintendo to ask them how I can develop for Wii U. They were very helpful. I got a link so I can register. There you can download Unity for Wii U.
But you need an extra hardware you can buy there and this is very expensive.
So even if you don't need Unity Pro and an extra Wii U license, you need to pay a lot before you can start to develop.

[createasaurus]

Hi Rabagast,
Great points!  One clarification, yes, before you publish you would need to buy a dev kit, which some may consider expensive.  Personally, I do not consider this expensive because I've made many times the dev kit money back on either of my 2 games (done totally with Playmaker.)
However, you can start to develop for free.  The program is free to join, and you can access the fourms and documents and begin developing on the free Unity Pro for Wii U.  Eventually you need the dev kit to send builds to the hardware to test and ultimately publish.

[Rabagast]

Hi!

So I can for example make the game in Unity and also test it on my Mac, like I normal do, and when the game is finished I can buy this Dev Kit and and then test it on Wii U? Another problem I have, is that Unity for Wii U is only for Windows.

[jeanfabre]

Hi,

 Thanks for sharing your experience and success story, this is great!

Is that this link?

http://www.famousgamous.com/index.html

http://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/b3-game-expo-for-bees-wii-u


Bye,

 Jean

Hi Just and jeanfabre,

I'm a Wii U dev and I've been using Playmaker / Unity / Wii U with great success.  There are others too... But I think our numbers are small.  I never am sure about NDA so I'm extra careful what I say on forums, but here are some tips:
1.) join up with Nintendo, it's easy and free to do.
2.) visit the Nintendo dev forums, search Playmaker, you will find discussions, but most importantly a very, simple way to put the Playmaker settings to work with Wii U
3.) pretty much everything basic works easy and fine... But there are some special things that would require someone to write (or copy and paste existing code) into custom actions... Examples off the top of my head are triggering rumble, and things involving MiiVerse stamps, stuff like that.
4.) I'm a beginner with game design.  Wii U and Playmaker are my first game design experience, so I'm not too much help troubleshooting, but I guarentee it works fine.
5.) if you are curious what can be done, I just made a fully Playmaker game on Wii U, called B3 Game Expo For Bees.  Probably can find a video on YouTube.

Best luck!!  Hope to see you on the Nintendo dev fourms.  And thank you Playmaker for being the best software in the universe, that allowed me, a beginner to release a counsel game.

[createasaurus]

Hi Jean,
Yes! Those are my links. Thank you for for all the help (I don't know if you remember helping me a couple years back when I was just starting). And I am always reading Playmaker fourms to help me along.  Thank you Jean!!

B3 Game Expo For Bees (just released), and Keytari (1 year ago) are my absolute first game development experiences.  I have an art background, but I always wanted to make a game... Specifically for Nintendo.  Playmaker made it all possible.  I got Unity, Playmaker, and the Wii U Dev kit, just a couple years ago, that was the begining of game dev for me.

Hi Rabagast,
Yes! You could develop first... Then when you are done, get dev kit, remap controls, then publish.
However...
1)It is more efficent to develop with the kit, so you can constently test your work in the final environment.  Because you may be suprised by some things that may not work... Maybe some shaders, maybe other plugins, maybe lots of itween was fine on your Mac but not on Wii U.  Who knows?  This will save you rework... If you are testing as you develop.
2)Mac support.  I don't know.  I think the kits are designed for PC, not sure status of this changing, or if a work around has already been made.
3)Wii U lifecycle.  This is personal opinion, but I know it took me some time to set up the kit, learn all the stuff, and go through the publishing process.  If I was starting now, I would consider how long the lifecycle for the Wii U may be.  With that said, the Nintendo dev community is not just for the Wii U, but also for the 3ds and in future who knows what future systems?

[Rabagast]

Thank you! :-)

Is it possible to develop on Mac and then copy the project to another Windows PC and open the project there and continue the work?

[Just]

I just want humbly express my gratitude for Createasaurus giving current insight of using Playmaker with Nintendo's platform, while being new to game development no less. You gave great answers for concerns I had.

I plan to join developer's portal at some point, fact that there exist projects made solely with Playmaker gives me more optimistic viewpoint to able work with it. I think it's wise to join there once I have something ready enough to start working with porting.

I agree it's wise to consider ending lifecycle of Wii U, I'm looking forward to see what kind of tricks NX has in it's sleeve.

For final question I have, did you got any performance issues with projects? If you had, were you able easily to overcome with them?

[Seiryu33]

Since Nintendo has officially started to support Unity on 3Ds, are there any custom actions planned for Playmaker? For instance utilizing the dual screen set up. It would stand to reason that you could make do without it, but I can see that getting cumbersome quickly since pretty much every 3ds game uses it.

[Seiryu33]

Bump. Got to keep this topic fresh. Since Switch hasn't been announced for Unity and Wii U is on it's way out, interested in knowing if there's an 3Ds support.

[jeanfabre]

Hi,

 I have personally raised our case to the Nintendo managers at Unite few years ago and the answer is no, there will be no support or help coming from their side for middlewares, because there is simply too little developers that will use PlayMaker and Nintendo and even less chance for this small amount of developers to actually publish anything, and generate income.

It's understandable from their point of view. Simply put It means no free dev kit for us to develop something for the community, so we have no way to validate and test any work ourselves.

I would contact Nintendo instead, but their answers will likely be "Learn scripting or pay someone to script, an pay for the dev kit in any cases".

It's of course a good move I'd say, but maybe they are short and so giving away dev kits isn't in their politics because it's expensive.

 Maybe things have changed, so get in touch with Nintendo, you can mention me and Alex if they want to open a discussion on this topic.

 Bye,

 Jean