The Games Factory
The Games Factory, also known as TGF, is a game-creation tool created by Clickteam. It allows games to be created easily with very little programming compared to other game creators. There are two versions, a 16bit version and a 32bit one, although most people tend to go for the more advanced version.
Registration
TGF offers a trail period of 30 days usage before demanding a registation code. The home version is retailed at $29.00 and the pro at $49.00 from clickteam's official site. Although there is not much difference between the two, the professional version gives you the liscence to sell your games without an advertisment at the end of the program.
Without registering, TGF is unable to save games as stand-alone applications, meaning the only people who can play games made in TGF are those who own TGF. It also means that Screensavers and online applications can't be made too.
Known Issues
Unfortunately, TGF is known to have quite a number of bugs, especially with more advanced computers.
For one, TGF has a tendancy to "Run out of memory" if certain events are created. This can result in the whole game crashing, and may cause a "Read Error", corrupting the entire game. Usually however, TGF can restore previously saved data when you re-start the application.
TGF's built in platform engine is also frowned upon for being full of collision errors and glitches. Whereas some games use this to their advantage, most game creators try to develop a 'Static engine' based from TGF's 'static movement' option. Static engines need to be coded from scratch however, which can be frustrating and take a long time. Usually the end result is far better than TGF's platform engine, however. The engine was kept for MMF too, however a number of errors were fixed meaning it isn't as bad.
TGF only allows a certain amount of objects to be on screen at once, even though it will allow you to place as many as you want. Unlike MMF which allows hundreds of objects on screen, TGF may 'cut' some out, leaving them invisible and therefore not work correctly.
There are many other bugs involved in all sorts of areas, some that can be easily avoided, and some that cannot be. It is wise to back-up games regularly when using the program, as it can be unreliable.
