The Android Tab

This section deals with the Android tab of the Global Games Settings Window.

This Android tab is split into various separate sub-tabs (accessible on the left of the window) to make changing and updating the information for your game clearer and less complicated. These tabs are explained in the following sections.

General

The first thing to do is fill in the details about your game, including its Display Name, its Package Name and the Version info. The package name can only be made up of letters from A-Z and numbers 0-9, with no symbols or other special characters at all, nor should it have uppercase characters. It should follow the format “com.domain.myapp”.

Here you can also set the build tools version to use, along with the SDK values to use (minimum SDK version, Target SDK version and the Compile SDK version). In general you will want to leave these at their default values, but if your game targets a specific Android version then you can set the build tools and SDK values to that which you require here.

To the right of the page, you can add a splash screen to your APK, for both landscape and portrait modes, which will be shown while the game loads on the device. This screen should be a 24bit PNG file, and is recommended to be the same size as the first room (or view) in your game. If you require that the splash screen be shown for a specific time then you can also set it here from 0 to 10 seconds (the default time of 0 means that it will only show for the duration of the asset loading).

On this page you can also set the following options for your final APK file:

Architectures - This is the CPU type that your game will support. The most common ones are chosen by default (99% of all devices use these), but you can choose those that you think appropriate. Bear in mind that each one will add about 1MB to the final apk size, don't go ticking them all unless this is not a problem!

Orientation - Here you can choose to lock the game to a specific orientation by checking either landscape, portrait, landscape-flipped or portrait-flipped. Note that if you have selected Portrait and PortraitFlipped, then this is handled as sensorPortrait, but not all devices will allow the PortraitFlipped orientation in this mode.

Misc - This section permits you to add extra support for certain features:

you can add iCade Support or Bluetooth gamepads (see the functions for GamePad Input

you can add Haptic Effects which will permit the use of vibration in your game. Haptics are dependant of you accepting the Immersion EULA that pops up. If you decline to accept the agreement, then haptic effects will not be enabled, and if you have code for them in your game, the game will fail to compile. For more information on the GameMaker: Studio haptic effects, see the section Immersion Haptics.

you can set the Install Location for your game. This can either be set to auto, in which case the game will be installed to the location chosen by the user on their device, or it can be set to Prefer External which will always try to install the game to the external storage of the device.

you can add support for Moga Controllers for your game here. Note that all Moga functionality is accessed via an extension, and when you first check the Use Moga box you will be prompted to download and install the Moga extension from the Marketplace (you may need to log into your YoYo Account before it can be downloaded).

OUYA - If your game is being created for the OUYA games console, then you can specify that the final APK should be packaged in accordance with the console specifications here.

Graphics

The graphics tab has three sections to it - Options, Icons and Texture Pages. The first of these controls the display options for your game, with the first one being the Interpolate colours Between Pixels flag. This turns on interpolation, which basically "smooths" pixels, so for crisp pixel graphics, it should be off, but if you have nice alpha blends and smoothed edge graphics it is better left on.

Next, you can set the Screen colour Depth to either 16bit or 24bit. This will affect the compatibility with some older devices if it is set to 24bit, and will also increase the ashmem that is needed (this is the shared memory on Android devices).

The next here is the Device Support for your game. You can choose to support any device, or only those that have a GPU. Basically, if your game has any advanced drawing functions like alpha blending, additive blending, surfaces, etc... you should limit it to those devices that have a GPU otherwise you run the risk of getting negative comments and poor rating for your game due to graphical errors or crashes on older devices.

Finally there is the option for scaling to the device screen. Here you can choose to maintain aspect ratio (so a 4:3 room, for example, will be "letter boxed" on a 16:9) or to scale fully (stretching the image to fit the full screen).

WARNING! Switching off the application surface in your code will disable all the scaling options set in the Global Game Settings until it has been switched back on again. See The Application Surface for further details.

After these options there is the section for setting the size of the Texture Page. The default (and most compatible) size is 1024x1024, but you can choose from anywhere between 256x256 up to 2048x2048. There is also a button marked View which will generate the texture pages for this platform and then open a window so that you can see how they look. This can be very useful if you wish to see how the texture pages are structured and to prevent having texture pages larger (or smaller) than necessary.

On the right of the page you can set the game icons. These are used in various situations on the Store and in your game, and should be created as 24bit PNG files of the appropriate sizes given.

NOTE: Be aware that the larger the size of the texture page, the less compatible your game will be.

Social

This tab permits you to enable social functions for your Android game with either Amazon GameCircle, Google Play, or Facebook as well as activate Push Notifications.

If you require the Facebook functions, you need to click the "Use Facebook" checkbox and then supply the Facebook App ID and Facebook App Display Name. Note that all Facebook functionality is accessed via an extension, and when you first check the Use Facebook box you will be prompted to download and install the Facebook extension from the Marketplace (you may need to log into your YoYo Account before it can be downloaded).

In order for your game to use Push Notifications they must be enabled here first otherwise they will not work. Local notifications on Android do not require the "GCM Sender ID", but you must add it should you wish to create remote notifications.

If you want to enable achievements and leader boards for the Google app store, then you need to check the appropriate check box. Once you have ticked one of the services, you will be prompted to download and install the corresponding extension from the Marketplace (you may need to log into your YoYo Account before it can be downloaded), and then code the functionality into your game using the Achievements and Leader boards functions. Note that if you use Google Play you will need to add your App Id into this tab for the services to work (this can be found from your Google Play Developers dashboard).

If you are using any Amazon Services, you need to tick the "Enable Amazon API's" checkbox. Once you have ticked this, you will be prompted to download and install the corresponding extension from the Marketplace (you may need to log into your YoYo Account before it can be downloaded). Unlike previous versions of GameMaker: Studio, the Amazon API no longer hooks into the built in leader board functions (like the Google APIs do) but instead has all the functions included as part of the extension.

NOTE: This also needs to be ticked if you require the use of the Amazon Services along with the Amazon Fire target module.

Permissions

From this tab you can change some of the permissions that your game may request within the Android Manifest. GameMaker: Studio allocate permissions automatically as required, however you may find you require a permission for your game that we haven't assigned in which case tick the requisite permission box on the tab. The list below outlines those that are available:

WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE - Will permit your game to write to external storage.

READ_PHONE_STATE - Allow read only access to the phone state.

ACCESS_NETWORK_STATE - Permit your game to access information about networks.

INTERNET - Permit your game to open network sockets.

BLUETOOTH - Will permit your game to connect to paired Bluetooth devices.

RECORD AUDIO - Will permit your game to record audio input from the microphone.

NOTE: If you are not sure that you need these, you should probably just leave them un-checked by default and let GameMaker: Studio deal with the permissions for your game.

Extras

One of the features of using Google Play for your Android games is the ability to licence your games. This means that your games will be controlled by Google so that only people that have downloaded it through their market will be able to play the game, thus avoiding illegal copies of your product from getting distributed.

To activate this function in your game, you must first flag the Enable Google Licensing box and then copy your Public Key into the box as shown in the above image. This licence can be found by going to your Google Play Developers Page and then selecting the option Edit profile. Once on the profile page, scroll down to the section titled "Licensing & In-app Billing" and there you should find the Public key that is needed for this functionality to be enabled.

Once activated, if anyone who is not authorised to posses your game tries to play it, they will be shown a pop-up message box that will inform them that the Licence cannot be found on their device, and then give them the option to retry and test again, or exit the game.

Another feature of Licensing is that your game can then use apk expansions. This is a way to bypass the 50MB maximum application size imposed by Google Play (and only Google Play). It will create your game in two parts: a small *.apk file and a larger *.zip file which will hold all your games assets, both of which are uploaded to the store. When the user first runs your game, the zip will be downloaded and unpacked. You can find further details of this option here.

Back: Global Game Settings

Next: The Amazon Fire Tab