First of all, create a Common Event and label it "Game play Timer" then set the Trigger to Parallel Process. Then create three Variables labeling them; Seconds, Minutes, and Hours. Now the Event Commands should look like the following:

<>Wait: 1.0 Sec
<>Variable Oper: [0001:Seconds]+,1
<>Branch if Var [0001:Seconds] is 60
    <>Variable Oper: [0002:Minutes]+,1
    <>Variable Oper: [0001:Seconds]Set,0
    <>: End
<>Branch if Var [0002:Minutes] is 60
    <>Variable Oper: [0003:Hours]+,1
    <>Variable Oper: [0002:Minutes]Set,0
    <>: End Now your Common Event should look like this:



In order to display the timer in a message, simply insert \v[1], \v[2], and \v[3] somewhere within the message; keep in mind the numercal values in \v[1],\v[2], and \v[3] are equal to the variables' ID's. Here's an example of what a message could look like: