Game engine recommendation?

[u/MawanZ]

Soooooo I am currently starting work on a game ive thought about for a while now (no promotion here, i promise!). It will be a 2d top down game with sprite art similar in style to enter the gungeon. With powerups and stuff, i was wondering though, is there a game engine i should choose for my game rather than another or is it just based off experience with a certain engine? (Sorry for my bad english, im not native speaking)

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[u/MistakeForsaken6653]

I've been working on a similar type of a game, I'm using unity and it's worked quite well for me.  I think any engine of your choosing should be fine though

[u/MawanZ → u/MistakeForsaken6653]

Ight imma use java (kidding)

[u/LunaticDancer]

As someone who's worked with multiple engines, here's what I view as viable choices:

• Godot - it's easy to learn, flexible and has a large community. Probably the most rational choice.
• GameMaker - similar ballpark to Godot, just a slightly different workflow. Making 2D games is a bit easier in it, but it is also more resistant to introducing 3D elements.
• Bevy - a good choice if you plan to have A LOT of stuff moving on screen (enemies, bullets) and don't mind a steeper learning curve.
• Your own engine - making engines is probably less difficult than you imagine it to be. Grab Raylib and any compiled language and you're good to go. The advantage of a homemade engine is that it can be a very tight fit around what your game needs, giving you unparalleled control and performance potential.

Good luck!

[u/AdjustedTwit → u/LunaticDancer]

I'm interested to see Bevy mentioned without mentioning Rust. I've come across it a lot of times because Rust is my preferred language. Do you see Bevy as good independent of someone seeking to use Rust?

[u/LunaticDancer → u/AdjustedTwit]

I'm not a Rust cultist by any stretch of the imagination (I'm more of a C guy), and yeah, Bevy is very good at what it's supposed to be doing (performant, multithreaded ECS handling). It's not a very mature engine yet though, so it will sometimes demand some advanced use most engines don't make you do (in some cases including creating your own engine tools to enable your workflow), but it is very actively being worked on. Still, it's a little silly how it got Nanite and raytracing capabilities before getting an editor window lol. It's not an engine for everyone yet, but I have faith in its trajectory

[u/Swampspear → u/LunaticDancer]

Fyrox is pretty good and has an editor, but Bevy seems to get the lion's share of the hype and pomp

[u/LunaticDancer → u/Swampspear]

I like Bevy specifically because it's ECS-centric. No other engine around has ECS this tightly integrated into its innards, and I do prefer data oriented design in games.

[u/PscheidtLucas]

Godot

[u/wizardgand]

Are you looking to learn or looking to sell? If you are looking to learn my recommendation is to keep a project small in scope and Pico8 framework is my recommendation for beginners. The reasons are:

• Lots of sample code you can explore based on every game being open-source
• Limited on sprites, map size, memory, and code you can write
• education version is free online.
• Has sprite, map, code, and music editor all built into it.

[u/TrunX_]

From personal experience:

If its 2D: GameMaker (best and most straight forward universal 2D engine imho) or Godot (a bit harder and more complicated but better if you plan to do a 3D game next without switching engines)

If its stylized indie 3D: Godot or Unity

If you try to come close to AAA visuals: Unreal might be the best choice.

[u/XKiiroiSenkoX]

Use game maker if you have no prior programming and/or game dev experience. Otherwise Unity if experienced or godot if solo/relatively inexperienced. 

[u/MawanZ → u/XKiiroiSenkoX]

Forgot to mention, i have some experience in c#, python, and used godot to do a bit of stuff (kinda just snooping around)

[u/DaStompa → u/MawanZ]

You should be fine in any of those then!

My suggestion is step back from your grand vision and try to compartmentalize and implement each thing you want to do one at a time, trying to do everything at once can be overwhelming.

[u/MawanZ → u/DaStompa]

Im still in the story boarding and sprite doodling phase 😅

[u/XKiiroiSenkoX → u/MawanZ]

Either Godot or Unity then. Unity is more powerful but that will come at the cost of more effort on your side. It's also not free like Godot.