[Mr_Fraggs]

Hey everyone, I've recently decided to move away from making games in DirectX and start using a different game engine. (I know DirectX isn't exactly an engine). What i'm looking for is an engine that is code based. I.E. something that doesn't make me use some kind of editor to use it. For example, SDL and SFML. All you do is add it to your project, and start coding. I was looking at Unity, but it looks like it's all based around a GUI they made. I'm looking for something that just gives me the functions for graphics, audio and input.

A few engines I tried were SDL, SFML and Allegro, and didn't really feel like they were what I wanted to make a game that I would release. I thought about Ogre and OpenGL, but it looks like there isn't any audio or input support.

Now, I know i'm going to get a million responses telling me "There is no right game engine for every project." I'm looking for opinions here. What are some good engines that include graphics, audio and input support and are completely code based. Thanks!

[Mr_Fraggs]

Also, sorry for the double post, I can't figure out how to edit my old one

I was looking at Unity, but it looks like you have to use their environment. Can you just use it as a plain old engine with say, Visual Studio? Or is Unity just an engine attatched to the environment they created?

[Game_Creator]

Someone gave me the advice to try XNA. I dont know if you would like it but its worth a try.

[stayscrisp]

Mr_Fraggs, on 19 June 2012 - 10:18 PM, said:

A few engines I tried were SDL, SFML and Allegro, and didn't really feel like they were what I wanted to make a game that I would release. I thought about Ogre and OpenGL, but it looks like there isn't any audio or input support.

These are not engines (except Ogre) they are API's. API's are general purpose frameworks for creating applications, engines utilise these API's to do more specific tasks such as game creation.

So with that said it sounds like you are looking for something like the irrlicht engine, while this is a 3D engine it has tons of plugins etc. to support input and sound.

[BBeck]

Of course I'm a huge fan of XNA, and would always recommend checking it out. Depending on what you're trying to accomplish, it might be exactly what you're looking for. In a lot of ways it sounds like what you're looking for.

As for an actual engine, most of the good ones are going to come with design tools. A big part of using, or especially buying, an engine is to avoid the low level stuff like making your own design tools.

I suppose this depends on whether you're doing 2D or 3D.

I haven't used Torque's 2D stuff, but I have played around with their 3D stuff quite a while ago. Yes. They have a bunch of design tools, but there's no reason you have to use them. If they give the complete source code, like Torque does, you can go in and rewrite it to work however you want.

But I'm thinking XNA may be a good choice for you. It gives you access to sound, controllers, graphics, etc. strictly through code. It's pretty "low level" in the sense that it doesn't do a lot of "game creation" for you. It handles a lot of things for you such as Arrays and Dynamic Data Structures. It handles a lot of stuff for you like calling the graphics card. It handles a lot of stuff for you like not requiring you to write a device driver for your game controller. But otherwise, it's all you.

With XNA, you'll probably still have to build your own level editors and design tools (other than Photoshop, 3D Max, and that sort of thing of course).

Anyway, I think XNA would be worth your time looking into.

Oh. And XNA is in many ways just a wrapper around DirectX; so you're going to get a lot of the same functionality. Except that XNA added additional functionality for controller support, etc. In fact, I've heard that Microsoft is going to be adding some of the functionality from XNA into DirectX when Windows 8 comes out.

This post has been edited by BBeck: 20 June 2012 - 07:01 AM

[Nekroze]

Personally i would recommend DarkGDK 2 It can be used by code (no native/forced toolset) from any c++ compiler as well as PureBasic and the D Programming Language is being worked on supported, there is also a SWIG wrapper generator for it that allows it to be used from ruby and python and any language SWIG supports. The new version coming out soon will also support all .net languages (c#, vb etc) And it provides a solid base for 2d and 3d gaming as well as a huge amount of support for other plugins and languages. It works out of the box with networking protocols video decoders, multiple physics libraries work well as well. DarkGDK 2 can use assets (2d, 3d, audio whatever) in a large array of formats so if you can use many of the tools out there to make anything you need, such as gimp for 2d and textures and blender/3ds max for 3d.

Its rather easy to use and is quite effective, there is a free trial for version 2 as well as the fact that it is currently 50% off.

Hope it helps you mate.

This post has been edited by Nekroze: 21 June 2012 - 08:28 AM

[Mr_Fraggs]

Thanks everyone for the advice! I might give directx another shot, but if I decide against it, ill try what you guys told me. Possibly starting with xna. Again, thanks guys!