Game Engines (Year 1)

The Purpose of Game Engines:

What game engines are used within industry?:

2D Engines – Here a list of 2D engines commonly used for making 2D games:

1. GameSalad – A simple 2D engine made for beginners to learn the basics of creating a 2D styled game. Although its quick and easy to learn it is very limited in features and there is no plan to add future features.

2. Buildbox – Provides  users with ready-made templates that let you get started with a game in minutes. However this restricts the amount of freedom yo can have , and also tends to help create game clones rather than original concepts, but there are more advanced features included.

3. Construct 2 – is a very intuitive drag and drop for creating 2D games.  The learning curve is super fast, and the interface looks similar to Microsoft products, its an ideal tool for PC users who have never used a game engine before. However there is no Mac OS version, and games cans only be exported as HTML5. This means that they need to be converted  with a 3rd party service to work as native apps for android or iOS, which comes at a cost in terms of performance.

4. GameMaker Studio – This powerful simplified code engine supports both 2D and 3D, but is mostly used for 2D projects. One big advantage is that it lets you create all the assets for your game so you can quickly see how things look. The drag and drop interface also makes it ideal for quick prototyping , even for advanced game developers.

 

3D Engines: Here is a list of 3D engines used for 3D games:

1. Unreal Engine 4 – is a complete suite of game development tools. From 2D mobile games to console to VR, UE4 provides you with everything  you need to start, create and ship a game. Incredible performance, it can produce the most realistic graphics ever seen on iOS device. However the development is in C++ which isn’t a beginner friendly  language

2. Unity – is an engine that supports both 2D and 3D games however is primarily used for 3D games. Unity has a very strong community of asset and plugin creators – there’s lots of free and reasonable priced content available. Although the performance is not great, unity runs almost entirely in a single thread and makes almost no use of extra cores in most mobile devices. This is being improved in Unity 5 though.

 

3. Cryengine – is praised for its advanced realistic effects, the engine has many features to create a cohesive realistic looking world. Dynamic water effects allow users to have  beautiful oceans fog and cloud effects allow for realistic weather, and a plethora of lighting effects optimized for natural looking scenes make Cryengine one of the best engines for creating vast beautiful landscapes. Although the engine is great for realistic environments, the engine is primarily used for FPS games as they are easy to make with the engine. If you desire to make anther game genre with the engine it requires some advanced knowledge of C++ and Visual Studio.

4. Source Engine – has been extensively used in the modding community with hundreds if not thousands of mods available. Games such as half life 2 series, Counter-Strike, Left4Dead, Portal and Gmod are a few of what this engine has made. Although the engine has a massive community involved the engine itself is old and outdated though it still is powerful.

Game Mods:

The term “Game mods” or “Mods” is derived from the act of “Modifying a game”. To mod a game is to create a custom level, objects, characters or even a unique or stand-alone game from using existing game assets from the engine, this could also be referred to as “Plugins”. Many games come with an editor that allow for easier modding e.g. Source engine, Unity, Unreal and Creation Engine. A person who mods a game is called a “Modder”, they are usually non-paid people that make mods in their free time and upload it to various forums and websites that allow players to download and install the mods.

What game engines do we have at college?

1. 2D Engine:

• Construct 2

2. 3D Engine:

• Unreal 4
• Unity
• Maya
• 3DXMAX

What is the function of a game engine, consider?

1. Graphics

Graphics is what the game visually represents, Graphics could mean anything depending on the games style and visual representation. For example most 2D platformers use Pixel art for graphics e.g. Classic Sonic and Mario games during the 80s and 90s, although that has changed in recent times with most combing 3D and 2D into one therefore creating unique art styles

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In 3D games, there is a variety of graphical styles that can be portrayed, however most 3D games aim for “Realistic” graphics. One of the earliest and most popular 3D games “Tomb Raider” had ground breaking visuals at the time when 3D games were beginning to make breakthrough in the industry

2. Rendering

Rendering is the automatic process of generating a “photo-realistic” or “non-photo-realistic” image from a 2D or 3D model. Rendering may be done ahead of time (pre-rendering) or it can be done on-the-fly in real time. Real time rendering is often used for 3D video games, which require a high level of interactivity with the player. Pre-rendering, which is CPU-intensive but can be used to create more realistic images used for movies creation.

3. Collision Detection

Collision detection would coincide with Physics as they work the same. When the player in the game collides with a wall, a code tells the player that its collided with a solid object meaning the player can not go any further.

There is also “Hitboxes” which is when a player collides with an enemy and takes damage. This is represented with square boxes indicating the space in which the player takes damage and the 4 corners where the detection occurs.

4. AI (Artificial Intelligence):

AI in games is used to generate responsive, adaptive or intelligent behaviours primarily in non-player characters (NPCs), similar to human-like intelligence. In early day games, AI would be simple code telling the enemy to approach the enemy when within range and deal damage.

However one of the more positive and efficient features found in modern-day video game AI is the ability of AI’s to “Search and Destroy”. In recent games AI have become advanced enough to search for the player and kill them, AI will look for realistic markers, such as sound made by the player or footprints they left behind. These developments ultimately allow for more complex form of play within the game as AI improves the overall challenge of the game thus the player has to think strategically as the AI becomes smarter. This is usually common in most stealth genres

5. Sound & Music

Sound in game has played a big part of gaming history, it is one of the fundamental assets in a game and without it games would not work. Sound and music in games can create a certain distinct and unique atmosphere that you cannot get anywhere else. It draws the player into the gameplay and story as it gives a feeling of escape and freedom e.g. Feelings of happiness, sadness, fear and love. Probably the most iconic music in gaming history is the Super Mario Bros. theme, probably because of its upbeat retro style tune and of its nostalgia as being one of the first commercially successful games with great gameplay and a legacy of classic games.

6. Physics:

Game physics involves the introduction of the laws of physics into a simulation or game engine, this is for the purpose of making the effects appear more realistic to the observer. Typically, game physics is only a close approximation to actual physics, and computation is performed using discrete values.

There are several elements that form components of simulation physics including the physics engine, program code that is used to simulate “Newtonian physics” with the environment, and “Collision detection”, used to solve the problem of determining when any two or more physical objects in the environment cross each other’s path.

Construct 2 games review:

Pixel Cowboys

This game has an interesting art style being in 8 bit. The gameplay however lacks as it is very simple point and click to repeat the same action. What makes this game unique is the background art, there are small but visual animations playing in the background for example the sun rising and dawning. This is a very cool feature.

Bitcoin Survival

    

The game is called “Bitcoin Survival” the game consist of you exchanging the bitcoins and mine to real money, and the currency’s value is constantly changing, you can then use the money to buy and craft items to survive. The visual style is quite plain and with only white and black contrast, it has a similar look to “Undertale” however undertale combined unique art styles and visual effects. If your unaware of what to do, on the menu screen the game gives you a help guide glossary of what things do in the game.

Hyper Miner

This game was interesting as the presets in the game were presets from another game called “Minecraft”, I think this would be classed as plagiarism as the presets weren’t their own. However the game was heavily detailed with an interesting gameplay, you click the direction of where the miner runs to avoid falling boulders. While avoiding boulders you must collect diamonds and quickly dash to the mining carts to up your points. The animations were smooth, with also 16-bit graphics that are very nicely detailed.

Proxy Wars

This game was actually detailed, it has a set game idea with goals and progress. The game also includes a guide on how to play it with visual videos demonstrating what the play has to do. The game consist of you taking over bases with tanks and controlling them, the longer you control it the more tanks and supplies you get. Enemy bases can attack your base as well so you must either be on defense or offense.

My Construct 2 Game concept:

My Construct 2 game is going to be about a Russian Slav escaping a Gulag to reach the nearest alcohol store, The game will be a plat-former game so you will have to jump run and crouch your way through the game.

Here is my rough thought out sketches of potential characters for my game. The characters here a what are considered Russian “Gopniks” which are mainly a group young to middle aged working class men dressed in Adidas Tracksuits and drink a lot of Vodka, There are quiet similar to the British equivalent of “Chavs (Council House and Violent)”. They are considered degenerates of society for their poor behaviour and lack of respect for the law and usually get into a lot of trouble. Which is why my character (a Gopnik) is in a Gulag and has to escape it.

(IMPORTANT NOTE: My game in no way is too be taken seriously, I in no way intend to cause offence to anyone or any sort of Racism in my game. My game is purely a joke and is not by any means an attack to any Russian people or Eastern Europeans)

Motherland Construct 2 Development:

This is a GIF of the process of making my game, through this you can see the various stages in which it took to make this game. I struggled heavily in most of the coding but was given some help from my teacher and fellow students. I also researched some tutorials on how to code things such as the gun firing left and right, moving origin points to the correct corner or making a health bar display correctly. Eventually everything came together perfectly and I am immensely proud of my work.

Here is the link to the Construct 2 Arcade page where I uploaded my game, I hope you enjoy:

MOTHERLAND GAME