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Game engines as an art form

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Re: Game engines as an art form

#31

Post by wolverine876 »

amelius wrote: post #19
et1337 wrote: post #2

> If you had asked me why I’d been so dedicated to developing the same game engine for so long, I probably wouldn’t have had a very good answer for you until somewhat recently. Perhaps I would have cracked a joke about game engine development being a basic human need for me, right up there with food, water, and oxygen, but obviously we all know that’s not a real answer. I was exactly this person for a long time. I to…

> I've realized that game development is a great coping mechanism to help you feel safe and in control. Would this also work for, say, programming language and compiler design (which is also in a way about creating new, abstract worlds)?

It works for anything that makes you feel safe, in control, accomplished, etc. It's not related to the means. Every human has done it since the dawn of homo sapiens, and probably our ancestors too. It was done before computers, before books, etc. Paint something on a cave wall, if it works for you!

Re: Game engines as an art form

#32

Post by bullen »

Matheus28 wrote: post #26
bullen wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think OpenGL (ES) 3 / OpenAL is probably the final APIs you have to worry about for eternity. Metal/Vulkan/DX12 adds nothing of gameplay value.

Guess what, Apple has deprecated OpenGL too :)

I know, that is more proof tha Apple is heading in the wrong direction than anything else.

They can deprecate all they want, they will never be able to remove it!

Re: Game engines as an art form

#33

Post by bitwize »

I've found a good strategy is to focus on the game, not the engine. That is, don't go in hoping to write the be-all and end-all of game engines. Instead, sketch out a game that you would like to play and build as much engine as you need to support just that game.

It's easy to build an engine and then spend an eternity bikeshedding it to accommodate all sorts of games, while not actually writing any games. What you should be doing is focusing on getting a game out there, and letting the engine serve this goal and only this goal. Any engine work that doesn't directly contribute to a specific game reaching completion should be postponed or cancelled altogether.

I know because I used to be That Guy, the one who was going to write the awesomest game engine ever and use it to build awesome games. But the engine code seemed to get in the way of building games, and changing it took up a lot of time. So I pivoted to just writing a damn game, from scratch, and that so much better that the engine I wrote to run this one game was even awesomer than my universal engine.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#34

Post by felipemnoa »

et1337 wrote: post #2

> If you had asked me why I’d been so dedicated to developing the same game engine for so long, I probably wouldn’t have had a very good answer for you until somewhat recently. Perhaps I would have cracked a joke about game engine development being a basic human need for me, right up there with food, water, and oxygen, but obviously we all know that’s not a real answer. I was exactly this person for a long time. I to…

>>I would joke that I had a disease

Ha!I just say that I'm a bit crazy! For whatever reason I decided to build a physics engine from scratch, along with the game engine (not done yet). Not really sure why other than a really bad itch that I just had to scratch.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#35

Post by epolanski »

bullen wrote: post #4

3D A&V multiplayer is the final medium/media. Game engines are the final craft. Programming is a higher art than painting or music.

> Programming is a higher art than painting or music.

No it's not, and it is imho a delusion to think otherwise.

Programming is engineering, it is about finding the best solution based on a series of requirements (performance, readability, time, etc).

There's very little creativity involved in programming as it is the case with pretty much any engineering field.

I don't understand this narrative of making it seem a creative activity which is not. That's not to say that it is #completely# void of creativity or "beauty", but I just dont believe this narrative of it being "art". And comparing it to painting or music is straight up circlejerk material.

In the end for every single argument you can give for programming being art, l can just answer you that it applies even move to math. Is math art?

Re: Game engines as an art form

#37

Post by lc9er »

dragontamer wrote: post #5
bullen wrote: post #4

3D A&V multiplayer is the final medium/media. Game engines are the final craft. Programming is a higher art than painting or music.

Team Shanghai Alice / Zun (aka: that one crazy developer) does all his own artwork, music, and programming for the Touhou series. A lot of people joke that his artwork is sub-par and the music is repetitive, but frankly... the integration of all three into a single product / series of games is pretty amazing. --------- I don't know if gaming is the "ultimate" form of art. And no one is going to say that Zun's art or…

I strongly disagree with programming being a “higher” art than music or painting.

As for DIY game devs, I really enjoyed Tom Happ’s Axiom Verge series. The artwork and level design, especially. I’ve seen a couple interviews where he kind of brushes off the praise for the musical aspect - and I agree. I think it’s the weakest part of his games. The music fits incredibly well, but it feels a lot like someone noodling on a keyboard until they reach the appropriate level of spookiness.

But ultimately, all the components work well together, and the games feel like one person’s mad vision.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#38

Post by kelseyfrog »

kello wrote: post #12
et1337 wrote: post #2

> If you had asked me why I’d been so dedicated to developing the same game engine for so long, I probably wouldn’t have had a very good answer for you until somewhat recently. Perhaps I would have cracked a joke about game engine development being a basic human need for me, right up there with food, water, and oxygen, but obviously we all know that’s not a real answer. I was exactly this person for a long time. I to…

This hits hard for me. The part about being in control especially.

Same. I spent 5 or so years working on a project when I (sh/c)ould have been working on myself. I knew I needed to be doing something so I manifested that change externally which made me feel like I was making progress on something - something apprehendable.

What I needed to do instead was realize what those needs were, where they were coming from, and address them directly. Now I have a lot of catching up to do back-dropped with the emotional texture of lost time.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#39

Post by girvo »

wolverine876 wrote: post #30
motohagiography wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Knowing a lot of creative people with a drive that could be interpreted through the lens of pathology, on the other side of it, what does healthy look like?

What is pathological? The need to feel safe and have some control? That is perfectly healthy. How you do it - that is where unhealthy things can happen. Is art an unhealthy way to do it?

I've known plenty of amazing creative artistic people who were definitely unhealthy in terms of how they pursued their art.

I'm also interested in the GP's question: what does healthy look like?

Re: Game engines as an art form

#40

Post by nonbirithm »

kelseyfrog wrote: post #38
kello wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This hits hard for me. The part about being in control especially.

Same. I spent 5 or so years working on a project when I (sh/c)ould have been working on myself. I knew I needed to be doing something so I manifested that change externally which made me feel like I was making progress on something - something apprehendable. What I needed to do instead was realize what those needs were, where they were coming from, and address them directly. Now I have a lot of catching up to do back…

Unfortunately it is never simple. All my previous therapists affirmed my own projects as positive and even admirable and encouraged me to continue working on them. That was in spite of me ostensibly seeking out a therapist to address other issues despite believing that I was receiving some amount of fulfillment from the projects also.

Whenever I leave my project, it doesn't feel like there's a whole lot else I would rather do. When I seek answers, the "tough" advice that I'm greeted with instructs me to make something of my life. But wasn't that what I was already doing when I was still working on my projects? So I don't see any reason not to go back, if I can't find a way to make other kinds of progress myself, or am too good at avoiding internalizing the need for it constantly.

Unfortunately, if you tend to gravitate towards computers, and fail to find a professional who can give you more constructive ideas on how to define a concept as ambiguous as "working on oneself", it becomes far too easy to go back and self-medicate. I find it hard to judge someone else on the basis of how passionate they are about their hobbies, but if it's directed towards ourselves instead it sounds like we ought to be doing it more.

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