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Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

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Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#181

Post by YesBox »

Karrot_Kream wrote: post #171
YesBox wrote: post #156

I've been working on Metropolis 1998[1] for +4 years now. Custom C++ engine built with a modified version of SFML 2.5 and SQLite. Creating my own engine was both a personal and strategic decision for me. I was really worried about running into performance issues with generalist engines, and I did not want the friction of working with someone else's mental model. Pretty sure that friction would have caused so much bur…

Curious how long you spent on the "engine" vs just writing the game? Based on the stuff I see on Steam you're pretty far along. I see it's Windows only which makes sense for your goals (and honestly seems very easy to run in a VM.) Was it easier to target and test for a single platform? (Also thanks this is exactly the kind of game I'm into.)

A few weeks ago I was curious about this too:

   - - Total days - 1631
   Engine:          610
   Pathing / Roads: 287
   Features:        477
   Marketing:       45
   Burnout:         130
   Other:           82
The game engine is cross-platform ready, but as a solo dev I'm just targeting Windows for now.

You're welcome!

Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#182

Post by YesBox »

megalomanu wrote: post #168
YesBox wrote: post #156

I've been working on Metropolis 1998[1] for +4 years now. Custom C++ engine built with a modified version of SFML 2.5 and SQLite. Creating my own engine was both a personal and strategic decision for me. I was really worried about running into performance issues with generalist engines, and I did not want the friction of working with someone else's mental model. Pretty sure that friction would have caused so much bur…

Looks fantastic! Growing up on RollerCoaster (+Transport) Tycoon and SimCity myself, this is exactly the kind of project I'd dream about building, if only I had your dedication!

Thank you! I'm fueled by passion more than dedication.

Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#183

Post by HerbManic »

boca_honey wrote: post #114
RASBR89 wrote: post #94

A lot of modern games ‘feel’ the same to me now. Same sort of lighting, blur.. even the texture loading and pop in. They all sort of blend into one mess. I liked when games all felt very distinctly different and I feel like part of that was that they all varied on ‘engine’

That's the Unity / Unreal look. I can see why that might be a problem, but I actually really like the Unreal 4 look and think fondly about many games using that engine that I like. The way it handles lighting, fog effects and color in general makes me feel "I'm home".

This is why I am impressed by the works of Enhance Games. Their titles Tetris effect, Rez Infinte (UE4), Humanity and Lumines Arise (Unity) dont show any of the usual traits of those engines. They have done a great job of avoiding the defaults of these engines and crafting something new with the engines as the base foundation.

But I suspect that when you have multiple years to build Tetris, you can spend a lot of time crafting your own style.

Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#184

Post by mikepurvis »

the__alchemist wrote: post #175

3 anecdotes: - For Talos Principle 2, Croteam switched from their own engine to UE5. The description was "It would be like attempting to sprint and catch up with a train that is already far down the track and accelerating even faster.". From a user's perspective, observe the graphics of Serious Sam Siberian Mayhem and Talos Principle 2: Same company, released at a similar time. Talos Principle (UE5) looks dramaticall…

Not a gamedev, but I think a huge thing in a modern studio context is being able to parallelize effort. With UE5 you get authoring tools up and down the stack, so your artists and storyboarders and level designers can all start creating the world and setting up the scripted events and cinematics, even if key assets or behaviours aren't in place and are just placeholders. The developers are basically writing plugins into this system in collaboration with the design process.

Very different world from 20-30 years ago where the initial "game design" was happening in paint programs or even graph paper notebooks.

Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#185

Post by performative »

herpdyderp wrote: post #111
doctorhandshake wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I phrase this to myself is ‘make the tool, don’t make the tool that makes the tool.’

On the contrary, making the tool that makes the tool is what I live for! My personal tech stack has benefited incredibly from this practice and fuels my startup, though it did take me 20 years of slow iteration to get here.

that's really dope, but i'm not sure if it'll work out the same way nowadays. i think we're in a weird stage where momentum REALLY matters in a way that it didn't 10 years ago or 5 years down the line (probably)

Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#186

Post by performative »

YesBox wrote: post #181
Karrot_Kream wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious how long you spent on the "engine" vs just writing the game? Based on the stuff I see on Steam you're pretty far along. I see it's Windows only which makes sense for your goals (and honestly seems very easy to run in a VM.) Was it easier to target and test for a single platform? (Also thanks this is exactly the kind of game I'm into.)

A few weeks ago I was curious about this too: - - Total days - 1631 Engine: 610 Pathing / Roads: 287 Features: 477 Marketing: 45 Burnout: 130 Other: 82 The game engine is cross-platform ready, but as a solo dev I'm just targeting Windows for now. You're welcome!

the burnout chunk got an agony-fueled chuckle out of me thank you

Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#188

Post by Karrot_Kream »

YesBox wrote: post #181
Karrot_Kream wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curious how long you spent on the "engine" vs just writing the game? Based on the stuff I see on Steam you're pretty far along. I see it's Windows only which makes sense for your goals (and honestly seems very easy to run in a VM.) Was it easier to target and test for a single platform? (Also thanks this is exactly the kind of game I'm into.)

A few weeks ago I was curious about this too: - - Total days - 1631 Engine: 610 Pathing / Roads: 287 Features: 477 Marketing: 45 Burnout: 130 Other: 82 The game engine is cross-platform ready, but as a solo dev I'm just targeting Windows for now. You're welcome!

Thanks for the breakdown, I'm also sending the game to friends who like this genre of game so hope you get some downloads!

Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#189

Post by jonny_eh »

the__alchemist wrote: post #175

3 anecdotes: - For Talos Principle 2, Croteam switched from their own engine to UE5. The description was "It would be like attempting to sprint and catch up with a train that is already far down the track and accelerating even faster.". From a user's perspective, observe the graphics of Serious Sam Siberian Mayhem and Talos Principle 2: Same company, released at a similar time. Talos Principle (UE5) looks dramaticall…

Did you play the Talos Principle Reawakened? They took a great performing game made with their own engine, re-released it with UE5, and now it performs like doggy doodoo.

Re: Making Video Games in 2025 (without an engine)

#190

Post by agentifysh »

been working on something in three.js and ended up building an editor inside it

its kinda insane how much i can get done with codex

half way through i realize i need a way to build levels and codex suggests you need a editor, here's the PRD following the safety harness and framework in your AGENTS.md and I come back to get coffee and its done....

also have a appreciation for how much game engines do for you, every step of the way I want to add a simple feature and realize we are not using a game engine so those have to built as well

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