Best Free Game Engine?

[Tylale]

I use Unity 3D. Its pretty easy to use.

[Ad Bot]

[Saber15]

Yes, it is free. Download Alien Swarm and the Alien Swarm SDK.

that's a MODDING tool
you can't change how the engine works

Alien Swarm.  Outdated? Nope.

source takes ages to load anything remotely large (AS maps are tiny), it can't do open areas well, it relies on slightly updated map making engine that was originally made 14 years ago, almost all the lighting is pre-baked stuff that takes forever to render, the AI out of the box is horrible, the dynamic lights are resource hogs (even compared to STALKER)

[ase]

Construct, a free, open-source (oh god this sounds like an ad spiel) alternative.

It uses an events system for programming your game or you can use Python; plus there's various behaviors for objects that are implemented as base-level plugins such as top-down driving behaviors or physics. It is however still not at its first 'full release' (version 1.0) and probably still has some bugs and such floating around in several places. It's easy as piss to learn, but I dunno what's changed, I last used it at version 0.92 or something.

would be the way to go if you want to modify the engine itself.

I would recommend people start with making simple 2d games before they move on to 3d games.

[Nick4t]

that's a MODDING tool
you can't change how the engine works
source takes ages to load anything remotely large (AS maps are tiny), it can't do open areas well, it relies on slightly updated map making engine that was originally made 14 years ago, almost all the lighting is pre-baked stuff that takes forever to render, the AI out of the box is horrible, the dynamic lights are resource hogs (even compared to STALKER)

Quit your whining. Sure the source engine is dated, but it still works just fine.

[Night Fox]

IdSoftware is still my idle even after forget-ups like DooM 3. <3

It's your inactive what?

[ase]

It's your inactive what?

think he meant Idol

[hotshot87]

What do you think is the best free game engine?  I like to use Game Maker but it just seems so unprofessional.  Any recommendations?

quake

[Night Fox]

think he meant Idol

Oh, I know.

[Sirrus]

source takes ages to load anything remotely large (AS maps are tiny), it can't do open areas well, it relies on slightly updated map making engine that was originally made 14 years ago, almost all the lighting is pre-baked stuff that takes forever to render, the AI out of the box is horrible, the dynamic lights are resource hogs (even compared to STALKER)

Source engine is so far ahead of its time, there's no way you can bitch about stuff like that.



Half Life 2 was released seven years ago and the graphics are still great even for today's standards. I don't think it's hard to say that, relative to when it was released, Half Life 2 is the best looking game ever. Baked lighting is an innovation that makes it feasible for lighting to look amazing and still have outstanding performance.

[Marcem]

that's a MODDING tool
you can't change how the engine works

I don't think you can modify the unreal engine with UDK.

source takes ages to load anything remotely large (AS maps are tiny),

Probably just your computer.

it can't do open areas well,

True, but it's not designed for open areas.

it relies on slightly updated map making engine that was originally made 14 years ago,

And it's not broken.  I believe a lot of games still use BSP, I believe CoD still uses it.

almost all the lighting is pre-baked stuff that takes forever to render,

Portal 2 and DotA 2 are on the latest source engine that includes a new lighting system.

the AI out of the box is horrible,

Then code better AI.

the dynamic lights are resource hogs (even compared to STALKER)

They were designed to have one at a time.

[Saber15]

I don't think you can modify the unreal engine with UDK.

Probably just your computer.

True, but it's not designed for open areas.

And it's not broken.  I believe a lot of games still use BSP, I believe CoD still uses it.

Portal 2 and DotA 2 are on the latest source engine that includes a new lighting system.

Then code better AI.

They were designed to have one at a time.

mods like Empires, Eternal Silence, and GMOD all have large maps, and they take very long times to load, compared to smaller maps on regular hl2. my gmod has an average loading time of about 8 minutes (with only wiremod installed), making it have a loading time about 16x more than crysis running mods on a huge map.

the problem with hammer is that you have to exit your game, load up hammer, edit the stuff, compile it (which takes an eternity if you have anything complex, even with the optimization portion disabled), open it up in your mod/game. crysis, torque engine games, and iirc UE3 you can run the game from the map editor, edit the map, then press a button and playtest your map, then when you're done you press another button and you're back in the editor.

the single dynamic lights are huge resource hogs. when i ran hl2ep2 with dynamic lights on, my fps would drop from 80 to 30 when i turned on the dynamic light, while crysis and stalker have no drop at all (though both i average 50 fps)

[Sirrus]

Boo hoo with your bitching about compile times. That massive compiling process is the reason that Source engine games (even ones released in 2004, CS:S, HL2) can still hold their own graphically against modern games. Half Life 2 is actually probably in my top 10 games graphically, and it was released seven loving years ago.

I don't know how much you've actually studied the compiling process, but I think it's absolutely brilliant. The fact that such good looking maps lighting, texture, and complexity wise can still be played on older systems is a technical marvel and that's worth waiting a few hours ONCE for.

Source isn't Cryengine, and it isn't Unreal, but that doesn't mean that it isn't just as valid and technically astounding. This whole tirade against the Source engine makes it seem like you think Valve half assed the Source engine and ignored technical standards for today's technology, which simply isn't true.

By the way, even with basic optimization compile times can be cut down to amazingly small numbers. Relatively unoptimized, I started compiling my map and 11 hours later VBCT crashed at around "7..", which is probably only 30-40% done with VVIS. I added twelve large and logically placed visclusters and the compile took four and a half hours.

[Tylale]

Half Life 2 is actually probably in my top 10 games graphically

Seriously? Its like in my bottom 5 that I own.

[Marcem]

My Bedroom map for Gmod took around 10 minutes with proper optimization.

[Sirrus]

Seriously? Its like in my bottom 5 that I own.

I think it's just phenomenally well done for the technology and more importantly power available at the time.

Here are the best looking games I've played in roughly descending order. Half LIfe 2 isn't in the top ten but it still looks damn good.

STALKER CoP
JC2
Metro 2033
Crysis
Batman Arkham
GTAIV
DiRT2
BC2
Mirror's Edge
Mass Effect 2
Half Life 2