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itch.io Community » General » General Discussion

Alternative's: Need to Step off Unity?

A topic by Quto created Sep 15, 2023 Views: 789 Replies: 27

Viewing posts 1 to 6

Quto261 days ago(+1)

To tell the truth folks, I never trusted Unity as a whole. I know there are folks for the changes and the mob who are against it with torches, pitchforks and the type of weapons that would help the user commit a war crime if the trigger was pulled once.

This topic is to offer other alternative's to folks looking to step off Unity. I guess you can think of this as a google search slightly more simplified. Willing to update this list with any other post's to offer alternatives too if available.

(C#)

Stride(Free) - 2D, 3D: uses .Net 6, Cross Platform Deployment, has it's own scripting language that can be integrated in code - https://www.stride3d.net/

(C++)
Unreal - 2D, 3D: An engine almost everyone jumped too, I don't need to explain it. - https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/learn

(Multi-Support)

GoDot(Free) - 2D, 3D: Supports multiple languages, Popular alternative to Unity aside from Unreal. - https://godotengine.org/

Flax - 2D, 3D: Supports C++ and C#, Download is free though unsure about anything attached to it legally. - https://flaxengine.com/

(Legacy)
Blitz Basic - 2D, 3D: Popular dialect of Basic, ancient but is still used in a few projects today, can be found in the ITCH.IO Tools

mid261 days ago(+3)

No engine

Pop Shop Packs261 days ago

make the players call you on the phone and you can describe the gameplay

maybe involve dice for random events

wait a sec...

mid260 days ago (1 edit) (+4)

No engine doesn’t imply a board game.

Gamedev was defiled the moment it became a battle of game engines rather than actual game development.

The very topic is ridiculous; just make a video game. It differs in no way from any other piece of software, and if you know how to program, it should be no problem for you.

I don’t intend to hijack the topic with a debate, however “no engine” is as valid of an alternative as any.

Quto260 days ago

I agree with this.

Problem with me though is I don't know how to setup code to interpret bumpmaps, bitmaps, jpeg's, packets and ports or how to get it to call home to send data to keep up with 4 players positions and inputs while reducing latency to keep it fair, keep that jerk 'Greg' from cheating and incorporate an easy method for folks to mod what I put together.

Most of these environments have this pre-built. If there's a mid way that can be approached and understood, I'll abandon an engine and start using Raylib; otherwise, I may just need assistance in understanding how to build my own tools.

Pop Shop Packs260 days ago(+1)

Dude, I was making a joke...

mid260 days ago

Sorry, then. It’s hard to tell.

Pop Shop Packs260 days ago

My apologies, i'Ll WrItE lIkE tHiS nExT tImE

Evolutionary Games261 days ago (2 edits)

Please note Unreal is not free. They charge a 5% royalty, although that royalty kicks in only at $1 million. Copy and paste from their website:

"Unreal Engine is free to download. We offer a choice of licensing terms depending on your use of Unreal Engine.

Under the standard EULA, Unreal Engine is free to use for learning, and for developing internal projects; it also enables you to distribute many commercial projects without paying any fees to Epic Games, including custom projects delivered to clients, linear content (such as films and television shows) and any product that earns no revenue or whose revenue falls below the royalty threshold. A 5% royalty is due only if you are distributing an off-the-shelf product that incorporates Unreal Engine code (such as a game). Provided that you notify us on time using the Release Form, you will only owe royalties once the lifetime gross revenue from that product exceeds $1 million USD; in other words, the first $1 million will be royalty-exempt.
There are also options for custom licenses that can include premium support; private training; negotiated terms for lower royalties, no royalties, or a different basis for royalty negotiation; and more. Contact us to inquire about a custom license for either games or non-games use."

Licensing terms: https://www.unrealengine.com/en-US/license

Quto260 days ago

Fair enough, there's a reason I didn't give it the free tag, but this helps fulfill why, thanks!

CIULLO CORPORATION260 days ago

You forgot mentioning GODOT ENGINE as an alternative...

Quto260 days ago (2 edits)

I did, under multi support as Godot supports C#, C++, Python if I remember that last one right and it's own scripting language.

Between Unreal and Flax.

It even says popular alternative.

CIULLO CORPORATION260 days ago(+1)

Oh, sure... never mind...

Quto260 days ago

Your all good mate. :D

the rat gremlin260 days ago

If someone's is searching for other alternatives(although I think these are quite good recommendations), this person made a whole list of other engines, ranging from specializations.

https://itch.io/blog/588977/the-generous-space-of-alternative-game-engines-a-cur...

Quto260 days ago

Why is this list not on the Itch.io homepage?

redonihunter259 days ago

It kinda is

https://itch.io/game-development/engines

Quto259 days ago

I get of it kinda is. But if I look at the homepage, it's the basics like tools, resources packs, games; and going into tools, I can poke at a few search parameters to reached what the community gathers and posted.

But why isn't this list in ease of access is what I'm asking is all. Is it to keep folks on the site?

redonihunter259 days ago

I do not understand your grammar. I am not sure how to navigate to that list. It is just a summary of tagged engines on itch. Since it reads game-development, I assume, if you tick your account to not only play but make games, you will see some links how to get started.

But of course it also has the side effect of showing known alternatives to Unity. But since Unity is rather broadly, exactly what alternative is usefull to someone, depends heavily on what kind of game and what platform(s) are planned. Engines with the keyword 3d are rare on that list. Bascially only Unreal and Godot, never heard of the others.

FearCode260 days ago

Make your own engine, painful sometimes but fun :)

redonihunter259 days ago

Are you actually making an engine, as in you create an engine and put your game on top of it, or are you creating both at the same time, intertwined, so there is no clear distinction between engine and project?

FearCode259 days ago (3 edits) (+3)

That's indeed a good point, there are people not making engines and building their games on top of APIs directly and there are people actually making the engine. I'm the latter, I'm an engine programmer for a living, I really love doing low level backend stuff, specially gpu related.

I call it Fear Engine and it also has an Editor, so in practice, it's actually 3 projects: Fear Engine, Fear Editor and Game, both Editor and game are served by the engine in all backend related needs such as physics and 3D rendering. Game was also generated by the Editor making it the highest level project of them all. The Editor, uses a special build config of Fear Engine that allows for run-time profiling in exchange of performance, since in editor we care more about debugging than actual performance, while the opposite applies to the game itself). After I'm done working in the editor I "(re-)export the game", which means packing all assets and shaders into optimized data format for an actual stage run in game (it's like the "Package project"option in Unreal).

it's no simple task, the current engine I'm making & using I began development 5 years ago, but for me it's worth it for the freedom, lightweight and control :)

I'm still improving it and fixing bugs along the way, but it's now stable enough to take less than 10% of my time in my current game I'm developing: https://itch.io/t/2661175/shine-project

redonihunter258 days ago

Cool. It seems there is a market opening up for 3d engines ;-)

There are lots of 2d stuff, but engines sporting any type of 3d are few.

FearCode258 days ago(+1)

Yes, that's one potential future project I have in mind, some sort of 3D ___ Maker, it would be for a specific game genre since opening up the umbrella too much will have me killed :D

Quto258 days ago

This is actually quite impressive. If you publish the editor/engine beside your game when you release it, you can encourage modding and for someone else to do this whole journey after. So long as you don't act like Nintendo!

FearCode258 days ago (2 edits) (+1)

Thanks brother! Yes I do have that planned, it's too soon to actually implement it, but I do plan to allow for modding (if the game grows popular) and that will definitely include the Editor.

I share the same opinion as you have about Nintendo, I'm just an indie dev. with an indie mentality so as to share the IP (as a fair use) and allow for the community to mod and create over the game, seeing people modding a game I did would be like a dream coming reality :D

Quto258 days ago(+1)

Well, ya should anyway mate. I'm a dev myself, though my stuff won't get published due to my inadequacy in understanding 3D. XD
And if you do a proper Sonic game, Sega would take you under their wing; I've seen Nintendo go after dev.'s even remotely touching an I.P. of theirs from years upon years ago: If there is another gaming crash, they would not last.

To correct myself; they would survive like last time, but if there's no competition with the exception of the indies, then folks may go to the indie dev's as a cheaper source of entertainment for games that give more for their small budget's like the editor you should try to publish beside your project, should being my keyword but it's your game, not mine, so do what you will.

Well, good luck to ya! I'll keep tabs on your project!

FearCode257 days ago (1 edit)

That's true, besides being too early to do this, I do have plans to publish the game's editor in future, I'm still working on it because the game is just 15% complete so there's not much to edit in the editor, at some point it will become meaningful enough to make it suitable for modding, at that point I'll definitely release it.

I'll be glad if you keep tabs on my project, I post updates around every 10 days

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