coppercube 3d all the way for me
gimp for image editing
blender3d for modeling and animation
LMMS for tunes
i use game sound generators most often for soundsfx
I've made a cool prompt generator, this is helping me a lot to make games with new ideas that I would have never thought about! Here is the link -> Random Theme Generator
Basic but gets the job done :)
Defold - a very underrated game engine https://defold.com/
Gdevelop - just for quick Prototyping https://www.getpaint.net/
VisionCrafterAI - For all my Game Design Arts, Backgrounds, Character Design, Pixel Design (all Graphic stuff) https://visioncrafterai.itch.io/
REAPER - Audio Production https://www.reaper.fm/
I can't believe articy:Draft X doesn't seem to have been mentioned here. I'm making an RPG with Disco Elysium-style branching dialogue and articy is a godsend, especially if you're writing games with open-ended, branching stories.
articy lets you write dialogue and plot timelines by means of a 'flowchart' simply called the flow, where you can also do simple scripting by attaching code to flow items, and also comes with a database to help you keep track of documents, images, music, locations, people, items, etc. (which can also be tied to modules in the flow). Best of all, you can export your project directly to Unity or Unreal.
Its uses are very niche, but if you're looking to make a visual novel, then Visual Novel Maker is a pretty great engine. It's a bit rough around the edges, but you can create a whole game from start to finish with it. It's by the same people that make RPG Maker, it just doesn't receive the same level of support
Las 3 herramientas más completas para desarrollar videojuegos hoy en día son Unity, Unreal Engine y Godot. Unity es súper versátil para 2D y 3D, usa C# y tiene una comunidad enorme, ideal para proyectos que pueden escalar. Unreal Engine es más potente en gráficos, perfecto para juegos AAA o visualmente muy exigentes, con C++ y Blueprints para quienes prefieren lo visual. Y Godot, que es open source, muy liviano y fácil de aprender, ideal si estás empezando o querés algo sin licencias. En la carrera de Programación de Videojuegos en UNIAT usamos estas tres según el tipo de proyecto, y todas tienen mucho que ofrecer según tus metas y experiencia.
For those that develop or want to develop on iPad and Mac* i've been building TilePix for the last 5 months, just released update V1.9 building ontop of the existing feature implementations and further optimisations.
it's designed to do a bulk of the workload involving making a tileset, tilemaps and even has a built-in class editor as of writing using Bool and String class types. Exporting in a zipped JSON and PNG format or in a Tiled project file to maintain compatibility with major game engines.
Compatible with ipadOS 17+
For narrative/interactive fiction work, my stack is pretty minimal by game-dev standards:
**Ink** (by Inkle) is the core. It's a scripting language purpose-built for branching dialogue — you write the story logic in plain text, compile it to JSON, and it plays anywhere JavaScript runs. No engine required. The branch/weave/tunnel system handles complex choice structures cleanly once it clicks. inkjs is the runtime; drop it in a browser page and you're done.
**VS Code** with the Ink extension for authoring — it gives you a live play-through panel so you can test branches without leaving the editor. Worth having even if you're only occasionally writing Ink.
**Playwright** for anything involving automation or browser testing. Overkill for most indie devs, but if your game is entirely browser-based and you want to run regression tests on story branches, it works.
Beyond that: plain HTML/CSS for the interface, Kimi K2 for brainstorming branching outcomes when I'm stuck, and Audacity for any audio.
The Ink-to-browser pipeline is genuinely underrated for narrative games — keeps you focused on writing decisions rather than engine decisions. If you're curious what a finished browser game built entirely on inkjs looks like, the Crossroads series (glowinteractive on itch.io) is a working example.