Gaming is something we all enjoy. Games are a great way to pass time, speaking from my own experience. Not only this, but gaming also teaches many crucial things about planning, strategy making, teamwork, and quick reflexes.

Due to this immense love for games, many people start learning game development. I mean, wouldn't it be nice if people played a game developed by you? It would be more than a proud moment to see their response.

For game development, the most important element is the Game Engine. It decides how your game will come out in play. So in this article, we are going to describe some gaming engines that would help you in Game Development.

What is Game Engine

A game engine, also known as a game architecture, game framework, or game frame, is a software development environment designed for people to build video games. Developers use game engines to construct games for consoles, mobile devices, and personal computers.

The core functionality typically provided by a game engine includes a rendering engine (“renderer”) for 2D or 3D graphics, a physics engine or collision detection (and collision response), sound, scripting, animation, artificial intelligence, networking, streaming, memory management, threading, localization support, scene graph, and may include video support for cinematics.

A Game engine consists of five main components.

1. Main Game Program – It consists of the algorithms that implement the game’s logic.

2. Rendering Engine – The job of the rendering engine is to generate animated 3D graphics.

3. Audio engine – It consists of algorithms related to loading, modifying, and output of sound through the user’s speaker. Newer Audio engines are capable of producing Doppler effect, echoes and oscillations.

4. Physics Engine – Physics engine is used to implement the laws of physics realistically within the game.

5. AI – AI or Artificial Intelligence is employed according to the genre of the game since each genre uses a different logic.

Now that we have described the game engine, let us look at the top game engines.

1. Unity

Unity is a game engine developed by Unity Technologies. It is one of the most widely used engines in the game development industry. Since it is a cross-platform engine, it can be used to create games for different platforms like Windows, iOS, Linux, and Android.

The engine has been adopted by industries outside video gaming, such as film, automotive, architecture, engineering, and construction. As of now, the engine supports as many as 25 platforms. The latest version of the Unity at the moment is Unity 2019.2.

The engine can be used to create three-dimensional, two-dimensional, Virtual reality, Augmented Reality, and simulations/experiences.

Advantages of Unity

Advantages of Unity are

1. Debugging – Debugging in Unity is a hassle-free work and easy job for any developer. The support for debugging is nice because all the variables are displayed in the gameplay.

2. Graphics – It supports high-quality audio and visual effects that support easing the game development. The visuals are capable of adapting to every screen and device.

3. Analytics – Unity consists of built-in analytics which you can easily find in the editor. Thanks to Unity Analytics, you can get very deep insights into your game. It gives you information that can be used to improve the gameplay by doing some modifications and offer an awesome gaming experience for the players.

4. Community Support – Unity enjoys the support of a large number of users that help in keeping the engine up-to-date and free of bugs.

5. Platform Support – This is one of the biggest strengths of Unity. Since it offers support to 25 different platforms, it becomes easy to share an app created in one platform among others. Besides, its methodology allows for speedy prototyping, which in turn reduces the time required to develop apps.

2. Unreal

Unreal is a game engine developed by Epic Games which was first showcased in 1998 first-person shooter game Unreal. Initially, it was developed as a game engine for the first-person shooter. But over the year, it is being used to develop for other genres like platformers, MMORPGs, and other RPGs. The latest version of Unreal is 4.25.

It is the most preferred engine when it comes to game development for big title games(AAA). It is more suited for those working in teams rather than individually.

Advantages of Unreal

1. Performance – The performance of the Unreal Engine is great due to the fact that it uses very little memory and other resources.
2. AAA Games – Unreal is widely preferred when it comes to making big-budget games where the quality of the game needs to be over the roof.
3. Open-Source – Since Unreal Engine is open-source, this makes its development very easy and increases its efficiency. Iteration – Unity makes rapid iteration easy, which makes it useful when making a new project.
4. VR – It provides good integration for VR for achieving the best quality picture.

3. CryEngine

CryEngine is a game engine developed by German developer Crytek. It has been used in all of their titles. It has also been used for many third-party games under Crytek’s licensing scheme and has beautiful graphics. Along with it, the characters made with it are life-like.

To learn how to use CryEngine, there are a lot of free resources. Since it is programmed in C++, C#, and Lua, it is easy to code and supports platforms like macOS and Windows and consoles like Playstation and Xbox.

Advantages of CryEngine

Advantages of CryEngine are

1. Exceptionally convenient real-time lighting engine, neat terrain tools.

2. 90% of the gameplay framework is already in place, the best technical art pipeline in the business, blueprints offer high accessibility to designers.

Conclusion

Game development is a very interesting and fun hobby if you feel connected to games. For that, we use game engines like Unity, Unreal, and CryEngine. Unity is used for its beautiful graphics and platform support. Unreal is used for making big-budget games that are made by large teams. The performance of the engine is pretty good. CryEngine is used by CryTek and mostly employed in games like FarCry and Crysis.

Each engine has its own set of advantages and drawbacks. You can compare it on your own. Some might suit others while some won't. So it's better if you check its compatibility yourself.