3 ms·

Let's not guess and simply checkout a fair comparison, like this gentleman did: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tInaI3pU19Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIna

by qayxc 5y ago

Let's not guess and simply checkout a fair comparison, like this gentleman did: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tInaI3pU19Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tInaI3pU19Y From his perspective as an experienced developer, it took 3.4x more effort to implement a very basic project versus using a fully featured engine. And that's ignoring the editor part, not to forget. I'd call a factor of 3.4 quite significant. In more general terms, it's the difference between actually finishing a game in a 3½ months vs a full year. In other words, you could finish 3 projects in the time it takes you to fully handcraft one, with the added advantage of OOTB multi-platform support. So reality seems to disagree with your "not really saving you that much much time" assumption. It's the small conveniences that add up quickly: exporters/importers for assets, in-game editors, readily available prefabs/blueprints for all kinds of components, stuff like that. Of course it's not rocket surgery to use SDL and a handcrafted engine for a quick little project. Yet, I've witnessed far more game projects die (especially by beginners) that went the handcrafted all-the-way route versus people using game engines.

username90 5y ago
Rolling your own is mostly a fixed cost endeavour. Taking 3.4x more time on a week long project isn't that bad when considering that most projects takes years. And then you have to consider that the guy got 10x the performance on his hand rolled project, getting unity to similar levels of performance would likely take way longer than just using his own engine. > Yet, I've witnessed far more game projects die (especially by beginners) that went the handcrafted all-the-way route versus people using game engines. If you don't have the skills required to make your own game engine then you shouldn't do it. You shouldn't learn how to make a game and how to make a game engine at the same time.

by qayxc 5y ago

username90 5y ago

Rolling your own is mostly a fixed cost endeavour. Taking 3.4x more time on a week long project isn't that bad when considering that most projects takes years. And then you have to consider that the guy got 10x the performance on his hand rolled project, getting unity to similar levels of performance would likely take way longer than just using his own engine. > Yet, I've witnessed far more game projects die (especially by beginners) that went the handcrafted all-the-way route versus people using game engines. If you don't have the skills required to make your own game engine then you shouldn't do it. You shouldn't learn how to make a game and how to make a game engine at the same time.