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#1 Old 24th Oct 2012 at 1:51 AM Last edited by Mootilda : 25th Oct 2012 at 3:21 AM.
Default Programmers only, please.
In this thread, upayda said:
Quote: Originally posted by upayda
I asked here because i know there are good programmers here (fact), who may know what is the most suitable engine for a sims-like game.
This got me wondering about the level of programming and game-development expertise on the site.

So, several questions:

1) Have you ever worked as a programmer on a large scale commercial project? Specifically, I'm wondering how many of the programmers on the site are professionals, versus hobbyists.

2) Have you ever worked as a programmer on a large scale game which was actually shipped? I'm not interested in people who wrote a small game or prototype, but someone who worked for a year or more in a team of at least 10 people on a game which was commercially viable.

3) How many free and / or open source 3D game engines can you list? Can you list the primary features of each engine? I'm not expecting you to make comprehensive lists, just a number of game engines that you know of, and an indication of whether you have superficial or extensive knowledge of those game engines. Basically, I'm trying to determine whether people actually know about game engines candidates for an open-source sims-like game.

Of course, if you want to list game engines and their features, that would be wonderful. But, it's not required.

Bonus points if you can list the requirements for a game engine which would work for the Sims.

Bonus points if you know of a game engine which would actually be viable for a Sims-like game.

I'll start:

1) Yes, I am a professional programmer who has worked on large scale commercial projects.

2) No, I have never worked on a real commercial-quality game.

3) None, off hand. I don't keep track of free and / or open source game engines and their features.

However, this looks somewhat interesting:
http://www.moddb.com/engines
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Test Subject
#2 Old 24th Oct 2012 at 2:20 AM Last edited by Quatchi : 24th Oct 2012 at 5:08 AM.
1) Yes, I am a professional programmer who has worked on large scale commercial projects.

2) Yes, I am credited on 7 AAA titles.

3) There are not a lot of free/open source ones. There are a few that a free to develop on and then you have to pay a license fee for once you release a game. I don't think that the ones you have to license eventually are suitable for open source group projects.


Unreal - free to start. $$$$$$$ to ship. Ouch. meant for FPS type games.
Unity - free to start $$$$ to buy/ship - this has become the first choice of complex 3d browser based games.
There are several 2D engines - free to develop but cost to ship commercially.

My main experience is not in open source. These are open source engines that I know of. My knowlege of them is very limited.

Delta - A 3 engine. Open source. Free. I know of no real games shipped on it.
http://www.delta3d.org/

Panda 3d - this has been used for some B titles. This is a CMU engine.
http://www.panda3d.org/

Alice is another pseudo engine from CMU. Not suitable for commercial releases. Free.

Grit - a car racing engine. Open source. free.
http://gritengine.com/

Garage games Torque are going open source, but they aren't free to ship.
http://www.garagegames.com/products/torque-3d

The problem is none of these engines have the feature set needed by a sims like game and would be difficult to retrofit. To my knowlege most are better at adventure type games or shooter type games.
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#3 Old 24th Oct 2012 at 2:29 AM Last edited by Mootilda : 24th Oct 2012 at 3:04 AM.
I think that we can skip any 2D engines, for the purposes of this poll. I'll change the original post to make this clear.

Quote: Originally posted by Quatchi
there are not a lot of free/open source ones, but there are a few that a free to develop on and then you have to pay a license fee for once you release a game.
How would that work for an open-source game? I mean, people might just download the source code and compile it, then use the completely free development version of the engine. We're really looking for something that can be used for an open-source game.
Test Subject
#4 Old 24th Oct 2012 at 5:21 AM
You should be able to make an open source community developed game on a free engine that may not be open source itself. That said, I think its safer to develop on an engine you have the source code to, especially if the engine doesn't have the complete feature set you need.
Theorist
#5 Old 24th Oct 2012 at 2:37 PM
1) Yes, I am a professional programmer. Our projects are high-exposure, but I'm not sure I would say "commercial" as we get significant state funding. I am not in the gaming industry.

2) No, I have never worked on a real commercial-quality game.

3) None. Anything gaming-related for me would be strictly extra-curricular.

Resident wet blanket.
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#6 Old 25th Oct 2012 at 7:22 PM
Perhaps "commercial" isn't the right term. How about "commercial-quality"?
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#7 Old 29th Oct 2012 at 9:28 AM
1. Yes. Manufacturing industry; SAP, and stuff like that.
2. No.
3. List? Aww now, that's easy with search engines!
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_game_engines
- http://slashdot.org/story/06/04/21/...3d-game-engines

The ones I know of, as in read and follow development on, just out of interest? Blender and Unity. Well, Blender is obvious, I was attempting to pick up Meshing. Unity was mentioned a lot in the Blender guides for those wanting to do Game Development.

Just read up on Alice from the other thread days ago. From this thread, sparked my interest to go searching and came across this site: http://devmaster.net/devdb/engines
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