Android Research for the x86-based android* game Select the right engine detailed

Summary

Game developers know that there are huge opportunities in Android. About half of the top 100 apps in the Google Play Store are game apps (they account for more than 90% of the top 100 most profitable apps). Development speed is critical if you want to be in the market. Some start-up independent developers prefer to develop all their own code from scratch, but in order to achieve higher quality without spending years of development, others may choose an existing game engine. In the previous chapter, we examined the peer application details on the Intel android* Developer Guide, and you can consider several factors when choosing the engine:

• Cost-How much do you plan to spend?
• Dimension-is your game two-dimensional or three-dimensional?
• Language-what programming languages do your developers know?
• Artist Pipeline (Artist pipeline)-How does it integrate with content creation tools?
• Full resource access-do you need access to make deep changes to the engine?

There are a lot of Android game engines available today, but these engines are very different from these standards. With the adoption of Intel? Processors are becoming increasingly popular with high-performance Android devices, and choosing an engine optimized for x86-based Android devices is more important than ever. This article will help you choose the right engine for your game to provide the best performance for your Android customers.

Best choice

In this paper, the best alternative engine is detected from the following three aspects.

Epic Games ' unreal* Engine has long been an important position since its first release in 1998, and has contributed to a number of successful cases in the fields of computers, consoles and mobile platforms. Unreal Engine contains the following tools:

• Unreal Editor (3D content Editor)
• Blueprint Visual Script Editor (drag-and-drop editing)
• Persona Animation Tools
• Editors and tools for AI, lighting, and other effects

Project anarchy* is a recently developed engine for Havok. It combines Havok's proven main game technology with an engine tailored for mobile development. Project Anarchy includes the following components:

• Havok Vision Editor (3D content Editor)
• Havok Vision Engine with Havok Physics
• Havok Animation Studio (drag-and-drop editing)
• Autodesk scaleform* (UI tools)
• Editors and tools for AI, lighting, and other effects

Marmalade* is a cross-platform software development Kit designed for the fast creation and construction of mobile games. Marmalade is newer than the first two technologies and has just been released as a game in 2011. The Marmalade contains the following elements:

• Marmalade C + + SDK
• Marmalade Quick (Lua)
• Marmalade Juice (OBJ-C)
• Web Marmalade (html5/javascript*)

Cost

Many engines offer a variety of price points depending on the required functionality. The most common factors that determine price are the target platform and the size of your team or business.

Unreal Engine requires a monthly registration fee of $19 and 5% of all revenue from all projects developed by its technology. This technology supports custom price structuring, additional support, and development options for consoles.

Project Anarchy is currently (and will continue to be) free for teams of all sizes to use when developing mobile games. If a user needs to develop for a PC or console, gain deep access and other tools, you can also purchase an advanced version. For basic development, Project Anarchy is undoubtedly the most economical option, and it only requires a joint promotion with your game.

When writing this article, Marmalade is available for a team with less than $500,000 in revenue and 1 years for developers who are under 3. This is a temporary promotion and is generally subject to a fee of $149 or more for the license. Higher prices offer more target platform development and direct developer support.

Dimension of

The appeal of 3D games is indisputable, but for many simple games, 2D is a better choice, and it takes much less time and resources to invest than 3D. Your game dimension is closely related to the selected engine.

Marmalade does not have 3D graphics support, but Unreal Engine and Project Anarchy can provide this support. These engines have made countless improvements to provide the best experience in 3D development.

In short, the three engines are available for 2D development, but Unreal engine and Project Anarchy are not just there. Project Anarchy currently offers an alpha-class 2D toolset example, and Unreal Engine and Marmalade also provide 2D sample code. A subset of the Marmalade tools designed for rapid development Marmalade Quick is for 2D only.

The three engines are available for both 2D and 3D games, but the Marmalade is more suitable for 2d,project Anarchy and Unreal engine.

Language

If the developers on your team are familiar with the programming language used in an engine (if used better), the learning process will be significantly shortened.

In versions prior to Unreal Engine 4, Unreal engine's game programming was done in UnrealScript, which is the scripting language of Epic, which uses a C language-like syntax. With the release of Unreal Engine 4, C + + became the main development language.

Project Anarchy is based on C + + and uses Lua to write scripts. Many engines use lightweight scripting languages (such as Lua) as much as possible to reduce the risk of low-level tasks such as memory management.

Marmalade includes several toolsets, depending on the language you want. The basic SDK uses the C++,marmalade Juice with Objective-c*,marmalade Quick to use Lua,web Marmalade specifically designed for html5/javascript development.

In terms of the richness of language selection, Marmalade does have a prominent advantage. Your developers are better able to use some form of Marmalade based on how they like to develop. This feature is closely related to the nature of the abstraction layer "just write once and apply everywhere".

Artist Pipeline

In the past, only programmers were in the development team. Now, the game studio (regardless of size) clearly divides the responsibilities of programmers and artists. Engines that can be closely integrated with content creation tools can take advantage of the competition.

Unreal Engine and Project Anarchy all include 3D editors for layouts, level designs, asset operations, and more. These are especially useful for 3D artists because their interface is similar to many 3D art tools (they can also be used in conjunction with the engine's editor to create assets).

unreal* Editor (left) and Havok Vision editor (right)

Unreal Engine includes the Blueprint Authoring (Blueprint Scripting) feature, in which a script component, such as an action, can be visualized as a drag-and-drop element.

Blueprint Authoring (Blueprint scripting) features in Unreal* Editor

Project Anarchy provides a similar state machine-based design tool for animation design.

Project anarchy* layered State motorized drawing tools

Although Marmalade has a large community that is used to develop open source plugins and tools to support development work (most of which are available from the site: http://github.com/marmalade), but Marmalade The official suite does not provide any resources for non-programmers. With a comprehensive suite of tools, Project Anarchy and Unreal Engine take advantage of this.

Full resource access

In terms of likelihood, there is a benefit to creating your own engine, which is the ability to modify it. Because you have access to all the source code, you can change anything in it, or add your own support on other new target platforms.

Unreal engine is the most generous in this respect; if you pay the Unreal Engine 4 registration fee, you will be able to access all resources.

Project Anarchy provides a source for some components, and a higher fee is required if all sources are needed. Users can access low-level resources at any time, but only the free version can be modified.

Although Marmalade has a large number of open source plugins, it is itself a closed source. You can access the top-level network, but you cannot access other sources.

Most developers may not worry about this, but the more complex the game engine design, the more you need to have more control over every detail.

Feature comparison

		Marmalade	Project Anarchy	Unreal Engine
Lowest cost		Free Promotion/USD 149 + VAT	Free	19 USD/month + 5%
Dimension of	3D	can achieve	Apply	Apply
	The	The most relaxed	Alpha-Level Toolset	Achievable, example
Language		C + +, obj-c, Lua, HTML5	C + +, Lua	C++
Non-programmer features		Third party	3D Editor, Animation Studio	3D Editor, Blueprint scripting
Full source		No	Part, but all at the highest level	OK

Summarize

Each engine that is compared here has its expertise and a unique advantage. If you need to consider future costs, you can choose Project Anarchy. Unreal is the least expensive way to take into account skills and deep modifications and the need to extend the engine. Marmalade is the perfect choice for fast-developing 2D games. There are many other free and open-source engines on the market, which are comparable to the three engines compared in this article, but we choose these three engines, not others, because the performance of these engines can help your game bloom on a variety of Android devices.