Modern games with photorealistic graphics and convincing physics are built on decades of technological development. At the heart of every game is a game engine — a tool that turns messy coding into powerful, flexible processes. Let's break down how the industry went from hand-made to cutting-edge technology and how this changed the industry.
The 1970s–1980s — how games were created before engines appeared
In the 70s and early 80s, game development was very hands-on. Every line of code was tied to a specific piece of hardware and there was no automation.
- Pong (Atari, 1972) was a simple tennis simulation with minimal graphics. The code directly ran the hardware.
- Space Invaders (Taito, 1978) was a game in the Assembly. The developers set the behavior of the enemies manually.
- Pac - Man (Namco, 1980) — the first time simple animation was introduced, adding dynamism to the gameplay.
This approach made development slow and set a limit on how complex the projects could be. Nintendo attempted to create internal tools, such as for Super Mario Bros. In 1985, but these did not become full-fledged engines.
The 1990s: the first game engines appear
With greater computing resources and the transition to 3D graphics, it became clear that the industry required standardized tools. The first game engines came to the rescue by automating key tasks like graphics rendering, physics, and control.
The big game engines in the 1990s were:
id Tech 1 — Doom, 1993. Id software's John Carmack came up with the revolutionary idea of separating the engine from the content. This made it possible to create levels with simple tools, while the engine was responsible for the graphics, physics, and object interaction. This approach brought the breakthrough that was Doom: its pseudo - 3D environments, textures, and dynamic lighting impressed players.
Build Engine — Duke Nukem 3D, 1996. This engine allowed developers to build more complex and interactive levels. The game featured destructible environments, animations, and elements that reacted to the player's actions. The geometry of the worlds became more detailed, which made the gameplay more dynamic and exciting.
Unreal Engine 1 — Epic Games, 1998. The first multi-platform engine with support for dynamic lighting and high-resolution textures. Unreal Engine offered powerful graphics tools and was made available to other developers under license. This made it commercially successful and popular among studios.
The main advancement for the game industry in the 90s was modularity. Game development teams could work in parallel: the designers created levels, the artists painted textures, and the programmers tweaked the game logic.
In the 2000s, engines became the standard for game dev
In the 2000s, engines became the backbone of game dev. The proliferation of computers and consoles allowed large and complex worlds to be created while the engines simplified development by automating the main processes. Games became more realistic, and developing them became faster and more affordable.
The big game engines in the 2000s were:
id Tech 3 — Quake III Arena, 1999. This engine introduced shaders to determine how light, shadows, and textures appear on the screen. This gave games realistic surfaces and lighting. dynamic lighting became especially important, adding depth and atmosphere to game scenes. id Tech 3 served as the basis for most games of the early 2000s.
CryEngine — Far Cry, 2004. This engine made a breakthrough in graphics, offering photorealistic water, lighting, and huge open spaces.
Unreal Engine 3 — Gears of War, 2006. This engine was one of the key technologies of the mid - 2000s thanks to the following innovations:
- PhysX, a physics technology from NVIDIA that offered realistic destruction, collisions, and object behavior.
- PBR, physically correct rendering, which made materials and textures appear realistic under different lighting.
- Blueprints, a visual programming system that allowed developers to create game logic without writing code.
The emergence of unity in 2005 was a breakthrough for indie developers. The engine was free, supported cross-platform development, and was perfect for mobile games.
The 2010s — engines became available to everyone, not just large companies
In the 2010s, game development was no longer dominated by large studios. tools that were previously only within the grasp of multi-million dollar projects became open and accessible to small teams and indie developers. Game engines simplified the process of creating games and allowed creative teams to focus on ideas and design rather than technical minutiae.
The main game engines in the 2010s were:
- Unity held onto its lead for indie projects due to its simplicity and support for all platforms. Its games included: Hollow Knight (2017), Cuphead (2017), and Among Us (2018).
- Unreal Engine 4 added access to AAA technologies in 2014: PBR, Blueprints, and support for VR and PhysX.
- Godot is a free and lightweight open source 2D game engine popular among indie developers.
The engines of the 2010s simplified game development and gave small teams access to the same tools as the major studios.
The 2020s: the era of photorealism and AI
Graphics reached a similar level to cinema CGI and artificial intelligence made it easier to create and optimize game worlds. Developers got tools for creating complex scenes and automating routine tasks while also saving time and resources.
In 2022, Epic Games introduced Unreal Engine 5 — an engine that revolutionized graphics and performance. It introduced technologies like:
- Nanite — a virtualized geometry technology. It enables 3D modeling with billions of polygons without any loss in performance. developers no longer have to spend weeks simplifying their models — the engine adapts them for optimal performance.
- Lumen is a system offering global lighting in real time. the light in the game changes dynamically: move the light source and the scene immediately updates. This offers realistic lighting without demanding manual adjustments.
- The Matrix Awakens Demo showed how future games could look — photorealistic cities, live lighting, and incredible detail for characters and objects.
Artificial intelligence is now a key tool in game development.
What AI has brought to the table:
- Automation — AI generates textures, animations, and entire levels.
- Procedural generation — machine learning algorithms create large game worlds and dynamic animations and adapt them to the project's objectives.
- Testing — AI helps you find bugs and test your levels meaning you can fix bugs and release your finished product sooner.
Today’s engines have simplified game development, reduced the time and costs, allowing small teams to compete with the major studios. Thanks to these technologies, game development has become more flexible and affordable.
How IT technology has changed game dev
The hardware has become more powerful. Modern CPUs and GPUs have made photorealistic worlds possible. Shaders, Ray Tracing, and DLSS have helped make lighting and textures more realistic while running faster on today’s devices.
The physics has become realistic. Technologies like Havok and PhysX have saved developers from having to manually set the behavior of objects. Destruction, gravity, and collisions have begun to look natural and predictable.
Rendering has taken graphics to a whole new level. The PBR, Nanite, Lumen systems have allowed games to display realistic materials and light. The graphics now look alive and react dynamically to scene changes.
AI has accelerated development. Artificial intelligence has automated routine tasks. It creates textures, animations, and entire levels, saving teams time and resources. Developers can now focus on the creative part of the game dev.
Games have become cross-platform. Engines like Unity and Unreal Engine have made it easier to port games to PC, mobile devices, consoles, and VR. A single project can be adapted for multiple platforms at once without excess cost and complexity.
Cloud technology has made games more accessible. Cloud computing makes it possible to run heavy games even on weak hardware. Studios use servers for complex calculations and rendering, which speeds up development and improves performance.
Game engines have changed the industry — they have simplified game creation, made graphics highly realistic and opened doors for developers at every level. Thanks to powerful hardware, automation, and new technologies, game quality has increased and development has become faster and more affordable.
What do you think the future holds for the game dev industry?
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