Not necessarily. The two go can totally hand in hand. It can be much better to build your own game engine, so it works exactly the way your game design requires - instead of making your design fit the limitations of the engine.
Well-versed in the technical side of things thanks to extensive Software Engineering experience. Enthusiastic about Statistical Inference, Machine Learning and Visualizations. He/him.
In practice -- no. I see a lot of developers developing their own engine and not developing actual game. Because 1. they are programmers, they're good at programming and bad at game design but this way they can trick themselves into thinking they do develop a game; and 2. good game engine is a ton of work, one can spend years and years on it.
Besides, game design is a lot of work too for a decent-size game, one can easily spend years on that too. And that's on producing good game design document only, without art and code.
As a well-known example Jonathan Blow was working on Braid for about 5 years developing both the engine and the rest of the game, and he already was experienced game developer and designer. For an inexperienced developer and designer that would be an impossible endeavour.
Well-versed in the technical side of things thanks to extensive Software Engineering experience. Enthusiastic about Statistical Inference, Machine Learning and Visualizations. He/him.
Are you referring to "an impossible endeavour"? I don't see how a project you can't finish is a rewarding one.
Or you're saying developing a game engine is more rewarding than developing an actual game? Yes if you're a programmer and like developing game engines. I heard Unity engine started like that, they set to develop a game but in the process realized they like developing an engine then dropped the game and started selling the engine (and tooling).
But if you're a game designer then engine development is just a distraction for you. Maybe even annoyance. 🤷
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Not necessarily. The two go can totally hand in hand. It can be much better to build your own game engine, so it works exactly the way your game design requires - instead of making your design fit the limitations of the engine.
In practice -- no. I see a lot of developers developing their own engine and not developing actual game. Because 1. they are programmers, they're good at programming and bad at game design but this way they can trick themselves into thinking they do develop a game; and 2. good game engine is a ton of work, one can spend years and years on it.
Besides, game design is a lot of work too for a decent-size game, one can easily spend years on that too. And that's on producing good game design document only, without art and code.
As a well-known example Jonathan Blow was working on Braid for about 5 years developing both the engine and the rest of the game, and he already was experienced game developer and designer. For an inexperienced developer and designer that would be an impossible endeavour.
But ultimately a much more rewarding one
Are you referring to "an impossible endeavour"? I don't see how a project you can't finish is a rewarding one.
Or you're saying developing a game engine is more rewarding than developing an actual game? Yes if you're a programmer and like developing game engines. I heard Unity engine started like that, they set to develop a game but in the process realized they like developing an engine then dropped the game and started selling the engine (and tooling).
But if you're a game designer then engine development is just a distraction for you. Maybe even annoyance. 🤷