Have you ever found yourself deciding against a game you would otherwise check out because of what game engine it uses?



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If a games is made in UE5 I will definitely double check if the game can even run on low end hardware. And even if a game can run they often look like dogshit on low settings. Like I tried Exit 8 and it ran like shit on my low end PC. And that is a game that just takes place in a hallway.
Same for Steam Deck. UE5 games can ‘technically’ run, but they look a lot worse than other games. It’s the only game engine I check for.
No. You can make just about any engine do just about anything, especially if you’ve got low-level access to it. If this question is implying something about Unreal, just level set your expectations for the performance things that usually come along with that, but it’s not a foregone conclusion either.
I agree - An engine at the end of the day is just a tool.
This isn’t intended to be a bash a specific engine thing. I recently had a discussion with a friend who noted they very specifically avoided certain engines and I was wondering if that was a common sentiment or if he’s just odd.
Certain engines form certain reputations, but those people need to see enough counter examples to realize that the engine is just a contributing factor to what the resulting game is. Unity had “a look” for years, because so many devs used the default lighting, but then you realize that stuff like Cuphead, Hollow Knight, and Subnautica all run on Unity, and that reputation fades.
Another good example for Unity is Escape from Tarkov. Yes, EfT is a Unity game. It’s hard to believe.
One of my favorites is Batman: Arkham Knight. It uses Unreal Engine 3 and looks shockingly good despite it. Goes to show how much art direction matters.
If you played it at launch though, it did have a rough time scaling up to PC hardware that was better than consoles. It was pretty infamous for that back then.
Fortunately, no. I played after a few years.
Wasn’t that because of Denuvo?
If it’s anything other than unreal engine then no. If it’s UE then I will wait and then read about issues. If I see the same lazy bs then I’ll pass.
If I see it’s Unreal 5, I fully expect it to look like shit and perform weird, so it has some weight on my decision.
Personally yes, but I have a good reason I think. I am a Godot gamedev, so I feel a sort of kinship towards other Godot games. Like I really want to support them for whatever reason haha.
I was about to say “no” but saw your comment. If I am not sure about buying a game, seeing it was made with Godot makes me want to buy it. I am not a game developer but I support Foss and just love how good and clean Godot is.
I have huge respect to Mega Crit for this. After the Unity Engine controversy 2 years ago, they re-made all of Slay the Spire 2 (StS2) that was currently on the work to Godot and becamse sponsors of the project.
Currently I’m loving StS 2. The changes are mainly content and a bit of QOL, so it’s clear that changing engines represented a huge effort for them with respect to the noticeable impact to the players, and yet they still did it.
Yes, sort of. I absolutely hate the visual artifacts from TAA and from upscaling, which are both much more commonly used in UE5 games.
I’m also much more likely to try custom-engine games, just because I think people making their own engines is pretty cool ! I have only implemented very basic stuff myself, but it was very interesting to do !
I would say indirectly, if the game engine does not work on Linux then I’m not interested.
Increasingly yes, Unity is spyware and UE5 games all play, look and feel the same.
Yes, because of some shit the company pulled I’m no longer interested in games made in Unity.
The game engine should not be a factor in my opinion, but sometimes I have some feelings. In the end ultimately the game itself and how fun it is is the most important factor.
Honest question, what’s wrong with Godot? Haven’t play anything built on it yet. Will try Dog Walk sooner or later.
Nothing wrong with Godot. It’s just not the industry standard. Godot competes against Unity, but does not cost any money and its Open Source (so you know a company can’t do whatever they want). I’m not a game developer, so cannot go deeper than that I guess. :D
You seem to dislike most game engines. Interesting
I’d argue it doesn’t influence the decision making process, but is a good indicator of your taste in video games
There some some very efficient games using UE5, like Satisfactory.
On the contrary, I’m afraid of custom engine games. Even if they ultimately turn out okay, the dev hell required to get them there often sinks the game. See: ME: Andromeda, Cyberpunk 2077. And Distant Worlds 2 (even though it wasn’t technically fully custom).
IMO the best path is choosing the game engine for your niche. As an example, Cryengine was practically made for KCD2’s European forests and medieval towns. Larian’s Divinity engine is literally made for a D&D-type game like BG3.
I’ve had consistent treversal stuttering with satisfactory after one of their recent updatesend of last year to the point were I uninstalled.
I’m surprised about the satisfactory reference, that game never ran particularly well for me once I was a ways in with lots of stuff built up.
YMMV, I guess? I think it runs incredibly well, especially with Lumen enabled, given the sheer amount of stuff in-game. FPS is way higher than comparable looking games without thousands of player built objects, and the lighting is beautiful.
Custom engines are my kryptonite when you end up with games like animal well and
balatroI stand corrected I must have misremembered
Wait, Balatro doesn’t have a “custom engine”. They use https://love2d.org/ . On itch.io you can even search games made with this engine: https://itch.io/games/made-with-love2d
in nearly all cases me knowing the engine of a game is complete happenstance.
Yes. I heavily favour Godot.
Unity games give me pause, what with the opt-out rather then opt-in data collection and that there’s so many games lazily thrown together with the default assets.
It can if the engine makes the game run poorly or not at all (I wouldn’t buy it) or if the engine is exceptionally well regarded and runs great it might make me a bit more inclined to buy the game.
If it’s an engine famous for being janky, it might also make me delay buying the game until devs or modders fix it.
Also, if the engine is known for being mod friendly, that would probably make me more inclined to consider buying the game.
No not at all.