Unreal Engine 4 or Unity for Indie Devs? An overview on some popular games and situations these engines are used.

in #gamedev7 years ago

Hey Indie Devs! 🕹️


I know that this is really opinionated, but I see a lot of indies using the Unity engine for their work, and a lot of big companies using Unreal for theirs. Personally, I use Unity because, for me, the interface is a lot easier on the eyes; it's not so cluttered, and it's an all-purpose development environment that's great for making 2D games and 3D games. Also, C# is easier than C++ (for me). However, Unreal has a ton of outstanding default shaders and a lot of example projects to work with. Going off of the programming languages I mentioned earlier, Unreal has blueprints which can make things easier for newcomers. For those not aware of blueprints, check out this documentation from Unreal.

As I mentioned earlier, a lot of big companies use Unreal. Look at Bioshock, which utilizes Unreal Engine 3. There's also Kingdom Hearts III. A list I found from Gamepedia containing other games can be found here.

As for Unity, many people who participate in the famous Ludum Dare game jam use it. For those who do not know, Ludum Dare is one of the largest online game jams. A game jam is a gathering of people for the purpose of planning, designing, and creating one or more games within a short span of time, usually ranging between 24 and 72 hours, and some even longer (taken from Wikipedia). Some awarded games made with Unity include Cuphead, A Night in the Woods, and Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy. All of these games are produced by indie companies!

Now, I want to get your opinions! Is there anything I missed? Do YOU prefer Unreal Engine or Unity? Have you made any games you'd like to show off? Let me know down below. Thanks :D

-Kyle 🎮

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