We're looking for a game engine to use, but we have some questions first

General Discussion
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Hello everyone.

We’re a group of students that are looking for a game engine to use to create a commercial cross-platform “2.5D” indie video game. We are very new to this sort of thing, but we are willing to do a lot of learning as soon as we find out what game engine we’ll be using.

He are our needs and concerns.:

  1. We have preference for Java or Java-like syntax (and jMonkeyEngine passes that test).

  2. The license needs to be free as in freedom and useable to make proprietary software should that be the group consensus (and it seems to be the case that jMonkeyEngine can be used to make proprietary software, but please confirm).

  3. Since we’re not wealthy, using the game engine for commercial purposes should not cost any money whatsoever, but since the first platform we’re looking to be using primarily is Android, we’re particularly curious about any potential costs. Will there be any issues with the use of jMonkeyEngine requiring payments to Oracle if used in a mobile device (since jMonkeyEngine is built using Java)? If an elaborate answer could be provided in addition to a concise answer for this part, that would be great.

  4. We want cross platform support that supports at least Windows, Mac OS X, SteamOS/Linux and Android (and supports these platforms perfectly). However, looking here ( https://wiki.jmonkeyengine.org/legacy/doku.php/jme3:android ), we see that Framebuffers and Shadows are a work in progress and that water is not tested yet. Specifically about the water, this ( http://hub.jmonkeyengine.org/forum/topic/solvedjme3-test-waterprocess/ ) is the latest information we could find. Could someone elaborate on this situation (because we are too new to games/graphical development)? Basically, we’re looking to find the ideal engine and then start learning it thoroughly.

The jMonkeyEngine engine currently seems to be the ideal choice, if it weren’t for the potential cost issue, those two features that are a work in progress and the water not being tested yet. Those are our biggest concerns, given that everything else looks very good.

P.S.
Since a lot of people tend to advise beginners to do simpler stuff prior to jumping into difficult game development tasks, it’s worth noting that we are planning to do simpler stuff as part of our learning process prior to getting involved in the heavier aspects of game development, but we’d just like to get the engine choice sorted out first.

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2 is bsd, does so works
3 jme itself is free, as longa s you dont have to pay for android applications, there should be no issues
4. windows linux works fine for me confirmed, some use mac and seems towwrok there as well. android I cannot comment.

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@Empire Phoenix

Isn’t nehons game “Le voleur de Vent”

On sale in the app store?

Are we not allowed to charge for applications or games made with jme?

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@BigBob said: @Empire Phoenix

Isn’t nehons game “Le voleur de Vent”

On sale in the app store?

Are we not allowed to charge for applications or games made with jme?

I think he meant that the only money they would have to spend is apps that cost money… jme not being in that category

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  1. To post a game on Google play you need a Google developer account that is 25$ for a life time. that’s the only fee you can’t get around.
  2. Think smaller, mobile hardware is far from desktop. Water is a frame rate bitch, and you’re gonna struggle to have interactive frame rate with it on a phone.

And Amen to your PS

6

Thanks for all the responses!

About the money, we meant that we wanted to avoid all avoidable costs.

The thing about the water is that it is kind of important in “painting the picture” of the world we’re planning to “bring to life”, so we’re willing to sacrifice compatibility with the lower-end mobile hardware. The bigger question is: Will jMonkeyEngine be able to do render water, and if not yet, what are your estimates as to when it will be able to?

Is there a specific place to keep track of these developments? Will we have to wait until jMonkeyEngine 4.x for Android support to be fully covered, or should that happen in a version 3.x?

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The thing about the water is that it is kind of important in “painting the picture” of the world we're planning to “bring to life”, so we're willing to sacrifice compatibility with the lower-end mobile hardware. The bigger question is: Will jMonkeyEngine be able to do render water, and if not yet, what are your estimates as to when it will be able to?

Is there a specific place to keep track of these developments? Will we have to wait until jMonkeyEngine 4.x for Android support to be fully covered, or should that happen in a version 3.x?

Jmonkey supports two type of water rendering: basic water rendering and post-processor water rendering. The basic water rendering should be enough for any commercial game and is supported across all platforms.

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Apologies for the delayed response.

Now that the water issue seems to have been taken care of, we have officially chosen jMonkeyEngine as the engine for our game!

Thanks for all the input!