Quote:Original post by Shirker
I think what Johnny is getting at is
If you were to suggest an engine for a beginner to use for (say, 2D games for example), then which one would you say?
(Programming and art skill aside).

I was actually going to ask about this, so I'm glad it came up. I'm beginning to learn C++ and have been reading a lot lately (books and sites), and have been wondering what engine to get, or if one supported certain features better than another, or if one specific free engine was just as good as another that would cost a few hundred dollars (Torque).
Are there any free engines that would provide the same, or nearly, quality of the Torque 2D engine, or would it be foolish to pay for it?
This seems like a stupid question, but (Wording this correctly is proving to be difficult) would it be better to get a 2D geared engine when you are going to be attempting to create a 2D game, or would a seemingly more advanced 3D engine prove to be a better choice?

Thank you. I think that if I were to try and re-invent the wheel it could possibly be a long time before I could even begin to render something on the screen if I made my own 3d/2d world. But if I can use an "engine" or other such tool that is accepted by the community as a viable and good choice, I can get to the game creation aspect of the design as opposed to infrastructure.

For example, again, if I know how to program in a web language, I can create a website from scratch and will probably build an infrastructure in the process, creating a framework or CMS. Or, I can find someone that has build a trustworthy framework and get to what I want to - building content instead of nuts and bolts.

This does not mean I don't believe any programming will be necessary. Of course I know there will be and I like that part of the process (I like programming). It means much of the hard stuff that I would have a hard time building just so I could build what I wanted has been done and done better by better programmers.