Unity or Unreal?

cookiethecrumb · May 25, 2020

Hey guys, I am looking forward to making my first real game and i want to make it a top down 2D bullet hell similar to something like Realm Of the Mad God. And i was wondering what engine would be best for this. I want to do it in code because i want to fully understand whats going on. I've made an extremely simple game in game maker (one level, you could move and jump and i was a square with a face lol) and found it fun and want to make an actual full game this time. I have some experience with C++ (not much just done basic functions took a class in college) and unreal seems to be a industry leader in ease of use and capability. So it seemed like an obvious choice however, after researching it, it seems to not have many resources on making 2D games from the community. Is it because unity is better to learn on? I learn primarily from YouTube, so it unity better just for that? Just wanted your guys thoughts on which you would recommend to a first timer looking to make a game and maybe even sell it one day! thanks for any help!

SFFDesigns · May 25, 2020

I have personally only used Unity. It's C#, which is a relatively easy language to learn imo. Lots of addons/assets are available for it. The UI isn't too bad or hard to learn, but again, I've never tried Unreal so I can only explain the unity side of things

zassou · May 26, 2020

i have a weird idea of making a diablo-like arpg with low poly style using unity.

straight_stewie · May 26, 2020

https://docs.unrealengine.com/en-US/Engine/Paper2D/index.html

If you want to use C++ and need lots of community support, you almost don't have a choice but to use Unreal.

3rrant · May 26, 2020

11 minutes ago, straight_stewie said:

https://docs.unrealengine.com/en-US/Engine/Paper2D/index.html

If you want to use C++ and need lots of community support, you almost don't have a choice but to use Unreal.

You can use C++ on Unity as well, it's just not out-of-the box supported. Same is for C# on Unreal.

12 hours ago, cookiethecrumb said:

Hey guys, I am looking forward to making my first real game and i want to make it a top down 2D bullet hell similar to something like Realm Of the Mad God. And i was wondering what engine would be best for this. I want to do it in code because i want to fully understand whats going on. I've made an extremely simple game in game maker (one level, you could move and jump and i was a square with a face lol) and found it fun and want to make an actual full game this time. I have some experience with C++ (not much just done basic functions took a class in college) and unreal seems to be a industry leader in ease of use and capability. So it seemed like an obvious choice however, after researching it, it seems to not have many resources on making 2D games from the community. Is it because unity is better to learn on? I learn primarily from YouTube, so it unity better just for that? Just wanted your guys thoughts on which you would recommend to a first timer looking to make a game and maybe even sell it one day! thanks for any help!

IMHO Unity is much easier to use than Unreal for a 1-2 person team. It is easier to start meddling around with and a lot more user friendly with plenty of support in the community. If you already know C++ well, you can use a plugin to use it in Unity. Otherwise, if you are a low-mid level in C++ I suggest you to take a brief look at C# as they are very similiar and share most of the logic. C# is very straight forward. So I suggest you to go Unity with C# in the end.

straight_stewie · May 26, 2020

1 minute ago, 3rrant said:

You can use C++ on Unity as well, it's just not out-of-the box supported. Same is for C# on Unreal.

It's also true that a skilled programmer can get any language or system to interface with any other language or system. I fail to see how that answers the OPs question:

"I want to use C++ to make a 2D game and I require good community support, what engine is best?"

You get the most community support by using the most widely used tool. That doesn't mean it's the only way to do it. It doesn't mean that it's the best way to do it. Unreal will make 2D games with C++ out of the box and will have a larger amount of community support for that than Unity + <specific_addon> will.

I would agree though that beginners should probably use C# rather than C++, however with the added stipulation that beginners shouldn't learn C# in Unity, and probably shouldn't try to learn programming by creating games with graphics anyway.

3rrant · May 26, 2020

1 minute ago, straight_stewie said:

It's also true that a skilled programmer can get any language or system to interface with any other language or system. I fail to see how that answers the OPs question:

"I want to use C++ to make a 2D game and I require good community support, what engine is best?"

You get the most community support by using the most widely used tool. That doesn't mean it's the only way to do it. It doesn't mean that it's the best way to do it. Unreal will make 2D games with C++ out of the box and will have a larger amount of community support for that than Unity + <specific_addon> will.

I would agree though that beginners should probably use C# rather than C++, however with the added stipulation that beginners shouldn't learn C# in Unity, and probably shouldn't try to learn programming by creating games with graphics anyway.

I see what you mean, what I meant was that there's a plugin for Unity which adds C++ support and that there's (a MUCH better) addon for Unreal which adds C# support (USharp), not that I recommend it.

I recommended Unity because

12 hours ago, cookiethecrumb said:

....I have some experience with C++ (not much just done basic functions took a class in college) ....

To me, having little experience doesn't really count as "I need to use this language". Since making a videogame is challenging and require mostly problem solving than coding expertise as a solo developer (and new to this industry) it's better to go with a newbie-friendly tool, which I think Unity does a better job than Unreal to be. Unreal is great for small teams of experts.

Also, C# is a managed language while C++ is not. Having to deal with memory management etc isn't a good idea if you just want to try and make your first videogame...

For the OP, this is a very simple starting point for learning C# from C++ basics, which as I said is extremely easy:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/visualstudio/visual-studio-2008/yyaad03b(v=vs.90)?redirectedfrom=MSDN