So here again with some more opinion/discussion related topic about what features should/are normally be related into a game engine's core system from the implementation side of view. With a huge time I invested into writing and even more into research for my very own game engine project, there were as many differences as there are to coding guidelines. Especially open source engines (Urho3D, Lumberyard) and those that offer there source code (Unreal, CryEngine, Phyre) change during the centuries depending on current technical, coding and hardware standards. They all consist of third party code and libraries that are set apart from the core system bur rely on it.
Now I'm on a point where I want restructure/cleanup my project(s), removing obsolete and integrate prototyping code as same as change the growing code base to have a better clean managed file structure. The question that has had to emerge for long or short is what parts of the code base should be a core feature in order to keep the core system clean and flexible. Again reading many cross references it pointed some similarity out but also huge differences (like Unreals hashing/encryption code beeing in core) so I made a list of important stuff any game needs (I left out platform specifics and audio/renderer here because they are platform dependent and should stay in an own module/system)
Allocator (memory management)
Math (Vector, Matrix, Quaternion ...)
Threading (Threading, Locks)
Container (apart from the STL, Queue, Buffers, certain types of Array ...)
String (management, encoding, utils)
Input (seen a game without input?)
IO (reading/writing files and manage filesystem structure)
Type Handling
And a list that is optional but may/may not be inside the core code
Logging (because it is a development tool)
Profiler (see logging)
Serialization
Plugins
Events
In my opinion, logging and profiler code is a heavyly used feature in development but is stripped out mostly when deploying a release version, not all games rely on events rather than using other interaction (like polling, fixed function loops) and also the same for plugins and serializing/deserializing data; so what do you think should also be a must have in core system or should go from the list into core system as well as a must have? What else should go outside as an own module/system (into an own subfolder inside the engine project's code base)?
Courious to read your opinions
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