Thoughts about games and engines

While working on this engine, I've been reading and watching numerous GDC (Game Developer's Conference) stuff and I have learned alot of simple and advanced tricks, like multithread tasking, shadow mapping tricks, animation layering and reusing code in numerous ways, just to name few. Also a huge point that I've heard on many sources and witnessed myself, is that an AAA engine, like Unreal, CryEngine or Source have, at some point been a generic container of features and techniques, that then is mold into a game specific engine, with dropping and adding features, modifying some parts and just leaving the game specific stuff. The result can be something entirely different than what it used to be. This is also a huge point on getting the source code of an engine and why industrial AAA companies make a huge scene of it. It's true that Quake IV and Doom III used the same id Tech 4 engine, but the featureset is still so different.

This is also the case with AGE. I try to develop it so that I can later extend it to a game specific engine. Of course engines all have the core features remain the same, but some more high level, like shaders and action system might be altered.

Keeping in mind, that a game engine is the motor under the hood and the game is the nice seats, wheel, pedals and so on with the player being the driver, getting the experience of moving fast and waiting for the light turning green while burning the tires and listening to heavy rock. The game engine is the core to build a world for the player to experience.

A hint I've gotten from a industry veteran is, that don't make the game become experience, let the player experience the world the game creates.