A new video game development kit for indies Thread

Hello everybody !!
I'm trying to make my passion something real, that is making 3D video games because of video games art (I'm also orchestral composer ^^)
Now I'm speaking as a 3D developer. I'm developing a game development kit using the irrlicht 3d engine for independent video games developers and I would like to make this project professional. I'm here to start a "mini-market study" and then get your first opinions on this project.

I posted the thread on the irrlicht forum at Irrlicht.sourceforge.net where everything is explained.
I included screenshots for you, present features and what I plan to do if I can make this project (or my passion ) professional.

The idea of this development kit is to give a low-cost game editor especially for indies. Because I find all other products still too expansive or almost not enough interesting. There is more than 5 years of work on 3d technologies. I started this project 1 year ago.

Waiting for your opinion about this "mini-study market"

Regards,

Julien.

Biggest features are cross-platform support and mobile optimization features. Most company's are making games for mobile markets now so its very important for devs. There is a lot of competition out there already with stuff like unity, c4 engine, udk etc so it won't be easy to get people to switch.

Yeah that's my fear (people to switch) !
Thank you for your response

But the difference here is the no limitation for developers (I mean full customization due to the integral open-source bases) and also the target : indie game developers. Targeting indie game developers means less expansive, almost low-cost, so more interesting pricing for same features, like a special indie game developers game kit. Do you think this way interesting for you ?

consider this : interactive support at reasonable costed rates, that is Id like support if I were to use such a product and I know that's expensive to provide.
Charging a fee even on a per minute basis for questions that I want answered would not be considered by myself to be too big a burden.
However Id also like documentation and some basic guides that don't cost the earth.

Open or closed source is irrelevant If one cannot sell the end product to the right spectrum of audiences, I second the motion of apps in multiple format options though add in a caveat that while its nice to have multiple device options it isn't always absolute in the success of an engine.

Ability to add in standard format 3d objects would be ideal take for example the phoenix engine and how it allows for standard .obj placements.
(One thing that engine lacks severely is multiplayer which is why ill never begin any project within it)
Unity and UDK free version both have some massive feature lists yet they share a commonality the end license agreement clause , which severely impacts the final end monetary result and of course acknowledgement to udk or unity.
I know there are many more engine choices and I have once in the past been caught in a nasty situation whereby the game has been switched and a lot of time learning the engine was spent in vain.
Knowing this make the process easy to do, Allow for your plugin to cover standard 3d applications such as maya , 3dsmax and blender.
Making a plugin to export to this engine directly from blender would arguably gain you the most indie developers as its freeware and will enable a much broader team base to work from.
There are always limitations to an engine and I would strongly advise you seek to find out where its strengths and weakness lay , advertise strengths and recruit people to fix weaknesses.
Offers of reduced costs , or reduced final costs if you help fix problems can also assist your engine in being the best it can be without sucky drawbacks.
have a look at filterforge for an example of how they offer bonuses to get a better idea what I am banging on about here.

While on the subject of 2d Graphics make your engine work with a variety of formats , JPEG maybe even ,definitely BMP TGA and DDS.,
A mini market would be a great idea and you can charge commissions for completed works that sold (that way you get cash for hosting your server and you user base have an opportunity to earn cash also say 10% commission to you ?
Micro transactions could be accounted for with something like an account storecard system which would be purchased from you then music ,sound,image or model makers would wait till the cash collected from the model sales are over $100 and then receive a cheque for their hardwork ea time $100 rolls around)
From Standard format "model" to Game ready models , sounds, music, maps , effects -this could in turn net you much better cashflow then say reliance on the engine sales alone.
Making the Engine handle many formats will be key as too the protection offered to those content builders with a report button on suspected illegal content which effectively auto hides the product and sends the uploader a request of explanation , Autoread with a program looking for particular words to avoid too many tickets to read through and enable a contest this report button to allow for the odd mistaken report/abuse.
If you set this up with a current E cash system this will be even easier to do and you will see sales im sure.
(though I wouldn't mind a "irrlicht Games card" and this would make game making more affordable , and a one stop shop for indie games developers rather then having to head to turbosquid ect, then sound music sellers ,soundmakers ,image makers ,hiring programmers for shaders or new game mechanics.
Unity already does some of this and so do a few other developers like daz studio, im sure there is big money involved but if you have the drive and a half decent engine im sure you could well turn this idea into something workable.
offering a occasional free gift of your ecash card you could also do competitions , give aways and offer something to top "free" makers of products thus ensuring your engine becomes a standout in quality as well as ease to use.

Someone wrote: But the difference here is the no limitation for developers (I mean full customization due to the integral open-source bases) and also the target : indie game developers. Targeting indie game developers means less expansive, almost low-cost, so more interesting pricing for same features, like a special indie game developers game kit. Do you think this way interesting for you ?

So if I understood correctly you want to make your own open source Unity and give it out for free?

I think in this market study you will find that people are interested in cheap, flexible, versatile and easy to use dev kits but whether you can actually make it is another topic. Unity license is actually very indie friendly as it is practically free until you make enough money to buy all the software in the world. I don't see anybody topping what Unity offers and I especially don't see anyone topping it for free or at lower cost and call it a business.

What is there now is nice though, As for me im stating no such absurd notion of give me a free unity lookalike game maker.
I just want slightly easier and less demanding terms , sure if you plan on staying super small unity is great, unless you check the legal headers
no gambling without a separate license , one license each developer , free version cant be combined with paid version so once you have a success your stuck paying $75 a month each employee or pay $1500 ea employee (adds up if you say have a game where you use a lot of team members how many people worked on gta 5 ? 1000 !) , annual salary doesn't exceed $100,000 , oh the free version is supposed to be installed on ONE computer only , 1000 installs limited on certain devices , oh and you must not have anything result in unity source code being accessible which includes specific debugging processes.
So just to clarify for me $1500 isn't a great deal of cash to pay if you make a successful game im not about to say its a lot when it isn't.
However there are other reasons why unity may not suit certain developers.

example 1 a console developer wannabe asks:
"I would like to develop for a console such as Xbox360, PS3, or Nintendo Wii. What do I need?"Unity Official reply
Console publishing is not included with Unity Pro-- you will need a special Unity license for each platform on a per-title basis. First, you will need to be a registered developer with the console manufacturer or license holder, such as Microsoft, Sony or Nintendo. After you are registered and approved by the console manufacturer, you will need their devkit hardware and software tools. At that point you can purchase a console license from Unity Technologies for use on a per-title basis. Please use our contact form for more information.http://unity3d.com/unity/faq
Or Example 2

if you are a source guy and desire to change core features perhaps you want the source to edit
How can I license or use Unity's source code?

-------------end paste
so basically if your an indie Dev you can forget even asking for the source code despite being prepared to sign confidentiality aggreements and stating you will be making your games code impossible to view.(its also stated if you decompile the product your license is revoked so you cant just get around it by hacking the kernel)
That is one massive kick in the nuts to any indie developer but its still a fine product and worthy of use for most people.
Another flaw of unity is its inability to compile ios products on a windows machine , you must either get a mac or buy the "pro"license from the start.(testing in windows is of course a reliable way to get to alpha and debug before you commit to a new machine or license upgrade.
Again im not saying I wish to have a "FREE" product and if you check carefully you can see im just adding in some desired wish list items.
Ill be frank though , unity isn't sucky as a product and its terms are alright , but certainly if you can do US $80.00 for this editor and It has all the things in your list and works well.. you maybe able to find at least 1 developer to buy a copy.

cross platform support is number one!

Free software is anyways better. Why deal with tricky licensing and what not else especially when with pay engines as you are 100% at the makers merci?

I'd be highly interested if they decide to support WebGL in the future!

Hello everybody,

Thank you a lot for your answers. I used them when I presented the project and it's a success. I'm now full-time on it with good news.
The engine is 100% supported under Linux distributions, Mac OS X and Windows devices.
The API & the engine port on Android & iOS devices is still WIP but will appear.
The engine will provide a WebGL Exporter using Babylon.js. My mentor is now David Catuhe (the creator of Babylon.js).

Also, I'm working with a company called "Ohm Force" that provides a very powerful collaborative engine (used in their software Ohm Studio (http://www.ohmstudio.com)). I mean our game engine and Editor will provide a full collaborative feature. So, you'll be able to work together on the same project in real-time. Off-line version will be able too.

For more informations you can take a look at my blog to see the advancements at : Medium.com