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Add to SafariWhen comparing ENIGMA Development Environment vs Adventure Game Studio, the Slant community recommends Adventure Game Studio for most people. In the question“What are the best 2D game engines?” Adventure Game Studio is ranked 23rd while ENIGMA Development Environment is ranked 60th. The most important reason people chose Adventure Game Studio is:
Good for newbie game creators. Can be used for prototyping: on several occasions was used to make a demo/experimental version before creating a final commercial product on different engine.
Specs
Question Ranking
Pros
Pro Raw C++ power and GML accessibility
Almost full support for GML,
The ability to create and access C++ types, templates, and functions, compile DLLs and other C/C++ scripts
Pro Cross platform
Support for Windows, Mac and Linux.
Pro Compatible with GameMaker
Enigma can support over 90% of gamemaker's GML language
Pro Friendly user interface
besides the powerful combination between GML and C++, beginners can also use drag and dropping.
Pro Free and Open Source
Pro Faster than GameMaker
Written in C++, many features have been demonstrated running much faster than interpreted equivalents in GameMaker (up to 10-20 times faster than GM 8.1).
Pro Under active development
Changes are made daily to add new functions/fixing bugs.
![[deleted]](https://avatars.slant.co/identicons/50/21ab02b9-4ac2-5cd1-bb35-2f180743fa6d)
Pro Helpful error messages
A full stack trace with available cores and memory information as well as operating system and Java version including file names and number is generated whenever an exception is encountered, with a handy link to submit the issue to GitHub.
Pro Easy to learn tool
Good for newbie game creators. Can be used for prototyping: on several occasions was used to make a demo/experimental version before creating a final commercial product on different engine.
Pro Completely free and open source
AGS is licensed under Artistic License 2.0 and is completely free for use for creating both freeware and commercial games.
Pro Relatively well documented
Besides the manual there are multiple text and video tutorials and code samples written by community.
Pro Used for a number of high-profile commercial releases
Adventure Game Studio has been used to develop games such as "Resonance", "Blackwell" series, "Gemini Rue", "Primordia".
Pro Lots of assets available
An extensive library of game templates and script modules accumulated over years. You can construct a simple game in hours (if you know what you are doing).
Pro Friendly community
An old, big and active community which would support newcomers not only in learning basics of the engine, but can help with every aspect of game making (including art, voice acting, moral support, etc).
Cons
Con A few bugs & glitches
Because Enigma is under very rapid development, with new functions added almost daily, some bugs and unexaplainable glitches can happen, though they also gets patched quickly.
Con No code refactoring
Like any C++ based programs, the ability to refactor is limited. However, the new Ide for engima will support a few refactoring cababilities
Con Natively supports only 2D
2D only native support, 3D could be supported with plugins though.
Con Uses dated tech
Engine is based on the old technologies, which impose number of limitations and may cause problems on latest systems (level of annoyance varies depending on your priorities).
Con Graphics renderer is a bit dated
Graphics renderer is not well optimized for high-resolution games and complex effects.
Con No visual editor for scripts
You have to actually write all scripts yourself.
Con Development is slow
Further development of the engine is currently slow, done by only few people in their free time.
Con AGS Script isn't as full-featured as other scripting languages
Its own scripting language has lower syntax capabilities compared to modern script languages.
Con Assets cover almost exclusively adventure/quest genre
The features, script functions and game templates are very biased towards adventure/quest genre. The non-adventure games were made in AGS (2D shooters, platformers, turn-based strategies), but their development usually requires to write everything from scratch.
Con Workflow is closely coupled with the editor
Workflow is very tied to the editor and custom file formats, which can cause problems for bigger, more professional projects (interfering with source control, parallel development, automated builds, etc)
