When comparing Scratch vs jMonkey3, the Slant community recommends Scratch for most people. In the question“What are the best 100% free and easy game engines for beginners?” Scratch is ranked 25th while jMonkey3 is ranked 27th. The most important reason people chose Scratch is:
Code is represented as [visual building blocks](http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-use-Scratch/) that makes it easy to understand how a program is put together.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Visual
Code is represented as visual building blocks that makes it easy to understand how a program is put together.
Pro Great starting point for kids
Scratch was developed specifically for kids ages 8 and up as an exciting way to introduce them to technology. It's designed to be easy to learn, but still provides good depth in computational thinking.
Pro Easy to learn
Scratch is designed to teach computational thinking rather than focus on specific syntax. It was designed specifically to be easy to learn for anyone over the age of 8.
Pro Highly structured
The language is highly structured. Therefore, it gives you the essentials of how to think like a programmer and teaches you good programming practices from early on, so you could write clean, working and readable code in the future.
Pro No need to be able to type
Pro Can be used to create games
Pro Java is a great development platform
Java is a well-optimized just-in-time compiled language. It's faster than languages without an effective native-code compiler such as Python or Ruby, similar in speed to other just-in-time compiled languages such as C#, while slightly slower than compiled languages such as C or C++ (with some low-level and numeric benchmarks being similar to C++).
Java also has a wide variety of high-class IDEs available.
Pro Multiplatform support
Code can be ported to mobile (iOS is in the works) and other Android supported devices with minor changes to the code (just change some implementations that vary on the platform such as inputs and user interface). It can even run on certain Raspberry Pi devices.
Pro Free and open-source
jMonkey is completely free, meaning it's possible to develop and release a game with no fees or royalties. Because it is open-source, jMonkey has plenty of people fixing bugs and, adding to the engine as well as creating a variety of plugins that can be used in the engine.
Pro Not limited to using its own IDE
Unlike some engines, jMonkey doesn't force its own IDE. You can use its Netbeans-based IDE, but you can also set up a project to work in another IDE such as Eclipse. You can still use the special tools from jMonkey's IDE in such projects.
Pro Engine modifications can be made using Java
Because jMonkey is implemented in Java, the same language its apps are typically developed in, developers will have an easier time modifying the engine to their needs.
Pro Has everything
jMonkey3 handles input from computers and mobile devices. It handles networking, physics, rendering, terrain, and cinematics.
Pro Ease of extensibility
Engine is modifiable.
Pro Freedom of choice for architecture
The user is not compelled to use any programming architecture nor standard in order to make a project working. JME allows the freedom to use what is best for a game.
Pro Offers both low-level and high-level ways of editing shaders
Modifying shaders can be done either via a visual tool called Shader Nodes or via GLSL that allow you to make your own shaders without the engine getting in the way or having to hack around to do so.
Cons
Con For kids
For kids.
Con Won't get you a job
Scratch is not a language used in the workplace. Instead it teaches computational thinking, helping to create a foundation to aid in learning other languages.
Con Does not teach you programming
Learning Scratch might help you if you have high difficulty with logical thinking. However, starting with a proper programming language, especially an easy one, will give you the benefits of starting with something like Scratch and everything else.
Con Strange OOP
Scratch has a very strange implementation of OOP that is sprite based, and will become very confusing when you move to other languages.
Con Weird
It's straight up weird.
Con Terrible API reference
The methods are not defined.
Con Not an engine for total beginners
While it's clear that you need to know Java first before using this engine, it is recommended that you have some programming experience as well. Most performance issues and memory leaks are more due to bad programming practices than the engine itself.
Con Slow release cycle
jMonkey3 lacks manpower to have a fast and decent release cycle.
Con Relies on archaic tool chain
jMonkey Engine uses Apache Ant for build automation, which is archaic and backwards, even by Java standards.