When comparing HeroEngine vs GameApi, the Slant community recommends HeroEngine for most people. In the question“What are the best 3D game engines?” HeroEngine is ranked 40th while GameApi is ranked 58th.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Real time development- No nightly builds
Pro Streamlines MMO development
Backend completely handled by the team at Hero.
Pro Versoning control included in both HeroEngine and HeroBlade
No need for Perforce, Github or any other versioning software. It is built in. Check, Compare, Merge, revert, etc.
Pro Server and Networking built in
Pro Engine developer support
Developers of the engine and game developers are active on the Forums and Skype for private messaging.
Pro Versatile
Able to create many types of games and scales all the way from a single area up to a full-blown MMO.
Pro HeroScript
Designed for the needs of a MMO. HSL is also relatively easy to learn as scripting languages go. It was geared towards beginners, not time hardened programmers, and as such, its easier for a novice to pick it up sometimes, than a c++ programmer. That, and it was intended to be "readable" more like English.
Pro Very active community and support groups
Skype channel and forums questions answered by developers of HE and users very quickly.
Pro Highly optimized asset export plugins included
Though the export pipeline may be different and currently requires 3ds Max or Maya, the format is highly optimized to reduce high quality models down to KB's.
Pro All combinations of the features are working
In order to enable creation of 100 different kind of games, GameApi features are fully supporting all combinations of the existing features. This allows for huge amount of flexibility. The API carefully documents all dependencies between independent plugin-like modules and allows for combining their features in c++ code.
Pro Selection of 2d and 3d algorithms and techniques that construct opengl vertex arrays
The library is based on constructing opengl vertex arrays for 2d and 3d features including changing mesh colours, attaching textures, building larger worlds from smaller meshes, selection of predefined meshes like spheres, cubes and cones, Model loading from .obj files. Font support, gradient and other 2d bitmap operations, creation of 3d objects from bitmaps, Manipulation of points, lines, faces.
Cons
Con Lack of DirectX 11.1 or 12 support
DirectX 9 is the last version supported.
Con High price
Con HeroScript
A standalone scripting language with (so far) little in the way of learning resources.
Con Custom model export
Con In alpha
GameApi has just recently moved from pre-alpha to alpha status.