List of JavaScript game engines and frameworks
This is a list of game engines and frameworks that either has been written entirely in JavaScript or we can use JavaScript as a scripting language. The list does not include renderers but only complete game engines and frameworks that include the renderer, input, audio, physics and other libraries in one package.
GDevelop is an open-source game creation software, allowing to make games for the web (HTML5), desktop or mobile phones (iOS/Android). No programming or coding skills are required! It is easy to use and powerful enough for advanced users.
What makes GDevelop unique and so easy to use are the events. Events are a powerful way to express the logic of your game, without having to learn a programming language.
Sprites, particles engine, physics engine, platformer engine, pathfinding and many others features are available. Any kind of 2D games can be created with GDevelop.
Games can be exported in one-click for Android, uploaded online or packaged for iOS, Windows, macOS or Linux.
Phaser is a fun, free and fast 2D game framework for making HTML5 games for desktop and mobile web browsers, supporting Canvas and WebGL rendering.
Phaser Editor is a tool for HTML5 games creation. It provides several built-in editors for texture packing, JavaScript coding, Assets management, and 2D level building.
The games are based on the popular framework Phaser.
The RPG Maker software series is a set of game creation suites aimed at easy 2D role playing game creation. With an emphasis on JRPG gameplay mechanics, the suites typically include map, tile and sprite editors, character, encounter and dialog tools, among countless other elements to cover practically every facet of game building.
Cocos2d-x is an open-source and cross platform open source free game engine for mobile game development known for its speed, stability, and ease of use. Initially built for 2D games, the engine now features 3D tools for scene editing, lighting and more.
cocos2d-x is a cross platform open source free 2D game engine for mobile gamedev, that is fast and stable, easy to learn and use.
CopperCube is a 3D editor for creating interactive 3D applications or simple games for Flash / Stage 3D, WebGL or as application. No programming is necessary for this. Simply import your 3D models, specify camera controllers and behaviors, and hit 'publish'.
It is intended to be used for creating 3D educational programs, architectural visualizations, military simulations, product configurators, games, e-learning applications and 3D prototypes. And it can be used to convert 3D models to WebGL or Flash Stage 3D / Molehill.
This is the light edition of CopperCube, limited to 10 scenes per file, but otherwise, it is fully functional:
- It supports the import of 22 3D file formats such as 3D Max .3ds, AutoCAD .dxf, Maya .obj, COLLADA .dae, Lightwave .lwo, Truespace .cob and .scn, and many more: .ply, .stl, bps, lmts, .mesh, .x, .ase, .oct, .dmf
- Realtime 3D character animation, with an unlimited amount of joints
- Supports the features of the latest Flash Player 11 as well as older players
- Renders using OpenGL, Direct3D, WebGL or Stage 3D
- Simple, pre created Game AI behaviors included
- Various camera controllers included: for third person cameras, first person shooters, model viewers, panorama views
- Includes a global illumination lightmap renderer
- Supports 3D sound
- Scripting via JavaScript and ActionScript 3
Main features
Complete scene graph with lights, cameras, materials, meshes, animations, audio & actions Native collisions engine Physics engine (thanks to oimo.js & cannon.js Scene picking Supports left and right handed systems Antialiasing Animations engine Particles & Solid Particles Systems Sprites and 2D layers Complete audio engine based on Web Audio
Works on all WebGL platforms via a specific modern shader architecture and native touch support: IE11/MS Edge, Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Safari, iOS (iPad/iPhone), Android, Windows Phone 8.1/Mobile 10, Firefox OS, Xbox One Optimizations
Frustum clipping Sub-meshes clipping Hardware scaling Selection octrees Offline mode (Assets saved in IndexedDB) Incremental loading Binary compressed format Hardware accelerated instances Automatic scene optimizer LOD (Level Of Details) SIMD.js Collisions on Web Workers Merge mershing Shaders / Rendering
Physically Based Rendering (PBR)
Standard material is a per pixel material that supports: Diffuse lightning and texture Ambient lightning and texture Specular lightning Opacity texture Reflection texture (Spheric, planar, cubic, projection and equirectangular) Mirror texture Emissive texture Specular texture Bump texture Lightmap texture Up to 4 lights (points, directionals, spots, hemispherics) Custom materials Custom shaders Skybox Vertex color 4 bones per vertex Fresnel term for diffuse, opacity, emissive and reflection
Procedural textures library Materials library Special FX
Fog Alpha blending Alpha testing Billboarding Fullscreen mode Shadow Maps and Variance Shadow Maps Rendering layers Post-processes (blur, refraction, black'n'white, fxaa, SSAO, God Rays (VLS), HDR, DOF (Depth Of Field), customs...) Lens flares Reflection Probes Multi-views Edges renderer Highlights rendering Textures
Render target textures Dynamic textures (2D canvas) Video textures Compressed (DDS) textures & TGA Cameras
PlayCanvas is the world’s easiest to use WebGL Game Engine. It’s free, it’s open source and it’s backed by amazing developer tools.
