Tilengine

Tilengine

Tilengine is a free and open-source 2D graphics engine for creating retro-style video games. It is designed to replicate the graphics of 16-bit game consoles like the Sega Genesis or Super Nintendo, supporting features like sprites, tilemaps, parallax scrolling, and more. Tilengi
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Tilengine image
2d retro sprites tilemaps parallax-scrolling
Tilengine alternatives ➤

Tilengine: Retro-Style 2D Graphics Engine for Game Development

Free & open-source 2D graphics engine for creating retro-style video games, supporting features like sprites, tilemaps, parallax scrolling, and more.

What is Tilengine?

Tilengine is an open-source, cross-platform 2D graphics engine for creating classic/retro 2D games similar to the ones made for 1990's game consoles like the Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) or Nintendo Game Boy.

The engine aims to provide a simple and friendly tool for developers to create games with pixel art visuals, chip tunes music and gameplay reminiscent of the 16-bit game era. At its core, Tilengine handles all the underlying tasks needed for 2D graphics rendering like sprites, tilemaps, animation frames, parallax scrolling backgrounds and sound mixing.

Despite replicating a retro look and feel, Tilengine offers modern features like custom pixel shaders, scalable screen resolutions or multiple tile layers. It is optimized for performance with support for hardware acceleration using OpenGL when available.

Tilengine provides a C API that allows it to be embedded into games programmed with languages like C, C++, C#, Visual Basic, Java, Python among many others. Bindings for specific languages are also available to simplify integration. It runs on Windows, Linux, Mac, HTML5, iOS and Android.

The engine is released under the MIT open-source license, allowing it to be freely used in commercial projects. It is suitable for hobbyists or indie developers looking to create their own 2D platformers, shoot 'em ups, action games or role playing games with responsive controls and old-school graphics full of personality.

Tilengine Features

Features

  1. Sprites
  2. Tilemaps
  3. Parallax scrolling
  4. Palette effects
  5. Scaling and rotation
  6. Animations
  7. Collision detection
  8. Audio support
  9. Modular design
  10. Multiple programming language bindings

Pricing

  • Open Source

Pros

Free and open source

Lightweight and fast

Active development and community support

Cross-platform

Replicates retro graphics well

Easy to use and integrate

Good documentation

Cons

Limited to 2D graphics

No built-in physics engine

Less flexible than full game engines

Lacks some advanced graphics effects

Official Links

Official Website
https://www.tilengine.org/

The Best Tilengine Alternatives

Top Gaming Software and Game Engines and other similar apps like Tilengine

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