Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

AppGameKit VS JMonkeyEngine

Compare AppGameKit VS JMonkeyEngine and see what are their differences

AppGameKit logo AppGameKit

AppGameKit is a game development platform for mobile devices.

JMonkeyEngine logo JMonkeyEngine

What is jMonkeyEngine? It's a free, open source game engine, made especially for Java game developers who want to create 3D games using modern technology.
  • AppGameKit Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-12-23
  • JMonkeyEngine Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-09-20

AppGameKit features and specs

  • Cross-Platform Development
    AppGameKit allows developers to write code once and deploy it across multiple platforms, including Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, and Android. This saves time and effort in porting games to different devices.
  • Ease of Use
    The language and API are designed to be straightforward and accessible, making it easier for beginners and hobbyists to get started with game development.
  • Comprehensive Documentation
    AppGameKit provides detailed documentation and tutorials, which can help both new and experienced developers understand how to utilize its features effectively.
  • Active Community
    The platform has an active online community where developers can share resources, ask questions, and assist each other, fostering collaborative learning and problem-solving.
  • Rapid Development
    The scripting language and tools allow for rapid prototyping and development, making it easier to iterate game design and mechanics quickly.

Possible disadvantages of AppGameKit

  • Limited Advanced Features
    Compared to some other game engines, AppGameKit may lack certain advanced features and tools, which could be a limitation for highly complex or high-performance games.
  • Paid Licensing
    While there is a free trial, the full version of AppGameKit requires a purchase. This can be a barrier for some indie developers or students with limited budgets.
  • Performance Overhead
    Using a higher-level scripting language can introduce some performance overhead, which might not be ideal for games requiring high optimization and efficiency.
  • Less Popularity
    AppGameKit is not as widely used as some other game engines like Unity or Unreal Engine, which means fewer third-party resources, plugins, and tutorials are available.
  • Basic 3D Support
    While AppGameKit supports 3D game development, its 3D capabilities are not as robust or feature-rich as those found in more specialized 3D engines.

JMonkeyEngine features and specs

  • Open Source
    JMonkeyEngine is open-source, which means it's free to use and has a wide community of developers who contribute to its development and offer support.
  • Java-based
    It is built using Java, which makes it accessible to a large number of developers familiar with the language and benefits from Java's portability across different platforms.
  • Cross-platform
    JMonkeyEngine supports multiple platforms including Windows, macOS, Linux, and Android, enabling developers to create games that run on various devices.
  • Rich Feature Set
    The engine comes with a comprehensive set of features such as advanced 3D graphics, physics integration, terrain generation, and a user-friendly scene graph.
  • Active Community
    An active and responsive community provides forums, tutorials, and additional resources, helping both new and experienced developers.
  • Integrated Development Environment
    It includes its own SDK with an integrated development environment, which simplifies the process of game development by providing tools such as scene composer, model importer, and debugging tools.

Possible disadvantages of JMonkeyEngine

  • Java Performance
    Java generally has performance overhead compared to languages like C++ often used in other game engines. This can be a downside for performance-critical applications.
  • Limited Mobile Support
    While it supports Android, the engine's capabilities and performance on mobile platforms are not as robust as on desktops, and iOS support is limited.
  • Less Mature Asset Pipeline
    The asset pipeline of JMonkeyEngine is not as mature or comprehensive as those found in more established engines like Unity or Unreal, which may require additional effort for asset management.
  • Smaller Ecosystem
    Compared to mainstream engines, JMonkeyEngine has a smaller ecosystem. This means fewer third-party integrations, add-ons, and professional-grade assets available for immediate use.
  • Steeper Learning Curve for Java
    For developers not familiar with Java, there might be a steeper learning curve to become proficient with the language and its associated tools compared to more widely-used game development languages.
  • Less Commercial Support
    Being open-source and community-driven, JMonkeyEngine lacks the commercial support that some other engines offer. This can be a disadvantage for large-scale projects requiring professional backing.

Analysis of AppGameKit

Overall verdict

  • Overall, AppGameKit is a solid choice for both beginners and intermediate developers who are interested in 2D and basic 3D game development. It strikes a balance between ease of use and flexibility, although it might not be the best option for highly advanced 3D graphics or very large-scale projects.

Why this product is good

  • AppGameKit is considered a good tool for game development because of its simplicity and cross-platform support. It is designed to let developers write code that can be easily deployed to multiple platforms, such as Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, and HTML5. The language used is BASIC-based, which makes it accessible for beginners while still offering sufficient depth for more complex game functionalities.

Recommended for

  • Beginner game developers
  • Developers looking for cross-platform deployment
  • Individuals or small teams creating 2D games
  • Hobbyists and educators teaching game design basics

AppGameKit videos

AppGameKit Studio -- Introduction and Crash Course Tutorial

JMonkeyEngine videos

A Closer Look at the jMonkeyEngine

More videos:

  • Review - jMonkeyEngine -- The Others Game Engine Series
  • Review - jMonkeyEngine3 Engine Showcase

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to AppGameKit and JMonkeyEngine)
Game Development
65 65%
35% 35
Game Engine
58 58%
42% 42
3D Game Engine
54 54%
46% 46
Java
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare AppGameKit and JMonkeyEngine

AppGameKit Reviews

The Top 10 Video Game Engines
AppGameKit utilizes Vulkan as its coding language and doubles down on its cross-platform support. You can get started easily, have everything running quickly, and branch out to different platforms, achieving a large amount of exposure for your game.
Top 10 Mobile Game Development Tools For Intellectual Games
AppGamekit shares a similarity with Marmalade of “write once and run anywhere.” It uses its own scripting language that is quite easy to learn as it is similar to C++. The game development tool is user-friendly and caters to every type of developer from beginners to experts.
Source: unaryteam.com
The Best 15 Mobile Game Engines / Development Platforms & Tools in 2020
AppGameKit is great but it’s not C++ like. I would say it’s BASIC kinda language. But it’s not the exact BASIC that you know from Visual Basic, still quite familiar. New(ish) AppGameKit Studio has great features and fully backwards compatible with AppGameKit Classic.
Source: thetool.io

JMonkeyEngine Reviews

The Top 10 Video Game Engines
Right off the bat, the team boldly claims that using their engine will be easier than utilization and outright learning C++, which is true. C++ can be a hang-up for many not familiar with programming, and jMonkeyEngine can be a great option for those who want to create games without really breaking your back trying to learn a whole new language.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, JMonkeyEngine seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 23 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

AppGameKit mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of AppGameKit yet. Tracking of AppGameKit recommendations started around Mar 2021.

JMonkeyEngine mentions (23)

  • Unity's Licensing Changes: Discover Stride a Community-Driven Open-Source Engine
    > Unfortunately, this is yet another open source game engine with too small a user base. I wonder why some engines are seemingly destined for success and others... aren't. Godot got really big, despite a somewhat similar feature set: https://godotengine.org/ (really nice 2D support, 3D rendering was worse until version 4, GDScript has both a nice iteration speed but also has gotten some criticism, while C# was a... - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • My recommendation on which language and libraries to use for the engine.
    There more `bare-metal` engines like https://jmonkeyengine.org/ (well it is not C++, it is Java based)... Source: about 2 years ago
  • [Hobby] Need help implement Continuous Collision Detection in a classic top-down multiplayer space shooter
    This project develops a cross-platform Subspace client and server written in Java. It was developed from scratch on the idea of extensibility and modularity. The server is based on modules/frameworks highly optimized for scaled, networked, grid-based, infinite world physics. The client is based on the JMonkeyEngine, a minimalistic modern developer friendly, open source, game engine. Source: over 2 years ago
  • Godot 4.0 Stable
    > Godot is one of those pinnacle FOSS projects that just totally impresses me, especially given the state its in now, with 4.0. It is definitely one of the success stories, at least so far. For example, there are projects like jMonkeyEngine (a game engine in Java, on top of LWJGL) that don't get as much attention and their movement forwards is way slower: https://jmonkeyengine.org/ There's also Stride 3D, which is... - Source: Hacker News / over 2 years ago
  • I can't think about another video game using Java. I mean, there WILL be more but i haven't saw them.
    It is, or at least was, efficient. Java has a great game engine called https://jmonkeyengine.org/ that at the time could compete with Unity, not sure the status now. And LWJGL, the lower layer for ooengl, was quite nice to use and it is efficient to go that low level if you plan to do a game that does not fit the stereotypes in such game engines, as you will find yourself fighting the engine more than the actual... Source: over 2 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing AppGameKit and JMonkeyEngine, you can also consider the following products

Godot Engine - Feature-packed 2D and 3D open source game engine.

Unity - The multiplatform game creation tools for everyone.

MonoGame - MonoGame is an open source implementation of the Microsoft XNA 4 Framework.

Unreal Engine - Unreal Engine 4 is a suite of integrated tools for game developers to design and build games, simulations, and visualizations.

ct.js - ct.js is a 2D game editor (desktop app) based on web technologies.

Blender - Blender is the open source, cross platform suite of tools for 3D creation.