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CMake VS Open 3D Engine

Compare CMake VS Open 3D Engine and see what are their differences

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CMake logo CMake

CMake is an open-source, cross-platform family of tools designed to build, test and package software.

Open 3D Engine logo Open 3D Engine

Open 3D Engine is an open-source 3D game development engine in real-time.
  • CMake Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-09-21

We recommend LibHunt CMake for discovery and comparisons of trending CMake projects.

  • Open 3D Engine Landing page
    Landing page //
    2024-07-04

CMake features and specs

  • Cross-platform support
    CMake is designed to support multiple operating systems including Windows, macOS, and Linux. This allows developers to write platform-independent CMake scripts.
  • Build tool agnostic
    CMake can generate build files for a variety of build systems including Makefiles, Ninja, and Visual Studio solutions. This means developers are not tied to a specific build tool.
  • Large community and extensive documentation
    CMake has a large user base and an extensive amount of documentation and tutorials available which can be helpful for new and experienced users alike.
  • Integrated testing support
    CMake includes support for testing frameworks such as CTest, which allows for automated testing of code during the build process.
  • Modular and scalable
    CMake is highly modular, enabling users to create reusable and maintainable code by organizing CMake scripts into libraries and modules.

Possible disadvantages of CMake

  • Steep learning curve
    CMake's complexity and its extensive range of features can be difficult for beginners to grasp, leading to a steep learning curve.
  • Verbose syntax
    CMake scripts can often become verbose and difficult to read, especially for large projects. This can make maintenance and debugging challenging.
  • Inconsistent module quality
    The quality and support of different CMake modules can vary, sometimes leading to issues with compatibility or functionality.
  • Performance overhead
    CMake may introduce some performance overhead during the configuration process, especially for very large projects.
  • Complexity in advanced features
    Some of the more advanced features of CMake, such as custom commands and complex dependency management, can be quite difficult to implement correctly.

Open 3D Engine features and specs

  • Open Source
    Open 3D Engine is freely available under the Apache 2.0 license, allowing developers to access, modify, and distribute its source code without licensing fees.
  • High Customizability
    The engine's open-source nature and modular design enable extensive customization, making it possible for developers to tailor the engine to specific needs and workflows.
  • Cross-Platform Support
    Open 3D Engine supports development for multiple platforms including Windows, Linux, and macOS, broadening the scope for developers targeting different audiences.
  • Robust Toolset
    The engine provides a comprehensive set of tools for 3D development, including a visual scripting environment and a powerful asset processing pipeline.
  • Active Community and Contributions
    An active and growing community contributes to the continuous improvement and updating of the engine, providing support and a wealth of shared resources.

Possible disadvantages of Open 3D Engine

  • Steep Learning Curve
    Due to its complexity and extensive feature set, mastering Open 3D Engine can be challenging, especially for beginners.
  • Resource Intensive
    Running and developing with Open 3D Engine can require significant hardware resources, which may not be suitable for all developers or projects with limited capabilities.
  • Evolving Ecosystem
    As a relatively new entrant in the field, the ecosystem around Open 3D Engine is continuously evolving, which might lead to occasional instability or rapidly changing documentation.
  • Limited Third-Party Plugins
    Compared to more established engines, Open 3D Engine currently has fewer third-party plugins available, which could limit out-of-the-box functionality for some specialized needs.
  • Complex Project Setup
    Setting up projects and configuring the engine might be more complex compared to other engines, requiring more initial time investment to get started.

Analysis of CMake

Overall verdict

  • CMake is generally considered a good tool for managing the build process of software projects, especially those with a complex codebase that spans multiple platforms.

Why this product is good

  • Flexibility
    It offers great flexibility in terms of defining build processes, enabling advanced configuration and optimization techniques to be used.
  • Integration
    It integrates well with many popular IDEs and other tools, providing a smoother development experience.
  • Wide adoption
    CMake is widely used in the industry, which leads to robust community support and regular updates.
  • Cross platform support
    CMake is designed to support multiple platforms, which makes it highly valuable for projects that need to be compiled and run on different operating systems.

Recommended for

  • projects requiring cross-platform compatibility
  • developers looking for a powerful build configuration tool
  • complex software projects with numerous dependencies
  • teams that value strong community and industry support

CMake videos

CMake for Dummies

More videos:

  • Review - CppCon 2017: Mathieu Ropert โ€œUsing Modern CMake Patterns to Enforce a Good Modular Designโ€
  • Review - Hunter, a CMake driven package manager for C/C++ projects - Daniel Friedrich - Lightning Talks

Open 3D Engine videos

Lumberyard Engine Open Sourced!! -- O3DE or "Open 3D Engine" is the new name

More videos:

  • Review - Welcome to OPEN 3D Engine (O3DE)
  • Review - Announcing Open 3D Engine (O3DE)

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to CMake and Open 3D Engine)
Front End Package Manager
Game Engine
0 0%
100% 100
JS Build Tools
100 100%
0% 0
Game Development
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare CMake and Open 3D Engine

CMake Reviews

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Open 3D Engine Reviews

Best Unity alternatives for game development
Now, if you're looking for an engine that focuses on 3D, Open 3D Engine is a stellar choice (even if it is a bit finicky). You will notice that Open 3D Engine is essentially the successor to Amazon Lumberyard (however, Open 3D Engine is managed by the Linux Foundation). But this time, it is open-sourced and equipped with the Apache 2.0 license. Learning on this platform may...
What Are the Best Game Engines?
Lumberyard is a free, cross-platform engine. But recently, Amazon has taken its game engine and transformed it into an open-source model. Open3D is the latest from Amazon. It builds on top of Lumberyard and creates a more modular approach to game development.

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, CMake should be more popular than Open 3D Engine. It has been mentiond 55 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.

CMake mentions (55)

  • How I deployed my first project for my devops portfolio: Project Architecture
    I used CMAKE as my compiling tool followed by make. - Source: dev.to / 12 months ago
  • DeadLock: Research Results & Tech Stack
    All this C++ project can't be ran as simple C++ code, so I will be building this whole package using CMake. It will streamline building this project onto other computers. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Master This Feature of DevEco Studio to Efficiently Implement ArkTS and C++ Glue Code
    For knowledge in this aspect, you can refer to the relevant documents of the CMake build tool: https://cmake.org/. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Creating a Native Desktop GUI Using C++ with GTK
    I used CMAKE to define the build configurations. I find it very convenient that CMAKE generates the Makefile on Linux and can also create a Visual Studio project on Windows. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Top 7 C++ Tools to explore in 2024 if it's not already the case.
    CMake stands for "Cross-platform Make" and is an open-source, platform-independent build system. It's designed to build, test, and package software projects written in C and C++, but it can also be used for other languages. Here's an overview of CMake and its features:. - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
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Open 3D Engine mentions (17)

  • Unreal Engine change its price for non-game apps
    O3DE[0] looks interesting - owned by the Linux Foundation, originally based on Amazon's Lumberyard, and it has some big players involved: Amazon, Epic Games(!), Microsoft, NVIDIA, Intel, Huawei, Red Hat, [0] https://o3de.org. - Source: Hacker News / almost 3 years ago
  • Alternative Game Engines for Marooned Unity Developers
    03DE: Open source game engine, under Apache License 2.0, developed by Amazon and the linux foundation. Seems to work under a modular package called "gems", that you can use to pull in the functionality you need. It uses c++ as it's main language, but you can use Lua, python or visual scripting for scripting stuff. Has multiplayer built into the engine and what they call a "robust" system for open-world games.... Source: almost 3 years ago
  • Someone dropped the source code for Far Cry 1 on archive.org
    Note that Lumberyard became "Open 3D Engine" (yes, very inspired name) which is Apache 2 licensed: https://o3de.org/ https://github.com/o3de/o3de/ AFAIK all development in Lumberyard has ceased and moved to O3DE. - Source: Hacker News / about 3 years ago
  • Did they take down the post about motion matching recently?
    Many pages in o3de.org are down. They are working on it. Source: about 3 years ago
  • Is SPIRV-Cross a valid option to target Metal from HSSL?
    I've worked on this a bit as part of the shader pipeline of Open3DEngine, From my experience there are very few compatibility issues between hlsl and sprir-v, sprir-v to msl however does run into a few issues.Here are the ones I remember. Source: over 3 years ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing CMake and Open 3D Engine, you can also consider the following products

GNU Make - GNU Make is a tool which controls the generation of executables and other non-source files of a program from the program's source files.

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

SCons - SCons is an Open Source software construction toolโ€”that is, a next-generation build tool.

Unity - The multiplatform game creation tools for everyone.

SBT - SBT is a build tool for Scala, like Ant or Maven but with hieroglyphics.

Castle Game Engine - An open-source 3D/2D game engine for ObjectPascal.