A C++23 open-source 3D game engine with a full RHI abstraction layer, ECS (EnTT), Jolt Physics, AngelScript scripting, and an ImGui-based editor. Originally built around first-person shooters, it now includes genre templates for RPGs, MMOs, RTS, racing, open-world, and platformers.
🌐 Website now live: sparkengine.dev
SparkEngine is currently distributed as source. No versioned installer or prebuilt release has been published yet; the release-readiness gates remain authoritative. The in-tree installer documentation describes development and packaging workflows, not an available download.
Build from source:
git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/Krilliac/SparkEngine.git
cd SparkEngine
# Windows
.\generate.bat -g "Visual Studio 17 2022" release
.\build.ps1 -config Release -editor -angelscript
# Linux / macOS
./generate.sh release -g Ninja
./build.sh releaseVisual Studio and Ninja Multi-Config builds keep binaries isolated under
build/bin/<Config> (for example, build/bin/Release/SparkEditor.exe).
Requirements: MSVC 19.36+ / GCC 13+ / Clang 17+, CMake 3.25+.
See TROUBLESHOOTING.md for build issues.
Create a game module:
cmake --install build --prefix ~/SparkEngine-install
cp -r Templates/EmptyProject MyGame && cd MyGame
cmake -B build -DCMAKE_PREFIX_PATH=~/SparkEngine-install
cmake --build build --config Release
./SparkEngine -game ./libMyGame.soSee Templates/README.md and SparkTemplates.
SparkEditor provides 65 dockable panels spanning scene construction, asset and shader workflows, profiling, multiplayer operations, collaboration, dedicated servers, world streaming, and live region design.
More screenshots
| Screenshot | Description |
|---|---|
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Docked scene, hierarchy, inspector, console, and asset-browser workspace |
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Welcome screen and project setup |
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Panel layout — Scene, Inspector, Asset Browser, Shader Graph, Sequencer |
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Component editing and drag-drop |
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FPS-specific tools — weapon editor, damage model, HUD builder |
These are direct 1904×1041 captures from the current SparkEngine runtime. Each project also ships with alternate wide and detail views under docs/images/model-pipeline.
| First Person | Third Person | Top Down |
|---|---|---|
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| RPG | MMO | Multiplayer Arena |
|---|---|---|
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| Platformer | Blank 3D | Empty Project Runtime Preview |
|---|---|---|
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Full breadth and detail captures for every template
| Template | Wide view | Detail view |
|---|---|---|
| FPS Starter |  |
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| Third Person Starter |  |
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| Top Down Starter |  |
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| RPG Starter |  |
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| MMO Starter |  |
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| Multiplayer Arena |  |
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| Platformer Kit |  |
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| Blank 3D |  |
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| Empty Project |  |
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Six backends via a shared RHI abstraction:
| Backend | Status |
|---|---|
| DirectX 11 | Stable — primary Windows backend |
| DirectX 12 | Experimental — mesh shaders, DXR ray tracing, VRS |
| Vulkan 1.4 | Experimental — Linux and Windows |
| OpenGL 4.6 | Experimental — fallback on older hardware |
| Metal | Experimental — macOS, in progress |
| NullRHI | Stable — headless / software rendering via llvmpipe |
Render features include PBR materials, global illumination (DDGI, Adaptive Probe Volumes, hybrid ray tracing), forward/deferred/clustered render paths, cascaded shadow maps, GPU-driven rendering (compute frustum culling, indirect draw), virtual texturing, mesh shaders, DXR 1.1, FSR upscaling, and a 35-node Shader Graph. Post-processing covers bloom, HDR tone mapping (Reinhard/ACES/Uncharted 2), TAA, FXAA, MSAA, depth of field, motion blur, volumetric fog, lens flares, and light shafts.
Jolt Physics with rigid bodies (static/kinematic/dynamic), 15 collision shapes, 12 constraint types, raycasting, sphere/box overlap, shape casting, vehicles (wheeled/tracked), ragdolls, cloth, soft bodies, and destruction. Supports deterministic mode for replays and multiplayer.
XAudio2 3D spatial audio on Windows with Miniaudio cross-platform fallback. Distance attenuation, Doppler, pitch/volume control, master/SFX/music channels, and an object pool for source management.
- AngelScript — hot-reload via file watcher with state preservation, full engine API bindings, per-file module isolation, client/server context separation
- Visual scripting — 60 node types across 8 categories, compiles to AngelScript (no runtime overhead)
- Shader Graph — 35+ nodes, HLSL generation, live preview
- Lua — engine bindings, Lua 5.3+ compatible
Behavior trees with blackboard, Recast/Detour NavMesh with dynamic obstacles, EQS for tactical point queries, steering behaviors (seek/flee/pursue/flock), perception (vision cones, hearing, threat memory), cover detection, formation movement, group coordination, and an AI budget limiter supporting 100+ simultaneous agents.
UDP client/server with entity replication, dirty property tracking, client-side prediction, server reconciliation, and lag compensation (hitbox rewinding, 1-second history). Message channels: Unreliable, Reliable, ReliableOrdered. Delta snapshot compression, network statistics (ping, jitter, packet loss, bandwidth). MMO-scale architecture: AreaServer + WorldServer, entity migration across server instances, per-area session management, load balancing.
EnTT-backed ECS with 75+ component types. Includes: FPS weapons, damage model, HUD; vehicle physics; inventory, quests, achievements, dialogue trees; ability/cooldown/trigger system; destructible objects; replay record/playback; day/night cycle; weather; 2D/sprite rendering; tween system; async coroutine scheduler; save/load with ECS-aware serialization; async database-backed persistence.
Large worlds: seamless area streaming (no load screens), floating-point origin rebasing, 100K+ entities per area.
Scene hierarchy, Inspector, Asset browser, Game viewport, Gizmos (ImGuizmo), Node graphs (imnodes), Animation timeline, Material editor, Visual script editor, Terrain editor, Weapon editor, Profiler, AI debugger, Physics debug overlay, Cinematic sequencer, Dialogue editor, Ability/condition editors, Destruction editor, 2D/tilemap editors, Audio mixer, Replay panel, Save system panel, Dedicated server panel, Version control integration, Build/deployment pipeline, Level streaming, Command palette (Ctrl+P), Prefab system, Event monitor, Coroutine debugger, Collaboration panel (multi-user with node locking and presence), and more. Supports collaborative multi-user editing, full undo/redo, play-mode editing, and a plugin system.
Nine complete project templates load as .dll/.so modules at runtime and build independently against the installed SDK:
| Template | Highlights |
|---|---|
| Empty Project | Clean authoring world plus an explicit runtime-origin preview |
| Blank 3D | Camera controls, material studies, reusable primitive stage |
| FPS Starter | Weapons, damage, ammo, crosshair, target range |
| Third Person Starter | Character movement, pickups, portal objectives |
| Top Down Starter | Click-to-move combat, enemies, arena objectives |
| RPG Starter | Village exploration, dialogue, quests, inventory, abilities |
| MMO Starter | Player sessions, frontier objectives, area-ready gameplay |
| Platformer Kit | Gravity, sprinting, jumping, hazards, checkpoints |
| Multiplayer Arena | Teams, scoring, sudden death, symmetric tactical cover |
Tests: 6,844 test definitions across 572 files covering core utilities, ECS, physics, AI, animation, networking, gameplay, graphics, editor, and 50+ other subsystems.
cd build && ctest --output-on-failure
ctest -R "Physics" --output-on-failure # run a subsetSanitizer CI jobs:
| Suite | Detects |
|---|---|
| ASan + UBSan + LSan | Buffer overflows, use-after-free, UB, memory leaks |
| TSan | Data races, deadlocks |
| MSan | Reads of uninitialized memory |
Run locally:
cmake -B build-asan -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug -DBUILD_TESTS=ON \
-DCMAKE_CXX_FLAGS="-fsanitize=address,undefined -fno-omit-frame-pointer"
cmake --build build-asan && ./build-asan/bin/SparkTestsWhen a workflow uploads sanitizer or coverage results, they are available from that run on the GitHub Actions page. The primary Windows, Linux, and macOS lanes also retain granular JUnit XML, machine-readable JSON totals, runtime, and slow-test tables. CI rejects a missing, empty, malformed, failed, or suspiciously under-registered test run; the badge above remains explicitly source-definition based rather than claiming that every platform executed the same feature-gated cases.
Key CMake options:
| Option | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
ENABLE_GRAPHICS |
ON | Rendering system |
ENABLE_EDITOR |
ON | ImGui editor |
ENABLE_NETWORKING |
ON | UDP multiplayer |
ENABLE_VULKAN |
ON | Vulkan backend |
ENABLE_OPENGL |
ON | OpenGL backend |
ENABLE_METAL |
OFF | Metal (macOS) |
ENABLE_DXR |
ON | Ray tracing |
ENABLE_VR |
OFF | VR/AR |
ENABLE_MOBILE |
OFF | Mobile features |
BUILD_TESTS |
ON | Test suite |
BUILD_GAME_MODULES |
ON | 11 in-tree game modules |
ENABLE_SERVER_PROCESSES |
ON | Dedicated server, MMO gateway, daemon orchestration, and collaboration processes |
ENABLE_ASSET_PIPELINE_TOOLS |
ON | Deterministic asset cooker and isolated worker |
ENABLE_AUTOMATION_HOST |
ON | Black-box runtime automation and CI result host |
Headless build (no GPU, no editor):
cmake -B build -DENABLE_EDITOR=OFF -DENABLE_GRAPHICS=OFF| Minimum | Recommended | |
|---|---|---|
| OS | Windows 10 / Ubuntu 24.04 / macOS 12+ | Windows 11 / Ubuntu 24.04 |
| Compiler | MSVC 19.36, GCC 13, Clang 17 | MSVC 19.36+, GCC 13+, Clang 17+ |
| C++ | C++23 | C++23 |
| GPU | Any DirectX 11 capable | RTX 2080+ for ray tracing |
| RAM | 4 GB | 16 GB |
| Storage | 5 GB | 10 GB with all game modules |
| Build tools | CMake 3.25+ | CMake 3.25+, Ninja |
Headless/server deployments use NullRHIDevice — no GPU required.
Platform support:
| Platform | Compiler | Backend | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Windows 10+ | MSVC v143 (VS 2022) | DirectX 11 | Stable |
| Windows | MSVC v144 (VS 2026) | DirectX 11/12 | Experimental |
| Linux | GCC 13+ / Clang 17+ | Vulkan/OpenGL | Experimental, CI tested |
| macOS | Apple Clang | Metal | Experimental |
| Headless | Any | NullRHI | Stable |
| Resource | Description |
|---|---|
| TROUBLESHOOTING.md | Startup issues, debug commands, common fixes |
| Feature Roadmap | Planned features |
| Project Status | System status, recent changes |
| API Reference | Auto-generated symbol indexes, class hierarchy |
| Packaging Guide | Install layout, components, versioning |
| External Services & Orchestration | Dedicated hosting, gateway, daemon supervision, and collaboration |
| Offline Cooking & Automation | Deterministic asset builds, workers, pak inspection, and runtime smoke tests |
| Stable Plugin ABI | Versioned C plugin boundary, sidecar integrity, tasks, and hot reload |
| Game Module Guide | Building standalone games with the SDK |
| Networking Config | UDP, replication, MMO server setup |
| Wiki | 144+ pages covering all subsystems |
| DeepWiki | Community knowledge base |
Execution order: Physics → Animation → AI → Audio → Lifecycle → Render
SparkEngine/
├── SparkEngine/Source/
│ ├── Core/ Platform.h, EngineContext.h
│ ├── Graphics/ RHI (6 backends), RenderGraph, GI
│ └── Engine/
│ ├── ECS/ 75+ component types
│ ├── AI/ BehaviorTree, NavMesh, EQS
│ ├── Animation/ Skeletal, IK, Sequencer
│ ├── Networking/ UDP, Area/World Servers
│ ├── Scripting/ AngelScript, Visual Scripting
│ ├── Gameplay/ Weapons, Quests, Inventory
│ └── 20+ other systems
├── SparkEditor/Source/ 59 dockable panels, collaboration
├── SparkConsole/src/ Standalone debug console
├── GameModules/ 11 prebuilt game modules
├── Tests/ 6,844 test definitions, 572 files
├── wiki/ 144+ wiki pages
└── docs/ API reference, guides
- Fork the repository and create a feature branch
- Follow the coding standards in CLAUDE.md — C++23, zero warnings, RAII, const-correct
- Add tests for new functionality
- Run
clang-format(enforced in CI) and ensure all tests pass - Open a pull request — one feature per PR
Questions and bug reports: GitHub Issues
Discussion: Discord
Documentation: Wiki
Thanks to the Jolt Physics, Dear ImGui, EnTT, Khronos (Vulkan/OpenGL), and AngelScript teams.
Spark Open License 1.0 — no royalties, no fees, use for any purpose (commercial or otherwise), modify and redistribute freely.
This project makes use of AI-assisted development. All AI-generated code is reviewed and tested before merging.