Visualising Game Engine Subsystem Coupling Patterns

Visualising Game Engine Subsystem Coupling Patterns. Ullmann, G. C., Gu�h�neuc, Y., Petrillo, F., Anquetil, N., & Politowski, C. In Hlavacs, H. & Iorio, A. D., editors, Proceedings of the 22nd International Conference on Entertainment Computing (ICEC), pages 263–274, November, 2023. ACM Press. 8 pages.

Paper abstract bibtex

Game engines provide video game developers with a wide range of fundamental subsystems for creating games, such as 2D/3D graphics rendering, input device management, and audio playback. Developers often integrate these subsystems with other applications or extend them via plugins. To integrate or extend correctly, developers need a broad system architectural understanding. However, architectural information is not always readily available and is often overlooked in this kind of system. In this work, we propose an approach for game engine architecture recovery and explore the architecture of three popular open-source game engines (Cocos2d-x, Godot, and Urho3D). We perform manual subsystem detection and use Moose, a platform for software analysis, to generate architectural models. With these models, we answer the following questions: Which subsystems are present in game engines? Which subsystems are more often coupled with one another? Why are these subsystems coupled with each other? Results show that the platform independence, resource management, world editor, and core subsystems are frequently included by others and therefore act as foundations for the game engines. Furthermore, we show that, by applying our approach, game engine developers can understand whether subsystems are related and divide responsibilities. They can also assess whether relationships among subsystems are appropriate for the game engine.

@INPROCEEDINGS{Ullmann23-ICEC-GameEnginesCouplingPatterns,
   AUTHOR       = {Gabriel Cavalheiro Ullmann and Yann-Ga�l Gu�h�neuc and 
      Fabio Petrillo and Nicolas Anquetil and Cristiano Politowski},
   BOOKTITLE    = {Proceedings of the 22<sup>nd</sup> International Conference on Entertainment Computing (ICEC)},
   TITLE        = {Visualising Game Engine Subsystem Coupling Patterns},
   YEAR         = {2023},
   OPTADDRESS   = {},
   OPTCROSSREF  = {},
   EDITOR       = {Helmut Hlavacs and Angelo Di Iorio},
   MONTH        = {November},
   NOTE         = {8 pages.},
   OPTNUMBER    = {},
   OPTORGANIZATION = {},
   PAGES        = {263--274},
   PUBLISHER    = {ACM Press},
   OPTSERIES    = {},
   OPTVOLUME    = {},
   KEYWORDS     = {Topic: <b>Video game development</b>, 
      Topic: <b>Program comprehension</b>, Venue: <c>ICEC</c>},
   URL          = {http://www.ptidej.net/publications/documents/ICEC23.doc.pdf},
   PDF          = {http://www.ptidej.net/publications/documents/ICEC23.ppt.pdf},
   ABSTRACT     = {Game engines provide video game developers with a wide 
      range of fundamental subsystems for creating games, such as 2D/3D 
      graphics rendering, input device management, and audio playback. 
      Developers often integrate these subsystems with other applications 
      or extend them via plugins. To integrate or extend correctly, 
      developers need a broad system architectural understanding. However, 
      architectural information is not always readily available and is 
      often overlooked in this kind of system. In this work, we propose an 
      approach for game engine architecture recovery and explore the 
      architecture of three popular open-source game engines (Cocos2d-x, 
      Godot, and Urho3D). We perform manual subsystem detection and use 
      Moose, a platform for software analysis, to generate architectural 
      models. With these models, we answer the following questions: Which 
      subsystems are present in game engines? Which subsystems are more 
      often coupled with one another? Why are these subsystems coupled with 
      each other? Results show that the platform independence, resource 
      management, world editor, and core subsystems are frequently included 
      by others and therefore act as foundations for the game engines. 
      Furthermore, we show that, by applying our approach, game engine 
      developers can understand whether subsystems are related and divide 
      responsibilities. They can also assess whether relationships among 
      subsystems are appropriate for the game engine.}
}

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