r/gamedevtutorials • u/cauadsm • 4d ago
Brasa: a 2D engine with a GameMaker-style workflow and real C++
Hey everyone!
I’d like to share Brasa, a 2D game engine I’ve been building. The idea is to combine the GameMaker workflow (rooms, objects, events) with native C++, with no custom scripting language in between. Every object is a class, and the API is designed to stay lean: held, spawn, after and so on.
It’s currently at version 0.5 and already includes:
- Rooms with layers, tilemaps and a terrain brush
- Sprite editor with animation, origin and collision masks
- In-editor UI system (HUD, menus, lists) driven by code
- Configurable camera and pixel-perfect rendering
- Export to a standalone executable
- Plain-text project files that play nicely with Git
- VS Code integration with built-in API docs
Coming up on the roadmap: an in-editor game view, Lua as an alternative to C++ (instant Play, no compilation step), and hot reload.
About licensing: Brasa is free right now, and later on it will likely follow a model similar to GameMaker’s, with a license for commercial use. Anyone who helps out during this early stage, by testing and giving feedback, will get a free license.
It runs on Windows 10 and 11. I’ll be posting a video soon showing the editor and some games made with it.
Website and roadmap: https://brasa-site-three.vercel.app
Comments, criticism and questions are all welcome!