Introduction

VkEngine is a C++ game engine built on Vulkan for high-performance 3D graphics. It provides a complete game development framework including rendering, physics simulation, audio playback, and scene management. LabEscape, a puzzle-escape game included with the engine, demonstrates all major features in a production example.

Repository: https://github.com/spikest3r/VulkanEngine

Key Features

• Vulkan-based Rendering: Modern graphics API for cross-platform high-performance rendering with ImGui integration
• Physics Simulation: NVIDIA PhysX integration for realistic physics, collision detection, and character controllers
• Spatial Audio: FMOD integration for 3D sound with distance attenuation and positional effects
• Scene System: Flexible scene management with virtual initialization, update, and cleanup hooks
• Game Objects: C++ entity system with transforms, physics, audio, and rendering
• Character Controller: First-person character movement with gravity, jumping, and terrain interaction
• Resource Management: Unified system for meshes, textures, and sounds with lazy loading
• Input Handling: Keyboard, mouse, and DualSense controller support (with haptics on Windows/Linux)
• Debugging Tools: ImGui-based debug UI, physics debug rendering, raycast visualization

Technology Stack

• Graphics: Vulkan with GLFW windowing
• Physics: NVIDIA PhysX 5.x
• Audio: FMOD Studio
• Math: GLM (OpenGL Mathematics)
• 3D Asset Loading: Assimp
• GUI: ImGui with ImGui implementation for Vulkan
• Fonts: FreeType (via ImGui)

Getting Started: Basic Usage

Create an engine instance and load scenes:

#include <engine.h>

int main() {
    Engine* engine = Engine::Create();
    engine->init(800, 600, "My Game");
    
    // Create scenes (inherit from Scene class)
    MyScene* scene = engine->createScene<MyScene>();
    engine->loadScene(scene);
    
    // Main loop
    while (engine->running()) {
        engine->updateScene();
        engine->update();
        engine->render();
    }
    
    engine->cleanup();
    Engine::Destroy(engine);
    return 0;
}

Customize scene behavior:

class MyScene : public Scene {
    void EarlyInitScene(Engine* engine) override;
    void InitScene(Engine* engine) override;
    void UpdateScene(Engine* engine) override;
    void DestroyScene(Engine* engine) override;
};

Create game objects:

// In InitScene or later
Mesh* mesh = engine->getMesh("myMesh");
Texture* texture = engine->getTexture("myTexture");
PhysicsMaterial* material = engine->createPhysicsMaterial(0.5f, 0.3f, 0.2f);

auto obj = engine->createGameObject<MyGameObject>(
    transform,
    mesh,
    texture,
    material,
    isDynamic  // true for dynamic physics, false for static
);

See LabEscape Example for a complete working game.