Owl

Owl is a C++23 game engine built for learning game engine development. It features multiple graphics, input, and sound backends, an Entity-Component-System architecture, and a scene editor.

The full generated documentation is available online:

Documentation pages (browse on GitHub):

• Architecture Overview – Engine modules, backends, and shader pipeline
• Building Owl – Prerequisites, presets, testing, and CMake options
• Roadmap – Planned and completed features by version
• Contributing – Code style, conventions, and workflow

Features

• Rendering with Slang shaders compiled to SPIR-V
• Entity-Component-System architecture
• 2D physics simulation
• Sound playback backend
• Owl Nest scene editor with project management
• 3D model loading
• Cross-platform

Supported Platforms

OS	Architecture	Compilers
Linux	x64, arm64	GCC 13+, Clang 18+
Windows	x64	MinGW GCC 14+, MinGW Clang 19+

Backends

Category	Backends
Graphics	OpenGL 4.5, Vulkan 1.4+, Null
Input	GLFW, Null
Sound	OpenAL, Null

Quick Start

# Install Python dependencies (for DepManager and CI tools)
poetry sync --no-root
 
# Configure and build
cmake --preset linux-gcc-release -S .
cmake --build output/build/linux-gcc-release
 
# Run tests
ctest --test-dir output/build/linux-gcc-release --output-on-failure

See Building Owl for the full build guide and all available presets.

Dependencies

Dependencies are managed by DepManager and declared in depmanager.yml. They are automatically downloaded during CMake configure.

Dependency recipes are maintained in a separate repository: OwlDependencies.