Welcome to the game development community! This is a place to talk about and post anything related to the field of game development.
I'd point you to godot but I'm pretty biased because I just really love godot.
I will say though that depending on the scope of the project you have planned, it might not be best to make your dream project your first one. Test the waters with a few really small games first, and then once you're comfortable and know your tools well enough do your big idea.
You're right. I looked at Godot and it seems really good.
Definitely Godot, if you want a quick overview of it and or an introduction course it's very much worth checking out Brackeys on YT. He is an excellent teacher.
For someone with little to no dev experience, I would strongly recommend Construct. It's easy to develop in, doesn't require a download, free for most small games, and has lots of tutorials for new developers. It's the engine they used to teach game design at UCLA when I was there.
Godot is my goto engine for 2D and 2.5D stuff. It's fairly easy to pick up, it's free, and open source, and there's plenty or tutorials for it.
It uses GDscript which is a python like language, so it's not too difficult to learn. That's usually my recommendation to newbies.
But, I'd say try different things, and you'll figure out what you like personally. You may find something totally different suits your personal taste and interests best.
I think Godot is what I'll go for. Looking in to it, it seems like it'll be pretty forgiving.
I found that they had some nice starting tutorials in their documentation. I found they got me up and running.
You may like GDevelop
Can you tell me a little more about it? Maybe why it's better than other options?
I haven't used it but it is advertised as no code. Might be good if you don't know how to code
What engine would most suit a RPG game that’s 2.5D isometric view, is kind to new developers and has a whole load of reference material so I can teach myself as I go?
I only have experience with Godot, but from that I can say its documentation is really good and has helped me so far to teach myself important stuff (am really new to game dev, but had some programming experience), and I do know it has support for isometric tilesets.
Unity, I have no experience with, but I guess it's overall more mature from being in use so much. It does come with some issues, see the scandal around their planned profit sharing policies a while back, which Godot circumvents by being free software.
Yeah, I remember seeing the news about Unity a while back but I thought they decided against it?
They did, but also they showed that they can never be trusted again.
If you're starting from scratch, Godot is a much more sensible choice—any unity studio with the ability to do so, will be dropping it as soon as they can
Edit: also gotta add if you have no coding experience whatsoever, you're probably best addressing that first. If you can't build a simple application, you will probably not succeed in building a game.
AFAIK, yes, they pulled it back after the backlash - it just highlights that you will always be dependent on their decisions in the end. But overall - go with what feels better for you.
Unreal is heavy, and while you can make games without any coding knowledge, it's more for super fancy 3D games.
Unity and Godot are a bit simpler and more casual. Unity is ripe with issues and Godot is a little more immature. I would recommend Godot if you care about open source/community vibes, or Unity if you want more powerful features.
I wish there were better 2D or 2.5D dedicated engines, since imo most games don't require 3D to be cool, but I don't personally know any good ones (RIP Flash)
I have zero trust in Unity given recent events. In this case, I'd recommend Godot, unless OP is trying to build something that's intended for a large-scale/mass release.
GameMaker is a pretty good 2D game engine. I used it up until Yoyo Games pushed me out by making it prohibitively expensive with the release of Studio - but from what I hear, they've recently reversed course on their pricing in a good way.
I originally learned how to write code using the (very easy to learn) drag and drop editor in GameMaker 6, and I'm now a professional software developer, so I guess it holds a special place in my heart, haha.
Thanks for the suggestions. I was initially looking at RPG Maker but when I saw that it can't really handle isometric views I was a bit put off it. Well, that and the price of it....
Unity