Complete UI framework with light/dark theme support, text rendering, and modular HUD system.
Supports multiple light types (directional lights, point lights, spotlights) and normal mapping for realistic 3D rendering effects.
Automatic mesh simplification system that dynamically adjusts model detail levels based on distance to improve rendering performance.
A modern C++20-based 3D rendering engine featuring ECS (Entity Component System) architecture, supporting 2D/3D rendering, UI system, sprite animation, lighting system, and asynchronous resource loading.
- ✅ OpenGL 4.5+ rendering backend with modern graphics API support
- ✅ SDL3 window management and input handling
- ✅ Modular Architecture Clear layered design with well-separated responsibilities
- ✅ Shader System Vertex/fragment/geometry shaders with hot-reload and caching support
- ✅ Texture System PNG/JPG/BMP/TGA support with asynchronous loading
- ✅ Mesh System 10+ preset geometries, Assimp model loading support (OBJ/FBX/GLTF, etc.)
- ✅ Material System Phong lighting model with normal mapping and skeletal animation support
- ✅ Resource Manager Unified interface with smart reference counting and dependency management
- ✅ Fully Thread-Safe Safe design for multi-threaded environments
- ✅ Entity Component System Flexible entity-component system
- ✅ Component System Core components: Transform, MeshRender, Sprite, Camera, Light, UI, etc.
- ✅ System Architecture RenderSystem, AnimationSystem, TransformSystem, UISystem, etc.
- ✅ Scene Management Scene switching, serialization, and scene graph support
- ✅ Sprite System Sprite, SpriteSheet, SpriteAtlas support
- ✅ Sprite Animation State machine-driven animation system with animation events
- ✅ Sprite Batching Efficient rendering of large numbers of sprites
- ✅ Text Rendering TTF font support with text renderer
- ✅ UI Framework Complete UI control system (buttons, text boxes, sliders, menus, etc.)
- ✅ Layout System Flex and Grid layouts with responsive design
- ✅ Theme System Configurable UI themes
- ✅ Menu System UIMenu, UIPullDownMenu, inspired by Blender UI design
- ✅ Lighting System Directional lights, point lights, and spotlights
- ✅ Normal Mapping Complete normal mapping support
- ✅ Skeletal Animation Bone palette system
- ✅ Post-Processing Frame buffer support with post-processing effects foundation
- ✅ LOD System Automatic mesh simplification (meshoptimizer) with distance-based detail levels
- ✅ Instanced Rendering GPU instancing integrated with LOD system
- ✅ Batching System Multiple strategies: CPU batching and GPU instancing
- ✅ Material Sorting Reduces GPU state switches
- ✅ Frustum Culling Efficient culling system
- ✅ Math Library Optimization AVX2 SIMD, smart caching, OpenMP parallel processing
- C++20 Modern C++ standard, leveraging concepts, smart pointers, and other features
- OpenGL 4.5+ Cross-platform graphics rendering API
- SDL3 Window management, input handling, cross-platform support
- Eigen3 High-performance math library (vectors, matrices, quaternions)
- GLAD OpenGL function loader
- Assimp 3D model loading (OBJ, FBX, GLTF, Collada, MMD, etc.)
- SDL3_image Image format support (PNG, JPG, BMP, TGA)
- SDL3_ttf Font rendering and text support
- meshoptimizer Mesh optimization and LOD generation
- nlohmann/json JSON serialization and configuration
- ImGui Immediate mode GUI library for UI rendering backend
All third-party libraries are included in the third_party/ directory and require no additional installation.
- CMake 3.15+
- C++20 compatible compiler (MSVC 2019+, GCC 10+, Clang 12+)
- OpenGL 4.5+ driver support
Using Visual Studio 2022:
Use the automated script to set up all dependencies in one step:
# Run dependency setup script (automatically downloads and configures all third-party libraries)
PowerShell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File ".\setup-dependencies.ps1"
# Build Release version
mkdir build; cd build; cmake ..; cd ..
cmake --build build --config Release
# Run example
.\build\bin\Release\01_basic_window.exeScript Features:
- Automatically clones all required third-party libraries
- Automatically runs Get-GitModules.ps1 script
- Automatically copies required cmake files for SDL3_ttf
- Automatically downloads and extracts Eigen3
- Intelligently detects existing libraries to avoid redundant downloads
- Supports selective skipping of certain libraries (using
-SkipEigen,-SkipSDL,-SkipImGui, etc.)
If you need manual control over each step, follow these instructions:
# Get third-party libraries
cd third_party
git clone https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL.git
git clone https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL_image.git
cd SDL_image\external
PowerShell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File ".\Get-GitModules.ps1"
cd ..\..\SDL3_ttf-3.2.2\external
PowerShell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File ".\Get-GitModules.ps1"
cd ..\..
git clone https://github.com/nlohmann/json.git
git clone https://github.com/assimp/assimp.git
git clone https://github.com/zeux/meshoptimizer.git
git clone https://github.com/bulletphysics/bullet3.git
git clone https://github.com/ocornut/imgui.git
# Copy required cmake files for SDL3_ttf
copy "third_party\SDL\cmake\GetGitRevisionDescription.cmake" "third_party\SDL3_ttf-3.2.2\cmake\GetGitRevisionDescription.cmake"
copy "third_party\SDL\cmake\PkgConfigHelper.cmake" "third_party\SDL3_ttf-3.2.2\cmake\PkgConfigHelper.cmake"
copy "third_party\SDL\cmake\sdlcpu.cmake" "third_party\SDL3_ttf-3.2.2\cmake\sdlcpu.cmake"
copy "third_party\SDL\cmake\sdlplatform.cmake" "third_party\SDL3_ttf-3.2.2\cmake\sdlplatform.cmake"
copy "third_party\SDL\cmake\sdlmanpages.cmake" "third_party\SDL3_ttf-3.2.2\cmake\sdlmanpages.cmake"
copy "third_party\SDL_image\cmake\PrivateSdlFunctions.cmake" "third_party\SDL3_ttf-3.2.2\cmake\PrivateSdlFunctions.cmake"
# Get Eigen
wget "https://gitlab.com/libeigen/eigen/-/archive/3.4.0/eigen-3.4.0.zip" -OutFile "eigen-3.4.0.zip"
Expand-Archive -Path "eigen-3.4.0.zip" -DestinationPath "."
# Build Release version
cd .. # Return to main directory
mkdir build; cd build; cmake ..; cd ..
cmake --build build --config Release
# Run example
.\build\bin\Release\01_basic_window.exeNote: If the SDL3_ttf-3.2.2 directory doesn't exist, please manually download and extract it to the third_party/ directory.
BUILD_EXAMPLES=ONBuild example programs (enabled by default)BUILD_TESTS=ONBuild test programs (enabled by default)ENABLE_OPENMP=ONEnable OpenMP parallel processing (enabled by default, improves batch operation performance)RENDER_ENGINE_INSTALL=ONEnable installation support for prebuilt library distribution
To create a prebuilt library package for use in other projects:
# Method 1: One-click build and package (Recommended)
PowerShell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File ".\scripts\build_and_package.ps1"
# Method 2: Manual steps
# 1. Build the project
mkdir build; cd build
cmake .. -DRENDER_ENGINE_INSTALL=ON
cmake --build . --config Release
# 2. Install to a directory
cmake --install . --config Release --prefix ../install
# 3. Package (optional)
cd ..
PowerShell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File ".\scripts\package_prebuilt.ps1"See Prebuilt Library Usage Guide for detailed instructions on using the prebuilt library in your projects.
The project includes 63 complete example programs covering various engine modules:
01_basic_window.exe # Basic window creation
02_shader_test.exe # Shader system test
05_texture_test.exe # Texture loading and rendering
06_mesh_test.exe # Mesh rendering
12_material_test.exe # Material system test31_ecs_basic_test.exe # ECS basic functionality
32_ecs_renderer_test.exe # ECS rendering system
35_ecs_comprehensive_test.exe # ECS comprehensive test38_sprite_render_test.exe # Sprite rendering
39_sprite_api_test.exe # Sprite API usage
40_sprite_animation_test.exe # Sprite animation system
41_sprite_batch_test.exe # Sprite batching
42_sprite_state_machine_test.exe # Animation state machine
44_text_render_test.exe # Text rendering20_camera_test.exe # Camera system
45_lighting_test.exe # Lighting system
46_normal_map_test.exe # Normal mapping
47_skeleton_palette_test.exe # Skeletal animation
48_model_render_test.exe # Model rendering
49_miku_model_test.exe # MMD model loading example60_ui_framework_showcase.exe # UI framework showcase (layout system, controls)
61_ui_menu_example.exe # UI menu system example37_batching_benchmark.exe # Batching performance test
58_lod_generator_test.exe # LOD generator test
59_lod_instanced_rendering_test.exe # LOD instanced rendering52_application_boot_demo.exe # Application framework startup example
53_event_system_test.exe # Event system
54_module_hud_test.exe # Modular HUD system
55_scene_serialization_test.exe # Scene serialization57_toolchain_integration_test.exe # Toolchain integration testSee the examples/ directory for more examples, each with detailed comments explaining usage.
RenderEngine features a clear layered architecture design:
- Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) - OpenGL context management, extension detection, thread safety
- Core Rendering Layer - Renderer, RenderState, RenderLayer, batching manager
- Resource Management Layer - ResourceManager, asynchronous loading, cache system
- ECS Architecture Layer - World, Entity, Component, System
- Application Framework Layer - SceneManager, ModuleRegistry, EventBus
- ECS Architecture - Flexible entity-component system, easy to extend
- RAII Resource Management - Smart pointers and automatic resource management
- Modular Design - Plugin-based architecture, easy to add new features
- Observer Pattern - EventBus implements publish-subscribe mechanism
- LOD System - Automatic mesh simplification, distance-based detail levels, batch computation support
- Instanced Rendering - GPU instancing integrated with LOD system
- Batching Optimization - Multiple strategies: CPU batching and GPU instancing
- Material Sorting - Reduces GPU state switches
- SIMD Optimization - AVX2 instruction set with smart caching mechanisms
- Parallel Processing - OpenMP support, 2-4x performance improvement for batch operations
- Documentation Index - Complete documentation navigation
- Project Structure Analysis - Detailed project architecture description
- Project Structure Diagram - Visual architecture diagram
- Architecture Design - Architecture design document
- Feature List - Implemented and planned features
- Core API - API documentation index
- Rendering Core: Renderer, Shader, Texture, Mesh, Material
- ECS System: World, Component, System, Entity
- Resource Management: ResourceManager, AsyncResourceLoader
- Math Utilities: Transform, MathUtils
- LOD System: LOD, LODGenerator
- UI System: UICanvas, UIWidget, UIButton, etc.
- 2D Rendering: Sprite, SpriteAnimation, Text
- ECS Quick Start - ECS system usage guide
- Scene Management Guide - Scene system usage
- Module Development Guide - Modular development
- Resource Management Guide - Resource management best practices
- UI Development Guide - UI system development
- Material Sorting Architecture - Rendering optimization
- JSON Serialization Guide - Scene serialization
✅ Modern C++20 - Fully leverages new features for type safety and excellent performance
✅ Complete Features - Full 2D/3D rendering, UI, animation, lighting, and more
✅ High Performance - Multiple optimization strategies suitable for real-time rendering applications
✅ Easy to Extend - Modular architecture with plugin-based design
✅ Well Documented - Detailed API documentation and usage guides
This project is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 (AGPL-3.0).
Li Chaoyu (2052046346@qq.com)