Here at 8bitrocket.com we love game engines and engine reuse.  Damn, we even wrote a book about it!  It seems that we are not alone.

In a post published today, Spiderweb Software’s Jeff Vogel does a fantastic job defending his use of a game engine he has re-sued and nursed into a dozen or so games over the past 10 years.

Here’s a good quote:

“When I start a new game, I spend 3-4 months rewriting the worst or most
dated part of my engine, and then I take that old (but solid) engine
and make the coolest story I can with it. It’s a small company. Our
resources are desperately limited. Thus, I don’t spend time remaking
things that already work. If my wolf icon looks good, why make a new
wolf icon just for the sake of making a new one? Instead, I focus on the
story, the one thing that truly needs to be all new and excellent.”

There is a lot more this story over at Vogel’s blog.   Most if it is directed at the mainstream game industry, but there isa lot that Flash game developers could take-away too.