Basically, I am an artist, musician, & gamer.. I want to marry both of them into a project.

What are the simplest games I can make because I have not much talent for programming :/

Art will be 2D in the end..

Something like PvS, Isaac, tetris/tiled puzzle game? Also which engine, game maker, unity, unreal? I have some experience with modding and started messing with blueprints in unreal, but Its the core concepts of the game design process I lack, I really need some sort of universal reference to making simple games like these..

Thanks for any help!

If you're not really a programmer, but want to make some games, then you'll want to find something that reduces the game making process to "scripting" or something visual rather than having to write much code. If you already know how to use unreal blueprints, you can theoretically make a full game that way. I'm no expert with Unity, but I think you'd need some C# skills to get very far with it. The easiest starting/learning/jumping off point might be to use gamemaker or rpgmaker or something like that.

As for a first game to try to make, a good idea might be to look at some simple arcade mechanics, and remake those. Make a snake game. Then make a better snake game. Then make a space invaders kind of thing. Keep making slightly more complicated games until you've learned the skills you need to make the thing you want to actually make.

Some of the simplest games you can make are games like Pong, Snake, or Space Invaders (although that might be a bit tougher).

This really depends, however, on what you are using to make your game.

To give you some perspective, I started making games in a program called Alice 2.0 (if you look it up, you'll see that it was designed as a way to introduce kids to programming. It's actually now on to a 3.0 version that I never used). Alice 2.0 had a drag and drop commands interface for event-driven programming. It also had a 3d world where users could drag and drop items from a gallery onto the scene. It didn't support much in terms of graphics, but it was pretty great for building fun things. The simplest game I made in that was a tank combat game.

Contrast this with something like C++, an industry-wide used programming language. Now there are a ton of libraries out there to use with C++, but without any programming experience, the most basic thing you can make is something like pong, or snake.

These days, although I don't do much programming, I use the Unity engine or the Unreal engine. These are both proper game engines, and do require a knowledge of coding. However, since this isn't anything as bare bones as C++, the baseline bar goes up a bit. In Unity, without any scripting, you can make a basic world explorer (no gameplay, just an FPS character and a world to walk around in) using prefabs (Unity has a handy FPS explorer prefab) and whatever 3d models you have made.

The point is that the most basic thing really depends on what you are using.

Now I'm not super familiar with game-maker, and I assume you mean YoYo Games? It does seem to use some sort of scripting (from a cursory glance). I know more about Unity and Unreal though.

The question I have for you is how much programming are you willing to learn? It is entirely possible to create simple games without any scripting, using the right tools out there. The quality won't be great, and you'll have less control over the end result, but it is possible. I wouldn't recommend going that route, but you can if you really wanted to avoid scripting altogether.

I have map building experience (since the first Unreal) so i actually feel more comfortable in UnrealEd than the others. Also I have just noticed they have written a new audio engine for the latest release, which sounds like something my dreams are made of, it sounded modular & programmable < this i'm really really interested in, and might be able to bring something interesting to the table, if i can learn to program it correctly. I have some new ideas related to sound that havent been done yet.

I would be willing to learn any coding but i just dont have the... hmm... experience or a point of reference on how to begin? I really need a good bit of universal game design reference - I wish I had access to a full game in a giant map format that I could pick apart and have a look to see how it is made.. it always give me a brainache trying to get even simple c++ working, hence the blueprint idea, visual logic I can work out ok!

Either that or a good unreal template I could asset swap just to get me somewhere. I'm thinking a walking adventure might be the easiest way to showcase some art & sound design work while making it an interesting experience. I have VR so that could be part of it -

I'm not sure what type of game you want to make but the RPG Maker series (XP, VX, VX Ace, MV) is extremely simple to use. Although the core system is built to create fun rpg games a lot of people have used scrips (which are very easy to find (for free) and place) to morph it into the game of their liking.

In my opinion most of the hardest code really comes from having to do low level things. Now making a complete game of any size is pretty hard, but believe it or not it can often take more knowledge of things like algorithms and type behavior to write a game like snake or tetris than it does to make a small rpg with a drag and drop system.

Things like collisions, physics, dealing with time, rendering, are all quite complex if you get down to them. So anything like an engine that abstracts this away will make it ridiculously easier. You can throw together a 3d ball rolling around a physics world and hitting exploding barrels in about 30 minutes in Unity, you can spend many hours writing the code for snake just having to sit there and write all the code to manage the data and make sure it works under all circumstances.

Stick to a game engine with an editing suite like unity or unreal, or something like RPG maker or game maker. I wouldn't really get into code unless you have serious plans to be a programmer. Sometimes I feel like an idiot with how hard certain programming problems really seem to be because there is a million ways to do the same thing.

I'm going to do some really simple 'push button, receive sound fx & story picture' room, and then move on from there.

Anyone know anything RE: Universal game design reference? If I could visualise everything I needed to do, engine agnostic, and the way its done. like functions, macros, classes etc, what they are used for in a game that would be really helpful for some planning to make it interesting

Casino / gambling slot machine / card game.

With that you will learn the programming, dont use programs like game maker.

I'm going to do some really simple 'push button, receive sound fx & story picture' room, and then move on from there.

Anyone know anything RE: Universal game design reference? If I could visualise everything I needed to do, engine agnostic, and the way its done. like functions, macros, classes etc, what they are used for in a game that would be really helpful for some planning to make it interesting

Honestly there's no real reference (for structure of a game program) to go by, cause every game is different at the end of the day. Just dive in and try to make something is the best way to learn.

If you really want to, there's probably Unreal engine tutorials for making a basic game, which may help with your reference thing. A cursory google search found this:

https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/tutorials/creating-first-game-unreal-engine-4-part-1-setting-camera

Google some stuff, see what comes up, maybe follow a tutorial or two to get started, then dive in to your project once you feel you've got a handle.

dont use programs like game maker.

I don't usually try to push people towards or away from softwares, because at the end it's about what you need and want, and I myself do use software that industry professionals would never dream of using. However. I do agree with the incredible smoker. If you want to make something serious, don't use programs like game maker. They are good for some things, but at the end of the day, they are really very limited and usually don't give good visual results either. Engines like Unity and Unreal aren't super tough to learn, and the benefits far outweigh the effort you'll put in.