Not OP, but IMO, Godot. Extremely easy to import assets of any type and prototype a game. The only thing that I would consider a barrier is(if you don't already know how) setting up the initial tilemap and spritesheet. But either using Godot's documentation(which can be found inside of the editor) or through a YouTube tutorial I feel like compared to Unity/UE5 its much better for building quick prototypes.

Plus you can basically put it together in a variety of languages:

https://docs.godotengine.org/en/stable/tutorials/scripting/i...

No I'm not affiliated with Godot in any capacity. I've just had a much better experience using it vs the other previously mentioned editors.

There's also lua love and pygame for quick 2D game projects

I use https://excaliburjs.com/docs/ which is a Typescript-first 2D game engine for browser games.

It has support for spritesheets of course, but also Tiled map files (https://www.mapeditor.org/) which I use to build level maps.

If I'm building a game that can be implemented via the DOM (like if I don't need an update() loop), I love getting away with just using React or Elm. For example, any sort of grid-based game or board game.

I don't use Godot for browser games because (1) its browser support got worse from v3 -> 4, (2) I just want to write Typescript, and (3) it's just bigger and more complicated. Of course, the best game engine is simply the one that compels you to actually build and hopefully finish games.

Btw, give Pico-8 a shot. In a few months I'd built more games in Pico-8 than I finished across the rest of my life since the scope is so tiny.

Godot is very easy to get running.

Monogame / C# is also pretty easy, but it's definitely more in the lightweight camp.

I'm not the parent commenter but:

I have uploaded several games to itch (although it's been a while) and a cool thing I found was that even with no followers back when I started making things, a decent number of people played some of my games! Nothing crazy, but I remember being delighted that the second game i ever made[1] got a few thousand plays and some actual comments.

My experience is that:

    * tags matter! For example, a decent number of people seem to be looking for new incremental games and are willing to try new stuff in that category
    * your primary image, title, and description matter a lot and it's worth spending some time taking a good screenshot (I'm really bad at this)
    * you can upload a gif instead of just a screenshot to include a little gameplay in your title image and that might help
    * participating in gamejams can help a lot because you get some guaranteed players (everyone plays each others games and rates them; maybe you get some feedback too)

I'm not sure where you are in your gamedev journey (there's a good chance you're way ahead of me and this advice is useless!) but "just make some stuff and put it on there and see who bites" was effective and motivating for me early on

[1] https://itseieio.itch.io/sisyphus-needs-a-nap

It even comes up sometimes in the summary of game jams that are focused on his assets:

https://itch.io/jam/kenney-jam-2019

`<!--Jesus doesn't follow HTML standards-->` in the source :)

The license there is custom and a bit ambiguous: https://assethunts.com/license/