After 10 months of development the release of a free game engine , suitable for creating 2D and 3D games. The engine supports an easy-to-learn scripting language for game logic, a graphical environment for game design, a one-click game deployment system, extensive animation capabilities, and a physics simulation system, along with a built-in debugger and a performance bottleneck detection system. The source code of the game engine, game design environment, and associated development tools (physics engine, sound server, 2D/3D rendering backends, etc.) is licensed under the MIT License.
The source codes of the engine were in 2014 by the studio , after ten years of developing a proprietary professional-grade product that was used to create and publish for PC, gaming consoles, and mobile devices. The engine supports all popular desktop and mobile platforms (Linux, Windows, macOS, Wii, Nintendo 3DS, PlayStation 3, PS Vita, Android, iOS, BBX), as well as game development for the Web. Ready-to-run binary builds are available for Linux, Windows, and macOS.
In is being developed for rendering based on the Vulkan graphics API, which will be offered in the next Godot 4.0 release, replacing the currently offered rendering backends via OpenGL ES 3.0 and OpenGL 3.3 (support for OpenGL ES and OpenGL will be maintained by ensuring the operation of the old OpenGL ES 2.0/OpenGL 2.1 backend on top of the new Vulkan-based rendering architecture). Transitioning from Godot 3.2 to Godot 4.0 will require a rewrite of applications due to API-level incompatibility, but the Godot 3.2 branch will receive a long support cycle, the duration of which will depend on user demand for this branch. The inclusion of non-stability-affecting innovations from the 4.x branch, such as support for , , and the .
Key innovations in Godot 3.2:
- Support for Oculus Quest virtual reality headsets has been added, implemented based on for the Android platform. To develop augmented reality systems for iOS, support for the framework has been added. Support for the framework is being developed for Android, but it is not yet ready and will be included in one of the intermediate releases 3.3.x; the visual shader editor interface.
- the interface of the visual shader editor. new nodes for creating more advanced shaders. For shaders implemented with classic scripts, support for constants, arrays, and modifiers "varying" has been added. Many backend-specific OpenGL ES 3.0 shaders have been ported to OpenGL ES 2;
- Support for physically-based rendering (PBR) materials is synchronized with the capabilities of new PBR rendering engines, such as Blender Eevee and Substance Designer, to ensure similar scene representation in Godot and the used 3D modeling packages;
- Various rendering settings have been optimized to improve performance and increase image quality. Many features have been transferred from GLES3 to the GLES3 backend, including support for MSAA (Multisample anti-aliasing) and various post-processing effects (glow, DOF blur, and BCS);
- Full support for importing 3D scenes and models in the glTF 2.0 format (GL Transmission Format) has been added, along with initial support for the FBX format, which allows importing animation scenes from Blender, but is currently incompatible with Maya and 3ds Max. Support for skeleton skins when importing scenes via glTF 2.0 and FBX has been added, allowing one skeleton to be used across multiple meshes.
Work to improve and stabilize glTF 2.0 support has been carried out in collaboration with the Blender package developer community, which will offer enhanced glTF 2.0 support in version 2.83; - The engine's networking capabilities have been expanded with support for the WebRTC and WebSocket protocols, as well as the ability to use UDP in multicast mode. for using cryptographic hashes and working with certificates. A graphical interface for profiling network activity has been added. Work has begun on creating a Godot port for
WebAssembly/HTML5, which will allow running the editor in the browser via the Web; - Reworked for the Android platform and export system. Now there are two separate export systems provided for generating packages for Android: one with a pre-compiled engine, and the second allowing for custom builds based on customized engine variants. Custom build configurations can be made at the plugin level for Android, without manual editing of the source template;
- Selective support has been added to the editor Certain features can be removed, such as buttons for calling the 3D editor, script editor, resource library, nodes, panels, properties, and other elements not required by the developer (hiding unnecessary components significantly simplifies the interface);
- Initial support for integration with source control systems has been added, as well as a plugin for Git support.
in the editor; - The ability to override the camera for the running game through a window in the editor has been provided, allowing the evaluation of various modes in the game (free look, node inspection, etc.);
- The implementation of an LSP (Language Server Protocol) server for the GDScript language has been proposed, enabling the transmission of information about GDScript semantics and code autocompletion rules to external editors, such as the VS Code plugin and Atom;
- Numerous improvements have been made to the built-in GDScript editor: the ability to set bookmarks at positions in the code has been added, a minimap panel (for a quick overview of the entire code) has been implemented, and input autocompletion has been improved, capabilities in the visual scripting mode;
- A pseudo-3D game creation mode has been added, allowing the use of depth effects in 2D games by defining several layers that create a fake perspective;
- In the 2D editor, in the GUI, the anchor and area boundary placement process has been modernized;
- For text data, the ability to observe changes in effect parameters in real time has been added, supporting BBCode tags and enabling the definition of custom effects;
- A sound stream generator has been implemented, allowing the creation of sound waves based on individual frames and a spectral analyzer;
- Using the library
- V-HACD the ability to decompose concave meshes into accurate and simplified convex parts has been implemented. This feature significantly simplifies the generation of collision shapes for existing 3D meshes.
- The ability to develop game logic in C# using Mono for Android and WebAssembly platforms has been implemented (previously C# was supported for Linux, Windows, and macOS). Based on Mono 6.6, support for C# 8.0 has been introduced. An initial implementation of Ahead-Of-Time (AOT) compilation for C# has also been added to the codebase, but it is not yet activated (the interpreter is still being used for WebAssembly). It is now possible to connect external editors for C# code editing, such as MonoDevelop, Visual Studio for Mac, and Jetbrains Rider.
- Significantly expanded and improved . A partial into English ( introduction guide to getting started).
Source: opennet.ru
