Godot Digest 09
Welcome to the first edition of the last month of 2024. One more edition, and the year is gone! This will be another big edition, particularly for official news, so let’s get into it right away.
Game Dev News
EA open-sourced a set of accessibility patents. In 2021, the publisher announced the release of several patents related to accessibility, which other developers could use for free. This time, 21 new patents were added to this initiative, including photosensitivity and speech recognition patents.
If you want to learn more, check out this video from Gamefromscratch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZELj8zBY-0
This one is a super weird one. Last week, Funko took down itch.io. Yes, the makers of plastic garbage. The company contracted a third-party company to scan sites for and report unauthorized use of their IP. It seems that someone made a page about a Funko game, and this triggered a phishing report to itch.io registrar, and this registrar automatically shut down the domain. Another “fun” fact is that the tool used to provide this service was an AI tool.
Official News
The Godot Foundation published its December report, highlighting its objectives and work for the engine and the community, such as the work in the assets store and the priorities page.
https://godotengine.org/article/godot-foundation-update-dec-2024/
Godot reached an astonishing milestone. After over ten years of development, it reached issue 100000 in GitHub. To celebrate, they created this issue as a blog post to review the engine's history, show some stats, congratulate all the contributors, and encourage others to participate in the project.
https://godotengine.org/article/beyond-100000-you-re-breathtaking/
Godot 4.4 dev 6 was released. This version includes a feature we have been waiting for ages: a 3D camera preview in the inspector! The release notes list all the new features and bug fixes.
https://godotengine.org/article/dev-snapshot-godot-4-4-dev-6/
Also, with this release, Gamefromscratch made a video highlighting all the changes in 4.4 so far. It is a great end-of-year review of all things related to 4.4.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sX0ujcTRkKo
As the year ends, W4 Games released a blog post revisiting all the accomplishments during 2024, from the contribution to the engine itself to the community and the entire Godot ecosystem.
https://www.w4games.com/blog/w4-games-news-1/a-year-in-review-2024-78
As usual, we get the Godot showreel each December, a recap of what has been created using Godot during the year. I love this video and encourage you to watch it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1Lon_Q2T18
Last but not least (never said before), Godot published its priorities list. This is a tentative roadmap for the future of the engine. It lists the four pillars of improvements where they want to focus the efforts: Core (rendering, physics, animation), Editor, Platforms, and Scripting. Here is the official post
https://godotengine.org/priorities/index.html
If you like the video format, Gamefromscratch has you covered with a video that reviews all the items on the list
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00Ej1887udI
From the Community
Here are some of the latest tutorials and resources from the Godot community.
Radial blur shader — FencerDevLog
It is a simple shader that produces amazing blur effects. The results are similar to those seen in movies, and the shader can be used in several scenarios.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QELNXTBjjAs
Update TileMap nodes to TileMapLayer nodes —Michael Games
Great tutorial on migrating your project to the new TileMapLayer node. It goes through the entire process of updating the TileMap nodes in the context of a 2DAARPG.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeL24XUlgg8
Using the Raycast3D Node For Interactions — StayAtHomeDev
Continuing with its series of making an FPS in Godot, this time, it goes into the process of using ray casting to improve interactions in the game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DJdUCjS8dnA
Export Properties Tutorial — Gwizz
A super quick tutorial on how to show properties in the inspector.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGcoiRkei4s
Earthquake shader — FencerDevLog
This shader shakes the screen or an element on the screen. Although it is intended for the earthquake effect, it is a valuable tool to learn because it can be used for many other things.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kb7dFMtOaSM
Best new feature in 4.4 —Gamefromscratch
Mike made an entire video about one of the new features in 4.4. I don’t want to spoil it, so please check it out.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yc5TKAFj-A
Picking Up Objects — StayAtHomeDev
This is another tutorial in the FPS series. This time, it teaches how to pick up physics objects using a component that can be added to any RigidBody3D.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Fq5amwpagU
Quest system — Michael Games
Two lengthy tutorial videos on how to create a quest system.
The first part is about the quest manager and the resources needed to support this feature.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdPXr_gFJPY
The second one is about updating the UI to use this new system.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bylT7EEPP1w
In part 3 it will create a component to handle how the quest starts and advance.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=md1PjxyzgIg
@export — Queble
This is an extensive guide on using the @export syntax. Although it is a simple concept, there is much to unpack, and Queble covers everything.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-IPRwFipsI
Introduction to Debugging — MakerTech
This is part of a series of tutorials on learning to code. This time, it covers the process of debugging a program. It shows how to use the debug window and focuses on debug messages and breakpoints.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoZFcs4T5Jc