Game Development
Godot is one of the most popular open-source game engines nowadays, used by developers around the globe to create high-quality 2D and 3D games. With the release of version 4 of the game engine, many developers are wondering what the differences are between Godot 3 and Godot 4. In this article, we’ll explore the main differences between the two versions.
- Rendering: one of the main differences between Godot 3 and Godot 4 is the rendering. Godot 4 uses Vulkan as its default rendering API, which offers better resource management, improved performance, and better memory management compared to OpenGL. This translates to greater efficiency and performance for Godot’s 3D games.
- New Features: Godot 4 introduces many new features compared to Godot 3. Among the most interesting are the Mesh API, which allows for more efficient creation and modification of meshes, and real-time Ray Tracing support, which enables high-quality images with more realistic lighting. We also have a new Tilemap system that, compared to Godot 3, simplifies the creation of tilesets, offers a new layering system that allows you to easily organize your maps, for example by creating background layers, terrain layers, and object layers. Additionally, the management of tile collisions has been simplified, so that you can set the collision areas of your tiles in order to avoid unwanted collisions.
- Scripting: while the scripting language remains the same (GDScript), Godot 4 introduces many new features and improvements in the scripting system. GDScript 2 indeed introduces support for static typing, which allows developers to detect type errors at compile time. This simplifies code writing and reduces the number of errors that can occur during game execution.
- User Interface: the user interface of Godot 4 has been significantly improved compared to that of Godot 3. The user interface has been redesigned to be more intuitive and easy to use, and many features have been improved to be more accessible.
- Compatibility: Godot 4 is not completely compatible with projects created in Godot 3. However, there will be an option to import Godot 3 projects into Godot 4, and many projects can be converted without issue. However, there may be some incompatibilities that require code modification.
In conclusion, Godot 4 offers many new features and improvements compared to Godot 3, particularly in the area of rendering, resource management and performance, especially noticeable with 3D games. However, transitioning from Godot 3 to Godot 4 may require some time and effort to adapt to the new features and any incompatibilities.
