The fourth test version of Godot 4.5 is now available, bringing new features like support for embedded windows on macOS, moving 3D physics interpolation to SceneTree, the option to export variables as Variant, stackable outlines on Label, specular occlusion from ambient light, and improvements to the renderer.

Users of macOS have shown a keen interest in integrating their windows within the editor; however, this functionality is specific to the operating system and involves low-level implementation. Stuart Carnie implemented this feature in GH-105884, which operates differently from the implementations on Windows and Linux. The updated architecture for 3D physics interpolation effectively resolves the issue by transferring all logic to SceneTree while preserving the current API.

The issue regarding the export of variables as Variant has been resolved with GH-89324, enabling users to modify both the variable and its type. Stackable outlines on Label have been introduced to enable users to incorporate elegant outline or shadow effects without the need to overlay multiple text objects directly on top of one another.

Specular occlusion from ambient light has been improved by making several specific changes, such as adding Node.get_orphan_node_ids, updating Node.print_orphan_nodes, adding support for compression levels in the Zip module, fixing bugs in typed dictionaries, improving the crash handler for printing script backtrace, and adding a drag zoom feature with CTRL+MiddleMouseButton, along with other enhancements.

The release includes upgrades to the Android platform, such as yearly version updates, better management of fifo_v1, improved suspension logic, adding meshes to the Video RAM Profiler, switching from the current BRDF approximation to a DFG LUT with multiscattering energy compensation, custom interpolation for wheels, and making built-in region information available in shaders.

Dev snapshot: Godot 4.5 dev 4

To everyone who ended up going to GodotCon this past week, we hope you had a safe journey home! For those of you that missed the fun, we’ve logged some of the highlights on the blog already—such as the long-awaited  web support for .NET—with more to come later in the week. As always, we’ve recorded all of our GodotCon talks, and those shall be uploaded to our  YouTube channel in a few weeks. With that now behind us, we can go full-steam ahead on our next development snapshot: 4.5 dev 4. Plenty of new features this time around, so feedback and bug reports from testing are once again strongly recommended.

Jump to the Downloads section, and give it a spin right now, or continue reading to learn more about improvements in this release. You can also  try the Web editor or the Android editor for this release. If you are interested in the latter, please request to join  our testing group to get access to pre-release builds.

In case you missed them, see the  4.5 dev 1,  4.5 dev 2, and  4.5 dev 3 release notes for an overview of some key features which were already in those snapshots, and are therefore still available for testing in dev 4.

macOS: Embedded window support

After Windows and Linux users got to experience the benefits of embedding their windows in the editor, macOS users have understandably been expressing interest in the same coming to their platform. Easier said than done, as this feature is OS-specific and very low-level, so implementation requires someone both extremely knowledgeable in a niche area and actually owning the platform in question for proper testing. Thankfully, both of these qualifications were met by  Stuart Carnie, who was up to the task of integrating this behemoth in  GH-105884. The results should speak for themselves:

The macOS implementation works differently from the Windows and Linux implementations. Since macOS does not allow the kind of window manipulation that Windows and Linux use for game window embedding, macOS uses an inter-process communication approach where the framebuffer is sent from the game process (which performs off-screen rendering) to the editor window. Input events are also sent from the editor window to the game process. This approach is more complex, but is also more robust as it doesn’t rely on window management tricks that can fall apart in certain edge cases. This approach may be ported later to Windows/Linux in a future release, as it would help improve the reliability of game window embedding.

Move 3D physics interpolation to SceneTree

The old design of the 3D interpolation system was fundamentally flawed, as it operated under the assumption that the scene side wouldn’t require access to interpolated transforms. This isn’t something that could’ve just been “patched in” either, thanks to the multithreaded design, command queue, and stalling. Lacking any sort of workaround,  lawnjelly has taken a break from being the person responsible for 90% of 3.x code nowadays and  forward-ported a solution via  GH-104269. This addresses the problem by porting all logic to the SceneTree, while completely retaining the existing API!

No changes are needed to existing projects to benefit from the new 3D physics interpolation architecture.

Export variables as Variant

Despite both arrays and dictionaries technically supporting Variant values, this functionality was never actually exposed in isolation. That is: it was impossible to export a variable of type Variant directly.  Tomasz Chabora found this limitation quite silly, so took to addressing this grave injustice with  GH-89324. Now users are granted extra flexibility with their exports, as the option is now available to change not only the variable, but the type itself.

Stackable outlines on Label

Have you ever been in the situation where you want to add fancy outline or shadow effects to your text, only to realize that you’re stuck with only one of each? Sure, you can double-up the amount of text objects directly atop one-another, but that’s cumbersome and doesn’t account for outlines affecting other outlines. There must be a better way! Well, thanks to the efforts of  Delsin-Yu, users no longer have to struggle with this moral conundrum. Instead, they can simply take advantage of  GH-104731 adding support for stacked layers of effects; no cumbersome workarounds required.

Specular occlusion from ambient light

Our renderer currently lacks a cheap option for specular occlusion, causing certain metallic/reflective materials to still receive reflections when they should be darkened/occluded. 

There are too many exciting changes to list them all here, but here’s a curated selection:

• Core: Add Node.get_orphan_node_ids, edit Node.print_orphan_nodes ( GH-83757).
• Core: Add compression level support to Zip module ( GH-103283).
• Core: Fix for debugging typed dictionaries ( GH-106170).
• Core: Print script backtrace in the crash handler ( GH-105741).
• Editor: Add editor setting to collapse main menu into a MenuButton ( GH-105944).
• Editor: Enable Auto Reload Scripts on External Change by default in the editor settings ( GH-97148).
• GUI: Add drag zoom feature with CTRL+MiddleMouseButton ( GH-105625).
• GUI: Add property to control showing the virtual keyboard on focus events ( GH-106114).
• Import: Use libjpeg-turbo for improved jpg compatibility and speed ( GH-104347).
• Network: mbedTLS: Fix concurrency issues with TLS ( GH-106167).
• Particles: Overhaul the cull mask internals for Lights, Decals, and Particle Colliders ( GH-102399).
• Porting: Android: Annual versions bump for the Android platform ( GH-106152).
• Porting: Android: Bump the minimum supported SDK version to 24 ( GH-106148).
• Porting: Wayland: Handle fifo_v1 and clean up suspension logic ( GH-101454).
• Rendering: Add Meshes to the Video RAM Profiler ( GH-103238).
• Rendering: Allow moving meshes without motion vectors ( GH-105437).
• Rendering: Forward+: Replace the current BRDF approximation with a DFG LUT and add multiscattering energy compensation ( GH-103934).
• Rendering: FTI - Add custom interpolation for wheels ( GH-105915).
• Shaders: Expose built-in region information ( GH-90436).

Changelog

105 contributors submitted 261 fixes for this release. See our  interactive changelog for the complete list of changes since the previous 4.5-dev3 snapshot.

Dev snapshot: Godot 4.5 dev 4