Over on the Godot Engine blog they recently put together a summary of some of the exciting new 2D features that will arrive in Godot 4. Today we go hands-on with the majority of these new features. In addition to the new tricks showcased in the video there are other 2D improvements in Godot 4 including across the board performance improvements (due to the new Vulkan renderer and internal optimizations) as well as support for 2D signed distance fields.
Highlighted new features include:
- new 2D CanvasTexture with support for diffuse, normal and specular maps
- better support for 2D lights (all drawn in a single pass)
- directional light and shadow support
- new child clipping feature
- new CanvasGroup for grouping multiple sprites into a single draw call
In addition to these new features, Godot have also just released an update on the improvements to tilemap support, which will be covered in a separate video. Check out the video below to see these excellent new Godot 2D features in action.