It's like he's being paid to make Stadia more unpopular. :whistle:

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Quoting: setzer22There's hundreds of tutorials out there that will become outdated. How many of them will be fixed by their original developers? Because otherwise, they're as good as gone.

Then let them be gone.

A clean API that is easier to learn and understand is worth more than having old tutorials or plugins that haven't been updated in three years still be valid.
Every programmer worth their salt knows that they have to take old, unofficial (!!) tutorials with a grain of salt.
Everyone who writes tutorials knows this, too.
This is software development. Things can change rapidly, and so do APIs.

It isn't possible to create middleware API (which Godot is) and never change it for its entire lifetime if you also strive to improve it. That would require an amount of foreknowledge that nobody has.
At best, you can offer long-term support for older versions, which is the standard method most use, including Godot.

Also, you are mistaken about the Node->Node3D thing.
The current situation is that there is the base class, Node.
Then there is the 2D class deriving from it, Node2D.
Then there is the 3D class deriving from it, Spatial.
Wait, what - Spatial? That doesn't fit with the rest. And it has confused new users since the beginning of Godot.
Renaming it to Node3D will make it easier for everyone.
And I don't really doubt that people finding "Spatial" in some old tutorial will manage - if they aren't directly told by the editor "Hey, you typed Spatial. Did you know that Spatial is now Node3D?".

Quoting: setzer22https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyLBGkS5ICk And let me tell you this guy is no charlatan, he's the main designer of a programming language used by thousands of developers, and he managed to do so for 10+ years while never breaking an API :)

That's nice and all, but not comparable. First of all, programming languages are way more static than middleware.
A lot more thinking goes into designing their API than what is done or even possible for most middleware.
They change very slowly, if at all. Just look at the snail-pace of changes in C++.

Also look at PHP for a language that everyone knows is in dire need of a redesign with all its myriad of different styles and paradigms all mixed together (hell, not even function names follow a singular naming pattern).
Yet it isn't changed - why? Because it would almost literally break half the internet. It can't do that redesign anymore. It's too late.

Changing Godot API would only "break" some old, unofficial tutorials and require some small effort if you are porting from 3.X to 4.X - that's it.

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That website is just beautiful.
It's like something I'd have done in the late 90s or early 2000s.

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Quoting: setzer22This is the one thing I'll never understand about godot (and Blender has the exact same problem). Why do they have so little care for backwards compatibility? :sad:

Because backwards compatibility drags every project down with additional maintenance cost.
Windows STILL has to carry legacy code and support around that is by now ~20 years old.

Godot is in the position that they don't have to do that - and so they don't.
They already limit themselves to changes for major versions (and even backport improvements where possible) - that's more than reasonable.

If you think that doing a global find/replace for Node -> Node3D is a real problem, then I don't know what to tell you.
Though 4.0 will break a lot more than that. Porting a larger 3.2 project to 4.0 will probably take the better part of a week with API changes that go beyond renaming stuff.
I do hope they'll provide an extensive porting guide.

And that's still better than carrying legacy code around because it means Godot will actually be able to shed or replace old code instead of having to maintain it, making a much better use of their limited resources.

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In the category "Headlines you won't see about Unreal Engine".

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Quoting: Liam Dawe

Quoting: LinasDo we have any details on how they make these Windows-only DirectX 12 games work on Stadia? I mean, is it actually running on Linux? [Conspiracy theory intensifies]

Stadia is Linux, Debian Linux, just running in the cloud. Games need to run on Linux + Vulkan to work on Stadia. Games are ported to Stadia, just like they are for any other platform.

It frustrates me somewhat that this is true, but somehow doesn't seem to lead to more Linux releases of titles supporting Stadia.

It should be such a small step from Stadia to generic Linux release, shouldn't it?

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In other news, the Stadia team recently held a Q&A session with Founders in a special section on their community site. In response to questions about people pointing out the famous Google Graveyard, something people love to bring up constantly, Chris from Google replied to say:

You can rest assured that Google is in it for the long haul. We saw something special in cloud gaming, and we think we have the tools and knowledge to push this technology to the next level. It's okay to be unsure; the future is uncertain. But we care deeply about this space, because we are gamers too, and we want Stadia to succeed.

While the other Stadia staff member involved in the Q&A, Grace, said:

Ah, yes I hope you all know that I see those comments that say "Stadia is headed for the Google Graveyard". My response to this is... please give the Stadia team time. It's been less than a year since we've launched, and we have a lot in store for you all.

So, essentially, they said nothing that could actually alleviate any reasonable fears that this won't be around anymore in a year or two.
It's just PR blurb, of course they are saying this. I'd bet money they said the same thing about Google+ and all the other projects in the graveyard at the time.

Which, to be fair, is the only thing they can say and I don't even doubt they really mean it.
It's just not their decision when the higher-ups decide that the time is over.

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Quoting: DefaultX-od

Quoting: dpanterWho designed the new website? :neutral:
Granted the old site wasn't exactly amazing either, but this new one is impressively poor...

Ok, boomer

Nah, got nothing do with it.

It just really isn't well designed. At least the colors aren't.
Way too much contrast all-around with the alternating between straight white and almost-black when scrolling, the colors when hovering over things are just all over the place neon-styled rainbows, etc.
The navigation itself isn't that bad.
Honestly, it just needs some improved CSS to prevent triggering epilepsy when scrolling too fast ;)

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Quoting: slaapliedje

Quoting: TheSHEEEP

Quoting: slaapliedjeMy first Elder Scrolls game was Daggerfall. It still seems to be the 'best, and most ambitious' of the games. It expanded on what was in Arena, and made the land huge. Then came Morrowind, which is a fantastic game, but tiny in comparison to Daggerfall... Then Oblivion, they dumbed down and Skyrim they dumbed down further. All of the little side games that came out for it were even more basic. Wonder what MS will do with the series now that they own Zenimax...

I generally agree, but I wonder what you think they dumbed down from Oblivion to Skyrim.
Honestly, I think Skyrim is better than Oblivion in every regard and I don't see any further dumbing down between those two games, just a fixing of tons of mistakes from Oblivion.

A Morrowind-quality (and gameplay depth) game at the size of Skyrim is something I'd really love to play. Not that it will ever happen, of course.
AA/AAA devs nowadays are simply too afraid of doing open gameplay RPG systems that allow players to potentially break their "balance" and demand some time & thought investment.

Two things off the top if my head, skill progression, and ammo no longer weighed anything.

Isn't skill progression the same in all Elder Scrolls games?
You improve a skill by using it, you get a level-up after X improvements. What exactly the level-up does differs, but I'd really only call that differ, not dumb down.
Oblivion gets base stat improvements, Skyrim has these skill "trees".
I'd even call that added complexity as stats are a no-brainer (you'll always bump your main stats in Oblivion and ignore the rest), while these trees at least offered some choices (not good ones, mind you, at least without mods).

Ammo without weight?
Yeah, thankfully! If a game doesn't give you the (very realistic, but somehow almost never implemented) option of having a horse+cart, the least it should do is not bog down your weight with stuff like ammo or gold.
You already have to do multiple treks to clear out dungeons that actually contain some good loot.
Without ways to deal with the added weight, ammo/currency weight only serves to stretch gameplay and add menial repetition, which I do not consider positive gameplay elements.

Oh, wait, Daggerfall actually has that horse+cart! Plus banks to deal with your masses of gold.
Yeah, I remember how I was first pissed at how weight is handled (even currency has weight in Daggerfall), but then was pleasantly surprised that they give you the possibility to get a horse+cart as well as exchange your gold for bank certificates (which can be exchanged for gold again at different locations).
Definitely the best solution to the problem - man that game was, and in some ways still is, ahead of its time.

But having no weight for ammo/gold is still better than having weight for them, but no ways to deal with it.

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I used to use Plasma, but for the second time now, this ancient, still unfixed bug where the kwin_x11 process just continues to hog up CPU until 100% (making the entire system unresponsive) has occurred - and once it does, only fresh install will fix it.

In the end, I just switched to Cinnamon. Not quite as pretty, but a hell of a lot more reliable.

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