Here's one less reason for game developers to skip over using the free and open source Godot Engine, as it now has a free port available to bring games over to the Nintendo Switch.
You may remember recently that W4 Games, a company set-up by some of the Godot team, announced their own console port availability that has a cost attached to it which at a basic minimum would be $800 a year for a single console. Many felt the price was too much but, since it's all open source, anyone else could come up with a porting solution and now they have — for the Nintendo Switch at least.
RAWRLAB Games announced the free Godot Engine port for authorised Nintendo Switch developers, supporting projects made with Godot versions 3.5.x and 4.1.x. Features of the port:
· Complimentary access: Available at no cost to all authorised Nintendo Switch developers.
· License: The source code is distributed under the MIT License, offering broad usage and modification rights.
· Software provisioning: The software is provided "as is," without any implied warranty or support of any kind.
· Basic functionality included: This port includes only basic functionality.
· No C# or GDNative/GDExtension: Only GDScript is supported. Native extensions are not supported, but you can try to convert them into internal modules.
· Optimization Level: It is important to note that the port is not highly optimized but is adequately efficient for most small to mid-sized game projects.
· Expandability: Having access to the source code, developers with C++ knowledge have the opportunity to add and integrate additional functionalities as needed.
· No support provided: This port is provided without support. Developers are encouraged to engage with the community on the Nintendo Developer Portal for collaboration and assistance. We recommend partnering with porting companies for medium or large-sized projects.
· Access Procedure: Access can be requested through the Nintendo Developer Portal.
See the RAWRLAB Games announcement.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: ChesckDamn this looks like yet another huge win for Godot. Since the Switch is the main console Indie devs tend to want to port to, now having apparently a free option to do that may make the biggest disadvantage Godot had a lot less disadvantageous.The downside is that this is out of tree - we don't know how easy it will be to keep up to date with future Godot versions. Think of how Nvidia drivers routinely break with new kernel releases. Unlike Nvidia, there is no commercial organization with interest in keeping this up to date. This would probably be relatively easy to merge into Godot, if not for the fact that Nintendo's NDA prevents it...
Quoting: kokoko3kQuoting: Pikoloout of treeWhat is out of what tree?
Out of Godot main repo. In this context it kinda means without official support. If not for Nintendo's license, this could be a pull request to the Godot main project so it would be maintained by Godot maintainers
QuoteBasic functionality included: This port includes only basic functionality.This was really vague--it implies that any portion of the engine, from 3d to physics to networking, or even parts of 2d, could simply be entirely absent--and I asked them to elaborate on Twitter, but they just told me to look at existing games made with the port. I initially grilled them for dodging the question, but then someone reminded me that NDAs exist for consoles and they are extremely draconian. It's likely that the only thing you can do to find out what functionality is actually present in this port is to ask them in Nintendo's developer portal.
Last edited by TiZ on 24 January 2024 at 4:38 pm UTC
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