Animation, Baking and Concepts - Game Developers Network

From Concept to Completion: Navigating the Game Art Production Pipeline

iXie gaming

MARCH 28, 2025

Whether its a photorealistic RPG or a stylized indie game, every visual element follows a structured journey from concept to integration. But how exactly does a simple sketch transform into a fully animated, game-ready asset? This stage involves close collaboration between game designers, art directors, and concept artists.

Concepts

Concepts Art Texture Asset

Dev snapshot: Godot 4.4 beta 1

Mircosoft Game Dev

JANUARY 16, 2025

Breaking changes Animation Audio C# Core Editor GDScript Import Input Physics Platforms Rendering and shaders XR New in Beta 1! Add transparency support for LightmapGI Currently when baking lightmaps users have to choose between transparent objects casting shadows as if they were fully opaque, or not casting shadows at all.

Beta

Beta Dev Lightmap Baking

Strategies for Optimizing Multiplayer Games in Unity

Logic Simplified

APRIL 4, 2025

The utilization of Baked Lighting for static region precomputation results in enhanced runtime performance. Optimizing Animations for Smooth Performance Animations add realism but can strain multiplayer performance. Proper memory management ensures smooth, stutter-free multiplayer gameplay.

Games

Games Texture Render Balance

Animation data rework for 4.0

Mircosoft Game Dev

OCTOBER 31, 2021

has now been completed, resulting in much improved usability when dealing animation data. Animation data. While there are upcoming improvements on the general animation system, one key aspect that required a strong redesign and subsequent rework in Godot is the way that animation data is stored.

Animation

Animation Animation Data Alpha

What We Can Learn About LiveOps From the 2024 Mobile Gamedev Award Winners

Game Refinery

MAY 30, 2024

All these crossovers come in different shapes and sizes too, spanning everything from fashion brands, automotive, anime, TV, movies, and even other video games. Each partner event has a theme (like baking a cake, for example), with each team of two having its own target to reach (done by playing the game and building up event currency).

Mobile

Mobile Mobile Co-op Mobile Gaming

Navigation Server for Godot 4.0

Mircosoft Game Dev

FEBRUARY 19, 2020

Runtime navigation mesh baking. If you're unfamiliar with the concept of "servers" used in the Godot architecture, you can refer to this past devblog and the documentation. If you're unfamiliar with the concept of "servers" used in the Godot architecture, you can refer to this past devblog and the documentation.

Agent

Agent Baking Collision Mesh

The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #35

Astral Clock Tower Studios

DECEMBER 19, 2021

Kristala does feel like a traditional indie Soulslike game in many ways, but we've also lovingly baked in a ton of elements that will appeal to fans of other genres too. Concept Art. And with a dark fantasy action RPG like Kristala, there's pleeenty of concepts to go around, especially when it comes to weapons and armor.

Dev

Dev Concepts Animation Animation

Crazy and Fun Time Management Kitchen Game

Logic Simplified

JULY 18, 2022

Animator - 3. Tap to grill, bake and prepare dishes to the top. In 2019, they approached Logic Simplified to build a crazy and fun cooking game with a similar concept to Cooking Craze, but with unique locations and classic restaurant dishes. Stunning graphics and catchy animations were well-optimized. Game Genre.

Games

Games Entertainment Baking Animation

Origins of Ghost Master, Part One

iHobo

OCTOBER 26, 2022

And it's all down to Gregg Barnett, frankly - he had the concept, and he handed it onto me to craft into a design. And that was baked into the design from the beginning. We actually had concept art for a monstrous version of Cogjammer based on the gremlin in the movie-version of the same story - but it was too scary.

Film

Film Horror Concepts Animation

The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #27

Astral Clock Tower Studios

MARCH 20, 2021

In today's issue, we're servin' up some serious updates on a few large-scale, ongoing 3D models and concept pieces. Using a few detailed concepts from our art department, our 3D Character Designer, Bianca, has been working the past few sprints on modeling out each of our three Kota soldier variants and their accompanying armor sets.

Dev

Dev Rigging Concepts Demo

The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #21

Astral Clock Tower Studios

SEPTEMBER 10, 2020

Bianca manually did the retopology for the nymph, unwrapped and laid out the maps, baked the details, and started to spend time learning more about texturing in Substance Painter. Although Pete joined our team as a second Concept Artist (and is damn good at it too), he's proven to be an equally talented Character Modeler. Concept Art.

Dev

Dev Clipping Demo Concepts

The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #28

Astral Clock Tower Studios

APRIL 21, 2021

Concept Art. As part of our demo overhaul, we recently welcomed a few new team members into our motley crew in order to help us better establish the dark-fantasy vibe we're going for—including the newest member to our Concept Art team, Harold. Curious about Harold's process for building out each concept's composition?

Dev

Dev Concepts Demo Texture

Deathloop deconstruction / design thoughts

Radiator Blog

NOVEMBER 10, 2021

where the main drawback is you're still vulnerable during the 2 second execution animation. The game says you must kill her first, like this, always -- and if she always dies so early, that means her concept doesn't get to interact with anyone else. but you can only safely do this if you have 50% or more health already.

Fighting

Fighting NPC Puzzle AI

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 5

Mircosoft Game Dev

JUNE 27, 2022

The new NavigationServer adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. Animation: Add option to paste animation as duplicate ( GH-60226 ). Animation: New SceneTreeTween backported from Godot 4.0 ( GH-60581 ). x one, or adopt the new API from 4.0.

Render

Render Shaders Mesh Console

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 6

Mircosoft Game Dev

JULY 8, 2022

The new NavigationServer adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. Animation: Add option to paste animation as duplicate ( GH-60226 ). Animation: New SceneTreeTween backported from Godot 4.0 ( GH-60581 ). x one, or adopt the new API from 4.0.

Render

Render Shaders Mesh Console

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 8

Mircosoft Game Dev

JULY 28, 2022

The new NavigationServer adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. Animation: Add option to paste animation as duplicate ( GH-60226 ). Animation: New SceneTreeTween backported from Godot 4.0 ( GH-60581 ). x one, or adopt the new API from 4.0.

Render

Render Shaders Mesh Console

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 1

Mircosoft Game Dev

MAY 18, 2022

This adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. To help with the common task of accessing specific nodes from scripts, Juan Linietsky ( reduz ) added the concept of "scene unique names" for nodes in the master branch ( GH-60298 ), and Tomasz backported it for 3.5.

Render

Render Shaders Console Culling

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 7

Mircosoft Game Dev

JULY 22, 2022

The new NavigationServer adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. Animation: Add option to paste animation as duplicate ( GH-60226 ). Animation: New SceneTreeTween backported from Godot 4.0 ( GH-60581 ). x one, or adopt the new API from 4.0.

Render

Render Shaders Mesh Console

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 3

Mircosoft Game Dev

JUNE 1, 2022

The new NavigationServer adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. Animation: Add option to paste animation as duplicate ( GH-60226 ). Animation: New SceneTreeTween backported from Godot 4.0 ( GH-60581 ). x one, or adopt the new API from 4.0.

Render

Render Shaders Mesh Console

Godot 3.1 is out, improving usability and features

Mircosoft Game Dev

MARCH 13, 2019

Revamped animation editor. Use baked lightmaps instead. Revamped animation editor. The animation editor has also been completely rewritten to ensure a much better experience. New track type: Animation (play animations of sub-animation player, allowing complex cinematics). Optional typing in GDScript.

Feature

Feature Render Editing Shaders

Dev snapshot: Godot 3.5 beta 5

Mircosoft Game Dev

MAY 3, 2022

This adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. To help with the common task of accessing specific nodes from scripts, Juan Linietsky ( reduz ) added the concept of "scene unique names" for nodes in the master branch ( GH-60298 ), and Tomasz backported it for 3.5.

Beta

Beta Dev Shaders Render

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 2

Mircosoft Game Dev

MAY 24, 2022

The new NavigationServer adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. Animation: Add option to paste animation as duplicate ( GH-60226 ). Animation: New SceneTreeTween backported from Godot 4.0 ( GH-60581 ). x one, or adopt the new API from 4.0.

Render

Render Shaders Mesh Console

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 4

Mircosoft Game Dev

JUNE 17, 2022

The new NavigationServer adds support for obstacle avoidance using the RVO2 library, and navigation meshes can now be baked at runtime. Animation: Add option to paste animation as duplicate ( GH-60226 ). Animation: New SceneTreeTween backported from Godot 4.0 ( GH-60581 ). x one, or adopt the new API from 4.0.

Render

Render Shaders Mesh Console

Game Developers Network

From Concept to Completion: Navigating the Game Art Production Pipeline

Dev snapshot: Godot 4.4 beta 1

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Animation data rework for 4.0

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Navigation Server for Godot 4.0

The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #35

Crazy and Fun Time Management Kitchen Game

Origins of Ghost Master, Part One

The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #27

The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #21

The Kristala Dev Blog - Issue #28

Deathloop deconstruction / design thoughts

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 5

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 6

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 8

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 1

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 7

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 3

Godot 3.1 is out, improving usability and features

Dev snapshot: Godot 3.5 beta 5

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 2

Release candidate: Godot 3.5 RC 4

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