After another big move, the project is now running on Godot 4! This took a lot of effort because there are many script, shader and Node changes that could not be converted automatically. I have been slowly making progress since Alpha 10 of Godot 4.0 was released, to get ready for stable. Now it's finally here with all the new features and performance improvements available. First of the Vulkan renderer has been performing great without losing any of the features that were in 3.5.1. Volumetric fog was added which is absolutely necessary for a game with a Film Noire style.  

To decorate the levels and make them look more interesting, I've been adding a lot more assets. These were made by dada design and fit the game very well. Some of these object need to be made interactive so the gameplay is more dynamic. I still have some ideas on how to improve the performance to fit more assets into a level. But that has to wait for the next release.

I hope you all enjoy the changes I made in this version of Blacktrace!

Changes:

• Converted the project to Godot 4!
• Added volumetric fog to all the levels which can be disabled in the settings if performance is an issue.
• Baked all the character animations for more precise movement and blending. Thanks to the Game Rig Tools Addon for Blender.
• Swapping out character meshes when shooting off limbs is now smoother.
• Characters now use only one rig for bone attachments and ragdolls, this should result in better performance.
• Added a lot more environmental assets. Made by dada design.
• Shortened the intro animations and fading to black.
• Characters are now smooth shaded with a canvas material to make them look like actual ragdolls.
• Bullet impacts and bruises on character only show on the impact side, not on the back side.
• Worked on the lighting in all the levels to balance visibility with aesthetics.
• Many many many bug fixes and performance improvements that are not interesting to read about.