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Is there a good book to learn Godot? I've been waiting for such a book for some time. I have only been able to find online tutorials and videos, but I would lik

Is there a good book to learn Godot? I've been waiting for such a book for some time. I have only been able to find online tutorials and videos, but I would like an offline book.

TylerE 4y ago
No one writes dead tree books anymore. Stuff moves to fast. It’s out of date before the ink even dries.
- black_puppydog 4y ago
  The Rust Programming Language begs to differ. I learned rust this year, primarily from dead trees, and couldn't have done it without. Staring at a screen after a long day, and holding focus on a long text when I'm already in my browser, with literally the whole Web at my fingertips? No can do. Sitting down with a 300+ page book on programming? Yas please! This got me far enough that starting to do actual programming I felt secure enough with the basics that it never became overwhelming.
  - chefandy 4y ago
    It would be nice, but the fundamentals for every game engine I've seen have changed far more quickly than Rust fundamentals. Keep in mind... game engines aren't just programming language frameworks-- they're often inextricably tied to incredibly complex GUI applications and dozens of underlying systems that deal with things like lighting, animation, rendering efficiency, etc. etc. etc. Projects generally are assumed to remain in whatever engine version they're started in so version compatibility isn't a huge concern. The tutorial layer one half step above "Hello World" is generally unusable after whole number updates, and point releases bring changes that are fundamental enough to break "my first game" type projects. As someone who happily learned to code from paper books, I assure you that game engines bring different usage requirements. You could probably learn GDScript from a book (or really, just learn Python and read up on the differences,) but with engines these days, you're going to be going along for quite some time before coding becomes the primary barrier to achieving your goals.
prox 4y ago
I don’t think they are at the moment. You could ask in the official discord though, they usually are up to date on that sort of thing.
mordae 4y ago
Docs have some good walkthroughs. Other than that, it's very tinkering friendly.
runevault 4y ago
Not that I know of, and even the tutorials last time I looked are still factually incorrect though I haven't looked since Beta... 3? But some of the changes to nodes/classes with renamed properties/methods are still listed in the old, and before anyone asks yes I was looking at /latest/ not /stable/. I wish I'd taken notes so I could submit a PR but I just headbutted my way through it and moved on and only realized later I should have cloned the repo and updated the docs.
PaulsWallet 4y ago
There is no good "book" but the fine team over at GDQuest do a lot of written material in addition to their video courses. Their 2D Secrets course is entirely written with no video accompaniment. My suggestion is go through the docs, go through a couple short video courses, then pick up their 2D secrets course. It is the best written material for Godot currently available in my opinion
escherize 4y ago
It's not a book, but I think the most high quality introduction to Godot is by HeartBeast on youtube. I went through his "Pixel Platformer" video "Godot action RPG" playlist. These were quick and got me everything I needed to get started. Here are some games I made as a hobbyist with godot, in increasing complexity: - https://escherize.com/works/magnet https://escherize.com/works/magnet - https://escherize.com/evermeet https://escherize.com/evermeet - https://escherize.com/works/vampire https://escherize.com/works/vampire
- jedahan 4y ago
  really like the vampire (survivors-inspired?) side-scroller, thanks for sharing them all.
  - pedrosorio 4y ago
    I am curious what is survivors (a quick Google search didn't yield anything obvious) because the music is clearly from the Castlevania games.
    - kidfiji 4y ago
      OP is referencing Vampire Survivors: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1794680/Vampire_Survivors/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1794680/Vampire_Survivors...
    - 1123581321 4y ago
      Vampire Survivor like games are top-down action games where you move your character and it auto-attacks hordes of enemies. You gather XP and choose from a few options each level up. You end up selecting s handful of offensive and utility capabilities and get ultimate versions of them if you manage to max them out. There are some synergies between the different weapons and items you end up choosing in your build (complexity of synergies varies in the genre.) If you’re familiar with autochess, the leveling/building takes cues from that genre.
- Riverheart 4y ago
lazlee 4y ago
Godot Engine Game Development in 24 Hours, Sams Teach Yourself: The Official Guide to Godot 3.0 Which I believe is co-written by one of the founding devs. Amazon link - https://www.amazon.ca/Godot-Engine-Development-Hours-Yourself-ebook/dp/B07BFDQFL9 https://www.amazon.ca/Godot-Engine-Development-Hours-Yoursel...
amitmathew 4y ago
Our company creates Godot courses and while we have scripts for our videos, we’ve found it difficult to turn them into books. Game programming is just so visual, especially introductory content. Things like walking someone through the Godot editor is hard to convey in text. We’re working on it though!
chamakits 4y ago
This is the one I used: https://www.packtpub.com/product/godot-engine-game-development-projects/9781788831505 https://www.packtpub.com/product/godot-engine-game-developme... If you are a compulsive HumbleBundle buyer, you may already have it! If not, it's great. I didn't finish it, but I read through maybe a third of it, and that was enough for me to feel comfortable enough to learn the rest of it as I went. I wouldn't call myself an expert, but got far enough to publish a game (Puck Fantasy, available here: https://www.lowkeyart.com/puckfantasy https://www.lowkeyart.com/puckfantasy ), so I'd recommend the book!
chefandy 4y ago
Whoops, I responded to your comment on a different comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33794070 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33794070

Is there a good book to learn Godot? I've been waiting for such a book for some time. I have only been able to find online tutorials and videos, but I would like an offline book.

TylerE 4y ago

No one writes dead tree books anymore. Stuff moves to fast. It’s out of date before the ink even dries.

black_puppydog 4y ago
The Rust Programming Language begs to differ. I learned rust this year, primarily from dead trees, and couldn't have done it without. Staring at a screen after a long day, and holding focus on a long text when I'm already in my browser, with literally the whole Web at my fingertips? No can do. Sitting down with a 300+ page book on programming? Yas please! This got me far enough that starting to do actual programming I felt secure enough with the basics that it never became overwhelming.
- chefandy 4y ago
  It would be nice, but the fundamentals for every game engine I've seen have changed far more quickly than Rust fundamentals. Keep in mind... game engines aren't just programming language frameworks-- they're often inextricably tied to incredibly complex GUI applications and dozens of underlying systems that deal with things like lighting, animation, rendering efficiency, etc. etc. etc. Projects generally are assumed to remain in whatever engine version they're started in so version compatibility isn't a huge concern. The tutorial layer one half step above "Hello World" is generally unusable after whole number updates, and point releases bring changes that are fundamental enough to break "my first game" type projects. As someone who happily learned to code from paper books, I assure you that game engines bring different usage requirements. You could probably learn GDScript from a book (or really, just learn Python and read up on the differences,) but with engines these days, you're going to be going along for quite some time before coding becomes the primary barrier to achieving your goals.

prox 4y ago

I don’t think they are at the moment. You could ask in the official discord though, they usually are up to date on that sort of thing.

mordae 4y ago

Docs have some good walkthroughs. Other than that, it's very tinkering friendly.

runevault 4y ago

Not that I know of, and even the tutorials last time I looked are still factually incorrect though I haven't looked since Beta... 3? But some of the changes to nodes/classes with renamed properties/methods are still listed in the old, and before anyone asks yes I was looking at /latest/ not /stable/. I wish I'd taken notes so I could submit a PR but I just headbutted my way through it and moved on and only realized later I should have cloned the repo and updated the docs.

PaulsWallet 4y ago

There is no good "book" but the fine team over at GDQuest do a lot of written material in addition to their video courses. Their 2D Secrets course is entirely written with no video accompaniment. My suggestion is go through the docs, go through a couple short video courses, then pick up their 2D secrets course. It is the best written material for Godot currently available in my opinion

escherize 4y ago

It's not a book, but I think the most high quality introduction to Godot is by HeartBeast on youtube. I went through his "Pixel Platformer" video "Godot action RPG" playlist. These were quick and got me everything I needed to get started. Here are some games I made as a hobbyist with godot, in increasing complexity: - https://escherize.com/works/magnet https://escherize.com/works/magnet - https://escherize.com/evermeet https://escherize.com/evermeet - https://escherize.com/works/vampire https://escherize.com/works/vampire

jedahan 4y ago
really like the vampire (survivors-inspired?) side-scroller, thanks for sharing them all.
- pedrosorio 4y ago
  I am curious what is survivors (a quick Google search didn't yield anything obvious) because the music is clearly from the Castlevania games.
  - kidfiji 4y ago
    OP is referencing Vampire Survivors: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1794680/Vampire_Survivors/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/1794680/Vampire_Survivors...
  - 1123581321 4y ago
    Vampire Survivor like games are top-down action games where you move your character and it auto-attacks hordes of enemies. You gather XP and choose from a few options each level up. You end up selecting s handful of offensive and utility capabilities and get ultimate versions of them if you manage to max them out. There are some synergies between the different weapons and items you end up choosing in your build (complexity of synergies varies in the genre.) If you’re familiar with autochess, the leveling/building takes cues from that genre.
Riverheart 4y ago

lazlee 4y ago

Godot Engine Game Development in 24 Hours, Sams Teach Yourself: The Official Guide to Godot 3.0 Which I believe is co-written by one of the founding devs. Amazon link - https://www.amazon.ca/Godot-Engine-Development-Hours-Yourself-ebook/dp/B07BFDQFL9 https://www.amazon.ca/Godot-Engine-Development-Hours-Yoursel...

amitmathew 4y ago

Our company creates Godot courses and while we have scripts for our videos, we’ve found it difficult to turn them into books. Game programming is just so visual, especially introductory content. Things like walking someone through the Godot editor is hard to convey in text. We’re working on it though!

chamakits 4y ago

This is the one I used: https://www.packtpub.com/product/godot-engine-game-development-projects/9781788831505 https://www.packtpub.com/product/godot-engine-game-developme... If you are a compulsive HumbleBundle buyer, you may already have it! If not, it's great. I didn't finish it, but I read through maybe a third of it, and that was enough for me to feel comfortable enough to learn the rest of it as I went. I wouldn't call myself an expert, but got far enough to publish a game (Puck Fantasy, available here: https://www.lowkeyart.com/puckfantasy https://www.lowkeyart.com/puckfantasy ), so I'd recommend the book!

chefandy 4y ago

Whoops, I responded to your comment on a different comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33794070 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33794070