Armory 0.5 is out!

Releases
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Armory 0.5

New builds are up and can be downloaded at:

Support Armory development:
https://armory3d.org/fund

Get started:
http://armory3d.org/manual/#/getting_started/setup

Note: Using the built-in updater will not pull in all updates, please get the full package manually from itch.io or clone the sdk if you are migrating from 0.4.

Release notes:

Check out full commit logs:

Updates:

  • 0.5b builds are now up, including lot of fixes from the 0.5 testing period.

  • Both Blender 2.79 and (updated) Blender 2.8 versions are available. Use 2.79 by default, 2.8 is experimental only. 2.8 contains the viewport player.

  • We are now running on Haxe 4! Check out the Haxe release notes at:
    https://haxe.org/download/list/

  • Kode Studio has been updated! Runs on the latest VS Code. Krom now launches directly from Kode Studio.

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  • Krom binary is now 2.8x smaller, single executable with no external dlls / libs. It is using the Chakra engine by default. V8 builds are available on GitHub.

  • Kha / Kore has a new windowing system under the hood. Managing multiple windows per application is easier.

  • Krom window on macOS correctly pops up to the foreground now (thanks poke1024!)

  • Character skinning CPU performance has been improved and consumes less memory now.

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  • First work on the raytracing API for Kha is now merged. Runs on Direct3D12, Vulkan support will be added. Hybrid raytracing render-path is in the works for Armory.

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  • Related GDC presentation:

  • Tons of improvements pushed to our Direct3D12 / Vulkan / Metal backends. Shader compilation is now more robust.

  • More progress on the Graphics5 API in Kha. This API is designed to take the full advantage of Vulkan / Direct3D12 / Metal APIs.

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  • Build system has been improved, now with multi-threaded shader and asset compilation. Depending on the number of processor cores, build times should be significantly faster. Use Armory add-on preferences - Khamake Threads to configure number of threads.

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  • Drawing order can be now set in the Armory Render Path panel using the Draw Order property.

  • Blending modes can be manually set for the material now.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVw3B5e4Rjs

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  • Self-contained Armory mesh exporter has been updated, useful when using Iron library:
    https://github.com/armory3d/iron/tree/master/tools

  • Particle Systems are now properly cleaned up on removal.

  • Improved folder structure for published games, all data is now placed in a single folder.
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  • More fixes to mesh batching and level-of-detail features.

  • Initial support for handling big world coordinates, currently behind the arm_centerworld flag. Will be enabled by default in the future.

  • Bezier interpolation for object actions has been implemented.

  • Iron has more code docs now (thanks kenthinson!)
    https://github.com/armory3d/iron/pull/45

  • Math module has been reworked for more performance.

  • Improved CPU performance when performing draw dispatch in the render path.

  • When switching scenes, voxel volume is now properly updated (voxelao/gi).

  • Improved performance for C/C++ targets, Armory asset parser will load data into classes through @:structInit.

  • Unwrap type can now be set in the Armory Bake tools.

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  • Warning will be shown on wrong logic node connection.

  • Warning will be shown on missing UV coords / vertex colors.

  • Warning will be shown when trait script file is not found.

  • Save on Build option is off by default now.

  • Bundle and Icon can now be specified in Armory Exporter.

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  • Logic nodes will no longer throw exception when receiving null input.

  • Look At logic node has been added.

  • Deg to Rad and Rad to Deg logic nodes has been added.

  • New Debug Console - contains log viewer, scripting, render-path inspector, profiler and resource watcher.

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  • Added a new Array Slice and Array Splice nodes.

  • Added a new Contains String node.

  • Get Child node allows to specify object name search type.

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  • Pausing / resetting physics world is fixed.

  • More fixes on the mobile browser compatibility.

  • Removing item in the Armory Lod panel also removes the generated lod mesh now.

  • Fixes to the Mapping, Hue/Saturation, UV Map material nodes.

  • More vertex displacement fixes (displacement can by driven by vertex color now).

  • Reduced shadow artifacts when using tessellation.

  • Updated exporter with preparations for shape keys support.

  • Added support for Tangent material node.

  • Color Ramp material node now works properly, handles multiple color stops and interpolation modes.

  • Armory Updater will now properly print a message once the update is completed.

  • Armory Updater now also handles updating Krom binaries.

  • Blending has been fixed for the forward render path.

  • Fixed TAA artifacts when coupled with displacement.

  • Added a new Switch logic node (thanks devination!)

  • Initial support for Vector Curves and RGB Curves material nodes

  • Math logic node has been updated with newly added functions.

  • Added a new Set Particle Speed logic node.

  • UI Scale property set in Armory add-on preferences will now also affect Debug Console.

  • Fixed soft-body physics compilation for C++ targets.

  • Improved handling of linked materials.

  • Added new Set Light Color and Set Light Strength logic nodes.

  • Local Armory SDK setup is now possible. Build system can generate relative paths. This lets you have a fully self-contained and portable project setup:
    https://armory3d.org/manual/#/dev/contribute?id=full-sdk

  • Added support for Backfacing socket in the Geometry material node.

  • Armory now takes Properties - Scene - Rigid Body World - Solver Iterations into account.

  • Check out the new logic node tutorials by Armory, Blender, Game!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlEWfpCpFXw&list=PLCRDzlGnyXOOCrpCXlkezMTj9GTa7B0zu

Explore repositories on GitHub:

Hunt all the bugs, help Armory reach 1.0:

Next up:

Armory 0.5 marks a gigantic step for the engine with tons of challenges resolved and continued performance upgrades. The focus of 0.6 will be fixing graphics features, adding new ones like the Light Probe support and improving graphics performance.

We are also close to run Krom on Android, which will let us run Armory projects on Android straight from Blender in matter of seconds. :slightly_smiling_face:

And of course the continued bug fixing - the road to 0.6 begins! :bug:

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20 Likes
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Yeah!!! Finally!!!:sunglasses:

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booooooom AweSome!!!

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Great! I am busy with other stuff these weeks, will come back to test it more!

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Wow! lots of awesome new features! Keep up the great work!

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What happen to World Creator Tool?? did not hear anything about it.Would be awesome to hear about that…

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Please consider improving the integration of physics engines into Armory for the next versions.

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Just bought it! And hoping for a FSM animator design interface in the future.

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WOW!!! Good job!! I can’t believe all of the amazing stuff that you are doing! Keep up the good work!

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Oh man, this is great stuff!! Thank you!

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I suggest improving AI by adding Hierarchical Finite State Machines.
Then, in the Navmesh, Steering Behaviours and Jump Points.

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So it’s been a very, very long time now since Armory 3d has been officially updated, so does that mean it’s dead? Yeah I know Armor Paint is alive and well, but what happened to Armory3d? Yeah I know the developer is getting so much money for Armor Paint, so does that mean they no longer have time for Armor3d, which they promised through their initial crowd funding to develop, before Armor Paint took off and all that big money started rolling in? If not, than what’s up? It’s been over 2 years and nothing! If it looks like a duck, sounds like a duck and walks like a duck, than… Just saying it’s very fishy that no official updates in over 2 years usually means one thing. ABANDONED!!! If I’m wrong than lets see 0.6 or 0.7, or maybe 0.8! BTW I posted this 10/01/2020, not Jul 2019!

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Hi, this is just the last official release thread in this forum, Amory still gets monthly updates (today SDK 2020.10 was released) :slight_smile: Lubos (the main developer) is not that active anymore as you already said but Armory is still alive and there are many contributions by various people, bug fixes, new features etc.

If you want to get more information about what’s new, take a look at the now quarterly released [Armory Digest] - September 2020. Also there is the Armory 2020 thread on GitHub by Lubos himself where he writes about his plans for Armory in 2020, a few things from this list (Vulkan support etc.) are already done. GitHub is the place where you will get all the information about what’s currently happening, so it’s worth to follow the development there (latest commits for Armory).

But you’re right, from the official side of development Armory is pretty much behind Armorpaint, Lubos gets a lot of money (Epic mega grant for example) and attention for it, so for him its best to support Armorpaint as much as he can.

@xananax Maybe you can give @Naxela permissions to post the Armory Digest in this forum category? This way the Release category would be used again.

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Thanks for your reply. First I would like to point out that developer versions are often unstable and therefore not as credible as official versions which were 2 years ago. Second the latest version of the Armory Digest is 4 month old, which doesn’t convey confidence in anyone but the most die hard fans. Third the Development link you gave isn’t very helpful to anyone, who are not developers of Armory or have some real experience with programming since they do not explain anything in depth, but show examples of code that was used. While it maybe true that there is an under ground ban of programming savvy fans working on updating, fixing and trying to improve Armory, without official backing and a credible source of updating data, examples, etc. it is very difficult to believe Armory is still valuable and not on the verge of falling into oblivion. Experience has shown time and time again for the majority of programs/ideas their main developer/creator have abandoned, they will collapse into vaporware. I do not see any signs so far that Armory will be any difficult. It’s too bad that the flash of Dollar Signs in the main developers eyes have caused him to abandon a once very promising plug-in to Blender, but as the saying goes “Money Talks and S##t Walks.” I did see in the last Armory Digest 4 months ago that the core was being ported from Haxe to C. Having some experience with C I am sure if ported will it would be an amazing boost to speed, but Haxe and C are very different machines so I wish those brave souls who have worked on it and still are working on it all the best of luck. I will still from time to time drop in to see if Armory comes off of life support and back to life. There is always hope and it would be an amazing gift for Blender users who miss the BGE as I do too! Thanks again for your assistance and perhaps will chat again soon.

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Hi, thanks for your answer.

First of all, the Armory Digest is posted every quarter year because it takes a lot of time to create for @Naxela. We’re all people who work in their free time. However, its not true that that the latest Armory Digest was released 4 months ago, two weeks ago the new issue was published: [Armory Digest] - December 2020. I agree that there could be more advertisement for it, maybe we should include a link to it on the Armory readme which is very … minimalistic at this time.

@Naxela what do you think of a small monthly post here in the forum with the latest additions to Armory? If you have no time I could do that (even though I’m not sure if I will have time each month), it would just summarize/explain the most important commits and maybe show some screeshots.

I get that the link to the commits is not particularly helpful to a non-programmer, but it gives you at least some overview about i) how much happened and ii) what happened (the commit titles are not always as descriptive as they should be maybe, but at least you get some information).

You’re right that missing support from the main developer is a big problem, there are parts of the engine where we contributors are lacking experience and knowledge, and sometimes you have to annoy Lubos a bit with mentions to get answers from him about some details. But what is very important to say, even if it’s not what one want to hear: it is a free open source project and there is no entitlement at all to get updates from Lubos. This describes it very well:

Just because someone open sources something does not imply they owe the world a change in their status, focus and effort, e.g. from inventor to community manager.

The progress is slow but there is progress and that’s important. Again, we’re all people who do this for fun in our free time, it’s not about being on par with Godot or Unity. Those are engines with a big team and a big community behind them so they’re not really comparable with Armory at this point of time.

I’m glad that you give Armory a try and I totally understand your standpoint (you said a lot of very true things), and because you said you were a BGE user (me too), there is also the UPBGE Blender fork which you could check out, its main developer is very active.

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Hi,

@timodriaan
We probably could have some small monthly post describing the additions, although especially the time is a problem (I don’t have as much of it as I would like to have). But we probably could setup some shared documents and gradually build these monthly posts as new features are added, not sure if something like github or maybe just a google document would do?

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Sounds fine to me. Maybe even a thread where everyone posts about updates is totally enough.

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Thanks again timodriann for the update and an explanation about Armory Digest. I am very glad to see that my suspicions about Armory 0.5 being dead were incorrect. I will look over the Armory Digest and check out the update.

Your right also in that “Open Source” authors don’t anyone anything, and I meant no disrespect to either the author or Armory3d, only that statistics shows that without the main support of the author especially in the early chaotic stages of development the project usually withers and dies. It’s a bitter reality and since Open Source movements early days there have been literally tens of thousands of projects that started out great with a lot of support, but after a couple of years the author or the founding team would fall out or loose interest and then project would follow which causes a lot of bitter feelings and distrust to towards any new projects that come after. I do wish Armory does keep developing because the longer it grows the better it’s chances are of surviving in the new hands of the community. I am hopeful to see that Armory Digest is still being published since it’s really the only source for newbies and none programmers a like to keep abreast with Armory’s development. I’ll keep my fingers cross and keep returning to see how it and it’s community grows.

timodriaan thanks also for UPBGE too, I didn’t know about them so I’ll check them out too. Thanks again for the info, all of your hard working and dedication to this great endeavor. :grinning:

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does armory still support blender 2.79?

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The last released sdk for legacy was 0.6 is downloadable here.

Be aware that this sdk version quite possibly won’t work in legacy versions due to major changes in other areas of Armory that were introduced for 2.8+ compatibility. I myself was never able to set it up to work properly in 2.7x versions - kept getting errors.

2 Likes