CHANGELOG-v3.70.md

Version 3.70.0 - Yotsuba - 10th November 2023

New Features - Round Pixels

All pixel rounding math is now handled on the GPU instead of on the CPU. This feature has now been enabled by default.

• The Game Config roundPixels property is now true by default. This means that all Game Objects will be positioned and rendered with pixel-perfect precision, which is by far the most common use-case for Phaser games. This will prevent sub-pixelation when rendering at non-integer offsets and allows for smoother camera scrolling, especially at higher zoom scales. If you wish to disable this, you can do so by setting the roundPixels property in the Game Config to false. Note that only roundPixels has been set to true. The pixelArt property remains false. So if you're creating a pixel-art style game, please still enable this in your config.
• All of the core vertex shaders, including Multi, Single and Mobile now have a new uniform called uRoundPixels which is set in all of the corresponding pipelines. This means that all pixel rounding calculations are now done on the GPU instead of the CPU, which can save a lot of math in intensive games.
• CanvasRenderer.batchSprite has been updated to correctly use the Camera roundPixels property and apply it to the drawImage call.
• Camera.preRender will no longer round the origin, follow coordinates or scrollX/Y coordinates. It will still round the World view.
• The MultiPipeline.batchSprite method (which is also used by the Single Pipeline and Mobile Pipeline) will no longer use roundPixels when calculating the quad vertex data. It also won't apply it to any of the sprite values. This is all now handled in the shader directly.
• TransformMatrix.setQuad no longer uses an anonymous function for roundPixels, which will help with performance.
• The TransformMatrix.setQuad method signature has changed slightly. The roundPixels parameter is now optional and defaults to false. Previously, you always had to set it.

New Features - Texture Packer Nine Slice Support

The new version of Texture Packer (v7.1.0) and above will now allow you to export scale9 sprite data in your Phaser 3 Atlas JSON. This allows you to create Nine Slice Sprites directly from the data, without having to specify the border sizes directly in your code. To use this feature, simply edit the sprite in Texture Packer, enable the 'scale9' checkbox and then drag the guides as required. When you export the atlas, the JSON will contain the new scale9 object, which Phaser will parse and use when creating Nine Slice Game Objects.

• You can now create a NineSlice Game Object without specifying a width or height for it. If you do this, it will use the size of the texture frame instead.
• The NineSlice Game Object will now check to see if its associated Frame has any scale9 data set, and if so this is now used automatically to populate all of the border values.
• The NineSlice.setSlices method has a new optional boolean parameter skipScale9 which will allow you to set the border values of the Nine Slice directly, even if its Frame has associated scale9 data
• Frame.setScale9 is a new method that allows you to set the scale9 data associated with the given Frame. This is used internally by the Texture Packer parsers, but can also be called directly.
• Frame.scale9 is a new read-only boolean property that returns true if the Frame has scale9 data associated with it.
• Frame.is3Slice is a new read-only boolean property that returns true if the Frame has scale9 data associated with it that is 3-slice instead of 9-slice.
• The JSONHash texture parser will now check for scale9 data in the JSON and if found, set it via the Frame.setScale9 method.
• The JSONArray texture parser will now check for scale9 data in the JSON and if found, set it via the Frame.setScale9 method.

New Features - Arcade Physics

• Arcade Physics Bodies have a new method called setDirectControl which toggles a new boolean property directControl. When enabled (it's false by default) it means the Body will calculate its velocity based on its change in position compared to the previous frame. This allows you to directly move a Body around the physics world by just changing its position, without having to use acceleration or velocity. This is useful if you want to move it via a Tween, or follow a Pointer, or a Path. Because its velocity is calculated based on this movement it will still resolve collisions with other bodies, imparting velocity to them as usual.
• Arcade Physics Bodies have a new property called slideFactor. This is a Vector2 that controls how much velocity is retained by a Body after it has been pushed by another Body. The default value is 1, which means it retains all of its velocity. If set to zero, it will retain none of it. This allows you to create a Body that can be pushed around without imparting any velocity to it.
• Body.setSlideFactor is a new method that sets the Body's slideFactor property.
• The Arcade Physics World has a new method nextCategory which will create a new collision category and return it. You can define up to 32 unique collision categories per world.
• Arcade Physics Bodies have two new properties: collisionCategory and collisionMask. These allow you to set a specific collision category and list of categories the body will collide with. This allows for fine-grained control over which bodies collide with which others. The default is that all bodies collide with all others, just like before.
• setCollisionCategory is a new method available on Arcade Physics Bodies that allows you to set the collision category of the body. It's also available on Arcade Sprites, Images, Tilemap Layers, Groups and Static Groups directly.
• setCollidesWith is a new method available on Arcade Physics Bodies that allows you to set which collision categories the body should collide with. It's also available on Arcade Sprites, Images, Tilemap Layers, Groups and Static Groups directly.
• resetCollision is a new method available on Arcade Physics Bodies that allows you to reset the collision category and mask to their defaults. It's also available on Arcade Sprites, Images, Tilemap Layers, Groups and Static Groups directly.

The default is as before: all bodies collide with each other. However, by using the categories you now have much more fine-grained control over which objects collide together, or not. They are filtered out at the top-level, meaning you can have a Sprite set to not collide with a Physics Group and it will skip checking every single child in the Group, potentially saving a lot of processing time.

The new collision categories are used automatically by either directly calling the collide or overlap methods, or by creating a Collider object. This allows you to use far less colliders than you may have needed previously and skip needing to filter the pairs in the collision handlers.

New Features - FX Updates and Fixes

You can now set in your game config two new boolean properties that control if the built-in FX are enabled, or not. If you don't need to use the FX then disabling these will help save on texture memory and will compile less shaders, which can help with startup time. These are single-set flags, you cannot toggle them after the game has booted.

• disablePreFX set this to true in your game config to disable the creation and use of Pre FX on all Game Objects.
• disablePostFX set this to true in your game config to disable the creation and use of Post FX on all Game Objects.
• The PipelineManager will now delay the creation of the FX Pipelines until its boot method, using these config values to determine if it should proceed.
• The PipelineManager.renderTargets array will no longer be pre-populated if you disable Pre FX, saving on texture memory.
• FX.Circle.backgroundAlpha is a new property that allows you to set the amount of the alpha of the background color in the Circle FX (thanks @rexrainbow)
• PostFXPipeline.bootFX is a new method, which is the previous boot method but renamed. This is no longer called from the constructor, but instead when the Post FX Pipeline is activated by the Pipeline Manager. This means that the resources the Post FX requires, such as creating Render Targets and shaders, is delayed until the FX is actually used, saving on memory.
• The PostFXPipeline will now set autoResize to true on all of its RenderTarget instances. This fixes an issue where the PostFXPipeline would not resize the render targets when the game size changed, causing them to become out of sync with the game canvas. Fix #6503 (thanks @Waclaw-I)
• FX.Blur didn't set the quality parameter to its property, meaning it wasn't applied in the shader, causing it to always use a Low Blur quality (unless modified post-creation).
• The BlurFXPipeline didn't bind the quality of shader specified in the controller, meaning it always used the Low Blur shader, regardless of what the FX controller asked for.
• The FXBlurLow fragment shader didn't have the offset uniform. This is now passed in and applied to the resulting blur, preventing it from creating 45 degree artifacts (thanks Wayfinder)
• Fixed an issue in the way the Tilemap WebGL Renderer would call batchTexture that meant if you applied a PostFX to a Tilemap Layer it would apply the fx for every single tile in the layer, instead of just once per layer. In a simple map this fix has reduced draw calls from over 12,000 to just 52, and it no longer matters how many tiles are on the layer, the cost of applying the FX is consistent regardless.

New Features

• Text.setRTL is a new method that allows you to set a Text Game Object as being rendered from right-to-left, instead of the default left to right (thanks @rexrainbow)
• Physics.Arcade.World.singleStep is a new method that will advance the Arcade Physics World simulation by exactly 1 step (thanks @monteiz)
• Tilemaps.ObjectLayer.id is a new property that returns the ID of the Object Layer, if specified within Tiled, or zero otherwise. You can now access the unique layer ID of Tiled layers if the event a map doesn't have unique layer names (thanks @rui-han-crh)
• Tilemaps.LayerData.id is a new property that returns the ID of the Data Layer, if specified within Tiled, or zero otherwise (thanks @rui-han-crh)
• Text.setLetterSpacing is a new method and Text.letterSpacing is the related property that allows you to set the spacing between each character of a Text Game Object. The value can be either negative or positive, causing the characters to get closer or further apart. Please understand that enabling this feature will cause Phaser to render each character in this Text object one by one, rather than use a draw for the whole string. This makes it extremely expensive when used with either long strings, or lots of strings in total. You will be better off creating bitmap font text if you need to display large quantities of characters with fine control over the letter spacing (thanks @Ariorh1337)
• ParticleEmitter.clearDeathZones is a new method that will clear all previously created Death Zones from a Particle Emitter (thanks @rexrainbow)
• ParticleEmitter.clearEmitZones is a new method that will clear all previously created Emission Zones from a Particle Emitter (thanks @rexrainbow)
• The GameObject.setTexture method has 2 new optional parameters: updateSize and updateOrigin, which are both passed to the setFrame method and allows you to control if the size and origin of the Game Object should be updated when the texture is set (thanks @Trissolo)
• Both the Animation Config and the Play Animation Config allow you to set a new boolean property randomFrame. This is false by default, but if set, it will pick a random frame from the animation when it starts playback. This allows for much more variety in groups of sprites created at the same time, using the same animation. This is also reflected in the new Animation.randomFrame and AnimationState.randomFrame properties.
• You can now use a Phaser.Types.Animations.PlayAnimationConfig object in the anims property of the ParticleEmitter configuration object. This gives you far more control over what happens to the animation when used by particles, including setting random start frames, repeat delays, yoyo, etc. Close #6478 (thanks @michalfialadev)
• TilemapLayer.setTintFill is a new method that will apply a fill-based tint to the tiles in the given area, rather than an additive-based tint, which is what the setTint method uses.
• Tile.tintFill is a new boolean property that controls if the tile tint is additive or fill based. This is used in the TilemapLayerWebGLRenderer function.
• RenderTarget.willResize is a new method that will return true if the Render Target will be resized as a result of the new given width and height values.
• Structs.Map.setAll is a new method that allows you to pass an array of elements to be set into the Map. This is a chainable method.
• When creating a TimelineEvent you can now set a new optional callback: if. If set, this callback is invoked at the start of the TimelineEvent. If it returns true, then the rest of the event is processed (i.e. tweens started, sound played, etc) otherwise the event is skipped. This allows you to create conditional events within a Timeline.
• Geom.Line.setFromObjects is a new method that will set the Line start and end points to match those of the two given objects, which can be Game Objects, or anything Vector2-like (thanks @Trissolo)

Updates

• The WebAudioSoundManager will now bind the body to the removeEventListener method, if it exists, to prevent memory leaks (thanks @wjaykim)
• The AnimationManager.globalTimeScale property is now applied to all Game Objects using the Animation component, allowing you to globally speed-up or slow down all animating objects (thanks @TJ09)
• The Rope Game Object now calls initPostPipeline allowing you to use Post FX directly on it, such as glow, blur, etc. Fix #6550 (thanks @rexrainbow)
• The Tween.stop method will now check to see if Tween.parent is set. If not, it won't try to set a pending removal state or dispatch an event, which should help guard against errors where Tween.stop is called by mistake on already destroyed tweens (thanks @orcomarcio)
• The Tween.remove method will now check to see if Tween.parent exists before trying to remove it from the parent. This should help guard against errors where Tween.remove is called by mistake on already removed or destroyed tweens. Fix #6539 (thanks @orcomarcio)
• Particle.alpha is now clamped to the range 0 to 1 within the update method, preventing it from going out of range. Fix #6551 (thanks @orcomarcio)
• Math.Wrap has been reverted to the previous version. Fix #6479 (thanks @EmilSV)
• The Graphics Game Object will now set a default line and fill style to fully transparent and black. This prevents issues where a Graphics object would render with a color set in other Shape Game Objects if it had been drawn to and no style was previous set (thanks Whitesmith)
• The WebGLRenderer will now validate that the mipmapFilter property in the Game Config is a valid mipmap before assigning it.
• A small amount of unused code has been removed from the Polygon.setTo method (thanks @Trissolo)
• The WebGLRenderer.deleteFramebuffer method has been updated so it now tests for the existence of a COLOR and DEPTH_STENCIL attachments, and if found, removes the bindings and deletes the stencil buffer. The code that previously deleted the RENDERERBUFFER_BINDING has also been removed to avoid side-effects.
• If you make a Mesh Game Object interactive, it will now bind to the scope of the Mesh and uses the current faces in the hit area callback, rather than the faces as defined when the Mesh was made interactive. This will help keep the input in sync with a potentially changing Mesh structure (thanks @rexrainbow)
• iOS and any browser identifying as AppleWebKit will now set the Device.es2019 flag to true. This causes Phaser to use the native array Stable Sort. This fixes an issue where overlapping particles could flicker on iOS. Fix #6483 (thanks @mattkelliher @spayton)
• The Text.dirty Game Object property has been removed. It wasn't used internally at all, so was just adding confusion and using space.
• The Request Video Frame polyfill will now check first to see if the browser supports HTMLVideoElement before trying to inspect its prototype. This should help in non-browser environments.
• Plane.originX and originY are two new read-only properties that return the origin of the Plane, which is always 0.5 (thanks @rexrainbow)
• The LoaderPlugin will now call removeAllListeners() as part of its shutdown method, which will clear any event listeners bound to a Loader instance of the Scene, during the Scene shutdown. Fix #6633 (thanks @samme)
• SetCollisionObject is a new function that Arcade Physics bodies use internally to create and reset their ArcadeBodyCollision data objects.
• DynamicTexture.setFromRenderTarget is a new method that syncs the internal Frame and TextureSource GL textures with the Render Target GL textures.
• When a framebuffer is deleted, it now sets its renderTexture property to undefined to ensure the reference is cleared.
• TransformMatrix.setToContext will now use setTransform(this) as 'this' is an equivalent object that this method can natively take.
• Optimized WebGLRenderer.setTextureFilter so it no longer uses a temporary array for the filter mode.
• The MultiPipeline.batchTexture method has a new optional boolean parameter skipPrePost that will force the call to ignore calling the preBatch and postBatch Pipeline Manager methods for the Game Object. This allows you to skip the overhead of calling them if you know you don't need them.
• The tint property can now act as a getter and a setter, where-as previously it was only a setter. Reading this property returns the equivalent of the tintTopLeft value (thanks @rexrainbow)
• ParticleEmitter.addDeathZone now returns an array of the Death Zone instances created, rather than just a single zone. This makes it functionally the same as addEmitZone (thanks @AlvaroEstradaDev)
• The GameObjects.Layer.add method is now chainable (thanks @rexrainbow)
• The GameObjects.Layer.remove and removeAll methods are now chainable and have a new optional boolean parameter destroyChild, which will destroy the Game Objects removed from the Layer (thanks @rexrainbow)
• If a Game Object is destroyed, it will now automatically be removed from the Layer it was in, if any (thanks @rexrainbow)
• Curves.Path.defaultDivisions is a new property that holds the default number of divisions to split the Path in to (thanks @AlvaroEstradaDev)
• The Curves.Path.getPoints method has a new optional parameter stepRate which allows you to set the distance between points on the curve, and defaults to defaultDivisions (thanks @AlvaroEstradaDev)
• The Timeline class will now emit the new Phaser.Time.Events#COMPLETE event when it completes. It will also no longer process its update method once the Timeline has completed (thanks @rexrainbow)
• The BaseSound.destroy method will now call BaseSound.stop which will reset the isPlaying and other flags. Fix #6645 (thanks @rexrainbow)
• The RandomDataGenerator#weightedPick method will no longer under-sample the first and last elements in the given array, leading to better distribution of results. Fix #6562 (thanks @wayfinder @shy @samme)
• During Game.runDestroy it will now check for this.domContainer.parentNode before trying to remove it, preventing errors if the DOM Container has already been removed. Fix #6559 (thanks @orcomarcio)
• The Game instance will now boot the new SYSTEM_READY event, which indicates that the internal Scene System has been created by the Scene Manager and is ready for use. The Texture Manager now listens for this event in order to create the stamp Image. This fixes an issue where the stamp would throw a run-time error if the game didn't feature a preload function. Fix #6616 (thanks @rexrainbow)

Bug Fixes

• Particle.scaleY would always be set to the scaleX value, even if given a different one within the config. It will now use its own value correctly.
• Array.Matrix.RotateLeft was missing the total parameter, which controls how many times to rotate the matrix.
• Array.Matrix.RotateRight was missing the total parameter, which controls how many times to rotate the matrix.
• Array.Matrix.TranslateMatrix didn't work with any translation values above 1 due to missing parameters in RotateLeft and RotateRight
• The Tilemap.createFromObjects method wouldn't always copy custom properties to the target objects or Data Manager. Fix #6391 (thanks @samme @paxperscientiam)
• The scale.min and scale.max width and height properties in Game Config were ignored by the Game constructor, which was expecting minWidth and minHeight. This now matches the documentation. Fix #6501 (thanks @NikitaShpanko @wpederzoli)
• Due to a copy-paste bug, the Actions.GetLast function had the same code as the GetFirst function. It now does what you'd expect it to do. Fix #6513 (thanks @dmokel)
• The TilemapLayer.PutTileAt method would use an incorrect local GID if the Tilemap Layer wasn't using all available tilesets. Fix #5931 (thanks @christianvoigt @wjaykim)
• The TextureManager.addSpriteSheet method would fail if a Texture instance was given as the second parameter, throwing a Cannot read property 'key' of null (thanks @charlieschwabacher)
• The HexagonalCullBounds function incorrectly referenced this within it, instead of layer (thanks @DaliborTrampota)
• The HexagonalGetTileCorners function incorrectly referenced this within it, instead of layer (thanks @DaliborTrampota)
• The HexagonalTileToWorldXY function incorrectly referenced this within it, instead of layer (thanks @DaliborTrampota)
• The BitmapText Game Object will now reset the WebGL Texture unit on flush, which fixes an issue of a flush happening part-way during the rendering a BitmapText (thanks @EmilSV)
• When using interpolation for a Particle Emitter operation, such as: x: { values: [ 50, 500, 200, 800 ] } it would fail to set the final value unless you specified the interpolation property as well. It now defaults to linear if not given. Fix #6551 (thanks @orcomarcio)
• The Matter Physics ignoreGravity boolean is now checked during the Matter Engine internal functions, allowing this property to now work again. Fix #6473 (thanks @peer2p)
• Group.createFromConfig will now check to see if the config contains either internalCreateCallback or internalRemoveCallback and set them accordingly. This fixes an issue where the callbacks would never be set if specified in an array of single configuration objects. Fix #6519 (thanks @samme)
• PhysicsGroup will now set the classType and null the config when an array of single configuration objects is given in the constructor. Fix #6519 (thanks @samme)
• The PathFollower.pathUpdate method will now check if the tween property has a valid data component before running the update. This prevents a call to PathFollower.stopFollow from throwing a Cannot read properties of null (reading '0') error as it tried to do a single update post stop. Fix #6508 (thanks @francois-dibulo)
• Added missing parameter to some function calls in Structs.ProcessQueue#add (thanks @Trissolo)
• Tile was incorrectly using the Alpha Game Object component, instead of the AlphaSingle component, which meant although the methods implied you could set a different alpha per tile corner, it was never reflected in the rendering. It has now been updated to use just the single alpha value. Fix #6594 (thanks @jcoppage)
• The TextureManager.addAtlasJSONArray method would fail if a Texture instance was given as the second parameter, throwing a Cannot read property 'key' of null (thanks @1DAfT)
• The TextureManager.addAtlasJSONHash method would fail if a Texture instance was given as the second parameter, throwing a Cannot read property 'key' of null (thanks @1DAfT)
• The TextureManager.addAtlasXML method would fail if a Texture instance was given as the second parameter, throwing a Cannot read property 'key' of null (thanks @1DAfT)
• The TextureManager.addUnityAtlas method would fail if a Texture instance was given as the second parameter, throwing a Cannot read property 'key' of null (thanks @1DAfT)
• DynamicTexture.preDestroy was never called, leading to an accumulation of framebuffers in memory. This method has now been renamed to destroy and cleans all references correctly.
• If you gave the width or height in the Game Config object as a string it would multiply the value given by the parent size, often leading to a huge game canvas, or causing WebGL errors as it tried to create a texture larger than the GPU could handle. This has now been strengthened. If you give a string with a % at the end, it works as before, i.e. "100%" or "50%" to set the scale based on the parent. If you don't include the %, or use another unit, such as "800px" it will now be treated as a fixed value, not a percentage.
• The ParticleEmitterWebGLRenderer has been refactored so that the particle.frame is used as the source of the glTexture used in the batch and also if a new texture unit is required. This fixes issues where a Particle Emitter would fail to use the correct frame from a multi-atlas texture. Fix #6515 (thanks @Demeno)
• StaticBody.setSize will now check to see if the body has a Game Object or not, and only call getCenter and the frame sizes if it has. This fixes a bug where calling physics.add.staticBody would throw an error if you provided a width and height. Fix #6630 (thanks @Legend-Master)
• The DynamicTexture.fill method will now correctly draw the fill rectangle if the width and height are provided in WebGL, where-as before it would assume the y axis started from the bottom-left instead of top-left. Fix #6615 (thanks @rexrainbow)
• Calling the Line.setLineWidth method on the Line Shape Game Object would result in a line with double the thickness it should have had in WebGL. In Canvas it was the correct width. Both renderers now match. Fix #6604 (thanks @AlvaroNeuronup)
• The DynamicTexture was leaking memory by leaving a WebGLTexture in memory when its setSize method was called. This happens automatically on instantiation, meaning that if you created DynamicTextures and then destroyed them frequently, memory would continue to increase (thanks David)
• DynamicTexture.width and height were missing from the class definition, even though they were set and used internally. They're now exposed as read-only properties.
• The BitmapMask wouldn't correctly set the gl viewport when binding, which caused the mask to distort in games where the canvas resizes from its default. Fix #6527 (thanks @rexrainbow)
• The Geom.Intersects.GetLineToPoints function has been fixed to correct an oversight where the for loop prevented an intersection test between the given line and the line segment between the first and last point. Fix #6467 (thanks @Trissolo @Abspirit)
• The MultiAtlas File Loader didn't prepend the Loader.prefix if set. This now forms part of the key, leading to the correct keys used for the Texture Manager. Fix #6614 (thanks @machineman1357)
• There was an issue when loading Normal Maps with Sprite Sheets. Often, if the normal map image completed loading before the sprite sheet, it would cause it to be incorrectly added to the Texture Manager, resulting in broken frames. Now, regardless of the load order, the sprite sheet is added with its normal map correctly together. Fix #6491 (thanks @dreasgrech @PaulB-H @samme)
• The TextureSource.setFilter method will now check to see if renderer is defined before accessing its gl property. This avoids Phaser crashing if you're in headless mode and set anti-aliasing to false in the game config. Fix #6663 (thanks @moufmouf)
• SpineGameObject.setSkeletonFromJSON has been fixed so it now passes the parameters in the correct order to the setSkeleton method. Fix #6585 (thanks @machineman1357)

Examples, Documentation, Beta Testing and TypeScript

My thanks to the following for helping with the Phaser 3 Examples, Beta Testing, Docs, and TypeScript definitions, either by reporting errors, fixing them, or helping author the docs:

@AlvaroEstradaDev @emadkhezri @gohack0322 @johnhyde @julescubtree @neki-dev @paxperscientiam @samme