Posted November 18, 2024 by Ray
#raylib #release #programming #gamedev
One year after raylib 5.0 release, arribes raylib 5.5, the next big revision of the library. It's been 11 years since raylib 1.0 release and in all this time it has never stopped growing and improving. With an outstanding number of new contributors and improvements, it's, again, the biggest raylib release to date.
Some numbers for this release:
Highlights for raylib 5.5:
NEW raylib pre-configured Windows package: The new raylib portable and self-contained Windows package for raylib 5.5, intended for nobel devs that start in programming world, comes with one big addition: support for C code building for Web platform with one-single-mouse-click! For the last 10 years, the pre-configured raylib Windows package allowed to edit simple C projects on Notepad++ and easely compile Windows executables with an automatic script; this new release adds the possibility to compile the same C projects for Web platform with a simple mouse click. This new addition greatly simplifies C to WebAssembly project building for new users. The raylib Windows Installer package can be downloaded for free from raylib on itch.io.
NEW raylib project creator tool: A brand new tool developed to help raylib users to setup new projects in a professional way. raylib project creator generates a complete project structure with multiple build systems ready-to-use and GitHub CI/CD actions pre-configured. It only requires providing some C files and basic project parameters! The tools is free and open-source, and it can be used online!.
NEW Platform backend supported: RGFW: Thanks to the rcore platform-split implemented in raylib 5.0, adding new platforms backends has been greatly simplified, new backends can be added using provided template, self-contained in a single C module, completely portable. A new platform backend has been added: RGFW. RGFW is a new single-file header-only portable library (RGFW.h) intended for platform-functionality management (windowing and inputs); in this case for desktop platforms (Windows, Linux, macOS) but also for Web platform. It adds a new alternative to the already existing GLFW and SDL platform backends.
NEW Platform backend version supported: SDL3: Previous raylib 5.0 added support for SDL2 library, and raylib 5.5 not only improves SDL2 functionality, with several issues reviewed, but also adds support for the recently released big SDL update in years: SDL3. Now users can select at compile time the desired SDL version to use, increasing the number of potential platforms supported in the future!
NEW Retro-console platforms supported: Dreamcast, N64, PSP, PSVita, PS4: Thanks to the platform-split on raylib 5.0, supporting new platform backends is easier than ever! Along the raylib rlgl module support for the OpenGL 1.1 graphics API, it opened the door to multiple homebrew retro-consoles backend implementations! It's amazing to see raylib running on +20 year old consoles like Dreamcast, PSP or PSVita, considering the hardware constraints of those platforms and proves raylib outstanding versability! Those additional platforms can be found in separate repositories and have been created by the amazing programmer Antonio Jose Ramos Marquez (@psxdev).
NEW GPU Skinning support: After lots of requests for this feature, it has been finally added to raylib thanks to the contributor Daniel Holden (@orangeduck), probably the developer that has further pushed models animations with raylib, developing two amazing tools to visualize and test animations: GenoView and BVHView. Adding GPU skinning was a tricky feature, considering it had to be available for all raylib supported platforms, including limited ones like Raspberry Pi with OpenGL ES 2.0, where some advance OpenGL features are not available (UBO, SSBO, Transform Feedback) but a multi-platform solution was found to make it possible. A new example, models_gpu_skinning has been added to illustrate this new functionality. As an extra, previous existing CPU animation system has been greatly improved, multiplying performance by a factor (simplifiying required maths).
NEW raymath C++ operators: After several requested for this feature, C++ math operators for Vector2, Vector3, Vector4, Quaternion and Matrix has been added to raymath as an extension to current implementation. Despite being only available for C++ because C does not support it, these operators simplify C++ code when doing math operations.
Beside those new big features, raylib 5.5 comes with MANY other improvements:
...and much much more, including many functions reviews and new functions added!
Make sure to check raylib CHANGELOG for a detailed list of changes!
To end with, I want to thank all the contributors (+640!) that along the years have greatly improved raylib and pushed it further and better day after day. Thanks to all of them, raylib is the amazing library it is today.
Last but not least, I want to thank raylib sponsors and all the raylib community for their support and continuous engagement with the library, creating and sharing amazing raylib projects on a daily basis. Thanks for making raylib a great platform to enjoy games/tools/graphic programming!
After 11 years of development, raylib 5.5 is the best raylib ever.
Enjoy programming with raylib! :)