Great to hear Kasper, love it when people provide feedback on their experience because there is so much to learn from it.
Just some quick things that may help people around this:
- Shaders are easier than most people think, it's just daunting to get started and when targeting standalone VR there are performance limitations. AI is great to quickly get going but it doesn't teach you much and often doesn't understand the nuisances of platform requirements. Also highly recommend trying out Godots visual shaders, they work similar to shader nodes in Blender. Also check out: https://godotshaders.com/
- The add child node thing is a PITA. Its the best feature Godot has added in Godot 4.0, it's also the most dangerous one for us plugin builders because we can't restrict it (yet). Something that is being looked into and hopefully will be improved in a future version.
- Godots 3D audio works really well for basic stuff, the main thing to be aware off is making sure your viewport is set as a 3d listener. It is by default but this is something that trips up people who add spectator views. That said, I really want to try out steam audio and similar libraries soon which can do proper sound progression.
- One of the best things game jams teach IMHO is teaching you about scope and how much you can do in a week. The point isn't for people to crunch to a finish line, it's to focus on a single goal and try and build something around it you can do in a couple of days.