When we decided to branch into mobile game development, the first — and most critical — decision was the engine. We evaluated Unity, Unreal Engine, and Godot extensively before landing on Godot 4 as our primary platform for mobile titles like RuneGame and TD Game. Here is an honest breakdown of why.
The Case For Godot
Godot is a fully open-source, MIT-licensed engine. That single fact removes an enormous amount of friction for an indie or mid-sized studio. There are no royalties, no per-seat licensing costs, and no surprise policy changes from a corporate owner. What you build is entirely yours.
Godot is licensed under the MIT license — meaning you own 100% of what you build, with zero royalties or subscription fees, ever.
1 · Lightweight and Fast
The Godot editor is under 100 MB. Compare that to Unity or Unreal, which can consume gigabytes of disk space. For a team that moves quickly between projects — from a cinematic animation pipeline to a mobile puzzle game — that agility matters enormously. Cold boot to a working scene in under 10 seconds.
2 · GDScript is Beginner-Friendly but Powerful
GDScript is Godot's built-in scripting language. It reads almost like Python, which means artists and designers on our team who are not hardcore engineers can contribute to game logic without a steep learning curve. For more performance-intensive tasks, Godot also supports C# and GDExtension (C++).
"We built a fully playable prototype of RuneGame in under two weeks using Godot. That kind of speed-to-prototype is something we had not experienced with other engines."
— Harvest RT Studio Lead
3 · Mobile Export is First-Class
Android and iOS exports are treated as first-class citizens in Godot 4. With configured export templates, we go from editor to a working APK in minutes. The export pipeline is clean, scriptable, and plays well with CI/CD workflows — something we lean on heavily.
4 · 2D is a Genuine Strength
Many engines treat 2D as an afterthought layered on top of a 3D renderer. Godot's 2D engine is a dedicated, pixel-perfect system with its own coordinate space — which makes pixel-art games, UI-heavy puzzle titles, and stylised mobile games feel completely at home. For RuneGame's rune-connecting puzzle mechanic, this made a real difference.
The Tradeoffs
Godot is not perfect for every use case. Its 3D renderer, while improving rapidly with Godot 4, still lags behind Unreal Engine 5 in raw visual fidelity. For our animation and film work, we continue to rely on Unreal. But for mobile-first, gameplay-focused titles? Godot wins on nearly every dimension that matters: iteration speed, cost, portability, and community support.
- Iteration speed — save scene, run, test in seconds
- Zero licensing cost — no royalties, no seat fees
- Community — the Godot community is one of the fastest-growing in open source
- Mobile-first — touch input, screen scaling, APK/IPA export all built in
What's Next
Both RuneGame (a medieval fantasy number-puzzle game) and TD Game (a fast-paced casual arcade tapper) are currently in active development on Godot 4. We will be sharing development diaries, design decisions, and early gameplay clips in future posts. Follow along and stay tuned.