I wish they had done this for altruistic reasons, but I doubt it.
Unity is still better than Godot in a lot of ways (mainly the support ecosystem), but by March that might be different. Godot is catching up quickly. It has more momentum behind it than possibly any other open source project I've experienced.
Honestly the best thing that ever happened to the Godot community was the Unity diaspora trying it out and complaining. A lot of that was written off as simply insisting that Godot act and feel like Unity, but given that Unity is the more mature and widely used platform, it sets the standard implicitly whether people like it or not. Also a lot of technical complaints, particularly around Godot's relatively lackluster 3D capabilities, were ironed out that may not have even been addressed if left to community momentum alone.
I like Godot but its open source nature means it does have some rough edges, mostly around GDScript but framework features like tilemap implementation, model imports and physics have always been a bit wonky.
> I like Godot but its open source nature means it does have some rough edges, mostly around GDScript but framework features like tilemap implementation, model imports and physics have always been a bit wonky.
You're attributing a lack in Godot you feel to it being open source. Given the commercial success of other open source projects like Blender, I don't think this is a fair or measured take.
Blender is a lot older and has a lot more professional investment and interest behind it. I don't doubt Godot could be in a similar state of quality given as much time and effort, but I don't think it's there yet. With open source, contribution quality is often a function of popularity attracting contributors with the necessary skillset being willing to put in the time and effort, usually for free.
This isn't meant to be a slight against open source, just an acknowledgement of the tradeoffs of an open development model. Something like a game framework or model editor can't reach a certain level of maturity until actual professionals in the field care enough to contribute, because of the knowledge gatekept within those industries, and their expertise. Most free software contributors will necessarily be amateurs and hobbyists, and that will likewise limit the quality of the end product.
There's no such thing as “altruism”. The reasons don't matter. A good reputation, on the other hand, does matter, and I'm afraid that they've squandered it. It's difficult to regain people's trust.
Altruism is just a romantic notion. Speaking about its existence is like speaking about the existence of a soul. Souls may well exist, but it doesn't manifest in this universe.
Everything we do is for selfish reasons and that's good actually, as it means we have real motivation to help others.
Unity is still better than Godot in a lot of ways (mainly the support ecosystem), but by March that might be different. Godot is catching up quickly. It has more momentum behind it than possibly any other open source project I've experienced.