For those who don’t know the tool: Material Maker is a Godot-based node graph for procedural materials and experimental 3D painting, with export workflows for Unity and Unreal Engine.
Graph editing gets a practical pass
Material Maker 1.7 concentrates on everyday material authoring rather than a wholesale rewrite. Panel layouts can now be saved, loaded and reset, while side panels can be toggled and quickbar entries receive keyboard shortcuts.
The add-node window gains sorting options, and the graph view now exposes links to remote parameters from linked controls. Middle-clicking can jump to the remote source, connection lines display hover hints, and node movement gains offset snapping. These are small changes, but they target the repeated navigation costs that accumulate during game development.
File dialogs now display thumbnails and remember their display mode. The release also adds single-window operation, floating colour-picker windows, adjustable sensitivity for float-parameter dragging and a button for rerolling node seeds. Loading materials from the project website should also be faster, which may help larger procedural libraries feel less archaeological.
Nodes and exports gain new options
The main content addition is a Dynamic Sky Material. Several nodes gain a 32-bit option, TEX3D nodes have been improved, and export nodes can now be used inside subgraphs. The Sphere node adds a normalised mode, the math node gains a square-root function, and the PBR material metallic input can use its parameter as the default value.
Aperture-node editing gains shortcuts for jumping to an input node and changing label orientation. The release notes also list performance improvements for Aperture links and new label sizes for comment-line nodes. The official changelog credits most interface and node work to contributor williamchange.
Steam handles the updater tax
Version 1.7 is also the first release available through Steam. The store build offers automatic updates and achievements, while the open-source downloads remain available for Windows, macOS and Linux through itch.io.
The application remains MIT-licensed and built on the Godot engine. Its graph system combines GLSL shader operations until a buffer or output node is reached, avoiding an intermediate image render for every node.
Exports cover static and dynamic materials for Unity, with generated textures and shaders depending on the material type. Unreal Engine 5 export can generate a Python script that reconstructs the material inside the engine.
For Unreal Engine users, the update’s support for export nodes inside subgraphs may be the more consequential change, especially in reusable graph libraries. The release also upgrades the application to Godot 4.7 stable.
https://rodzilla.itch.io/material-maker/devlog/1584828/material-maker-17
