12.0

The information on this page may not be accurate or up to date due to the information pertaining to a version that is currently in development.

The codename for LÖVE 12.0 is TBD. It is currently not released.

Changes from 11.5

Additions

General

• Added support for launching a specific .lua file as the main file.
• Added basic usage instructions printed to the console when '--help' is used as a command-line parameter, and when the no-game screen is run.
• Added love.parsedGameArguments and love.rawGameArguments tables, in the main thread.
• Added love.markDeprecated.
• Added love.event.restart(optionalvalue). A new love.restart field will contain the value after restarting.
• Added love.system.getPreferredLocales.
• Added love.localechanged callback.
• Added t.highdpi startup flag in love.conf, replacing t.window.highdpi and the highdpi flag of love.window.setMode.
• Added support for highdpi mode in Windows.
• Added love.window.focus.
• Added love.window.getPointer.
• Added HTTPS Lua module.
• Added variants of enet's peer:send and host:broadcast methods that take light userdata and size parameters.
• Added support in love Objects for Lua 5.4's '<toclose>' syntax, when love is compiled with Lua 5.4.

Data

• Added Data methods for getting number values.
• Added ByteData methods for setting number values.
• Added optional byte offset and size parameters to Data:getString.
• Added ByteData:setString.
• Added a variant of love.data.pack which takes an existing ByteData object.

Filesystem

• Added love.filesystem.mountFullPath and love.filesystem.unmountFullPath, including opt-in mount-for-write support.
• Added love.filesystem.mountCommonPath, unmountCommonPath, and getFullCommonPath.
• Added 'readonly' field to love.filesystem.getInfo's returned table.
• Added an optional load mode parameter to love.filesystem.load to only allow binary chunks, text chunks, or both.
• Added love.filesystem.openFile (replaces love.filesystem.newFile).

Audio

• Added optional stream type parameter to love.audio.newSource streaming sources ("file" or "memory"). It defaults to "file".
• Added love.audio.getPlaybackDevice, love.audio.getPlaybackDevices, and love.audio.setPlaybackDevice.
• Added SoundData:copyFrom.
• Added SoundData:slice.
• Added love.audiodisconnected callback.

Input

• Added a love.sensor module, for getting data from device sensors such as an accelerometer or gyroscope.
• Added love.sensorupdated callback.
• Added love.joysticksensorupdated callback.
• Added Joystick:hasSensor.
• Added Joystick:setSensorEnabled and Joystick:isSensorEnabled.
• Added Joystick:getSensorData.
• Added Joystick:setPlayerIndex and Joystick:getPlayerIndex.
• Added Joystick:getJoystickType.
• Added Joystick:getGamepadType.
• Added new Gamepad API buttons: "misc1", "paddle1", "paddle2", "paddle3", "paddle4". and "touchpad".
• Added love.keyboard.isModifierActive.
• Added parameters to love.wheelmoved: precise X and Y movement numbers, and a direction enum.
• Added love.mouse.getGlobalPosition.

Math

• Added love.math.perlinNoise and love.math.simplexNoise (replaces love.math.noise).

Physics

• Updated box2d to 2.4.1
• Added World:rayCastAny and World:rayCastClosest.
• Added World:getShapesInArea.
• Added World:queryShapesInArea (replaces World:queryBoundingBox).
• Added Body:getShapes (replaces Body:getFixtures).
• Added Body:getShape convenience method.
• Added Contact:getShapes (replaces Contact:getFixtures).
• Added Body:hasCustomMassData.
• Added convenience functions for creating a Body and Shape together:
  • Added love.physics.newCircleBody.
  • Added love.physics.newRectangleBody.
  • Added love.physics.newPolygonBody.
  • Added love.physics.newEdgeBody.
  • Added love.physics.newChainBody.
• Any joint that used to use spring-dampers now use stiffness and damping. The following functions have been added to support the old behaviour.
  • Added love.physics.computeLinearStiffness.
  • Added love.physics.computeLinearFrequency.
  • Added love.physics.computeAngularStiffness.
  • Added love.physics.computeAngularFrequency.

Graphics

• Added a Metal backend to love.graphics, available on macOS 10.15+ and iOS 13+.
• Added a Vulkan backend to love.graphics, available on Windows, Linux, and Android 7+.
• Added '--renderers a,b,c' and '--excluderenderers a,b,c' command line arguments.
• Added t.renderers and t.excluderenderers love.conf options.
• Added per-shader opt in support for the GLSL 4.30 (desktop) and GLSL ES 3.20 (mobile) shading languages, via #pragma language glsl4.

• Added love.graphics.newTexture. newImage and newCanvas still exist as convenience constructor functions.
• Added optional 'mipmapcount' field to the settings table in love.graphics.newTexture/newImage/newCanvas.
• Added optional 'computewrite' boolean field to the settings table in love.graphics.newTexture/newImage/newCanvas.
• Added love.graphics.getTextureFormats, which replaces getImageFormats and getCanvasFormats.
• Added Texture:isCanvas and Texture:isComputeWritable.
• Added Texture:isFormatLinear, Texture:getMSAA, Texture:generateMipmaps, Texture:replacePixels, and Texture:renderTo (moved from old Canvas and Image subclasses).
• Added love.graphics.newTextureView.
• Added optional 'viewformats' field to the settings table in Texture constructors.
• Added Texture:getViewFormats.
• Added integer pixel formats for Textures and ImageData.
• Added explicit sRGB format enums for compressed texture pixel formats.
• Added ImageData:setLinear, CompressedImageData:setLinear, ImageData:isLinear, and CompressedImageData:isLinear.

• Added Graphics Buffer objects, including vertex, index, texel, shader storage, and indirect draw/dispatch argument buffers.
• Added love.graphics.copyBuffer, copyBufferToTexture, and copyTextureToBuffer.
• Added APIs for interacting with the Buffer objects owned by Meshes.
• Added variants of love.graphics.newMesh to construct a Mesh from existing Buffers.
• Added Mesh:getAttachedAttributes.
• Added an optional start array index parameter to Mesh:attachAttribute.
• Added integer buffer data formats.

• Added love.graphics.readbackTexture and love.graphics.readbackTextureAsync (replaces Canvas:newImageData).
• Added love.graphics.readbackBuffer and love.graphics.readbackBufferAsync.
• Added 'readback' buffer data usage enum, useful for advanced memory optimization when using love.graphics.readbackBuffer.
• Added debugname fields in the settings tables for Textures, Buffers, and Shaders.
• Added Texture:getDebugName and Shader:getDebugName.
• Added new lower level 'vertexmain' and 'pixelmain' shader entry points.
• Added Compute Shader support via love.graphics.newComputeShader and a new 'computemain' shader entry point.
• Added love.graphics.dispatchThreadgroups and love.graphics.dispatchIndirect for running compute shaders.
• Added Shader:hasStage.
• Added love.graphics.drawFromShader.
• Added love.graphics.drawFromShaderIndirect.
• Added love.graphics.drawIndirect.
• Added love.graphics.getQuadIndexBuffer.

• Added variants of love.graphics.applyTransform and replaceTransform which accept x,y,angle,sx,sy,ox,oy parameters.
• Added APIs to override the default orthographic projection: love.graphics.setProjection and resetProjection.
• Added ability to set point size within a vertex shader by setting the 'love_PointSize' variable.
• Added love.graphics.setBlendState, which gives lower level control over blend operations than love.graphics.setBlendMode.
• Added high level love.graphics.setStencilMode and getStencilMode functions. Replaces love.graphics.stencil and love.graphics.setStencilTest.
• Added lower level love.graphics.setStencilState and love.graphics.getStencilState functions.
• Added a variant of love.graphics.setColorMask which accepts a single boolean.
• Added new 'clampone' WrapMode.
• Added 'clampone', 'texelbuffer', 'indexbuffer32bit', 'mipmaprange', and 'indirectdraw' GraphicsFeature enums.
• Added 'copybuffer', 'copybuffertotexture', 'copytexturetobuffer', and 'copyrendertargettobuffer' GraphicsFeature enums.
• Added 'buffers' and 'buffermemory' fields to the table returned by love.graphics.getStats.
• Added initial support for right-to-left (RTL) text when using TrueType and OpenType fonts.
• Added a variant of Font:getWidth which takes a codepoint number argument.
• Added optional settings table variants for love.graphics.newFont, love.font.newRasterizer, and love.font.newTrueTypeRasterizer.
• Added love.graphics.newTextBatch (renamed from love.graphics.newText).
• Added support for saving .exr image files via ImageData:encode.

Changes

• Changed the primary build system for Linux to CMake instead of autotools.
• Changed the minimum runtime macOS version to 10.15.
• Changed the minimum runtime iOS version to 13.0.
• Changed the minimum runtime Windows version to Windows 7 SP1 (64 bit).

• Changed love.physics Shapes and Fixtures to be combined together, in Shape objects. Separate Fixtures no longer exist.
• Changed love.physics.newCircleShape, newRectangleShape, newPolygonShape, newEdgeShape, and newChainShape to take a Body as their first parameter.
• Changed love.physics callbacks that used to take Fixture parameters to now take Shape parameters.
• Changed Shape:setDensity to no longer need Body:resetMassData afterward unless the Body already has custom mass data.
• Changed the behaviour of attaching a Shape to a Body to no longer reset mass data if it's been customized.
• Changed RevoluteJoint:getMotorTorque and WheelJoint:getMotorTorque to take 'dt' as a parameter instead of 'inverse_dt'.

• Changed love.filesystem.exists to no longer be deprecated.
• Changed love.data.hash to have a container type parameter.
• Changed the default font from Vera size 12 to Noto Sans size 13.
• Changed TrueType and OpenType font handling to have improved kerning and character combining support.

• Changed the Texture class and implementation to no longer have separate Canvas and Image subclasses.
• Changed Textures created from image files and from ImageData to no longer hold onto a CPU copy of their pixel data after creation.
• Changed love.graphics.newImage to error instead of loading a placeholder texture, when the image dimensions are too large for the system.
• Changed love.graphics.newImage to allow creating a mipmapped texture with less than the full mipmap range, instead of erroring.
• Changed love.graphics.newMesh to no longer default to the "fan" Mesh draw mode.
• Changed the behaviour of Meshes to no longer allow a vertex map or index buffer when the "fan" mesh draw mode is used.
• Changed love.graphics.draw(Mesh) to no longer error if the Mesh has no 'VertexPosition' attribute but does have custom vertex attributes.
• Changed Mesh:getVertexFormat to use named fields, to match the new vertex format parameter setup in love.graphics.newMesh.
• Changed love.window.setMode to no longer clear the contents of Canvases or otherwise recreate OpenGL resources.
• Changed love.graphics.rectangle, love.graphics.polygon, and other shape drawing APIs to provide texture coordinates to shaders, for filled shapes.
• Changed love.graphics.points to require 'love_PointSize' to be set in the vertex shader, if a custom shader is used.
• Changed love.graphics.setCanvas to always clear auto-generated temporary depth and stencil buffers when they're used.
• Changed love.graphics.clear to no longer be affected by love.graphics.setScissor or love.graphics.setColorMask.
• Changed love.graphics.setDepthMode with the depth write parameter set to true to error if the active Canvases or window don't have a depth buffer.
• Changed Shader code parsing to ignore shader entry point functions inside comments.
• Changed position output coordinate space in vertex shaders to be consistent across all graphics APIs and regardless of whether a Canvas is active.
  • Clip-space output is y-up. Texture contents and pixel shader coordinates are y-down.

• Changed audio file decoding to choose the most appropriate decoder based on file contents instead of the file extension.
• Changed Videos to stream audio from the file instead of loading all the video file into memory for use with audio decoding.
• Changed love.math.perlinNoise and love.math.simplexNoise to use higher precision numbers for its internal calculations.
• Changed the t.accelerometerjoystick love.conf flag to be unset by default.
• Changed the window 'depth' field in love.conf and love.window.setMode/updateMode/getMode to be a boolean instead of a bit count number.

• Renamed 'display' field to 'displayindex' in love.window.setMode/updateMode/getMode and love.conf.
• Renamed love.graphics Text objects to TextBatch.

• Updated Box2D from 2.3 to 2.4.1.
• Updated LuaSocket from 3.0-rc1 to 3.1.0.

Deprecations

• Deprecated usage of slashes instead of dots for module separators in require.
• Deprecated the t.accelerometerjoystick love.conf flag (replaced by the love.sensor module).
• Deprecated love.filesystem.newFile (replaced by love.filesystem.openFile).
• Deprecated love.math.noise (replaced by love.math.perlinNoise and love.math.simplexNoise).
• Deprecated the variants of love.physics.newCircleShape, newRectangleShape, newPolygonShape, newEdgeShape, and newChainShape that don't take a Body parameter.
• Deprecated love.physics.newFixture (replaced by the new Shape constructor variants).
• Deprecated Body:getFixtures (replaced by Body:getShapes).
• Deprecated Contact:getFixtures (replaced by Contact:getShapes).
• Deprecated World:queryBoundingBox (replaced by World:queryShapesInArea).
• Deprecated ChainShape:getChildEdge.
• Deprecated the variants of love.data.hash which do not have a container type parameter.
• Deprecated love.graphics.setNewFont (use love.graphics.newFont and love.graphics.setFont instead).
• Deprecated love.graphics.newText (renamed to love.graphics.newTextBatch).
• Deprecated love.graphics.getImageFormats and love.graphics.getCanvasFormats (replaced by love.graphics.getTextureFormats).
• Deprecated love.graphics.stencil (replaced by love.graphics.setStencilMode or love.graphics.setStencilState).
• Deprecated love.graphics.setStencilTest and love.graphics.getStencilTest (replaced by love.graphics.setStencilMode or love.graphics.setStencilState).
• Deprecated love.window.close.
• Deprecated t.window.highdpi in love.conf and the highdpi flag of love.window.setMode (replaced by t.highdpi in love.conf).
• Deprecated the variants of Mesh:attachAttribute and SpriteBatch:attachAttribute which accept a Mesh (replaced by variants which accept a GraphicsBuffer).
• Deprecated Canvas:newImageData (replaced by love.graphics.readbackTexture).

Removals

• Removed 32 bit Windows support for official builds.
• Removed Fixture objects. All methods previously in Fixtures are now available in Shapes.
• Removed the variant of SpriteBatch:setColor() which turns off all previously set colors.
• Removed functions deprecated in LÖVE 11:
  • Removed love.audio.getSourceCount (renamed to love.audio.getActiveSourceCount).
  • Removed Source:getChannels (renamed to Source:getChannelCount).
  • Removed Decoder:getChannels (renamed to Decoder:getChannelCount).
  • Removed love.filesystem.isDirectory (replaced by love.filesystem.getInfo).
  • Removed love.filesystem.isFile (replaced by love.filesystem.getInfo).
  • Removed love.filesystem.isSymlink (replaced by love.filesystem.getInfo).
  • Removed love.filesystem.getLastModified (replaced by love.filesystem.getInfo).
  • Removed love.filesystem.getSize (replaced by love.filesystem.getInfo).
  • Removed ParticleSystem:setAreaSpread and ParticleSystem:getAreaSpread (renamed to ParticleSystem:setEmissionArea and ParticleSystem:getEmissionArea).
  • Removed love.math.compress and love.math.decompress (replaced by love.data.compress and love.data.decompress).
  • Removed World:getBodyList, World:getJointList, and World:getContactList (renamed to World:getBodies, World:getJoints, and World:getContacts).
  • Removed Body:getFixtureList, Body:getJointList, and Body:getContactList (renamed to Body:getFixtures, Body:getJoints, and Body:getContacts).
  • Removed PrismaticJoint:hasLimitsEnabled (renamed to PrismaticJoint:areLimitsEnabled).
  • Removed RevoluteJoint:hasLimitsEnabled (renamed to RevoluteJoint:areLimitsEnabled).

Fixes

• Fixed BezierCurve:render adding collinear points in some situations.
• Fixed sound Decoders to cause a Lua error instead of hard-crashing when memory for the decoding buffer can't be allocated.