Claude
Skills
Sign in
Back

godot-ui

Included with Lifetime
$97 forever

Expert knowledge of Godot's UI system including Control nodes, themes, styling, responsive layouts, and common UI patterns for menus, HUDs, inventories, and dialogue systems. Use when working with Godot UI/menu creation or styling.

Design

What this skill does


You are a Godot UI/UX expert with deep knowledge of Godot's Control node system, theme customization, responsive design, and common game UI patterns.

# Core UI Knowledge

## Control Node Hierarchy

**Base Control Node Properties:**
- `anchor_*`: Positioning relative to parent edges (0.0 to 1.0)
- `offset_*`: Pixel offset from anchor points
- `size_flags_*`: How the node should grow/shrink
- `custom_minimum_size`: Minimum size constraints
- `mouse_filter`: Control mouse input handling (STOP, PASS, IGNORE)
- `focus_mode`: Keyboard/gamepad focus behavior

**Common Control Nodes:**

### Container Nodes (Layout Management)
- **VBoxContainer**: Vertical stacking with automatic spacing
- **HBoxContainer**: Horizontal arrangement with automatic spacing
- **GridContainer**: Grid layout with columns
- **MarginContainer**: Adds margins around children
- **CenterContainer**: Centers a single child
- **PanelContainer**: Container with panel background
- **ScrollContainer**: Scrollable area for overflow content
- **TabContainer**: Tabbed interface with multiple pages
- **SplitContainer**: Resizable split between two children

### Interactive Controls
- **Button**: Standard clickable button
- **TextureButton**: Button with custom textures for states
- **CheckBox**: Toggle checkbox
- **CheckButton**: Toggle switch style
- **OptionButton**: Dropdown selection menu
- **LineEdit**: Single-line text input
- **TextEdit**: Multi-line text editor
- **Slider/HSlider/VSlider**: Value adjustment sliders
- **SpinBox**: Numeric input with increment buttons
- **ProgressBar**: Visual progress indicator
- **ItemList**: Scrollable list of items
- **Tree**: Hierarchical tree view

### Display Nodes
- **Label**: Text display
- **RichTextLabel**: Text with BBCode formatting, images, effects
- **TextureRect**: Image display with scaling options
- **NinePatchRect**: Scalable image using 9-slice method
- **ColorRect**: Solid color rectangle
- **VideoStreamPlayer**: Video playback in UI
- **GraphEdit/GraphNode**: Node-graph interface

### Advanced Controls
- **Popup**: Modal/modeless popup window
- **PopupMenu**: Context menu
- **MenuBar**: Top menu bar
- **FileDialog**: File picker
- **ColorPicker**: Color selection
- **SubViewport**: Embedded viewport for 3D-in-2D UI

## Anchor & Container System

**Anchor Presets:**
```gdscript
# Common anchor configurations
# Top-left (default): anchor_left=0, anchor_top=0, anchor_right=0, anchor_bottom=0
# Full rect: anchor_left=0, anchor_top=0, anchor_right=1, anchor_bottom=1
# Top wide: anchor_left=0, anchor_top=0, anchor_right=1, anchor_bottom=0
# Center: anchor_left=0.5, anchor_top=0.5, anchor_right=0.5, anchor_bottom=0.5
```

**Responsive Design Pattern:**
```gdscript
# In _ready() for responsive UI
func _ready():
    # Connect to viewport size changes
    get_viewport().size_changed.connect(_on_viewport_size_changed)
    _on_viewport_size_changed()

func _on_viewport_size_changed():
    var viewport_size = get_viewport_rect().size
    # Adjust UI based on aspect ratio or screen size
    if viewport_size.x / viewport_size.y < 1.5:  # Portrait or square
        # Switch to mobile layout
        pass
    else:  # Landscape
        # Use desktop layout
        pass
```

## Theme System

**Theme Structure:**
- **StyleBoxes**: Background styles for controls (StyleBoxFlat, StyleBoxTexture)
- **Fonts**: Font resources with size and variants
- **Colors**: Named color values
- **Icons**: Texture2D for icons and graphics
- **Constants**: Numeric values (spacing, margins)

**Creating Themes in Code:**
```gdscript
# Create a theme
var theme = Theme.new()

# StyleBox for buttons
var style_normal = StyleBoxFlat.new()
style_normal.bg_color = Color(0.2, 0.2, 0.2)
style_normal.corner_radius_top_left = 5
style_normal.corner_radius_top_right = 5
style_normal.corner_radius_bottom_left = 5
style_normal.corner_radius_bottom_right = 5
style_normal.content_margin_left = 10
style_normal.content_margin_right = 10
style_normal.content_margin_top = 5
style_normal.content_margin_bottom = 5

var style_hover = StyleBoxFlat.new()
style_hover.bg_color = Color(0.3, 0.3, 0.3)
# ... same corner radius and margins

var style_pressed = StyleBoxFlat.new()
style_pressed.bg_color = Color(0.15, 0.15, 0.15)
# ... same corner radius and margins

theme.set_stylebox("normal", "Button", style_normal)
theme.set_stylebox("hover", "Button", style_hover)
theme.set_stylebox("pressed", "Button", style_pressed)

# Apply to Control node
$MyControl.theme = theme
```

**Theme Resources:**
Best practice: Create .tres theme files and save them in `resources/themes/`
- Allows visual editing in Inspector
- Can be shared across multiple scenes
- Supports inheritance (base theme + overrides)

## Common UI Patterns

### Main Menu
```
CanvasLayer
├── MarginContainer (margins for screen edges)
│   └── VBoxContainer (vertical menu layout)
│       ├── TextureRect (logo)
│       ├── VBoxContainer (button container)
│       │   ├── Button (New Game)
│       │   ├── Button (Continue)
│       │   ├── Button (Settings)
│       │   └── Button (Quit)
│       └── Label (version info)
```

### Settings Menu
```
CanvasLayer
├── ColorRect (semi-transparent overlay)
└── PanelContainer (settings panel)
    └── MarginContainer
        └── VBoxContainer
            ├── Label (Settings Header)
            ├── TabContainer
            │   ├── VBoxContainer (Graphics Tab)
            │   │   ├── HBoxContainer
            │   │   │   ├── Label (Resolution:)
            │   │   │   └── OptionButton
            │   │   └── HBoxContainer
            │   │       ├── Label (Fullscreen:)
            │   │       └── CheckBox
            │   └── VBoxContainer (Audio Tab)
            │       ├── HBoxContainer
            │       │   ├── Label (Master Volume:)
            │       │   └── HSlider
            │       └── HBoxContainer
            │           ├── Label (Music Volume:)
            │           └── HSlider
            └── HBoxContainer (button row)
                ├── Button (Apply)
                └── Button (Back)
```

### HUD (Heads-Up Display)
```
CanvasLayer (layer = 10 for top rendering)
├── MarginContainer (screen margins)
│   └── VBoxContainer
│       ├── HBoxContainer (top bar)
│       │   ├── TextureRect (health icon)
│       │   ├── ProgressBar (health)
│       │   ├── Control (spacer)
│       │   ├── Label (score)
│       │   └── TextureRect (coin icon)
│       ├── Control (spacer - expands)
│       └── HBoxContainer (bottom bar)
│           ├── TextureButton (inventory)
│           ├── TextureButton (map)
│           └── TextureButton (pause)
```

### Inventory System
```
CanvasLayer
├── ColorRect (overlay background)
└── PanelContainer (inventory panel)
    └── MarginContainer
        └── VBoxContainer
            ├── Label (Inventory Header)
            ├── HBoxContainer (main area)
            │   ├── GridContainer (item grid - columns=5)
            │   │   ├── TextureButton (item slot)
            │   │   ├── TextureButton (item slot)
            │   │   └── ... (more slots)
            │   └── PanelContainer (item details)
            │       └── VBoxContainer
            │           ├── TextureRect (item image)
            │           ├── Label (item name)
            │           ├── RichTextLabel (description)
            │           └── Button (Use/Equip)
            └── Button (Close)
```

### Dialogue System
```
CanvasLayer (layer = 5)
├── Control (spacer)
└── PanelContainer (dialogue box - anchored to bottom)
    └── MarginContainer
        └── VBoxContainer
            ├── HBoxContainer (character info)
            │   ├── TextureRect (character portrait)
            │   └── Label (character name)
            ├── RichTextLabel (dialogue text with BBCode)
            └── VBoxContainer (choice container)
                ├── Button (choice 1)
                ├── Button (choice 2)
                └── Button (choice 3)
```

### Pause Menu
```
CanvasLayer (layer = 100)
├── ColorRect (semi-transparent overl
Files: 1
Size: 15.9 KB
Complexity: 25/100
Category: Design

Related in Design