How to Create a Proper Main Menu

Click on 'Scene' → 'New Scene' or press Ctrl+N. In the popup, select 'User Interface' → 'Control' and click Create. The Control node is Godot's base node for all UI elements and provides powerful layout and anchoring features perfect for menus.

Right-click on the Control node in the Scene panel and select 'Add Child Node'. Search for 'VBoxContainer' and click Create. The VBoxContainer automatically arranges its children vertically with even spacing, perfect for menu buttons. Rename it to 'MenuContainer' for clarity.

With the VBoxContainer selected, add three Button nodes as children. Name them 'PlayButton', 'SettingsButton', and 'QuitButton'. For each button, select it and in the Inspector panel, find the 'Text' property under 'Button' section. Change the text to 'Play Game', 'Settings', and 'Quit' respectively. You can also adjust font size, color, and alignment in the 'Theme Overrides' section.

Select the PlayButton, click the 'Node' tab (next to Inspector), and double-click the 'pressed()' signal. Click 'Connect' in the popup. This creates a function in your script that runs when the button is clicked. Repeat for SettingsButton and QuitButton. Godot will automatically create the _on_ButtonName_pressed() functions in your script.

In the script, implement the button functions. For the Play button, use: `get_tree().change_scene_to_file('res://path/to/your/game_scene.tscn')` to load your main game. For the Quit button, use: `get_tree().quit()` to close the application (note: this only works in exported games, not in the editor). For Settings, you can either create a settings scene or use a popup menu.