Game design — designer-discipline methodology, the think layer. Thirty-three skills chained by an orchestrator with decision gates.
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01
art-direction
Set or review a game's art direction — style pillars, reference matrix, colour/shape/lighting language, and a readability check against gameplay.
game-design-art-direction -
02
audio-design
Design or review game audio — SFX layering, adaptive music, mix priority, and audio accessibility.
game-design-audio-design -
03
character-design
Write or review characters — profile, motive, voice, and a psychological layer using OCEAN, MBTI, Schwartz values, and attachment style.
game-design-character-design -
04
cognitive-load
Evaluate a design's cognitive load — how much a player must track at once, and which biases it exploits fairly or not.
game-design-cognitive-load -
05
combat-numbers
Design or review combat numbers — standard player model, damage formulas, DPS/EHP/TTK, and pseudo-random distribution.
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06
concept-pillars
Distill a game idea into a one-line positioning, core fantasy, 3–4 design pillars, and what-not-to-do boundaries.
game-design-concept-pillars -
07
core-loop
Design or review a game's core loop — action, feedback, reward, and how it nests into mid and long loops.
game-design-core-loop -
08
design-review
Review a design change with the MDA framework — mechanics, dynamics, aesthetics — plus an emergence lens for LLM/procedural gameplay.
game-design-design-review -
09
dialogue-writing
Write or review dialogue and copy — voice consistency, differentiation, rhythm, and subtext, with an LLM real-time performance layer.
game-design-dialogue-writing -
10
doc-writing
Write or restructure any non-GDD document — guides, manuals, patch notes — using the Diátaxis four-category method.
game-design-doc-writing -
11
economy-balance
Review whether a game's resource economy and pacing hold up — source/sink tables, net values, and extreme-curve simulation.
game-design-economy-balance -
12
feature-staffing
Break a design into who does it — map features to disciplines and roles, with a one-person-many-hats ruling.
game-design-feature-staffing -
13
game-feel
Diagnose or design game feel and juice — responsiveness, feedback layering, impact, cadence, and clarity.
game-design-game-feel -
14
gdd-authoring
Write or restructure the GDD itself — skeleton, chapter split, level-of-detail layering, and document hygiene.
game-design-gdd-authoring -
15
level-design
Design or review level and encounter pacing — spatial layout, sightlines, difficulty curves, and teach-practice-test choreography.
game-design-level-design -
16
llm-systems-design
Design systems where gameplay runs on an LLM — the deterministic/emergent split, own-state design, and anti-collapse guardrails.
game-design-llm-systems-design -
17
market-positioning
Evaluate a game idea's market position — audience persona, competitor matrix, and a one-line differentiator.
game-design-market-positioning -
18
monetization
Design or review a monetization model — premium, DLC, pass, IAP, ads, or subscription — against a dark-pattern red line.
game-design-monetization -
19
narrative-structure
Design or review a story arc and truth structure — pick a skeleton, break it into beats gameplay can advance.
game-design-narrative-structure -
20
new-game-pipeline
Orchestrate a complete design dossier end-to-end — chains the game-design skills in disciplinary order with decision gates.
game-design-new-game-pipeline -
21
onboarding-ftue
Design or review the first N minutes — the first hook, teaching one thing at a time, and the first-win moment.
game-design-onboarding-ftue -
22
playability-retention
Judge whether a game is worth playing and keeps people — loop closure, session viability, and peak moments.
game-design-playability-retention -
23
player-personas
Walk through a design as different player types — Bartle types or Quantic Foundry motivations — to expose blind spots.
game-design-player-personas -
24
player-psychology
Check a mechanic against player-psychology principles — loss aversion, variable reinforcement, flow, and more.
game-design-player-psychology -
25
playtest-metrics
Plan a playtest — decisive-question triage, minimal validation slice, Go/No-Go KPIs, and data instrumentation.
game-design-playtest-metrics -
26
production-scoping
Break a design into an executable production plan — milestones, dependencies, risk, and effort under real constraints.
game-design-production-scoping -
27
progression-systems
Design or review growth and unlock systems — experience, skill trees, gear, and the sense-of-power curve.
game-design-progression-systems -
28
propagate-change
Trace every dependency of a core design change across the GDD, so nothing is left self-contradictory.
game-design-propagate-change -
29
spawn-director
Design or tune a credit-economy spawn director — income, spawn-card costs, wave caps, and boss-burst budgets.
game-design-spawn-director -
30
systems-design
Map a system's coupling before adding or changing it — input events, output effects, and deterministic vs. emergent ownership.
game-design-systems-design -
31
title-and-cover
Name a game and produce one promotional cover image, both derived from the design itself.
game-design-title-and-cover -
32
ux-ui
Design or review game UI/UX — information architecture, HUD priority, and readability heuristics.
game-design-ux-ui -
33
worldbuilding-scene
Design or review worldbuilding and scene narrative — world self-consistency and how scenes narrate silently.
game-design-worldbuilding-scene
Godot — Godot 4.x engine engineering, the build layer. Four skills covering development, assets, and web export.
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01
asset-integration
Integrate generated art, 3D models, or audio into a Godot 4.x project — PackedScenes, .import sidecars, and AudioStream wiring.
godot-asset-integration -
02
dev
Develop, test, build, and deploy Godot 4.x games — GdUnit4 tests, PlayGodot automation, web/desktop exports, and CI/CD.
godot-dev -
03
feature-breakdown
Break a gameplay feature into the Godot systems it touches — scenes, autoloads, signals, and integration risk order.
godot-feature-breakdown -
04
web-export
Fix Godot 4.x web-export pitfalls — washed-out renderers, untextured models, CJK tofu, and oversized .pck files.
godot-web-export
Phaser 3 — Phaser 3 engine engineering, the build layer. One skill for static-site browser games.
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01
dev
Build, review, or debug a Phaser 3 browser game as a pure static site — vendored ESM, Arcade physics, and sandboxed-iframe deployment.
phaser-dev
three.js — three.js engine engineering, the build layer. One skill for WebGL static-site games.
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01
dev
Build, review, or debug a three.js browser game as a pure static site — vendored ES modules, 2D or 3D WebGL, and GLB packaging contracts.
threejs-dev
Art — AI art-asset production pipelines, the produce layer. Five skills, engine-free.
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01
2d-asset-production
Produce reviewable 2D game art — sprites, tilesets, backgrounds, UI images — via an image-generation API with prompt provenance.
art-2d-asset-production -
02
3d-model-generation
Generate a real 3D model asset as GLB/glTF via text-to-3D or image-to-3D, verified for scale, orientation, and engine handoff.
art-3d-model-generation -
03
audio-sfx-synthesis
Synthesize sound effects and music loops procedurally — oscillators, envelopes, and noise, the sfxr/bfxr way.
art-audio-sfx-synthesis -
04
reference-sprite-regeneration
Regenerate or replace a game sprite from a reference image while preserving likeness, pose, and proportions.
art-reference-sprite-regeneration -
05
ui-widget-generation
Generate game UI widget art — HUD frames, bars, panels — decomposed into production-ready, nine-sliceable components.
art-ui-widget-generation
Workflow — cross-project process backbone, the organize layer. Four skills, engine-free.
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01
design-chat
Run a design-partner chat turn that also orchestrates a game-dev pipeline — discuss the game, dispatch next actions.
workflow-design-chat -
02
design-to-tickets
Split a game design into executable art/program tickets — a SPEC plus a machine-readable task manifest.
workflow-design-to-tickets -
03
game-dev
Set up a game project's end-to-end workflow — chaptered GDD, spec-to-plan lifecycle, and a versioned AI art pipeline.
workflow-game-dev -
04
game-v2-migration
Migrate a legacy game repo to the current workflow structure while production stays on the old main branch.
workflow-game-v2-migration