The issue asked for three nodes: Set layer, Set collides with and Layer of. A probe showed that the finding behind the first two is outdated. The Properties node of type Collider already writes both settings while the game runs, and both collision systems see the change at once. As agreed, only Layer of is built, and writing stays with Properties. - Layer of is a data node with the input object and the outputs name and number. The name is what the project calls the layer. - NodeContext.collisionLayerOf answers the number, and the new field collisionLayers on GraphLookup brings the names to the node. - layerHolderOf in solids.ts says whose layer counts. An object stands for its first collider child, a collider or tilemap for itself. - Decided here: a collider that is switched off counts too, because its layer is set either way. - Decided here: without a collider the name is empty and the number is -1. - The node is a read, not a run, so it answers at the moment it is asked. Right after a Set in the same flow it names the new layer. - The output number was not asked for. It fits the layer port of Properties as it is. Changing the layer during a run had no test at all so far. Five tests now hold it in both systems. Tests: - Gate: 198 files, 2929 tests (2914 + 15), exit 0 - e2e 1-6: 285 checks passed (06: +2 for block 6z-x) - Five unit tests for the change during a run: a mover is blocked, passes and is blocked again, a ray with a layer filter follows the change, and a dynamic body falls through the ground in Play - Six unit tests for Layer of, three against each system, and four cases in the node catalog - 6z-x finds the node in the palette, checks its ports and logs "Ghost" and "1" for the owner's collider in a Play run - Two counter-probes for the change during a run fail 1 and 4 tests, and only new ones, so those places were unguarded before - Six counter-probes for Layer of fail 2 to 3 tests each. All eight ran on stein2, not in the container. - The browser counter-probe fails 6z-x with "Layer 1" and "1" - The e2e sum of 1619 is calculated (1617 measured in CI run 276, plus 2). Neither the full suite nor the smokes ran for this state. - Not looked at in the browser: that the layer port of Properties shows the same picker as the inspector. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
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Game Maker
A browser-based tool "one step before a game engine": create assets (scenes, cameras, sprites), place them into scenes, tweak their properties in an inspector and press Play – all in one program, all drawn inside a single WebGL canvas.
Live: https://nockal.com/game-maker/ · Widget playground: https://nockal.com/game-maker/?playground
The documentation is the wiki: https://git.nockal.com/meleki/game-maker/wiki – every concept, node, tab and shortcut, plus the architecture and the development workflow. This file is the short way in.
In one screen
- An asset is a named, typed thing (scene, camera, sprite, text, behavior, variables, struct, collider, rigidbody, container, clip area, texture, vector art, pixel art, palette, animation, curve, tile, tilemap, state machine, shader, font, sound, particles) with properties and no position.
- A scene object places an asset: position, sparse overrides of its properties, an optional parent. Only what differs from the asset is stored; the inspector paints it gold and offers ↺ / ↑.
- A container is a reusable group edited once and placed many times; its content is resolved from the template on every read. A screen is a container switched on and off.
- A behavior is logic as a node graph, placed like anything else and parented to the object it acts on. Play has no built-in behaviour – everything that happens is a graph.
- An account owns projects: the editor asks for a user name and a password first, and each account sees only its own projects. The Account menu at the far right of the toolbar changes the password and signs out.
- Play runs a throwaway copy of the project; every panel stays usable and Stop brings back exactly what was saved. Release… shares a link that plays the saved game on its own, without the editor and without signing in.
Quick start
Node 22 is required.
npm install
npm run dev # http://localhost:5175/game-maker/dist/ – API calls are proxied to production
npm run check # typecheck + lint + format:check + unit tests – the gate CI runs too
npm run build # writes dist/ and regenerates index.html; the folder is what nginx serves
The browser suite and the three example games need a machine with a GPU:
node tools/seed-e2e.mjs && node tools/e2e.mjs # the editor, 1619 checks (GM_STEPS=20 for one step)
# every tool signs in first – see the Accounts page
node tools/seed-jumprun.mjs && node tools/smoke-jumprun.mjs
node tools/seed-tetris.mjs && node tools/smoke-tetris.mjs
node tools/seed-actor.mjs && node tools/smoke-actor.mjs
Every push runs all of it on the Gitea runner – the gate as one job, build and suite as another beside it – so locally take the gate plus the step your change touches and leave the full run to CI. Details, the GPU requirement and the detached runner are in Development.
Documentation
| Page | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Concepts | Assets, scene objects, overrides, play mode, the camera, the console |
| Accounts | Signing in and out, the accounts, who a project belongs to, what the check tools need |
| Scenes | The edited scene, the start scene, and switching scenes from a graph |
| Scene editing | Placing, z-order, hierarchy, the editor offset |
| Behaviors | Node graphs: variables, the node set, structs and lists, loops, nesting, editing |
| Structs | Struct assets: a named shape that struct variables, fields and Pack/Expand follow |
| Colliders | Shapes (box, circle, capsule, polygon), collision events, blocking movement, one-way colliders and raycasts |
| Physics | Rigidbodies, the collider material, gravity, the fixed step |
| Textures | Images, frames, nine-slice, the filter, upload limits |
| Vector art | Pictures drawn from shapes: the pen, curves, gradients and texture fills, combining shapes |
| Pixel art | Pictures painted pixel by pixel: the palette, the tools, layers and frames |
| Fonts | Font assets, the picker, what a text falls back to |
| Sounds | Sound assets and Play sound |
| Animations | Animation assets and the Animation tab |
| Curves | Easings drawn by hand, the Curve tab, using one on a key or a Lerp |
| Shaders | Shader graphs a sprite wears, their node set, the properties they declare |
| Particles | Particle graphs: a particle as a function of its age |
| State machines | The asset, named transitions, State branch, Set state and State transition |
| Containers | Templates, instances, screens |
| Tiles | The tile asset, plain tiles and the two autotile kinds, the pictures as animation steps, the Tile tab |
| Tilemaps | The tilemap asset, painting in the scene view, layers, what it looks like in the game |
| Plugins | Extending the editor: the plugin file, how it is loaded, switching one on and off, API v1 |
| Keyboard | Every shortcut |
| Architecture | Stack, source layout, the rules that keep it organised |
| Development | Commands, the e2e suite, the example games, CI |
| API | The PHP JSON API and the project document |
Ideas, gaps and bugs
They live in the issue tracker: https://git.nockal.com/meleki/game-maker/issues. What is not there yet is listed on the wiki's Home page.
