An indie game studio in your terminal or editor.

A Claude Code-, Cursor-, and CLI-friendly template for solo and tiny teams who want AI help that feels like three talented friends in a small studio — not a AAA corporation. Workflows live in .claude/skills/; Cursor loads them through .cursor/skills, a symlink to that folder. If the link is wrong after clone, or skills never appear in Cursor, see TROUBLESHOOTING.md (common causes: Windows Git checkout without symlinks, OneDrive, or missing Developer Mode / elevated shell for mklink).

Highlights

• Three agents, many skills — developer, designer, and artist voices plus slash workflows from /start through /vertical-slice, scoped for small teams.
• Client-flexible, engine-agnostic — use Claude Code, Cursor, or Codex CLI; no required src/ layout or engine stack in the template.
• Optional MCP servers — screen snapshots (tiny-vision) and asset generation (tiny-assets) when you want evidence and real audio/2D/3D output.
• Single source for skills — edit .claude/skills/ only; Cursor stays in sync via .cursor/skills when the symlink is intact (TROUBLESHOOTING.md if not).

What this is

• CLAUDE.md — master operating guide for the repo.
• AGENTS.md — thin bootstrap for Codex CLI (and other tools that read AGENTS.md); full detail stays in CLAUDE.md.
• .claude/agents/ — exactly three agents: game-developer, game-designer, game-artist.
• .claude/skills/ — slash workflows (/start, /brainstorm, …).
• .cursor/skills — symlink to .claude/skills/ so Cursor stays in sync (Cursor only — see TROUBLESHOOTING.md).
• .claude/docs/ — philosophy, collaboration, QA-evidence, and optional MCP setup:
  • vision-setup.md — tiny-vision
  • assets-setup.md — tiny-assets
• .claude/settings.json — starter permission hints you can extend.

There is no mandatory src/, engine, or engine-specific stack — add your game where you like; the template stays lightweight.

Quick start

1. Copy this folder or use it as a GitHub template (when published).
2. Open the project in Claude Code, Cursor, or Codex CLI.
   • Cursor: project skills come from .cursor/skills → .claude/skills (verify the symlink in TROUBLESHOOTING.md, especially on Windows).
   • Codex CLI: reads AGENTS.md → CLAUDE.md → skill files. Agent Skills live under .agents/skills (docs); copy or symlink .claude/skills/<name> there to reuse.
3. Run /start to onboard and write design/gdd.md (design + art direction).
4. When building gameplay: /brainstorm, /design-feature, /implement-feature in that order.
5. Before you show a build: /qa and /ship-check.

Slash commands (skills)

Command	Purpose
/start	Onboard; write design/gdd.md
/brainstorm	Shape concepts, verbs, emotional goals
/design-feature	Lean feature spec (designer-led)
/implement-feature	Build in slices (developer-led)
/art-direction	Refine GDD art direction section
/playtest-review	All three perspectives on a slice or idea
/qa	Evidence-first quality pass
/ship-check	Share/release readiness for the stated scope
/asset-plan	Asset budget; gate paid API calls
/gen-audio	Audio via ElevenLabs MCP
/gen-2d	2D via Nano Banana MCP
/gen-3d	3D via Tripo MCP (draft → optional refine)
/vertical-slice	Full slice: plan → generate → playtest

Names may appear with or without the slash depending on your client. Skill files: .claude/skills/<name>/SKILL.md.

Optional MCP servers

Both are optional. Skills work without them; placeholders are used when providers are missing.

Vision — tiny-vision

Screen snapshots for playtest evidence. See .claude/docs/vision-setup.md.

pip install -r requirements-vision.txt
# Cursor MCP: python -m core.vision.mcp_server  (cwd = repo root)

Assets — tiny-assets

Real audio, 2D, and 3D generation. API keys stay in the server process — never returned to the LLM. Missing keys are non-blocking; those asset types use placeholders while configured providers continue.

See .claude/docs/assets-setup.md for full setup.

Install:

python -m venv .venv
.\.venv\Scripts\Activate.ps1
pip install -r requirements-assets.txt

Environment variables (set only what you need):

Provider	Variable
ElevenLabs	ELEVENLABS_API_KEY
Tripo AI	TRIPO_API_KEY
Nano Banana	GEMINI_API_KEY or GOOGLE_API_KEY

Cursor MCP config:

• Command: venv python
• Args: -m, core.assets.mcp_server
• Working directory: this repo root
• tool_timeout_sec: 200 (Tripo refine can take up to ~180s)

Check providers (CLI):

python -m core.assets.providers

Tools exposed: check_asset_providers, gen_audio, gen_2d, gen_3d_draft, gen_3d_refine

Invoking agents

Use your client’s subagent or Task flow with the markdown files in .claude/agents/. Each file describes voice, ownership, and collaboration.

Who it is for

• Solo developers using AI for design + code + art direction conversations.
• Pairs or trios who want shared vocabulary without enterprise workflow.
• Anyone who liked the idea of a “game studio in a repo” but not the scale of the big templates.

Hooks

No hooks are required. Add minimal scripts under .claude/hooks/ only if they solve a real problem (e.g. your team wants a pre-commit lint). The default template stays quiet.

Customization

• Keep AGENTS.md short; put durable studio rules in CLAUDE.md.
• Edit CLAUDE.md with your non-negotiables (platform, engine, tone).
• Tighten or loosen agent prompts in .claude/agents/.
• Add one skill at a time under .claude/skills/ — keep the set small.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.