PixelCore Engine — The free game engine that teaches you as you build

PixelCore Game Studio

A studio that feels instant.

Open a project in seconds, edit while your game runs, and see every change the moment you save. Studio and your shipped game share one runtime, so what you see is exactly what ships.

Harbor Town

⌘K

Hierarchy +

Harbor Town
Camera Rig
Terrain
Roads
Districts
Market Row
Clock Tower
Docks
Delivery Carts
Trees
UI Layer
Economy

2D3D2.5D

LitOverdrawExplain

60.0 fps · iPhone tier 1 · 214 draws

Inspector

Transform

Position

806

Rotation

0450

Building

Footprint2 × 2

Upkeep$12 / day

Workers4

Lit at night

Clock (script)

Chime every1h

Assets town_pack

clock_tower.pxsmarket.pxshot reloaded · state kept

1component Clock
2    chime_every = 1h
3
4    on start
5        every chime_every
6            play_sound("bell")
7            town.pay_wages()

Hot reload everything

Scripts, textures, meshes, materials and UI update in the running game. Your game state stays put.

Play on device in one click

Run on a connected iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, Android device or Steam Deck, with logs and frame stats streamed back.

Made for Git

Scenes, prefabs, materials and UI are clean text files that diff and merge, cooked to fast binaries only when you build.

PixelCore Engine

Everything a game needs.
Nothing it doesn't.

A focused, modern C++ runtime that ships inside your game. Every system is small, polished, documented and tested on real devices.

A renderer that scales

Physically based materials, baked lighting and light probes, cascaded shadows and a full HDR post stack, tuned to look great on a phone and gain quality tiers on desktop.

2D and 3D as equals

Sprites, atlases, tilemaps and a pixel-perfect camera live in the same scene model as 3D meshes. Build 2D, 3D, isometric or 2.5D without switching tools.

Physics, built in

Rigid bodies, a character controller, triggers and queries in 3D, and fast, stable 2D physics for platformers and puzzles.

Animation

Skeletal animation with state machines, blend trees and basic IK, plus frame-based sprite animation with events.

UI that fits every screen

One UI toolkit for phone, tablet, desktop and TV, with themes, data binding, safe areas and controller focus navigation built in.

Audio

A 3D mixer with buses, snapshots and layered adaptive music that follows your gameplay.

Simulation kits

Ready-made building blocks for economies, grid placement, calendars, inventories and data tables, made for tycoon, builder and strategy games.

Saves and localization

Versioned save files with migrations, cloud-save hooks, string tables with plural rules, and font fallback for every language.

Accessibility from day one

Text scaling, color-blind-safe themes, full controller remapping, subtitles and reduced motion are part of the engine, not an afterthought.

Rendering

One look. Every screen.

Design once for the phone in your pocket, then let quality tiers add richness on stronger hardware. One renderer and one material system for every platform, so nothing needs rebuilding when you change targets.

Crowds without the cost. Instancing, batching and impostors keep busy towns and factory floors smooth on phones.
Materials written once. Every material works on every platform, with no per-device versions to maintain.
Device-aware. Thermal and battery state can lower the tier on the fly so play stays smooth.

Tier 1 · every devicev1

PBR materials, image-based lighting
Baked lightmaps and light probes
Cascaded shadows, SSAO
HDR, filmic tone mapping, bloom, depth of field, grading

Tier 2 · stronger hardwarev1.x

Screen-space reflections, volumetric fog
Temporal anti-aliasing and platform upscalers

Tier 3 · high endLater

Advanced real-time lighting
Even richer detail on high-end hardware

Director and Cast · coming in v1.x

Tell your story like a filmmaker.

Shoot cutscenes and trailers with a camera that behaves like real cinema glass, and fill them with characters you build in minutes. Both live inside Game Studio.

Director · harbor_intro.pxcut

Shot 4 · Take 2

A CAM 50 mm · f/1.4 · 180° · ISO 800 REC 00:00:12:08 FOCUS 3.4 m 2.39:1 · SPHERICAL

Lens

Aperture f/1.4

Focus

Glass

Director

Real focal lengths, f-stops, focus pulls and anamorphic lenses on a cutscene timeline, with dolly, crane and handheld rigs.

Cast

3D and 2D characters from bodies, faces, hair and outfits, on one skeleton so every animation fits.

Trailers and photo mode

Render your cutscenes to 4K for the store page, and give players the same lenses in a built-in photo mode.

Try the lenses and build a character

PixelScript

Ten lines to open a door. Enough to ship an empire.

PixelScript is a friendly, typed language made for games. Types are inferred, so beginners rarely write them, and the editor still catches mistakes before you press play.

Game-shaped. Components, events, signals, entity queries and wait 2s coroutines are part of the language.
Visual graph that round-trips. Designers build with nodes that compile to readable script.
Real tooling. Autocomplete, docs on hover, breakpoints, a profiler and a VS Code extension.

Explore PixelScript

door.pxssaved · reloaded, state kept

component Door
    open_speed = 2.0
    is_open = false

    on interact(player)
        if player.has("key")
            is_open = true
            play_sound("door_open")
            tween(self.rotation.y, 90, over: 1s)
        else
            show_hint("You need a key.")

Platforms

From the phone in your pocket
to the TV in your living room.

Mobile, TV and handheld are first-class targets, not afterthoughts. One action-based input system handles touch, mouse and keyboard, controllers and the Siri Remote.

macOSStudio + games

WindowsStudio + games

LinuxStudio + games

Steam DeckController-ready

iPhoneTouch-first

iPadTablet layouts

Apple TVTen-foot UI, Siri Remote

AndroidPhones and tablets

ConsolesPlanned after 1.0

WebPlanned after 1.0

XRPlanned after 1.0

PixelCore Learn

The engine that teaches you.

Learning is built into the product. Lessons run inside Studio, check your work as you go and work offline. Every template explains itself, and every code sample in the docs is tested automatically, so it always works.

Beginner path

Ten guided mini-projects, from your first scene to shipping on a phone.

Recipes and reference

Short answers to real tasks, plus a complete API reference with docs on hover.

Quick start · about 30 minutes

Install StudioA small download that opens in seconds.
3 min
Open a templatePick Platformer, Top-down, Puzzle or 3D Explorer.
2 min
Change somethingEdit PixelScript and watch it hot reload.
8 min
Make it yoursSwap art, tweak the UI, add a sound.
8 min
Play on your phoneOne click to run on a connected device.
5 min
Export itA real build, badge and all.
4 min

AI-ready

Build with an assistant that can see your game.

PixelCore ships with a first-party MCP server. Claude, or any MCP-compatible assistant, can read the docs, create scenes, write PixelScript, run your game and check its own work with screenshots, logs and frame stats.

Local first. Runs on your machine. Your project stays yours, and nothing is uploaded to us.
You stay in control. Read-only until you allow edits; every change lands in Studio's undo history.
One code path. Assistants use the same commands as Studio and the command line.

pixelcore-mcp · Harbor Town connected · edit

Add a night market that opens at 8pm and sells lanterns.

Reading the docs on calendar events → done

Adding Night Market from the market stall prefab → done

Writing the night market script → done

Checking the script → no errors

Reloading the game and taking a screenshot at 8:05 pm → done

Done. The market opens at 8pm with lantern stock tied to the economy kit. It's one undo step if you want it gone.

Protected builds

Your game is yours. Keep it that way.

Release builds are protected by default, with no extra tools or setup. Studio opens only source projects, never shipped games.

Encrypted packages

Game data is encrypted and signed, so edited or tampered files refuse to load.

One-way builds

No editor metadata ships. A cooked game can't be imported back into a project.

Compiled code

Scripts and shaders ship compiled, never as readable source.

Honest limits

No client-side protection is unbreakable. Ours stops casual copying and ripping, and our docs say exactly what it does.

How it compares

Built to do better, everywhere we can.

We studied where developers struggle and designed PixelCore around fixing it. Here's the short version.

Feature	PixelCore 1.0	Unity	Unreal Engine	Godot
Royalties on your game	None, ever, written into the license	None; paid seats above a revenue threshold	5% of lifetime gross above $1M per product	None
Learning inside the editor	Lessons with checks, offline docs, self-explaining templates	Some in-editor tutorials; most learning online	Mostly online	Offline API reference; tutorials online
2D and 3D	Equals in one scene model; 2.5D built in	Both, with separate 2D packages	3D-first; limited 2D tooling	Strong 2D; separate 2D and 3D node types
Apple TV	First-class, focus UI and Siri Remote	Supported	Supported	Not officially supported
AI assistant integration	First-party MCP server at 1.0	Vendor AI tools; MCP varies	Community add-ons	Community add-ons
Protected builds	On by default: encrypted, signed, one-way	Third-party tools	Optional package encryption	Optional encryption with custom export templates

PixelCore column describes the planned 1.0 feature set. Other columns reflect publicly available information as of October 2026 and may change; check each vendor for current terms. Product names are trademarks of their respective owners. See the full comparison →

Pricing

Free engine. Free studio. Free forever.

We earn our living from optional content, not from a cut of your game.

Everything you need

$0forever, no royalties

PixelCore Engine, PixelCore Game Studio, PixelScript, the MCP server, free templates, starter assets and every lesson and doc.

Commercial use, any revenue, no seat fees
Every 1.0 platform included
Protected release builds
Requires the “Powered by PixelCore” badge

Get early access

Optional extras

Packs & kits

Genre starter kits and content packs tuned to PixelCore's look, so your game looks great on day one.

Tycoon, city builder, farming, factory, tactics and story kits
Art, audio, UI kits and effects
Royalty-free inside your shipped games

See pricing details

Roadmap

Proven on real games before it's yours.

SeriousPlay Games builds its own titles on PixelCore first. Every phase ends with a real game running on more devices.

In progress

Foundations

Proving the core of the engine on every platform we support.

The tools to build a real game, running on desktop and phones.

Then

Every platform

2D, TV and handheld, content and protected builds.

Launch

Learn and launch

Lessons, templates, a private beta, then 1.0.

Full roadmap

FAQ

Questions, answered.

Is PixelCore really free?

Yes. PixelCore Engine, PixelCore Game Studio and PixelScript are free to download and use for commercial games, with no royalties, no runtime fees and no seat fees. That promise is written into the license, and we will never change terms retroactively for a released version. We make money from optional content packs and genre starter kits.

What's the catch?

Every game made with PixelCore shows a small “Powered by PixelCore” badge: a short launch splash and a line in the credits. Studio adds it automatically to release builds. That's the only condition.

When can I use it?

PixelCore is in development. SeriousPlay Games is building its own titles on it first, and we expect the public 1.0 by 2028 at the latest. Join the early-access list and we'll invite you to the private beta.

Which platforms can my game ship to?

At 1.0: macOS, Windows, Linux, Steam Deck and other SteamOS devices, iPhone, iPad, Apple TV and Android phones and tablets. Consoles, web and XR are planned after 1.0. Game Studio itself runs on macOS, Windows and Linux.

Do I need to know how to code?

No. Start from a template, follow the in-Studio lessons and build logic with the visual graph, which compiles to PixelScript you can read whenever you're ready. When you do want to code, PixelScript is designed to be friendly: a door that opens with a key takes about ten lines.

Can I make 2D games, 3D games, or both?

All three. 2D and 3D share one scene model, one scripting API and one Studio, so you can build a pixel-art platformer, a 3D explorer or an isometric city builder that mixes sprites and models in the same scene.

How does the AI integration work?

PixelCore ships with a local MCP server. Any MCP-compatible assistant, such as Claude, can read the docs, create scenes, write PixelScript, run your game and check screenshots and logs. It's read-only until you allow edits, every change goes through Studio's undo history, and nothing is uploaded to us.

Can I make cutscenes and characters?

Yes, with two Game Studio tools planned for the first updates after 1.0. Director is a cutscene and trailer timeline with a physical cinema camera: real focal lengths, apertures, focus pulls, anamorphic lenses and camera rigs. Cast is a character creator for 3D and 2D games, with every character on one standard skeleton so animations fit them all.

Can people open or rip my shipped game?

Shipped PixelCore games are built one way: Studio can't open them, their files are encrypted and signed, and scripts and shaders ship compiled, never as source. No client-side protection is unbreakable, and we say so plainly, but casual copying and asset ripping become hard.

Is PixelCore open source?

No. The engine and Studio are closed source, which lets us offer them free with protected builds and a sustainable business behind them. A native C++ plugin API lets you extend the engine, and a paid source license is planned for studios that need one.

Your next game starts at the core.

Join the early-access list for beta invites, development updates and first look at the starter kits.

Get early access Explore Game Studio

Build anything. Ship everywhere.

A studio that feels instant.

Hot reload everything

Play on device in one click

Made for Git

Everything a game needs.
Nothing it doesn't.

A renderer that scales

2D and 3D as equals

Physics, built in

Animation

UI that fits every screen

Audio

Simulation kits

Saves and localization

Accessibility from day one

One look. Every screen.

Tell your story like a filmmaker.

Director

Cast

Trailers and photo mode

Ten lines to open a door. Enough to ship an empire.

From the phone in your pocket
to the TV in your living room.

The engine that teaches you.

Beginner path

Recipes and reference

Build with an assistant that can see your game.

Your game is yours. Keep it that way.

Encrypted packages

One-way builds

Compiled code

Honest limits

Built to do better, everywhere we can.

Free engine. Free studio. Free forever.

Proven on real games before it's yours.

Foundations

Engine and Studio

Every platform

Learn and launch

Questions, answered.

Your next game starts at the core.

Build anything. Ship everywhere.

A studio that feels instant.

Hot reload everything

Play on device in one click

Made for Git

Everything a game needs.Nothing it doesn't.

A renderer that scales

2D and 3D as equals

Physics, built in

Animation

UI that fits every screen

Audio

Simulation kits

Saves and localization

Accessibility from day one

One look. Every screen.

Tell your story like a filmmaker.

Director

Cast

Trailers and photo mode

Ten lines to open a door. Enough to ship an empire.

From the phone in your pocketto the TV in your living room.

The engine that teaches you.

Beginner path

Recipes and reference

Build with an assistant that can see your game.

Your game is yours. Keep it that way.

Encrypted packages

One-way builds

Compiled code

Honest limits

Built to do better, everywhere we can.

Free engine. Free studio. Free forever.

Proven on real games before it's yours.

Foundations

Engine and Studio

Every platform

Learn and launch

Questions, answered.

Your next game starts at the core.

Everything a game needs.
Nothing it doesn't.

From the phone in your pocket
to the TV in your living room.