design-game
Performance Notes
- Take your time to do this thoroughly
- Quality is more important than speed
- Do not skip validation steps
Design Game
Run a UI/UX design pass on an existing game to improve visuals, atmosphere, and game feel. No design experience needed — this command analyzes your game and applies proven visual patterns.
Instructions
Analyze the game at $ARGUMENTS (or the current directory if no path given).
First, load the game-designer skill to get the full design vocabulary and patterns.
Step 1: Audit
- Read
package.jsonto identify the engine - Read
src/core/Constants.jsfor the current color palette and config - Read all scene files to understand current visuals
- Read entity files to see how game objects are drawn
- Read
src/core/EventBus.jsfor existing events
Step 2: Design Report
Score each area 1-5 and present as a table:
| Area | Score | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Background & Atmosphere | ||
| Color Palette | ||
| Animations & Tweens | ||
| Particle Effects | ||
| Screen Transitions | ||
| Typography | ||
| Game Feel / Juice | ||
| Game Over | ||
| Expression Usage | If personality characters exist, score how reactively expressions change to game events. Score 1 if expressions never change. |
Then list the top improvements ranked by visual impact, with a plain-English description of what each one does (e.g., "Add a sky gradient so the background looks like a real sky instead of a flat color").
Step 3: Implement
Ask the user which improvements they want, or implement all if they say so. Follow the game-designer skill patterns:
- All new values in
Constants.js - Use EventBus for triggering effects
- Don't alter gameplay (physics, scoring, controls, spawn timing)
- Prefer procedural graphics
- New files in proper directories
Step 4: Verify
- Run
npm run buildto confirm no errors - Summarize all changes made in plain English
Example Usage
Full design pass
/design-game examples/asteroid-dodge
Result: Audits visuals → scores Background 2/5, Particles 1/5, Typography 3/5 → adds sky gradient background, star parallax, explosion particles on asteroid destroy, screen shake on hit, smooth scene transitions. All values in Constants.js.
Troubleshooting
Visual changes cause performance drops
Cause: Too many particle emitters or gradient fills per frame. Fix: Limit active particles (pool and reuse). Use cached gradient textures instead of recreating per-frame.
Design changes break layout on different screen sizes
Cause: Hardcoded pixel positions instead of using PX scale factor. Fix: All positions and sizes should use Constants.js PX-relative values.
Next Step
Tell the user:
Your game looks much better now! Next, run
/game-creator:add-audioto add chiptune background music and retro sound effects — all procedurally generated, no audio files needed.Pipeline progress:
/make-game→/design-game→/add-audio→/qa-game→/review-game