Create Game Assets skill

Create Game Assets

Turn a game's visual intent into a consistent, engine-ready asset set. Treat image generation as one production tool inside a controlled pipeline, never as proof that an asset is shippable.

Core workflow

1. Inspect before inventing. Find existing screenshots, concept art, sprites, models, fonts, import settings, camera framing, target resolution, and naming conventions. Preserve a coherent existing direction unless the user asks for a redesign.
2. Lock the technical frame. Record engine, 2D/3D, camera/view, native display size, asset dimensions, world scale, transparency, palette, filtering, animation frames, texture budget, and target platforms. Use assets/art-direction-brief.md as a copyable brief.
3. Name the visual system. Define shape language, silhouette priorities, value structure, palette roles, materials, lighting, detail density, edge treatment, and motion character. Use concrete visual properties; do not substitute a living artist's name for an art direction.
4. Make an asset manifest. Copy assets/asset-manifest.json, then list every required asset, state, variant, size, pivot, collision role, source, license, and approval status. Separate production assets from disposable greybox placeholders.
5. Approve one visual target. Create or select a representative hero asset or small style board before producing a full set. Judge it at actual game scale and against a gameplay background. If the user delegated the choice, pick the strongest viable direction and record the decision instead of blocking.
6. Produce related assets as families. Reuse the approved target as an edit/reference input. Keep palette, view, proportions, lighting, outline, and texture density invariant. Generate small coherent batches; avoid unrelated one-off prompts that drift.
7. Normalize deterministically. Crop, size, anchor, slice, name, compress, and check alpha with ordinary image/DCC tools. Never trust generated grids, transparency, seams, pivots, topology, or dimensions without inspection. Use the bundled scripts for raster QA and contact sheets.
8. Import with engine-native settings. Set filtering, mipmaps, pixels-per-unit/world scale, color space, compression, sprite slicing, texture types, materials, and collision deliberately. Read the relevant engine skill before editing engine files.
9. Validate in context. Inspect a contact sheet and the actual game at native resolution. Check silhouette, scale, animation stability, seams, legibility, palette, collision fit, memory, and compression artifacts. Iterate on the source asset, not only on runtime compensations.
10. Record provenance. Keep the source URL/tool, license or generation note, edit history, and restrictions beside the manifest. Preserve embedded provenance metadata when the pipeline can.

Choose the production path

Need	Default path
Existing asset needs a controlled change	Edit the original/reference; state what must remain unchanged
New 2D visual family	Approve seed → generate/source family → normalize → preview → import
True pixel art	Use generated work as a draft; enforce grid, palette, clusters, and frames with pixel tools
Tileable surface or tileset	Produce a small family; repair seams; test repeated 3×3 before approval
UI art or icons	Keep text and interaction code-native; prefer SVG/vector for simple geometric symbols
3D model or material	Use concepts as reference; author/clean in a DCC; validate topology, UVs, scale, pivots, and LODs
No generation/edit tool is available	Build the brief and manifest; source licensed assets or keep explicit greybox placeholders
Audio asset	Route sound implementation and mixing to audio-design; still track source/license in the manifest

Image-generation handoff

When a capable image generation or editing tool is installed, use it for live visual creation. If the workspace exposes an imagegen skill, read and follow it for the actual generation/edit call; this skill owns the game-art brief, constraints, normalization, and acceptance gates.

Build prompts from these blocks:

ROLE/PURPOSE: production asset for [gameplay role]
SUBJECT: [specific object/character and action]
VIEW: [orthographic/top-down/side/three-quarter], [camera and facing]
ART DIRECTION: [shape language], [palette roles], [materials], [edge treatment]
GAME-SCALE READ: [silhouette and focal details that must survive at WxH]
TECHNICAL OUTPUT: [dimensions/aspect], [transparent or scene background], [frame/slot count]
LOCKS: preserve [identity, proportions, palette, costume, lighting, line weight]
EXCLUDE: text, labels, mockup frames, scenery, duplicate objects, cropped edges, signatures

For edits, say both what changes and what stays fixed. Ask for transparent output through the tool's native transparency option when available, then verify the alpha channel—prompt wording alone does not guarantee transparency.

Raster QA recipes

Inspect constraints and emit a machine-readable report. --require-alpha also fails an RGBA file whose every pixel is opaque, which is how a baked background or fake checkerboard shows up:

python scripts/asset_report.py assets/player-idle.png \
  --expect-size 64x64 --require-alpha --max-colors 48 --json

Build a nearest-neighbor contact sheet over a checkerboard:

python scripts/build_preview_sheet.py output/player/*.png \
  --out output/player-preview.png --columns 4 --cell-size 192

Run script paths relative to this skill directory, or resolve the installed skill path first. Both scripts require Python 3.10+ and Pillow 10–13 (Pillow 13 needs Python 3.11+). Install the only dependency with python -m pip install -r scripts/requirements.txt when it is not already available.

Quality gates

• Cohesion: related assets share palette roles, line/edge treatment, view, light direction, scale, and detail density.
• Gameplay read: silhouettes and state changes remain clear at native resolution, in motion, and over real backgrounds.
• Technical fit: exact size/frame count, usable alpha, stable anchors/pivots, correct color space/filtering, no clipped content, no accidental labels or baked mockup chrome.
• Animation: identity, volume, proportions, costume, facing, and baseline do not drift; timing and anticipation read in an in-engine preview.
• Tiles/backgrounds: required edges tile without seams; repetition is tolerable; parallax layers have intentional depth and no baked collision cues.
• 3D: transforms, scale, pivot, normals, UVs, materials, topology, rig, collision proxies, LODs, and runtime format are checked rather than inferred from a render.
• Rights: every shipped file has recorded provenance and terms compatible with the project.

Do not call an asset production-ready from a prompt result alone. Approval requires the relevant technical checks plus an in-engine or native-scale visual inspection.

References

• For visual-system decisions and maintaining consistency, read references/art-direction.md.
• For sprites, animation strips, tiles, backgrounds, UI art, and engine import settings, read references/raster-pipeline.md.
• For concept-to-mesh, textures, glTF/GLB, LOD, collision, and runtime validation, read references/three-d-pipeline.md.
• For licenses, generated-media records, and provenance, read references/provenance.md.

Related skills

• game-ui-ux for layout, navigation, readability, and accessible interaction.
• game-feel, shader-programming, and audio-design for presentation after the source art fits.
• Engine import/rendering skills such as godot-tilemap, unity-tilemap-2d, pixijs-rendering, and threejs-gltf-loading.