Popular games built on game engine PICO-8
A hardcore platform game for the PICO-8 fantasy console.
Tutankham is a combination of the maze, action and shoot 'em up genres. Taking on the role of an explorer grave robbing Tutankhamun's tomb, the player is chased by creatures such as asps, vultures, parrots, bats, dragons, and even curses, all that kill the player on contact. The explorer can fight back by firing lasers at the creatures, but he can only cover the left and right directions. The player is also endowed with a single screen-clearing "flash bomb" per level or life. Finally, each level has warp zones that teleport the player around the level, which enemies cannot use. To progress, the player collects keys open locked doors throughout the levels, searching for the large exit door. Optional treasures can be picked-up for bonus points. Each level has a timer; when it reaches zero the explorer can no longer fire lasers, and once a level is cleared the remaining time is converted to bonus points.
Climb the tower of archeos and kill the evil sorcerer. An enhanced version was later released for itch.io and Steam.
Picopicotron is a toy desktop environment built with PICO-8. Use the mouse to control it like a standard computer from the nineties. Includes a Pyramid card game and a version of minesweeper.
A one level PICO-8 demake of Rez for the Dreamcast by Morgan Quirk.
A turn-based asteroids / snake / roguelike for LD41. VYPERSPACE is an asteroids game, you shoot asteroids to break them into smaller chunks before you can destroy them. Sometimes there is ore inside. VYPERSPACE is a snake game, you eat ore to grow longer and need to avoid running into your own tail. VYPERSPACE is a roguelike, it is a keyboard-driven turn-based tile-grid game of delaying permadeath by emergent hazards that only move when you do.
A Top-down dungeon crawler bullet-hell shmup.
A PICO-8 demake of the classic Konami arcade game Time Pilot (1982).
A SHMUP-Survivor-Roguelike mash where you must dodge, shoot, and upgrade in order to beat the final boss. Created along the LazyDevs academy basic shmup tutorial with its own twists on the theme.
What's at the bottom of the pit? Could be anything! Could be everything! I have to find out!
For 2019 I ran two prototyping classes – one in Pico-8 for the undergraduates and a graduate version with no platform constraint (which generally means they work in Unity). So this year I hid the same prompt in two different interpretations of the same idea. I tuned the Pico-8 game for the youthful reflexes of the undergraduate class, but I did not count on the fact that none of them would have ever played a bullet-hell game, and as a result, only one of them was able to reach the end and find out what the assignment was. I instructed that person that they could keep it a secret if they wanted to.
Picross game with 12 easy (10x10) puzzles and 15 normal (15x15) puzzles.
"From Rust To Ash" is roguelike auto battler where your items are your build. Fight, Loot, Scavenge. Arrange your items to benefit from each other, store items in your backpack for future synergies, scrap what you don't need to increase your health. Do all that you need to survive the encounters before you.
Infinimoes is a space filling puzzle game (like tangrams) involving a variety of polyominoes and sometimes an infinitely repeating space.
You are a blob bunny. Your goal? Touch every tile! Enjoy 60 bite sized puzzles across 5 different worlds in this casual puzzle game.
Gather resources and build a cosy little town!
In 2021, the last time I taught the class, I didn’t want to hide the homework in the games. Instead I used the games as ways of presenting ideas. I made several, but I like this one, a reinterpretation of the fortune-telling minigame from Ultima IV.
Pröng is a mutant game of pong. Also a techno-thriller dating sim.
Pico Snail is a Pico-8 game inspired by the musician Snail's House You play as Snail-Chan, and are tasked with defending the Dream castle! You can run, jump, thwack enemies, and use stars you collect for special powers!
This is 2018’s assignment, a diabolical puzzle. You’re a monk who has forgotten where his cell is in the monastery, and who must walk the labyrinth in order to remember it. If you can find his room, you’ll find out what the assignment prompt is. I was a bit worried the students would be unable to find the prompt hidden in this one, but about half of them got there eventually. (The rest were expelled from the university.) 2018’s class was 100% Pico-8 so it seemed appropriate that the prompt game should be in Pico-8 too. Pico-8 is so great for prototyping — as a case in point, it builds to a single JS and HTML file which loads quite happily in the browser from a local file, so you don’t get annoying permissions or crossdomain problems.
In Astropocalypse you take control of a hotshot meteor bent on destroying the galaxy. Use your directional pad to steer your meteor buddy and ram it into nearby planets in the current solar system. Once all planets are destroyed, it's time to go for the finishing blow... destroy the sun!
The evil Chiro Empire has captured all of the other Dragon Eggs! It's your job to save them!
In Knight of the Dead, the apocalypse is upon us. To run from the inevitable horde, one must consider their moves wisely, lest time, and the undead, catch up to them.
Everyone's favorite Watermelon Game for PICO-8. Drop fruits and merge fruits that are alike.