spawn · walkthrough

The walkthrough·

Your first game, start to finish: pick a starter game, design it, make it yours in every room, test it, and share it in the lobby. It is also the Walkthrough in the companion: open spawn.cromulentech.com/companion on your phone or tablet (in the studio, Help shows a code to scan), and each level clears when you do it in the studio.

World 1: Get going·

1-1 Link your phone·

This is your companion. It sits beside you while you build. Linked to the studio, it follows you: open a room on the computer and the Reference tab turns to that room.

Do it: On the computer, press Help (the question mark) at the top of the studio and scan the code, or type the six letters into the box above.

Linking sends one thing from the studio to your phone: which room you are in, and a few yes or no answers like "a game is open". Nothing of your game. No phone? Every tab works without linking, and Next clears a level instead.

spawn opens with a sign-in. Type your student ID and your PIN, the same ones you use for glitch and launch.

Do it: Sign in with your student ID and PIN.

Everything you make is kept on the server: your games, your drawings, your sounds, your log. Make a game at home and it is there at school. spawn signs you out after 30 minutes with nothing pressed, and 12 hours after you sign in; your work is saved first. Forgot your PIN? Reset it at sfhsbta.com/pin.

1-3 Pick a starter game·

A starter game is a game that already works. You change it until it is yours. Never made a game? Pick Starter. Want an empty page? Pick Blank. Otherwise pick the one closest to the game in your head.

Do it: Click a starter game under start from a starter game.

A starter game always starts a new game; it never writes over one of yours. Your games are under continue on the same page, and in the game menu at the top right under My games.

1-4 Play it once·

Your game is in the middle of the studio, 600 by 600, the size it plays on Spawn Point.

Do it: Click the game once so it hears the keyboard, then press SPACE. Most games move with the arrow keys.

Nothing happens when you press keys? The game did not hear you: click on it first. Restart, the round arrow under the game, starts it again from the top; the square beside it, Stop, freezes it, and the same button plays it on.

World 2: Design it·

2-1 Open 02 design·

Before you change anything, say what your game is. Five lines, in your words.

Do it: Click 02 design in the bar at the top.

2-2 Write the five lines·

The name, the goal, who you are, how you win, how you lose. Short is fine. You can come back and change them any time, even after the game is done.

Do it: Fill in the lines, then press Make it yours at the foot of the page.

The lines go at the very top of your code, and player two reads them before every change it makes, so the clearer they are, the better its help. If a code change ever takes them out, 02 design shows a button: Put the design lines back.

World 3: Make it yours·

3-1 Turn a knob·

On 03 make, the knobs are the quick changes: speed, lives, gravity, colors, the words on the title card. Every knob is one line in your code, and turning it rewrites that line.

Do it: Change any knob and watch the game change as you do.

A slider is a number, a color box is a color, a text box is words on screen. Too fast to play? Turn it back, or press Undo (the amber arrow under the game).

3-2 Undo is your friend·

Undo, the amber arrow under the game, takes back the last change. Ctrl+Z does the same. Try anything: nothing is ever one click from gone.

Undo works on knobs, art, the map, sounds and code alike. The number beside Undo and Redo opens your history: every change in words, who made it, and a button to go back to just after it. To go back further than the last 100 changes, open Earlier copies in the game menu.

3-3 It saves itself·

There is no save button. Your game saves itself every time you change it, to your account, so it is there on any computer you sign in on.

The button at the top right says where your game is kept: Saved to the server once it is kept, or Not saved to the server yet when the server cannot be reached and it is waiting on this computer.

World 4: The rooms·

4-1 Walk into the Art room·

Five rooms open from 03 make: Art, The map, Sound, The code and Layout. Art is what everything looks like.

Do it: Open the Art room from 03 make.

4-2 Dress your player·

Each slot on the left is a sprite in your game: the player, the thing you collect, the thing that hurts. Click one, then pick a picture.

Do it: Give your player new art from the Library. Search it by word: cat, knight, robot.

An art pack fills the player, the things to collect and the hazards in one click, all in one style. Show all lists every art pack. A plain square in your game is a sprite with no art yet; give its name art and the square goes away.

4-3 Draw your own·

Draw opens Piskel, a pixel art editor: pen, fill, select, layers, frames. It saves as you draw, and your game changes as you draw.

Start a new drawing at 16 to 64 pixels, or press Edit in Piskel on any library picture to start from it. Full screen gives the drawing the whole window. What you draw or upload goes in Mine, ready for your next game too. Upload takes a PNG, JPG, GIF or WebP up to 512 KB; choose several and each becomes a frame. Press Make it pixel art first and a photo of a thing (up to 15 MB) becomes a 16, 24 or 32 pixel sprite, made on your computer. Player two cannot turn a photo into a sprite, so this is the way. To have player two draw a sprite from your words, choose Ask player two.

4-4 Pick a background·

At the bottom of the Art room, The background is what is behind everything, and you pick ONE of three: Just a color, A picture or A sprite. A picture fills the screen: one screen, or a long scene that scrolls with the camera and loops forever. Pick one from Library, draw your own in Draw, or bring a picture in Upload. A sprite is any sprite, from your game or the library, grown to fill the screen.

Edit on any scene draws on your game's own copy; the library one stays as it was. On a long scene, Move the join to the middle puts the spot where the end meets the start in the middle of the sheet, so you can draw across it. Just a color goes back to a plain color, a knob on 03 make.

4-5 Walk into The map·

The map is your levels, painted one square at a time. Runner, maze, platformer, side-scroller, adventure, race track, tower defense, digger and tower climb have one, and the explorer has a world of screens; other starter games do not.

Do it: Open The map from 03 make. No map card there? Your game has no map, and this level is done.

4-6 Paint a level·

Pick a tile, then click or drag on the grid. The + next to the level tabs adds a level (a copy of this one to change); − removes one.

Under the grid, can it be won? checks your level with your game's own speed, jump and gravity, and outlines anything a player cannot reach. Play level plays just that level, so you do not have to beat the others to test it.

4-7 Walk into Sound·

Each slot in the Sound room is a moment in your game, like catch, hurt or you win. A slot starts off. Give it a sound and it plays.

Do it: Open Sound from 03 make.

4-8 Make a sound·

Four ways in: Make one (a retro sound from sliders), Library, Record (your microphone), or Upload.

A sound keeps its first ten seconds. For a song, open music at the top of the slots: pick a track (Spawn originals, classics or covers) or upload one you have the right to use. Music keeps up to three minutes and loops while the game plays. Recorded or uploaded sounds stay silent on your shared link until the game is in the Hall of Fame.

4-9 Lay out your game·

Layout is where things go on your screen. Drag a picture from the library onto the game and it lands where you let go: a tree, a lamp, a sign. Drag a sprite's dashed box to move where it starts.

Do it: Open Layout from 03 make and drag a picture onto your game.

The game stops while Layout is open. Drag a picture again to move it; the arrow keys move the picked one, and Delete takes it off. A decoration sits behind every sprite and touches nothing: the player walks in front of it.

4-10 Walk into The code·

Everything in the other rooms is code underneath. The code shows all of it. The Code button under the game opens it from anywhere.

Do it: Open The code.

4-11 Blocks or text·

Blocks and Text are the same program two ways. Switch any time; switching never changes the code.

Next to the code, the checker reads your program every time it changes. It gives your game a stage, on the Code button under the game too: prototype, alpha, beta or gold, or won't start. Each stage says the one thing that climbs to the next. Click a finding to jump to its line. In Text, Ctrl+F finds and replaces.

World 5: Player two·

5-1 Meet player two·

Player two is Claude, the helper on the right side of the studio. It can make changes and explain things, but it never changes your game on its own.

Do it: Find player two's box on the right. Signed in, it is ready to ask.

Not there? The strip on the right folds it away; click it to open. On a phone, press Player two in the bar at the top. If it says player two is not switched on, everything else still works.

5-2 Ask for something·

Say what you want in your own words: make the player jump higher, add a second enemy, why does my score not go up? A question comes back as words.

Do it: Ask player two for one change, then press the arrow beside the box, or Enter.

Do not put your name, or anyone else's, in what you ask. What you send leaves spawn to be answered; the line under the ask box says where. Your questions and its answers are saved with your account. Show my game sends the game screen as it is now with the question; Add a picture sends a drawing or a screenshot, and you can paste or drop one on the box too.

5-3 Keep or drop·

A change comes back as lines you keep or drop. Untick any you do not want, then Add changes.

Play it and see if it does what you asked. If not, tell player two what happened. That round goes in your co-op log. The log goes with your game only if you tick the box when you share.

World 6: Test it·

6-1 Playtest·

Playtest (the game controller under the game) moves the room aside so the game gets the whole middle. Play it the way a player will.

Do it: Press Playtest, the game controller under the game.

Too hard to test? The speed menu in Tools slows the game down for testing: half, slow, crawl. The game you share is not changed.

6-2 Look inside with Tools·

Stop (the square under the game) freezes it and Play carries on. Tools (the wrench and screwdriver) opens the debug row: Step one frame at a time while it is stopped, Hitboxes to see what counts as touching, Grid to read positions, Lines that ran (the footprints) to see in the code which lines your game reached and how many times, and the console. Click beside a line number in the code to set a breakpoint: the game stops there, and Next line, Into and Out walk through what happened, one line at a time, with every value as that line saw it.

Do it: Press Tools, the wrench and screwdriver under the game.

In the console, type a name like player.x and press Enter to see its value right now. watch keeps a value on screen while you play. Picture (the camera) saves a screenshot of the game.

World 7: Ship it·

7-1 Open 04 ship·

When it is fun, share it. 04 ship puts it in the lobby on Spawn Point.

Do it: Click 04 ship at the top.

7-2 One last playtest·

Run the exact code plays your game the way Spawn Point will. If it breaks here, it breaks there.

Do it: Press Run the exact code.

Want a second opinion? Check it has player two read your game and say if it runs, if it can be won and lost, and what to fix first. Optional. It uses one of your questions.

Press Share my game. It goes in the lobby on Spawn Point, and you get a link and a QR code to share anywhere.

Do it: Share your game and copy its link.

There is nothing to type: your game goes up under your account. A game the checker says breaks cannot be shared: fix it first. Change it later and press Update my link: the link stays the same. You can Despawn it any time, from any computer you sign in on.

7-4 Keep going·

That is a whole game, start to ship. Share the link, play other games in the lobby, and come back and make it better, then press Update my link.

The best games go in the Hall of Fame, on the front of Spawn Point. Every word you met on the way is in the Glossary, and every block is in Code.

Every word in bold is in the glossary. Every question students ask, by place, is on Questions.