Show HN: Pyxel – A Python retro game engine with built-in art and sound editors

67 points by kitao a day ago

Hi HN, I'm the creator of Pyxel, a free, MIT-licensed retro game engine for Python. I've been developing it since 2018, and it recently passed 18,000 stars on GitHub.

Pyxel includes pixel art, tilemap, sound, and music editors, so you can create a game's visuals and audio as well as write its code in Python. The engine itself is implemented in Rust.

Games run on Windows, macOS, Linux, and the web, as well as supported Linux-based retro handhelds.

You can share a URL to launch a Pyxel game hosted on GitHub directly in a browser. You can also create games entirely in your browser with Pyxel Code Maker, or write chiptunes in Pyxel MML Studio.

See what people have made with Pyxel: https://kitao.github.io/pyxel-user-examples/

Try Code Maker: https://kitao.github.io/pyxel/web/code-maker/

I'm happy to answer questions about the engine and its implementation.

dejobaan - 2 hours ago

I've seen this around from time to time. I haven't used it, but wanted to mention that (as someone who grew up on the 6502), I love these retro things, and always appreciate seeing your project's progress. The breadth of cool stuff folks are making is delightful too.

LarsDu88 - 3 hours ago

Love pyxel. My drive to create something with it has weakened over the years since you can literally get Astra to one shot a 3d multiplayer FPS now.

I wonder if it is possible to write the games in pure rust as opposed to Python. Would be a good excuse for me to learn more Rust.

kitao - 2 hours ago

It’s possible to make games using Pyxel’s Rust modules, but they weren’t designed as a game development API for Rust users. So I wouldn’t recommend Pyxel as a starting point for learning Rust.

gregkb - 14 hours ago

had such a great time with Pyxel! was great fun to recreate some of the demo scene effects from my childhood. easy to setup and get coding and make some pixels "move" quickly. it has some inherit limitations (eg. how colours and bitmaps are organised) which gives you some satisfying challenges. just enough to satisfy your 8-16bits assembly nostalgia. maybe I should go back add a few more parts to my demo: https://github.com/greg76/megademo

davidedicillo - 2 hours ago

Normalize making regular apps look like 80s video games, please. I've been building a couple with that look and I'll definitely explore using this to power the next ones.

krapp - a day ago

It looks cool. I have two questions.

1) What's your AI policy?

2) How is this different from PyGame?

kitao - a day ago

On AI, I have two goals. First, I want Pyxel's simple API to make programming and game creation enjoyable for people writing code themselves, without AI.
On the other hand, I also think its simple, focused design makes it a useful library for AI-assisted development, including vibe coding. I've published Pyxel MCP (https://github.com/kitao/pyxel-mcp) and Pyxel Skill (https://github.com/kitao/pyxel-skill) to support that use.
Compared with Pygame, which is more general-purpose, Pyxel deliberately narrows its scope and specifications. It also includes pixel art, tilemap, sound, and music editors. The focus is on helping beginners start making games without having to make lots of decisions about tools and low-level details. Those retro, old-school constraints also appeal to experienced game developers.
jhbadger - 7 hours ago

To follow up on kitao's response, with its editor system allowing you to interactively edit sprites and sounds, pyxel is more like a "fantasy console" like PICO-8 and TIC-80 if you are familar with those.