GB Studio Chris Maltby
winget install --id=chrismaltby.gb-studio -e A quick and easy to use drag and drop retro game creator for your favourite handheld video game system
GB Studio is a retro game creation tool designed to simplify the development of classic-style adventure games for handheld systems like the Game Boy. It provides an intuitive drag-and-drop interface, enabling users to design and build games without extensive coding knowledge.
Key Features:
- Visual scripting system for designing game logic
- Sprite editor with support for 2D animations
- Tilemap creator for building game levels
- Event-based system for creating interactive elements
- Sound and music integration capabilities
- Testing tools for debugging and playtesting
Audience & Benefit:
Ideal for indie developers, hobbyists, educators, and retro gaming enthusiasts seeking to create polished, engaging games quickly. GB Studio lowers the barrier to entry for game development while maintaining flexibility for experienced creators.
GB Studio can be installed via winget, offering a seamless setup process for users on supported platforms.
README
GB Studio
Copyright (c) 2021 Chris Maltby, released under the MIT license.
Twitter: @maltby
Reddit: /r/gbstudio
Discord: Join Chat
GB Studio is a quick and easy to use retro adventure game creator for Game Boy available for Mac, Linux and Windows. For more information see the GB Studio site
GB Studio consists of an Electron game builder application and a C based game engine using GBDK, music is provided by GBT Player
Installation
Download a release for your operating system from the GB Studio Downloads page.
Or to run from source, clone this repo then:
> cd gb-studio
> yarn
> npm start
GB Studio currently uses Node 21.7.1. If you have NVM installed you can use the included .nvmrc to switch to the supported Node version.
> cd gb-studio
> nvm use
GB Studio CLI
Install GB Studio from source as above then
> npm run make:cli
> yarn link
# From any folder you can now run gb-studio-cli
> gb-studio-cli -V
3.0.0
> gb-studio-cli --help
Update the CLI
Pull the latest code and run make:cli again, yarn link is only needed for the first run.
> npm run make:cli
CLI Examples
-
Export Project
> gb-studio-cli export path/to/project.gbsproj out/Export GBDK project from gbsproj to out directory
-
Export Data
> gb-studio-cli export -d path/to/project.gbsproj out/Export only src/data and include/data from gbsproj to out directory
-
Make ROM
> gb-studio-cli make:rom path/to/project.gbsproj out/game.gbMake a ROM file from gbsproj
-
Make Pocket
> gb-studio-cli make:pocket path/to/project.gbsproj out/game.pocketMake a Pocket file from gbsproj
-
Make Web
> gb-studio-cli make:web path/to/project.gbsproj out/Make a Web build from gbsproj
Documentation
Note For Translators
If you'd like to help contribute new language localisations to GB Studio you can do so by submitting pull requests adding or updating the JSON files found here https://github.com/chrismaltby/gb-studio/tree/develop/src/lang
If you're looking to update an existing translation with content that is missing, there is a handy script that lists keys found in the English localisation that are not found and copies them to your localisation
npm run missing-translations lang
# e.g. npm run missing-translations de
# e.g. npm run missing-translations en-GB