Draw how everything in your game behaves as states and arrows. The player, the enemies, doors, menus, cameras, even the rules of the game. Pick from 291 ready actions and press Play. 2D or 3D, on an engine written in C++ and tuned to outrun hand-written GDScript where games spend their time.
Not a toy
Every action runs as compiled C++, measured frame by frame against hand-written GDScript.
A thousand enemies patrolling, chasing and attacking, at under a fifth of a millisecond a frame.
A first-person shooter, a rally game, a bullet-hell, a platformer, an action RPG and more.
Your game is an ordinary Godot project in your own folder, exported with Godot's own tools.
States inside states, parallel states, events that carry data, variables of every kind.
How it works
A state is something a part of your game is doing, like an enemy chasing, a door opening, a menu showing or a level counting down. An arrow says what moves it on. Actions do the work. On the right, the enemy that comes with StateCraft walks its map as it plays. Switch it to 3D: the same machine works in a 2D or a 3D game.
A ready-made hero, enemy or pickup that already works, a template, or an empty machine on any node in your scene.
Add states like Patrolling and Chasing, join them with events like when it sees the player, and give each one actions.
It runs at once, and the graph lights the state each character is in, so you can see why it did what it did.
Not just characters
Anything in your game that does one thing, then another, is a state machine, and you can put one on any node. Here are a few you will build on day one.
ClosedOpeningOpen
Open when the lever is pulled, lock again when the room is cleared.
TitlePlayingPausedGame Over
The whole flow of your game, from the title screen to the credits.
FollowingBoss IntroShaking
Follow the player, cut to the boss as it wakes, shake when something hits.
WaitingWaveCleared
Waves of enemies, a countdown, a score to reach, what happens when time runs out.
RestingWarningStriking
Spikes that wait for you, platforms that carry you, lava that rises.
WaitingTaken
Coins, keys, health and loot, into the inventory with the right sound.
GreetingAskingThanks
Who says what, what the player can answer, and what the quest asks next.
PatrollingChasingAttacking
And of course the characters, from heroes that run and jump to enemies that hunt you down.
Inside StateCraft
These are the real panels. Everything is picked from lists and set by clicking. There are no scripts to write and no code to read. Notes and groups keep a big machine readable, for you and for whoever opens it next.
Where it starts
StateCraft opens on its own front page. Give a new game a name, choose what it starts from, and it opens ready to make. The games you have made wait on the same page, a click away.
Learn by doing
You never start from a blank page. Everything below comes with StateCraft. Play it, open it, see how it is made, and take what you need.
Small, finished pieces of a game, each a scene you can play and read, with the states, the arrows and the actions explained on the screen.
Pause menuRebind a keyCountdown timerChange level with a fadeSecret button comboHearts for healthSave and loadA quest from a conversationGuard that sees youRooms and a minimapChaser that gives up
One for every action and check. Pick an action in the Add Action window, press Open Example, and watch it work on its own before you use it.
AIAnimationAudioCameraCombatInputInventoryPhysicsQuestsSave and filesUI
A manual that walks you through making a game, and a reference with a page for every action that says what it does, when to use it, and what every setting means.
Step-by-step walkthroughsA page per actionA to Z indexGoal finder
Documentation
Two books come with StateCraft. A manual takes you from your first machine to whole games, and a reference has a page for every action and check. The reference is free to read right now, and so are the recipes and the manual's contents.
Real pages from the books. Click one to read it. 172 pages in the manual, 329 in the reference.
Made with StateCraft
Every one was built from the StateCraft panel alone, and all of them come with it. Play them, take them apart and make them yours.
Real pictures from the games. Hover over one to see it move.
Torch-lit dungeons, skills, loot and a king at the bottom.
A stage against the clock, corners called out.
Four levels of running, jumping and dashing.
Weapons, pickups and enemies that go for cover.
Hundreds of chasers at once, each its own state machine.
Climb the spire through rooms of bullet patterns.
A village with conversations, quests and a cave.
Start from any of them, or a hero on an empty level.
Speed
The games you make with StateCraft run on its engine, written in C++ and measured against the same games written by hand in GDScript. Where games spend their time, it wins. Crowds of enemies run up to three times faster, and a character with nothing to do costs next to nothing, because crowds share work that hand-written scripts repeat for each one.
Frame cost in milliseconds, shorter is faster, against the same game written by hand in GDScript. Mac mini, Godot 4.7. The benchmarks will be published with their code, so anyone can check them.
For developers
Advanced, and optional. New to making games? Skip this section. Every game on this page was made without a line of code.
If you do write code, StateCraft does not box you in. Your machines run on its compiled C++ core, and you extend it in GDScript with your own actions, your own checks, and new versions of the ones that ship. They sit in the same Add Action list as ours, and a newcomer on your team uses them without ever opening a script.
One small script. Right-click a folder and choose Create New > StateCraft Action, and it is in the Add Action list straight away. Its settings become fields in the panel, and its comments become their tooltips.
Create New > StateCraft Action
A question for a Check is one function, _check, that answers yes or no. Door locked, quest done, enough mana. Anything your game can ask.
_check
Build on any of the 291 actions and replace only the part you need. Everything you leave alone still comes from the original, compiled.
send_event, go_to, get_value, set_value, and signals when a state changes. Your scripts and your machines talk both ways.
send_event
go_to
get_value
set_value
State changes, events, variables, timers and every built-in action run in the compiled core. A machine with nothing to do is not called at all, so your own actions add their cost and no more.
Machines are Godot nodes and designs are Godot resources saved as text. They live in your project and your version control like everything else.
@tool class_name OpenDoorAction extends SCMachineAction ## Slide the door open. ## How far it slides, in metres. @export var distance: float = 2.0 func _enter(m: SCMachine, index: int) -> void: var door := m.target as Node3D door.position.x += distance m.finish(index) func _summary() -> String: return "Open door %s m" % number(distance)
Ready to go
Drop them into a level and play at once. Each has its settings in the Inspector and its whole machine open to change.
Side-on, top-down and free-roaming 3D players that run, jump and dash, with a camera that follows.
Patrol, wander, spot you, call friends, chase, fight or shoot, take cover and flee when hurt.
Health, items, inventory, quests, conversations, saving and loading, and changing scenes.
Health bars, a minimap, a quest log, dialogue boxes, a skill bar and menus.
Your games are yours
You pay for StateCraft once. Whatever you make with it is yours to sell on Steam, itch.io or anywhere else, and we take nothing from it, now or later.
Early Access
StateCraft is fully featured right now, and it is still being worked on every day. Buy it in Early Access and every update on the way to full release is yours.
Planned, in no fixed order. We would rather ship it right than ship it on a date.
Rises to $49.99 at full release.
Questions
No. Everything in the seven games was made from the StateCraft panel, using states, arrows, actions and settings. If you do write code, you can add actions of your own in GDScript and they sit beside the built-in ones.
Godot is a free, open-source game engine. StateCraft runs on it and comes with it set up, so there is nothing else to install. You keep all of Godot, with its editor, its 2D and 3D tools and its exports.
Both, with the same states and actions. So far there are platformers, shooters, a rally stage and an isometric RPG.
StateCraft runs on Windows and macOS. Your finished game exports to Windows and macOS, with Godot's own export tools. More places for your games to run are on the list.
No. You buy StateCraft once, and every game you make with it is yours to sell. No royalties, no revenue share, no fees per player and no logo of ours in your game. You export it with Godot's own tools, and it runs without StateCraft installed.
$29.99 while it is in Early Access on Steam, rising to $49.99 at full release. Early Access buyers get every update on the way to full release.
A full manual, a reference with a page for every action, step-by-step recipes, and the seven games to open and take apart.
Coming to Steam
Hear first about the launch date, new videos and the first look at the store page. One email when there is something to see. Questions? Write to godotstatecraft@gmail.com.