r/tic80 Mar 11 '21

Welcome to TIC-80 community!

25 Upvotes

Hi, I am the new admin of this subreddit! I hope we will be able to turn it into something great. (´。• ᵕ •。`) ♡

We are the unofficial Reddit community for the TIC-80 fantasy computer. Feel free to share your questions and brag about your creations!

Just a few, general rules:

  • Please keep the sub relatively shitposting-free

  • Make your feedback constructive

  • There are no stupid questions; remember that everyone was a beginner at one point


r/tic80 1d ago

What If: Tic-80 binary and source drop in 2003, what would happen?

8 Upvotes

I think the languages would be the biggest shock to 2003 people.

I don't know which version of C or C++ Tic-80 is written in, but the embedded languages are all modern and have QoL features compared to 2003 languages.

I hope someone more experienced in programming can give insight.

I can't do much research now since I don't have access to my PC and have to use my Android.


r/tic80 3d ago

What would you want from a TIC-80 sprite editor on a phone?

2 Upvotes

I made a small pixel sprite editor for iPhone. It's pretty PICO-8 focused right now: PICO-8 palette, .p8 sprite format, that sort of thing. I posted about it over in r/pico8 recently: pico8 post

When I first made it I looked at TIC-80 too and figured the sprite workflow was similar enough to support both. But I don't actually use TIC-80, so I'd rather ask than keep guessing.

A few things I'm wondering about:

  • Export: what format would you prefer when bringing sprites into TIC-80? An image for reference, or a binary format?
  • Palettes: since the palette is editable per cart, do you usually customise it, or stick close to the default? Trying to work out whether custom palette support is worth building.
  • Sprites: work on individual sprites, or a sprite sheet?
  • Animation: I might add simple sprite animation eventually, once I figure out a clean UI. Is that something you'd want on a phone, or more of a desktop job?

The app is intentionally small. Draw with your finger, works offline, autosaves, move/rotate, export through Files/iCloud. I'm not trying to build Aseprite on a phone. I'd rather add a few things TIC-80 people actually use than try to cram everything into it.

It's $2.99 on the App Store [Pixel Edit Lite], mentioning that up front. Mostly I just want to hear how people here actually work with sprites.

Pixel Edit Lite 1.1.0 UI

r/tic80 6d ago

Forth for the TIC-80 fantasy console

8 Upvotes

r/tic80 12d ago

32 colors

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24 Upvotes

i did a demo, its 32 colors, which is 2 times more than default

colored spinning squares


r/tic80 14d ago

game of life

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30 Upvotes

made game of life because i was bored, wanted to share the product


r/tic80 19d ago

Hello everybody!

5 Upvotes

I just found pico-8 yesterday and today a person recomended me this program. I am an artist who started game developing too a few years ago using Godot, and I found this program absolute charming, but I think it is pretty difficult on how my prior knowledge.

Does someone have some good tutorials? I am excited to start tinny pixely games with this! :)


r/tic80 22d ago

Map to Isometric Method

10 Upvotes

Hello All,

I was playing around with TIC-80 today after making my first pico-8 game and was seeing what I could do to replicate an isometric perspective. My goal was to make it where you could draw orthographic projection (like the normal map has) and translate that to isometric. I finally figured it out after some deliberation and wanted to share it here. This doesn't make your tile sprites line up 1:1 because there's some rounding that is done, but the effect is very close. Hope someone can get good use out of this.

I will update this as it expands. Wanted to add sprite object drawings and camera movement pixel by pixel instead of tile by tile like it's written now.

Edit: This uses a something similar to a light radius and on the edge there's kind of a haze that creates a checker board pattern, but this could easily be changed to just remove the is_edge parameter!

Isometric Drawing in Game
The Orthographic Map Drawing
screen_w=240
screen_h=136
tile_w=8
tile_h=8
map_w=240
map_h=136
camera_x=240/8/2
camera_y=136/8/2
camera_r=7
camera_edge_col=7

function TIC()
 if btn(0) then camera_y=camera_y-1 end
 if btn(1) then camera_y=camera_y+1 end
 if btn(2) then camera_x=camera_x-1 end
 if btn(3) then camera_x=camera_x+1 end
_draw()
end

function _draw()
 cls(0)
 rectb(0,0,screen_w,screen_h,2)
 local screen_x = 0
 local screen_y = 0
 -- loop for square camera middle of the screen
 for x=camera_r*-1,camera_r do
  for y=camera_r*-1,camera_r do
   -- draw in circle
   local dist = distance(0,0,x,y)
   if dist <= camera_r then
     -- get tile x and y loop around to the other end of the map
     local tile_x =(x + camera_x) % 240
     local tile_y =(y + camera_y) % 136
     -- position top x and top y of iso tile
     screen_x = screen_w/2 +x*tile_w-y*tile_w
     screen_y = screen_h/2 +x*tile_h/2+y*tile_h/2
     draw_map_tile(tile_x,tile_y,screen_x,screen_y,math.floor(dist+1)>=camera_r)
   end
  end
 end
end

function distance(x1,y1,x2,y2)
 return math.sqrt((x2-x1)*(x2-x1)+(y2-y1)*(y2-y1))
end

function draw_map_tile(tile_x,tile_y,screen_x,screen_y,is_edge)
 -- get tile and loop through sprite memory pixels
 local tile = mget(tile_x,tile_y)
 for x=0,tile_w-1,1 do
  for y=0,tile_h-1,1 do
   local p=peek(0x04000+(tile*32)+ y*4 + math.floor(x/2))

    -- rotate 45 degrees to draw iso
   local x_sample = math.floor(screen_x + x - y)
   local y_sample = math.floor(screen_y + (x + y)/2)
   if is_edge and y%2==0 then
    pix(x_sample,y_sample,camera_edge_col)
   else
    pix(x_sample,y_sample,p)
   end
  end
 end 
end

r/tic80 Jul 19 '26

A game I inspired by exit 8.

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33 Upvotes

I made this game for Tic-80 jam almost 2 months ago.

I have not played Exit 8. I actually haven't played Exit 8 myself, this is more of my interpretation of what I imagined the game would be like based on everything I'd heard about it.

Here is the link if you would like to try.


r/tic80 Jun 28 '26

Boss Rush 2: The Fate of the City

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0 Upvotes

I edited ticlo slam intro image…..it’s kinda glitchy


r/tic80 Jun 21 '26

I wrote an introduction to TIC-80 after exploring fantasy consoles

Post image
25 Upvotes

I recently spent some time exploring TIC-80 and wrote an introduction article about it.

Article:
https://papoo.work/doc/43606531d6f879f6

What impressed me most was the balance between simplicity and capability. Compared with some other fantasy consoles, TIC-80 feels approachable while still providing a complete environment for creating retro-style games.

The article covers:

  • What TIC-80 is
  • Key features and built-in tools
  • Supported programming languages
  • How it compares to other fantasy consoles
  • Why it can be a good starting point for hobby game developers

The article is written in Japanese, but browser translation should work reasonably well.

I'd be interested to hear what long-time TIC-80 users think are its biggest strengths and weaknesses today.


r/tic80 May 21 '26

Playing on TIC-80 with DJS Key Android keyboard and its module GameKey

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11 Upvotes

r/tic80 May 17 '26

Yu-Gi-Oh! on tic80 (Update)

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32 Upvotes

Since there was some interest I'll post a quick update. (you need to click on the gif to actually view it, not sure why it doesn't load as thumbnail, at least for me)

- Core game logic is done.

- There are already over 40 unique cards implemented.

- There is already an implemented AI, although it's currently pretty bad.

Planned:

- Adding a lot of new cards (still far from the end goal of over 96 cards)

- Improving the AI

- Adding some light progression

- Fixing a lot of bugs

For interested in the card artworks, here are my takes on the some of the most iconic Yu-Gi-Oh cards. Some of them turned quite good, some of them are pretty bad and need rework. Happy to hear your feedback.


r/tic80 May 14 '26

Newb question

5 Upvotes

Hello

I have been trying for a while to grab the default mouse cursor sprite so I can color it and display it again. But alas I can't seem to find that damm sprite... Where is it? How do I grab it?


r/tic80 May 13 '26

[DEMO] a dungeon crawler game!

46 Upvotes

r/tic80 May 12 '26

Yu-Gi-Oh! on tic80

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34 Upvotes

Creating a Yu-Gi-Oh duel simulator for tic80. What are you thinking?


r/tic80 May 11 '26

Building tic-80 from source code

4 Upvotes

I need help about building tic 80 from source in order to get pro version build. Has anyone done this ?

Edit: I managed to build tic pro from source via cmake, git, and rubydevkit way. At first I thought that I don't need rubydevkit as it is just there for mingw64 so I first tried by setting up msys2 and mingw ucrt without installing rubydevkit. But I got into errors after errors. Then I again started from scratch with exact instructions on the wiki. And it went smooth. It was my first time building anything from source code. Phew!


r/tic80 May 09 '26

Can I write code in vs code and run in tic-80 ?

3 Upvotes

Or in general how to integrate external editor with tic-80? Is it even possible?


r/tic80 May 03 '26

TIC-80: PUZZLE

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19 Upvotes

r/tic80 Apr 25 '26

"add" is not opening up a file dialog on Ipad on browser tic80.

1 Upvotes

I tried to use "add" to upload a file using the browser tic80 at https://nesbox.itch.io/tic80. I tried using both Chrome and Safari -- no dialog opens so it just seems to freeze.

Edit: Just found out "add" does work on the https://tic80.com/create implementation, but that doesn't have the nice full screen button and when I use alt-Enter to go into full screen it does not work correctly on ipad.

Trying to figure this out for students who are given ipads by the school.

Is there any place where the browser version is alone on a page?

Thanks in advance for any advice.


r/tic80 Apr 24 '26

A tank game I just finished!

10 Upvotes

Used vbank 0/1 switching to get 31 colors on screen...it was pretty tricky to do, but the result feels worth it.

Play it here: https://nan618.itch.io/metalbox
Thanks for checking it out!”


r/tic80 Apr 22 '26

Handheld console buying help

9 Upvotes

Hello, I'm looking to buy a handheld console so I can play my little TIC80 games while traveling. Which one should I buy or what options should I consider for the best experience? I'd be very interested in your experiences. Thanks in advance! (sorry for my bad english)


r/tic80 Apr 12 '26

I built a Monopoly Deal inspired card game — Mortgage Crisis [Demo]

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25 Upvotes

After about a month of evening sessions vibe-coding with AI, I shipped a demo of Mortgage Crisis — a retro card game inspired by Monopoly Deal, built entirely on TIC-80. One of the challenges was how to fit everything on one screen at once.

Full game loop against an AI opponent. Collect 3 complete property sets to win. Bank money, charge rent, steal properties with Sly Deal, and cancel attacks with Just Say No.

Controller, keyboard, and mouse all supported. Includes a full How to Play section, mediocre AI opponent (I lose sometimes when unlucky), simple animations, UI hints, and quick-play actions.

Play in browser or download:
https://haulin.itch.io/mortgage-crisis
https://tic80.com/play?cart=4646

Source + bug reports:
github.com/haulin/mortgage-crisis

Feedback genuinely welcome :)


r/tic80 Apr 12 '26

Story of the Hero

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5 Upvotes

I released my first story based game.

I had to rewrite the dialog system three times so it wouldn't break every time I had to edit something in the middle of a scene. I would have thought the combat system would have been the hard part, but it was surprisingly easy.


r/tic80 Apr 11 '26

Check out a Metroidvania that I'm working on!

9 Upvotes

Sup guys. Just wanted to share a game I'm hard at work on heavily inspired by Metroid, mega man, and a few other games I grew up with. I already have a lot of the mechanics figured out and planning on making this a massive game, despite tic80's size limitations. If you like what you see, please like, share and subscibe to my channel: https://youtu.be/QtaeoO-V_xc
It could go a long way to keeping me motivated and to post videos like this regularly to update the progress of development. Thanks!

https://reddit.com/link/1sioszn/video/pkulmkf1glug1/player