[TIC-80] A Fantasy Computer for Creating & Playing Games

I'm planning on doing a series of posts about TIC-80 games. I've been playing a lot of them recently. But before that, here's a post about why these small games deserve your attention.

What is TIC-80?

TIC-80 is a multi-platform fantasy console made by nesbox. Its main feature is to develop games and play them.

Fantasy as in it's not an actual computer but a virtual one that can be run on most current systems (Like PC & Mobile.)

There are versions for Windows, Mac, Linux, Android and more. There's also a web version that works on any browser. Though the web version offers less performance.

TIC-80 is an open-source project (Github link) inspired by the more limited and paid fantasy console PICO-8. Both have a huge following.

One of the strongest features of TIC-80 is that the game's code can be included with the game ('must' in the free version) which allows players to play with parameters and maybe learn some coding. It also allows more experienced developers to help to debug and improve your code.

How to Use

TIC-80 starts with a command-line interface. Typing help will show you a list of command. Surf shows a list of playable carts. Load is used to prepare a cart for playing with Run or editing with Edit.

Cartridges are saved in *.tic format and can be shared. If you want to add a downloaded cartridge to your list you can enter Folder which will open TIC-80's main folder so you can copy/past the game there.

Specifications

TIC-80 system comes with code, sprite, sound and map editors. It has limits when you make a game with it. The limitations of the system are tailored to ignite your creativity and some great games are made using these limitations.

These limitations are:

• DISPLAY: 240x136 pixels, 16 colors palette
• INPUT: 2 gamepads with 8 buttons/ keyboard/ mouse
• SPRITES: 256 8x8 foreground sprites and 256 8x8 background tiles
• MAP: 240x136 cells, 1920x1088 pixels
• SOUND: 4 channels with configareble waveforms
• CODE: 64KB of Lua or Moonscript or JavaScript or Wren or Fennel

Games

TIC-80 have a mix of 2D games and pseudo-3D games. There are more than 500 games on the official website and on Itch.io There are all kinds of genres and game types, there are also demakes of popular games.

There are a Dungeon Crawler, some Racing Games a Flappy Bird clone, Candy Crash clone, some First Person Shooters and more!

TIC-80 Post Series!

I'll be doing a series of posts talking about some of these and other TIC-80 games. If there's a game you'd like me to play please recommend it in comments (or on twitter)

---

Images are screenshots of TIC-80 and its games. The animated .gif is taken straight from TIC-80 website's main page.