Skill: Share the game

Written for blit386 1.8.0. The rest of blit386.dev documents the newest engine, so an API you find there may be missing from a game pinned to 1.8.0.

npm run dev runs the game on your own computer while you make it. To let other people play, you make a "production build" - a folder of plain files - and upload that folder to a free hosting site. The game is just files, so there is no server or database to set up.

When to use

Use when the user wants to publish, deploy, or host the game, send a playable link to a friend, or asks "how do I put my game online" or "make a real version".

Step 1: build the game

npm run build

This writes a dist/ folder. Everything the game needs is inside it: the HTML page, the JavaScript, and your sprites and fonts. That whole folder is the game.

Step 2: try the built game before sharing

The built game can behave a little differently from the dev server, so test it once first. Your project has a preview script for this - run it the same way you run dev and build (for example pnpm run preview or npm run preview). It serves the dist/ folder at a local web address so you can click around and confirm everything still works.

Step 3: put dist/ online

Upload the whole dist/ folder to any free static host - it accepts plain files, no server needed. Good options for a game are GitHub Pages, Netlify, Cloudflare Pages, or itch.io (drag-and-drop the folder). Each one gives you back a web address you can share.

Notes

• The game runs on WebGPU where it is available and falls back to plain Canvas 2D everywhere else, so friends can play in any modern browser with nothing extra installed. (Only fullscreen CRT or post-process effects need WebGPU - see the add-crt-effect skill.)
• Has sound? Expect the shared game to be silent until the player clicks, taps, or presses a key. Browsers refuse to make noise on a page nobody has touched yet, so this is not a broken upload. Give the game a "press a key to start" screen and the sound arrives with the first keypress. See the play-a-sound skill.
• Played on a phone? Mobile browsers dim and then lock the screen after 30-60 seconds of no touches, even mid-game. Set isWakeLockEnabled: true in configure() to keep the screen awake during active play. Landscape-only games can also set preferredOrientation: 'landscape' (Android may lock; iOS will not) and read BT.screenOrientation or implement onOrientationChange(type) to show a "please rotate" prompt. See the blit-api-names rule for the exact names.
• Made a change you want to share? Run npm run build again and re-upload dist/. The build does not update itself.
• Do not hand-edit files inside dist/ - they are generated from your src/ code. Change the source, then rebuild.