Maintained Software

PixelForge is a font editor built for pixel fonts: draw each glyph on a grid, set the spacing and kerning, and export a TrueType file that installs like any other font. It can also import an existing TTF - if it is genuinely a pixel font it detects the size and loads the glyphs back onto the grid for editing.

ASCIIFlow is a browser scratchpad for drawing boxes, arrows and labels in plain ASCII, for diagrams that have to live inside a comment or a text file. There is nothing to install and nothing to sign into.

Asset Forge makes models by kitbashing: drop blocks from its kits into a scene, snap them together, recolor them and export the result as a model or as rendered 2D sprites.

BitFontMaker2 is a bitmap font editor that runs in a browser: draw each character on a small grid, set the widths, and download a TrueType file. It has been around a long time and stayed simple, which is why it is still the quickest way to get a pixel font out of an idea.

Bitsy is a tiny editor for making small worlds: a few rooms of 8x8 tiles, an avatar that walks around them, and short conversations with the things in them. The limits are the point - there is no scripting to speak of and two colours at a time - and a finished game is a single HTML file.

ChipTone builds sound effects from layered oscillators, envelopes and effects with a lot more control than an sfxr style generator.

FileToVox converts things that are not voxel models into voxel models: meshes, point clouds, heightmaps, images and Minecraft schematics all become MagicaVoxel files. It runs from the command line, which makes it easy to put in a pipeline.

GoatTracker writes SID music on modern machines and exports player routines that run on a real C64.

GrafX2 was made for DOS and has been ported everywhere since. It has tools no other program does, constraints for retro platforms, and an antiquated interface.

GraphicsGale has been in use since 2005 and excels at animation, with onion skinning and frame-by-frame preview. It was made freeware in 2017. The interface shows its age but the tools are precise.

Juice FX takes a sprite and generates effects such as shaking, flashing, outlines, dissolves and bounces as animated sprite sheets.

Kenney Shape builds chunky 2.5D icons and sprites by stacking flat shapes and giving them depth, rather than by modelling in 3D. It is a fast way to get a consistent set of game icons, and exports both flat images and models.

Laigter builds normal maps and other lighting textures from 2D sprites so they can be lit dynamically in a game engine.

The most popular voxel editor: fast, small, and with a renderer good enough that most voxel art you see was rendered inside it.

A classic free chiptune synth plugin with pulse, triangle and noise voices, pitch and volume sequences, and modern DAW compatibility.

Hexels paints on hexagonal, triangular and square grids with vector output, sitting between pixel art and vector illustration. It also animates.

Marq's PETSCII Editor is where most Commodore 64 character art gets drawn. It runs in a browser or on the desktop, covers animation and several C64 screen modes, and exports the data in the forms a real C64 program expects.

MilkyTracker recreates the FastTracker II workflow for XM and MOD files, with sample editing and playback on every platform.

Moebius is an ANSI art editor from the Blocktronics scene, with collaborative editing, character palettes and 16-color and iCE color modes.

Monodraw is a Mac editor for pictures made of text: box diagrams, flowcharts, trees and layout sketches that can be pasted straight into source code, a commit message or a README. It draws with real tools - shapes, lines, arrows, text boxes - rather than by typing characters into a grid.

PabloDraw edits and views ANSI and ASCII art and supports several people drawing the same piece at once over the network.

Petmate edits PETSCII images with the C64 character set and colors, and exports to formats the real machine can load.

A particle editor that renders effects with pixel art constraints: fire, smoke, explosions and magic, exported as animated sprite sheets.

Pixelmash takes high-resolution artwork - painted, photographed or rendered - and pixelizes it through a stack of layers whose settings stay editable. Change the output resolution or the palette at any point and everything downstream re-renders, which makes it a way to try pixel sizes rather than commit to one.