Docs User guide
Getting started
Install Voxel Game Maker, find your way around the welcome window, and make something in your first ten minutes.
Voxel Game Maker is a desktop app for making small 3D games out of blocks. You build voxel models, place them in levels, press Play to walk around, and export a game that runs on another PC with nothing installed.
#Download and open the app
A download link will appear on this site when the app is released. Download it, open the folder, and run the app. You don't need to install anything else.
The editor opens maximized. The first time you run it, it opens the Sample Game on its start level, Level: Village, in its own tab.
#The welcome window
Each time the editor starts, a welcome window opens. To bring it back later, use Help ▸ Welcome. If you'd rather skip it, untick Show this window when the editor starts.
It has three tabs:
| Tab | What's there |
|---|---|
| Start | Your last three projects, Open a project…, New project…, and the sample worlds. |
| Tutorials | Lesson 1 is a 2-minute guided tour (▶ Start). Some later lessons link to a matching challenge; the rest say Soon. |
| Challenges | Three bite-size goals inside the samples, such as Give Mira a crown in the Sample Village. |
Each challenge card shows how hard it is (Easy or Medium), about how long it takes (~5 or ~10 minutes), what it teaches, and its steps. Open sample & start makes a fresh copy of the sample for you, and a quest card ticks off the challenge's conditions as you go.
#Sample worlds
The samples are small, complete games, each in its own genre and look. Click one on the Start tab and it opens your own copy, so you can change anything. The next time you click it, it opens that same copy.
A few to try first:
- Sample Village — a small adventure with a quest from Mira.
- Lantern Hollow — a cozy autumn hamlet with no combat: harvesting, cooking and a shop.
- Rainbow Sky Obby — an obstacle course in the clouds with checkpoints and a clock.
- Ember Crypt — a dungeon crawler with a boss fight.
- Lichgate Depths — four levels joined into one dungeon.
There are more, including a puzzle garden, a platformer, a survival arena, a pirate adventure, a racing game and a parkour course. Each sample has its own player character, its own look for menus and messages, and its own HUD. They're good places to see how a feature is set up before you use it yourself.
#Your first ten minutes
- Take the tour. Choose Help ▸ Guided Tour (or start lesson 1 in the welcome window). It makes a fresh project and walks you through five steps: make a model, draw it, put it in the world, play it, export it. Each step moves on by itself when you've done it.
- Play the sample. Open the Sample Village and press F5 (or ▶ Play). Walk with WASD, jump with Space, and press E to talk to characters and open things. Press Shift+F5 to stop.
- Change something. Double-click an object in the world to edit its model. Add a few voxels, then press Esc to go back to the level. Every copy of that model updates.
- Make your own project. Choose File ▸ New Project… (Ctrl+N). Templates show as picture cards; Blank project is picked by default and is truly empty. You can also pick a template such as Hills & Caves, a big generated world you can dig in.
#Make your first game
In an empty world, a guide called Make your first game sits in the middle of the view. It walks you through seven steps: add a floor, get blocks or make a model, place it, add something to collect, set a goal, press Play, and export. Each step ticks itself off as you do it. Click ▾ to fold the guide into a small pill, and use View ▸ First-game quest to show or hide it.
Every new project comes with 15 starter models, including grass, path, blocks, stairs, water, walls, a fence, a bush, flowers, a pine tree, a lamp and a chest. If an older project is missing some, use Create ▸ Add Starter Models.
#Saving and backups
Press Ctrl+S to save. While you have unsaved changes, the editor also saves a backup every few minutes. File ▸ Restore Backup lists them by time and opens the one you pick as a new project, so your original is never overwritten.
When you open the editor again, it picks up where you left off: the same project, level, open tabs, camera view and tool.
#Where to go next
- The editor — what each panel and tab does.
- Modeling — building voxel models.
- Building levels — placing models and shaping your world.
- Playing and testing — trying your game from the editor.
#Running from source
If you'd rather run the app from its source code, you need Godot 4.7. In Godot, choose Import, select project.godot in the repository folder, and press F5. Most people won't need this.