Make a pack for Shellby

A pack is one JSON file: a few lines of pixel art per item, plus a palette. No code, no build step, and nothing to install. If you can draw with letters in a text file, you can dress up a crab.

1. Draw it in Pack Studio

Open Pack Studio and click Start from template. Change the pixels rows. Each character is a pixel, . is transparent, and the palette maps characters to colors. Shellby wears it live as you type, and the checker tells you exactly what's wrong in plain English.

{ "id": "cozy-hat", "name": "Cozy Hat", "slot": "hat", "pivot": [3, 3],
  "palette": { "B": "#e76f51", "b": "#b3472c", "w": "#f4f1ea" },
  "pixels": ["...w...",
             ".BBBBB.",
             "BbBbBbB",
             "BBBBBBB"] }

Slots: hat, face, neck, held (in his claw) and shell. There are also effects (snow, bubbles, anything that falls, rises, floats, orbits or twinkles), colors (whole-crab color schemes), voices (what he says in his speech bubble: a pirate, a grump, another language), scenes (little stories he acts out in beats when he's idle) and decor for his tank (castles, plants, rocks, a new floor or back glass). Shellby draws a thin dark line round everything he wears, so you don't need to draw an outline yourself. The pivot is the pixel of your item that touches Shellby. For a hat, that's the middle of the brim. The full reference, with a diagram of the crab and every anchor point, is in the creator guide.

2. Try it in Shellby

Download your pack.json from Pack Studio and drop it onto Shellby's Wardrobe (click the crab logo in his panel). He'll show you what's inside and ask before installing. Edit the file, then hit Reload in the Wardrobe to see changes.

3. Publish it to the gallery

1. Fork x-salmon/shellby-packs on GitHub.
2. Add your file as packs/<your-pack-id>/pack.json. The folder name must match the pack's id. You can add a README.md next to it describing your pack.
3. Open a pull request. An automatic check runs Shellby's validator on it and posts the results.
4. Once it's reviewed and merged, your pack appears here within a few minutes, with an Add to Shellby button.

To update a pack later, edit it and bump its version. People who installed it can grab the new version with one click.

The rules