engine-selection

A guide for choosing a game engine or framework based on the target platform, game type, interface, and team workflow. It compares tools such as Phaser, PixiJS, Three.js, Godot, Unity, Ink, and Twine.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to compare engines before implementation and choose between canvas games, 3D scenes, browser interfaces with embedded game areas, and branching-story tools.
Why use it?
It helps avoid choosing a tool that does not fit the game or the way it will be built. It also clarifies whether the game should own the whole screen or run inside a regular web interface.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/frogobox/frogo-sdk/engine-selection
Any agent
npx skills add frogobox/frogo-sdk --skill engine-selection
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/frogobox/frogo-sdk

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 70 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 1,213 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00070 $0.01213
Opus 5 $0.00035 $0.00607
Sonnet 5 $0.00014 $0.00243
Haiku 4.5 $0.00007 $0.00121

Measured 2d ago against content hash 9eb7bd67ee6a, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

engine-selection scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 2d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

.agents/skills/game-development/engine-selection/SKILL.md · 116 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 116 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Engine selection

Pick tools that match delivery target, interaction model, and team constraints. Engines serve the game type — not the reverse.


Fit questions (ask first)

  1. Platform: Web, mobile, PC, console, VR?
  2. Primary loop: Action/physics, turn-based, narrative branch, management/UI, hybrid?
  3. Presentation: Full-screen canvas, DOM/UI chrome, or both?
  4. Toolchain: No-build / ESM OK, or bundler + editor OK?
  5. Authoring: Code-only, or designers need Twine/Ink/Godot/Unity editors?

Architecture patterns

Pattern When Notes
Full engine shell Game is the canvas/scene Phaser, Godot, Unity, Kaplay as app root
Renderer + custom logic You want draw power, own gameplay PixiJS, Three.js + your systems
Hybrid shell + guest Dense UI/text + occasional skill-checks DOM/app shell; mount canvas engines in modals/viewports only
Narrative runtime Branching prose is the product Ink, Twine; host chrome separately
Content-as-data Levels/events authored as packs JSON/YAML + thin loader; engine optional

Web — decision tree

What type of game?
│
├── Mostly DOM / panels / forms / text UI
│   ├── + small arcade/spatial challenges
│   │     └── Hybrid: custom shell + guest
│   │         Raw Canvas/WebGL → Kaplay → Phaser → PixiJS
│   └── + branching story
│         └── Ink (inkjs) or Twine export → host in DOM
│
├── Full-screen 2D game
│   ├── Full gameplay features (scenes, physics, input)
│   │     └── Phaser 4  (or Kaplay if you want lighter/faster prototype)
│   └── Mostly rendering / custom systems
│         └── PixiJS 8  (or Raw Canvas/WebGL if tiny scope)
│
└── Full-screen 3D game
    ├── Full engine / physics / XR
    │     └── Babylon.js
    └── Rendering-focused / lighter
          └── Three.js

Quick comparison (web & common exports)

Tool Type Best for Watch-outs
Raw Canvas / WebGL 2D/low-level Tiny games, learning, no framework tax You own everything
Kaplay (ex-Kaboom) 2D toolkit Fast prototypes, jam games Less “full product” structure than Phaser
Phaser 4 2D engine Complete 2D features Heavier; often bundled
PixiJS 8 2D renderer Performance, custom game code Not a full gameplay framework alone
Three.js 3D renderer Visuals, lightweight 3D You add gameplay systems
Babylon.js 3D engine Fuller 3D + XR Heavier than Three for simple scenes
Ink + inkjs Narrative Complex branching prose Weak for real-time multi-entity sims
Twine / Twison / TweeJS Narrative Educator-friendly branches Export/host glue; not a physics engine
Godot 4 Full engine 2D/3D indie, open source Web export iteration cost
Unity Full engine Large teams, multi-platform Heavy for simple web UI games

Read the full file on GitHub · 116 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 2d ago First seen · 116 lines · 70 tokens per session scan A 9eb7bd67ee6a

Subscribe to this mod's changes

engine-selection is a skill published in the GitHub repository frogobox/frogo-sdk (21 stars, last pushed 2d ago), licensed Apache-2.0. It adds 70 tokens to every session and 1,213 once invoked, about $0.0003 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-30.

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