Make retro pixel-art games in Python, with art and music editors

Made by Takashi Kitao

Pyxel is a game engine for making small retro-style games in Python, deliberately limited like an old console: 16 colours and 4 sound channels.

It comes with its own editors for pixel art, tile maps, sound effects and music, so the art, audio and code of a game all come from one tool. The engine is written in Rust underneath, and games run on Windows, macOS, Linux and in a web browser. This is an established project, not a new one: one developer has built it since 2018, and it has over 18,000 GitHub stars.

Can I use this?

Runs in your browser, or with Python on your computer

You'll need A web browser, or Python 3.11+ on Windows, Mac or Linux

Worth knowing The 16-colour, 4-channel limits are the point, so it suits small 2D games rather than modern 3D ones. It is maintained by one person. The creator does not recommend its Rust internals as a way to learn Rust. BuildTube has not run or verified this software.

Why it's here

18,399 people have starred it on GitHub.
Shown on Hacker News (Show HN) on 1 October, with 104 points.

Numbers as of 6 October 2026, from BuildTube’s latest daily refresh.

Behind it

See the code on GitHub

BuildTube has not run or verified this project. Everything above is written from what the creator published.

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