Making a Pixel Horror Game with Claude | The Illusionist Devlog

I’m building The Illusionist, a pixel art horror RPG with AI, and in this video I’m sharing how it’s coming together. I’ve always loved story-driven games, so making my own has been really exciting. This one takes place in a creepy mansion full of secrets, puppets, puzzles and people whose stories don’t quite add up. I’m building it with Claude Opus 5.5, but getting things to work is only part of it. I keep going back to rooms, characters and scenes because they don’t quite feel the way I imagined yet... There’s still a lot I want to fix and improve, from the art and pacing to the rooms themselves, but this is where the game is at so far! There’s also plenty I’m not showing in this devlog, including puzzles and other areas of the mansion, so stay tuned for part 2 👀 In this devlog: • The mansion entrance, before and after • Making pixel characters readable at game size (and fixing them by hand in Pixel Fix) • The one or two pixels that made the walk look like floating • Building a full theatre show with music, puppets and magic, and why I cut the lyrics • Why the garden got quieter, and how taking things away made it creepier • How I give AI feedback that's specific enough to act on Follow The Illusionist on itch.io (free demo coming, full game on Steam): https://isgstudio.itch.io/the-illusio... Play my last horror game, Happy Day, free: https://isgstudio.itch.io/happy-day Watch how I made Happy Day:    • I Built a Pixel Horror Game with Claude Op...   Building a game too? AI Game Makers Club is where we share unfinished projects, playtest and help each other move forward: https://www.skool.com/build-pixel-art... Chapters 0:00 Opening: the show 0:31 Same entrance, very different feeling 1:15 Why I'm making this game 2:02 Writing the story vs making the game 3:08 Building the mansion 4:22 The new entrance 4:41 Making the characters readable 5:23 Fixing the art by hand in Pixel Fix 5:52 The floating feet problem 6:24 Building the theatre show 7:51 Animated lyrics, and why I cut them 8:48 Sound: the quieter garden 9:40 Taking things away 10:18 Building with AI 11:23 What's next: demo and Steam 12:07 One more look at the entrance #gamedev #horrorgame #pixelart