cTurtle Studio reference
cTurtle Studio is the editor for cTurtle games. Open your project in it to edit scripts and data files, lay out scenes, tune models, materials, animations and effects with live previews, run the game with Play, debug your BT scripts, and build release packages.
Your project can add its own tools and editors to Studio with Studio plugins (Experimental).
Starting Studio
| How | Result |
|---|---|
Run CTurtleStudio | Opens the Welcome page, where you can open or reopen a project. |
Run CTurtleStudio <path to .ctproject or game.json> | Opens that project. Opening a project never builds or runs it. |
Double-click a .ctproject file | Opens it in Studio, after you register the file type (below). |
Drop a game.json or .ctproject on the Studio window | Opens that project. |
If Studio closed with unsaved work, it first offers to restore it; see Recovery.
To make .ctproject files open in Studio, run the script in the package's
integration/ folder once: register-windows.ps1 on Windows or
register-linux on Linux.
Pages
| Page | Read it to |
|---|---|
| Workspace | Find your way around the window: panels, menus, showing, moving and resizing views, small windows. |
| Commands and shortcuts | Look up keyboard shortcuts, use the command palette, change shortcuts. |
| Documents | Understand saving, Undo, files changed outside Studio, autosave and crash recovery. |
| Play and debug | Run your game inside Studio, set breakpoints, step through BT code. |
| Building from Studio | Set up build targets and build or deploy your game. |
| Code intelligence and language servers | Use completion, go to definition and find usages; add servers for other languages. |
| Studio plugins | Write your own Studio tools and editors for your game (Experimental). |
| Plugin files | Look up the fields of studio.json and plugin descriptors (Experimental). |
| Studio settings files | Find, back up or reset your settings, shortcuts, layout and recovery data. |
Views
| View | Use it to | Page |
|---|---|---|
| Welcome / Project | Open a project; see a project overview | Explorer |
| Explorer | Browse and open project files | Explorer |
| Game Scripts | See and open the scripts your game runs | Game Scripts |
| Source Editor | Edit any text file | Source Editor |
| Code Intelligence | See completions, definitions and usages | Code intelligence |
| Output | Read messages, build output and problems | Output |
| Asset Browser | Browse the asset registry | Asset Browser |
| Inspector | Edit the properties of whatever is selected | Inspector |
| Scene Hierarchy, Scene View, Live Scene | Edit and run your scene | Scene editing |
| Models, Model Editor | Edit procedural models | Models |
| Image Viewer | View PNGs and set their mipmaps | Image Viewer |
| Material Editor | Edit materials and paint texture maps | Materials |
| Animation Editor | Edit sprite-sheet animations | Animation Editor |
| Model Animation, Timeline | Animate models, rigs and scene entities | Model animation and Timeline |
| Effect Editor | Edit particle and sprite effects | Effect Editor |
| Lighting Diagnostics, Render Pipeline | Check lights, shadows and render graphs | Lighting and render pipeline |
| Debug Tools | Control the debugger | Play and debug |
| Build Settings | Set up build targets and the C toolchain | Building from Studio |
| Settings | Set autosave; open Keyboard Shortcuts | Documents |
Files Studio edits
| File | Format |
|---|---|
Project file (game.json, .ctproject), including build targets | game.json, .ctproject |
| Asset registry, scenes, models, effects, motion clips and rigs | Asset registry, Scenes, Models, Effects, Motion and rig |
studio.json and plugin descriptors | Plugin files |
| Your settings, shortcuts, layout, recent projects and recovery data | Studio settings files |