Don't Look Away: a candle-lit horror game where the GPU shader is the game.

Something is in the house. It only moves in the dark. Your cursor is a candle. While your light is on the Visitor, it stands still; look at the window, the portrait or the door, and it takes a step closer, in a new pose, somewhere new. In the dark you only see two pale points. When it reaches you, the candle goes out.

Features used: Rive CLI and GPU Canvas, plus Scripting, Data Binding and State Machines.

- GPU Canvas (WGSL): the darkness is a fragment shader: a breathing pool of candlelight around the pointer, smoke in the light, a vignette that closes in with dread, and a tear across the picture every time it steps.

- Rive CLI + RML: the room, the words, the view model and the state machine are plain markup, built and checked with rive --verify, inspect and headless screenshots; the demo video was rendered by replaying a scripted pointer frame by frame.

- Luau scripting: one rule, it only moves while the light misses its head and body; it also draws the Visitor and the candle in your hand.

- Data Binding: its distance drives the step counter and the portrait on the wall, which slowly becomes her. State machine: title, ending, and the flash of the scare.

- Rive Editor: the file was opened in the editor, and the claw marks beside the door were drawn there with the pen tool and pulled back with rive pull.

Play it (lights off): https://dont-look-away-nkdh1b.rive.to

Video with the agent workflow and code: https://youtu.be/Pt_J1wdtQxI

The cursor as a candle and a Visitor that moves only when you look away is a strong mechanic. How did you do the lighting in the shader?

Jack's Last Light 🎃

A jack-o'-lantern keeps watch over a foggy graveyard, and your cursor is a lantern. Move it to part the fog and find the ghosts drifting inside. Jack's eyes follow you everywhere and he leans in when you get close. Click him and a spirit possesses him: an evil laugh, a hellfire candle, a blood moon and a cursed CRT glitch. Click again to banish it. Every soul he claims is counted.

Features used: Rive CLI + GPU Canvas (both)

• Rive CLI: the whole scene is RML, written with a coding agent and checked with rive --verify, rive inspect and headless screenshot tests

• GPU Canvas: 4 WGSL shaders: a moonlit sky with a cratered moon, domain-warped fog with a cursor "lantern" hole, the candle flame clipped to Jack's carved face, and a CRT possession glitch

• Scripting (Luau): turns the pointer and clock into view-model data and drives every shader layer

• Data Binding: pupils, head tilt, candle flicker, ground glow, souls counter and the hover cursor

• State Machine: 5 layers (Possession, Notice, Ghosts, Bats, Wings); a click listener toggles possession with a negate converter, and an audio event plays the laugh

• Second pass: recarved Jack's face (scowling almond eyes, fanged grin) and added the possession laugh (CC0 sound by AntumDeluge)

Play it: https://jacks-last-light-wr26yl.rive.to

On X: https://x.com/AnshuKu41583837/status/2106063231039258889