Phaser World - May 2025

Author

Phaser Studio
May 28, 2025

There has been a great deal of activity at Phaser Studio over the past couple of months, and we’ve done our best to include it all here, from a massive new Phaser 4 Rendering Guide, to Gamedev.js Jam winners, to Phaser v3.90 Released. There’s a lot to digest in this issue!

Phaser v4 Release Candidate 4 is out!

Massive mobile performance gains and memory optimizations mark the final release candidate (RC) before the official v4 launch. This version was an epic amount of work from the team. From extensive device testing, we've achieved mobile performance gains, filter improvements, and memory enhancements. You name it, we probably improved it! You can read the full details here:

We're confident RC4 is the final version. It has everything that we wanted. However, the more eyeballs we can get on it, the better - so we could do with your help testing! You can download a build from GitHub or npm, you can use the new Labs to run thousands of examples that have been updated for it, and you can also use it in the Phaser Sandbox.

We plan to let this version remain with the community for the next two weeks or so. During this time, we will monitor new issues posted to GitHub and then review them for the final build in June.

New Phaser 4 Labs

We also gave Phaser Labs an overhaul too!

Phaser Labs was the old ‘Phaser Examples’ site. We kept it online mainly because it was an easy way for us to test new concepts against different versions of Phaser at once. But a big part of the Phaser 4 release work involved checking every single example we have against Phaser 4. Those that broke, we fixed. Those that needed updating, we updated. And those that used features no longer present in v4 (such as the Mesh Game Object) were removed. We then merged all the brand-new Phaser 4 examples, especially those related to filters, gave the interface a fresh look, and pushed it all live.

Phaser 4 Rendering Concepts Guide

We’ve published a brand new article: Phaser 4 Rendering Concepts. It provides a comprehensive overview of how we developed the new renderer for Phaser 4, what it replaces in Phaser 3, and how to optimize its performance.

Phaser v3.90 Released

We can't have Phaser v4 stealing all of the limelight! So we're happy to present the latest Phaser v3 release. This version brings several developer-friendly features that make game creation smoother. The standout addition is rounded corner support for Rectangle Shape Game Objects through the new setRounded() method, giving developers more visual flexibility without custom graphics. Audio capabilities get a boost with Firefox fallback support for positional audio, ensuring the WebAudioSound follow feature works consistently across browsers.

This is very likely to be the last version of Phaser v3. All development from the team going forward will be exclusively on Phaser v4, and this is where all new features will be introduced as well. Given how well-established Version 3 is now, we don't believe any major bugs are remaining in it. However, if a browser API update happens to break it dramatically, we will address that. Otherwise, v4 is now our only focus.

Phaser Beam is Coming - Waitlist now Open

We've been hard at work on Phaser Beam - our first ever "no code" game creation tool. This new tool employs an infinite-grid approach, enabling you to place and organize elements and then utilize them in your games. It's pretty neat - and it has been a fun challenge to create something designed for non-coders that can still produce enjoyable games.

The waitlist for Beam is now open at https://beam.game, and we'll be pulling in our first beta group soon.

Oh, and for those of you who've been here a while, previously "Beam" was the name we gave to the Phaser 4 renderer. The plan was to release the renderer entirely on its own, which is why we named it. However, this will not be happening now, so we were left with a beautiful logo and nowhere to deploy it. We decided to use it for the name of this product instead. From now on, if you see any of the team talking about Phaser Beam, they are referring to our 'no code' game editor. Not the Phaser 4 renderer. Although internally, it does use Phaser 4! Ahh.. Phaser inception 😅

Spine Phaser v4 Runtime Released

Spine has officially supported Phaser v3 for 2+ years. Now that Phaser has a v4 release candidate, Esoteric Software brings you spine-phaser-v4, the official Spine runtime for Phaser v4.

Phaser Templates Updated

Thousands of you are now using our Phaser Templates! Our anonymous telemetry indicates that a Phaser game is built using one of our templates every 40 seconds. That's quite amazing!

For those new to Phaser, these are our official starter templates for combining Phaser with popular front-end frameworks and bundlers such as React, Vue, or Vite. We recently overhauled them, which allowed for a more unified approach. One of the coolest improvements (for us anyway!) is how we've reorganized our template structure.

We now have two standard Phaser templates that serve as shared foundations, making everything more consistent and easier to maintain, thereby creating a clear distinction between vanilla JavaScript/TypeScript templates and our framework-based ones.

This allowed us to quickly update every single template to the latest versions of the respective front-ends or bundlers. Additionally, we updated them all for Phaser v3.90 as well.

For those using React or Angular, don't worry - we've kept the eventbus system that helps your web components talk smoothly with Phaser scenes.

We will release Phaser v4 versions of all our templates when Phaser 4.0.0 ships.

Phaser Tauri Template

Talking of templates - we've a new one for you to try! This shows how to use Phaser with Tauri. Tauri allows you to create desktop apps that run natively on Windows, macOS, or Linux. It's similar to Electron, which you may have heard of, except it uses the system web view and is created in Rust, making it smaller and lighter. This also makes it a great choice for bundling Phaser games for Steam! To help you on this journey, have a play with our Beta Tauri Template:

Phaser Launcher Update

Phaser Launcher is our free, beginner-friendly, all-in-one dev environment for Phaser games. It bundles a code editor, media browser, project manager, help files, tutorials, templates, and game runner. We recently updated it to include some Quality of Life improvements. Thousands of you are using this every single day, which is very encouraging to see!

If you've never tried it before, here is a new Tutorial video on our official YouTube channel. Whether you're entirely new to coding or just looking for a friendly introduction to Phaser, you're in the right place. This tutorial will guide you from absolute beginner to a somewhat confident creator in no time using Phaser Launcher:

And also, here is this excellent new video from the YouTube legend that is Scott Westover:

Naturally, the latest release has been updated for Phaser v3.90, and we will update it again when Phaser v4.0.0 ships as well.

🎦 Phaser Games

Gamedev.js Jam 2025 Winners

Gamedev.js Jam 2025 was the sixth yearly edition of the online web game development competition, and like last year, Phaser Studio was proud to support it with $1000 worth of prizes to be won.

The competition wrapped up on April 26th with a record-breaking 420 submitted games - 69 of which were entered into the "Build with Phaser" category! We're proud of our Phaser community and what they've created, and had lots of fun playing the entries to pick our Top 4 games. You can see these in our official video here:

And if you'd like to see the full Top 14 winners list, please see here: https://itch.io/c/5753957/phaser-studios-top-picks

Total Defense: Three Kingdoms

An immersive strategic tower defense game centered on the legendary tales of Shu-Han. Take on the mantle of a battlefield commander and wield iconic defense towers incarnated by heroes like Liu Bei, Guan Yu, and Zhao Yun across 32 epic campaigns—from the Oath of the Peach Garden to the Battle of Yiling.

Folklands

Build up and manage a settlement and care for your folks in this relaxing settlement builder with simulated citizens. Provide shelter, guarantee a steady supply of food, resources and products, protect against the threats of nature. All while paying attention to your citizens well-being, to ensure your folks are happy, employed and safe.

Kemotaku

Kemotaku is a brand new roguelike card game mixed with puzzle, deck-building and tower-defence. Beat away attacking enemies and defend your town with a variety of animals!

Konkr.io

A turn-based strategy game by Michal Bureš. Inspired by the brilliant simplicity of Sean O’Connor’s “Slay”, this game aspires to be a love letter to the concept of “easy to learn, hard to master”. Expand your kingdom, build up your economy, crush your enemies, then crush your allies too!

👨‍🏫 Tutorials

How To Make A Zelda-Like Game With Phaser 3

Scott Westover presents the "How To Make A Zelda-Like Game With Phaser 3" full course and shows you how to create a top-down adventure game reminiscent of The Legend of Zelda, using TypeScript and Phaser 3.

Bubble Shooter Game with Phaser

If you’ve ever wanted to learn to build your own Bubble Shooter game, through this three-part tutorial series shows you how to use Phaser to build core mechanics and gameplay features.

I Built a Cozy JavaScript Game

Create a game that teaches users how to make different pasta shapes from The Code Dose. Using Phaser.js, Urvashi shows you how to build a JavaScript game with no prior game development experience.

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Until the next issue, happy coding!