Pixel Art Laser Beam: Pixel art laser beam: light gathers at the barrel, then a red laser snaps on fat and settles to a pulsing line, spraying sparks and rings off the wall it hits; it thins out, leaving a cooling scorch and smoke.

Pixel Art Laser Beam

Pixel art laser beam: light gathers at the barrel, then a red laser snaps on fat and settles to a pulsing line, spraying sparks and rings off the wall it hits; it thins out, leaving a cooling scorch and smoke. Use it for laser turrets, beam weapons and boss lasers in shooters and sci-fi games; it plays once, then loops.

Pixel Art Laser Beam is a pixel art effect that loops seamlessly every 2 seconds, drawn on a 384 by 384 canvas at 3x pixels. It is built from 15 particle emitters, 1 laser beam and 4 glowing strokes. Most layers blend additively, so it glows on dark backgrounds.

Colour

Recolours the preview and the free downloads.

Free download with a transparent background, cropped to the effect, 60 frames at 30 fps. Use it in commercial games, no credit needed.

Licence: use it in any project, including paid commercial games such as a game sold on Steam. There is no per-project licence to buy and no credit needed. Terms.

Roblox: the download is a flipbook for a ParticleEmitter. Set FlipbookLayout to Grid8x8, FlipbookMode to OneShot and Lifetime to 2, then emit one particle per cycle. Roblox setup.

REMIX WITH AI

Try:

Left empty, it just opens in the agent, free. Each change is one AI build, and you start with free builds.

Engine data for Unity, Godot, GameMaker and Aseprite comes with a plan: open it in the studio.

OPEN IN THE STUDIO

Change the colours, timing or size, or export for Unity, Godot 4, GameMaker, Phaser, PixiJS and Aseprite.

Try variations: new colours, motion and shapes of this effect, free in the studio.

FRAME BY FRAME

8 evenly spaced moments across the 2 s loop.

Pixel Art Laser Beam at 8 moments, from 0 s to 1.75 s

HOW IT'S MADE

Pixel Art Laser Beam centres on 1 laser beam drawn as glowing strips, with 15 particle emitters around them. Techniques worth a look: glowing strokes traced along shapes, sub-emitters set off by other particles, collisions, turbulence and post filters (bloom and colour grade). 4 scene layers (ground and props) show in the studio for context and stay out of every export.

It loops seamlessly every 2 s, and 8 of its layers fire in bursts, so it pulses instead of flowing evenly. Start times are staggered from 0 s to 1.37 s, so the layers arrive one after another. To change its colour, select "Flash glow" in the studio and edit Colour A and Colour B. Size on the same layer sets how big its particles are. Pixel size in the Pixel art panel sets how chunky it looks. The colour swatches by the downloads recolour every layer at once.

Layers, in draw order

  1. Floor lightparticles / additiveA single particle at 0.56 s. Colour: red.
  2. Charge motesparticles / additiveA stream of streaks from a ring, its rate keyframed over the loop. Colour runs from white to pink over each life.
  3. Charge glowparticles / additiveA single particle at 0.08 s. It grows as it ages. Colour: red.
  4. Charge coreparticles / additiveA single particle at 0.22 s. It grows as it ages. Colour: white.
  5. Laserlaser / additiveA laser beam firing sideways. It pulses 12 times a second.
  6. Muzzle flareparticles / additiveA stream of soft glows, its rate keyframed over the loop. Colours range between white and pale pink.
  7. Hot spotparticles / additiveA stream of soft glows, its rate keyframed over the loop. Colours range between white and pink.
  8. Spark sprayparticles / additiveA stream of streaks, its rate keyframed over the loop. They fall under gravity, bounce when they hit something and slow down with drag. Colour runs from white to red over each life.
  9. Molten dripsparticles / additiveA stream of streaks, its rate keyframed over the loop. They fall under gravity and slow down with drag. Colour runs from white to red over each life.
  10. Wall ring, Wall ring, Wall ring +1stroke / additiveA glowing line traced along a circle.

7 more layers are in the studio.

DETAILS

Length
2 seconds, seamless loop
Canvas
384 x 384, pixel art at 3x
Layers
15 emitters, 1 laser and 4 glowing strokes
Blend
Mostly additive (glows)
Colours
whiteredpale goldpale pink
Sprites
Kenney Smoke Particles by Kenney (CC0)
Tags
pixel art, laser beam, laser, beam, turret, sci-fi, weapon

USING IT IN YOUR GAME

Phaser, PixiJS
The PNG sheet is a plain grid of frames that both can slice. A TexturePacker JSON atlas comes with a plan, from the studio.
Unity
Import the PNG sheet as a Sprite with Mode set to Multiple and slice it, or open the effect in the studio for a ready-made grid.
Godot 4, GameMaker, Aseprite
Open it in the studio and pick your engine in Export: with a plan, it writes the files that engine imports.
Web and chat
The GIF plays anywhere; the APNG keeps soft edges on any background.
Blend mode
This effect is made of light. For the same glow in your game, draw the sprite with additive blending, or export it on black from the studio for additive shaders.

Step by step: Unity, Godot 4, Roblox, GameMaker, Phaser and PixiJS, Aseprite, Web games (live runtime). Drawn with additive blending: see glow effects without a black box.

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