Game particle effects in Claude Desktop and claude.ai

In Claude Desktop and on claude.ai, ParticleFX connects as a custom connector. There is nothing to install and no key: you sign in with your ParticleFX account once. Claude shows the preview renders right in the conversation, and each export comes back as a download link.

Connect Claude

1. In Claude, open Customize, Connectors, and choose Add custom connector.
2. Name it ParticleFX, enter the URL https://mcp.particlefx.studio/mcp and choose to sign in.
3. Claude opens particlefx.studio: sign in with your ParticleFX account and allow the connection.
4. In a chat, turn ParticleFX on from the + menu, under Connectors.

Free Claude accounts can add one custom connector. On Team and Enterprise, an owner adds it once under Organization settings, Connectors, and each member presses Connect. A connector works in Claude Desktop and on claude.ai alike.

Claude Desktop can also reach the server through its config file (Settings, Developer, Edit Config) with an API key, through mcp-remote, which needs Node.js. Keeping the header in env without spaces in args avoids a known Windows problem with spaces in arguments. Restart Claude after saving.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "particlefx": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "mcp-remote", "https://mcp.particlefx.studio/mcp", "--header", "Authorization:${AUTH_HEADER}"],
      "env": { "AUTH_HEADER": "Bearer pfx_live_your_key" }
    }
  }
}

Example: a level-up effect for Godot

Use ParticleFX. Start from the Pixel Level Up effect, name it level-up, make it
green instead of gold and show me the render. When it looks right, export a GIF for my
devlog and a spritesheet with Godot 4 SpriteFrames data, transparent, 30 fps.

What happens:

1. list_presets finds Pixel Level Up (pixel-arcade/levelUp), and create_effect copies it into your account as level-up.
2. edit_effect recolours it, and render_preview shows a contact sheet of the loop in the chat. Ask for changes the way you would ask an artist; each round is another edit and preview.
3. export_effect runs twice, once as gif and once as sheet with sheet_meta: "godot". Claude gives you the two download links, which work for 1 hour.
4. The sheet link downloads level-up-sheet.zip with level-up.png and level-up.tres.

1. Copy both files into the root of your Godot project (the .tres points at res://level-up.png; change that line if you put them elsewhere).
2. Add an AnimatedSprite2D and drag level-up.tres into its Sprite Frames.
3. Play the animation named level-up when the player levels up.

$LevelUp.play("level-up")

Chat apps cannot hand files from your computer to a tool yet, so to put your own character into a Sprite FX effect from claude.ai, use the website route. Coding agents such as Claude Code can upload it directly.

Pixel Level UpHealLevel UpHeart Pickup

What it costs

Connecting costs nothing, and neither do searching the library, reading the reference, analysing an effect, or any edit after the first. Paid steps use builds, the same builds as on the website:

• Create the effect from a library preset (create_effect): 1 build.
• Edits and the loop check (edit_effect, analyze_effect): free.
• Previews (render_preview): the first 20 of each UTC day free, then 1 build per 4, at most 200 a day.
• Export (export_effect, GIF, then a Godot SpriteFrames sheet): 1 build, and the Godot data file needs a paid plan.

So this example takes 3 builds of work if the previews stay inside the free ones: 1 for the new effect and 1 for each of the two exports. The free sign-up and daily builds are for the website and never pay for MCP calls. On a free account and on Starter, MCP calls are paid from pack builds, from $4.99 for 150 that never expire. Creator at +50%, Studio at +25%, Studio Max one for one can spend plan builds instead, and fall back to pack builds when those run out. Work that fails on our side is refunded.

The Godot data file is a plan feature, as in the studio: any plan, from $7.99 a month (Starter), unlocks it. Without a plan the same build exports a GIF, WebP, APNG, PNG frames, or the sheet as an image only (sheet_meta: "none").

If you would rather our own effects agent did the creative work, build_effect takes a description and costs 1 build (Basic) or 10 (Pro). Full price list: MCP tools and keys, limits and billing.