art-bible

!bash "${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/../../hooks/yaml-helper.sh" resolve_config --keys review_mode,automation,workflow,docs.density

Resolved above — use as-is; --review overrides review_mode. No block → defaults in .claude/docs/config-resolution.md.

Phase 0: Parse Arguments and Context Check

See .claude/docs/director-gates.md for the full check pattern. Individual gate definitions live in .claude/docs/director-gates/[gate-id].md — the spawned agent reads its own gate file; do not read it in the parent session.

Every AskUserQuestion call follows .claude/docs/automation-modes.md (collaborative asks always · guided major-only · autonomous logs and proceeds; automation_always_ask categories always prompt).

docs.density — it controls per-section depth, where workflow controls which sections exist. modes.rigor sets both together; set docs.density explicitly to vary depth alone: terse = each section a bulleted list of constraints + references; balanced = paragraphs explaining each visual choice (default); thorough = full prose including style explorations, references, and rationale per choice. Apply it to every section you author.

workflow (see .claude/docs/workflow-modes.md):

• full — all 9 art bible sections required.
• standard — required only if visual asset stories exist in the project; sections 1–4 are the minimum when required. workflow_overrides.art_bible_strict: true forces all 9 sections regardless of tier.
• minimal — not required. Can still be run voluntarily.

Read design/gdd/game-concept.md. If it does not exist, fail with:

"No game concept found. Run /brainstorm first — the art bible is authored after the game concept is approved."

Extract from game-concept.md:

• Game title (working title)
• Core fantasy and elevator pitch
• Game pillars (all of them)
• Visual Identity Anchor section if present (from brainstorm Phase 4 art-director output)
• Target platform (if noted)

Retrofit mode detection: Glob design/art/art-bible.md. If the file exists, build the status table without reading the document — you are about to author only the incomplete sections, so loading the complete ones is loading exactly what you will not touch:

Grep pattern="^## " path="design/art/art-bible.md" output_mode="content" -n
Grep pattern="\[To be designed\]|\[TBD\]|\[To be written\]|^_?TODO" path="design/art/art-bible.md" output_mode="content" -n

• The first grep gives the section headings and their line numbers — the gap between consecutive headings is that section's size.
• The second gives placeholder markers and where they fall.
• A section is Complete if it has substantive distance to the next heading and no placeholder marker inside it; Placeholder if a marker falls in its range; Empty if consecutive headings sit adjacent.
• Where the two greps leave a section genuinely ambiguous, read that section's line range with Read(offset, limit) — never the whole file.
• Build a section status table:

Section | Status
--------|--------
1. Visual Identity Statement | [Complete / Empty / Placeholder]
2. Color Palette | ...
3. Lighting & Atmosphere | ...
4. Character Art Direction | ...
5. Environment & Level Art | ...
6. UI Visual Language | ...
7. VFX & Particle Style | ...
8. Asset Standards | ...
9. Style Prohibitions | ...

• Present this table to the user:

  "Found existing art bible at design/art/art-bible.md. [N] sections are complete, [M] need content. I'll work on the incomplete sections only — existing content will not be touched."

• Only work on sections with Status: Empty or Placeholder. Do not re-author sections that are already complete.

If the file does not exist, this is a fresh authoring session — proceed normally.

Extract performance budgets and the engine for asset standard constraints: read performance.* and engine.name from project.yaml; for any key absent or empty (including when project.yaml has no performance or engine block), fall back to .claude/docs/technical-preferences.md.

---

Phase 1: Framing

Present the session context and ask two questions before authoring anything:

Use AskUserQuestion with two tabs:

• Tab "Scope" — "Which sections need to be authored today?" Options: Full bible — all 9 sections / Visual identity core (sections 1–4 only) / Asset standards only (section 8) / Resume — fill in missing sections

  Mark the option the resolved workflow tier actually requires as (Recommended), and say why — the tier already decides this and the user should not have to know the tier table to answer:

  • full → Full bible — all 9 sections are required at this tier.
  • standard → Visual identity core (sections 1–4 only) — that is the documented minimum when an art bible is required at all. Say: "Sections 1–4 are what standard requires; 5–9 are available if you want them."
  • minimal → no art bible is required. Say so before asking, and offer sections 1–4 as the useful-if-you-want-it option rather than defaulting to 9.
  • workflow_overrides.art_bible_strict: true → Full bible regardless of tier.

  This is the single biggest cost lever in this skill: every authored section carries a specialist spawn, so authoring 9 sections where the tier requires 4 more than doubles the run for artifacts nothing downstream will check.

• Tab "References" — "Do you have reference games, films, or art that define the visual direction?" (Free text — let the user type specific titles. Do NOT preset options here.)

If the game-concept.md has a Visual Identity Anchor section, note it:

"Found a visual identity anchor from brainstorm: '[anchor name] — [one-line rule]'. I'll use this as the foundation for the art bible."

---

Phase 2: Visual Identity Foundation (Sections 1–4)

These four sections define the core visual language. All other sections flow from them. Author and write each to file before moving to the next.

Spawn policy for this phase. Section 1 is delegated on its own — it is foundational and the user chooses between anchor directions before anything else can build on it. Sections 2–4 are then delegated in one art-director call, not three: they are the same agent receiving the same inputs (Visual Identity Statement + pillars), and mood, shape and colour are interdependent — an art director defines them together, not in isolation. Three separate calls re-sent the same context three times and asked the agent to reason about colour without knowing the shape language it had just written.

This is not reduced specialist involvement — every section is still authored by the specialist, which is the point .claude/docs/effects-map.md makes about art-bible delegation being mandatory. It is one call instead of three for the same three sections. Per-section user approval and write-to-file-immediately are unchanged.

Section 1: Visual Identity Statement

Goal: A one-line visual rule plus 2–3 supporting principles that resolve visual ambiguity.

If a visual anchor exists from game-concept.md: present it and ask:

• "Build directly from this anchor?"
• "Revise it before expanding?"
• "Start fresh with new options?"

Agent delegation (MANDATORY): Spawn art-director via Agent:

• Provide: game concept (elevator pitch, core fantasy), full pillar set, platform target, any reference games/art from Phase 1 framing, the visual anchor if it exists
• Ask: "Draft a Visual Identity Statement for this game. Provide: (1) a one-line visual rule that could resolve any visual decision ambiguity, (2) 2–3 supporting visual principles, each with a one-sentence design test ('when X is ambiguous, this principle says choose Y'). Anchor all principles directly in the stated pillars — each principle must serve a specific pillar."

Present the art-director's draft to the user. Use AskUserQuestion:

• Options: [A] Lock this in / [B] Revise the one-liner / [C] Revise a supporting principle / [D] Describe my own direction

Write the approved section to file immediately.

Section 2: Mood & Atmosphere

Goal: Emotional targets by game state — specific enough for a lighting artist to work from.

For each major game state (e.g., exploration, combat, victory, defeat, menus — adapt to this game's states), define:

• Primary emotion/mood target
• Lighting character (time of day, color temperature, contrast level)
• Atmospheric descriptors (3–5 adjectives)
• Energy level (frenetic / measured / contemplative / etc.)

Agent delegation for Sections 2–4 — one call, issued here. Spawn art-director via Agent with the locked Visual Identity Statement and pillar set, and ask for all three sections in a single brief:

1. Mood & atmosphere — "Define mood and atmosphere targets for each major game state in this game. Be specific — 'dark and foreboding' is not enough. Name the exact emotional target, the lighting character (warm/cool, high/low contrast, time of day direction), and at least one visual element that carries the mood. Each game state must feel visually distinct from the others."
2. Shape language — "Define the shape language for this game. Connect each shape principle back to the visual identity statement and a specific game pillar. Explain what these shape choices communicate to the player emotionally."
3. Colour system — "Design the color system for this game. Every semantic color assignment must be explained — why does this color mean danger/safety/reward in this world? Identify which color pairs might fail colorblind players and specify what backup cues are needed."

Require the three to be mutually consistent — the palette must serve the mood targets and the shape hierarchy — and returned as three separately labelled blocks so each can be approved and written on its own.

Then present Section 2 to the user, approve it, and write it to file immediately before moving to Section 3. Do not present all three at once: the batching is in the delegation, not in the review.

Section 3: Shape Language

Goal: The geometric vocabulary that makes this game's world visually coherent and distinguishable.

Cover:

• Character silhouette philosophy (how readable at thumbnail size? Distinguishing trait per archetype?)
• Environment geometry (angular/curved/organic/geometric — which dominates and why?)
• UI shape grammar (does UI echo the world aesthetic, or is it a distinct HUD language?)
• Hero shapes vs. supporting shapes (what draws the eye, what recedes?)

Draft source: the Sections 2–4 delegation issued under Section 2 — use the shape-language block it returned. Do not spawn again.

Write the approved section to file immediately.

Section 4: Color System

Goal: A complete, producible palette system that serves both aesthetic and communication needs.

Cover:

• Primary palette (5–7 colors with roles — not just hex codes, but what each color means in this world)
• Semantic color usage (what does red communicate? Gold? Blue? White? Establish the color vocabulary)
• Per-biome or per-area color temperature rules (if the game has distinct areas)
• UI palette (may differ from world palette — define the divergence explicitly)
• Colorblind safety: which semantic colors need shape/icon/sound backup

Draft source: the Sections 2–4 delegation issued under Section 2 — use the colour-system block it returned. Do not spawn again.

Write the approved section to file immediately.

---

Phase 3: Production Guides (Sections 5–8)

These sections translate the visual identity into concrete production rules. They should be specific enough that an outsourcing team can follow them without additional briefing.

Section 5: Character Design Direction

Agent delegation for Sections 5–6 — one call, issued here. Both sections were separate spawns of the same agent with the same input (sections 1–4), which is pure duplication: the second call re-sent the whole visual identity to an agent that had just been given it. Spawn art-director once with sections 1–4 and ask for both:

1. Character design direction — "Cover: visual archetype for the player character (if any), distinguishing feature rules per character type (how do players tell enemies/NPCs/allies apart at a glance?), expression/pose style targets (stiff/expressive/realistic/exaggerated), and LOD philosophy (how much detail is preserved at game camera distance?)."
2. Environment design language — "Cover: architectural style and its relationship to the world's culture/history, texture philosophy (painted vs. PBR vs. stylized — why this choice for this game?), prop density rules (sparse/dense — what drives the choice per area type?), and environmental storytelling guidelines (what visual details should tell the story without text?)."

Require characters and environments to be legible against each other — a character silhouette must read against the environment texture density the same brief defines. Return two separately labelled blocks.

Present Section 5 first, approve, write to file, then Section 6.

Section 6: Environment Design Language

Draft source: the Sections 5–6 delegation issued under Section 5 — use the environment block it returned. Do not spawn again.

Write the approved section to file.

Section 7: UI/HUD Visual Direction

Agent delegation: Spawn in parallel:

• art-director: Visual style for UI — diegetic vs. screen-space HUD, typography direction (font personality, weight, size hierarchy), iconography style (flat/outlined/illustrated/photorealistic), animation feel for UI elements
• ux-designer: UX alignment check — does the visual direction support the interaction patterns this game requires? Flag any conflicts between art direction and readability/accessibility needs.

Collect both. If they conflict (e.g., art-director wants elaborate diegetic UI but ux-designer flags it would reduce combat readability), surface the conflict explicitly with both positions. Do NOT silently resolve — use AskUserQuestion to let the user decide.

Write the approved section to file.

Section 8: Asset Standards

Agent delegation: Spawn in parallel:

• art-director: File format preferences, naming convention direction, texture resolution tiers, LOD level expectations, export settings philosophy
• technical-artist: Engine-specific hard constraints — poly count budgets per asset category, texture memory limits, material slot counts, importer constraints, anything from the performance budgets (performance.* in project.yaml, falling back to .claude/docs/technical-preferences.md)

If any art preference conflicts with a technical constraint (e.g., art-director wants 4K textures but performance budget requires 2K for mobile), resolve the conflict explicitly — note both the ideal and the constrained standard, and explain the tradeoff. Ambiguity in asset standards is where production costs are born.

Write the approved section to file.

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Phase 4: Reference Direction (Section 9)

Goal: A curated reference set that is specific about what to take and what to avoid from each source.

Agent delegation: Spawn art-director via Agent with the completed sections 1–8. Ask: "Compile a reference direction for this game. Provide 3–5 reference sources (games, films, art styles, or specific artists). For each: name it, specify exactly what visual element to draw from it (not 'the general aesthetic' — a specific technique, color choice, or compositional rule), and specify what to explicitly avoid or diverge from (to prevent the 'trying to copy X' reading). References should be additive — no two references should be pointing in exactly the same direction."

Write the approved section to file.

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Phase 5: Art Director Sign-Off

Review mode check — apply before spawning AD-ART-BIBLE:

• solo → skip. Note: "AD-ART-BIBLE skipped — Solo mode." Proceed to Phase 6.
• lean → skip (not a PHASE-GATE). Note: "AD-ART-BIBLE skipped — Lean mode." Proceed to Phase 6.
• full → spawn as normal.

After all sections are complete (or the scoped set from Phase 1 is complete), spawn creative-director via Agent using gate AD-ART-BIBLE (.claude/docs/director-gates/ad-art-bible.md).

Pass: art bible file path, game pillars, visual identity anchor.

Handle verdict per standard rules in director-gates.md. Record the verdict in the art bible's status header: > **Art Director Sign-Off (AD-ART-BIBLE)**: APPROVED [date] / CONCERNS (accepted) [date] / REVISED [date]

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Phase 6: Close

Before presenting next steps, check project state:

• Does design/gdd/systems-index.md exist? → map-systems is done, skip that option
• Is an engine configured — engine.name present in project.yaml, or a configured Engine field (not [TO BE CONFIGURED]) in .claude/docs/technical-preferences.md? → setup-engine is done, skip that option
• Does design/gdd/ contain any *.md files? → design-system has been run, skip that option
• Does design/gdd/gdd-cross-review-*.md exist? → review-all-gdds is done
• Do GDDs exist (check above)? → include /consistency-check option

Use AskUserQuestion for next steps. Only include options that are genuinely next based on the state check above:

Option pool — include only if not already done:

• [_] Run /map-systems — decompose the concept into systems before writing GDDs (skip if systems-index.md exists)
• [_] Run /setup-engine — configure the engine (asset standards may need revisiting after engine is set) (skip if engine configured)
• [_] Run /design-system — start the first GDD (skip if any GDDs exist)
• [_] Run /review-all-gdds — cross-GDD consistency check (required before Technical Setup gate) (skip if gdd-cross-review-*.md exists)
• [_] Run /asset-spec — generate per-asset visual specs and AI generation prompts from approved GDDs (include if GDDs exist)
• [_] Run /consistency-check — scan existing GDDs against the art bible for visual direction conflicts (include if GDDs exist)
• [_] Run /create-architecture — author the master architecture document (next Technical Setup step)
• [_] Stop here

Assign letters A, B, C… only to the options actually included. Mark the most logical pipeline-advancing option as (recommended).

Always include /create-architecture and Stop here as options — these are always valid next steps once the art bible is complete.

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Collaborative Protocol

Applies in collaborative mode (the default). For guided and autonomous modes, see .claude/docs/automation-modes.md — the rules below describe what collaborative mode requires, not universal behavior.

Every section follows: Question → Options → Decision → Draft (from art-director agent) → Approval → Write to file

• Never draft a section yourself — every section's content comes from the relevant specialist. One delegation may cover several sections (2–4 share a call, as do 5–6), but no section may be written from the orchestrator's own judgement instead of an agent's.
• Write each section to file immediately after approval — do not batch the writes or the approvals. Batching applies only to the delegation call; the user still sees, approves and commits one section at a time.
• Surface all agent disagreements to the user — never silently resolve conflicts between art-director and technical-artist
• The art bible is a constraint document: it restricts future decisions in exchange for visual coherence. Every section should feel like it narrows the solution space productively.

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Recommended Next Steps

After the art bible is approved:

• Run /map-systems to decompose the concept into game systems before authoring GDDs
• Run /setup-engine if the engine is not yet configured (asset standards may need revisiting after engine selection)
• Run /design-system [first-system] to start authoring per-system GDDs
• Run /consistency-check once GDDs exist to validate them against the art bible's visual rules
• Run /create-architecture to produce the master architecture document