About Ship Mixer
Build pixel-art spaceships by mixing hulls, cockpits, wings, engines, and weapons. Randomize, recolor, save. Free in-browser shmup ship designer, no sign-up.
How to use
- Click a category tab in the left rail — bg, hull, cockpit, wings, engine, weapon. Each tab opens a grid of pixel-art parts drawn for the 32-by-32 top-down shmup canvas. Categories combine bottom-up: hull first, cockpit on hull, wings beside, engine below, weapon front.
- Click any part to stamp it into the central preview. The composition engine handles z-ordering automatically so the cockpit always sits on the hull and the weapon always pokes forward — you cannot accidentally build a ship with the engine on top.
- The engine category includes a thrust animation — the second frame draws engine 1 pixel higher so the exhaust appears to flicker. The preview animates live so you can see the thruster bob in real time, just like the final game-ready sprite will.
- Hit Randomize to roll every unlocked category at once. Lock the hull silhouette you like and reroll wings, engine, and weapon to discover variant ship classes — flagship, scout, cruiser, gunship — that share a recognizable family aesthetic.
- Recolor through the palette panel to set the faction. Default purples and blues read as alliance ships; swap to red and orange for enemy faction; chrome and white for elite class. The same hull becomes a roster of factional variants without redrawing.
- Click PNG to download at native 32-by-32 (with transparent background) or 4x upscaled to 128-by-128 for store pages. The native size matches classic shoot-em-up sprite pitches so it drops directly into a Phaser, Godot, or Unity 2D shmup project.
- Click Save to My Assets to push the build into your 3D Assets dashboard. Build a full enemy roster (5-10 ships) by saving each variant, group them into a Collection, and you have a complete shmup lineup with consistent visual language in one session.
Examples
Build a full shmup enemy roster in one session
Generate one alliance hero ship, three enemy escort variants, two heavy gunships, and a boss. Save each to a Collection labeled 'Fleet One' in My Assets. Export the PNGs and you have a complete enemy roster for level 1 of your shmup — every ship visually consistent because they share the part library.
Design faction icons for a 4X strategy game
Build a single capital ship, then re-export it three times with red, blue, and green palette swaps. The same silhouette becomes three faction flagships that read as distinct civilizations because the recolor changes the perceived faction without breaking the family aesthetic.
Frequently asked questions
Can these ships be used in commercial games?
Yes. Ships you build with Ship Mixer are yours to ship in commercial games on Steam, itch.io, mobile stores, console platforms, and anywhere else with no royalties or attribution. The pixel data is generated on your device from the part library and ToolFluency claims no rights to your output. The same applies to printed merch, art books, and trailer footage.
How do I import these into Unity, Godot, or Phaser for a shmup?
Drop the 32-by-32 PNG into your engine's asset folder. In Unity set Filter Mode to Point and Pixels Per Unit to 32; in Godot disable filtering on the texture; in Phaser enable pixelArt on the renderer config. The PNG carries an alpha channel so the transparent background drops cleanly onto a starfield. The native 32-by-32 size matches classic top-down shooter pitches without scaling.
Does it support sailing ships or just spaceships?
Ship Mixer is purpose-built for top-down spaceships in the classic shoot-em-up style — the hulls, cockpits, wings, engines, and weapons are all tuned for sci-fi shmup composition. For sailing ships and tall ships, the Cartography Mixer's Ship icon (in the Infrastructure category) renders fantasy-style sailing vessels suitable for fantasy world maps. Different visual languages, different tools.
How do I build a complete enemy roster?
Generate 5-10 ships by varying the hull and locking everything else. Then take the same roster and recolor each ship in a different faction palette — alliance blue, enemy red, mercenary green. You end up with 15-30 sprites that all share recognizable family resemblance because they were built from the same parts. Save each to a Collection in your dashboard for quick recall during prototyping.
Does the engine animation actually animate in the preview?
Yes. The preview canvas runs an internal animation clock and the engine layer alternates between two frames — the thrust appears to bob 1 pixel up and down. When you export PNG, you get the static base frame; for animated thrust in your game, take the saved ship into Sprite Sheet Generator (linked below) which renders multi-frame animation grids from the base sprite.
Can I save and reopen a ship later?
Yes. Save to My Assets pushes every part choice and palette tweak into your 3D Assets dashboard. Reopen the asset from My Assets and the build reloads exactly. The Share URL captures the same state as a string, so you can bookmark designs without an account or drop a link into Discord for teammate review before committing to engine import.
Part of ToolFluency’s library of free online tools for Creative. No account needed, no data leaves your device.