Chalk Galaxy

What is Chalk Galaxy?

Chalk Galaxy is a one-button shoot 'em up staged on a school blackboard and drawn entirely in chalk. The ship fires automatically, so the only real decision is when to hold the button and when to let go. A session is arranged like a school day: five classes of three minutes each, covering Math, Physics, Chemistry, Geography and Art, with the recess bell at 15:00 marking the finish.

Every class closes with a boss. The Compass draws circles of damage that mirror the player's own movement, and the Teacher's Hand writes words whose letters turn into bullets. The Ruler, the Bubbling Flask and the Giant Eraser round out the staff. Between those fights, eight enemy types populate the board, among them Equations that only die inside a loop and Erasers that chew through the chalk trail.

It is a prototype, free to play in the browser as an HTML5 build, and feedback is actively invited, including the blunt question of whether the loop idea lands within the first thirty seconds of play.

How to play

The whole game hangs on one idea. Holding the button flies the ship in a straight line; releasing lets it spin on its own. Shots fire continuously either way. To attack, fly out, turn, and come back across the chalk trail already drawn, closing a loop around whatever sits inside it.

Size decides everything. A loop has to be wider than the ship's natural turn to count at all, so small circles do nothing. When a loop closes, every scribble caught inside it is erased, and the wider the loop, the heavier the damage it deals. That tension between flying safe and flying wide is the entire skill curve.

Progress arrives as a test question: a prompt asks the player to pick the correct answer and the choice is ticked off in red pen. Weapons, passives and evolutions follow the pattern familiar from Vampire Survivors. Max out a weapon, hold the right passive, and open a chalk box to push it into an evolved form. Seven weapons, eight passives and seven evolutions feed that system across a run.

Controls

One input does almost everything. Hold to fly straight, release to let the ship spin. Holding for longer than a second engages turbo, and a double tap reverses the direction of the spin.

That single control accepts several devices: the mouse, a touchscreen, the space bar on a keyboard, or the A button on a gamepad. Because shooting is automatic and there is no aim input to manage, the hands never have to leave that one control in the middle of a fight.

One extra key changes the look rather than the rules. The board animates at 12 to 15 frames per second, styled like a chalk cartoon, and pressing F switches that to a smooth 60 fps. Touch input follows the same rhythm as every other device, so the hold-and-release timing carries over intact.

Tips for your first run

The opening half minute decides whether the game clicks. The habit worth breaking early is circling tightly near danger, because cramped turns are worthless here. Fly out on a committed straight line and then bring the ship back so the return path slices across the outbound one.

Once the loop feels natural, start choosing where to close it rather than simply surviving the turn. A weapon taken to its maximum and paired with the matching passive is the route to an evolution, so favour depth in one weapon over scattering picks.

• Commit to the straight line before turning back, since a timid turn makes a loop too small to erase anything.
• Aim the loop over clusters of enemies; everything caught inside a finished loop is wiped away.
• Treat Equations as loop-only targets, because ordinary automatic fire will not remove them.
• Watch for Erasers and Smudge puddles, which destroy the trail, and plan the next loop somewhere else.
• Read the Paper Ball's dashed warning line and dodge it by flying straight rather than spinning away.
• Expect the Compass to answer with damage circles that copy your movement, so keep patterns narrow while it is active.
• Spend colored chalk on permanent upgrades and try the Paper Plane for wide turns or the Saucer for near-stationary spin.

Content and replayability

Five classes, five bosses and eight enemy types make up the spine of a run, while the level-up pool holds seven weapons, eight passives and seven evolutions. The board also records the session: every kill leaves a permanent smudge, so the blackboard slowly becomes a rough history of the fight.

At the end comes a graded test scored from 0 to 10, alongside a map showing the path taken, the loops drawn, the fights and the bosses. Colored chalk collected along the way buys permanent upgrades, and the same currency unlocks two more ships, the Paper Plane with its wide turning circle and the Saucer that spins almost in place.

Because a run is broken into three-minute classes and the loop is a skill rather than a lucky drop, there is clear room to replay for a cleaner grade and a tidier map. This is a prototype, so the current roster is a starting point rather than a finished catalogue.

Presentation and performance

The visual idea is a blackboard. Ships, enemies and effects are chalk strokes animated at 12 to 15 frames per second for a hand-drawn cartoon feel, and pressing F lifts the presentation to a smooth 60 fps for anyone who prefers clarity over the chalky stagger.

Audio is generative: marimba, music box and pizzicato played live in the browser, with a different key for each class. Art, sound and music are all drawn and synthesized in code at runtime, with no image or audio files shipped alongside. The two typefaces, Cabin Sketch and Patrick Hand, are used under the SIL Open Font License.

Text is available in English, Spanish and Portuguese. The build is HTML5 and runs in a browser, with mouse, touch, keyboard or gamepad input available throughout.

Who should play it

Players who enjoy bullet-heaven and roguelite progression but want a smaller, sharper ask will get the most from this. There is no aim stick and no fire button; everything comes down to reading a straight line and deciding where to close it.

It also suits anyone who plays in short sittings, since each class lasts three minutes and ends with its own boss. The school framing, from the graded test and red pen ticks to the recess bell and the chalk dust left by every kill, gives the arcade structure a theme that holds together.

Finally, it rewards people who like watching a prototype grow. Feedback is being collected, including whether the loop clicks within the first half minute, so early impressions carry real weight. Anyone who needs a long campaign, saved progression or a finished content roster should treat this as an early stop rather than a destination.